The Employment Nightmare Facing Young British Asians

A staggering 16.1% of people aged 16 to 24 in the UK are now unable to find work and for British South Asians, aspirational pressure intensifies.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) also revealed that unemployment for those aged between 16 and 24 stands at 16.1%, its highest in more than 10 years.

Young people across the UK are waking up to a labour market that has effectively pulled up the ladder.

While the government points to the upcoming Youth Guarantee Scheme as a solution, the reality on the ground is one of stagnation and frustration.

For British Asians, a demographic that has historically relied on education as a guaranteed ticket to social mobility, this blockade creates a unique kind of despair.

How Rising Costs Have Frozen Hiring

The most immediate barrier standing between young British South Asians and their first pay cheque is the sheer cost of employing them.

Businesses are currently navigating a treacherous financial landscape, and entry-level workers are becoming the first casualty of balance sheet protection.

The national minimum wage has risen every year since 2019, with a 6.7% increase in 2025 followed by another scheduled 4.1% hike in April 2026.

While higher wages are necessary for living standards, they have unintentionally incentivised employers to freeze recruitment for inexperienced roles.

According to the Centre for Policy Studies, the combined cost of employing someone aged 21 and over will have risen by 15% since 2024.

For the 18-to-20 age bracket, the increase is even sharper at 26%, equating to an additional £4,095 per employee.

Sectors like retail, hospitality, and logistics, traditional training grounds for second-generation immigrants looking to build a CV, are aggressively cutting staff rather than training new ones.

Business graduate Rohan* told DESIblitz:

“My parents own a small textile business, so I understand the margins.

“But understanding it doesn’t make it easier. I’m applying for junior roles at logistics firms, and the feedback is always the same: they can’t afford to train someone.

“They need someone who hits the ground running because the salary floor is now so high. I’m expensive before I’ve even proven I’m useful.”

The Employment Rights Act has further complicated the picture. New mandates on sick pay and parental leave have made businesses risk-averse.

Ashwin Prasad, running Tesco’s UK arm, warned recently that the UK is “sleepwalking into a quiet epidemic” of joblessness.

For British Asian families, where supporting the household is often a collective duty, having able-bodied young adults unable to contribute is a source of intense stress.

The traditional route of ‘working your way up’ from the shop floor is vanishing because the shop floor has become too expensive to staff.

AI’s Role

While costs are squeezing the bottom line, artificial intelligence is fundamentally altering the structure of the workplace.

The tasks that were once defined as “entry-level” work are now being handled by software.

This shift has removed the bottom rungs of the career ladder.

Danni Hewson, head of financial analysis at AJ Bell, notes that AI could result in a permanent scarcity of entry-level posts.

For a young person, those mundane tasks were the primary way to learn office dynamics and professional etiquette. Without them, there is no “in.”

The problem extends to the hiring process itself. Companies are utilising AI to screen CVs, filtering thousands of applicants down to a handful in seconds.

As a result, it has become a ruthless filter, rejecting candidates based on keyword mismatches or lack of specific, codified experience that a graduate simply hasn’t had time to acquire.

Aisha* has found herself trapped in this digital loop:

“I’ve started using AI to write my applications because that’s the only way to get past the bots.

“It’s ridiculous. I type a prompt to write a cover letter that will be read by another AI, which will then reject me. There is no human element left.

“I recently applied for a digital analyst job, and I was rejected a few minutes after hitting send. No human read that.

“My mum asks me, ‘Did you call them?’ She doesn’t get it. You can’t talk to an algorithm. I feel invisible.”

This technological wall creates a disconnect between effort and result.

Young people are sending out hundreds of applications, only to be met with silence or automated responses.

Hiring teams are using these tools to “de-risk” recruitment, screening for established skills rather than potential.

Therefore, soft skills that are hard to measure in a database results in a significant disadvantage for young people.

The Experience Trap

For those who manage to bypass the digital gatekeepers, the interview stage has mutated into a gauntlet of unpaid labour.

With UK unemployment at 5.2%, employers hold all the leverage.

Martin Warnes, managing director of Reed.co.uk, highlights that businesses are placing immense emphasis on “pre-employment screening” to evidence that they are bringing the right person in.

In practice, this means prolonged interview processes, take-home assignments, and “trial shifts” that occupy a legal grey area.

Under UK law, candidates aren’t entitled to the national minimum wage if the tasks only last a few hours and are deemed proportionate to the role.

However, the definition of “assessment” is being stretched to its breaking point. Young people are reporting “cultural fit days” where they are expected to shadow teams and perform tasks for free.

Simran* recalled: “I did a two-day trial at a marketing agency in Manchester.

“I audited their social media, wrote sample posts, and sat in on a strategy meeting.

“In the end, they told me I wasn’t the right fit but kept my notes.”

“Two weeks later, I saw they used one of my content ideas on their Instagram. I felt completely used. But what can I do?”

The statistics paint a grim picture of the long-term consequences of this dynamic.

Former minister Alan Milburn pointed out that 45% of 24-year-olds who are not in education, employment, or training (NEET) have never had a job.

This lack of early experience creates a “scarring effect” on their future earnings.

Employers in 2026 view a 24-year-old with no work history as a liability, ignoring the structural reasons why that history doesn’t exist.

An Identity and Independence Crisis

The collision of these economic and technological factors is producing a crisis of identity unique to the British South Asian demographic.

It is less about “what people will say” and more about the internal pressure of “return on investment”.

South Asian families often invest heavily, both financially and emotionally, in their children’s education, with the expectation that this will yield stability and independence. When that transaction fails to materialise, the dynamic within the household shifts.

Young people are finding themselves in a state of suspended adulthood.

The inability to secure work delays critical life milestones: moving out, saving for a mortgage, or even considering marriage.

In a culture where providing for one’s parents is often seen as a duty, the reversal of roles, where the child remains financially dependent well into their mid-20s, is a source of silent but acute distress.

Chemistry graduate Arjun* admits:

“I feel like a permanent teenager. “I did everything right. I got the grades, I went to a good uni.

“But now I’m 25, asking my parents for money to buy a train ticket to an interview that probably won’t go anywhere.

“You feel the pressure every day. They worked double shifts so I wouldn’t have to, and yet here I am, stuck.”

“It strains the relationship because they can’t understand why a degree isn’t enough anymore.”

This isolation is compounded by the fact that young people not looking for work due to ill health are excluded from the headline 16.1% unemployment figure.

If we were to account for the mental health crisis exacerbated by this job market, the true picture of youth worklessness would likely be even grimmer.

The landscape for young jobseekers is defined by high walls and narrow doors.

The rise in the minimum wage, while well-intentioned, has combined with the efficiency of AI to price potential out of the market.

The result is a generation of British South Asians who are educated, eager, and capable, yet unable to secure the most basic foothold in the economy.

While the government’s Youth Guarantee Scheme promises apprenticeships and support, these measures feel like distant abstractions to the young person refreshing their email inbox today, waiting for a reply that likely won’t come.

We are witnessing a profound waste of talent.

The challenge is to separate self-worth from employment status and to support its youth through a period where the traditional rules of success no longer apply.

Until businesses and government align to de-risk hiring and value human potential over algorithmic efficiency, the “quiet epidemic” of joblessness will continue to silence the aspirations of the UK’s brightest young minds.