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One factor is that those who already have good jobs are less hasty to leave them because they (we) know that the grass isn't greener elsewhere at the moment.
So a lot of the better jobs that might see some churn during an employee's market are just being sat on by the incumbent
Not as unfortunate as the time he presented Top of the Pops and had to say that at number six was Suggs with Cecelia 
Except hes far from a gentleman. Hes a fucking hypocrite. Didn't you see the show in the dark where he was acting like a spoilt child that lost a game.
I read the post and I think you got it wrong. The post was asking why others from lower bckgrounds were also not moving up and whether social mobility is getting better or worse
This is the answer.
It’s also the same reason why the subreddit was created in the first place. There’s always a negative sentiment towards high-earners from the UK personal finance / FIRE subs and it made sense to create an avenue for people to discuss without others putting them down for earning a lot while not being rich themselves (yet).
Yes and when people mention it they have to qualify it with “I know that I am in an incredibly fortunate position…”
My mate came from nothing and until a few years ago was renting - now clears £400k per year. It seems like it has came very suddenly for him and he sees it as an opportunity no one in his family has ever had and a chance to build a legacy for them. But he can't believe he is in that situation and has no-one to apologise to.
Cannot agree more on the “disclaimer” with every post.
I started my IT career in Southeast Asia and was earning £250/month as my first salary. I was on academic excellence scholarship in uni for my education. Literally a humble beginning. Not yet quite on the same level as your friend but I’m close to that and it’s a huge jump from where I was.
I was able to move to Singapore, NYC, and now London for my tech career. I would like to say it’s good fortune but I also know I worked my ass off all these years to be here.
I love living in the UK but one of the toxic traits that I’m struggling with is that ambition is not often seen as a good thing here.
You can work your ass off and have good fortune. Working hard means nothing if all your luck is bad. But working hard, and smart, does create more opportunities and assuming your luck isn't atrocious eventually something will work out to one degree or another.
I think it's because you need more help than just ambition to succeed greatly. Like most people wouldn't be able to afford to move around the world unless they already had money.
Unless you're given money and help it's hard to get to the places you need to in order to begin the journey.
Not saying that it wasn't deserved help, just that it isn't available to everyone
Yes. On the UKPF subreddit you'd often get questions about tax at £100k, what to do at certain savings levels, or even just advice on budgeting when at a higher salary. Perfectly legitimate topics of discussion in a financial forum.
These would often be gatecrashed by someone saying "you earn £100k?!?! Never heard of such nonsense. I earn £18k and get by just fine thank you. Maybe if you didn't want fancy holidays, frothy coffees..."
It's like a competition for them.
>On the UKPF subreddit you'd often get questions about tax at £100k, what to do at certain savings levels, or even just advice on budgeting when at a higher salary. Perfectly legitimate topics of discussion in a financial forum.
UKPF did have a rough spell about 18 months ago when nearly every thread was one of two flavours: "I'm destitute/in a ton of debt, help" or "My partner and I both earn £60k, we have a reasonable mortgage lin a cheaper part of the country and don't have kids, why are we always broke? Also we spend at least £3k a month on sentened candles."
Which is ridiculous because on those salaries you could afford at least £7k a month on candles. Simple budgeting.
There was definitely a period where a lot of people's expectations hadn't caught up with the wild inflation of the last couple of years. I had sympathy with people who had trained, taken on more responsibility, and been promoted to £50k jobs only to realise it was now worth the same amount as their £40k salary from two years ago.
That sub also opened my eyes to how many parents mooch off their child's student loans, or commit fraud in their name but the kid just eats the punishment because they don't want their parents to get into trouble.
>That sub also opened my eyes to how many parents mooch off their child's student loans, or commit fraud in their name but the kid just eats the punishment because they don't want their parents to get into trouble.
It really does shock me how many people take out contracts in their kid's names. And not just a phone, but full-blown loans.
The problem is it becomes like a competition to the bottom.
It’s like people don’t want to see other people succeed because they themselves haven’t. Then in turn, they’ll be stumped into that salary level because they are not doing anything about it.
I highly recommend looking into construction / infrastructure companies supporting the many large energy projects across the country. They are literally crying out for people in client and contractor roles, there aren’t enough people to fill them and the majority pay good salaries for the roles available.
Most of the roles I see that people are struggling with are in the IT sector, you have transferable skills if you want to change industry.
This is so true! There are a number of huge infrastructure projects in the UK at the moment I currently work for one and they are crying out to recruit all sorts of roles in project management, commercial management, finance and engineering etc.
LinkedIn is a good starting place but also on company websites like National Grid, if you put infrastructure in to the job search you will find a lot of companies. There are also consulting companies if you don’t want to be client side that are desperate for people, Jacob’s, Arcadis, Motts are just a few with many more out there.
As part of the commitment to meet Net Zero there are projects not only on the generation side but also the infrastructure to move the generated electricity around the country. An example company would be National Grid from an infrastructure perspective for client sided roles with the main suppliers in the field (you can find through a quick google search) also needing to heavily resource.
The economy is stagnating because of Brexit and under investment. Most jobs are in London and the south east and wages are low as so many graduates are chasing them. Many UK regions are officially behind Eastern Europe in terms of gdp but the education and skill levels in those regions are atrocious so businesses aren't investing in them. I used to live in Germany and it is mostly so much richer than the UK you wouldn't believe it.
Brits can’t accept this reality at all. I’m in West Midlands and the baseline education level is shocking. This region has been poor so long they don’t even notice the recession. They just blame immigrants for taking their jobs.
The casual illiteracy is bizarre. Worked a few places and it’s ‘Andrew can’t read.’ To explain why he does whatever. Andrew is under 30. Happened at several places in 2 years. Only happened 4 times in Bristol in over a decade. Never happened any other country I lived at all.
Sometimes I wonder if so many generations of families living in the area have been illiterate that a worrying number of kids are being born in unproductive households and passing on the problem to the next generation.
Fewer people are having kids and the ones who are, are either doing it because they can only have one or that they don't know any better. Crazy how much being a parent tells other people about what kind of person you are.
Absolutely. It’s truly shocking the difference between here and Bristol. People here don’t leave to to to Birmingham for a day, let alone London. Ignorant and fearful.
I would agree that the skill drain of Brexit as well as the general competency level of the average working age Brit is a massive cause for concern. As a culture, our hard graft mentality is dying with each new generation and that's fair when you can see you are getting less out than you are putting in than when your parents were in the same position.
the job market has been shit from 2008-2020 , had a couple good years now it's back to normal, probably still better than the rolling average, I think .
we had 0 hour contracts , fake apprenticeships in retail (yes on working on a till in shop) ,unpaid internships a year long , job centres sending people as free laybour to the likes of tescos for 16week trials.
now every shop in town has staff wanted posters.
if you think this job market is bad you haven't seen shit frankly and I think this is only the beginning.
and lastly think of all the decent jobs in your parents' age that are now basically seen as crap jobs.
teachers
police
nurses
alot of roles in local councils was once very sort after and pretty well paid.
these alone must be a few million decent jobs gone , and now only exist as crap low paid jobs
No way are Apprentices actually doing apprentice only tasks in this role. You'd be trained up to a normal staff member but they will have used this apprentice loophole to pay you half the needed amount.
That's a pretty sweeping statement. For tech there were fuckloads of jobs going in that 2012-2023 period, it was genuinely easy to get employed (if you had experience/certs/degree). Now, there are noticeably way less.
Also salaries offered have dropped like fuck.
Yeah that is a fair statement, I'd say fairly similar for engineering stuff too (from what friends have said, so I could be wrong).
Well an example I can give in my field is that my current role and similar jobs were advertised at +-£45-50k 2 yrs ago, and there were a lot of them. Looking for the same roles now with the same or more responsibility, it's hard to find anything for over £37k.
Similarly, product owner roles would pay anywhere from £60k-£100k (senior, London) 2 years ago, now it's all £50-70k absolute max, I even see these roles going for as low as £30-35k.
I know that none of these salaries are 'low' and I am grateful to earn what I earn, but I work my ass off and the difference is noticeable.
I will be leaving the UK in the next couple of years I think, we pay so much tax and get nothing in return for it.
yeah I agree , if min wage is basically 24k now down the road at a shop , hardly seem worth the hassle for 37k.
by time you count for 3 lossed years of earnings, uni dept repayments . commuting cost , possible having to run a car if you don't work from home. probably some loss benefit top ups if you have kids .
are you really much better off to warrant the effort ?.
I think alot of the young have worked this out and just given up
A friend of mine has worked at the council for years and its paid absolutely shit, yet they say their benefits are why they stay. But i get paid much more with much better benefits from private health care, bonuses, soft skill training, parent groups, womens groups, even menopause seminars which my friend has never even heard of.
The uk has a trend of expecting a lot of experience for low pay. There are higher paid roles and I think generally there’s people savvy and qualified getting them and there’s a lot of qualified people who are slow to job hop or don’t have the confidence that they are good enough for that pay jump (forgetting they are seriously underpaid).
Because recruiters want an 18 year old with a degree, 5 years experience and is happy with being paid minimum wage. All the jobs I apply for I'm more than qualified but because I'm much older and want higher pay I never get to the interview stage.
This is my current problem. I’ve managed hotels and hostels around the world. Got about 10 years of hospitality experience. I moved back to the UK when covid hit, have I been able to find a job in that sector in four years? Fuck no. I think I’ve had one management interview, one supervisor interview and despite me having applied to entry level (housekeeping/front of house/reception jobs at pretty much every hotel related business in my area, had zero interviews. It’s simply easier and cheaper to employ a 18 year old than a 30 year old.
Yeah it really sucks right now! My friends daughter is 9 years old and her maths teacher is 45 with degrees in maths, that's the only job he could get.
I remember leaving university with a degree in music and no one cared that I had it. The job market today is a joke.
Honestly, the only job worth doing in the music business is being a music teacher. Forget trying to be a rock star or owning your own recording studio, you have to be incredibly lucky.
Yep the problem with that though is the market is so saturated, I offer lessons at more than half the cost of the competition and get nowhere some months. I was literally deaf until the age of 5, taught myself absolutely everything, you’d think there would be value in that. Think again.
