The Youth Unemployment Bomb

The Youth Unemployment Bomb

www.businessweek.com

From Cairo to London to Brooklyn, too many young people are jobless and disaffected...In short, the fissure between young and old is deepening. "The older generations have eaten the future of the younger ones," former Italian Prime Minister Giuliano Amato told Corriere della Sera. In Britain, Employment Minister Chris Grayling has called chronic unemployment a "ticking time bomb."

(visit the link for the full news article)

Interesting article that ties together an emerging global trend of angry, jobless youth.

Somehow the system that processes young people and turns them into workers and members of society seems broken on a global scale. The issue is complex. Relentless improvements in technology and efficiency should be improving the prosperity and the lives of millions, but instead they are hacking away at job opportunities.

In much of the developing world, over 50% of the population is in its 20s or even younger, forshadowing a massive glut of ever-more-unnecessary manpower. In the developed world, the opposite is true, with a glut of older people close to retirement, but there, too, opportunities for the young are increasingly limited, meanining that millions of new working-age adults are not getting the experience necessary to build a dynamic economy. This will impact not only their ability to earn a living for themselves, but also their ability to care for the ageing elders who make up the bulk of those nations' population.

Something has to give, or this will end very badly indeed.

www.businessweek.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

reply to post by silent thunder


Well speaking for us here in Australia I can say honestly there is no issues with getting a job..

Some of the younger ones do expect a bit too much and are loathe to start at the bottom though..
Others see how well our Government pays them to sit at home playing online games and prefer to do that..

But with very few exceptions, anyone can get work in Australia.
Maybe not in your chosen field, but a job is a job..

The economy in Alberta is doing good. Where I work they laid a bunch of people off right before christmas, which was not very nice but they all but one have found new jobs and we are starting to hire again. You can find jobs it's just that most of the young engineers think that they should start over 100k per year straight out of school. 20 ish years ago we made 24-30k a year to start and we figured we were rolling in money. The problem is that most of the young guys figure they should be able to afford the payments on a mcmansion from day one.

It's all about unrealistic expectations.

Isn't globalism great? Nothing like decent jobs being shipped over seas to a lower paying population. That's the future of the world we live in. The jobs go to the lowest bidder.

It's not just manufacturing jobs either. With broadband and wireless networks getting faster and faster it won't be long before there is just about any job that can be shipped over seas. The IT guy will no longer need to be in the same country. They can remote access any system to provide support. Doctors can video conference with patients from overseas instead of having them visit the office.

I have already seen fast food drive thru's being outsourced. I kid you not, when you go to the drive-thru window you speak to someone not even in the same country to place your order.

I don't agree with the article. It's not the older generations fault. It's the globalization of the economy, the redistribution of wealth.

There's definetly jobs to be had. Straight out of high school, I'm making $15/hr working a professional IT job with just a high school diploma. I didn't do particularly well in school (mostly because I didn't care ) and don't have friends in high places. I think there's too much emphasis put on college and the like so the younger generation focuses so much on that they completely forget that experience is the best teacher, and many companies will value that much higher than a piece of paper saying they went to college (in my experience, at least). There's jobs out there, the biggest thing is if you really want a job, you have to more competitive than ever to get it.

Here in Colorado i is soooo hard to find a job at least in half the cities. Especially for the youth.

Yep, job hunting in the UK is terrible at the moment, especially for youths. I'm 22 myself, and am having a lot of problems trying to find a job- there really are so little opportunities out there. It's the same even for graduates- though I dropped out half way through my degree, so I don't fit into that category. Even joining the forces is a joke, at least for a lot of roles. I'm on the waiting list for the RAF/air force, and even that is incredibly limited. The role I have has a 6 month waiting list, and even then, there's

These kids need to do two things, quickly.

First, they need to get right with God.

Secondly, they need to stop whining like a bunch of socialists looking for handouts. If they educate themselves with useful skills (not degrees in underwater Brazillian basketweaving lol) they would be much more useful.


Need to try hartd to make it in this world, no free rides for freeloders!

reply to post by ZionSteel


Amen to that without god nothing good will come in the end

reply to post by silent thunder


This is for sure a topic i feel needs more attention. I spent the last 6 years in and out of The University of Texas. Ranked 13th best public university in the US. I have taken time off to run my business and have seen many of my friends graduate in the last two years from UT. Almost all of them DO NOT have jobs and CAN NOT find jobs unless they are extremely overqualified for the job. I think of 20 friends I know who have graduated only 3 have found work. 5 that have graduated Grad school! none have jobs. The few that cant are trying to get a job as a teacher or going into the service industry. My girlfriend looked for over a year and could not find a job anywhere. Finally her father found her a job with one of his buddies. The few friends that are working are bar tending, and one that is working 40+ hour weeks, no vacation, and mid 20K salary, little chance of promotion and terrible benefits and very long commutes.

