Can we talk about NEETs?

[MrsBennetsPoorNervesAreBack]

Sorry if there's a thread already and I've missed it. But I want to talk about NEETs.

Apparently, we are potentially going to have 1.25million young people not in employment, education or training by the early 2030s. This is quite an alarming number, and it feels like we're failing an entire generation - both the NEETs themselves, who don't seem to have very much going on in their lives that might give them a sense of satisfaction or achievement, but also their working peers who will presumably end up having to support them via the tax system.

I really don't want this to be a thread with lots of judgement or criticism of these young people - it seems to me that we must have failed them somehow as a society. I also want to steer clear of party politics if we can. But I really want to understand why we have so many young people in this position right now.

Does anyone have a child in this situation who would be willing to share why they find themselves in this position? What are the barriers to them studying or getting at least a part time job? Are they happy with how things are right now? Are they trying to change their situation? What do they actually do all day? Are they surrounded by friends who are in the same position? What do they do about money? And what do you feel about the whole situation as a parent?

If anyone is willing to share, I really hope we can avoid a pile-on in which the young people and/or their parents are subjected to a character assassination. I would like an honest and frank exchange of views and experiences because I do genuinely want to understand the root causes of this issue, but if it descends into blame and fingerpointing, then the whole conversation will get derailed.

For full disclosure, I do have a dc in the middle of the 16-24 age group, but neither she nor any of her friends fall into this category.

I also think people don't really know what they mean by ' useless degrees'. They always mention things like ' media studies' or ' golf course managemenr' or something-degrees with high employment rates then say degrees like Law or accountancy are good degrees that lead to jobs. Both those jobs can firstly be done without degrees and certainly without degrees in that subject and both those careers are being eaten up with AI at the lower levels. As is banking. People flippantly talk about apprenticeships when the offer for apprenticeships is tiny compared to a degree. If you are 18 and can't even get a Saturday job and your choice is University , fighting 300 people for one apprenticeship place or unemployment then what choice is there?

That's what an apprenticeship is!

It’s just one part of an issue with many facets (and, with how many pages this thread already has, I’d be surprised if it has not been mentioned already) but my two first jobs out of school don’t exist anymore. They were on the tills at McDonalds and in a supermarket.

How often are people talking about this, that swathes of jobs (often entry/part time compatible type jobs) have been wiped from the market in this way? I know of one supermarket that has paid out for a very expensive cleaning robot, rather than an actual cleaner.

This has to be a factor. I know an Ex-NEET just turned 30. They live with a health condition and by a lot of effort from their parents behind the scenes they work a few days a week. I wonder if they had the potential to afford to build their own life through earning a full time wage would they be more motivated? You need some hope to stay motivated.

I’ve just been paid and it’s absolute buttons, frankly. I literally don’t know why I’ve bothered.
And it’s significantly more than minimum wage. Still, it’s one mortgage payment and one big shop.

This gets trotted out and shows complete lack of awareness in reality. You can’t volunteer in stem, engineering etc. You need specialised skills and firms don’t want all and sundry hanging about offices. They also can’t just hand out jobs to people they like- a proper progress has to be gone through and there are way too many applicants for every job. Those with experience in the field and the areas they are looking for will get the jobs not those who have don’t random volunteering experience that doesn’t even touch what specific skills and knowledge they want.

Working in McDonald’s and cadets are not going to get you degree relevant jobs.

Stem degrees aren’t useless. A chap on Jeremy Vine had a first in CS and had applied for 600 jobs.

So sick of the assumption this is just impacting lazy young people with micky mouse degrees. It’s not, all our young people are being impacted .

There was a thread about pensions and if you actually want to do the right thing for your children and set them up
Stop buying them toys, stop buying them crap from China and start opening pensions for them at birth.
Get their sipps set up, lifetime ISA’s established the 18
And then no matter what happens with the job market they won’t starve.

The problem is our housing market really isn't it and that we allowed it to become so expensive? We wouldn't have needed the insane minimum wage rises we've seen otherwise. And it would make it easier to employ young people.

In 2010 a part 1 architect (first job after degree but not qualified yet) in Birmingham might have got paid 16k, which was low because it was the financial crisis and it was hard to find a job. At the time minimum wage was 12k and it was comfortable living on 12k. You could easily live in a shared house and do stuff on much less money.

So a part 1 got 33% more than minimum wage back then and were affordable to employ. Now they will get minimum wage and are expensive to employ.

Edited to add. The wages for those who are in the middle at are qualified have not risen very much. So they now will probably be in the low to middle 30s in terms of salary. So are not hugely more expensive, complete work more quickly and can be left to their own devices. So when you are doing a fee quote for a job it makes the slightly more expensive but hugely more experienced person deliver the work cheaper for the client.

No they’re not, but they might give you the confidence to be able to walk in an interview room, smile say hello, shake hands confidently, have answers to interview questions when you overcame a difficulty. Being able to take instruction, ask the right questions, work with others, sell yourself, represent a company, are all other skills on top of education that help, they really do.