One thing I've come to notice is the UK is rife with nepotism and jobs for mates.
I've worked for companies that every single role was actively given to friends or family of the company.
I saw a school "IT Manager" job advertised recently. Not only were you solely responsible for the equipment and systems in a school of 1000+, you also had to deliver training, manage purchasing and manage the network. £28k/yr is what they were offering.
It’s basically an Employers market
Unemployment has risen to 4.3%, so there are more people available and seeking employment, meanwhile for a lot of companies they’re getting 50-100+ applicants for every vacancy.
That means that employers can 1 - be VERY picky around who they interview and hire, and 2 - deliberately shaft people on wages because they competition is so high for every role that they know they can lowball people and if they don’t accept, they can hire someone who will
4.3% is still as low as it has been for the last 30 years. Also need to factor in the studies of less people seeking work than ever before, not all those unemployed are actually seeking work or do not need to.
I suppose it depends on the industry, in property it is very much the employee's market as there are a shortage of Chartered Surveyors, so much so the government are now paying for 90% of the cost of obtaining a degree.
Nope. Companies are making more than ever. But they are getting to the point of to keep the quotas going up they need to make more than their audience can possibly give them, so they just cut back on everything that lets them operate.
The story from almost all IT contractors I speak with is that 2-3 years ago they just turned on their phone, and several genuine contract offers would dump in every week, and it was merely a matter of accepting one with a decent daily rate. Now, the phone has stopped ringing. This is not caused by IR35. It is caused by lack of contracts available. If you believe a recession is not coming, you're being a fool.
A British software engineer who is made redundant from a bank isnt going after a minimum wage job. And the million open vacancies ? Zero hours or shit pay or shit job for shit company.
Unemployment rate of 4.3 percent ? Nah. Not buying that. That is people on a specific benefit for up to 6 months jumping through hoops to get the pittance they can to feed their kids.
And they only stay on that stat for a few months. Lies damn lies and statistics
The job market is shit and employers are taking the piss. Programme Manager in London for 45k ? Nah. Fuck off and keep fucking off and when they get there they should fuck off some more.
And you just know they will grind you down for whatever small amount they can get away with paying.
Who is to blame ? Bank of england and other central banks pushing QE and then going cold turkey on their little fucking money drug orgy. Stability should be the goal not constant growth at the expense of everything else. Not fucking 2 per cent inflation. Stability. That is what we all want. To know if we get cut that there will be jobs. Not no jobs cos everyone is cutting.
I agree it seems like the statistics are being fiddled, and it looks similar for the US as well. Have seen comments on other threads about the situation in USA. Government say there's a "skills shortage" and they've "created thousands of jobs" but no one can get hired
You’re not losing the plot. Lots of bigger companies posting non-existent vacancies in an effort to scare existing employees into thinking they could be on the chopping block and/or to appear more successful than they are (see here, for example: https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20240315-ghost-jobs-digital-job-boards).
I would argue against some of the people in this thread saying that people with “good” jobs are holding onto them. They’re possibly (probably) being underpaid and if not then I know of a lot of people who are MISERABLE holding onto these supposedly good jobs for the job security, only to be treated like dirt or bored out of their minds.
In addition to this, wages have stagnated horrendously so you quite literally could be earning more in a supermarket or hospitality than in a white collar/desk job (which some see as “real” work as opposed to the service industry). Some of the job postings going up are asking for the most ludicrous prerequisites, some of which are actually comedic (I remember hearing of one asking for 10+ years of experience with a particular program which has only existed for 5 years, as an example).
It’s a sad state of affairs but here we are. I opted to go to uni as a mature student and am vaguely hopeful that by the time I graduate things will be a little better. Thankfully, I suppose, if they aren’t — I’m so used to earning close to minimum wage and my wages have stagnated since I started working full time at 16 (in 2009, right after the crash) that I get by just fine with the minimum. I don’t think that people ought to accept this as the norm however 14 years of Tory rule have got us to this point. Fingers crossed for literally any kind of positive change, the bar is in hell right now.
Good response thank you. Evidence suggests you are right about "phantom" job postings and about people holding on to jobs that they'd rather not stay in, given the choice. I agree on both. Also, based on what I've seen it's definitely not true that a desk job pays better at the moment. Many want 3+ years experience in something fairly specialised for 22k, which we all know isn't a living wage right now for most people
The jobs that people want aren’t there anymore. They’re might be “loads” of jobs available but they’re no more than admin, stores or warehouses. People are staying put in their jobs if it’s going well and companies aren’t hiring lots of people.
Reddit is not the country.
The stats tell us the job market has slowed down but is still relatively hot compared to historic standards.
Reddit tells us there are literally no jobs.
I personally believe the employment stats are a bit misleading. I think the criteria for being unemployed is someone having looked for work for the last 4 weeks. This is why we have 10M people not working and not looking, many of these should be classed as unemployed if they'd like to work.
And (I think) only 1 hour of work per week is classed as employed.
The decline of manufacturing and heavy industry. Coal .. gone. Steel.. pretty much gone. British car industry - gone. Oil & gas, that long time provider of high-paying, skilled jobs, taxed into oblivion. For some reason successive governments seem to think the country can survive on the financial industry in London (which is also under threat if Shell and the like move to the US) and low paying service industry. Fucking stupid and almost irreversible without some serious incentives for business to come back and invest.
We are told the best way to invest is to diversify to reduce risk and increase the chance of being involved in industries that flourish. I'm sure a lot of our politicians understand this with their massive wealth, why do they not apply this to the countries finances? They are essentially going all in on a few industries which is just gambling.
Because its intentional. They want the masses to suffer while they gamble our future away with our taxes. Its not their future they are gambling. They are gambling yours.
This has been discussed to death, the UK is declining economically in many way and theres always ups and downs in hiring.
Not much any of us can do but find our best solutions.
Really we need this sub to start offering more solutions and tips, someone in here a while back posted about using AI for cvs and it’s helped me massively.
Declining economically? You have to love the redditors who sprout complete nonsense
https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/GBR/united-kingdom/gdp-growth-rate#:~:text=U.K.%20gdp%20growth%20rate%20for,a%200.24%25%20increase%20from%202018.
The UK is and has been declining economically for a while.
Inflation is high and the long term unemployment rate is high (9.83 million people are economically inactive). Government deficits & debt are high. Real wages are stagnant. The pound has lost lots of ground to the euro (our biggest trading partner). Personal and corporate debt are as high as ever.
The economy grew by 0.1% in 2023, do you think that's strong growth?
Its why people need to stop using a single fucking metric to measure their entire world view. The guy that invented the GDP measure actually predicted this would happen and warned against how it is now used today.
A number of factors.
Tighter budgets so employers will be trying to get the best they can for cheap.
If i can get one person who could potentially do 2 peoples job for maybe a small pay increase why not.
Abusing the fact that employers and companies are fully aware that people are becoming desperate for more money to survive.
On the other hand my friends son applied at tesco with 1 year retail experience and got the job so literally 1st job he applied for he got so 1/1
So jobs market is tough but not all sectors. Some people think they are to good to work for example at tesco so they would rather be unemployed go figure.
Its not about loving to be unemployed, its about getting the right job. The job that will build experience in a career that ultimately that person wants to have. Because the argument 'I just got any job while i was looking for the job' won't win anyone any brownie stars or applicable experience. If anything the 'just a job' will drain and limit the time spent looking for the job.
I was once unemployed and my unemployment advisor (absolutely forgot the actual name for the role) told me he did not want me to find any job and I'm so grateful he did because I got the time I needed to find a job that I'm passionate about and successful.
Comments like yours lead other people to feel like they have to when they don't.
This reminded me (35M) of my old boomer boss told me a story of some multi-million CEO climbed the corporate ladder starting out from a janitor, he was complaining about millennials/Gen z being too ambitious. I just smiled didn't responded, because I don't think he ever cleaned a busy female bathroom in the middle of events in a convention center.
Well, I left the job 6 months later, held out as long as I could while surviving as a professional on burger flipping wage.
Yeah, we want to have a viable route to an actual decent life worth living in the first place. Shit dead end jobs and living indefinitely with parents do not give you that.
Anecdotally, I’m seeing far fewer IT type roles in the 40-50k range being advertised than I saw 6 months ago. I’m not sure if that trend is true for other industries.
What I’m imaging is happening is businesses are pausing hiring in anticipation of rates lowering a bit in the next year.
It is exceptionally bad at the moment from where I’m standing, usually I could start a new job every week if I wanted but it seems interviews have become few and far between.
I think, and it's kinda obvious I suppose, is that employment experience depends on what industry your in, hence all this polar opposite experience. After nearly 3 months unemployed I came to the conclusion that I guess that's a wake up call for retraining (uni or whatever) into something new, which is what I'm doing. Gone back to do a MSc conversion into construction. However, trying to find a job part-time or local full-time (reduce commuting hours) is horrendous. I've got a degree in Ecology, got machinery tickets out the wazoo, however can't get a job. That's in grounds maintenance, shops, farm work, delivery drivers, all the types of work around me (all of which I've got experience of from previous jobs). I know it's not my CV quality as I run it by my father who runs the hiring process for the large energy company he works for.
There are shortages in the passenger transport industry (buses and coaches) and some places pay a decent-ish wage.
For example, I currently do about 3 hours worth of actual work a day, get paid for 10 and it's at a rate of £15 an hour. I only do school runs and primary school swims, no service work. It's a doddle in all honesty and I'm absolutely stealing a living.
I work in tech and I’ve seen people struggling to get a job after leaving very good positions - I think there are a couple of reasons why this is happening
- Big tech grew a lot during covid, they want to keep growing and layoffs look good to investors, so a lot of people lost their jobs because of that
- During covid a lot of companies hired aggressively to meet a demand that’s not there anymore
- AI is not taking jobs yet but there is uncertainty as to what the fields are going to look like in the coming years, I think it’s going to create more jobs but the uncertainty means companies are more worried about hiring aggressively
- Economies worldwide are not doing great, the UK specifically is still recovering after brexit, on top of that we had the war in Ukraine and the ongoing conflict in Gaza which are definitely affecting economies in a way or another (the energy crisis was quite a big one)
I think the economy will pick up again and the situation will improve, it takes time though and it sucks, there has been a massive transfer of wealth during Covid from the poor to the rich making inequality even bigger than it was before.
