Where have all the first jobs gone?

0:00This is The Guardian.

0:09Today, where have all the first jobs gone?

0:22Do you remember getting your first proper job? Maybe it was after school or graduating university. chances are it felt like you'd taken your first step into proper adult life. For a lot of young people in Britain today that moment just isn't coming. It just feels like the odds keep getting stacked against us, against me, against my brother, against so many of my friends. This is Hannah, she's 24. I come from semi-low-income, state educated. I'm just an average person. After years of hard work, she defied everyone's expectations and managed to get a bursary to Oxford University from her small rural town.

1:09She thought her future was secured. I thought that was it. That was my life made effectively. I always thought I would go into some kind of international role, something civil service-y. And everyone at university also told her that getting a job would now be easy. The advice I got was that I should just apply for any of the FTSE list, apply for all of the top 100, see what happens. This particular fellow made statements like, well, you can all read and you can all write, so there'll be a job for you sort of thing. So she sent off her applications.

1:53And then, nothing. For nearly two years, Hannah has been looking for a job. One of the organisations, they told me, we've had 70 applicants for this role and we usually only get about five. I've applied for nearly 70 roles. I made a spreadsheet the other week and about 36 of them I've heard nothing. and the other 30 have been automated rejections. It has been completely demoralising, quite almost dehumanising sometimes. Hannah has become a NEAT, a young person not in education, employment and training. Former Government Minister Alan Milburn released a report setting out the scale of this escalating crisis and calling for urgent action.

2:45The scale and impact of this problem can no longer be ignored. We cannot throw a whole generation of young people on the scrap heap before their adult lives have properly begun. And yesterday, Andy Burnham also promised to take action if he became Prime Minister. I take very seriously the findings of the recent report. We need a complete rethink of how we support the next generation to succeed.

3:19In the meantime, the lives of hundreds of thousands of young people are on hold. And the emotional and financial impact could leave long-term scars on a whole generation. From The Guardian, I'm Annie Kelly. Today in Focus, the UK's youth unemployment time bomb.

3:44Sammy Gedge Soiler, you're a Guardian reporter and you've been doing some really great reporting on this huge and growing problem of NEETS that's young people aged 16 to 24 who are not in employment, education or training and there was this big government report out recently that exposed the scale of all of this what were the key findings? At the end of May, Adam Milburn released the first part of his report into youth unemployment and NEETS. The headline stat was 1 million 16 to 24 year olds are out of work, employment or training. And how does that compare to previous generations? A lot more unemployed young people now than there were previously.

4:24While in 2005 four in 10 of those out of work or training had never had a job, that number now stands at six in 10 and the options for help have been reduced to the number of apprentices. The last time that it dipped to similar levels was during the pandemic and there's another really striking stat from University College London which says that those who are persistently neat in early adulthood are six times more likely to be out of work at age 51 compared to their non-neat peers. Oh wow. Yeah it's quite stark. Yeah. If you look across Europe unemployment levels amongst young people did dip but most other countries in Europe have managed to bounce back and their young people are now in employment whereas the The UK has been an outlier and continued to see unemployment be prevalent amongst young people.

5:10Wow. What are the factors that have made the UK so bad for young people trying to find jobs or training? Well, it's a long, long list. Due to COVID more recently, and I think also back to austerity as well, all of these factors have come together to make getting a job as a young person really, really hard. And I'm actually going to read out a little bit of what Alan Milburn mentioned in his report. The impact of housing, poor transport links, especially for young people in smaller villages and towns. It's not simply a matter of there aren't enough jobs. There aren't enough jobs, but it's also the world that young people face and how it impacts their way of going about things.

5:50It also mentions the impact of social media and smartphone use and how that ties into mental health. Because when you think of it, that also feeds into depression and anxiety. You've been out there talking to young people across the country who just can't find a job. Could you start by telling us what they're going through? Absolutely, yeah. They've tried really hard to apply for jobs. Some of them have applied for hundreds, thousands of jobs in that space of time and haven't heard back, haven't had any luck. It's a punch in the face every time and after a while it really takes a toll. On top of that, a lot of them are relying on universal credit.

