6 ms·

These numbers are really grim, and considering the job market only gets more cruel a few years after the top end of this age bracket, it makes it hard for young

These numbers are really grim, and considering the job market only gets more cruel a few years after the top end of this age bracket, it makes it hard for young people to have a lot of hope for the future. Granted, maybe some of them are reflective of age-agnostic trends but still! Start in higher debt then make less than ever! As a young person looking at these numbers I realize I am squandering my blessings as a high paid tech worker. We are setting up our future for failure while claiming we needed to make these sacrifices for today.

angersock 12y ago
It's pretty great--all the while, even in tech we're watching fewer IPOs (and thus good exits for non-founders), companies whose business proposition is often literally "We externalize our costs by ignoring local laws and screwing our emplo^Hcontractors", and all the while pissing off everyone else in the economy by telling them how awesome the future is going to be. And we still haven't managed to engage (politically or otherwise) the folks actually running the government. Things aren't looking good. :(
kaoD 12y ago
Welcome to "staying competitive". Here at Spain (and generally Southern Europe) we've been told over and over again that we have to stay competitive, which is just an euphemism for working more and earning less (i.e. becoming Europe's China). In a globalized market with a (still) steadily growing population, competition is growing and therefore salaries are shrinking. It's happening in all industries (e.g. tech firms offshoring) but also at homes. I don't know about the USA but here in Spain housewives love hunting for sales, buying as cheap as they can, and proud about it. Why are they surprised later when their children can't find a decent salary? Buying Perú's asparagus cheaper than in our home country (including transportation across the Atlantic!) is only driving prices lower and lower, which hinders the whole economy in the long term. And now the USA is going to sign a trade agreement with Europe which will further increase competition and will drive wages even lower than they're now for both parties. On the other hand, isn't this just leveling the playing field for developing countries? After all, for them to grow, we have to shrink.
- disputin 12y ago
  Seems to me it's the government which needs to stay competitive, not the workers, ie regulation and bureaucracy.
  - kaoD 12y ago
    What a cliché. EDIT (to elaborate): IMHO economy (like most things) is all about trade-offs. I know the states and bureaucracy are cumbersome, but they offload risk from individuals into society (which isn't always a bad thing). I respect your views on deregulation (and share them to some extent), but your phrase is really a cliché and does not address my comment (since deregulation is orthogonal to labor competition).
    - disputin 12y ago
      A cliché? Or general agreement? I thought people generally agreed that Spain has issues in that regard. "I know the states and bureaucracy..." I wasn't referring to states in general, you were talking about Spain, I was responding about Spain. I'm not a ranting libertarian, I'm aware of a state's role in society. Knee jerk pouncing on a cliché that wasn't here. we've been told over and over again that we have to stay competitive, which is just an euphemism for working more and earning less How much of that extra work is unnecessary (in Spain)?
      - tormeh 12y ago
        The problem in Spain is that the government and its regulations are so bad, that the only way Spain can become competitive is if the government gets its act together. Until then (i.e. always) lower wages and longer hours will have to do.
        disputin 12y ago
        (i.e. always) Based on above comments I hope you're voting for Podemos. * if the government gets its act together* That won't happen spontaneously.
logfromblammo 12y ago
Careful with your use of the word "we". What is happening is that between 1974 and 1994, the generation that was then in power decided to stop paying off their own debts, and started deferring payment to future generations. The effect is similar to being forced to cosign a mortgage before you are even born, then when you turn 18, your parents kick you out of their house and stop making the payments. You then have to pay for two houses, and can probably only live in the worst one. It's a really nasty thing for your elder generation to do, but all your life, they have taught you that you aren't allowed to murder all of them and sell off the assets they purchased with your labor as collateral. So it becomes somewhat of a tradition for each generation to refinance the debts of the previous with the labor of the next as security. But at some point, a generation realizes that the only way they can afford the same lifestyle as their parents is by having two incomes and fewer children. "Our" grandparents needed to make the sacrifice back before they died. But they didn't, and now they can't. So I prefer to let their creditors go find them in Hell if they want their money back. I am perfectly willing to be responsible for my own financial decisions, but rolling over the debts of the fathers unto the fourth generation seems more than a little bit unfair. And that is justified in large part by use of the pronoun "we". I, specifically, am being taxed to pay for the economic benefits enjoyed by entire generations of older people who reaped more than they ever sowed. And my gruel, along with that of younger generations, has become thinner ever since. I even get angry when my spouse says "we need to do X" and really means "I want you to do X, and expect nothing--even gratitude or acknowledgement--in exchange", so I can't imagine how politicians can so easily get away with doing the same thing to entire nations. What "we" need to be doing is demanding that some specific people be held individually responsible for their own bad behavior.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- Florin_Andrei 12y ago
  So, for everything you said above, how do you define the pronoun "we"? People in the USA who entered the workforce in the 90s/00s?
  - 12y ago

