A 23-year-old graduate has opened up about the grim reality of the job market for young people, revealing that even fast-food jobs are now seen as a benchmark for success. Isabel, who graduated with a 2:1 in Business Management from a reputable university, described her desperate search for employment in a first-person account.
Hopes dashed by silence
Isabel initially applied to top firms like PwC, KPMG, and Deloitte, but received only automated acknowledgements followed by complete silence. “Not a rejection or a notification that the application hadn’t been successful, just silence,” she said. She soon realised that the job application process had lost any human element.
She then turned to smaller companies and graduate programmes at Cadbury’s, Arla, Lidl, Sainsbury’s, and B&Q. Despite performing well on skills tests, she was met with generic rejections citing “overwhelming demand.” The lack of feedback left her confused about how to improve.
McDonald’s as a dream job
Isabel noted that “working in McDonald’s” was once used as an insult for failure, but now many of her friends have applied to its graduate programme and been rejected. “If that was the previous generation’s benchmark for failure, what does this say about our generation?” she asked.
Her daily routine involves waking up late, filled with anxiety, and making frantic job applications on LinkedIn. Seeing peers succeed online only deepens her demoralisation. She managed two interviews but was ultimately rejected due to high competition, which felt worse than silence.
Humiliation and unpaid work
Following her father’s advice, Isabel physically handed out CVs to shops and restaurants, describing the experience as “humiliating” and “like begging.” Some staff were rude, others helpful, but she never heard back. After an unpaid trial shift at a restaurant chain, she was ghosted. “They got a night’s free work and I got another dose of humiliation,” she said.
She now works sporadically at a pub and is considering training as a nursery practitioner, but the cost and time are daunting. Unlike many, she lives rent-free with parents who support her financially. “I’m one of the lucky ones,” she admitted.
A lost generation
Isabel compared her situation to the TV show “It’s a Sin,” set in the 1980s, where young people could afford to share a flat in London on entry-level salaries. “To my generation, that’s as much a fantasy as Stranger Things,” she said. She believes the government-created upside-down world full of monsters is more plausible than her generation enjoying the same opportunities as their parents did.
Concluding her account, Isabel urged older generations to understand the fear and desperation young people face. “This is scary and real, and we’re really not sure if there’s a way out of it.”