I like to be optimistic but I think something has to be done to find a way to tax assets and start building more affordable housing
I was wondering about AI and its influence on tech/IT jobs. I think I agree with your point - everyone is trying to work out what costs/labour they can cut or how they can increase efficiency by using it. Could easily be affecting hiring decisions. Also agree about the Covid boom
ATS/AI tools to eliminate the bulk of CVs. They're preventing most people's CVs from landing with the recruiter/employer. Before this was a thing, I'd get calls on 8-9 of 10 applications I would put out and be regularly interviewing.
Now? None. Not a single one gets back to me. I now have to spend hours and hours fighting some software just to get my CV seen, when it's always been one of the top performing before this shit came along. There are just as many vacancies available now as there was also, so it's not that there's just less of them.
I've had this thought about the use of AI for applications too and have had the same experience. My logic is, the fewer jobs there are and the "easier" it is to apply (one click etc) the more applications they get. I believe there are fewer jobs.. but regardless..
This logic was taken from the "Life After Layoff" YouTube channel where he mentions that one click apps mean thousands of CVs turned in. So apparently.. we've created a problem and then created a sub optimal solution for it and called it an improvement
Pay absolutely no attention to Reddit and jobs blogs, they're full of people that are struggling because they all want somewhere to go to scream into the void and I completely understand why, you just have to remember where you are.
It's like going to a drugs support group and thinking 9/10 people in this country are on drugs, it's just not a true reflection of reality. The truth is we're at very low unemployment levels compared to other periods in our history, we're also becoming a very picky nation when it comes to what work we're willing to do and I say that as someone with a specific skill set and training thats admittedly transferrable however most employers struggle to understand what working on snotty people's bmws has to do with customer service and problem solving.
I've been searching for analytical jobs for the last 2 years and it's been bleak. I am highly experienced and have 3 degrees. I used to get approached by headhunters on a monthly basis, since mid-2022, nothing. Here's what I've learnt to help explain....
1. In my field (tech/consultancy), there was a hiring frenzy during the pandemic as companies were on a rapid path to digitisation. That little bubble has of course burst, and there have been multiple large layoffs since then. So the market is flooded with experienced and skilled workers.
2. ATS platforms are commonly used to recruit, and they use AI to screen your CV. They give no shits about how qualified or experienced you are. If your CV doesn't parrot back the keywords in the job posting, your CV will be consigned to the scrapheap before even getting seen by a human.
3. Companies are now getting picky about where they recruit from. I got told that because I didn't work at a Big 4, they were unwilling to consider me. I've also seen adverts stipulating they want applicants from Facebook or Google.
4. Pay is objectively lower (I've analysed my pre 2010 salaries and adding inflation, I've found that comparable jobs today were being advertised at a lower rate). This means that it's a race to the bottom if you're competing for a role with someone who's willing to take a lower salary.
5. I've found multiple examples of job ads that are not bona fide. There are a lot of reposting sites that just want to harvest your personal information, and they are just reposting old ads but make them look current and even inflate salaries to lure you in. Also, unless a hirer explicitly shuts down the ad in their ATS, it will keep being reposted to LinkedIn.
5. Brexit.
6. Recession.
I could go on......
Really interesting comment. As I've said in a couple of other replies, I work in a tech related area (also has some relevance to analytics). Have been looking for 3 months and haven't had a decent offer yet. It seems like people have been funnelled into the digital/analytics space via the surrounding hype and the number of vacancies has actually reduced
This is literally me right now. Everyday is a grind, clicking 'send' or 'apply' on Indeed and Reed, feels like figuratively banging my head against the wall, it's so depressing. AEB courses are my only lead at the moment.
Thanks for posting what i was going to post.
Let me just say a quick thing. Today i found a phenomenon. I was browsing indeed. I did a 100 mile search radius from London. Out of the first 5-10 pages, at least 3-5 of the job adverts was from my workplace (advertised within the last 2 weeks) and some from a similar organisation down the road. I had to recheck that i wasnt going blind or stupid, and yes its true....
Anecdotally the situation is very bad....
I've noticed far fewer vacancies per geographic area on Indeed. I heard that Indeed has increased its fees for advertisers which may be part of the reason, but I don't think that explains everything. It seems barren to me
I got a new job recently and start very soon, you need to be active, the more you go for one, the more you go for interviews the better you will become at presenting yourself and your ideas, don’t get stagnant at a job where they arnt increasing your wage, move around.
I never noticed that.. No idea how I didn't. But yep that is super suspicious. Have suspected for ages there are thousands of applicants per remote role at the moment. Probably loads for local as well
Excess migration and lack of economic growth to match
Housing sector being smashed aswell, 300k homes built last year , 600k migrants in...... During a housing crisis lololol
In dollar terms Europe, including the UK, has been in recession since 2008.
The Chinese economy has grown 400% and is now bigger than Europe, the USA has grown 50% and is 50% bigger than Europe.
Despite the economy not getting any bigger, populations are, our "cheap green power" is 3x as expensive as in China, despite world electricity usage increasing by 25% its fallen 12% in Europe, thats businesses shutting down.
The news reports that "700,000 people came to the UK last year", but thats NET, 1.3mn came and 600k left, those 600k that left are the high added value people who create tomorrows growth industries, they are now in the USA, Arabia and South East Asia, and every year our best and brightest are chased away.
The last time we were in this situation we were still world leaders in tech, today Nvidia is worth as much as the entire FTSE100, which is all legacy industries circling the drain.
Our future is South America at best.
It fully depends on the area you work in… for example I am in finance and there are quite a few opportunities seemingly all the time.
I can definitely understand other sectors may be struggling.
If you are struggling at the moment, I’d be curious to know what sector and “stage” in your career you are at.
People are less prepared to move for jobs these days.
My dad moved from London to Milton Keynes, then to Newcastle and then back to Milton Keynes for jobs. He was never particularly well paid (sub £40k) so it wasn't like he was chasing high profile jobs.
That’s what I’ve done recently. Moved out of an area I’d ultimately like to settle in, but I had to take a career opportunity elsewhere for the mid-level experience.
Moving is horrifically expensive. Husband and I lived in Bedfordshire and worked in London. Both got made redundant 7 years ago, moved (despite my reservations) to my hometown in NW. It’s awful for jobs. He was lucky enough to be old enough to retire. I’m mid-40s.
I do have a job that is well paid for the area but if I wanted to move jobs, it’s difficult as there aren’t many, if any other options. I’d love to move back to London/Home Counties but we wouldn’t get enough on our house and my earnings to be able to afford anywhere.
I've managed to survive in another technical support job in a data centre but I still cannot find a career in IT no matter what I try, I've studied IT in college and Computer Science in uni and I have done a fair amount of projects at home and at work to gain practical experience. I've been applying for jobs since I graduated 3 years ago 😂. The job market is literally pure garbage. Like, I'm not even asking for much but apparently entry level jobs are just impossible to get into.
I think a lot of it is because people are aware the situation is pretty bleak so they’re just staying in the jobs they’re already in. Wages aren’t great for many roles, so it’s a bit of a case of better the devil you know. I’d love to change jobs right now as I’ve been at my current place for years, but when other roles I’m qualified for offer similar money, it’s hard to find the motivation to make that jump.
We’ve been one of the worst hit western countries in the recent recession, then slap brexit on top of that.
Wages here have always been shocking outside of finance/law for the most part, with some of the highest living cost in the world if you’re living in London.
Make this make sense. Average job with 5 years experience seems to be paying ca £40-50k. A shitty 2 bed in zone 3-4 costs about 2-2.5k a month plus bills.
Companies are lowballing because they can get away with it.
I think we're still seeing the after-effects of Covid in a lot of ways.
You have folks who lost their jobs, obviously went out and got new work, now happy with the stability.
There's a chunk of folk who were furloughed who used the time to retrain, or got new jobs that felt a bit more secure.
Lot of people who worked through who I think appreciated the security whilst seeing what was happening to others.
And then another group of people who have seen an improvement in their conditions with WFH/hybrid.
Add in the cost of living, people maybe delaying retirement because of it, and others not wanting to gamble on a new job just now, and you've got a really stagnant workforce that don't want to move as much as usual.
Been out of work since Oct and I have noticed an uptick in activity.. not massive. But I have had both inbound (people seeking me) and outbound (me applying) using a CV success this week.. it maybe just coincidence but it feels a lot more +ve all of a sudden.
Due to inflatiion most peoples disposible incomes have fallen. This week's stats showed retail sales have plummeted significantly, meaning that less spent in shops hence managers not keen to hire (Could explain why the tories have initiated the election, knowing that the ship is starting to sink the elections were annouced immediately after retail data came out.Higher interest rates makes it difficult for companies to borrow money and expand.
In real terms growth has been slowly contracting because the working age population has been expanding at a faster rate. There are too many people and there is not enough work. So they can pay shit wages and expect the most qualified from a large pool of applicants.
I’ve been on zero hour for 4 months after bringing in 2.5k a month (not much I know but I’ve been out of work for 9 years as a solo parent) I’ve now just started a new roll with a totally unrelated profession to anything I’ve done in the past year, you’ll get there you just have to keep pushing.
If someone repeatedly isn’t getting work there could be an underlying reason why … I self assessed and adjusted and got a result.
Good luck to all those struggling! 💕
We crushed the industrial sector because it isn't green. Can't have mines, fossil fuels, chemical plants, steel works etc because they pollute too much, so we drove the cost up until it was unsustainable. Much 'greener' to buy it from China...
Then we crushed the services sector post banking crisis, and then whacked it again with Brexit. The UK doesn't make much and it doesn't export much, so it is a poor country who thinks it is rich.
No companies = no jobs. If you want to start a company you'd start in in the US where they don't mind pollution as much, or in the EU where at least you can export to the rest of Europe easily.
