Talkin' 'Bout My Generation

People try to put us d-down (Talkin' 'bout my generation)
Just because we get around (Talkin' 'bout my generation)
Things they do look awful c-c-cold (Talkin' 'bout my generation)
I hope I die before I get old (Talkin' 'bout my generation)

This is my generation
This is my generation, baby

-The Who "My Generation"

A friend living abroad and I were talking last week; we talked about our jobs, mostly with how disappointed she is with her job in Argentina. She asked me if the job situation in the United States was looking up. I said no, there were still no more jobs in the United States than when she left. We both came to the same conclusion, a kind of petulant indignation.

This wasn't what we were promised. This wasn't what I expected.

We were told if we worked hard, went to college and got a degree, we would get better-paying jobs. I could pursue a career in something I loved- or hopefully at least enjoyed.

I know. It's childish. Adulthood is never what we expect as teenagers, but I'm not talking about the shock of "the real world"- being responsible for living expenses, planning your future, etc. This is about the job market we were expecting to fall into after our education.

I've talked to other friends of mine, people I knew from high school and from college, many of whom have come to the same conclusion at some point since finishing their undergraduate or their postgraduate. It got me thinking about my generation and what we are facing coming into a recession. Despite the fact that about 69% of students graduating high school in the United States immediately go on to a 2 or 4-year institution, more are going on to graduate school to avoid the work force for a few years. Even those in what I always considered "safe" degree paths like engineering and computer science are choosing higher education over finding a job.

Those who don't go towards even higher education find themselves in a perilous position. I knew when I graduated in 2006 with a BA degree that I was not likely to fall right into a career the way my friends with business or engineering degrees did.

But I didn't expect it would be so hard to find a job of any ilk, and that was before the largest crash in 2008. Studies find that salaries for new graduates have dropped even further, but even the salaries they list for new graduates are higher than what I've found upon graduating. I'm talking the $23,000-24,000 range. In my career, I'll be lucky to see $40,000.

With so many unemployed in the United States, the entry level positions once reserved for those fresh-faced graduates are now taken by those who have been in the workforce longer. With a college degree we can't go back to the jobs we had during college; they tell us we are over-qualified.

That's where we sit -- somewhere between over-qualified for the bar-tending and waitress jobs we had, and too little experience for the industries we got our degrees to join.

So I have seen some trends amongst people my age, beyond just retreating to grad school to wait out the recession.

Bring on the debt
If the recession was supposed to teach us anything, it was the dangers of debt. Yet, my generation has been born into debt. I'm not talking about credit cards, racked up by frivolous spending. I'm talking about the tens of thousands of dollars that it costs to get that degree we so highly prized. When we can't find that decent-paying job after graduation, we let those student loans sit, and sit, and sit. And those credit cards become necessary to afford the gas, groceries, things we need until we finally get a job. Don't forget about those extra student loans for those who go back to postgraduate degrees. We expect debt, whether that's from a credit card, a student loan, or bills we just can't quite make this month.

So we expect debt, debt that will take us decades to pay off. We are numb to it. What's $3,000 in credit card bills when you have $70,000 dollars in student loans racking up interest? With $40,000 in debt from undergrad, why not add another degree and another $40,000 in loans?

A job is a job is a job
By joining the work force late, we are not going to be racking up the experience we need for a career we want. Saddled with debt, it becomes harder to think, "I could still get a job in" whatever field you wanted to go into. Take what you can get, pay aside, even benefits aside.


Delaying adulthood
We're staying in school longer. We're joining the workforce later and at lower wages. This means we're also holding out on those big purchases the U.S. economy hopes us to make- homes and cars. Many of us still rely in some way on our parents, at least those with parents still willing and able to help. We move back home, or the parents still help pay bills.

So here we have it, my generation in the job search. It's not that we're lazy. We have a lot to contribute. We just don't know where to go or how to get there.