Here’s a fun game: what was your first job?
Mine was a classic of the genre: at 16, I went to work (after school and at weekends) on the checkouts at a local supermarket. I can still remember my wage (£3.32 an hour), the checkout code for Maris Piper potatoes (1014), the pain of having to start work (quelle horreur) at 6.15am on a Saturday – and the pervasive sense of mindless, crushing boredom.
It was so utterly torturous that I used to draw little circles on my hands to represent each hour of my six-hour shift and would colour in the quarters, every 15 minutes – just to have some sense of the time passing. Once, someone had a heart attack at my checkout. Another time, a regular customer waited for me outside and asked me out (and yes, he was old enough to be my dad – and no, the store manager did nothing about it). Still, I remember thinking at the time, it could be worse: I could’ve been on the fish counter.
I highly recommend asking friends, loved ones and family members about their first employment, because it returns some hilarious (and horrifying) results: my ex-husband stuffed sausages at a factory in Bristol; my mum washed up in an East End cafe when she was just 13 – and her wages were “a scone with cream and jam”. My sister-in-law cleaned hotel rooms when she was 15 for £3.25 an hour; while her sister worked in a sandwich shop, where her only job was to “make coleslaw”.
The list goes on: after I finished at the supermarket, I went to work as a “sweeper” for a vet – where my entire role was to sweep up the ashes of people’s beloved family pets – which was exactly as horrible as it sounds. I’ve also worked, variously, as a receptionist, a clothes shop assistant, a lifeguard at a local swimming pool and as a “data analyst” (inputting numbers on a computer and pressing return over and over, so repetitively and so mind-numbingly that it was almost exactly like Severance).
But now, in a move that – actually, I wholeheartedly support – Rachel Reeves has unveiled new plans to get young people back into jobs like this.
The chancellor has pledged a brand new “youth guarantee” proposal which would offer paid work, an apprenticeship or a college place to every young person who’s been out of work and on universal credit for 18 months. It’s part of Labour’s plan to tackle our unemployment crisis, now that we know that one in eight 16-to 24-year-olds are currently NEET (not in active employment, education or training) – and that has risen by a third in the past four years. And I’m here for it… with caveats.
Because while I do, genuinely, believe it is character-building to be in work – yes, even if you hate it, even if it pains you to be there, and you’d be amazed at how effective boredom can be as an incentive to strive to do something (anything) else – this won’t work for everybody.
It won’t work for those with disabilities preventing them from being able to take up “any job”, despite what the government may insist, and it won’t work for those with significant mental health problems. We already know, thanks to warnings from leading charities, that as many as one in four young adults in England alone suffer from conditions such as anxiety and depression. We know that the waiting lists for effective treatment and support are so long as to be almost entirely reductive, making the problems worse – and we also know that the system is overwhelmed, underfunded and unequal.
We also know that many graduates in this country are struggling to find work due to a lack of entry-level roles – and in some cases, kids coming straight out of university are being turned down for the kind of roles you and I may have had, 20 years ago, in supermarkets or warehouses, because they’re seen as overqualified, too risky or surplus to requirements.
And I don’t – I repeat, don’t – agree with slashing benefits as part of some kind of punitive, blanket move to threaten people into a point of terror and desperation. It is entirely right that Labour did a U-turn on welfare reform after heavy left-wing rebellion.
But I do agree with the principle, the message and the merits – physical, financial and mental – of getting back into work. One under-discussed consequence is pride: pride in yourself, pride in being able to provide, pride in being a functioning member of society as someone who contributes to that society.
And one of the biggest secrets of happiness is feeling that you have purpose. It is purpose and meaning that help people get out of bed every single day. Work can be key to giving people purpose – no matter how menial it might feel, how small, how arduous. That particular work doesn’t have to be forever, but it can be a start. A jump-lead to the rest of your life.
So, Reeves has the right idea – at least, in theory. Being given a helping hand (or push, or nudge) to join the workforce is just the beginning. It isn’t so much what you do, but the act of doing itself. Some people just need help taking the initial step.
Even neurologists say so: of the plethora of ADHD diagnoses that are only just coming to light, one big issue for people with the condition is “task paralysis”. But research shows that the dopamine hits that ADHD brains constantly seek out actually start firing once action has been taken. In other words, it is only in “doing” that you start feeling better and more active – and get that “hit” or reward. So, too, with work.
And if the idea of slaving away in a bank or on a factory floor bores young people to tears, then put it this way for some perspective: it could be worse. You could be on the fish counter.
