Nearly 1m young people out of work

[Starfeesh]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c62gzl2yl24o

AIBU to be concerned that a life on benefits seems to be a viable option, and glad Labour are bringing in compulsory work placements?

A lot of employers are proud to employ people with disabilities, but the profile of disability has changed. Before it meant wheelchair ramps and a disabled toilet, now it means endless days off for the person concerned, long term sick leave for ‘burnouts’, a lot of adjustments around things they don’t want to do etc

I guess it depends how you see the issue. 1m young people out of work is bad for them and bad for all of us. So we can sit back and say ‘that’s life’ or we can collectively try to understand the multiple social and economic factors that have led to this situation and try to do something about it. Application processes are one factor, by no means the biggest one, but one where employers could be encouraged or supported to do make changes.

You know this is not true don’t you?

not to mention all the other generations that lived through experiences far worse, and for far longer, than covid?

I'm not denying Covid was awful for some kids (although some benefitted hugely). But the strictest restrictions only applied for a few months at a time. Even if you accept that it did have a significant detrimental impact on them, you can hardly say it was worse than the impact of WW2 on kids growing up in the 1940s? Or WW1 on the generation before that? Or kids growing up in the victorian era working down mines or in factories? Or the stress of potential cold war of kids growing up in the 60s, or seeing your parents out of work/on strike for months at a time for communities in the coal industry in the 1980s? And that's just this country - kids else where in the world have it even worse, even today.

Many of us growing up in the 70s-2000s had fairly idyllic childhoods on the whole (not excepting individual issues) but that's the exception, not the rule. Essentially in the course of human history, we were uniquely lucky, rather than the current generation of young adults being uniquely unlucky.

I have a sibling who had a good job working at a hospital on 4-day shifts.
Her BF who was on benefits and rarely worked convinced her she was a sucker so she went on long-term sick. She took early retirement and is now cruising.

I think the system encourages this behaviour and it's detrimental to everyone in society.

My daughter has been trying to get a part time job for over a year. The hoops she's had to jump through for zero -7hr contracts and then never hear back have been crazy. Her confidence is on the floor, I can totally believe many YP give up!

"...as they are done by the main supermarket staff."

That is something that I've noticed as well. Go back 30 or 40 years ago and a sizeable proportion of supermarket staff working evenings were students aged 16-18. This did sometimes mean that people working Friday night had to start later on Saturday morning as there are strict rules concerning breaks from work for under 18s.

When I go in to Sainsburys or Tescos today there is hardly anyone under 18 working there.

Another reason for fewer jobs is the introduction of barcodes and scanning. Sainsburys started installing scanners in the late 1980s. Before then, just about everything had to have a price sticker applied with a pricing gun. This obviously required a lot more labour.

There were also a lot more instore counters (eg meat, deli, bakery) than there typically is today (with the exception of Waitrose).

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@CandidLurker

"It’s starting to feel like the 1980’s ... I took work wherever I could get it eg a couple of weeks work over Christmas at Sainsbury’s packing bags and stacking shelves. Paid out of the petty cash box."

You weren't paid out of the petty cash box.

Back then everybody in Sainsburys stores, except management, was paid weekly in cash. There was no monthly direct transfer to a bank account or anything like that, you got paid in cash - to the penny - and were handed your pay packet.

Back then, cash was used for purchases a lot more than it is today so supermarkets had a lot of cash swilling around on the premises. It was easier and cheaper to pay the staff in cash out of the money taken from customers rather than to pay to have it transported securely to a bank.

Also, it was normal. Even in the 1980s it was normal for people to be paid in cash at the end of the week.

Not read any of the comments yet, but I think the problem is much bigger than 16-24. My cousin is 27 soon and she hasn't worked since leaving college, and her friends are the same.

I see it as the world doesn’t owe our teens a living

We could have sat back whilst they were 13 but we didn’t we told them to do something

So they got delivery rounds and do farm volunteering
and hit the books for their GCSEs

it would have been much easier, less resistance, to
let them eat biscuits and do online gaming - we can bank roll them for sure

but they have turned up (sometimes pissing and moaning) most weekend mornings for 4-5 years now

one plays football, and has seen their 16 yr old student coach do ref and coaching badges, on top of college, during the evenings and weekends, covering first aid etc and cutting grass on pitches, a full 7 day week with evenings - because this is the sort of hours that you need to put in to do this job (he wants to be a head coach and we all want tickets to his first premier club game). It’s relentless dedication. He’s an impressive young man.

People think the same opportunities should just happen for everyone and think if you hurt someone’s feelings by asking them to fill out a form you are a very bad person.

Life is hard and competitive. And boring and thankless. At least at first.

At some point you need to put in hard boring low paid, or free graft, that can be training or exams.

But just to know other young people are up against thousands who are already doing this. And is it fair? Yes it’s totally fair.

Do you think a weed smoking, lazy gamer who’s “good at FIFA” deserves a trainee football coaching position over someone who has spent hundreds of hours gaining badges and certificates, studying and working evenings, plus refereeing at the weekend?

Most teenagers are capable. Many are lazy and entitled. That’s for their parents to sort out.

Ones that struggle a bit more but could work need to work out what they can do not what they can’t.

