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?

As for how many jobs are available at the moment, how is this being measured? If it’s going by job adverts then a lot of these adverts are ghost job adverts, self-employed “opportunities” that are bordering on scams, even MLMs sometimes advertise on jobs boards.

If we want to know how many real, actual jobs are available, and how many of those adverts will actually result in someone being recruited where the client won’t suddenly have a hiring freeze after five rounds of interviews, the number is going to be a lot lower. There are literally millions of people applying for jobs that don’t even exist.

It never occurred to me to sign on either but I left school in 1990 went to college and had a part time job in a nursing home ,i then did my nurse training frim 1993 -1996 and was offered several jobs when I qualified
But there were loads of jobs for newly qualified nurses then
Had I not bern so lucky it might of occurred to me I might need to sign on.

IMO too many people are addicted to smoking weed, smartphones and video games to be effective employees. We have seen it time and time again where I work. You can't blame employees for preferring to hire older, more mature people.

Lazy stereotyping. The vast majority of youngsters aren't weed addicts etc. Yes, some are, but most aren't.

My point as only that some agencies are crap but that doesn't mean the all are.

My daughter's agency isn't a teaching agency and she has worked every day she's been available since signing up with them.

Also the number of people technically "employed " on zero hours contracts ....but barely any work for each of them...?

I would have thought it was easier for a shop to organise rotas to have eg 15 members of staff to cover the shifts, either on set days or at least having set numbers of hours....instead of a larger number who might work 0,1, 2 or 3 shifts a week each?
I imagine its because its cheaper - maybe having a lot of staff , they each dont meet the threshold for tax, NI, pension etc

DD had no shifts a few weeks ago, she doesnt have lectures on Fridays so is available to work then. She was messaged at 6am to see if she wanted an 8am shift. She didnt wake up til 8 so she missed it, but had she known beforehand she'd have taken it.

Agree. If you’re employing students, they have the same lectures every week so they should be available for the same work shifts every week. Ridiculous to keep changing them.

No they don’t.

My dd has a completely different timetable this term to last.

They tend to change by semester and also my dc is on a 2 weekly timetable so one week much heavier than the other re tutorials.
You couldn’t confidently agree in September to work every Tuesday for example.

Lecture/seminar/tutorial slots change every term, so three times per year and that's the official timetable/schedule, which is often changed during the term and there are additional "one offs" too such as special presentations/lectures, career sessions, etc.

Zero hour contracts are often used to cover absent "permanent" staff taking holiday days, sick days, a few hours for a GP or hospital appointment, and all manner of other "unplanned" time off, hence why they're often called in at short notice, usually to cover someone who hasn't turned up or called in sick at the start of their shifts.

The "low hours" to avoid NIC is no longer valid really since Rachel lowered the NIC threshold which catches a lot more "low earners", i.e. part timers on few hours.

Basically the more "workers" that an employer has on speed dial gives more options to cover when other staff aren't in for a multitude of reasons.

It's easy to say that, say, a small shop should just have 3 staff and one of the others should cover when employee A is on holiday or calls in sick, but if the other two aren't available then the shop is stuck. Even more so when the other staff don't want to work more hours because it affects their benefits, i.e. UC or tax credits, etc., which is also a big problem - lots of part timers plan their working hours very carefully to avoid losing benefits so won't be willing to "cover" for an absent colleague if it means breaching whatever threshold they're staying under.

I suppose maybe its her (and tbf my own) naivety hoping she'd get a regular number of shifts per week....she definitely didnt sign up for a job for "emergency cover if someone is ill or has a gp appointment " ...because in reality how many people want to have a job where they dont know whether they'll be working that week....

The insidious thresholds include those for carers claiming Carer’s Allowance. That should be a lot higher and the rules less rigid.

Interesting. I went to a uni with a very rigid timetable.

My understanding of zero hours contracts, at least in retail, is that however little work they give you, they require you to be available at all times and penalise people for not taking emergency shifts.

I also think I read somewhere that this was going to change, and that this new law meant zero hours staff would have to get some kind of minimum guaranteed hours?

My DS worked for Better/GLL for a bit as a life guard and they operated like that, seemed to have an infinite pool of people to draw on and if you didn't get to know the manager you had no chance. He gave it up as he just couldn't get shifts. Really bad practice

Yes my dd at McDonalds was zero hours. You told them your timetable. But they rostered you on and if you couldn’t do it it was your responsibility to get cover. They had a group chat and usually could get someone but some shifts if no takers the kids would have to put money on it eg I’ll give you £20 if you do my shift or if no one call in sick (say vomiting as food work meant couldn’t come in)

Yes if manager didn’t like you got awful shifts or no shifts.
If they were quiet and overstaffed they’d send people home (so kids could have paid bus fare and earn no money)
They also needed their own work shoes which wore out to a big hole in sole due to constant standing. I bought 2 pairs in 2 years and she never worked more than 10 hours a week.
My mum was really shocked re sending home and providing own work shoes. Totally different world to what she knew.

