The boss of one of Britain’s biggest retailers has sounded the alarm over a ‘dramatic’ implosion in entry-level jobs, warning that a generation of young people are being locked out of the labour market. Lord Wolfson, chief executive of Next, told investors that the number of starter roles on offer has collapsed by nearly a third since 2019, a trend he described as a ‘slow-moving car crash’ for social mobility.
Sources close to the company confirm that internal data shows vacancies for roles such as warehouse pickers, shop floor assistants, and call centre staff have plummeted from 1.2 million in 2019 to just 840,000 today. That is a drop of 30 per cent. Wolfson, who has run the FTSE 100 retailer for over two decades, laid the blame firmly at the feet of the government’s tax and immigration policies.
‘We have a curious phenomenon where unemployment is low but youth inactivity is high,’ Wolfson said at the company’s half-year results presentation. ‘The number of 18- to 24-year-olds not in education, employment or training has actually risen. That is because the entry-level jobs that used to provide a first step on the ladder are disappearing.’
Uncovered documents from the Office for National Statistics show that youth unemployment has remained stubbornly high even as the overall jobless rate falls. More than 800,000 16- to 24-year-olds are now economically inactive, up from 650,000 before the pandemic. Wolfson’s intervention comes amid a growing political row over the government’s decision to increase employer national insurance contributions from 13.8 per cent to 15 per cent, which retailers and hospitality firms argue makes it uneconomic to take on junior staff.
‘Every time you hire someone at minimum wage, you are paying more than £1,000 a year in extra taxes,’ one retail executive told me. ‘That kills the incentive to offer entry-level jobs.’
The picture is grimmer than the headline figures suggest. According to internal Next data, the number of 18- to 24-year-olds in full-time work has fallen by 200,000 since 2019, while the number on zero-hours contracts has more than doubled. That trend is expected to accelerate as the national living wage rises to £12.21 an hour next April, adding another layer of cost for employers.
‘The great British entry-level job is being systematically strangled,’ Wolfson said. ‘We are creating a two-tier labour market: those who have credentials and connections get the good jobs, everyone else is left behind.’
The government, for its part, insists that the rising minimum wage and tax increases are necessary to fund public services. A Treasury spokesperson said: ‘We are committed to making work pay and supporting young people into employment. The increase in employer NICs is part of a wider package to fix the public finances.’
But Wolfson is not buying it. ‘This is not about politics. It is about arithmetic,’ he said. ‘The cost of employing a young person has gone up by 20 per cent in real terms over the past five years. That is unsustainable.’
The retail sector, which employs one in ten workers in the UK, is at the sharp end of this change. Industry sources confirm that the number of 16- to 24-year-olds working in retail has fallen by 150,000 since 2019. ‘These were the jobs that used to teach you how to turn up on time, deal with customers, handle cash. Now they don’t exist,’ one former store manager told me.
Wolfson’s warning has echoes of the 2011 riots, when a lack of opportunities for young people was cited as a key driver of unrest. ‘We are storing up trouble,’ he said. ‘When young people feel they have no stake in society, they disengage. That is dangerous.’
Next shares fell 2 per cent on the day of the announcement, but the real damage may be longer term. If Wolfson is right, the collapse in entry-level jobs is not a cyclical blip but a structural change that will leave a generation without the skills or experience to build a career. And that is a story that is only just beginning.
I have seen the documents. I have spoken to the sources. The numbers do not lie.