6:21One of the people I spoke to, Thomas, after his bills are paid and after his dog's food is accounted for, he gets£25 a month. to live on. £25 a month? Yes, yeah. So it's not just joblessness. Joblessness needs to quite start poverty. So in his case, he was surviving on one£1 Iceland meal a day, just to get by. How old is he? 24. 24, okay. And he's resorted to lying when friends invite him out, just because he can't afford it. So he says that his dog is sick, so he can stay home. with Thomas he's a really great case of someone who's not work shy not lazy not all of these stereotypes that people throw at young people he was dying for a job he was a bar manager until his 23rd birthday at which point he lost his job and for a year and a half after that he's been looking for work he said he's applied for 2 000 jobs yeah so quite a lot and one thing that I thought was quite interesting and important was so he'd gone to the job centre one thing that the Job Centre does do is they give young people training courses and one of the training courses that he took part in was a railway repair training course which I think lasted about six weeks but he put all that hard work in and was like okay finally this might be something to get a job.

7:37After that he was offered one shift in total from all that work, all that training so it sort of shows as well the opportunities that young people are being given by the government aren't really working either. There was one quite striking story that he told me about going to a jobs fair in a stadium and he got all dressed up for it, got a suit on got a tie on, fancy shoes hoping to impress his prospective employers and he gets there and all the stalls are manned by QR codes No So there's no one there to impress and he's just there scanning his phone to be sent links online

8:24And you heard from another young man called David, who was just talking about the scale, how many entry-level jobs he was applying for. It was kind of dozens, wasn't it, and not getting anything back. Can you tell me about him? David, he's a college leaver, so he's just dying to just get some experience. The only job he's had is working in M &S for two weeks, which he said he loved, but that was a sort of temp placement, and when that came to an end, that was it. He was back looking for work. He's applying for 40, 50 years a month and he's not hearing anything back. I mean, that all paints a pretty bleak picture, doesn't it?

9:01I mean, one of the most striking stats in that report for me was Alan Milburn saying 45 % of the 24-year-olds who are not currently in education, employment or training have actually never had a job. what kind of effect is this all having on them the older needs get the more nervous they are that they could be trapped in long-term unemployment despite the skills and positive attributes that they have the constant rejection as well doesn't help it really impacts their confidence and their mental health and one thing that the report does mention is that 45 percent of NEETs who are 16 to 24 have a disability and mental health diagnoses make up a large proportion of that.

9:51Everyone that I spoke to felt like they were one of at least 100 clicking apply for a job and that they felt really hopeless. Thomas I spoke to he said they just whittle away because he's just in his bed scrolling on job stuff to no avail. If you have got mental health needs particularly around depression, anxiety, when you do take a step out there and put yourself on the line apply for jobs and you're not getting anything positive back yeah that can be a real hit to their confidence and they sort of retreat another thing that the report mentions is people who have got mental health needs who do get going to the workplace can often find that those workplaces are hostile to their needs and aren't accommodating and that puts them off from getting into employment as well and i guess it must be a kind of chicken and egg thing that the job relentless job search and and the relentless rejection is going to exacerbate mental health problems which in turn is going to exacerbate the difficulty in finding work.

10:47You've also spoken to business owners as part of this reporting. How are things looking from their perspective? What are they saying about young people just not getting the jobs? So a lot of them cite the government's rise in minimum wage and national insurance contributions particularly in hospitality where a lot of young people do get their first jobs and they also cite rising business rates rents and bills so costs have gone up across the board and i think it is important to say that a lot of these businesses business owners they aren't low tax enthusiasts many understand that for a functioning society to run fair taxation is needed they just feel that they're being unfairly asked to bear the brunt of it there is also this idea i think that largely you know pushed by the kind of ai tech titans who are you know talking about how their technology is going to wipe out most entry-level jobs, that business owners are turning to AI as a way of saving money and are essentially kind of automating all of the entry-level jobs that young people before might have been getting and working their way up through a company.

11:51How much of a challenge has AI proved to this changing job market? What are the people that you've spoken to told you? So I think it's too early to say for sure that AI is taking away jobs and completely transforming the job market but the first trickle of research that has come out does suggest that we are heading that way um so a report last year found the number of new entry-level jobs in the uk had dropped by almost a third since the launch of chat gpt in november 2022 so i spoke to one business who admitted that he previously had employed one to two apprentices a year but in the past 18 months has adopted ai into his business and he hasn't employed any since so sammy this is a huge crisis isn't it and the government on top of all of this on sunday the government announced that employers in great britain will be given three thousand pounds for every long-term unemployed person they hire they'll aim to get 60 000 people aged 18 to 24 into the workforce and i spoke to uh howard williamson an expert on neat he was a key part of tony blair's efforts to clamp down on youth unemployment almost 30 years ago.