Young people (indeed our whole society) is perpetually online.

There are barriers, sure, but let's not be ridiculous about this.

Yes, many many teenagers are terminally online. But a sizeable number experience digital poverty. https://digitalpovertyalliance.org/digital-poverty-in-the-uk-a-socio-economic-assessment-of-the-implications-of-digital-poverty-in-the-uk/

Also being online all the time doesn’t mean being able to do every type of online activity. I’m no better at Roblox because I post on Mumsnet. Why would gaming or social media make someone good at job applications?

@ThingsAreNotWhatTheyWere so you are saying someone not working for ill health at that age won’t claim for ill health due to a private income? Do you have any evidence for that as that’s not what the data says?

And where did I say people can’t help
being ill? I was just replying to a post about the cost to taxpayers from another poster…

This is not about playing Roblox it's about filling in applications.

For people struggling, support is available in job centres, colleges, schools for this purpose.

Why wouldn’t it?

We all had to learn to do online job applications despite growing up in digital
tumbleweed. We learned 🤷‍♀️

But if they have the drive they could use an hour or two a day online for educational or upskilling if they have the desire to.

To try and excuse or fix utter laziness or complacency is society insanity.

Today's youngsters can't be blamed for not having a work ethic when society/politicians have put so many obstacles in the way of them getting a job, even evening or Saturday jobs

Agree, the jobs I did don’t really exist anymore. Many entry level jobs have been removed due to automation. When I’m in the supermarket and in a restaurant the staff are middle aged or older. There also isn’t the same progression so much anymore. If you start on a low wage, zero hours contract you could be staying on that for a long time.

Do you think a weed smoking, lazy gamer who’s “good at FIFA” deserves a trainee football coaching position over someone who has spent hundreds of hours gaining badges and certificates, studying and working evenings, plus refereeing at the weekend?

Comments like this just don’t make me think you’re posting in good faith.

One of the key things in your post is that you’ve acknowledged that you could ‘bank roll’ your kids. Well not everyone can. And unfortunately there is a chunk of those 1m kids out of ETE whose parents can’t afford for them to do coaching and reffing for free every weekend, can’t transport them to volunteer on a farm at 13, and plenty of farms that wouldn’t take on an unknown 13 year old. And they can’t afford for them to be in school or FE either, so the kid goes on benefits and is then stuck. You think you’re educating them on how hard life is? Of course you’re not, their life is shit from the get go. It doesn’t matter how hard they work, plenty of them will not make it without changes they are not in control of.

People think the same opportunities should just happen for everyone and think if you hurt someone’s feelings by asking them to fill out a form you are a very bad person.

Nobody has said that and again, it’s hard to imagine you’re posting in good faith, but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. It’s not about hurting someone’s feelings, it’s about making changes that could improve chances for some struggling young people, which are ultimately good for us all. I don’t want to pay for 1m and rising young people to be workless forever, and I realise that sitting there shouting ‘work harder’ isn’t going to fix it. I don’t think you have looked past the end of your nose if you think the experience of just your kids is universal.

I don’t think you have looked past the end of your nose if you think the experience of just your kids is universal

Indeed

Of course they could, if they have the drive, the skills, the equipment and data. Just like you could, if you had the drive (because I can see you have the other things) learn a bit more about the 1m young people in this position and realise they are not all lazy or complacent. But you’ve chosen not to.

Of course they could, if they have the drive, the skills, the equipment and data. Just like you could, if you had the drive (because I can see you have the other things) learn a bit more about the 1m young people in this position and realise they are not all lazy or complacent. But you’ve chosen not to.

It’s not about hurting someone’s feelings, it’s about making changes that could improve chances for some struggling young people

I feel like we could do anything though, and they’ll then start blaming something else.

It’s very blamey out there and personal responsibility seems to have genuinely vanished. Everyone is ‘being failed’ apparently

I mean the definition of madness is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. We’ve created a situation in which a growing number of young people are out of ETE, and your solution is ‘well I figured it out’. Clearly, what we have isn’t working - for all kinds of reasons, application processes being one barrier for some people. But carry on, I’m sure it will eventually improve. 🤷‍♀️

Young people now are no different to young people then. They still need to eat and have a roof over their heads.

The difference is employers are greedy and want 5 years' experience and pay minimum wage, as an OP said. They even want internships for internships. There is zero desire to train, or to look at transferable skills.

I agree with the lack of creativity in some cases, or a lack of "oomph" - but in previous eras it wouldn't have mattered, something would have come up. Might not have been what they wanted, but they would have something. But not everyone can be super-talented and do a million internships. Or learn a trade - I would be rubbish at that!

I don't know what the answer is.

You ‘feel like’ that would happen? You think that entire group of 1m young people across the country, 16-25 years old, different backgrounds and experiences, will all have the exact same response?

If you’re not in college or school, no it isn’t. And some job centres are great, but not all are.

There are some really good programmes that do support people who struggle with this (and working with some of them is how I know people can struggle with this). But they’re mainly charitable or LA funded projects and there needs to be more of them.

For clarity, I’m advocating for supporting people and removing barriers so their natural drive and aspiration isn’t thwarted by shitty set ups. It’s not about letting people be lazy but actually trying to understand the pinch points before writing off a generation.