Georgia Leaker is not where she thought she'd be five years after graduating uni.

She's applied for 300 jobs, undertaken four unpaid internships and is currently only employed three days a week.

Rather than being unemployed, Georgia is UNDERemployed with insecure work - she wants a full-time job, but hasn't been able to land a position yet.

The 27-year-old told Hack (as part of Thursday's Hack Live: The War on Young People) even now, in her part-time job as a copywriter, she works on a rolling contract that has to be renewed every two months.

"This wasn't really the plan... I did think by now I would have a full-time job that paid enough that I didn't have to worry about rent and bills every week," she said.

To make ends meet, Georgia bakes cakes and picks up odd jobs to supplement her income.

"I work for event companies occasionally running barbeques, I help out my friends when they Airbnb their apartments and get paid for that.

"If I put down every single tiny job I ever did on my resume, it would three or four pages long just for jobs.

I feel like I've done everything - from packing mouthguards in a factory, to changing sheets on beds at Airbnb locations, to chasing children around and teaching cooking lessons."

Despite applying for about 300 jobs, Georgia hasn't been able to find full-time work in an area she's interested in.

Instead, she became an internship queen.





"I've done four internships. They were all varying lengths at varying locations. Some of them weren't as great as others."

One internship ended up putting a job on the table for her. But a week later they came back and asked her if she would work three days a week for free instead.

I was so offended that they thought that instead of a job I would work three days for free. I'm not slave labour. I deserve better than that. I shouldn't have to intern for the rest of my life."

But the constant job search has also taken a toll on Georgia’s mental health and she was diagnosed with depression in 2013.

"My anxiety is still really high. I get really anxious and it definitely translates when I do go for a job interview because I put so much pressure on myself because I know that I have to impress and think that probably doesn't help the situation."

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Georgia says it makes her furious when older generations tell her she mustn't be working hard enough and there are jobs out there for the taking.

"We want to work, we're desperate to work. You should see how many job applications we fill out. You should see how hard we try. You should see how many little jobs we take to make ends meet to keep going with our dream.

You told us when we were little that we could do anything if we worked hard enough and here we are working our butts off. We are jaded. We're over it. We are angry at the system."

"We're sick of you guys not giving us a chance. We're sick of waiting for our turn and just being taken for granted. We're not lazy. We're trying our best. You promised us the world and we know we can't have the world but I guess we thought we would have a little bit more than we've been given."

Young people bound for 'portfolio careers'

According to the Foundation for Young Australians, Georgia's not alone in her struggle for secure employment.

CEO Jan Owen told Hack the country is currently facing the most significant change in the future of work.

"All the data that we have right now says that young people are unemployed or underemployed, so we're incredibly over-educated, over-qualified and under and unemployed."

When the foundation compared those rates to 30 years ago, about the time when our parents were looking for work, they found we're almost three and a half times more likely to be underemployed than the previous generation.

And our pay isn't going up by as much either.

"There's been a 20 per cent increase in pay for 15-24 year olds since 1985 and yet for other age groups, say for 45 to 59 year olds, there's been a 37 per cent increase in pay."

And, completely unsurprisingly, it's harder to find work.

We crossed over in 2015 where we've got more young people in part-time work than full-time work."

Jan also thinks this is going to keep happening and we could end up working a few different casual or contract jobs at a time throughout our lives.

"I think that thing that worries me the most is this idea of young people falling behind even though they're putting in a huge amount of work.

"Contrary to all the stories about the so-called entitled Gen Ys who have everything, that is not actually the picture that we're seeing."

Georgia will join Tom Tilley and a panel of guests on Hack Live: The War on Young People on ABC2 at 9:30pm on Thursday.

