A City executive is drawing attention to the hamster wheel of job applications Gen Z faces when trying to break into the job market.
A former Deutsche Bank managing director and now vice chair of the London Foundation for Banking and Finance, Quentin Nason, has slammed the impossible application process for fresh-faced graduates—or as he puts it, a “meat grinder.”
“Job listings that stayed open for a month last year are now closing within hours,” he wrote in a LinkedIn post. “Barclays reportedly shut its graduate intake five hours after opening because applications flooded in.”
He’s seen the issue up close up through City Pay it Forward, a UK program that helps high school and university students pursue careers in finance, and he concluded that the system is broken. And other than applying to everything in sight, he said that “there is little practical advice that seems to make any difference.”
For a generation that did what “society told them to do,” Nason isn’t only worried about the economic cost, but the emotional one. As he points out, tough job markets are not a new phenomenon—but this time it feels different.
“Too many young people were steered into debt-funded degrees with promises that no longer hold true,” he said. “What worries me most is the human cost, this generation is not built to withstand that level of rejection.”
That sentiment holds true on social media, at least. On TikTok, Gen Zers have commiserated to show their hundreds of spreadsheet applications, and collages of rejections from companies with no end to the cycle in sight.
“My own son just went through this meat grinder,” he added.
Nason thinks AI tools for recruiters and applicants are a lose-lose situation
Nason also sounded off an alarm on another catastrophe for fresh-faced grads: AI.
In fact, he said technology isn’t only a problem for graduates but that the system is broken on both sides. Not only are recent graduates nervous that their jobs could be replaced by AI, the application process is also becoming disrupted by the tools.
For example, he said that AI screening tools now scan through tens of thousands of resumes before a human ever gets involved, and candidates face multiple automated tests and video interviews before speaking to an actual person.
On top of that, he added that job applicants are using AI to craft perfect CVs and cover letters, easing up the process of clicking to apply to everything with zero friction costs.
The result: an oversaturated market, or “five thousand candidates for five jobs being the norm.”
“Add AI to both ends of the process, recruiters and applicants, and you get a pressure cooker of disappointment and frustration,” he wrote.
The job crisis needs fixing—or risk a Gen Z revolt like in Nepal
Going forward, Nason thinks Gen Z’s job crisis needs to be addressed sooner rather than later, as their student loans start to accumulate and frustrations bubble.
“Few realise those student loans compound daily from the first day of term. They are effectively PIK notes [Payment-In-Kind note–or form of debt where interest isn’t paid in cash but added to the loan balance] in disguise,” he said, adding that only the few who manage to secure ultra-wealthy finance roles will actually be able to pay them off.
He compared the urgency to Gen Z burning down Parliament and toppling the government in Nepal. “It may seem distant, but it could be a preview of what comes next,” the exec wrote. “The first Gen Z revolt, not born of ideology but of exhaustion with a system that no longer works for them.”
“I hope it does not come to that here. But something has to give, and soon.”