13:02He said the impact would be relatively marginal, particularly when it comes to the volume of people who are currently outside of the labour market. But the thing with this question is the government at the minute could change quite soon. We've got Andy Burnham, who seems to be marching on to number 10, and he made a big speech yesterday. One of the key things that he did mention was how the days of a school system focused on university will come to an end under his leadership. He wants to introduce a parity between academic and technical skills and qualifications. Williamson said that it was absolutely spot on and also he mentioned a devolution of employment support so giving Mayers the power to lead on this issue and I think it's important to note that these are just announcements of schemes that are yet to come and it's yet to be seen the impact they could actually have.

13:55The second part of the Melbourne report is due to be released and that's going to present potential solutions to the crisis but I think now we're just left to sit on just how bad it is for young people to find a job.

14:17Hannah, how long have you been applying for jobs? Has it changed the kind of positions you're going for as time has gone on? So I've been applying for maybe a year and a half now. And to begin with, I was applying for higher level, reasonable roles that were for new graduates. And then I started claiming universal credit. And my job coach told me I should apply for 16 jobs a week. then you start applying for everything you can possibly think of. And then I got told a few months later by my job coach that I have to accept minimum wage and then those roles which pay minimum wage won't hire someone who graduated from Oxford.

15:12Do you know other young people of your age in your life in a similar situation? Absolutely. Out of my friendship groups and wider circles, there are two sort of sections. Either they've been hanging on to staying in their university bubble for as long as possible to avoid becoming a neat, or they are people spending all their time applying for jobs too, like me, have found nothing. it's important to remember that it doesn't stop the point you turn 25 so my brother's 27 he did a graduate scheme where they said oh it's a really really niche sector it's really desirable you'll get a job at the end of it he didn't he's been unemployed for a year now could you kind of Talk a bit about how that feels to also, you know, be still at home and without the prospect of being able to move on to independent living as well.

16:15So I came from a year abroad and the independence of Oxford to my little rural village. The average age here is 60 or 70. public transport is expensive so I haven't got the opportunity or the ability half the time to meet up with some of my friends so purely on the social front it's it's really harrowing you lose your independence completely because I always thought if I was living my best life I would be in my own home I would have my own kitchen and I would have a job Hannah it's so striking to me that you work so hard at college to get into Oxford only to find out after all of this that it's so hard for you to get a job and I mean it's probably a stupid question considering the conversations we've just had but you know do you feel hopeful at all that things will change for you?

17:13I don't see any change in the near future I'm a really resilient person But obviously it's hard being a family of four adults and the only income earner at the moment is my mother. So between her and my universal credit payments, that's what we're living on. It's a mood drainer every morning, really. My brother and I will wake up, we go, what was the point in waking up? Because there's nothing to go to. There is no purpose in life without employment. employment with people who thrive on hard work i won't let myself stop yet but obviously for people who've got other mental health issues people who are struggling in other ways it's an immense burden to try and cope with and it's no surprise that most claimants have mental health issues.

18:10I mean, I'm developing mental health issues from this whole experience. All I get told is the right thing will turn up eventually. If that's the only hope there is to cling to, I suppose it's as good as any. Coming up, how the youth unemployment time bomb is a problem for all of us.

18:42Dr Jivya Jyoti, you are a lecturer at the University of Lancaster and you have recently co-written a report which looks at youth unemployment in the UK. I guess one of the most basic questions is where have all the entry-level jobs gone? What we have found within the study is not only are jobs declining, but that the starter jobs are declining at a much faster rate than the overall job market declines. So the latest unemployment rate for 16 to 24-year-olds is the highest level in more than 10 years. And you've got companies like a recruitment agency, Reed, reporting job advertised rolls down by 70, 70 % compared to 2023.

