More than 600,000 graduates on benefits

https://archive.is/20250728111429/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/28/more-than-630000-graduates-on-benefits/#selection-3639.198-3639.264
(article without paywall)
Highlights a lot of the points that are why I'm here, answering the threads that I do, with the honesty that I do - creative careers are high risk passion industries and people that are aspiring to those careers should be informed about the risk they are taking and the dedication needed to succeed against the odds.
We shouldn't prevent people from doing these degrees - but we should make sure they are doing them purposefully and going into them well-educated about how they can alter their chances of success and beat the odds. We shouldn't necessarily encourage people to do high-risk degrees but if they come to conclusion they want to do them independently, then they should be well within their right to have a go.

There is like double unemployed compared to actual job vacancies. This is the UK, I am not surprised in the slightest.

tbh you can do a less high risk degree and still be on benefits. None of them really lead to a job these days. Computer Science is a good example of this.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/28/more-than-630000-graduates-on-benefits/
Article is paywalled but am wondering what people's thoughts are on this.

I mean you can't control whether they will coast through their degree without learning any additional skills and not persevere with applications... Any degree can be "unemployable" if an individual isn't motivated to succeed. And I don't think the fault is on the individuals the majority of the time - they may have been reassured by their teachers, parents, university that "just having a degree is enough" (which is why educating people about their graduate outcomes is so important) - but upon learning that is not the case, it does fall to individuals to change their behaviour accordingly to try and improve their chances. Some people won't, and don't - all I hope is that some people will, and succeed despite not being set up to.
Ultimately, I would hope that universities enact stricter rules about courses teaching employable skills. This is already something they are required to justify, but clearly from data like this those rules are not stringent enough. If everywhere that taught concept art was required to teach 3D, photobash and freelancing skills rather than just drawing pretty pictures, we'd probably A) have less concept art courses and B) have higher skilled and informed concept art graduates.

This shouldn’t be a shock to people and even in 2022 only 61% of graduates were employed within 15 months and only 60% of those were in ‘skilled’ employment.
The fact is that since Blair’s 50% target, we’ve had massively more graduates than jobs requiring graduates because it has allowed people to study English with no real career aim to become an academic or editor. Even my Econ degree while better than most probably isn’t specific enough and is one of the reasons I’ve worked jobs since graduating that don’t require a degree.
In my opinion I’d still have done the degree for knowledge as essentially part of additional education but I’d stop telling people they should be expecting a job in the city and actually I’d advise my children whenever they arrive to do a degree level apprenticeship and then just study a degree part time.

I was motivated to succeed on my course, I gained a First and I did well. Still ended up shelf stacking two years down the line though. I do agree about the stricter employability elements though

I wish I never went to university as it was an utter waste of effort, money time and my mental health has been ruined.

I empathise with you because it is of course still a huge achievement to get a First at university, and it's evident that you were passionate about what you were studying - but (and this leads back to my point about educating people who are looking to study a high-risk course) getting a First is not enough and you can be incredibly talented and be passed over for someone who might be less refined but sought out opportunities to talk to people in industry, did additional work beyond the requirements of their course, did thorough research into the kind of portfolios and showreels that people in industry are looking for and then worked on them intensively, sometimes far after they have graduated... and then applied to entry level roles over and over and over and over again, being incredibly resilient to the silence and rejection, until they succeed. (I applied to more than 30 roles before securing my first job in games)
Those are the people that I see succeed in creative industries - the people that go above and beyond the requirements of their course - seek out opportunities - are persistent. It's not a slight on you - I know plenty of people like you that were really creative and skilled and did great at university but then couldn't get a job and were left wondering why. It's why i'm really passionate about informing people of the realistic workload - you will need to balance the workload of your course and the workload of industry knowledge to succeed as a graduate from a competitive high-risk course. You need to expect to work long hours while at university and to not have as much of a social life as your peers. That's the truth.

X

This shouldn’t be a shock to people and even in 2022 only 61% of graduates were employed within 15 months and only 60% of those were in ‘skilled’ employment.
The fact is that since Blair’s 50% target, we’ve had massively more graduates than jobs requiring graduates because it has allowed people to study English with no real career aim to become an academic or editor. Even my Econ degree while better than most probably isn’t specific enough and is one of the reasons I’ve worked jobs since graduating that don’t require a degree.
In my opinion I’d still have done the degree for knowledge as essentially part of additional education but I’d stop telling people they should be expecting a job in the city and actually I’d advise my children whenever they arrive to do a degree level apprenticeship and then just study a degree part time.

I mainly went to university because I was long term unemployed beforehand and my parents threatened me with homelessness if I did not go through with the degree course. I finished it because they made me and I gained a First because I had nothing better to do.
My degree was in a creative course but I didn't know what else I was realistically going to do under the circumstances as I attended during the covid pandemic so doing an apprenticeship etc wasn't going to happen as any possibility of gaining employment was not going to happen at the time. I did actually do a lot of those things that you mentioned (or at least as much as I could under the circumstances) and I still ended up with basically nothing. I don't even want a creative job anymore, I just want any job that's somewhat decent for a graduate in my situation.
I might do a TEFL course and teach abroad, that seems to be a fairly compelling option when people give up on life.

I mainly went to university because I was long term unemployed beforehand and my parents threatened me with homelessness if I did not go through with the degree course. I finished it because they made me and I gained a First because I had nothing better to do.

My degree was in a creative course but I didn't know what else I was realistically going to do under the circumstances as I attended during the covid pandemic so doing an apprenticeship etc wasn't going to happen as any possibility of gaining employment was not going to happen at the time. I did actually do a lot of those things that you mentioned (or at least as much as I could under the circumstances) and I still ended up with basically nothing. I don't even want a creative job anymore, I just want any job that's somewhat decent for a graduate in my situation.

I might do a TEFL course and teach abroad, that seems to be a fairly compelling option when people give up on life.

Life’s **** and then you die. Most people will be nothing but miserable, and everyone tries to change that until they can’t anymore, but going to uni and **** is ultimately pointless in 99% of cases