How Britain's economy has wronged young people for decades
Sergei Bachlakov / Shutterstock.com Edward Yates, University of Sheffield Conditions for young people in the UK are bleak. Young people are more likely to be unemployed than all-age workers, and are more likely to be in low-paid jobs when employed . National minimum wage laws allow lawful discrimination against young people as they mean a young worker can be paid less than those over the age of 24 for doing the same job. Young people have worse pension opportunities than previous generations and suffer from a housing market characterised by high rents and purchase costs. They are also paying record levels of tuition fees for university, as well as spending more on accessing training and skills in a system of provision that is increasingly driven by profit. Media portrayals of young people compound the problem and are rife with discriminatory language. Young people are labelled lazy, idle “ snowflakes ” and are blamed fo...