the Monday Musings column from that consultant bloke

A few months back the Berkshire Belle read me something about youngsters, those who had not long left school, being on the dole because they were afraid of going to work, or of having to be in the workplace. It seemed astonishing at the time. Then yesterday we were watching a recorded TV programme an someone around thirty was expressing the fear of moving from teenager into adult life. It is easy to just brand these people, ten years or so apart in age, as snowflakes, but there is a deeper issue in trying to understand why they should feel that way.

Society has changed a lot in the years since I was at the point of moving from school to full-time work. There just was no question that we would leave school and go to work. Was it wrong that we were conditioned that way? I don’t think so. Most of us had part time jobs of some sort outside of school hours: Paper rounds, shop jobs and so on. I started my first job aged ten, working Saturday mornings at the village butcher. Later I had two paper rounds, one evening and one on Sunday mornings, pumped petrol, stocked supermarket shelves and did gardening jobs. Why? Because I earned money.

It was as simple as that. I understood that to live I needed funds. Yes, there was a choice of turning to a life of crime, but I was bought up differently, so the only choice was to exchange my mind and body for wages. If you worked, then people paid you, and, if you were not earning enough, you got an evening job.

And so I come from a different time, but where did we go wrong? What have we done to change society to the point where young people are afraid to join the adult world and go to work? I know that the workplace can be a scary place, and, whilst the extreme initiations that some had to go through, especially on apprenticeships, are a thing of the past, these days all you have to do is to meet expectations.

I recognise the problem, but don’t understand it. Going to work is one way to contribute to society, sitting at home collecting benefits is a drain on society. We need to to something about this issue to support young people at home and at school so that they can move into adulthood with some confidence. It is society’s problem, and if it is not solved we will implode.