According to the government’s employment adviser, an “anxious generation” of young people is struggling to adapt to the outdated workplace.
In a report this week, Alan Milburn, the former Labour health secretary, will say businesses must offer greater flexibility and stronger mental health support to younger workers or face an “economic catastrophe.”
Milburn was commissioned by Prime Minister Keir Starmer in November 2025 to investigate why almost one million people aged 16 to 24 are not in education, employment or training (NEETs).
His interim report, due next week, is expected to identify “a rising tide of mental ill-health, anxiety, depression [and] neurodiversity” as a major reason behind growing economic inactivity among young people.
The review will also reportedly examine the impact of social media and smartphones on young adults, with Milburn arguing their lives and behaviours have been fundamentally reshaped by constant digital exposure.
Milburn told The Times: “The system is trapping people in worklessness rather than enabling them into work.
We’re at a risk of just writing a whole generation off.
“This is a bedroom generation. They are sort of living in their bedrooms. They are on all the time, they’re never off.
“[Social media] is leading to some evidence of functional impairment, changing their sleep patterns, concentration levels. That is having an impact on their ability to work.
“They are not snowflakes. People say it’s a soft generation. My view unequivocally is that it isn’t. It is an anxious generation.”
More than half of the UK’s 946,000 NEETs have never worked. Around a quarter are classed as unable to work due to long-term sickness or disability.
Among that group, 43% said mental health problems were the main reason they could not work. That figure stood at 24% in 2011.
The government previously said Britain’s proportion of Neets is considerably higher than many comparable developed nations.
The UK has roughly double the number of NEETs seen in countries such as Japan and Ireland, and three times as many as the Netherlands.
Research has also linked unemployment before the age of 23 with lower earnings decades later.
Milburn’s report is expected to state: “[Young people] are different, not worse, not lazier, not less intelligent.
“They have grown up in a digital world that has rewired how they communicate, form relationships and manage stress.
“They have fewer experiences of workplaces and they present with higher levels of anxiety and depression.”
The former cabinet minister is also expected to argue that tackling youth worklessness could help businesses struggling with labour shortages following a sharp decline in immigration.
New figures released on Thursday showed net migration to the UK fell to 171,000 last year, down from a peak of 891,000 in 2022.
Earlier this week, Peter Hyman, a former adviser to both Tony Blair and Starmer, warned schools were becoming a “pipeline” to worklessness.
In an interview with the Guardian, Hyman called for sweeping reforms, including a ban on social media for young people.
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