I was watching a TV show about how London buses are manufactured yesterday. They are marketed as British made, but they just import the whole bottom chassis from abroad, complete with engine, electrics and even the steering wheel is fitted. They literally drive it off the lorry and into the factory to complete it.
We could make the entire bus here but it’s yet another manufacturing process offshored.
Honestly the UK is completely in poverty if you don't count London where the ultra wealthy live, the City Centre in Birmingham and maybe Solihull. Most areas are worse than third world countries with high living costs and low wages
Many online job adverts are for non-existent phantom jobs, so the government keep touting record advertised vacancies as meaning a booming economy but it’s nonsense. Fundamentally the main driver of unemployment at the moment is the “event that must not be named” that happened in 2016.
Because we're either in or heading into a major recession.
Something to do with adding £310-410bn to the public debt in 2020-21, £12bn to helping the US fight their proxy war with Russia, £3bn a year on putting "surprise tourists" up in fancy hotels.
Add to that a wrecked energy policy based on NetZero, adding to insane energy cost inflation.
Add a drop of overregulation of everything (how many trades take apprentices now that they have to do a boat load of paperwork for them?).
Buckle up: it's going to make the early 90s look like a walk in the park.
[1] https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9309/#:~:text=Current%20estimates%20of%20the%20total,the%20pandemic%20for%20that%20year
[2] https://www.gov.uk/government/news/pm-in-kyiv-uk-support-will-not-falter#:~:text=With%20this%20latest%20funding%2C%20the,squadron%20of%20Challenger%202%20tanks
[3] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/illegal-migration-bill-factsheets/illegal-migration-bill-overarching-factsheet#:~:text=The%20current%20broken%20asylum%20system%20costs%20the%20UK%20around%20%C2%A3,government%20and%20other%20local%20services
Because all the decent employees aren’t on this sub’ moaning about not getting a job because they are working and this sub’ is left with mostly those that can’t be bothered to put the effort into finding one (the usual “I’ve applied for five hundred jobs and had no response”, no you haven’t applied for one single job just sent off your generic CV with nothing else).
This sub’ is an echo chamber and rabbit hole for these people.
Over thirty three million people are employed, they ain’t here complaining about not having a job, a few dozen unemployed are here complaining though. What does that tell you?
Forget about it, you can tailor your CV and still not getting a response, most job descriptions are vague and only give out the job requirements partially, in my industry, they never reveal any thing other than some of the expectations, it will only ball up from the point of interview if you are qualified. You can waste your time sale yourself on cover letters based on what the company does and job posting, and not getting a response - why is that? Because project particulars cannot be revealed on job postings! How am I to imagine as an employee of your organization to deliver expected performance, in particular to your projects that requires different experiences and soft skills?
I've got my current offer through job consultants, there are no job postings - he didn't even know what the job requires other than "I've got a hunch that you will fit in" until I went in for an interview.
Putting in the effort does absolutely fuck all when so many employers are greedy arseholes who want experienced people for minimum wage and absolutely refuse to spend any time or money to train people. The jobs market for entry level and career changes is absolutely dire in lots of sectors.
And I'd bet plenty of employed people would complain about their jobs if you asked them. It's not just the unemployed who struggle with our current jobs market.
And have a totally shit miserable life with your parents because you can't afford to move out.
This country has a huge problem with terrible pay for loads of socially vital positions, combined with awful housing costs.
I feel there's a lot of "why aren't there any decent jobs" posts that don't really specify what they mean by "a decent job".
I see loads of jobs in my space (Product Marketing in B2B tech). These generally start at £40-50k but easily hit £100k+ in more senior roles. Is that decent enough? It certainly pays for my Rice Krispies.
But you have to have done some years on less well paid, more general roles to build up the relevant skills and find what makes you tick. Maybe even do some qualifications or training. Likely put your hand up for a few things outside your comfort zone too.
If I'm hiring, I want someone to articulate what they're looking for, what they have done, what they're passionate about. Not just someone who wants better pay and progression but doesn't really know what they want to do to get that.
I've had to chuck out tons of totally irrelevant CVs who don't even make an effort to say why they want the role, just yeeted it my way in the hope I'd pick them over the other qualified, experienced, and (most importantly) actually interested candidates who also applied.
Lots of big companies closed down, which flooded the market with unemployed people looking for a job. Companies are more careful with their budget, so they hire less. This gives less jobs, so more applicants for each job and companies can be picky. People leave a well paid job less often than before, even if they are unhappy, as the risk is too high, so there is less turnover and less openings for good positions.
It's scary how people can come to conclusions based on dodgy evidence.
This sub is selecting for those who can't find a job.
People who do, don't post here.
UK unemployment is at near record lows.
I am employed so nothing to complain about, but I think the job market is worse than it has been for a while. I used to be contacted by recruiters proactively on LinkedIn several times a month, and I haven't had any contacts for a while now.
I see also that salaries advertised have dropped a lot. I guess just the impact of supply (fewer jobs) and demand (many applicants).
I guess that's the impact (and aim) of raising interest rates to slow down the economy, reduce inflation and make company investments more expensive.
That's odd I know a lot of people who have found a decent job. My cousin who dropped out of school and bounced between jobs has found one recently that he loves and pays him about £15 per hour. I recently moved company's and I'm on 9k more then my last place. I wonder if it's area specific
It’s because there’s a massive influx of people into the country. E.g. in IT (my field) loads of Indians apply for roles and they’ll do it for next to nothing. Either that or roles are outsourced
Cause all people seem to care about is a job that will pay them money. What they do while they're there isn't really relevant to them so long as they get paid and as long as they have this mindset they'll never find a decent job.
As someone who is regularly involved in the hiring process for developers and testers I see the completely opposite, we are interviewing candidates who have offers coming out of their ears and are able to negotiate much higher salaries.
Sorry, but your post doesn't really mean anything without some context as to your discipline or skillsets. In my experience, the opposite is true in technical jobs, there's literally hundreds of positions per company that can't be filled. If you're talking about unskilled/ no experience jobs that anyone can get, then you might be right, I don't know.
I started interviewing for more jobs just over a year ago, applied to four places, and got 4 offers - as an engineer with 9 years experience out of uni. I played them against eachother a bit and got a massive payrise. Because of supply and demand. The place I left was in a deficit of a couple of hundred engineers, the place I joined needed just 1.
How relevant this is for you depends on your skillset and experience though.
Pretty sure somebody can find a decent job right now. Vague statement is vague. Maybe share your experiences with the job market and what career/level you're looking at.
I think the ratio of salary to cost of living is tough right now. Other than that I’d say my job i started last month is decent, with flexi time, 30 days annual leave, WFH 90% of the time.
99% of people in work and able to find more work aren't here.
It's like you go on any website like a Reddit or Imgur or any forum, you'd think Labour were gonna win every election by a landslide. Demographics.
I'm out of work and went to a jobs fair. Every little helps as they say so you never know. I was given a list of all the professionals that were there and went about the usual conversations. No one in that building had a list of actual jobs but every single one of them had a third party course they could refer to. I'm currently volunteering, committee support, brushing up on my office skills and on a course to help apply which has actually been very helpful but if the state of that job fair was any reflection of the current health market there's your answer.
You've probably studied and practiced for the wrong thing.
I did. Decided at 32 to go back to education and do something that regardless of the economic situation cannot be replaced . I chose civil engineering, i dont even want to be an engineer i just dont want to be made redundant, embarrassed and disrespected when the markets go up and down.
Any now im graduated at 40. On 55k with 3 payrises in 2 years , car allowance, fuel card, 37 hours a week and 3 days WFH.
Ye gotta re tool, re equip and choose something useful.
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One factor is that those who already have good jobs are less hasty to leave them because they (we) know that the grass isn't greener elsewhere at the moment. So a lot of the better jobs that might see some churn during an employee's market are just being sat on by the incumbent
I pictured a Chris Eubank type gentleman saying that
I'm going to read all reddit comments this way from now on Thankyou
> are just being sat on by the incumbent An unfortunate sentence for Eubank to say.
Not as unfortunate as the time he presented Top of the Pops and had to say that at number six was Suggs with Cecelia 
Except hes far from a gentleman. Hes a fucking hypocrite. Didn't you see the show in the dark where he was acting like a spoilt child that lost a game.
There are bais, people who are able to get another job isn't going to post because that isn't really worthy to make a post about
Exactly this. Go to the r/HENRYUK subreddit for the many success stories of people in the UK with high salaries.
ngl I thought this was going to be a sub for people bragging about finally being able to afford a Henry hoover
Honestly though, I'd take my battered Hetty vacuum over any Dyson pos that costs 3x as much. Worth every penny.
Recently inherited a hetty and Jesus christ, that girl can suck!
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I read the post and I think you got it wrong. The post was asking why others from lower bckgrounds were also not moving up and whether social mobility is getting better or worse
Those people are allowed a space to discuss whatever they feel like. They don't have to remember their "difficulties in the beginning".
This is the answer. It’s also the same reason why the subreddit was created in the first place. There’s always a negative sentiment towards high-earners from the UK personal finance / FIRE subs and it made sense to create an avenue for people to discuss without others putting them down for earning a lot while not being rich themselves (yet).
Yes and when people mention it they have to qualify it with “I know that I am in an incredibly fortunate position…” My mate came from nothing and until a few years ago was renting - now clears £400k per year. It seems like it has came very suddenly for him and he sees it as an opportunity no one in his family has ever had and a chance to build a legacy for them. But he can't believe he is in that situation and has no-one to apologise to.
Cannot agree more on the “disclaimer” with every post. I started my IT career in Southeast Asia and was earning £250/month as my first salary. I was on academic excellence scholarship in uni for my education. Literally a humble beginning. Not yet quite on the same level as your friend but I’m close to that and it’s a huge jump from where I was. I was able to move to Singapore, NYC, and now London for my tech career. I would like to say it’s good fortune but I also know I worked my ass off all these years to be here. I love living in the UK but one of the toxic traits that I’m struggling with is that ambition is not often seen as a good thing here.
