3 ms·

Let’s Talk About Millennial Poverty

14 points by chollida1 11y ago

devopsproject 11y ago
My parents and grandparents told me to "go to college". No mention of majors. They said this because they saw their peers with "college degrees" advancing in their fields. You could pay for college with a part time summer job making minimum wage. Today, the labor market is flooded with "degrees" so the major matters more than ever. The cost has also skyrocketed. The advice today should be "Go to an inexpensive college and choose a major that can lead to a lucrative career".
- dudul 11y ago
  Excellent comment. I always find it infuriating when someone says "I have a college degree" without specifying the major. What does it mean you have a degree? A degree in what? Farming? Psychology? Pet sitting? Mathematics? What can you actually do? I would amend your last advice with "... and if the lucrative career doesn't need a degree, don't go to college at all, learn a useful trade, don't get in debt for nothing and start making money right away doing something useful".
- pc86 11y ago
  > Today, the labor market is flooded with "degrees" so the major matters more than ever. Really? I've since gotten my degree but I dropped out of school in 2008 with half a bachelor's in Political Science. I've been a full-time software developer since 2009. Having a degree is a signal that you can finish something on a longer time horizon than the end of the month.
  - dudul 11y ago
    I'm sure there are cheaper ways to send that signal.
  - angersock 11y ago
    Counterargument: most software projects are maintenance, and finishing something inside of a month is actually a rare accomplishment. Besides, school is more a series of different assignments cycled through with set objectives--the real world (sadly, especially in our industry) lacks either the variety or velocity that we are acclimated to in school. Instead, it's day after day of the same bullshit, punctuated by panic.
- merpnderp 11y ago
  My parents and grandparents told me to "go to college and learn something useful". We spent a lot of time discussing cost vs. benefits of each type of degree. And this was 20 years ago. I've never understood how people can get a degree in something with little market value and then be confused as to why they can't find gainful employment.
  - wfo 11y ago
    Because many people think of college as the path you go along to develop a career, become educated, become a part of an informed and thoughtful society, (because that is what it used to be and should still be) not a job training for the general population that is free for corporations and life-destroying for citizens, their future indentured debt-slaves-cough I mean employees. Not everybody does a cost-benefit analysis to calculate what jobs are in demand (realistically, will be in demand 5 years from now which may be radically different and unpredictable) and what majors give them these skills, then choose to forgo a real education in order to train for something they hate because of expected financial return. You're arguing that everyone should do that. I'd suggest that no-one should.
    - sjg007 11y ago
      those that do, go to med school
  - zaccus 11y ago
    >I've never understood how people can get a degree in something with little market value and then be confused as to why they can't find gainful employment. >We spent a lot of time discussing cost vs. benefits of each type of degree. I think you answered your own question.
angersock 11y ago
My bike stops, I ditch right towards some bushes and roll off the sidewalk into grass. The bluejeans, shoes, and presumably legs of the homeless guy asleep across the sidewalk are safe, their owner sleepily oblivious to my passing. In the Houston summer, I don't know what he dreams of--maybe of the same thing the homeless lady I saw last month sprawled (high? napping? seizing?) across the light rail platform, maybe of a job, maybe of a society that gives a damn. As it is, I've got to get to my job. My job which has no benefits. My job which pays about half the median salary for developers. My job which is theoretically solving all those "hard problems" that investors and people here on HN bandy about, and yet which curiously never seem to materialize funding despite the amount of public celebration of our company's work. Praise is easier than paying invoices on time, I suppose. Train opens, I get on, I lean over my bike and watch the world slide by. Some other millenials (judging by age) are here with me. Unlike the homeless guy, they still are trying to play their role in the system. Like me, they probably believe in living within their means. They probably have fuckhuge college debts to pay off. They probably have people telling them all day "Get a job", "Work harder", "Be generous to others". If they're entrepreneurial, they get other messages too: "Work on important things", "Screw revenue, acquire investment", "Everybody is getting funded", "Normal jobs are for sissies and cowards and the middle class". They'll keep doing this, as perhaps will I. They'll keep voting for politicians bought and sold so thoroughly that their vote will never register. They'll put in long hours working on solved problems, to impress a boss just as beholden to the system as they. They'll come to work sick because who has time to see a doctor, if the shitty benefits package could afford one anyway. They dream of a better situation, of casting off their chains and maybe fixing the system. Then again, they see through the window as I do the police hustling the poor and crazy and sick and afraid into vans and cars and tanks to God knows where for God knows how long. That's the alternative. That's what happens when you don't mesh in. With no funds, large debt, and yet so much messaging that you can change the world if you just try hard enough, it's a rough place to be. A billboard urges compassion and giving next to a church, telling me to be happy I've got what I have. A few blocks later, another billboard shows off cars I can't afford next to bars that won't let me in. The door opens. It's time to get off.

