It is all too easy at present to imagine that everything about politics is to do with Trump, the USA, Ukraine, resulting international crises, threats to peace, the destruction of international aid programmes, and related issues. My own bias in my professional work towards development and issues around international political economy has certainly made me pay attention to those issues.
That, however, also requires that I deliberately recall that, important as these things are, there remains a domestic agenda within the UK where deprivation, government neglect, the failure of neoliberalism, the rise of neo-fascism, and the threats that this creates are just as important. In this context, I share this note from the House of Commons library which is shocking because it provides such clear evidence of the reason why so many young people are alienated in the UK:
One in eight young people are not participating in education or employment in the UK. Many of them are unable to do so because they are not getting the support that they require to participate in a society where the expectation of what I might describe as a high degree of normality and compliance is making it ever harder for some young people to do so.
The process of integrating people into a world where stereotypicality is what employers desire is becoming increasingly difficult. This is especially so when a great many of the routes for accommodating such diversity that used to exist have now disappeared, with that change being reinforced by the aggressive recruitment procedures of almost all larger employers in the UK.
The consequence of this is alienation, and not just amongst those who have been left on the sidelines. The awareness that this risk and possibility exists is having a massive impact upon the psyche of a great many young people who live in fear that it might happen to them.
It is now de rigueur to criticise life in the 1970s, when I was a young person, and then joined the workforce. This was, supposedly, a terrible decade. I do not, in any way, recall it as such. Looking back, across the quite diverse friendship groups that I had at that time, extending well beyond those that were normal amongst the decided minority who went to university in that era, I have no recall of a fear of unemployment or a lack of potential opportunity.
Whether people left school at the age of 15, which was by then rare, or 16 or 18, my remaining perception is that work was readily available and the hurdles put in the place of those wishing to secure it were not excessive, or unreasonable, or burdensome.
For those applying from university, there was nothing like the current process of job application, where up to six rounds of processing might be required, of which the first three might be AI driven with absolutely no personal interaction, and with later around being predicated upon the possibility of failure, and very clear rejection.
If those sitting around in positions of power in the UK wish to know why the world that they have created is so unacceptable to many, I suggest that they look at the way in which they treat young people in this country. It is abysmal, unless you happen to have the advantage of access to opportunity through the privilege that parental wealth or contacts provide.
Neoliberalism has created a society constructed on the basis of prejudice, exclusion, and a straightforward belief that no one has responsibility for those left by the wayside by business that thinks it has no obligation to the society of which it operates.
Worse, this attitude also pervades the government, which is dominated by the same type of thinking.
We might face international crises. What, however, we should never forget is the type of thinking that Donald Trump and JD Van evidence is not that exceptional. Nor is Musk. What they believe is that they have no responsibility to others. To put this in the terminology of microeconomic theory, which dominates their whole political narrative, they do not believe that they are under any obligation to consider the externalities of their actions, the cost of which they presume will fall on others, without ever asking who that might be, or how they will deal with it.
The real crisis that we now face in the world is the societal breakdown that we are seeing almost everywhere as a consequence of this philosophical callousness, and the reality is that unless we learn to care again, we have no hope.
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It’s getting harder to gain an entry level job. The government makes many roles in recreation and services illegal, the miminum wage is too high, and there’s too many regulatory obstacles to employing people such as DBS checks. You can agree that all these things are just but then if you also complain that young people can’t get a foot on the rung then there’s a little irony.
But one should also be wary of the LFS – response rates are low. Have you ever been picked out by the survey and did you decline or accept? The probability that you have is about the same as jury service. And then add in the million or so in the UK illegally who are not permitted to work, and certainly aren’t going to tell someone from the ONS that they’ve gotten a NI number that isn’t theirs.
The minimum wage is too high?
Pardon?
What a weird response……is this a human, or an American?
A programmed person for sure
So you have issues with regulations surrounding employment, minimum wage, DBS checks, but also illegal workers? You not only missed the point of the blog post, but also, seemingly, your own argument.
True….
