The employment crisis has officially eaten itself. We have reached peak absurdity: the Saturday job—that sacred rite of passage where teenagers once earned pocket money restocking shelves—has become a competitive credential factory that would make a hedge fund recruiter weep.

According to the boss of Next, Britain’s entry-level job opportunities have undergone what he diplomatically called a “dramatic fall.” Translation: if you want to work Saturdays at a high street retailer, you now need to submit a CV that reads like a hedge fund analyst crossed with a Michelin-starred sous chef.

Let us examine what the market is apparently demanding. The job description for a part-time Saturday position at a mid-tier clothing chain now opens with the phrase “ideal candidates will have completed an Ivy League education.” Not preferred. Not advantageous. Required. Because nothing says “folding jeans” like a degree from Princeton in molecular biology.

But wait—there is more. The posting continues: “Experience in molecular gastronomy is essential.” One has to wonder what exactly the hiring manager envisions happening in the stockroom. Perhaps the new uniform involves preparing a deconstructed tapenade while simultaneously processing returns? Maybe the break room has been converted into a test kitchen?

The requirements spiral downward into the genuinely unhinged. “Fluency in Mandarin, Sanskrit, and Portuguese required.” For a shop in Swindon. “Five years’ experience in venture capital.” For a job that pays £8.50 an hour. “Must have personally negotiated a trade deal with the government of Luxembourg.” The posting does not explain why, and frankly, neither does anyone else.

There is also the mysterious demand for “a demonstrated history of successful yacht ownership.” Not sailing experience. Not boat familiarity. Ownership. Of a yacht. Presumably because if you cannot afford to buy a maritime vessel, you lack the financial discipline to handle the responsibility of selling merchandise at cost price.

One particularly creative job posting asked for “a PhD in Renaissance art history, preferably with a thesis on Caravaggio’s use of chiaroscuro.” The position involved manning the fitting room. The hiring manager later clarified that this was “non-negotiable,” as if the entire point of a Saturday job has somehow become a proxy for sorting the genuinely elite from the merely competent.

The absurdity is, of course, a mirror held up to something genuinely broken. Entry-level jobs have become harder to find because the economy has been hollowed out in ways that make even part-time work scarce. Companies are hiring fewer people, demanding more from those they do hire, and creating a strange fiction where a job that once existed to give teenagers pocket money now requires a CV that would impress a Fortune 500 board.

But the real comedy—and the real tragedy—is that this is not actually that far from the truth. Employers do ask for absurd qualifications for entry-level roles. They do demand experience for positions that should require none. They do post requirements that no single human could possibly meet. The only difference between the actual job market and this description is that the actual job market does not have the good sense to acknowledge how ridiculous it has become.

So if you are a teenager looking to earn some cash on Saturdays, here is your path forward: secure an Ivy League degree, master molecular gastronomy, become fluent in three languages most of the world does not speak, buy a yacht, write a dissertation on Renaissance art, and then—only then—you might be considered for a position paying minimum wage, working four hours a week, with no guaranteed hours.

The boss of Next was right. There has been a dramatic fall in entry-level opportunities. What he did not say is that we have somehow made the fall even more ridiculous by pretending the jobs that remain require qualifications that would be excessive for a cabinet position.

Welcome to 2026. Even your Saturday job is now a luxury item.