To think we need to start talking about the lack of jobs?

[Newmeagain]

This is prompted by quite a few threads I have read recently, from parents of young people looking for jobs or posters themselves struggling with finding a job.

I feel like a lot of responses are completely out of touch and people are not aware how hard it is right now. There are no “supermarket jobs” etc that you can just pick up.

I think this is having a particularly significant impact on school leavers and graduates looking for their first full time job, students wanting part time work and also anyone over 50 who suddenly finds themselves unemployed.

Particularly in services where there is little of any competition ( public services) or ones where moving is a faff- banks etc

KS2 then

I don’t drive. Public transport is good but as I said some jobs start and end before and after the trains do. So I get taxis… you have to spend money to make money sometimes.

Thank you. Though is that P3 to P6? I’m Scottish. We just have P1 to P7, then S1 to S6.

7 to 11 year olds

Thanks. Someone who was a child back then.

It unse to be called junior school. The 4-7 group ( now ks1) were infants

Lots are franchises so family work in them.

Yes so many, newly qualified nurses, midwives and paramedics can’t get jobs and have gone back to the jobs they did before going to uni. 500 applicants for 1 job.

Well who is getting the jobs?

There’s a short documentary about why 60% of all the motels and hotels in Canada and US are owned by Patels:

https://www.patelmotelstory.com

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/10/04/travel/patel-motel-story-hotel-history-cec

My first reply was deleted, Oh well. Still I'm glad I posted it as so many other people then spoke about the same issue.

1 person is, and 499 are not.

Well obviously some of those 499 people will get other jobs. I'd be very interested to know what the typical application-to-job ratio is, and how much it varies. If this were the average, people would be applying for 500 jobs to get one job offer, and there are indeed plenty of stories in the media about people who have applied for hundreds of jobs and got nothing. No wonder job-hunters are fed up.

I think there's a lot of hyperbole going on during these discussions or people are talking about specific areas and extrapolating that to mean 'everywhere'.

Here's the current job advertisements for 1 NHS trust in Bristol for example. There are a few other trusts in the area also recruiting.

Current Vacancies | North Bristol NHS Trust

There's no dearth of jobs, nor are 500 people who could do the job applying for each post. Many posts aren't getting any applications so they have to re-advertise.

Also, a post may have many applicants ( not 500 hundred) but only a handful actually eligible for shortlisting. I've had to do shortlisting for several roles and you get A LOT of completely inappropriate applications who don't even meet basic criteria for the job. Often, you're advertising for a band 5 qualified nurse post and you get applicants from people without any nursing qualification at all.

A terrible story on social media today that unfortunately proves my point with regards to rural roads.

doesn’t matter if it happens rarely if it’s happened to your family it’s horrific.

I agree with you on this - for instance when I used to advertise for an admin assistant at our music business with at least some previous experience, good excel and had lots of cash handling and could speak a smattering of German and or/french/spanish etc and able to travel reasonably often (and the confidence to run a merch desk) I used to get maybe 120 replies ( university small city) of this maybe around 10 to 15 were remotely suitable - the rest were a mix of people with zero relevant experience ( and yes I know everyone has to start somewhere but with a team of me, my H plus the- other person- the other person had to be able to run immediately) or women with young kids who admitted they couldn’t travel and do the merch desk thing ( which was integral to the job) or wanted full time and it was 3 days a week apart from when they were on tour - so it only suited very specific people - mainly sociable students with a smattering of another language ,good computer skills , flexibility and a decent work ethic - some jobs are like this however fair it may seem and people don’t always read the description and think you will be so amazed by them that the job can be moulded to fit what they want- rather than what the employer (who is paying) needs. And if your kids want to get ahead however unfashionable it is I would maybe push at least a decent smattering of another language - it’s one reason some foreign students are more employable - the German girl I had spoke fantastic English, German, French and some Italian - , the Dutch girl similar

Genuine question then. Can I, as a White UK born here type Brit buy a degree or other qualification from an Indian diploma mill, and get some of these jobs? Is that literally how it works, or is there more to it?

Not sure if this has been mentioned as I haven't read every single post, but a lot of jobs posted are just to follow protocol. The job is intended for an existing employee but it has to be advertised. Absolute waste of people's time and effort. Especially when you look at some of the application forms these days, plus the multiple rounds of interviews!

We don't post any job externally if it is going to be filled internally.

I think this was one of those urban myth things that somebody read about in 1996 and it’s just been replicated repeatedly if we know which Internal Candidate is getting the job. We don’t need to benchmark them against anybody. They just get the job once they’ve been interviewed accordingly.