I know I’m too late to reply to yesterday’s edition, but very, very well said Richard. I was born in 1953. I agree that compared to today the 1970’s looks like and actually was a time of much greater opportunity and optimism. No tuition fees at universities and polytechnics, proper apprenticeships available where it was possible to be fully trained in all aspects of a trade, and much less anxiety about being able to find training for the career of your choice and to get a job at the end of it. This isn’t a sentimental, rose tinted look back – it was real – a more nurturing, kinder world for the young. No wonder that depression and anxiety are so prevalent in young people now. The saddest thing is that in the absence of the opportunities and supportive attitudes that they deserve, significant numbers are giving up on democracy and pinning their hopes on the authoritarian right.
A middle-aged friend of mine with many years experience of working in one of the main supermarkets, who had become unemployed due to an accident he’d had on holiday in Spain, is now looking for a job. And he can’t believe what you have to go through now. As he reported the other day on Facebook: “…well I applied for 2 retail jobs recently, it’s so stressful, had to do a 40 question test for Asda price then fill in the forms and watch a video and that’s before I even get an interview.”
I dread to think what it must be like for a school-leaver.
It is grim.
& thus does process & box ticking replace judgement. My job to run Sony’s factory services in Bridgend. One headhunter interview, face to face, one interview @ the factory (various people – on the same day). That was it. It was also 1983. How times have changed, no more judgement or personal responsibility & given this, why would any young person want to take part in such demeaning processes.
I always recruited by simple process designed to not waste anyone’s time. I often followed hunches. The vast majority of the time it worked.
I wonder how much of that box-ticking style of hiring practice is the result of third-party companies coming in and selling business management systems to ‘streamline’ the process.
A lot
Dusting off my PhD in the Bleeding Obvious what we need is to make sure as far as we can that children get through school an.d higher education successfully or at least if they dont it isnt for reasons that are unavoidable.
In the same way we need them to get into employment, setting up home etc
But we dont……..
Much to agree with there.
In a society denuded of resources caring will always suffer.
What I am struck by is something I call World War 1 Syndrome by which I mean the decision makers have never been so far away from the frontline they are meant to be managing than ever before. They just cannot be bothered to go and look.
They are simply divorced from operational reality through working from home, managing through tech or through special advisors.
My own children aside, I meet and talk to a lot of fine young people who deserve much better than this.
And the same is for older workers too, things like retraining and refreshing skills are just not on the radar.
Its so sad but we are failing our young people by not offering opportunities and the security they need to live a good life. My go to book Simpler living Compassionate Life published in 1999 from a Christian perspective, essays by Henri Nouwen, Cecile Andrews, Richard Foster, and 19 other writers encourage you to respond to dialogue about the fundamental issues of life: time, money, food, spirituality, heritage, and community. Richard would you consider a compilation with others to provide an up to date version of these topics , although the book is still very relevant today. As community and as human beings we really need to start caring again about our neighbours.
Agreed
There is a high percentage of young people with no stake in society. This is, as you say, not good.
Society is essentially a shared illusion. So long as enough people buy into it the illusion holds. Money still has value, those with authority will be listened to etc
However it’s not an objectively real thing. So people need to have incentive to play along.
What is boils down to is that enough people need to get a net benefit from society to play by the rules that those who don’t are seen as irrational.
If it doesn’t benefit enough people then the rules break down. People are still behaving rationally but they have a very different perspective.
The actual procedures for jobs are a consequence of the massive growth of ‘training’ as an industry
and ‘psychobollocks’ personality and ability testing (cf the ubiquity of Myers-Briggs test, a piece of rubbish scientifically). It is far cheaper to pay for a battery of eligibility and induction hurdles from a ‘personnel/HR’ firm than to employ people to sift and interview applications.
Largely agreed
But I have to say Meyers Briggs made me realise I was an introvert and the impact of that, which no extrovert has probably ever tried to understand.
Yes, caring.
I am reading Jared Diamond’s The World Until Yesterday. He talks about the attitude of children in Papua New Guinea to kindness and sharing, how naturally generous they are to each other. This is something I witnessed myself when I worked in a closed Aboriginal settlement in the NT in Australia in 1997. But his final paragraph in that section is the most revealing,
“When western missionaries who have lived in New Guinea with their young children return to Australia or the US, …….. the children tell me that their biggest adjustment problem is to deal with and adopt the West’s selfish individualistic ways, and to shed the emphasis on cooperation and sharing that they have learned among the New Guinea children.”
So it is no good the neoliberal world saying “there is no alternative” – there is.
