‘On the Treadmill’ is a sociological study exploring the current experiences and potential future facing the current cohort of young adults - 18 to 40 year olds - in the UK. The aim of the research is to investigate the extent to which changes in working lives and career opportunities, within deregulated and globalizing labour markets, are affecting the career prospects, pay, benefits and long-term security of this group. Also, related to these developments in the workplace, the impact of the global house price bubble of the last few years is also of crucial interest, in recognition of the fact that home ownership currently requires younger people - at least those who can afford to do so - to commit increasing levels of their income if they are to have any prospect of ever buying a first home. It is our view that, when the implications of these developments are taken together, they hold the potential to produce profound and, as yet, largely unanticipated social consequences for this age cohort, as well as for UK society as a whole. Through this research we wish to uncover the form and extent to which the experience of this group of young Britons departs from that of other ‘post-war’ generations and to try to identify any policy initiatives that might usefully be applied to addressing the range of social and personal problems which, we anticipate, are likely to arise from the current direction of socio-economic change.
The study is currently in its pilot phase and we would welcome comment, personal accounts of relevant experiences, notifications of willingness to participate in the research, and any other valid contributions. We would also note that any information given will be used for professional research purposes only, that subjects will remain anonymous in the reported findings, and that all information will be treated confidentially.
PLEASE CONTACT US AT : soc231@abdn.ac.uk
John Bone & Karen O’Reilly, School of Social Sciences, University of Aberdeen