This exact reason made my question the importance of a degree. I still have over a year left of school to get my degree but everyone i see who is graduating is not getting work. I currently am holding off on school. I currently single handedly run a business with close to a Million in sales with nearly a 50% profit margin. So i am very fortunate but on an odd spot looking towards my future. I have come to realize a degree is almost the most important thing you can get, because everyone has one now and you cant even get through the door without it, But its is also useless now as well because everyone has one and it wont do anythign for you. Kind of like goign to a concert and EVERYONE has backstage passes. Well backstage is just as crowded and the band is just as unattainable as they were from the auditorium.

Hell i have tried for the sake of it and i cant even get an interview with a low end job because i don't have a degree, Yes i have more business experience than most career businessmen. I could litterly write the books i have stuied in some of the classes I have taken. I have won many national awards for my stock trading abilities, selected as one of the top young entrepreneurs of america. etc etc... And still cant get "hired". Not that i really want to. What this leads me to believe is that too many job seekers, especially young people, are relying on other people to give them employment. They are not being self supportive. Most are too proud to start low and work their way up and get experience. So they just sit out and hope a great job they feel they deserve comes around. Eventually two years passes and they would have worked their way up by then, but they are still jobless.I think the best lecture i ever had in school was a professor ranting bout how kids these days are so full of entitlement and feel they deserve everything just handed to them. Of course everyone in the class probably felt they were not included in the group of people she was referring too. haha.

From what i have seen from the young people of today... they are idiots. Most of my friends make enough to barely cover their bills and they have a new iphone every month!!! Used for nothing but browsing facebook. I mean hell i make a ton and i still have a crappy walmart $15 go phone i stuck my sim car into. haha. They all have $2000 laptops to browse facebook and write papers on and an ipad! They all have huge TV's they are paying off over 2 years. I have a friend taking out a third loan to buy his third sports car and he is unemployed. I have a decade old truck with nearly 200K miles on it! Most of my friends get new cars every year or two and lose a ton of money every time they get new cars. I on the other hand get paid to drive my truck. $.50 a mile tax write off on business miles! And these are just people in their low 20's! Just imagine the hell they will be in then they are in their 40's and 50's! WOW. I have honestly never bought anythign on credit. If i cant pay for it i wont buy it. Unfortunately i also have no credit history. haha. And apparently good money management skills and not spending more than i can chew is a bad thing. I cant even get an apartment unless i pay most of it in advance regardless of my income.

This is just what i have observed living deep in the heart of a large university for the last 5-6 years.

Yeah, that's my experience. Now, I'm luckier than most because I worked in customer service/as a secretary for most of my work experience and have some good experience to get a halfway decent paying job. Not great, but decent. A lot of kids my age have a Bachelor's, a lot of them in decent fields, and still can't find jobs. You know something is wrong when the IT and Business majors can't even get jobs as fast food managers. Realistically, with unemployment so high in many areas, it's just plain stupid to put the blame entirely on the young.

reply to post by 12345lonestar


That's one of the biggest problem that I have with older adults these days. They go on and on about how you have to start at the bottom. I'm sure that people would have no problem starting "at the bottom" if it weren't for the fact that the "bottom" demands that they have a Bachelor's degree while only paying 50 cents more an hour than the job they had in high school.

This is a big thing in my community right now. The white folk and their children are up-set, because all the new immigrants take the bottom feeder jobs that use to belong to high school students and drops outs. Granted, if you look you may be able to find something, however I am noticing more and more organizations hiring immigrants and staying away from students... When I worked at a warehouse, they would bring in a new employee every week or so, and most of the time they arrived here the week before from either a middle eastern country or Africa. Now, personally I do not have a problem, business' can run anyway they want. However, what I do have a problem with is WHYYYY! they hire immigrants. They hire immigrants because they have no idea what their rights are and they don't question authority... Boss says no breaks- no breaks, eat your food while your working (witnessed it my self in the nastiest warehouse you could imagine.) Boss says you have to stay late- you stay late... Cause your an immigrant, and just do what you are told because it was better than before. Eventually I became fed up with it, and I actually started telling some of newbies to go on breaks and to get lost before they were done (only had a few months to go with the wretched company.), I even told one girl to take her food from her work station and get to the break room. That really pissed off my boss. WHY? Cause there is nothing he could have done.

That pretty much sums up my experience on being a youth and obtaining a job here in the greater Toronto Area.

I personally have no remorse for all the baby boomers with out jobs right now. Or generation X, as they consumed with out thinking about my generation. They made decisions without thinking what it will be like for their children. They have left us with huge problems to solve. Thank god our generation as radically stupid as they are, they are SMART. From the hood rat to your university student, people are coming up with bright ideas.

