奥马尔在英国申请了500多份工作却毫无结果 —— 她将这一过程比作“对着虚空呐喊”。直到她参加了一个为期10周、专门针对绿色能源行业的培训课程，才在一个月内找到了工作。
Omar applied for more than 500 jobs in the UK and got nowhere — a slog she likened to "shouting into the void". It took a 10-week training course, tailored to the green energy sector, to finally land her a job within a month.
工党政府希望在更大范围内复制她的经历，正准备在下周接收一份报告和建议，其中有争议地提议限制青年疾病和残疾福利，以资助旨在帮助近100万既不就业、也不接受教育或培训的年轻人的“重返职场”计划。
Her story is one the Labour government hopes to replicate on a much bigger scale, as it prepares to receive a report and proposals next week that would, controversially, restrict youth sickness and disability benefits in order to fund back-to-work programmes aimed at the nearly 1 million young people not in work, education or training.
今年第二季度，英国有98.1万名16至24岁青年属于“非在学、非就业、非受训”人群（NEET），占该年龄段总数的13%，这一比例去年在欧洲排名第二高。
Britain had 981,000 people aged 16-24 not in employment, education or training (NEET) in the second quarter of this year, accounting for 13% of the age group as a whole and a share that was the second-highest in Europe last year.
英国15.6%的青年失业率也异常偏高，远高于年长工人的3.4% —— 在欧洲其他国家，青年失业率通常仅略高于年长年龄组的两倍。
Its 15.6% youth unemployment rate is also unusually high compared with the 3.4% rate for older workers — elsewhere in Europe, the youth jobless rate is typically only just over double that of older age groups.
前部长艾伦·米尔本是首相安迪·伯纳姆的党内盟友，他在5月发布的青年失业调查报告第一部分中警告存在“迷失的一代”风险。
Former minister Alan Milburn, a party ally of Prime Minister Andy Burnham, warned of a "lost generation" in May in the first part of his report into youth unemployment.
在公共财政紧张的背景下，围绕米尔本为更多“重返职场”计划筹资的方案，很可能出现分歧，他在周四接受报纸采访时回应了这一问题。
Disagreement is likely to arise over Milburn's plans for how to fund more back-to-work programmes against a backdrop of stretched public finances, something he addressed in a newspaper interview on Thursday.
“我不是说这会很容易，也不是说不会痛苦，”米尔本对《泰晤士报》表示。“坦率地说，这可能意味着一些人将获得更少的经济支持。”米尔本今年早些时候表示，希望将福利支出与就业支持支出25比1的比例更多地向后者倾斜，并从荷兰等更多年轻人就业的国家汲取经验。
"I'm not saying that any of this will be easy, or that it will be pain-free," Milburn told the Times. "Candidly, it could mean that some people will get less financial support." Milburn said earlier this year that he wanted to shift the 25-to-1 ratio of spending on benefits versus employment support more towards the latter, and draw lessons from the Netherlands and elsewhere where more young people are in work.
下周，他将提议禁止25岁以下人群领取标准失业救济金中的疾病补贴，并将他们转入一个限制更严格的主要残疾福利版本。
Next week he will propose barring under-25s from ill-health supplements to standard unemployment benefits and also moving them to a more restricted version of the main disability benefit.
但他的报告不太可能迅速减少每年用于青年福利的 80 亿英镑（约合 110 亿美元）开支。
But his report is unlikely to rapidly reduce the £8 billion ($11 billion) a year spent on benefits for young people.
削减福利也可能在工党许多议员中引发不满，这些议员曾挫败前首相基尔·斯塔默削减福利的尝试，给反对党提供了攻击弹药，指责执政党偏袒福利领取者而非工作者。
Cuts are also likely to be unpopular among many lawmakers in the Labour Party who thwarted attempts by previous prime minister Keir Starmer to cut welfare, handing ammunition to opposition parties who accuse the governing party of favouring welfare recipients over workers.
就业慈善机构 Generation 英国负责人迈克尔·霍利汉表示，应扩大那些在帮助人们就业方面有成功记录的项目规模。
Michael Houlihan, UK head of employment charity Generation, said programmes with a proven track record in getting people into jobs should be scaled up.
