First off his time line is wrong. I am barely young enough to be genX I had kids early and mine are still in college so most of the kids graduating this year will have boomer parents. If you were listening to Pearl Jam in high school you would have had to have had your kids in high school for them to be in college now.
He is half right about the idea that we taught kids that most jobs are beneath them. I don't see a problem with telling your kids to aim higher that flipping burgers but we went and put skilled labor in the same bag and turned working hard from a virtue to vice. People look at me funny when I say I change my own oil instead of paying someone else to it while I sit on my ass and wait. You hear a lot of talk about the middle class but not much talk about the working class.
In the time you can get a bachelors degree in graphic arts you can get a journeyman license as a plumber and not only make money while you learn instead of building debt but make more money in general. That and you don’t have to set through a humanities or art appreciation class. Yes the very best jobs require college degrees so the mindset was get a college degree and you will get the very best job. The problem is there was never a shortage of people to fill those high paying job slots and training more people for them doesn't really crate more slots it fact it creates more competition for them and lowers the value. Most jobs don’t really require a degree and the four extra years of job experience might have served you better. A lot of jobs that claim they require degrees will overlook that if you have the work experience. In the mean time we have a shortage of some skilled labor jobs and a shortage of people with hard science degrees. We have to import electrical engineers at my company because we can not find qualified Americans.
He is wrong about the entitlement issue. This generation suffers from gross entitlement beliefs. Sorry if you were misled but you don't deserve a high paying job just because you went to school an extra four years. If you have bachelor’s degree in a field that requires a masters or PHD and you can’t find a job that is your own damn fault. If you got a degree in a field that doesn’t have jobs or that pays to little that is your own damn fault. You should have spent a little more time researching your degree instead of just taking something that sounded cool. Guess what the plumber worked hard for his knowledge as well and unlike your interpretive dance he learned marketable skills and it makes sense that he makes more money than you do. It is fairytale we sold to both ourselves and our kids that a degree is magic key to open all of lives doors. We have done something similar with high school where we put a greater value on graduating students then we do on educating them.
He is right that we failed kids but letting them sit on their asses to much but throwing in the entertainment industry crap was just a soapbox issue he is trying to wedge in where it doesn't belong. He acknowledges that the entertainment industry is part of what has caused problems for this generation but letting our kids weaken is one of our great failings?? He needs to go back and watch some of those 70s movies and point where the loss of quality movies is showing up. If anything the major studies are embracing and promoting independent movies now more than ever.
Looking at the site he rants a lot but most of the time he is talking out his ass.
He is half right about the idea that we taught kids that most jobs are beneath them. I don't see a problem with telling your kids to aim higher that flipping burgers but we went and put skilled labor in the same bag and turned working hard from a virtue to vice. People look at me funny when I say I change my own oil instead of paying someone else to it while I sit on my ass and wait. You hear a lot of talk about the middle class but not much talk about the working class.
In the time you can get a bachelors degree in graphic arts you can get a journeyman license as a plumber and not only make money while you learn instead of building debt but make more money in general. That and you don’t have to set through a humanities or art appreciation class. Yes the very best jobs require college degrees so the mindset was get a college degree and you will get the very best job. The problem is there was never a shortage of people to fill those high paying job slots and training more people for them doesn't really crate more slots it fact it creates more competition for them and lowers the value. Most jobs don’t really require a degree and the four extra years of job experience might have served you better. A lot of jobs that claim they require degrees will overlook that if you have the work experience. In the mean time we have a shortage of some skilled labor jobs and a shortage of people with hard science degrees. We have to import electrical engineers at my company because we can not find qualified Americans.
He is wrong about the entitlement issue. This generation suffers from gross entitlement beliefs. Sorry if you were misled but you don't deserve a high paying job just because you went to school an extra four years. If you have bachelor’s degree in a field that requires a masters or PHD and you can’t find a job that is your own damn fault. If you got a degree in a field that doesn’t have jobs or that pays to little that is your own damn fault. You should have spent a little more time researching your degree instead of just taking something that sounded cool. Guess what the plumber worked hard for his knowledge as well and unlike your interpretive dance he learned marketable skills and it makes sense that he makes more money than you do. It is fairytale we sold to both ourselves and our kids that a degree is magic key to open all of lives doors. We have done something similar with high school where we put a greater value on graduating students then we do on educating them.
He is right that we failed kids but letting them sit on their asses to much but throwing in the entertainment industry crap was just a soapbox issue he is trying to wedge in where it doesn't belong. He acknowledges that the entertainment industry is part of what has caused problems for this generation but letting our kids weaken is one of our great failings?? He needs to go back and watch some of those 70s movies and point where the loss of quality movies is showing up. If anything the major studies are embracing and promoting independent movies now more than ever.
Looking at the site he rants a lot but most of the time he is talking out his ass.
5 Ways We (gen X) Ruined the Occupy Wall Street Generation
27/11/2011 08:26:47 AM
- 1753 Views
This article both pisses me off and makes me want to spend more time outdoors. *NM*
27/11/2011 09:26:58 AM
- 585 Views
Is gen x people who grew up in the 80's?
27/11/2011 12:48:35 PM
- 952 Views
Wikipedia gives a lose definition of people born between the early 60s to the early 80s. *NM*
27/11/2011 01:46:04 PM
- 416 Views
It's really mostly correct, and also highlights why OWS was a total failure.
27/11/2011 05:44:15 PM
- 868 Views
The whole concept of 'Generation' is a near total fiction
27/11/2011 08:49:28 PM
- 850 Views
Well, thank you for that explanation about cousins, yes.
27/11/2011 09:41:57 PM
- 741 Views
I always like to include useful pieces of trivia in my rants, like a lollipop from the dentist
27/11/2011 11:17:17 PM
- 808 Views
I disagree, but think generational influences are often oversimplified.
28/11/2011 02:14:07 AM
- 888 Views
I like that you're citing that your citing the stuff I was clearly staring at in my own post
28/11/2011 04:33:57 AM
- 1083 Views
Well, without a cite there is no way to know if we are looking at the same stuff.
28/11/2011 06:27:29 AM
- 1094 Views
It's more of a humorus aside, one of my drafts linked the graph
28/11/2011 07:21:34 AM
- 777 Views
Yeah, I just thought you were taking a more absolutist position than you did.
28/11/2011 09:05:08 PM
- 820 Views
John Cheese is an ass. His weekly column on a humor website is full of this crap
29/11/2011 02:09:45 AM
- 855 Views
There's an irritatingly large amount of that on Cracked these days, or even The Onion
29/11/2011 03:11:37 AM
- 820 Views
I wouldn't be putting the blame on Generation X. People have been screwing up the next generation
27/11/2011 09:54:30 PM
- 798 Views
So pretty much each succeeding generation of humanity is worse off *NM*
28/11/2011 01:27:31 AM
- 388 Views
Nah. Nature compensates in some unfathomable way to keep us from going to hell in a handbasket. *NM*
01/12/2011 01:16:02 AM
- 392 Views
How is it anyone's fault ?
27/11/2011 11:24:53 PM
- 797 Views
Basically, because there was no reason it had to get in line with the rest of the world.
28/11/2011 02:40:46 AM
- 812 Views