This country as gone into terminal decline

[Carmes]

I have 2 young children in school.

I am becoming more and more anxious about what sort of jobs / careers they will have open to them.

I work for very large company with 10,000s of employees.

20 years ago whe I started work here there would be 100s of entry level jobs at any given time. These are jobs that don't require experience or a degree, ideal for a school leaver, and I know dozens of people who started their career this way.

Now there are maybe 10 jobs that would fit the same criteria.so. All the jobs have been offshored.
Now are the vacancies are for very specific technical skill set or experience.

This doesn't bode well for someone who has left school at 18'or even university.

Judging by the posts responses - silent people are agreeing. They just won’t say it on the thread. I don’t agree with their pov as it were. I was disgusted by the personal attacks, not only from you but other posters. This is an online forum and it’s not an echo chamber. Bad mouthing and going on an attacking spree is not ok. I’d rather MN wasn’t an echo chamber where people feel it’s ok to bully people off the site rather than engage like an adult. Everyone’s views should be welcomed and challenged.

Yet again you can’t respond without calling bot or being abusive. I have reported you again - MNHQ can check my IP. It’s your behaviour I have an issue with.

Oh, I'm so scared 😅Did you miss the post where they asked me if I was up a gum tree with chlamydia? That was civilised wasn't it? You do realise that I have also had responses on my posts.

If that particular poster hadn't been nasty and offensive themselves then maybe they wouldn't have received "abuse" (you can't have been on MN very long if you think that was abuse). There's a saying which is very relevant in this case - don't dish it out if you can't take it, something that poster needs to understand. They were argumentative and unpleasant, and someone (I reiterate NOT ME) obviously agreed and had their posts removed.

You can report me all you like - I couldn't care less.

I agree, that poster was awful, nasty and offensive, I saw the posts had been deleted and thought at first it must have been a troll or pbp

There's a saying which is very relevant in this case - don't dish it out if you can't take it, something that poster needs to understand.

There should be a thread about this as a lot of posters seem to struggle with this concept! 😆

I thought you were never posting again, not responding and done with MN? Seems you do care. Maybe don’t bully people. I’ve been on MN a long time - your posts were abusive which is why many were removed.

Aren’t you just doing what you are accusing that poster of doing?

I see that you are talking specifically about teenagers and experience of work, whether in the home or paid work. I was talking far more generally as I think that is far more interesting economically/ sociologically/ philosophically!

I agree that, in general, today's teenagers tend to do less in terms of housework/ paid work. Not to say they do none- I know plenty of teens who have part time jobs and responsibility at home, who multi task brilliantly. It definitely seems to be more frowned upon to use a teen to care for younger children now; far more is thought to be the parent's sole responsibility.
There are many, complicated reasons for these shifts but I do agree, in general, that giving children and adults responsibility and a sense of purpose is a very good thing.

@browneyes77 My DP is a self employed plumbing and heating engineer. Did a YTS when he was younger, worked with an highly experienced chap for years and then eventually set up on his own 25 years ago (and has to do exams every 5 years to stay qualified). And he would wholeheartedly disagree that it’s an industry that’s crying out for more of them.

Maybe it's regional? We've just had work done on our house. Plumber, joiner and electrician all self-employed (first two age fifties and other in forties)
and all not got an apprentice as costs them too much. All three saying older guys retiring leaving fewer and they can pick and choose their jobs.

It’s the same here- most won’t even quote for a small job

Possibly. We’re in the West Midlands.

My DP took on a lad in his 20’s who’d come straight from a college course and decided to set up on his own and was doing bodge jobs all over the shop, because he simply wasn’t experienced. He knew the lads father so took him under his wing to teach him properly and now the lad works with him on jobs regularly.

My DP is 48 and can’t really pick and choose his jobs with any luxury. He does get good/big jobs come in because he’s very good and very experienced and is also a Worcester Bosch accredited engineer for his area. So he does well and earns well, but will only turn down jobs if he thinks the person will be a difficult customer when it comes to payment (they often give themselves away at quote stage).

But certainly in the West Midlands there’s an awful lot of under qualified and inexperienced plumbers out there doing cowboy work, because people want to pay peanuts.

I'd love to know your location. It's nigh on impossible to get any kind of tradesperson these days around here, qualified or otherwise. Phone for a quote and they seldom return your messages, or agree an appointment time and don't turn up, or even when they've quoted, they ghost you when to phone them to give them the go ahead. We've virtually stopped trying to get people in as it's a nightmare. We've wanted a new bathroom for around 3 years now, and every few months re-start our efforts to find someone to do it, but it's just a complete waste of time as no one is interested except for the big/expensive firms with their own showrooms who want to charge £20k for a bog-standard small bathroom!