他表示，Generation 课程约有 70% 的学员在 12 个月内找到工作，是同类项目平均水平的两倍，关键在于确保课程针对有空缺岗位的行业中雇主的精确需求量身定制。
Around 70% of people on Generation's courses found a job within 12 months, double the average for similar ones, he said, with the key being to ensure courses were tailored to the precise needs of employers in sectors with vacancies.
对于 27 岁的奥马尔来说，2023 年在 Generation 参加一个专注于绿色能源特定岗位的课程，帮助她在一个月内找到了工作。
For 27-year-old Omar, attending a course in 2023 at Generation focused on specific roles in green energy helped her nail down a job within a month.
“在参加 Generation 之前，我有动力但没有路线图。所以我不知道如何进入可持续发展领域。气候变化是我的热情所在之一，但我不知道如何……找到一条进入绿色行业的可行路径，”他说。
"Before Generation I had the drive but I didn't have the map. So I didn't know how to get into sustainability. Climate change was one of my passions, but I didn't know how to ... find an accessible path into the green sector," he said.
据 IT 咨询公司 FDM Group（FDM.L）高管詹姆斯·塔蒂特称，目前问题的一个方面是，人工智能减少了客户对初级员工的需求。他表示，FDM 现在不得不对新员工进行更长时间的培训，然后再将他们外派。
One part of the problem now, according to James Tuttiett, an executive at IT consultancy FDM Group (FDM.L), is that artificial intelligence has reduced client demand for junior staff. He said FDM now had to train recruits for longer before hiring them out.
“你面临着一种无声的招聘冻结，AI 越来越多地能够完成白领工作中存在的许多岗位，”他说，并补充道，更高的最低工资和增加的雇主社会保障缴费也限制了招聘。
"You have this silent hiring freeze where AI can increasingly do a lot of jobs that exist in white-collar work," he said, adding that a higher minimum wage and increased employer social security payments had also limited hiring.
所谓“尼特族”不工作或不接受培训的原因各不相同，但许多人缺乏学历资格，或表示有健康状况，使得找工作更加困难。
So-called NEETs' reasons for not being in work or training vary, but many lack educational qualifications or report having health conditions that make it harder to get a job.
左倾智库决议基金会（Resolution Foundation）的经济学家尼·科米内蒂表示，与“不升学、不就业、不进修”（NEET）比例较低的欧洲国家相比，英国的福利待遇并不算特别慷慨。但在英国，领取健康相关福利的年轻人面临的返岗流程要求较少。
Nye Cominetti, an economist at the left-leaning Resolution Foundation think tank, said Britain's welfare benefits were not unusually generous compared with European countries with lower rates of NEETs. But young people receiving health-related benefits in Britain faced fewer requirements to engage with a process of getting back to work.
荷兰乌得勒支大学就业法教授索尼娅·贝克尔表示，她所在的城市派人上门走访那些不升学、不就业的年轻人，提供托儿服务或心理健康支持等解决方案。
Sonja Bekker, a professor of employment law at Utrecht University in the Netherlands, said her city sent people to knock on the doors of young people not in education or work, to offer solutions such as childcare or mental health support.
由于荷兰设有职业学校，许多荷兰学生在17岁时会进行为期数月的实习；16至17岁的青少年中有三分之二从事兼职工作，而英国这一比例不到五分之一。
Vocational schools mean many Dutch pupils are on months-long work placements aged 17, and two-thirds of 16- to 17-year-olds have part-time jobs — compared with less than a fifth in Britain.
不过，即便在荷兰，NEET比例也已开始上升。与英国一样，人工智能和税收有时也被归咎为原因。
Even in the Netherlands, though, the rate of NEETs has begun to rise. Like in Britain, AI and taxes are sometimes blamed.
“我们不知道这是长期趋势，还是仅仅是经济周期中的一次波动，”贝克尔说。
"We don't know whether it is a long-term trend or whether it is just a bump in the economic cycle," Bekker said.