Nearly 1 million young people aged 16–24 – almost one in seven – are now classified as “Neet” (not in employment, education or training), according to the Office for National Statistics. The rate has risen steadily since 2022, and growth is concentrated among young men.
It’s a particularly difficult time for young people to be establishing their working lives: with their education disrupted by the pandemic, and in the midst of a cost of living crisis preceded by over a decade of wage stagnation.
In response, the UK government has announced a “youth guarantee” as part of its Get Britain Working white paper. The guarantee sets out plans for 18- to 21-year-olds to be “earning or learning”. It aims to do this by increasing education and training opportunities, funding 8 “youth trailblazers” in mayoral authorities to trial ways to tackle youth employment challenges at a local level, and developing partnerships with large employers such as the Premier League to create opportunities for young people.
This youth guarantee is an integral part of the government’s aim to boost the employment rate of working age adults up to 80% — an ambitious five percentage points higher than it is today.
But for the approach to succeed, the UK government needs to make sure there are enough good-quality, secure jobs available, and must address regional disparities – as well as taking a compassionate approach to understanding the relationship between health and work.
A period of unemployment before reaching 22 can result in a wage penalty 20 years later of between 13% and 15% – a disadvantage that can also be passed on down generations. But this doesn’t mean that any job is better than no job. Bad-quality work can harm health — in some cases, more than unemployment.
The white paper hints at welfare conditionality – linking whether young people are eligible for benefits with whether they take up training or work. But this risks pushing people into bad-quality jobs that are ultimately unsustainable. Of the 114,931 jobs listed on the UK government’s Find a Job website between October 27 and November 26 2024, 26% were for temporary or fixed-term contract jobs, offering no guarantee of long-term employment.
Young people are already disproportionately concentrated in these types of precarious job. People aged 16 to 24 are 2.2 times more likely than workers aged 50–65 to face severe work insecurity, characterised by a lack of basic employment protections or regular income. This disparity has widened since the pandemic.
This matters because insecure jobs are not a reliable pathway to stable work. Over 40% of insecure workers remain trapped in insecure employment for four or more years. These roles fail to provide financial stability and limit people’s time to take up training or seek better jobs.
While the UK government has plans to create jobs in partnership with high-profile employers, it hasn’t yet laid out the detail of these plans – and the need for good jobs goes far beyond what the deals will likely be able to deliver.
Employment interventions for young people must also address regional disparities. Where people live significantly affects their access to good-quality work. Rates of young people not in work or education are higher outside London and the south-east, and regional clusters of unemployment magnify these challenges. This creates competition for scarce jobs among young people in neighbouring districts.
Post-industrial areas in particular face acute difficulties. The decline of manufacturing has left many regions reliant on low-wage jobs that fail to match the quality of the roles that once supported these economies. There is a correlation between high levels of insecure work, economic inactivity and unemployment in these areas.
The unaffordability of housing and lack of transport mean many young people struggle to move to areas with better jobs. The creation of secure and sustainable jobs in regions where they are most needed must be a priority.
Areas with diverse industries and more small- and medium-sized businesses tend to experience lower rates of youth unemployment – underpinning the need for joined-up local economic planning. The mayoral trailblazers in the youth guarantee are a promising start, but the structural nature of regional inequality means there will be no easy fix.
The interplay between work, education and health is complex, and requires a compassionate response. This means participation in the youth guarantee scheme should be voluntary.
The rising prevalence of inactivity caused by mental health issues will not be solved by any one policy. In the UK, poor health is now surpassing skills as a primary barrier to workforce participation – but the two interact. Work-limiting health conditions disproportionately affect those with lower qualifications.
This is partly because the jobs available to people with fewer qualifications are often poor quality, offering little flexibility or autonomy. This makes them incompatible with managing health conditions.
Underpinning the youth guarantee with the spectre of benefit sanctions, which the government has hinted at but plans to share more detail on next year, assumes there are sufficient good jobs and training schemes available nationwide to ensure everyone can find a suitable opportunity. That is not currently the case, and pretending otherwise sets people up to fail.
An alternative would be to invest directly in job creation. Given the overlapping challenges from health, work and skills — which require attention in tandem — an effective approach may be to prioritise funding for direct job creation of secure, high-quality roles tailored to the needs of local economies.
Lessons can be learned from initiatives such as the Future Jobs Fund (2009) and the Kickstart scheme (2020), both of which sought to generate jobs directly for young people at risk of long-term unemployment. Both faced challenges, but the principle of creating jobs as a way to guarantee work is worth revisiting.
Designed well, locally led job creation schemes could also help address wider policy aims. Some local authorities used the Kickstart scheme innovatively to address wider labour market needs by, for example, employing young people in care homes to train colleagues in digital skills, or as teaching assistants in schools facing shortages.
Alice Martin is affiliated with The Work Foundation and The Autonomy Institute.