Ambition actively trampled
You can work your ass off and have good fortune. Working hard means nothing if all your luck is bad. But working hard, and smart, does create more opportunities and assuming your luck isn't atrocious eventually something will work out to one degree or another.
I think it's because you need more help than just ambition to succeed greatly. Like most people wouldn't be able to afford to move around the world unless they already had money. Unless you're given money and help it's hard to get to the places you need to in order to begin the journey. Not saying that it wasn't deserved help, just that it isn't available to everyone
Yes. On the UKPF subreddit you'd often get questions about tax at £100k, what to do at certain savings levels, or even just advice on budgeting when at a higher salary. Perfectly legitimate topics of discussion in a financial forum. These would often be gatecrashed by someone saying "you earn £100k?!?! Never heard of such nonsense. I earn £18k and get by just fine thank you. Maybe if you didn't want fancy holidays, frothy coffees..." It's like a competition for them.
>On the UKPF subreddit you'd often get questions about tax at £100k, what to do at certain savings levels, or even just advice on budgeting when at a higher salary. Perfectly legitimate topics of discussion in a financial forum. UKPF did have a rough spell about 18 months ago when nearly every thread was one of two flavours: "I'm destitute/in a ton of debt, help" or "My partner and I both earn £60k, we have a reasonable mortgage lin a cheaper part of the country and don't have kids, why are we always broke? Also we spend at least £3k a month on sentened candles."
Which is ridiculous because on those salaries you could afford at least £7k a month on candles. Simple budgeting. There was definitely a period where a lot of people's expectations hadn't caught up with the wild inflation of the last couple of years. I had sympathy with people who had trained, taken on more responsibility, and been promoted to £50k jobs only to realise it was now worth the same amount as their £40k salary from two years ago. That sub also opened my eyes to how many parents mooch off their child's student loans, or commit fraud in their name but the kid just eats the punishment because they don't want their parents to get into trouble.
>That sub also opened my eyes to how many parents mooch off their child's student loans, or commit fraud in their name but the kid just eats the punishment because they don't want their parents to get into trouble. It really does shock me how many people take out contracts in their kid's names. And not just a phone, but full-blown loans.
The problem is it becomes like a competition to the bottom. It’s like people don’t want to see other people succeed because they themselves haven’t. Then in turn, they’ll be stumped into that salary level because they are not doing anything about it.
This is true
Its because all most talented people are posting on reddit
I highly recommend looking into construction / infrastructure companies supporting the many large energy projects across the country. They are literally crying out for people in client and contractor roles, there aren’t enough people to fill them and the majority pay good salaries for the roles available. Most of the roles I see that people are struggling with are in the IT sector, you have transferable skills if you want to change industry.
Where would such jobs regularly be advertised?
As a starting place, LinkedIn, National Grid as one example are recruiting for lots of roles currently.
This is so true! There are a number of huge infrastructure projects in the UK at the moment I currently work for one and they are crying out to recruit all sorts of roles in project management, commercial management, finance and engineering etc.
I would also like to know where they are advertised?
LinkedIn is a good starting place but also on company websites like National Grid, if you put infrastructure in to the job search you will find a lot of companies. There are also consulting companies if you don’t want to be client side that are desperate for people, Jacob’s, Arcadis, Motts are just a few with many more out there.
Could you elaborate on the large energy projects and where one might find a role?
As part of the commitment to meet Net Zero there are projects not only on the generation side but also the infrastructure to move the generated electricity around the country. An example company would be National Grid from an infrastructure perspective for client sided roles with the main suppliers in the field (you can find through a quick google search) also needing to heavily resource.
This is interesting. I work in a technology related area and had wondered if the issue was mainly in this area
The economy is stagnating because of Brexit and under investment. Most jobs are in London and the south east and wages are low as so many graduates are chasing them. Many UK regions are officially behind Eastern Europe in terms of gdp but the education and skill levels in those regions are atrocious so businesses aren't investing in them. I used to live in Germany and it is mostly so much richer than the UK you wouldn't believe it.
Brits can’t accept this reality at all. I’m in West Midlands and the baseline education level is shocking. This region has been poor so long they don’t even notice the recession. They just blame immigrants for taking their jobs.
Yeah the West Midlands is shockingly poor. Outside that bit of Cov and Birmingham for shopping and shit it’s a mess.
The casual illiteracy is bizarre. Worked a few places and it’s ‘Andrew can’t read.’ To explain why he does whatever. Andrew is under 30. Happened at several places in 2 years. Only happened 4 times in Bristol in over a decade. Never happened any other country I lived at all.
Sometimes I wonder if so many generations of families living in the area have been illiterate that a worrying number of kids are being born in unproductive households and passing on the problem to the next generation. Fewer people are having kids and the ones who are, are either doing it because they can only have one or that they don't know any better. Crazy how much being a parent tells other people about what kind of person you are.
Absolutely. It’s truly shocking the difference between here and Bristol. People here don’t leave to to to Birmingham for a day, let alone London. Ignorant and fearful.
Immigration depresses wages especially for the poorly educated. So I'm not surprised they're upset.
Don’t forget decades of high taxes which have disincentivised people working longer / harder and innovation in general
I would agree that the skill drain of Brexit as well as the general competency level of the average working age Brit is a massive cause for concern. As a culture, our hard graft mentality is dying with each new generation and that's fair when you can see you are getting less out than you are putting in than when your parents were in the same position.
the job market has been shit from 2008-2020 , had a couple good years now it's back to normal, probably still better than the rolling average, I think . we had 0 hour contracts , fake apprenticeships in retail (yes on working on a till in shop) ,unpaid internships a year long , job centres sending people as free laybour to the likes of tescos for 16week trials. now every shop in town has staff wanted posters. if you think this job market is bad you haven't seen shit frankly and I think this is only the beginning. and lastly think of all the decent jobs in your parents' age that are now basically seen as crap jobs. teachers police nurses alot of roles in local councils was once very sort after and pretty well paid. these alone must be a few million decent jobs gone , and now only exist as crap low paid jobs
I remember seeing apprenticeships for McDonald’s and subway. Like on already shit wages you’d prob be paid less as an “apprentice”
yeah they was , that was the whole point in them, even cheaper staff , aprentership pay as of today is £5.28 an hour .
No way are Apprentices actually doing apprentice only tasks in this role. You'd be trained up to a normal staff member but they will have used this apprentice loophole to pay you half the needed amount.
That's a pretty sweeping statement. For tech there were fuckloads of jobs going in that 2012-2023 period, it was genuinely easy to get employed (if you had experience/certs/degree). Now, there are noticeably way less. Also salaries offered have dropped like fuck.
think techs always been an outlier tho . what was the wages before and now out of interest?
Yeah that is a fair statement, I'd say fairly similar for engineering stuff too (from what friends have said, so I could be wrong). Well an example I can give in my field is that my current role and similar jobs were advertised at +-£45-50k 2 yrs ago, and there were a lot of them. Looking for the same roles now with the same or more responsibility, it's hard to find anything for over £37k. Similarly, product owner roles would pay anywhere from £60k-£100k (senior, London) 2 years ago, now it's all £50-70k absolute max, I even see these roles going for as low as £30-35k. I know that none of these salaries are 'low' and I am grateful to earn what I earn, but I work my ass off and the difference is noticeable. I will be leaving the UK in the next couple of years I think, we pay so much tax and get nothing in return for it.
yeah I agree , if min wage is basically 24k now down the road at a shop , hardly seem worth the hassle for 37k. by time you count for 3 lossed years of earnings, uni dept repayments . commuting cost , possible having to run a car if you don't work from home. probably some loss benefit top ups if you have kids . are you really much better off to warrant the effort ?. I think alot of the young have worked this out and just given up
A friend of mine has worked at the council for years and its paid absolutely shit, yet they say their benefits are why they stay. But i get paid much more with much better benefits from private health care, bonuses, soft skill training, parent groups, womens groups, even menopause seminars which my friend has never even heard of.
Tories destroyed the economy
And the social fabric and resultantly culture, which is why nobody has any optimism. Oh and the NHS and a bunch of other things.
Yep. Remember to vote next general election.
The uk has a trend of expecting a lot of experience for low pay. There are higher paid roles and I think generally there’s people savvy and qualified getting them and there’s a lot of qualified people who are slow to job hop or don’t have the confidence that they are good enough for that pay jump (forgetting they are seriously underpaid).
Because recruiters want an 18 year old with a degree, 5 years experience and is happy with being paid minimum wage. All the jobs I apply for I'm more than qualified but because I'm much older and want higher pay I never get to the interview stage.
This is my current problem. I’ve managed hotels and hostels around the world. Got about 10 years of hospitality experience. I moved back to the UK when covid hit, have I been able to find a job in that sector in four years? Fuck no. I think I’ve had one management interview, one supervisor interview and despite me having applied to entry level (housekeeping/front of house/reception jobs at pretty much every hotel related business in my area, had zero interviews. It’s simply easier and cheaper to employ a 18 year old than a 30 year old.
Yeah it really sucks right now! My friends daughter is 9 years old and her maths teacher is 45 with degrees in maths, that's the only job he could get. I remember leaving university with a degree in music and no one cared that I had it. The job market today is a joke.
And here I was thinking about going back to uni to study music (am a guitar teacher now) lol.
Honestly, the only job worth doing in the music business is being a music teacher. Forget trying to be a rock star or owning your own recording studio, you have to be incredibly lucky.
Yep the problem with that though is the market is so saturated, I offer lessons at more than half the cost of the competition and get nowhere some months. I was literally deaf until the age of 5, taught myself absolutely everything, you’d think there would be value in that. Think again.
One thing I've come to notice is the UK is rife with nepotism and jobs for mates. I've worked for companies that every single role was actively given to friends or family of the company.
I saw a school "IT Manager" job advertised recently. Not only were you solely responsible for the equipment and systems in a school of 1000+, you also had to deliver training, manage purchasing and manage the network. £28k/yr is what they were offering.
Pitiful. And to add insult to injury, they probably make you do a yearly performance review to see what else can you can do for them for no extra pay.