angersock 12y ago

It's pretty great--all the while, even in tech we're watching fewer IPOs (and thus good exits for non-founders), companies whose business proposition is often literally "We externalize our costs by ignoring local laws and screwing our emplo^Hcontractors", and all the while pissing off everyone else in the economy by telling them how awesome the future is going to be. And we still haven't managed to engage (politically or otherwise) the folks actually running the government. Things aren't looking good. :(

kaoD 12y ago

Welcome to "staying competitive". Here at Spain (and generally Southern Europe) we've been told over and over again that we have to stay competitive, which is just an euphemism for working more and earning less (i.e. becoming Europe's China). In a globalized market with a (still) steadily growing population, competition is growing and therefore salaries are shrinking. It's happening in all industries (e.g. tech firms offshoring) but also at homes. I don't know about the USA but here in Spain housewives love hunting for sales, buying as cheap as they can, and proud about it. Why are they surprised later when their children can't find a decent salary? Buying Perú's asparagus cheaper than in our home country (including transportation across the Atlantic!) is only driving prices lower and lower, which hinders the whole economy in the long term. And now the USA is going to sign a trade agreement with Europe which will further increase competition and will drive wages even lower than they're now for both parties. On the other hand, isn't this just leveling the playing field for developing countries? After all, for them to grow, we have to shrink.

disputin 12y ago
Seems to me it's the government which needs to stay competitive, not the workers, ie regulation and bureaucracy.
- kaoD 12y ago
  What a cliché. EDIT (to elaborate): IMHO economy (like most things) is all about trade-offs. I know the states and bureaucracy are cumbersome, but they offload risk from individuals into society (which isn't always a bad thing). I respect your views on deregulation (and share them to some extent), but your phrase is really a cliché and does not address my comment (since deregulation is orthogonal to labor competition).
  - disputin 12y ago
    A cliché? Or general agreement? I thought people generally agreed that Spain has issues in that regard. "I know the states and bureaucracy..." I wasn't referring to states in general, you were talking about Spain, I was responding about Spain. I'm not a ranting libertarian, I'm aware of a state's role in society. Knee jerk pouncing on a cliché that wasn't here. we've been told over and over again that we have to stay competitive, which is just an euphemism for working more and earning less How much of that extra work is unnecessary (in Spain)?
    - tormeh 12y ago
      The problem in Spain is that the government and its regulations are so bad, that the only way Spain can become competitive is if the government gets its act together. Until then (i.e. always) lower wages and longer hours will have to do.
      - disputin 12y ago
        (i.e. always) Based on above comments I hope you're voting for Podemos. * if the government gets its act together* That won't happen spontaneously.

logfromblammo 12y ago

Careful with your use of the word "we". What is happening is that between 1974 and 1994, the generation that was then in power decided to stop paying off their own debts, and started deferring payment to future generations. The effect is similar to being forced to cosign a mortgage before you are even born, then when you turn 18, your parents kick you out of their house and stop making the payments. You then have to pay for two houses, and can probably only live in the worst one. It's a really nasty thing for your elder generation to do, but all your life, they have taught you that you aren't allowed to murder all of them and sell off the assets they purchased with your labor as collateral. So it becomes somewhat of a tradition for each generation to refinance the debts of the previous with the labor of the next as security. But at some point, a generation realizes that the only way they can afford the same lifestyle as their parents is by having two incomes and fewer children. "Our" grandparents needed to make the sacrifice back before they died. But they didn't, and now they can't. So I prefer to let their creditors go find them in Hell if they want their money back. I am perfectly willing to be responsible for my own financial decisions, but rolling over the debts of the fathers unto the fourth generation seems more than a little bit unfair. And that is justified in large part by use of the pronoun "we". I, specifically, am being taxed to pay for the economic benefits enjoyed by entire generations of older people who reaped more than they ever sowed. And my gruel, along with that of younger generations, has become thinner ever since. I even get angry when my spouse says "we need to do X" and really means "I want you to do X, and expect nothing--even gratitude or acknowledgement--in exchange", so I can't imagine how politicians can so easily get away with doing the same thing to entire nations. What "we" need to be doing is demanding that some specific people be held individually responsible for their own bad behavior.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
Florin_Andrei 12y ago
So, for everything you said above, how do you define the pronoun "we"? People in the USA who entered the workforce in the 90s/00s?
- 12y ago