Finding A Job In 2018

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by Neil Bamforth

I do feel sorry for young people you know. I’ve lost track of how many times I have heard them complain, quite rightly, about the difficulties in finding a job. The main source of angst for them is the classic potential employer line of ‘experience essential’. How the hell can young people get the experience if nobody will employ them in the first place to gain experience?

Madness.

One way around this problem is to go to university and get a degree. It doesn’t have to be a degree even vaguely related to the job you want. Any old degree will do. Employers see the word ‘degree’ on your CV and you’re in.

Fine if you went to university but problematic if you didn’t. There are literally thousands of young people who may never reach their potential because employers are morons. They don’t want to invest in training young people. It would make a dint in the profit margins. Must keep the shareholders happy.

It’s enough to make you weep for young people.

It was easy when I was young. There were jobs a plenty and I did most of them. Really, I did. This is a list of the jobs I have done from aged 16 to 60. Even I was startled at the number.

Farm worker, police cadet, cotton mill worker, furniture salesman, forestry worker, engineering machine operator, airport long term car park cashier, fork lift truck driver, computer tape librarian, kitchen porter, electronics warehouse-man, electronics purchaser, computer materials planner, vinyl record production coordinator, computer warehouse manager, taxi driver, taxi company owner, financial adviser (seriously! For the Prudential. I was top salesman for 7 out of 12 months along with being the only salesman who had no idea what he was doing), bus driver, replacement window salesman, airport cargo agent and, finally, driving instructor.

That doesn’t include being a furniture salesman and an engineering machine operator twice. I’m also pretty sure there are one or two missing. Memory not quite what it was I suppose.

These days young people can’t move about – not that, I suspect, many would want to move about as much as I did. It’s hard enough for them to even get a job worth having if they haven’t got a degree.

It makes no sense to me. Surely our young people are the future? Well, if us oldies are the future we’re in real trouble aren’t we? Surely we should invest in the future?

Is this why those at the bottom are turning increasingly to crime? The latest surveys suggest that young working class white and black men are committing the most crime. Guess which section of society struggles the most in education? Young working class white and black children

Asian children are fine. Their parents are determined that their offspring will be doctors and lawyers and so forth. Parents with a conscience who would be classed as working class try and help their kids get on in life. Help them along in education to get good results and go to university and gain a degree and they’re away!

Parents who just haven’t got the where with all – not necessarily through any fault of their own – end up with kids at the bottom of the pile, along with parents who, frankly, shouldn’t be parents.

Those kids see the money their successful peers get and realize they never will. Some then turn to crime. Drugs and so forth. The money is good.

Why aren’t we investing in them? They want to be successful and, preferably, in a legal way so they avoid prison. Train them! Give them skills to make things! Give them a pride in what they do and make it financially worth it.

Then I look around and realize that, clearly, I am speaking rocket science.

Oh well. I’m retired now. No degree? No hope? Train as a driving instructor. Worlds your oyster then. Good money. Mind you, it will cost you about £6,000 or so to train. Not got that much? Oh dear. Back to the drugs life then.

What a sad sad waste of so many young lives. What a loss in achievements that could have benefited everybody. How dumb are we?

About Post Author

Neil Bamforth

I am English first, British second and never ever European. I have supported Oldham Athletic FC for 50 years which has made me immune from depression. My taste buds have died due to too many red hot curries so I drink Kronenburg beer and milk - sometimes in the same glass. I have a wife, daughter, 9 cats and I like toast.
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Bill Formby
5 years ago

Like Mike I taught for many years at a university and watch many young people waste someone’s money by being in college hoping to get a degree. Quite often they forgot one thing; they don’t just give them out for attendance. There is work involved so many fall by the wayside. As Jess suggested we need more emphasis on training and and apprenticeships in the trades. Computers and technology can do a lot but they still cannot drive nails, fit pipes, or run electrical wiring. People still need a place to live and while machines can help in building homes they cannot yet do it themselves. They cannot yet diagnose why a sink is stopped up, or why the lights are not working, or why the roof is leaking. That still requires a human with skills. Unfortunately, those jobs call for manual labor which are looked down on by society. At least until they have one of those problems.

Neil Bamforth
5 years ago

Glenn – plenty of nutters on the road here too…I’ve probably taught em 😂😂

E.A. – too right. Even degrees don’t always get you in. What will these companies do when there’s nobody left with experience?

Jess / Mike – you’re both right!

Admin
5 years ago

A lot of young people living in depressed areas simply don’t give a shite about a job. There are plenty of them, and training is available, but you have to want it, and they don’t. Motivation is the key to getting an education, finding a job, having a career.

jess
5 years ago

Some people don’t want to go to school either so how do those people fit in when there are no apprentice type things available for like plumbers, electricians etc. One of our friends from school had zero desire to go to college and instead went into an internship, it was paid, in a cabinet making place. He is now the owner of his own custom woodwork place and employs 10 people with 2 being apprentices. We need to get some of those things back.

E.A. Blair
5 years ago

Even with a degree, people still fall into the “no previous experience” trap – at least I did. Then, after working with computers for a number of years including intricate and difficult programming, I tried to go back to college for the academic credentials, only to find that all my years of actual work in the field didn’t count for crap in school. I had been working at levels that normally would have required at least a masters’ degree – if not a PhD, but still couldn’t get out of certain freshman-level requirements. I finally gave up on the back to school thing, since it was a waste of money.

Glenn R. Geist
5 years ago

I wonder if there is any training required or available to teach driving in the US, unless it’s competition driving. There aren’t many of those and I imagine the requirements include experience.

But whether there even are driving instructors here or not, you’d never notice from observing the way people drive. Today’s cars are enormously faster now than when I was learning. I was so happy to have one with 100 horsepower, but today you can drive out of your Chrysler dealer with over 800 and even the most prosaic little things will easily top 100 per – and certainly do. This time of year it’s worse because of the Northern Invasion and the elderly who can’t see.

Of course many of them receive free advice when in my vicinity.

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