Hospitality job postings in the UK fell by 25% year-on-year between 2024 and 2025, with 22,369 fewer unique postings, according to data cited in a new opinion piece. This decline is leaving nearly 1 million young people not in education, employment or training (Neet), despite 84% of these seeking work.
Impact on young jobseekers
Hospitality leaders have blamed rising wage and tax costs for their inability to hire new starters. The Recruitment and Employment Confederation has warned that the industry relies heavily on 16- to 24-year-olds, so the impact will be on teenagers seeking their first job.
In Manchester, Nell’s Pizza advertised 10 part-time roles for people aged 14 to 18 and received about 2,000 applications.
More than a career step
The author, Isabel Brooks, argues that young people will miss out on a more fundamental process of maturing. She writes that working in hospitality as a teenager was how she grew up, learning to handle mistakes and difficult encounters in person.
Of today’s 24-year-old Neets, 45% have never had a job, which suggests the salient issue is getting a foot in the door. The author suggests the crisis should be renamed the “teenagers can’t get bar work” crisis.
Economic and personal costs
The rhetoric around Neets relies heavily on the word “cost”, with figures such as “up to £300,000” in lost earnings per person and £125bn every year to the economy and taxpayer. The author describes this as a bleak way to talk about people.
There is strong evidence that a part-time job while at school leads to higher self-efficacy and greater confidence. Without this training ground, the author warns of “long-term scarring” for young people when they finally join the workforce.