There are many subtle soft skills that interviewers see and employers need.

Our teens need degrees for their hopes and dreams , they also like and want student jobs. They currently work part time, volunteer regularly and are always looking out for additional opportunities, small at first but they build up.

STEM degrees aren’t useless but some CS graduates are not ready for the workplace.

H interviews CS graduates and some haven’t got the right applicable skills.

When H retires (early) one of his retirement dreams is to write a CS degree textbook (absolutely no money in this) to bridge this gap, as he wants to give back to the industry which continues to serve him well.

Education doesn’t always equal a career. It can but it’s not always the case. It’s such a complicated area.

Without anything on their CVs they won’t get as far as interview and relevant experience with expertise in the field trumps all that.

It’s not they’re not ready it’s that they have zero experience in relevant areas which is impossible to get in the currrnt climate. It’s nigh on impossible to get a placement in industry whilst at uni. My husband also works in the field and has recruited and he has said repeatedly it’s simply down to experience in the relevant areas which graduates haven’t had a chance to build and the current climate has taken away most chances of them doing so.

This is not bad advice (the early pension bit which is mentioned often) surrounded in completely unhinged suggestions.

It is a fact that further education in the UK has expanded within a generation from catering for a small cohort of academically minded school leavers who embarked on courses that offered the chance to become graduates with genuine scholarship and advanced learning in their field to now catering for anyone who fancies a go irrespective of their suitability to attend university. While old school red bricks (and a few ex polys) still maintain some standards an awful lot of universities do not and they are now essentially property management companies where students are now customers who are being sold second rate soft degrees that are barely recognised by industry and offer little in the way of improved employment prospects. Many of these students have been sold a pup, they have been told getting a degree, any degree, is better then nothing and the huge debt incurred is worth it.

Anecdotally, my wife has a young woman in her team who armed with good A levels proceeded straight from school on to a corporate apprenticeship. At 24 years old she is now a charted accountant, has six years experience working for a FTSE 100 company, is debt free, on a decent salary and about to buy a flat. I think quite a few bright school kids are being a bit more circumspect as to what the pros and cons are of going to uni.

Maybe we should open a type of educational institution that focuses on vocational education, applied sciences, and career-focused training with strong links to local industries and recognised qualifications that allows school leavers another option other then uni. We could call them polytechnics.

Yes but taking part time jobs, or cadets when they are at school not university contribute to interviewing well.

Graduates are going to be rookies in a team, they need some soft skills as well as education.

H interviews for graduate positions, they weren’t expecting experience, they were expecting a level of computer skills that were woefully missing. Some didn’t even understand the basic server/user system set-up.

It’s not the interviewing that’s the issue it’s the getting the interview with bots doing the selecting that’s the issue.

Competent young people are applying for hundreds of jobs and never hearing back or being selected.

To be honest with things on their CVs many aren't getting as far as shortlists.

I'm a bit fed up of this 'build your CV advice coming form people on the thread. DS has had 4 different jobs in 3 sectors and none of that seems to get him shortlisted , even for work in the same or related sectors.

The 'foot in the door' mantra doesn't even seem to apply any more.

I would like to know more about this. I can't find those courses at the local FE college. I can see something similar by private providers, but from what I see it would cost about 5k. I'm wary of spending that money in case it leads to nothing without already being in a work placement (and ofc many young people don't have that money to spend).
Can a young person without trade connections really get work after doing these courses?

I've seen previously courses that offer to turn you into e.g. a plumber and they don't tend to lead to paid work if they're done in isolation without a proper apprenticeship.

@DeftWasp can you advise?

My husband’s field expects experience. They don’t have spare cash in the field to babysit. Graduate positions are pretty much non existent now. They want people experienced and have the pick from around the world. Why would companies go to somebody fresh out of a uk uni with zero experience when they can have their pick of people with experience in this climate?

It’s best part of £30k to employ somebody on minimum wage for firms. The guy on Jeremy Vine was saying they get little from people on entry level jobs as such jobs are training for the future- nice but the problem is increasingly firms don’t have the cash to offer these kinds of roles now .

Exactly however if you have key words from the job requirement as regards experience the bot will
pick you. Cadets and McDonald’s are not going to be key words.

I know. I know they are and it’s soul crushing that much potential is going to be lost as the UK continues to fail to invest in innovation. Companies are investing more in the EU. Investment in the UK has fallen off a cliff and established organisations have moved operations to the EU, even just over to Ireland.

Our teens can get EU passports, which might end up being the major asset of theirs even if they get degrees. We are a few years off graduation yet, so things might change.

Yep EU passports will be gold. Farages kids have them because his wife is German. Nice he and Boris shut the door for everybody else’s kids.

Why oh why are we as a nation not jumping up and down with fury as to what they have done to our kids?