14 points by chollida1 11y ago

My parents and grandparents told me to "go to college". No mention of majors. They said this because they saw their peers with "college degrees" advancing in their fields. You could pay for college with a part time summer job making minimum wage. Today, the labor market is flooded with "degrees" so the major matters more than ever. The cost has also skyrocketed. The advice today should be "Go to an inexpensive college and choose a major that can lead to a lucrative career".

dudul 11y ago
Excellent comment. I always find it infuriating when someone says "I have a college degree" without specifying the major. What does it mean you have a degree? A degree in what? Farming? Psychology? Pet sitting? Mathematics? What can you actually do? I would amend your last advice with "... and if the lucrative career doesn't need a degree, don't go to college at all, learn a useful trade, don't get in debt for nothing and start making money right away doing something useful".
pc86 11y ago
> Today, the labor market is flooded with "degrees" so the major matters more than ever. Really? I've since gotten my degree but I dropped out of school in 2008 with half a bachelor's in Political Science. I've been a full-time software developer since 2009. Having a degree is a signal that you can finish something on a longer time horizon than the end of the month.
- dudul 11y ago
  I'm sure there are cheaper ways to send that signal.
- angersock 11y ago
  Counterargument: most software projects are maintenance, and finishing something inside of a month is actually a rare accomplishment. Besides, school is more a series of different assignments cycled through with set objectives--the real world (sadly, especially in our industry) lacks either the variety or velocity that we are acclimated to in school. Instead, it's day after day of the same bullshit, punctuated by panic.
merpnderp 11y ago
My parents and grandparents told me to "go to college and learn something useful". We spent a lot of time discussing cost vs. benefits of each type of degree. And this was 20 years ago. I've never understood how people can get a degree in something with little market value and then be confused as to why they can't find gainful employment.
- wfo 11y ago
  Because many people think of college as the path you go along to develop a career, become educated, become a part of an informed and thoughtful society, (because that is what it used to be and should still be) not a job training for the general population that is free for corporations and life-destroying for citizens, their future indentured debt-slaves-cough I mean employees. Not everybody does a cost-benefit analysis to calculate what jobs are in demand (realistically, will be in demand 5 years from now which may be radically different and unpredictable) and what majors give them these skills, then choose to forgo a real education in order to train for something they hate because of expected financial return. You're arguing that everyone should do that. I'd suggest that no-one should.
  - sjg007 11y ago
    those that do, go to med school
- zaccus 11y ago
  >I've never understood how people can get a degree in something with little market value and then be confused as to why they can't find gainful employment. >We spent a lot of time discussing cost vs. benefits of each type of degree. I think you answered your own question.

angersock 11y ago

My bike stops, I ditch right towards some bushes and roll off the sidewalk into grass. The bluejeans, shoes, and presumably legs of the homeless guy asleep across the sidewalk are safe, their owner sleepily oblivious to my passing. In the Houston summer, I don't know what he dreams of--maybe of the same thing the homeless lady I saw last month sprawled (high? napping? seizing?) across the light rail platform, maybe of a job, maybe of a society that gives a damn. As it is, I've got to get to my job. My job which has no benefits. My job which pays about half the median salary for developers. My job which is theoretically solving all those "hard problems" that investors and people here on HN bandy about, and yet which curiously never seem to materialize funding despite the amount of public celebration of our company's work. Praise is easier than paying invoices on time, I suppose. Train opens, I get on, I lean over my bike and watch the world slide by. Some other millenials (judging by age) are here with me. Unlike the homeless guy, they still are trying to play their role in the system. Like me, they probably believe in living within their means. They probably have fuckhuge college debts to pay off. They probably have people telling them all day "Get a job", "Work harder", "Be generous to others". If they're entrepreneurial, they get other messages too: "Work on important things", "Screw revenue, acquire investment", "Everybody is getting funded", "Normal jobs are for sissies and cowards and the middle class". They'll keep doing this, as perhaps will I. They'll keep voting for politicians bought and sold so thoroughly that their vote will never register. They'll put in long hours working on solved problems, to impress a boss just as beholden to the system as they. They'll come to work sick because who has time to see a doctor, if the shitty benefits package could afford one anyway. They dream of a better situation, of casting off their chains and maybe fixing the system. Then again, they see through the window as I do the police hustling the poor and crazy and sick and afraid into vans and cars and tanks to God knows where for God knows how long. That's the alternative. That's what happens when you don't mesh in. With no funds, large debt, and yet so much messaging that you can change the world if you just try hard enough, it's a rough place to be. A billboard urges compassion and giving next to a church, telling me to be happy I've got what I have. A few blocks later, another billboard shows off cars I can't afford next to bars that won't let me in. The door opens. It's time to get off.