It’s basically an Employers market Unemployment has risen to 4.3%, so there are more people available and seeking employment, meanwhile for a lot of companies they’re getting 50-100+ applicants for every vacancy. That means that employers can 1 - be VERY picky around who they interview and hire, and 2 - deliberately shaft people on wages because they competition is so high for every role that they know they can lowball people and if they don’t accept, they can hire someone who will
4.3% is still as low as it has been for the last 30 years. Also need to factor in the studies of less people seeking work than ever before, not all those unemployed are actually seeking work or do not need to. I suppose it depends on the industry, in property it is very much the employee's market as there are a shortage of Chartered Surveyors, so much so the government are now paying for 90% of the cost of obtaining a degree.
Oh boy, if you think 4.3% unemployment is an employers market, you have obviously not been alive for very long.
This doesn't add up. Companies are claiming they are having massive shortages yet employment has rise to over 4%?
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Nope. Companies are making more than ever. But they are getting to the point of to keep the quotas going up they need to make more than their audience can possibly give them, so they just cut back on everything that lets them operate.
The story from almost all IT contractors I speak with is that 2-3 years ago they just turned on their phone, and several genuine contract offers would dump in every week, and it was merely a matter of accepting one with a decent daily rate. Now, the phone has stopped ringing. This is not caused by IR35. It is caused by lack of contracts available. If you believe a recession is not coming, you're being a fool.
This aligns with things I've seen/heard from others in the tech space. Starting to think that could be right about a (deeper?) recession
There is no doubt in my mind this is happening.
Probably because this sub is full of low quality complainants
A British software engineer who is made redundant from a bank isnt going after a minimum wage job. And the million open vacancies ? Zero hours or shit pay or shit job for shit company. Unemployment rate of 4.3 percent ? Nah. Not buying that. That is people on a specific benefit for up to 6 months jumping through hoops to get the pittance they can to feed their kids. And they only stay on that stat for a few months. Lies damn lies and statistics The job market is shit and employers are taking the piss. Programme Manager in London for 45k ? Nah. Fuck off and keep fucking off and when they get there they should fuck off some more. And you just know they will grind you down for whatever small amount they can get away with paying. Who is to blame ? Bank of england and other central banks pushing QE and then going cold turkey on their little fucking money drug orgy. Stability should be the goal not constant growth at the expense of everything else. Not fucking 2 per cent inflation. Stability. That is what we all want. To know if we get cut that there will be jobs. Not no jobs cos everyone is cutting.
I agree it seems like the statistics are being fiddled, and it looks similar for the US as well. Have seen comments on other threads about the situation in USA. Government say there's a "skills shortage" and they've "created thousands of jobs" but no one can get hired
You’re not losing the plot. Lots of bigger companies posting non-existent vacancies in an effort to scare existing employees into thinking they could be on the chopping block and/or to appear more successful than they are (see here, for example: https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20240315-ghost-jobs-digital-job-boards). I would argue against some of the people in this thread saying that people with “good” jobs are holding onto them. They’re possibly (probably) being underpaid and if not then I know of a lot of people who are MISERABLE holding onto these supposedly good jobs for the job security, only to be treated like dirt or bored out of their minds. In addition to this, wages have stagnated horrendously so you quite literally could be earning more in a supermarket or hospitality than in a white collar/desk job (which some see as “real” work as opposed to the service industry). Some of the job postings going up are asking for the most ludicrous prerequisites, some of which are actually comedic (I remember hearing of one asking for 10+ years of experience with a particular program which has only existed for 5 years, as an example). It’s a sad state of affairs but here we are. I opted to go to uni as a mature student and am vaguely hopeful that by the time I graduate things will be a little better. Thankfully, I suppose, if they aren’t — I’m so used to earning close to minimum wage and my wages have stagnated since I started working full time at 16 (in 2009, right after the crash) that I get by just fine with the minimum. I don’t think that people ought to accept this as the norm however 14 years of Tory rule have got us to this point. Fingers crossed for literally any kind of positive change, the bar is in hell right now.
Good response thank you. Evidence suggests you are right about "phantom" job postings and about people holding on to jobs that they'd rather not stay in, given the choice. I agree on both. Also, based on what I've seen it's definitely not true that a desk job pays better at the moment. Many want 3+ years experience in something fairly specialised for 22k, which we all know isn't a living wage right now for most people
The jobs that people want aren’t there anymore. They’re might be “loads” of jobs available but they’re no more than admin, stores or warehouses. People are staying put in their jobs if it’s going well and companies aren’t hiring lots of people.
Reddit is not the country. The stats tell us the job market has slowed down but is still relatively hot compared to historic standards. Reddit tells us there are literally no jobs.
I personally believe the employment stats are a bit misleading. I think the criteria for being unemployed is someone having looked for work for the last 4 weeks. This is why we have 10M people not working and not looking, many of these should be classed as unemployed if they'd like to work. And (I think) only 1 hour of work per week is classed as employed.
The decline of manufacturing and heavy industry. Coal .. gone. Steel.. pretty much gone. British car industry - gone. Oil & gas, that long time provider of high-paying, skilled jobs, taxed into oblivion. For some reason successive governments seem to think the country can survive on the financial industry in London (which is also under threat if Shell and the like move to the US) and low paying service industry. Fucking stupid and almost irreversible without some serious incentives for business to come back and invest.
We are told the best way to invest is to diversify to reduce risk and increase the chance of being involved in industries that flourish. I'm sure a lot of our politicians understand this with their massive wealth, why do they not apply this to the countries finances? They are essentially going all in on a few industries which is just gambling.
Because its intentional. They want the masses to suffer while they gamble our future away with our taxes. Its not their future they are gambling. They are gambling yours.
This has been discussed to death, the UK is declining economically in many way and theres always ups and downs in hiring. Not much any of us can do but find our best solutions. Really we need this sub to start offering more solutions and tips, someone in here a while back posted about using AI for cvs and it’s helped me massively.
Declining economically? You have to love the redditors who sprout complete nonsense https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/GBR/united-kingdom/gdp-growth-rate#:~:text=U.K.%20gdp%20growth%20rate%20for,a%200.24%25%20increase%20from%202018.
The UK is and has been declining economically for a while. Inflation is high and the long term unemployment rate is high (9.83 million people are economically inactive). Government deficits & debt are high. Real wages are stagnant. The pound has lost lots of ground to the euro (our biggest trading partner). Personal and corporate debt are as high as ever. The economy grew by 0.1% in 2023, do you think that's strong growth?
Now do GDP per capita. It’s lower than in 2007.
I wrote loads of text but this is the answer.
Its why people need to stop using a single fucking metric to measure their entire world view. The guy that invented the GDP measure actually predicted this would happen and warned against how it is now used today.
The data doesn’t seem to match the reality of people on the ground. GDP is a bad statistic for that reason.
how was AI used in this case?
A number of factors. Tighter budgets so employers will be trying to get the best they can for cheap. If i can get one person who could potentially do 2 peoples job for maybe a small pay increase why not. Abusing the fact that employers and companies are fully aware that people are becoming desperate for more money to survive. On the other hand my friends son applied at tesco with 1 year retail experience and got the job so literally 1st job he applied for he got so 1/1 So jobs market is tough but not all sectors. Some people think they are to good to work for example at tesco so they would rather be unemployed go figure.
Its not about loving to be unemployed, its about getting the right job. The job that will build experience in a career that ultimately that person wants to have. Because the argument 'I just got any job while i was looking for the job' won't win anyone any brownie stars or applicable experience. If anything the 'just a job' will drain and limit the time spent looking for the job. I was once unemployed and my unemployment advisor (absolutely forgot the actual name for the role) told me he did not want me to find any job and I'm so grateful he did because I got the time I needed to find a job that I'm passionate about and successful. Comments like yours lead other people to feel like they have to when they don't.
This reminded me (35M) of my old boomer boss told me a story of some multi-million CEO climbed the corporate ladder starting out from a janitor, he was complaining about millennials/Gen z being too ambitious. I just smiled didn't responded, because I don't think he ever cleaned a busy female bathroom in the middle of events in a convention center. Well, I left the job 6 months later, held out as long as I could while surviving as a professional on burger flipping wage.
Yeah, we want to have a viable route to an actual decent life worth living in the first place. Shit dead end jobs and living indefinitely with parents do not give you that.
Must have been awhile ago that, jobcentre advisors push people into any paid work now whether its suitable or not.
Anecdotally, I’m seeing far fewer IT type roles in the 40-50k range being advertised than I saw 6 months ago. I’m not sure if that trend is true for other industries. What I’m imaging is happening is businesses are pausing hiring in anticipation of rates lowering a bit in the next year.
It is exceptionally bad at the moment from where I’m standing, usually I could start a new job every week if I wanted but it seems interviews have become few and far between.
I think, and it's kinda obvious I suppose, is that employment experience depends on what industry your in, hence all this polar opposite experience. After nearly 3 months unemployed I came to the conclusion that I guess that's a wake up call for retraining (uni or whatever) into something new, which is what I'm doing. Gone back to do a MSc conversion into construction. However, trying to find a job part-time or local full-time (reduce commuting hours) is horrendous. I've got a degree in Ecology, got machinery tickets out the wazoo, however can't get a job. That's in grounds maintenance, shops, farm work, delivery drivers, all the types of work around me (all of which I've got experience of from previous jobs). I know it's not my CV quality as I run it by my father who runs the hiring process for the large energy company he works for.
There are shortages in the passenger transport industry (buses and coaches) and some places pay a decent-ish wage. For example, I currently do about 3 hours worth of actual work a day, get paid for 10 and it's at a rate of £15 an hour. I only do school runs and primary school swims, no service work. It's a doddle in all honesty and I'm absolutely stealing a living.
