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Scrap employer NI for every worker under 25.
More than a million young people are shut out of employment, education or training. Our solution? Let's get to NEET Zero by making it cheaper to say “yes” to a young worker.
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"Youth unemployment is fast becoming the crisis of our time"
Ruth Kelly
The Problem
There are currently 981,000 people aged 16–24 not in employment, education or training — more than one in eight (ONS, August 2026). It's a number that has climbed since 2021, reversing years of progress, and the UK is now an outlier among comparable economies.
Being NEET leaves a mark that lasts. The Work & Pensions Committee heard how long spells out of work have a “scarring effect” – lower lifetime earnings and worse health for years to come. A 22-year-old who falls out of work through ill health can end up more than £1 million worse off over their lifetime, with the state carrying a similar cost. Behind the statistic are young people describing themselves as feeling “in limbo” – and losing confidence with every rejected application.
Nearly half – 44% – aren't claiming benefits at all, so they fall outside much of the support on offer. The longer a first job is out of reach, the harder that first rung becomes.
The solution – Scrap employer NI for every worker under 25.
In 2024 the cost of employing people went up: employer National Insurance rose to 15% and kicked in at a far lower salary. Business after business have told us the same thing – higher costs means down slowing hiring, where young people are hit hardest as first jobs dry up.
There's already a fix hiding in plain sight. Employers pay no National Insurance on under-21s and on apprentices under 25 – right up to a salary of £50,270. This campaign asks the Treasury to extend that same relief to every employee under 25. One clear, simple step: hire a young person, pay no employer NI on their wages up to £967 a week.
Independent modelling by the Resolution Foundation found scrapping employer NICs for under-25s would put 38,000 more young people into work.
Jobs and Education: Building the Bridge to Opportunity
Jobs and Education: Building the Bridge to Opportunity is the latest in our series examining the core factors that shape job creation and economic growth, following our earlier work on energy costs, investment and taxation. Over six months, authors Tim Clark and Catherine Frost travelled the length of the country, visiting businesses and schools to understand what employers actually want from young people leaving education, and where schools can fill the gaps. The result is an ethnographic study that is rigorous, human and, at times, uncomfortable reading.
The report's central finding is that the NEETs crisis has two causes, and both need addressing at once. On one side of the bridge stands the world of work, where rising employment costs, from higher employer National Insurance contributions to a narrowing gap between youth and adult minimum wage rates, are making businesses increasingly reluctant to take a chance on inexperienced young people. We call this the demand problem. On the other side stands the school system, where teacher shortages, funding pressures and uneven access to employers mean many schools cannot deliver the careers education that would prepare young people for work. We call this the supply problem.