The reason they don't like hiring us youth of the internet age is because as rude as we can be... We ask questions, even when we have already gotten one answer. We are smart and know when someone is screwing us around... So they hire immigrant

Reply to post by backinblack

Same here in WA. In fact the biggest problem here is that youth seem to not want to work, even when we offer $20 - 25 per hour (we're slightly stronger then the US dollar, so about $20.50 - 26.00 US). I have personally seen many, many kids just pack in a job on farms or vineyards because they they view it as too hard, or beneath them. And for the rest of us, who take pride in our job, it's quite an insult.


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

Was watching a documentary last night called The End of Man

It said in 2010, there are more women in the workforce than men

Our roles, our design, our mold, to become provider, supporter, money earner, has now changed forever

reply to post by gnosticquasar


Well i am only 23. Not some old geezer who has lost touch with the current employment issues.

Well they may not be paying you a whole lot better than you got in high school but there is a lot more opportunity. Hell interns learn a lot, gain valuable connections and get paid little to nothing. Reality is in most careers you have to start out low and get that experience. Especially today. You have people with 20+ years of experience who were laid off trying to get a job in your field who are just sitting around waiting to take those job openings and they will have presidence before you. As great as a degree is it is pretty much useless for actually going into a career. You do not walk out of College with a bachelors degree with everything you need to know to do whatever job you will be doing. You have a general idea but you will probably learn more in your first year or two in your job than you did in school. Which usually explains the bad pay.

Starting at the bottom and getting experience is better than sitting around complaining about how there are no good jobs or that you dont want to work for a degrading pay. Hell i worked in a Mexican restaurant to learn industry skills for $5 an hour. What i learned doing that was way more important than the money i was making. The experience at this point is more valuable than the pay you will be getting. The few people i know who are doing well were the ones who got a job ASAP started out at the bottom and worked their way up. Some even started before they even graduated, got the degree and got a promotion. They then had good recommendations and moved onto a better job, and did well. Eventually they got a few brakes, but mostly because of the experience and connections they had gained in the few years they had spent working. MY other friends who are sitting around hoping for that 40K starting job just aren't getting them. They still have no experience. While the guys who started out low are making $50K+ now. Other than a degree the most important thing that will get you hired is experience and good recommendation from prior employers. A degree alone wont easily land you a good job without experience. But you still have to make smart employment decisions. Sometimes less pay is better for a job that will lead to more experience and connections. AKA non corporate, smaller private companies.

It just seems many of the recent graduates just expect to walk out and be hired on as a CEO of a large corporation. The degree alone today wont get you anything. You have to add on to your degree. Your degree is only just a place mat to put your future achievements on. I personally wont hire anyone just based on their degree. A degree is nice but past experience showing someone is a good worker, dedication, and even motivated to succeed are what i look for in an employee. I have been to school with enough people to know there is plenty of @sses i would never hire who graduated with honors. A degree shows soemone can get the job done and is capable. But there is no shortage of people running around with degree to pick from. And yes i would almost always hire someone i knew or someone who was recommended by someone i know over a stranger. Thats where connections and networking come to play.

There are jobs out there, you just have to be more creative than you had to be in the past. Its more of a chess game now rather than just a predictable strait line like it used to be in the past generations.

Then change the paradigm. Produce locally. Buy locally. Create jobs. Don't sit around waiting for the world to change to suit you. Change the world. Sounds trite but what else is there to do? Look to governments or corporations to fix this? Not going to happen.

reply to post by ADUB77


lol. Honestly I know a lot of men who hire girls who are attractive....pretty much over any other qualified applicant. They figure most people are qualified for the job so why not have some eye candy around. Its actually how my ex got hired. The manger at her apartment though she was cute and asked her if she wanted a job leasing. $15 an hour with no resume...Within 6 months she took his job. Haha. There are also many qualified women as well. I see men and women pretty much as equal now. Its pretty much who is he best person for the job. Not as much discrimination in the workplace these days. The only thing i see is distraction issues. I couldn't hire a woman for my business. It would just be too awkward. What is she became attracted to me, or What is i was attracted to her. etc etc. In a close intimate environment like my business is operated in, it could be a distraction.

But same amount of jobs per capita....now both men and women are working now. More so than ever. It seems today most women want a career. so twice as many workers for the same amount of jobs. With more people around wanting the jobs, employers can fill those jobs while paying less.Also more people looking for jobs as well.

Originally posted by gnosticquasar
Yeah, that's my experience. Now, I'm luckier than most because I worked in customer service/as a secretary for most of my work experience and have some good experience to get a halfway decent paying job. Not great, but decent. A lot of kids my age have a Bachelor's, a lot of them in decent fields, and still can't find jobs. You know something is wrong when the IT and Business majors can't even get jobs as fast food managers. Realistically, with unemployment so high in many areas, it's just plain stupid to put the blame entirely on the young.

Well you cant be a fast food manager if you don't know how the fast food industry is ran. IF they work a year at a fast food restraint i bet they would be hired easily as a manager. But honestly someone who has worked at a fastfood restaurant for 10 years since they were 16 with no more than a HS degree would make a better manager then soemone who has never worked in a fast food restaurant and a degree form a great university.