The unemployment fudge

[pirate]

He works in recruitment.

architecture and design

 

[I'm With Stupid]

It entirely depends on what sector you’re in I think. Which doesn’t exactly help my argument have a clear direction I know. I think wages have gone up in most areas where people have to be either qualified or qualified with experience and they have stagnated towards the bottom where they can take inexperienced people.

Supply and demand rules still work in principle, I think it depends how much competition there is obviously (this could generally be location too) and how crucial that position is to the company operating.

That may be a load of waffle but I work in the industry of getting people jobs and head hunting and that’s the best I can do to explain it. In short it massively varies across areas of the country and sectors, generally speaking though people are suffering and I’m for further government intervention.

I wonder how much of it comes down to union membership too. There's currently a dispute going on in Ireland about archaeologists working on building sites. To do that job, you need at least a masters and many have a PhD. And yet they're frequently earning under the living wage and barely more than the minimum wage. And crucially, they were earning less than contractors working on the same site driving diggers, or what have you. It turns out the contractors were unionized and archaeologists weren't. So there was a campaign to get them unionized, and now there's a big fight going on, but one of the biggest companies has increased wages as a result (still to pathetic levels for people with 4-7 years of specialized training, admittedly). They're certainly not the only example of highly-skilled workers not being given wages and benefits that reflect their level of expertise and training. Academia is full of shitty, temporary contracts, even at a time of soaring tuition fees and record student numbers. And increasing workloads for doctors and teachers have coincided with the government's attempts to undermine unions. The proliferation of academies, for example, has allowed schools to bypass previously agreed pay and conditions that applied either nationally or locally. And there is certainly a belief in teaching circles that some schools want to replaced highly experienced (and therefore highly paid) members of teaching staff with newer teachers who will accept worse conditions (in addition to being cheaper anyway) and there are plenty of anecdotes of teachers who are simply given a workload so overwhelming that they'll quit.

 

[inbetween]

That’s what my daughter did after uni. Took her about two days to get a job once she started looking. Getting a graduate job is harder but she’s working in the meantime. There’s no real excuse for sitting on your arse while waiting for the perfect job. There’s loads of work out there and there’s nothing to stop people applying for a long term job while working in a bar or restaurant. In fact I reckon an employer is more likely to give a job to someone with a bit of working history on their CV.

Graduate jobs are unfortunately a fantasy and the graduate market in general is just a total con in the way it is sold to students because there are just too many graduates. I knew many people who refused to work on the minimum wage and viewed the job market as cruel to them because they have a degree and are somehow owed a ticket to a high flyer job. As you might guess none of them ever got that magic job either.

Your daughter is doing the right thing in keeping going, it is hard but hard work always pays off and the opportunities are there. She will go far if she keeps her head down, keeps searching and isn't afraid to start somewhere which might not be great but might open a door to elsewhere.

I gave up on the graduate job search after finishing uni and started in my first job in engineering as a trainee on £16k and 2 years later I moved to the company I am at now on £34k. The biggest irony for me is the company I am at rejected my graduate application barely 5 years ago and a bit of my job now is to mentor graduate engineers!

 

[Ifwecouldjust.......]

This government massages the youth unemployment figures by making everyone under 18 either stay in full time education or take up an apprenticeship or traineeship.

 

[inbetween]

This government massages the youth unemployment figures by making everyone under 18 either stay in full time education or take up an apprenticeship or traineeship.

Wow... So forcing people to educate themselves or gain skills through work under training is a bad thing?

Yep, surely they would be better off unemployed doing nothing instead?

 

[taleofbluehalves]

I wonder how much of it comes down to union membership too. There's currently a dispute going on in Ireland about archaeologists working on building sites. To do that job, you need at least a masters and many have a PhD. And yet they're frequently earning under the living wage and barely more than the minimum wage. And crucially, they were earning less than contractors working on the same site driving diggers, or what have you. It turns out the contractors were unionized and archaeologists weren't. So there was a campaign to get them unionized, and now there's a big fight going on, but one of the biggest companies has increased wages as a result (still to pathetic levels for people with 4-7 years of specialized training, admittedly). They're certainly not the only example of highly-skilled workers not being given wages and benefits that reflect their level of expertise and training. Academia is full of shitty, temporary contracts, even at a time of soaring tuition fees and record student numbers. And increasing workloads for doctors and teachers have coincided with the government's attempts to undermine unions. The proliferation of academies, for example, has allowed schools to bypass previously agreed pay and conditions that applied either nationally or locally. And there is certainly a belief in teaching circles that some schools want to replaced highly experienced (and therefore highly paid) members of teaching staff with newer teachers who will accept worse conditions (in addition to being cheaper anyway) and there are plenty of anecdotes of teachers who are simply given a workload so overwhelming that they'll quit.

In terms of teaching the workload is just there.It’s largely driven by fear of bad results, which are hugely hard to determine with new exams. Poor results ususally leads to Ofsted. If that doesn’t go well there’s pressure on, usually more work. There are also biting cuts with teaching assistants, admin support cut to the bone, class sizes up and contact time at its maximum.

What does happen is a lot of pressure on underperforming staff who are put under significant scrutiny say for 6-10 weeks. If there’s no improvement usually competency and that’s on your record for life so people go. Fair enough it’s a child’s education. To be fair to teachers very few set out to be bad. The changes in exams means there’s a lot of unknowns. Increasingly the pressure means many kids down tools, parents are increasingly powerless to make them revise and in some cases even get to school.

With the new expectation of retiring around 67 most older teachers have just had enough and retire early. Nice saving for the government.

 

[Mike D]

I can give you one now.
My daughter was on a temporary contract after finishing university.
It ended, she moved home and went to sign on.
Local job centre had closed down (austerity dont ya know)
So two buses and an hour later, she gets to the job centre for her initial assessment.
The good news she is entitled to claim jobseekers (yay) the bad news is that it will take 12 weeks to kick in and will not be backdated. In addition she will have to attend the job club every day for a month starting immediately and failure to do so will mean her jobseekers will be revoked. She then asked how she could travel the 16 miles to the job centre with no money? They said she would have to work it out.
The upshot is she isnt on jobseekers and therefore isnt officially unemployed although she hasnt worked for 4 months.

She has ajob interview tomorrow, so fingers crossed.

That's the caring sharing tories for you nothing like kicking someone when they are down how nice. Just wait until she does sign on (really hope she doesn't) maybe she be party some of other tricks of the trade like stopping your dole for not turning up for interviews that you knew nothing about.

 

[Mike D]

Be easier for her to get a job in a bar or restaurant whilst job hunting no?

But doesn't that depend on whether she can find the right job that fits in with what she is doing which is looking for a job that she is qualified in? The majority of people don't want to be signing on it I have done it at one part in my life many years ago. Just shoe horning people into any job that comes up to get them off the unemployment stats is plain wrong.

 

[SWP's back]

But doesn't that depend on whether she can find the right job that fits in with what she is doing which is looking for a job that she is qualified in? The majority of people don't want to be signing on it I have done it at one part in my life many years ago. Just shoe horning people into any job that comes up to get them off the unemployment stats is plain wrong.

It’s what I did whilst waiting for the “perfect” job for me even though I didn’t particularly enjoy the work nor the hours. But it kept me from ever having to sign on after uni and gave me some measure of financial independence.

 

[Henkeman]

When I graduated about 20% went to university. Now it's about 50%. That's a wonderful thing, but imagining the number of "graduate" jobs has magically increased in the same way is a fantasy.

People compete for jobs. It was ever thus.