I work in tech and I’ve seen people struggling to get a job after leaving very good positions - I think there are a couple of reasons why this is happening - Big tech grew a lot during covid, they want to keep growing and layoffs look good to investors, so a lot of people lost their jobs because of that - During covid a lot of companies hired aggressively to meet a demand that’s not there anymore - AI is not taking jobs yet but there is uncertainty as to what the fields are going to look like in the coming years, I think it’s going to create more jobs but the uncertainty means companies are more worried about hiring aggressively - Economies worldwide are not doing great, the UK specifically is still recovering after brexit, on top of that we had the war in Ukraine and the ongoing conflict in Gaza which are definitely affecting economies in a way or another (the energy crisis was quite a big one) I think the economy will pick up again and the situation will improve, it takes time though and it sucks, there has been a massive transfer of wealth during Covid from the poor to the rich making inequality even bigger than it was before. I like to be optimistic but I think something has to be done to find a way to tax assets and start building more affordable housing
I was wondering about AI and its influence on tech/IT jobs. I think I agree with your point - everyone is trying to work out what costs/labour they can cut or how they can increase efficiency by using it. Could easily be affecting hiring decisions. Also agree about the Covid boom
ATS/AI tools to eliminate the bulk of CVs. They're preventing most people's CVs from landing with the recruiter/employer. Before this was a thing, I'd get calls on 8-9 of 10 applications I would put out and be regularly interviewing. Now? None. Not a single one gets back to me. I now have to spend hours and hours fighting some software just to get my CV seen, when it's always been one of the top performing before this shit came along. There are just as many vacancies available now as there was also, so it's not that there's just less of them.
I've had this thought about the use of AI for applications too and have had the same experience. My logic is, the fewer jobs there are and the "easier" it is to apply (one click etc) the more applications they get. I believe there are fewer jobs.. but regardless.. This logic was taken from the "Life After Layoff" YouTube channel where he mentions that one click apps mean thousands of CVs turned in. So apparently.. we've created a problem and then created a sub optimal solution for it and called it an improvement
Pay absolutely no attention to Reddit and jobs blogs, they're full of people that are struggling because they all want somewhere to go to scream into the void and I completely understand why, you just have to remember where you are. It's like going to a drugs support group and thinking 9/10 people in this country are on drugs, it's just not a true reflection of reality. The truth is we're at very low unemployment levels compared to other periods in our history, we're also becoming a very picky nation when it comes to what work we're willing to do and I say that as someone with a specific skill set and training thats admittedly transferrable however most employers struggle to understand what working on snotty people's bmws has to do with customer service and problem solving.
I've been searching for analytical jobs for the last 2 years and it's been bleak. I am highly experienced and have 3 degrees. I used to get approached by headhunters on a monthly basis, since mid-2022, nothing. Here's what I've learnt to help explain.... 1. In my field (tech/consultancy), there was a hiring frenzy during the pandemic as companies were on a rapid path to digitisation. That little bubble has of course burst, and there have been multiple large layoffs since then. So the market is flooded with experienced and skilled workers. 2. ATS platforms are commonly used to recruit, and they use AI to screen your CV. They give no shits about how qualified or experienced you are. If your CV doesn't parrot back the keywords in the job posting, your CV will be consigned to the scrapheap before even getting seen by a human. 3. Companies are now getting picky about where they recruit from. I got told that because I didn't work at a Big 4, they were unwilling to consider me. I've also seen adverts stipulating they want applicants from Facebook or Google. 4. Pay is objectively lower (I've analysed my pre 2010 salaries and adding inflation, I've found that comparable jobs today were being advertised at a lower rate). This means that it's a race to the bottom if you're competing for a role with someone who's willing to take a lower salary. 5. I've found multiple examples of job ads that are not bona fide. There are a lot of reposting sites that just want to harvest your personal information, and they are just reposting old ads but make them look current and even inflate salaries to lure you in. Also, unless a hirer explicitly shuts down the ad in their ATS, it will keep being reposted to LinkedIn. 5. Brexit. 6. Recession. I could go on......
Really interesting comment. As I've said in a couple of other replies, I work in a tech related area (also has some relevance to analytics). Have been looking for 3 months and haven't had a decent offer yet. It seems like people have been funnelled into the digital/analytics space via the surrounding hype and the number of vacancies has actually reduced
This is literally me right now. Everyday is a grind, clicking 'send' or 'apply' on Indeed and Reed, feels like figuratively banging my head against the wall, it's so depressing. AEB courses are my only lead at the moment.
Glad it's not just me
Thanks for posting what i was going to post. Let me just say a quick thing. Today i found a phenomenon. I was browsing indeed. I did a 100 mile search radius from London. Out of the first 5-10 pages, at least 3-5 of the job adverts was from my workplace (advertised within the last 2 weeks) and some from a similar organisation down the road. I had to recheck that i wasnt going blind or stupid, and yes its true.... Anecdotally the situation is very bad....
I've noticed far fewer vacancies per geographic area on Indeed. I heard that Indeed has increased its fees for advertisers which may be part of the reason, but I don't think that explains everything. It seems barren to me
I got a new job recently and start very soon, you need to be active, the more you go for one, the more you go for interviews the better you will become at presenting yourself and your ideas, don’t get stagnant at a job where they arnt increasing your wage, move around.
Whats curious is indeed are now hiding number of applicants per job
Glad I wasn't the only one to notice that. A month back I was astonished to find myself competing with 100-150 people for each job. No I have no idea
I never noticed that.. No idea how I didn't. But yep that is super suspicious. Have suspected for ages there are thousands of applicants per remote role at the moment. Probably loads for local as well
Excess migration and lack of economic growth to match Housing sector being smashed aswell, 300k homes built last year , 600k migrants in...... During a housing crisis lololol
In dollar terms Europe, including the UK, has been in recession since 2008. The Chinese economy has grown 400% and is now bigger than Europe, the USA has grown 50% and is 50% bigger than Europe. Despite the economy not getting any bigger, populations are, our "cheap green power" is 3x as expensive as in China, despite world electricity usage increasing by 25% its fallen 12% in Europe, thats businesses shutting down. The news reports that "700,000 people came to the UK last year", but thats NET, 1.3mn came and 600k left, those 600k that left are the high added value people who create tomorrows growth industries, they are now in the USA, Arabia and South East Asia, and every year our best and brightest are chased away. The last time we were in this situation we were still world leaders in tech, today Nvidia is worth as much as the entire FTSE100, which is all legacy industries circling the drain. Our future is South America at best.
Highest ever minimum wage and a weak economy along with people unwilling to job hop to open up jobs FULL STOP
It fully depends on the area you work in… for example I am in finance and there are quite a few opportunities seemingly all the time. I can definitely understand other sectors may be struggling. If you are struggling at the moment, I’d be curious to know what sector and “stage” in your career you are at.
Pay Per Click advertising, just under 2 years experience. So early stage career in this area
People are less prepared to move for jobs these days. My dad moved from London to Milton Keynes, then to Newcastle and then back to Milton Keynes for jobs. He was never particularly well paid (sub £40k) so it wasn't like he was chasing high profile jobs.
That’s what I’ve done recently. Moved out of an area I’d ultimately like to settle in, but I had to take a career opportunity elsewhere for the mid-level experience.
Moving is horrifically expensive. Husband and I lived in Bedfordshire and worked in London. Both got made redundant 7 years ago, moved (despite my reservations) to my hometown in NW. It’s awful for jobs. He was lucky enough to be old enough to retire. I’m mid-40s. I do have a job that is well paid for the area but if I wanted to move jobs, it’s difficult as there aren’t many, if any other options. I’d love to move back to London/Home Counties but we wouldn’t get enough on our house and my earnings to be able to afford anywhere.
Its sad how most of the worthwhile jobs are in London but living costs are insane there that anything under £50k is living in poverty over there
I've managed to survive in another technical support job in a data centre but I still cannot find a career in IT no matter what I try, I've studied IT in college and Computer Science in uni and I have done a fair amount of projects at home and at work to gain practical experience. I've been applying for jobs since I graduated 3 years ago 😂. The job market is literally pure garbage. Like, I'm not even asking for much but apparently entry level jobs are just impossible to get into.
I think a lot of it is because people are aware the situation is pretty bleak so they’re just staying in the jobs they’re already in. Wages aren’t great for many roles, so it’s a bit of a case of better the devil you know. I’d love to change jobs right now as I’ve been at my current place for years, but when other roles I’m qualified for offer similar money, it’s hard to find the motivation to make that jump.
That's interesting.. thanks for your comment
We’ve been one of the worst hit western countries in the recent recession, then slap brexit on top of that. Wages here have always been shocking outside of finance/law for the most part, with some of the highest living cost in the world if you’re living in London. Make this make sense. Average job with 5 years experience seems to be paying ca £40-50k. A shitty 2 bed in zone 3-4 costs about 2-2.5k a month plus bills. Companies are lowballing because they can get away with it.
I think we're still seeing the after-effects of Covid in a lot of ways. You have folks who lost their jobs, obviously went out and got new work, now happy with the stability. There's a chunk of folk who were furloughed who used the time to retrain, or got new jobs that felt a bit more secure. Lot of people who worked through who I think appreciated the security whilst seeing what was happening to others. And then another group of people who have seen an improvement in their conditions with WFH/hybrid. Add in the cost of living, people maybe delaying retirement because of it, and others not wanting to gamble on a new job just now, and you've got a really stagnant workforce that don't want to move as much as usual.
I've never thought about delayed retirement and that's an interesting thought
Yes unemployment is creeoing up in the uk according to the laterlst statistics, the job market is getting worse.
Been out of work since Oct and I have noticed an uptick in activity.. not massive. But I have had both inbound (people seeking me) and outbound (me applying) using a CV success this week.. it maybe just coincidence but it feels a lot more +ve all of a sudden.
Due to inflatiion most peoples disposible incomes have fallen. This week's stats showed retail sales have plummeted significantly, meaning that less spent in shops hence managers not keen to hire (Could explain why the tories have initiated the election, knowing that the ship is starting to sink the elections were annouced immediately after retail data came out.Higher interest rates makes it difficult for companies to borrow money and expand.
In real terms growth has been slowly contracting because the working age population has been expanding at a faster rate. There are too many people and there is not enough work. So they can pay shit wages and expect the most qualified from a large pool of applicants.