Thanks
Most interesting. Begging the question: why were these western missionaries there in the first place? What did they bring to the locals? – who seemed – given the quotations to be raising their children in a good way – without the need for Christianity? What gives them, the missionaries, the right to tell others what to believe in & how to think. I have Norman Lewis’ book, the Missionaries. I only got about half way through – I found it far far too distressing to read further. It is also worth reflecting that Christianity although it purports to encourage “kindness and sharing” in reality in supposedly Christian countries such as the USA the exact opposite is the case.
But I would not expect any sort of reflection on this by most Christians – who are self satisfied and sanctimonious. Note the word “most” there are exceptions (& I have had the priviledge to meet one or two)..
Mike, I agree with you 100%. I am a non religious person. I could have slightly misquoted Jared Diamond and omitted the word missionaries, but that would have been an incorrect quote. The point was that the children of “western” people working there in New Guinea had that experience, to me it is not relevant what their parents were doing there.
My experience across the water in Northern Territory Australia, where I worked recording / identifying/ documenting the ancient basketmaking techniques taught me much the same about different societies attitudes to sharing resources. It was an extraordinary difference to see the One for all and all for One attitude so lacking in our modern western times. I also learnt about (via a local anthropologist ) some of the awful results of the “missionary” invasion of earlier times among other groups . Luckily the group of people I was with had not been touched much by this intrusion.
Thanks
Appreciated
I would agree and disagree . Christians over the centuries have got a lot wrong and there has been much harm committed in the name of Jesus and there still is. But as a Christian who still gets a lot wrong, I know that if I follow one of the most important Commandments to love your neighbour as yourself that this changes lives. For each of our neighbours we want a good life and an abundant life, caring for people and caring for the earth. Jesus is my one hope for a better world in a world divided by oppressor and oppressed, rich and poor. As we know even with the best programs we devise we can clearly see the limits of the fact that poverty and suffering cannot be avoided, which is why my Hope is in God.
I assume those employment figures include all the under employed, zero hours, zero security, zero support, zero prospect workers that we can’t do without, but are treated as disposable by the people for whom they are generating massive profits.
No, these are those repeatedly doing nothing
Yes sorry, I meant “don’t include” [doh!].
“1970s […] was, supposedly, a terrible decade.”
Trying to avoid donning my rose-tinted glasses, I agree that it was not. In fact it was the best decade of my life. Until 1979 that is; although I didn’t feel the full force of Thatcherism until about 1983.
I have fond memories of it
Thank you, both.
I was born in 1970 and remember the progress made by my parents and those of friends and classmates.
As with Nigel, from about 1981 or so, one sees the full force of Thatcherism on tv and in class. With regard to the latter, newcomers from south Wales, Northern Ireland and the north of England arrive at school (RC), church (RC) and work as their regions are destroyed.
A decade of two ago, the Telegraph featured an article critical of the 1970s. Readers pushed back and said how even one salary was enough to house, feed and clothe a family and even pay for a holiday. One reader said how his / her single mum school secretary was able to do so.
Quite right
The 70s was a decade of possibility and possibilities.
Me too.
You have not mentioned that it was possible to buy a modest house for a small multiple of the average salary – though you might have to wait as credit was tightly controlled. Of course, that stopped prices running away. Nor that those of us lucky enough to get to university left with no, or very little, debt. I can’t imagine what it feels like to have that burden round your neck at 21 or 22.
All agreed.
The 1970s were not bad, unless you were gay, or disabled, or struggling on low pay living in a badly-designed tower block, or… The key difference, even for such people, was a sense that things were slowly getting better.
Somehow, we have to rekindle that optimism. And that starts with a Government committed to fixing the things that need fixing.
The problem with “fixing things so that people feel they’re starting to get better” in the 1970s optimism/opportunity sense, is that’s increasingly impossible, economically, geopolitically and above all environmentally as regards specific resources or sinks (carbon etc) and overall planetary overshoot.
So yes, fixing public services, infrastructure and especially NHS and care services… But if the general public mindset remains GDP growth oriented (per LINO’s typical propaganda) then the general idea and the related Overton Window possibilities will be more (real) money in people’s pockets to be spent on more consumption, more cheap flights to the sun, more ‘stuff’ for home or to wear…
The 1970s were also good for me (no student debt! and an easy transition into graduate work and then into oil and gas engineering…). I had lots of contemporaries who were also fulfilled at ‘less academic’ jobs, apprenticeships and the like. But I now realise I was drawing down an immense capital that nature had blindly built for us all.
