Comment by pc86
1 year ago
> Ms. Livingston graduated around when I did. I can't think of anything that I (or she) did to launch a career, either pre- or post-graduation that would be applicable to someone graduating today.
Really? Not a single thing? Not "work hard," or "be curious," or "be willing to fail or be wrong?" Those aren't genetic qualities, they can be taught and they can be learned.
I don't know when you graduated but I've been working professionally for nearly 2 decades now and I heard the same thing when I graduated - about how it was so much easier just 5, 10, 15 years prior, how I was in for a real battle, how I had an insurmountable amount of debt given my earnings prospects. And yes it was hard but I survived - I could have made smarter decisions to make it easier, I could have made worse decisions and ended up a barista in my late 30s. On a systemic level it might be harder now, it might not be. But they will survive as all previous generations have and will continue to.
There seems to be a bimodal distribution in people 20-30 years post-college discussing today's graduates. It's either "these kids are so lazy noboDY wAntS To WorK ANYMore just have a firm handshake" nonsense, or "these children will be wage slaves forever and it is undeniably the fault of capitalism/AI/Musk/whatever boogeyman."
I think it was hard when I started out. I think it's probably a little harder now. That doesn't mean it's any more of a "dog eat dog capitalist slugfest" than it was 10, 20, 30 years prior.
How about you actually go to today's college environments and talk to young people of this generation first? Look at how their life is, and what trends are affecting them firsthand? Would be much better than making wild declarations out of nowhere.
Your snarky comment seems to imply I haven't, which you have no way of knowing (and which also happens to be completely false).
Perhaps save your wild declarations out of nowhere as well.
> I don't know when you graduated but I've been working professionally for nearly 2 decades now and I heard the same thing when I graduated - about how it was so much easier just 5, 10, 15 years prior, how I was in for a real battle, how I had an insurmountable amount of debt given my earnings prospects.
On the whole the graduate market has indeed been getting fairly steadily worse, and student greater, for the past forty or more years, no?
> today are entering a dog eat dog capitalist slugfest where a lucky few winners take all.
If you believe that to be true, perhaps it might be worth trying to become one of the few lucky winners.
Or come on, learn some Python and take the second prize with a six digit salary in a corporation, private health insurance and benefits plan.