'Job snobs' lose out on pay and training

Jobs snobbery is preventing British workers from taking up posts with good salaries and training prospects, a report published this week says.

A Work Foundation survey found that the UK has a "blind spot" to service industry companies. It criticises the failure to recognise training advances in firms such as Tesco, Asda and McDonald's while piling plaudits on TV chef Jamie Oliver for training youngsters for his restaurant Fifteen.

The report's author, Andy Westwood, said: "These organisations are extremely good at developing skills that are of tremendous and incalculable benefit to the UK's economy."

But in a poll commissioned for the report, half of workers aged under under 30 said they were influenced by the views of friends and family when it came to choosing where they worked.

Dr Glenn Wilson, of the University of London's Institute of Psychiatry, said: "The job snobs choose status and prestige ahead of more hidden benefits like training and career progression."

The report coincides with the publication of the Government's Skills White Paper on Wednesday, part of an attempt to devise a strategy to meet Britain's skills deficit.