Interesting angle.. thanks
I’ve been on zero hour for 4 months after bringing in 2.5k a month (not much I know but I’ve been out of work for 9 years as a solo parent) I’ve now just started a new roll with a totally unrelated profession to anything I’ve done in the past year, you’ll get there you just have to keep pushing. If someone repeatedly isn’t getting work there could be an underlying reason why … I self assessed and adjusted and got a result. Good luck to all those struggling! 💕
Is that 2.5 net? 2.5 after tax isn’t bad
It is if your mortgage is £2k 😂
We crushed the industrial sector because it isn't green. Can't have mines, fossil fuels, chemical plants, steel works etc because they pollute too much, so we drove the cost up until it was unsustainable. Much 'greener' to buy it from China... Then we crushed the services sector post banking crisis, and then whacked it again with Brexit. The UK doesn't make much and it doesn't export much, so it is a poor country who thinks it is rich. No companies = no jobs. If you want to start a company you'd start in in the US where they don't mind pollution as much, or in the EU where at least you can export to the rest of Europe easily.
I was watching a TV show about how London buses are manufactured yesterday. They are marketed as British made, but they just import the whole bottom chassis from abroad, complete with engine, electrics and even the steering wheel is fitted. They literally drive it off the lorry and into the factory to complete it. We could make the entire bus here but it’s yet another manufacturing process offshored.
We stick German car parts together because we're too dumb to engineer them ourselves.
It's greener to buy it from China. I see the irony completely
Honestly the UK is completely in poverty if you don't count London where the ultra wealthy live, the City Centre in Birmingham and maybe Solihull. Most areas are worse than third world countries with high living costs and low wages
Many online job adverts are for non-existent phantom jobs, so the government keep touting record advertised vacancies as meaning a booming economy but it’s nonsense. Fundamentally the main driver of unemployment at the moment is the “event that must not be named” that happened in 2016.
Because we're either in or heading into a major recession. Something to do with adding £310-410bn to the public debt in 2020-21, £12bn to helping the US fight their proxy war with Russia, £3bn a year on putting "surprise tourists" up in fancy hotels. Add to that a wrecked energy policy based on NetZero, adding to insane energy cost inflation. Add a drop of overregulation of everything (how many trades take apprentices now that they have to do a boat load of paperwork for them?). Buckle up: it's going to make the early 90s look like a walk in the park. [1] https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9309/#:~:text=Current%20estimates%20of%20the%20total,the%20pandemic%20for%20that%20year [2] https://www.gov.uk/government/news/pm-in-kyiv-uk-support-will-not-falter#:~:text=With%20this%20latest%20funding%2C%20the,squadron%20of%20Challenger%202%20tanks [3] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/illegal-migration-bill-factsheets/illegal-migration-bill-overarching-factsheet#:~:text=The%20current%20broken%20asylum%20system%20costs%20the%20UK%20around%20%C2%A3,government%20and%20other%20local%20services
Because all the decent employees aren’t on this sub’ moaning about not getting a job because they are working and this sub’ is left with mostly those that can’t be bothered to put the effort into finding one (the usual “I’ve applied for five hundred jobs and had no response”, no you haven’t applied for one single job just sent off your generic CV with nothing else). This sub’ is an echo chamber and rabbit hole for these people. Over thirty three million people are employed, they ain’t here complaining about not having a job, a few dozen unemployed are here complaining though. What does that tell you?
You don't have a clue, but thanks.
Forget about it, you can tailor your CV and still not getting a response, most job descriptions are vague and only give out the job requirements partially, in my industry, they never reveal any thing other than some of the expectations, it will only ball up from the point of interview if you are qualified. You can waste your time sale yourself on cover letters based on what the company does and job posting, and not getting a response - why is that? Because project particulars cannot be revealed on job postings! How am I to imagine as an employee of your organization to deliver expected performance, in particular to your projects that requires different experiences and soft skills? I've got my current offer through job consultants, there are no job postings - he didn't even know what the job requires other than "I've got a hunch that you will fit in" until I went in for an interview.
Putting in the effort does absolutely fuck all when so many employers are greedy arseholes who want experienced people for minimum wage and absolutely refuse to spend any time or money to train people. The jobs market for entry level and career changes is absolutely dire in lots of sectors. And I'd bet plenty of employed people would complain about their jobs if you asked them. It's not just the unemployed who struggle with our current jobs market.
Because most people that can aren't wasting their time posting/looking at reddit.
So can you, or can you not?
There's plenty of jobs out there.. you just have to be willing to work any job
And have a totally shit miserable life with your parents because you can't afford to move out. This country has a huge problem with terrible pay for loads of socially vital positions, combined with awful housing costs.
Where can I find them help me please in london
Isn't this sub just full of people with no skills or experience shotgunning poor CVs at random then complaining that they aren't earning 40k
I feel there's a lot of "why aren't there any decent jobs" posts that don't really specify what they mean by "a decent job". I see loads of jobs in my space (Product Marketing in B2B tech). These generally start at £40-50k but easily hit £100k+ in more senior roles. Is that decent enough? It certainly pays for my Rice Krispies. But you have to have done some years on less well paid, more general roles to build up the relevant skills and find what makes you tick. Maybe even do some qualifications or training. Likely put your hand up for a few things outside your comfort zone too. If I'm hiring, I want someone to articulate what they're looking for, what they have done, what they're passionate about. Not just someone who wants better pay and progression but doesn't really know what they want to do to get that. I've had to chuck out tons of totally irrelevant CVs who don't even make an effort to say why they want the role, just yeeted it my way in the hope I'd pick them over the other qualified, experienced, and (most importantly) actually interested candidates who also applied.
Lots of big companies closed down, which flooded the market with unemployed people looking for a job. Companies are more careful with their budget, so they hire less. This gives less jobs, so more applicants for each job and companies can be picky. People leave a well paid job less often than before, even if they are unhappy, as the risk is too high, so there is less turnover and less openings for good positions.
It's scary how people can come to conclusions based on dodgy evidence. This sub is selecting for those who can't find a job. People who do, don't post here. UK unemployment is at near record lows.
The stats show a relatively healthy market?
I am employed so nothing to complain about, but I think the job market is worse than it has been for a while. I used to be contacted by recruiters proactively on LinkedIn several times a month, and I haven't had any contacts for a while now. I see also that salaries advertised have dropped a lot. I guess just the impact of supply (fewer jobs) and demand (many applicants). I guess that's the impact (and aim) of raising interest rates to slow down the economy, reduce inflation and make company investments more expensive.
That's odd I know a lot of people who have found a decent job. My cousin who dropped out of school and bounced between jobs has found one recently that he loves and pays him about £15 per hour. I recently moved company's and I'm on 9k more then my last place. I wonder if it's area specific
Engineering has a huge skills shortage. I am constantly approached by agents to move, and could get another highish paying job anytime I wanted.
What type of engineers are they looking for?
I imagine this correlates with another comment about net zero infrastructure projects needing staff across the whole of operations
I’ve never had an issue finding a job. I work in construction which usually always pays better than average.
It’s because there’s a massive influx of people into the country. E.g. in IT (my field) loads of Indians apply for roles and they’ll do it for next to nothing. Either that or roles are outsourced
For technology/digital/IT I think this is definitely accurate and I've heard this mentioned elsewhere. Thanks for confirming
It depends
Plenty of jobs available if you are good at what you do
What about people who are more junior though, because they still need jobs in order to become good at something
Cause all people seem to care about is a job that will pay them money. What they do while they're there isn't really relevant to them so long as they get paid and as long as they have this mindset they'll never find a decent job.
As someone who is regularly involved in the hiring process for developers and testers I see the completely opposite, we are interviewing candidates who have offers coming out of their ears and are able to negotiate much higher salaries.
What level are you hiring for?
Sorry, but your post doesn't really mean anything without some context as to your discipline or skillsets. In my experience, the opposite is true in technical jobs, there's literally hundreds of positions per company that can't be filled. If you're talking about unskilled/ no experience jobs that anyone can get, then you might be right, I don't know. I started interviewing for more jobs just over a year ago, applied to four places, and got 4 offers - as an engineer with 9 years experience out of uni. I played them against eachother a bit and got a massive payrise. Because of supply and demand. The place I left was in a deficit of a couple of hundred engineers, the place I joined needed just 1. How relevant this is for you depends on your skillset and experience though.
The job market is fudged.
Brexit
Pretty sure somebody can find a decent job right now. Vague statement is vague. Maybe share your experiences with the job market and what career/level you're looking at.
I think the ratio of salary to cost of living is tough right now. Other than that I’d say my job i started last month is decent, with flexi time, 30 days annual leave, WFH 90% of the time.
99% of people in work and able to find more work aren't here. It's like you go on any website like a Reddit or Imgur or any forum, you'd think Labour were gonna win every election by a landslide. Demographics.
Definitely not a great job market right now - but I'm also trying to change fields, which probably doesn't help
I'm out of work and went to a jobs fair. Every little helps as they say so you never know. I was given a list of all the professionals that were there and went about the usual conversations. No one in that building had a list of actual jobs but every single one of them had a third party course they could refer to. I'm currently volunteering, committee support, brushing up on my office skills and on a course to help apply which has actually been very helpful but if the state of that job fair was any reflection of the current health market there's your answer.
Idk something fraudulent by the companies that are hiring or the UK government maybe? Why are they keeping such a major issue so shushed?
Because it's bad for the economy if we broadcast to the international community that we have this problem
You've probably studied and practiced for the wrong thing. I did. Decided at 32 to go back to education and do something that regardless of the economic situation cannot be replaced . I chose civil engineering, i dont even want to be an engineer i just dont want to be made redundant, embarrassed and disrespected when the markets go up and down. Any now im graduated at 40. On 55k with 3 payrises in 2 years , car allowance, fuel card, 37 hours a week and 3 days WFH. Ye gotta re tool, re equip and choose something useful.
Yes unemployment is creeoing up in the uk according to the laterlst statistics, the job market is getting worse.
Yes unemployment is creeoing up in the uk according to the laterlst statistics, the job market is getting worse.
Are you looking for a job? I can offer you a job that suits you.
Being a Civil Engineer is engineering ye clown