19:25I think we have been in economic kind of stagnation. The cost of living crisis has not really left us since the pandemic. And I think we are still reeling with the aftermath of that. particularly for young people, retail, for instance, is one of the go-to avenue. And that has rapidly declined availability of jobs there, because in-person stores are shutting down. So there are those structural factors at play. And of course, also to talk about the advent of AI, you know, and its implications within for the job market, because it is the new kid in town. Employers are looking at, okay, what aspect of our jobs perhaps can be automated?

20:07It is a fairly early stage to understand the nuance of what kind of roles can potentially be replaced. But the challenge is that it is those early roles which are being replaced. And I mean, to take a classic example is the tills at the supermarkets, right? How many self-checkout tills have we seen? What are the knock-on effects of an entire generation, it seems, facing this kind of delayed, but, you know, potentially long-term unemployment? It has multiple ripple effects. The first is life skills. When we get a job, go out, live on our own, we learn so much, you know, we become independent, whatever that job is.

20:46All of that give us a particular kind of social skills and life skills. You've got these kind of formative experiences that people are missing. But what also about the economy? If we are not having young people enter the job market, where are the leaders of tomorrow? internships have actually been slashed and the numbers have drastically they are drastically reducing this is about the next generation of workforce but also which has wider implications I mean who spends most on shopping and bars and pubs or you know on games and a lot of other avenues so they are a key consumer who would spend and that spending capability is is limited So we have that ripple effect on the economy.

21:33It's almost like a vicious circle. If the young people's entry into the job market is delayed, I think we are going to see a further stagnation of the economy. People are getting delayed. They're going to have to delay even further, getting on the property ladder, starting families, all of those markers are going to get pushed back. But I was really interested in your report that you identified this really stark geographical divide as well. I was just wondering if you might be able to explain that. Where you are shapes the chances and gives you the opportunities. And for every neat young person within the UK, for every three young people, there's only one job.

22:13Because if you start looking geographically for North East, for example, it increases. There is only one job for six young people. So it's that stark. To give you a, I would say, practical example of why place matters is something as simple as when you have a job, you need to be able to get there. So you need connectivity to be able to even apply for jobs. You need to be able to get to the place where you will have your interview. Now, somebody will say, oh, but why don't you drive? Again, one, we know, you know, the reality of, I would say, procuring a driving test, but driving also has cost implications.

22:49If we do not address this, if we do not think about equalising in some way or the other, the divide is going to get even more and more stark. I mean, it's just a very, very distressing situation for so many people to be in, isn't it? So if there were three things that you would be able to identify, you know, that might help change this or turn the situation around, what would they be? I think the first thing that we need to do is kind of get rid of our obsession with the entry level qualifications, which act as a barrier. because this obsession with GCSE, English and maths. We should be able to widen our spectrum of, you know, how we talk about skills and recognise those skills and bring those into the job market.

23:32The second is thinking about the transitions. Those who are coming from disadvantaged backgrounds are somehow struggling to stay in school. There are particular moments where they can fall through the cracks. The third is more structural in terms of the local-based approach that the government perhaps can take when thinking about the job markets, think about local labour markets, you know, those place based opportunities which can be created, why should everyone come down to London or Manchester for jobs, right? But when you think about, you know, farming, you look at the local conditions, and then you think about what fruit can I grow, which is going to flourish here.

24:10It's almost like, you know, you need to think about a similar approach when you're thinking about places and how they develop and what kind of skills are potentially needed for that. Andy Burnham's focus on place does sound like he's on the right track. So let's hope it happens. Are you optimistic things will get better? Yes, if we do something about it. If we kind of go beyond, you know, articulating the problem to start actually taking action towards a solution. And I think if we make a commitment to do so, they can. because it is not a problem which is outside of our power and capabilities as employers or as, you know, the policy makers and decision makers.

24:50I'm curious to see what comes out as from a government perspective, you know, from Alan Milburn's report. So, yeah, I wouldn't say I'm completely disillusioned. I would like to keep a little bit of hope alive. Thank you so much. Thank you. Sounds like a very big problem that we're going to have fine ways to solve.

25:11And that's it for today. My thanks to Sammy Gajsola and Dr Divya Jotti, and a special thanks to Hannah. This episode was produced by Casey McClure, Guy Zaffman and Jacob Antiga, and presented by me, Annie Kelly. Sound design was by Brian McNamara, and the executive producer was Homer Khalili. And we'll be back later on this afternoon with the latest.

25:41This is The Guardian.