Posted on 10/10/2009 4:12:44 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Bright, eager—and unwanted. While unemployment is ravaging just about every part of the global workforce, the most enduring harm is being done to young people who can't grab onto the first rung of the career ladder.
Affected are a range of young people, from high school dropouts, to college grads, newly minted lawyers and MBAs across the developed world from Britain to Japan. One indication: In the U.S., the unemployment rate for 16- to 24-year-olds climbed to more than 18%, from 13% a year ago.
For people just starting their careers, the damage may be deep, long-lasting, potentially creating a kind of "lost generation." Studies suggest that an extended period of youthful joblessness can significantly depress lifetime income as people get stuck in jobs that are beneath their capabilities, or come to be seen by employers as damaged goods.
Equally important, employers are likely to suffer from the scarring of a generation. The freshness and vitality young people bring to the workplace is missing. Tomorrow's would-be star employees are on sidelines, deprived of experience and losing motivation. In Japan, which has been down this road since the early 1990s, workers who started their careers a decade or more ago and are now in their 30s account for 6 in 10 reported cases of depression, stress, work-related mental disabilities, according to Japan Productivity Center for Socio-Economic Development.
When today's unemployed finally do get jobs in the recovery, many may be dissatisfied to be slotted below people who worked all along—especially if the newcomers spent their downtime getting more education, says Richard Thompson, vice-president for talent development at Adecco Group North America, which employs more than 300,000 people in temporary positions. Says Thompson: "You're going to have multiple generations fighting for the jobs that are going to come back in the recovery."
(Excerpt) Read more at businessweek.com ...
You still don't get it. None of that crap has anything to do with success. Take a lesson from Woodie Allen: "90% of success in life is showing up."
Did people in the Depression piss and whine about there being no jobs where they were? Yes, some of them.
Many of them got up and went where the jobs were, however.
These kids need to get up off their plush posteriors, put one foot in front of the other and get while the going is good.
He is disabled. Not military quality.
No, but it was implied. And, a 16 year old today on a construction site would be a big problem for his employer.
I applaud your initiative, but the real world of today would be a different scenario.
I know you have never faced adversity in life. Good for you.
Yea, right. All those years of poaching small game as a kid so we could have food on the table was just sport hunting without paperwork. Nothin’ to it.
Lack of money as a youth is what made me into a money-making sled dog in life. People who say it “is hard” get nothing no sympathy from me. Been there, done that, didn’t get any sympathy from other people at the time.
Looking back, I’d do it all again, hardship and all. Without the tough times as a kid, I have no doubt I would never have been as successful. Whenever I thought “Hey, I could kick back and slack off... things are pretty good right here...” all I had to remember was the times we didn’t know if my mother was going to lose the house to the bank, how we’d pay for groceries and so on.
Best motivation in the world: remember what it was like to not have much at all.
Kids today are spoiled like they’ve never been before. Same advice given to me as a youth applies to them: “quityerbitchin’ and get to work.”
Was tossed in the ‘ special ed ‘ classes for math which was a huge joke. One year I insisted on taking a regular Algebra class like everyone else, convinced myself I could do it. Even this class was dumbed down a bit and I still was on the verge of failing almost every semester no matter how hard I tried.
I learned nothing in those damned special ed classes though.
Well, good for you. Glad you can do it all on your own.
So true. For whatever reason, I took the blue collar route.
Didn't have that 100K college loan and kept my snoot to the grindstone. Now that I'm about done, I have little sympathy for the boo-hooers.
As an old man at work told me when I was starting out-"I got mine, you got yours to git!"
My son graduated engineering in 2007 and has just been spinning his wheels, my daughter graduated in 2005 with math and economics and after a year and a half found a job in Canada. That door was only open to her because my wife was born in Montreal and maintained dual citizenship just for the hell of it.
Over the last year my son has obliterated our frequent flyer miles traveling to interviews anywhere he can get them. He too is now looking in Canada.
My children are economic refugees,
ping
I guess we both have to back up a bit and stipulate to the fact that he is generationally in a condition beyond categories, that "X'er" and "War Baby" are terms that apply to Americans who are participants in their society.
A Red Diaper baby, Zero was educated as an enemy alien to emulate and esteem, from afar, his Mau-Mau daddy and the Communist International. He has always been an exotic, and he played on that in his presidential campaign. So saying he was a "Boomer" or an "X'er" makes about as much sense as trying to apply those terms to migrating Lapplanders or to Australian aborigines who've spent their whole lives going walkabout in the bush.
What about graduate school? Does college alone not matter anymore without grad school or is grad school just a waste of time?
Concur—see my post #49. I know my initial post probably came off sounding a little arrogant. However, the point I was trying to make is that most of these kids KNOW what majors will yield good paying jobs and which are more risky in terms of earning a living. As some have pointed out, having a technical degree does not guarantee a job, but overall the odds are more in your favor. Many of those with liberal arts degrees have skills that will eventually allow them to earn good $$. It just takes longer for them to build up to it.
Truth in advertising—I am a college professor (Computer Science). I see numerous students who start off in CS and then migrate to other majors because they’re easier. Most of these kids could stick it out if they pushed themselves—they just don’t want to do the hard work required. You would not believe the number of kids who major in Special Education because they believe its an “easy” job.
Sorry to hear that. I still think the odds of getting a job with a technical degree are better than one with a liberal arts degree. Your son’s experience nonwithstanding, I think the BLS stats back me up on this. In the end there are no guarantees of anything, only odds in/out of your favor.
Best of luck to your son.
09/01/1997 $5.15
07/24/2007 $5.85
07/24/2008 $6.55
07/24/2009 $7.25
I took one semester of HVAC a long time ago but every now and then I am able to apply some of it here at home. HVAC in the south is a necessity. I am so burned out on computers and other technology I am looking to do something else. If the budget can survive this year, maybe I can afford to go to tech. college.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.