Looking back to the sense that everyone has a meaning, can contribute, is part of a community and can add something to a ‘common weal’… whilst redefining what ‘good work’ is (let’s leave aside the ‘hard-working families’ talk!) is nevertheless a vital part of looking forward to something different practically and in lifestyle, but with a recovered sense of hope and purpose. A reformation (re-formation of mindsets) is needed.
I disagree
We are so far from delivering well-being to most people the lot ofmthe vast majorioty can still be improved, significantly.
We might need to rethink well-being though.
I have long thought that the consumption of ‘stuff’, ‘cheap flights to the sun’ etc. is just a (futile) palliative for the misery that people endure at work. I don’t think that the public mindset is necessarily oriented towards GDP growth, especially if that entails working even longer hours to just about maintain the same level of income in real terms while others take the profit, which it probably does. For so many people, work is like wearing shoes that are a size too small, so all they can think about is taking them off (i.e. getting as far away from their day-to-day lives as possible) as many times a year as they can afford.
It is, of course, kept like that through recruitment processes that are designed to select for obedience and conformity rather than imagination or insight. Those displaying too much of the latter are considered difficult or even dangerous by the recruitment industry. This suppresses diversity of thought in organisations, thereby suppressing problem-solving and, ironically also growth.
But I think for most people, the obedience and conformity are performative. But if you find yourself being contracted to spend most of your time saying things you don’t believe, it causes real psychological injury.
We have turned our towns into grey, soulless places where you’ve no business being unless you are buying something, and even that last vestige of communal life is teetering on the brink. I know quite a few people who see and experience very little apart from the inside of their home, the inside of their car, and the inside of their workplace, and they aren’t happy even though they think they should be. Fundamentally, it is community that they lack, both within and outside work. Other people, i.e. those outside the ‘economic unit’, are perceived as a threat to a greater or lesser degree. This has severely weakened communities and I don’t think it is an accident. This atomisation is rapidly approaching its zenith in an economy that seems to be increasingly powered by activities that dubious at best and exploitative at worst.
I have even come to the view that outright scams are now tacitly approved of, because of the ‘growth’ opportunities they offer at such time as they ultimately have to be unravelled (see PPI, VW, PCP, sign your entire estate over to the charity for poorly hamsters etc. ad nauseam.)
I can’t but feel that we are watching ourselves fall over the edge. Cheap flights to the sun won’t be affordable for much longer, and the consumer trinkets that China (principally) helped western economies to keep within people’s reach are now becoming too expensive. Those are the palliatives that have been persuading just enough people to clap along at the derelict circus. But the number who refuse increases by the day. They have seen behind the curtain, largely because it has seemingly become unprofitable to pay for a convincing curtain at all. The economic model is breaking down before our eyes. I don’t think that is reversible, and I would argue it is now necessary for a range of reasons. That doesn’t have to entail societal breakdown. It may lead to repair, but unfortunately it won’t be a quick or forgiving process. In the meantime, the more we talk openly about these things, the better.
Reading your post, I was prompted to look up factors indicative of failing states. I remember some index perfectly identified states that collapsed in Northern Africa (including the order of their collapse). A key issue was the stake that young people had in society. A large number of young people with little or no stake leads to unstable societies…… (not really a surprise).
I couldn’t (quickly) find what I was looking for….. But I did stumble across this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Fragile_States_Index. The index values listed are from 2023. But the input metrics are of interest given the last few weeks… (again ….. not really a surprise)
-Cohesion (Security apparatus, Factionalized elites, Group grievance)
– Economic (Economic decline and poverty, Uneven development, Human flight and brain drain)
– Political (State legitimacy, Public services, Human rights and rule of law)
– Social (Demographic pressures, Refugees and internally displaced persons)
– Cross-cutting (External intervention)
They’re all obvious, but there is nothing wrong with that
1970s – newly married, husband earning £1600pa, but me a bit more; we both did evening work to supplement our main incomes, and there was work available for all who wanted it; 3 bedroom terraced house in south London cost £12000, mortgage interest 17%; corrugated cardboard on the floors until we could afford carpets; shared phone lines and no mobile phone; rented black and white TV (Radio Rentals); no home computers and even in offices computers were rare; the miners strike caused commercial use of electricity to be rationed = the 3 day week and blackouts – I cycled 10 miles to work each way when the trains were not running (strikes) – I could go on but suffice to say we were happy, but then I was born towards the end of WWII and so brought up with food rationing and shortages of most things – tea, coffee, sugar, butter, meat, fresh fruit were all either rationed or in short supply – clothes were passed down through families, socks were darned, broken biscuits from the large glass jar in the grocers were a treat. Then there was the Suez crisis with petrol rationing in the 1950s. 1970s and central heating was only just becoming commonplace in homes and offices and there was no double glazing. Technological development has created jobs, but has also destroyed jobs; technology may be innovative but does cause inequalities and especially for employment for younger people. Life in the 1970s was at times difficult, but seldom ‘terrible’; people cared whether family, friends or neighbours, and employment was plentiful.
