Health is a leading factor. The proportion of NEETs citing long-term or temporary sickness has tripled since 2011, with ill health now accounting for a quarter of all youth worklessness.<\/p>\n
Mental health<\/a> issues are particularly pronounced. Between 1995 and 2019, the number of young men aged 18 to 29 with a common mental health disorder \u2013 such as anxiety or depression \u2013 jumped from 16% to 25%. Among young women, it rose from 30% to 37%.<\/p>\n Eli, a former youth worker, used to work with young people whose mental health was a barrier to employment. Now, they themselves have been pushed out of the workforce by sickness.<\/p>\n The now-30 year old contracted long Covid<\/a> and chronic fatigue early in the pandemic. Life has become \u201ca living nightmare\u201d, they said, through a battle to negotiate complicated neurological symptoms, light sensitivity and chronic fatigue.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve lost my ability to interact with the world,\u201d they explained. \u201cI spend most of my life now lying down, with earplugs in, in dark rooms, just trying to not feel absolutely horrendous all the time.<\/p>\n Advertising helps fund Big Issue\u2019s mission to end poverty<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve struggled with my mental health since I was 12 or 13, when puberty kicked off, but that is now really hard to manage.\u201d<\/p>\n Eli has tried repeatedly to return to work, testing out part-time jobs, nursery shifts and volunteer roles. But each attempt worsened their health: \u201cI\u2019ve found that I just can\u2019t do anything.\u201d They also have autism<\/a>, ADHD and premenstrual dysphoric disorder, a hormonal condition that can bring suicidal ideation every month. They are working with Just Treatment<\/a>, a patient advocacy body, to help raise awareness of these barriers.<\/p>\n \u201cThe reality is that in my 20s I stopped being a profitable person to work with because of my health,\u201d they said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Read more:<\/strong><\/p>\n The government has acknowledged the scale of the challenge, pledging to help young people \u201cunlock their potential\u201d with apprenticeship reform and a youth guarantee.<\/p>\n But their disability benefit reforms<\/a> \u2013 which would slash personal independence payment (PIP)<\/a> and remove the additional health element of universal credit<\/a> for people under 22 \u2013 cast a long shadow over these aspirations, Harrison warns.<\/p>\n Advertising helps fund Big Issue\u2019s mission to end poverty<\/p>\n \u201cGovernment plans to constrain access to health-related welfare benefits risks exacerbating these challenges \u2013 potentially pushing more people into unsuitable jobs that may compound and worsen their health issues,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Eli \u201cdesperately\u201d wants to work \u2013 and finds the government\u2019s messaging around youth unemployment and health \u201cappalling\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cI loved my job,\u201d they said. \u201cI don\u2019t need to be lectured by the Labour government about how work can provide purpose and meaning. I am absolutely devastated by the fact that I can\u2019t work.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n If the government really wants to get young people working, they added, it should put money into youth centres<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cWe saw a 70% reduction in funding for youth services (between 2011 and 2022). For me that is the biggest barrier to getting young people into work.\u201d<\/p>\n When young people can\u2019t find jobs, it\u2019s often down to a lack of support, rather than a lack of initiative.<\/p>\n Advertising helps fund Big Issue\u2019s mission to end poverty<\/p>\n Ben, 25, struggled to find work \u201cfor a long time\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThat was obviously a downer for me. So it was just the sort of vicious cycle of having to go into the Jobcentre as a young person, and not being really led in any sort of direction by them, and just sort of clocking in every week.\u201d<\/p>\n He received an opportunity through the government\u2019s Kickstart Scheme<\/a>, and started working as a job coach supporting other young people. It was difficult, but rewarding.<\/p>\n That scheme has since been closed, and Ben\u2019s contract ended. He\u2019s volunteering with the Youth Futures Foundation and \u201ctrying to get involved in that line of work as much as possible\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n Work helps him \u201cget out of his own head\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cBeing in full time work and having other people\u2019s issues to deal with while being an employment coach sort of suppressed my depression,\u201d he told Big Issue. \u201cNow I\u2019m out of work again and it\u2019s been an up and down journey.\u201d<\/p>\n Advertising helps fund Big Issue\u2019s mission to end poverty<\/p>\n Big Issue is also working to help young people overcome barriers to work. Our specialist recruitment service Big Issue Recruit<\/a> works with employers to support people affected by poverty<\/a> and inequality to move into work. It has supported 41 candidates aged 18 to 24 years of age to help them move into employment.<\/p>\n Do you have a story to tell or opinions to share about this?\u00a0Get in touch and tell us more<\/a>.\u00a0Big Issue exists to give homeless and marginalised people the opportunity to earn an income.\u00a0To support our work buy a copy of the magazine<\/a>\u00a0or get the app from the\u00a0App Store<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0Google Play<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Why are so many young people out of work? One in eight young people \u2013 around one million…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":214882,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3092],"tags":[11246,51,348,3374,105,13975,897,11525,1118,85452,218,16,15,16437],"class_list":{"0":"post-214881","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-analysis","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-disability-benefits","11":"tag-employment","12":"tag-health","13":"tag-health-and-wellbeing","14":"tag-jobs","15":"tag-learning-and-employment","16":"tag-long-covid","17":"tag-long-term-sick","18":"tag-mental-health","19":"tag-uk","20":"tag-united-kingdom","21":"tag-young-people"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114747624963261656","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214881"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214881\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Poverty-Zero-banners_article-800x250-1.png\")
<\/p>\n