<p>^dito, lol</p>
Millennials Who Chose Not To Attend College Are More Likely To Live In Poverty Than Past Generations
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<p>I hear this a lot from students but it makes little sense.</p>
<p>The “make way” theory assumes that young people are hired into the same jobs as people hold toward the end of their careers. In many situations that’s not the case. Also, labor markets change. We need more physical and occupational therapists and fewer kindergarten teachers. There is not a fixed pie of jobs to be shared out.</p>
<p>In my field, retirees are not being replaced with younger full-timer equivalents.</p>
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<p>I agree that it’s flawed but the idea is that as more senior level employees retire, employees below them will be promoted up the ladder and then entry level positions will open up. </p>
<p>When my H retired after >45 years of service, it took 4-5 employees and contractors to do parts of the job he did alone. They did not hire anyone to do it, they just used staff that was there and doing other things to try to keep doing what he was doing. The other day the called him (he retired in 2012). They had a problem and he and all the names they read to him were retired. None of the contacts on the list had been updated and no one knew where to turn. He told them the names he knew as of when he retired and advised them to update their list with current employees. </p>
<p>The jobs and positions will likely ultimately be moved out of our state to DC or somewhere else, even tho that will make the time zone differences with the South Pacific and other parts of the world crazier than they already are. A lot of times when these older, more senior folks retire, their knowledge goes with them and no one has the contacts and skill set to continue the work, so it is lost when they leave. Sometimes something new is started in its place and sometimes it remains just a hole, sadly. </p>
<p>just saw a commercial the other day that said that going to college doesn’t train for the real world. it was a trade commercial. funny.</p>
<p>Well, there’s a lot of truth in that. College doesn’t necessarily prepare you for the real world. That’s not its mission. </p>
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<p>Most college students are preparing for the real world in which having only a high school education won’t get you very far (and most are not self-motivated enough to self-educate more effectively or efficiently than they can be educated in a school setting, and some subjects require equipment or facilities that limit effective self-education). Two thirds of bachelor’s degrees in the US are granted in overtly pre-professional majors, and many liberal arts majors are chosen for pre-professional reasons. Even for majors with no overt pre-professional targets, the student is at least seeking a bachelor’s degree that is often a requirement for entry-level jobs, due to creeping credentialism.</p>
<p>While there may be some scions of the SES-elite for whom college is merely an experience, and there is no real need for them to attend college in order to inherit jobs/money/etc. from the wealthy parents, that is not a big percentage of the college-attending population.</p>
<p>My D is attending college primarily for the experience. She is hardly a “scion of the SES elite.” It’s true that she has no loans. But that doesn’t mean she has a trust fund or a job with the family firm. She didn’t know what she wanted to do for a living when she was 17 and applying to colleges. She may still not know at 22 when she graduates. At least she will know herself and her abilities better than she did as a high school senior, and she’ll be in a better position to make an informed choice about what to do next.</p>
<p>There is no such thing as “the real world.” There are a lot of different worlds. And if you can’t choose one at 18, college is as good a way to spend your time as anything else if you have self-discipline, interest and ability. There is little opportunity cost to undergraduate education unless you have to take out large loans to do it.</p>
<p>Most of those who contemplate college do not have the luxury of getting most of it paid for by scholarships, good financial aid, and/or wealthy parents. For them, spending money on college needs to be done with a return on investment in mind, rather than just finding oneself. Yes, that may be offensive to the academic idealists who say that “college is not job training”, but that is reality for most. This is even more true today than it was a generation ago, when college was much less expensive, and a high school graduate could more easily “work his/her way through college” without financial assistance from parents, financial aid, or scholarships.</p>
<p>It seems at least a third, if not half, of the kids I know studied psychology - with no intention of actually going into the field after graduation. They now work in various fields - the degree got them through the college-degree-required door to jobs, but has nothing to do with what they’re doing now, or plan to be doing in the future. I’m apt to agree that for most, college is a means to an end - a job - but given how many kids go into jobs that have nothing to do with their education, I think that it ends up being a(n expensive) way of "finding themselves:, too.</p>
<p>Commonly asked question but I will repeat myself, “when did it become a crime to be successful?”. 2 things we hold to be true, parents want better for their children than they had for themselves and successful people OFTEN beget successful children. Before anyone points out how their DD or DS knows someone who came from abject poverty to cure cancer, take notice that I said often and was not speaking in absolutes. No guarantees in life, but from someone who was a math major, when in doubt make decisions (and opinions) based on the highest probability.</p>
<p>If the baby boomers would just retire already then maybe young people like myself will be able to get jobs. </p>
<p>Who can afford to retire?</p>