How easy do you think it is for young people growing up with abuse and neglect like I did to make good decisions when young?

I left school with poor results because I was busy surviving, not studying.

Being able to return to education as an adult saved me from a lifetime of benefits and poverty, but adult education is so expensive now, I am not sure I would be able to do the same today.

Zero hours contracts can work
Hospital, s for example have had " bank staff " forever bank shifts did suit a lot of people becsuse they could pick and choose the shifts they wanted to work around child care etc
That said when I was a nurse there was always loads of bank shifts available.

My dc didn’t struggle at 16+ - all got min wage retail or hospitality for a few hours a week. The “proper job”, full time job, and grad scheme market is a different ball game and swamped with ghost jobs, preposterous hoop jumping for min wage unskilled work, companies who ignore applications, companies who say you are under qualified for a min wage job, companies who say you are overqualified for their training scheme. DS has applied for what feels like millions of civil service jobs but with 70000 fast track applicants and 3-400 applicants for every basic entry level role then he doesn’t have much of a chance. He’s had LOADS of interviews (some with bots) and been held on wait lists but no offer. He is working, but in a min wage zero hour job which gives him around 20 hours a week. He isn’t entitled to UC, so isn’t entitled to any of the courses and schemes that the job centre run either. You can get a 2 week civil service work placement with the possibility of a job at the end but only if you don’t do any work for 2 years first - get a zero hours crap job and you can’t access that. He’s tried lots of agencies but hasn’t had any work at all. I don’t know any non professional who has any luck with agencies. I work in the NHS and it’s dire. Redundancies and recruitment freezes in non-clinical and bare bones recruitment in clinical. We don’t have a single advert out for any nursing, midwifery or AHP staff at any band in my trust so doing a sensible degree doesn’t apply to this years health graduates. I do think ds is getting lazier as time goes on - he’s regressing and his life is getting smaller at the very moment he should be launching.

The government in particular and the previous government to a lesser extent have made employing people an absolute ballache. Stopping 14-16 year olds working without huge restrictions was a big mistake imo. It’s too expensive and risky to take a chance on new employees now - lots of smaller hospitality businesses are just reducing hours instead and dumping staff and the bigger ones are using tech and having worse service.

He’s had LOADS of interviews (some with bots)

OMG I’ve heard about those AI interviews. Are people actually agreeing to do these? This is what I mean by a lack of respect from employers. They apparently can’t even spare the time of day to interview someone properly. You need to get on with the interviewer and feel the vibe of the place. The tone of voice of the interviewer can be a green flag or a red flag but it’s really important.

I’m not surprised your DS, and young people in general, are getting “lazier” over time when recruitment processes are so broken. Why would anyone want to be part of the world of work if that’s how employers treat people?

My ds1 is desperate for almost ANY job. He obtained his degree in Biotech( last year of Uni was affected by Covid).Since then he has had 2 temp jobs..not related to his degree and one he moved away for. He is now back at home. It is a hideous mess tbh...he has applied for so many and not just where we live.

The employers use those interviews and then have the cheek to complain about candidates using AI! What's sauce for the goose and all that.

It's really bad at the moment. My DS2 who is 18 can't find any casual work and neither can any of his friends despite having great CVs with lots of volunteering work and also being well educated. The only ones that have jobs are those with connections - i.e. working in relatives family businesses. Nepotism may have been stamped out in large listed companies but it is alive and well in small businesses, but then who can blame them?

It is tragic that it is happening. This makes it even more important to make wise educational decisions when young

it's nothing to do with wise decisions. If you have a STEM degree it's a bit easier to get jobs but they are not walking into jobs either. And anyway you have to do what you are good at.

The ones who are really cute are the ones getting degree apprenticeships. But compared with university courses, they are very hard to get. So even if you want one, you won't necessarily get one.

And if employers won't take 21 year olds without experience they won't take 18 year olds without experience either, so leaving school after A levels won't work either other than for a lucky few.

If the Government are willing to subsidise Universities, (lets face it - the doyen of the Left) and many, many micky mouse degrees that will lead nowhere, why can't they offer tax breaks to employers to take on and actually train the guaranteed tax payers of the future. Why can't employees/apprentices opt out of NWM if they, themselves, want to work and recognise the benefit (to them) of three years worth of training. After all, they would not earn anything at all whilst at Uni and a trade apprenticeship will be worth more than three years at Uni for a good proportion of courses offered.