My last post included some bitching about elementary and high schools (because they deserve it) but there’s always more to say. Dr. Profeta has sage advice about college:
(Hat tip to Maggie’s Farm and askblog.)
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Almost all of those entry level low skill (and even moderate skill) jobs are filled by adult hispanics in most areas. Whether illegally here or not, they have filled the niche previously occupied by young people on their way up in the world of work. And since it’s all they know, and better than ‘back home’, they are sticking to that niche like a tick on a dog.
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You’ve got a good point. When you’re a kid, competing with adults is brutal! You don’t know shit and adults have running cars, experience, spouses, resources you don’t have, and they know stuff. Hard to beat ’em. For the entry age cohort, it’s one of life’s big lessons; life is not fair… not even a little bit.
Nor is it limited to adult job competition sourced from illegal or recent legal immigration. Sometimes the economy just plain sucks. When that happens it’s doubly hard on young entry level jobseekers. Another of life’s cruel lessons.
I experienced a shitty deal first hand. I entered the workforce in an era when the economy sucked in a place that pretty much always sucks anyway. My peers and I competed hard to land such coveted rungs on the ladder as burger flipping. I date myself but rewinding VHS tapes was a princely profession for which I didn’t make the cut. Eventually, most of us cleared the gate; if not burger flipping, then stacking shelves, or shoveling shit. You just had to be such a good shit shoveler you got your foot in the door and such a hard worker you stayed there. There are almost no second chances when the economy sucks.
I’d submit that now, in 2019, the economy is roaring. Especially for kids looking for low end “starter” jobs, this is an excellent time to make bank in the real world. For the same reason, it’s a dumb time to hide out on a college campus.
Of course, when I mention this to kids they roll their eyes and think I’m “geezer reminiscing”. They think <4% unemployment is simply the way things are and it'll always be that way. (Hint: it won't.) Then again when I was a kid I was an idiot too. I thought 8%+ unemployment was about as low as it would ever go and geezers telling me about better times where nincompoops. Some things you gotta' learn for yourself.
Ideally, the state of the economy should be a big part of the college calculation. If the economy is roaring and colleges are expensive, why warehouse yourself with whiny pseudo-adults? Unless you're material for MIT or want to be a surgeon, just get a job. Conversely, if the economy is tanked, rolling the dice on tuition (in a well selected field) is worth the risk. It might help you blast past competition for that lawnmowing gig you just can't land and put you on a different path.
In my misspent youth I entered and exited college based very much on what other options I could unearth. ROI was always on my mind. Every minute I wasn't bringing home the bacon really bothered me. But, when the economy shit a brick and I was hanging by a thread I thought "I'm broke anyway, I'd better knock out a skillset while the world is burning down around me". No regrets but if I'd had better options I'd never have darkened academia's door. I also wouldn't have missed many years of modest earnings hoping for a brass ring on the other side.
(As an aside, in college old tenured professors nudged me toward the tenured world that'd treated them so well. They meant well but their out of date advice would've crushed me. Careers as they experienced them don't exist now. I saw it fading even though they did not. I escaped academia before I wound up like the author's pool at Huffington Post; too inexperienced and unqualified for a slightly above shit job, doing wheel spinning clerical work at sub shit job wages, and staving off huge student loans. Yikes, what a train wreck!)
We've all experienced the recent college grad that can't find their ass with both hands. In times of a roaring economy, there's less reason for that to happen. The trick is for young kids to not be that fool.
Hm. You've inspired me. I'm reading up on historic unemployment rates now. 🙂