Thanks
Mental health crisis ‘means youth is no longer one of happiest times of life’
UN-commissioned study in UK, US, Ireland, Australia, Canada and New Zealand finds satisfaction rises with age
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/mar/03/youth-mental-health-crisis-happiness-un-uk-us-australia
Sad….
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/mar/03/a-ticking-time-bomb-the-neglected-crisis-of-send-education-in-england
I didn’t do particularly well at school, but finished every day, went home to change into overalls, for an after school job in an engineering workshop., . (Insurance complications these days won’t allow that). !!
So now we have a one shoe fits all! You are measured and you are tethered to that system.? Maybe it’s time to rethink the system!?
Special educational needs and disability is something this government, really has to get ahead of. Paying private companies is not the answer! Investment is.
I was born in the mid 50s and the 70s were my “home” I have to say I have never been happier. My parents fought in WW2 and I was born as rationing was ended, I know about those 20s 30s 40s 50s 60s before my emergence and I have to say the 60s and 70s were possibly the best two decades ever and it seems to me that after that bloody Thatcher woman, it never got even better which it should have done. We seemed to lose something when the west Reagan Thatcher decided to promote “greed is good” above all things. This neoliberal agenda of “enough is never enough” is the most dreadful thing eve. Surely we can promote 1 car 1 house 1 phone a full stomach a warm house a roof over our head is enough? It’s enough for me I don’t need 20 houses 40 cars 6 aeroplanes 4 yachts etc etc slaves followers or anything else and yet the 70s were the times of plenty. Let’s sort the communities the kids and the world. Enough is enough.
1 car 1 house 1 phone a full stomach plus a warm house and a roof over our head is the dream of many with no clue how to do it.
I still find it difficult to accept that there are people in this world that really don’t care about the wellbeing or plight of others. It often seems that they are in the majority but I just believe that is the case and am still convinced that the vast majority of people on this earth just was peace and a bit of prosperity. A secure roof over their head, warmth in winter, good healthcare, good food, a good education for their children etc. I still struggle to understand why those that have the resources and the capacity to make a difference don’t
Me too
We are of one mind on this
Correction: should of course read ‘I can’t believe’
I am not a believer but I do believe in this from the prophet Micah:
“But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree, and none shall make them afraid.”
and:
” He hath showed thee, O man, what is good and what does the lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.”
I think this fits well with the discussion in your Consequences of a society that does not care.
Thanks Larry
Much to agree with.
Thank you for your work Richard. Have you ever spoken to Garry of Garry’s economics? You’d have much to agree on and I’d love to see some content with the two of you.
At the core of it is that we’ve created a society in which the youth have no stake, so why would they want to participate? Why work just to have the luxury of barely affording to live in a mouldy shared house?
I’m 30 and have done well in my career (top 10% earner), but unfortunately I’ve grown up just outside London. I don’t have wealthy parents to front me a deposit so I rent a mouldy flat with structural issues from a landlord who simply doesn’t care and has extracted nearly £60,000 from me in the past few years. I love this country and want to see it get better, but our existence here is miserable. I have friends and family in Norway who live great lives in very regular jobs. Change is possible, we can do better, and we must do better.
The government keeps talking about young people not working, let’s start with making work more flexible. I have friends with health conditions that mean regular 9-6 work is difficult, but they can and absolutely do want to work… They just need some flexibility, understanding and compassion from their employers so they can decide when and how they do that work.
We have communicated.
When I work out what I want to do do next, working with others may be on the list.
And I note all you say. You are one of the many for whom I am angry.