\n<\/p>\n
It has been more than six months since Leah Savage, 24, started job hunting and despite applying for almost 100 jobs, she has had just two interviews in that time.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s so demoralising. All I do is wake up and apply for jobs. I reach out to different people and everyone says the same thing \u2013 they\u2019re not hiring at the moment,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s a real struggle. I am lucky to be able to live at my parents\u2019 house and I am on universal credit, but I can\u2019t do stuff like go out with my friends because I just can\u2019t afford to.\u201d<\/p>\n
She has a first-class honours degree in marketing management and also did a one-year internship at Amazon during her studies, which she thought would give her a leg-up when applying for graduate roles.<\/p>\n
But the competition for work is fierce and there are now extra challenges such as ensuring your CV makes it past the AI filters companies employ to whittle down hundreds of applicants.<\/p>\n
<\/span>Leah Savage has a first-class degree but is still struggling to find opportunities.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSometimes it can be something as small as formatting which is not readable to AI and you\u2019ve got no chance,\u201d she said. \u201cI can\u2019t help but think what the point is of my degree that I spent four years working hard for, while balancing part-time work, if that isn\u2019t enough to even get me a foot in the door?\u201d<\/p>\n Guardian analysis has shown that almost half of all jobs lost since Labour came to power were among the under-25s, and youth unemployment is running at 15.3%, the highest level outside the Covid pandemic since 2015. Across the board, young people including school leavers and graduates are reporting the battle to find work is harder than ever.<\/p>\n Lee, who is 18 and has been looking for a job in Manchester for four months after finishing her A-levels, said the market was \u201ca waste of time and very depressing\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThey ask you for experience that you can\u2019t get without first having a job,\u201d she said. \u201cI am multilingual, I speak three languages, I have the competence and knowledge to do a good job, but I can\u2019t even get an interview.\u201d<\/p>\n Miranda Alford, 22, described the entry-level job market as a \u201ccomplete desert\u201d which her university degree didn\u2019t prepare her for.<\/p>\n <\/span>Miranda Alford has found the job market precarious and dispiriting.<\/span><\/p>\n She said she felt very lucky to have secured a role as a receptionist, but it was only a temporary contract coming to an end next month, so the prospect of another job hunt is rapidly looming.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s just a constant conveyor belt of applications and getting nowhere. Last time I was looking, I got into a real slump about myself and believed I was a failure \u2013 I have so much to give but they didn\u2019t want me,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Alford lives in a house share in Nottingham, and has eaten into her savings in order to pay rent and bills while job hunting. \u201cIt\u2019s really stressful. Entry-level jobs want multiple years of experience in that sector, for minimum pay, so it is very much a catch-22,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cNone of my friends who\u2019ve graduated have found a job that pays well and they\u2019re happy in, and a lot of them are unemployed and still looking.\u201d<\/p>\n David Weston, 23, from Chesterfield, said it took about six months and more than 200 applications for him to find a job after graduating, and that was a role stacking shelves at a warehouse, which he only got after removing his politics degree from his CV.<\/p>\n \u201cI feel as if I have been told all throughout my education to study hard and get a degree, and then you are almost guaranteed a job. But that wasn\u2019t the case,\u201d he said. \u201cI didn\u2019t have any practical skills employers were looking for in roles related to my degree. And the lower wage roles I had done before now considered me too educated.\u201d<\/p>\n Chouka Tung, 24, had dreams of pursuing a dream in the media industry after moving from Hong Kong to the UK \u2013 but a year and a half after graduating from her journalism degree, she is working part-time in an Asian supermarket after receiving \u201crejection after rejection\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThe difference between reality and expectation can be quite unbearable,\u201d she said. \u201cI can only just pay my rent and I fear I am slowly becoming less proficient in my journalistic skills. I have no idea how I can get myself out of this limbo.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It has been more than six months since Leah Savage, 24, started job hunting and despite applying for almost 100 jobs, she has had just two interviews in that time. \u201cIt\u2019s so demoralising. All I do is wake up and apply for jobs. I reach out to different people and everyone says the same thing<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":33840,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[19326,19327,3848,949,2625,3904],"class_list":{"0":"post-33839","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-social-issues","8":"tag-demoralising","9":"tag-exasperated","10":"tag-graduates","11":"tag-high","12":"tag-unemployment","13":"tag-youth"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/33840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}