Even other jobs, like finding a tree-surgeon is stupidly hard. Thankfully, we've a long standing electrician who will actually answer his phone and turn up for jobs, large and small, but he dropped the bombshell that he was retiring last time he came. We used to have a brilliant joiner, but he gave up to re-train as a lorry driver as his back had gone due to heavy lifting of Oak doors that everyone seems to want! Still got a good plasterer who we use every few years. But plumbers are like unicorns. It even took us a few months and probably a dozen phone calls to find a gardener for my mother in law's bungalow!

This puts it in perspective ! With the average salary in the country ( £37K) paying less than £7k per year tax & NI, which would only just pay for a knee operation let alone all the other things in the NHS like staff, hospitals, social care, civil service, schools roads, pensions & benefits etc etc. it really puts in perspective that we’re really not paying enough for everything to be “free” as everyone seems to expect and time for a reality check and to start living within our means and take responsibility for it.

If only we weren't forking out 8m a day on hotels for asylum seekers.. feel free to criticise me & check the figures yourselves..
10bn on non permanent staff for the NHS 2022/23..
It can't go on.

How would you resolve this?

If you read further down, I’ve already confirmed I’m in the West Midlands.

@browneyes77 "My DP is a self employed plumbing and heating engineer. Did a YTS when he was younger, worked with an highly experienced chap for years and then eventually set up on his own 25 years ago (and has to do exams every 5 years to stay qualified). And he would wholeheartedly disagree that it’s an industry that’s crying out for more of them.
*
Many plumbers and heating engineers struggle to get work coming in, as the industry is saturated with people who don’t have the proper knowledge and skills, charge less to get the business and then do sub standard dangerous work, that the qualified, experienced guys like my DP then have to go out and fix.* "

I live in North Yorkshire. Getting plumbers and heating engineers is very difficult. When we replaced our boiler, part of the quote process was who would also service it. The chap that fitted and now services it is in such demand, he will only now service and repair the boilers he has fitted unless it is an extremely deserving case, ie elderly person with no heating. So I do not think there is anywhere near enough skilled trades certainly in plumbing and heating in our area. We also have to pay top prices

Or the working age that don't work?

@Parker231 I would have wanted to see if just maybe, the Rwanda scheme would have been a deterrent - I think the Labour Govt rather threw the baby out with the bath water there. Anyone voicing concerns about all the people coming into the country is usually called racist, which is ridiculous, other european countries have also had enough. It's unsustainable. Australia's version of Rwanda worked there.
As for the NHS, we really have to spend money in the short term to save in the long term, by training more medical staff. Ditto bloody train drivers, I see Avanti have kicked off now. Surely it doesn't take as long to train drivers as it does to train doctors? Everyone's trying to run services on a shoestring, while paying massive amounts out on agencies, overtime etc.. again, unsustainable.

Thank you for responding although I totally disagree with the Rwanda scheme. The individuals have come to the UK to apply for asylum. The cases should be handled in the UK and if successful have the right to remain in the UK. Not be shipped off to Rwanda and if successful have to remain in Rwanda.
Unfortunately the Tories never got their act together in processing applications and hence the huge backlog there is now.

Agree with your comments on the NHS manpower - it needs significantly investment now. DH is a doctor but we have now left the UK.

Or the working age that don't work?

You think there are 20m of them? 😆

10bn on non permanent staff for the NHS 2022/23..

Because of the lack of investment so it’s all short term catch up. But I’m not sure how you fix it now.

The unemployment rate is c4.3% (1.51m). Excludes those on any form of sickness or disability and not looking to be in the job market.

I would also suggest that it is partly as the rate for working bank is good and you can take hours that suit you whereas permanent staff are on awful rotas that are impossible to plan around family life and childcare.

Agree

Nail on the head. It's the inflexibility of the permanent/long term contracts/rotas that's the killer. Stubborn managers who won't even discuss things that are normal in other workplaces, like flexible working, job sharing, etc., which causes staff to be forced into leaving and going on the "bank" as the only way that they can choose the shifts/hours that suit them.

My OH has got quite friendly with one of the senior nurses who runs the day treatment centre where he goes for his regular infusions. He's been going there for 7 years so has seen he many times over the years. Last time he went, she told him she was leaving as her shift/rota pattern was no longer suitable as she had to start doing more caring for her elderly mother. She's going on the "bank" in the same oncology/haematology department, but can't do the qualified nurse jobs anymore, such as fitting canulas as there's some kind of restriction as to what bank staff can do, so despite being qualified and experienced to do it, when she starts on bank work, she'll be stuck doing lower level work. It's things like that which are utter madness.