Spider9

In that mammoth post one of my main points was that there is still a thought within society that being a graduate leads to better pay. By all means young people should continue study - I did and I enjoyed it, even though my degree ended up pretty much useless vocationally. My point is that a degree is not a magic key to a grand new world. Is that a bad thing? I'm not sure, but its a consequence of a change in circumstances which has meant that there are far more graduates around. This is felt most in jobs where the discipline for the degree isn't important. It might be that young adults going to Uni have to be prepared to not earn any more or be no higher up the company infrastructure than they would have been going into employment.

From my experience at Tesco, there are schemes where even if you don't have a degree, you can get on to the Graduate Scheme via an internal management course.

There is nothing wrong about keeping studying. Young people and their parents have to manage their expectations that all.

I haven't trawled back through all the posts, but pavvi made a good comment and point at 12.54am about stopping benefit payments, because this can be a real problem for some people, that by trying to better themselves the system actually can make it worse for them, especially if they have to re-apply, with a catch-22 situation involved.

A comment that as not been made, or I haven't noticed, is the increase of food banks and soup kitchens around the country, because people have found themselves in dire need, even though 3 pay cheques before, they thought that they were 'secure' and would never have ended up the way that they have. Being classed as some, as scrounger's of the state!.

A local businessman and farmer I know, contributes over £300 a week of his own money plus fresh farm produce to support one such twice weekly food bank/soup kitchen. This venture started up about four years ago, and since then they have seen an increase in clients. Of the two days the scheme is open, over 90 families and more than 150 single people turn up for some form of hand-out, whether that a small hot meal to a bag of surplus groceries and other essential provisions, possibly donated by the local Sainsbury store or other more fortunate . The point of mentioning this, is that some of the people had what they thought secure employment, but it was not so. One such person had a call centre job, paying £900 a month, now she is in receipt of £140 per fortnight, which as to support herself and young son. The most frightening thing for her, was the fact that she was always able to get a job, now she cannot,because like others, there's nothing out there?.

The local business and farmer is rightly annoyed about the governments stance on this, because they do not seem to accept that this is going on, and is on the increase. Yet at the same time they are talking about "back to employment" as though there are plenty of jobs available, with the possibility that a little re-training will solve the issues.

As I said in an earlier post, there is solutions of possible work in the community, but will this effect benefits and all the red tape usually associated with this?.

FE - I also doubt very much that the women of the day worked harder than most of today's men." Then you do not know much about conditions outside of an office. To make it simple do you really think PRINTING was easier, or the same, in the war years when "cut" meant a pair of scissors and paste a jar of glue? Have you seen a car track before robo's or before what some call lights out? "harking back to a bygone age is pointless." Looking/learning from the past is always good.

spider -Physical work has been getting easier since time began. dirty jobs now fully mechanised No kids working in mines - keep up i was referring to "children born now "

oresome

You could well be correct, I was only passing on the information given to me. But it was mentioned that the money she is saving by accepting food parcels, helps to keep her child clothed and the meter topped-up?.

I perhaps should have also mentioned, that the people using this facility have to show and prove entitlement to benefits, because in the earlier years and even now, there are people who are not in need, trying to get something for nothing?.