Posted on 04/14/2006 6:44:37 AM PDT by Panzerlied
Not me! I'm in the "damned lazy kids" group of posters but I'm not a geezer; I graduated from college in the 90s with a liberal arts degree and rented a room (in a gloomy basement in gloomy Seattle!) to support myself while I worked at entry-level jobs.
I'm a Gen Xer, I now make $35K in a professional field, working P/T, only two days a week--mostly I'm a stay-at-home mom whose children WILL move out when they are 17.
Agreed I think you have to factor in the situations. See my post above too.
Wow... I felt like I really grew more intellectually in the years after college than during!
Same thing here. Graduated in the late 90s and I'm just now starting to feel a bit financially stable. Of course I'm not married yet and I suck at money, so factor that in, I guess. Those first years out of school were pretty lean.
All the stuff I didn't understand in college, life made abundantly clear.
They're not listening to a professor drone. They're listening to a TA. The professor is busy doing oh-so-important research. His salary has to be paid as well as the TA's.
If what you have to offer is a typical 9-5 position at a starting salary in Cleveland or Rochester someplace, 18 of of 20 candidates will turn it down out of hand. They'd rather live at home with Mom and Dad until all of these demands are met. Spoiled brats!
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Exactly. Thank you. But root cause is Mom and Dad.
I don't know any science or engineering majors who are unemployed. I know a lot of engineers who complain miserably about how lowly paid they are though, and about how they are going to lose their jobs any time now. Poor buggers only getting 35 dollars an hour plus benefits to start...then only seeing 10% increases per year in compensation
The reality is their training has real commercial and societal value. If they can create real wealth, people will pay them to do so, and take a cut aka profits. Meanwhile airy-fairy degrees in our very liberal, liberal arts programs are to me sort of like those madrassahs in Pakistan. Where they don't really learn anything about the laws of nature or practical.. but get indoctrinated into an ideology.
I have had this discussion with college deans. Colleges need to keep pace and revise their programs to align with the careers that exist and the skills that are required. They should be forward looking as well.
Colleges need to offer career planning orientations in the first year of school. Let the kids do self assessments and evaluate how their skills and interests lead to specific careers and then align their education. MOST KIDS DROP OUT because they have no end career goal or understand how their education leads to it.
Colleges need to help kids connect the dots as to what a particular degree will enable a person to do. For example, most biology majors have little idea what their major will help them to do for a job. Yet there are a zillion interesting jobs out there for them.
too bad college professors don't work so they actually have no clue on what jobs are available.
Yeah, the sad part is its likelihood.
How in the heck do these kids choose their majors anyway?
This says it all. She got a degree in a field where there is little demand and couldn't find a job.
Must not have had an employment office there. Or was this a "feelgood" degree?
She must be overqualified to be a teacher. There are teacher shortages all over the place.
The following is a serious question that I have, because I have a daughter (9years old). Initially, after reading it, I know that people will get red hot, and procede to flame me, however, I do ask it in all seriousness...
When we send our daughters off to college, are we buying into the Feminazi belief that a career is more important then being a wife and homemaker?
When we send our daughters off to college doesn't that put them into the rat race of having to get a job to pay off the debts.
My wife, bless her soul, has been a stay at home mom for the last 13 years. Only recently, has she taken some part-time jobs. She did so because all the kids were in school, and she could still be home when they got home. In all of her part time jobs she worked with other women who had degrees but were doing the same job as her for the same pay.
These other women HAD to work to pay off college/house/cars. Because we bought our house and cars based on my income alone, we didn't start out in the crunch that most couples find themselves in.
IMHO, I think part of the problem begins when parents and girls buy into the idea that they must go to college, then the debt/rat race begins.
Sincerely (flame away)
No flames, but I think higher education is great for future stay-at-home moms too.
An educated mother might be a bit better mother, since all learning begins at home--and her education level will probably correlate with her children's education level, and hence their future "success," whether in the work force or also in the home.
Some just starting out now should try for a trade such as pipefitters or welding. Direct from high school, they don't even want college types. Of course, for those trades one has to learn to do actual trig calculations, but they use calculators now. Get to journeyman level and you can write your own ticket just like you had a Doctorate.
Geez,
All the good excuses have been taken and they all missed the real cause of the poor job market. Try this for a real reason.
The socialists have taken control of the US government and since the late 1970’s they have been exporting all major industry from the nation. Now the major industries normally cause the creation of smaller supporting industries. The higher paid industrial workers spend money and create other jobs in the area. All of which is lost when the industries are exported.
Paul Volker said in 1981, Americans have the highest standard of living in the world. No other nation can hope to attain this standard of living. Therefore, we must reduce the standard of living of Americans. (Pure egalitarian thought.)
Notice that no credit is given for the educated work force, the willingness of the workers to work smart and hard, and the economic environment which promoted enterprise. Not that the socialists didn’t know that these conditions existed. They immediately start attacks on all of these areas.
Education was attacked by the Department of Education created by Jimmy Carter in 1978. Yes, Jimmy Carter has acknowledged being a socialist. The NEA teachers union supplied the means and method. Workers may still be motivation to work hard, but the a great deal of the smarts were not included in the educational process. The process is commonly called the Dumbing of America.
The economic environment was attacked by a mountain of restrictions and regulations which were intended to create burdens and obstacles for industry while driving up costs. At the same time, the government actually aided industries monetarily and diplomatically that wanted to leave the country. The markets remained available to the leaving industries by ‘free trade’ regulations. The Global agenda is a Marxist socialist program .
Now, why are there no decent entry level jobs?
Take a socialist out for lunch.
No flames. I am college educated and treasure that experience. I have a very curious mind and hate to think what my life would have been without my education.
However, I believe to this day that motherhood is more important than career. In fact, I left a good career when I was left alone with a child. I worked, but her schedule always came first. No woman, or man for that matter, knows what the future may bring. What if a woman has a number of children and is a stay-at-home mom (good for them) and the husband dies. Or leaves. What then?
I think there is a HUGE problem in this country about motherhood not being respected. But I don't think it is because women are college educated. That may contribute to it for women already disposed to think that way, but I think the real problem is a lack of respect for life. And selfishness.
People are different. If your daughter wants to go to college, then I think you should help her. If she doesn't want to go, then I wouldn't try to convince her, if you think that's the right action for her.
My daughter is living at home and I would strongly recommend to most parents to consider that, if they are near a suitable college.
For me what did it was military service - it is made abundantly clear in bootcamp that your baseline is picking up cigarette butts from the grinder and that you're going to have to earn your way up from there. In case there are any cherished assumptions left in your young mind of special status or how much life owes you there's usually an NCO of some sort with a colorful means of disabusing you of any such illusion. It is that that is mischaracterized by non-military lefties as "breaking" an individual. It is no such thing. It is enlightening them.
I had about $11 K in credit card debt and $5K in student loans. My starting salary was $32K. It took about 2 years to clear off all the debt. It was such a great feeling to "clear a bill" and not have to see it again.
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