What It Means To Be A Millennial
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2013-02-18/what-it-means-be-millennial
Today's 20-somethings are politically progressive, at ease with technology and more ethnically diverse than previous generations. How millennials are re-defining traditional ideas of what it means to be an adult.
Guests
Paul Taylor
executive vice president of the Pew Research Center.
Hannah Seligson
journalist and author of "Mission: Adulthood."
David Burstein
author of "Fast Future: How the Millennial Generation Is Shaping Our World."
Roger Fierro
co-founder of the start-up First Encounter Productions.
Related Items
Read An Excerpt
Excerpted from "Fast Future: How the Millennial Generation Is Shaping Our World" by David D. Burstein
(Beacon Press, 2013). Reprinted with permission from Beacon Press.
Read An Excerpt
Excerpted from "Mission: Adulthood: How the 20-Somethings of Today Are Transforming Work, Love, and Life" by Hannah Seligson (Diversion Books, 2012). Reprinted with permission from Diversion Books.
Comments
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@ecgberht2
1. It was an anecdote about what is plainly obvious a college education did at one point open far more doors than it does now.
2. Of course in a generic sense you are correct but at the same time the topic at hand is the comparative fortunes of generations. If you're implying you think that difference is because of laziness I think you're just wrong and yes I do think that men who only graduated high school or maybe didn't even but still found manufacturing or similar jobs with professional level wages were lucky in a way virtually no in my generation is.
The world evolves. The great dislocation of previous generations was the shift from the farm to urban manufacturing.
Many people were displaced from their farms and came to the city determinedly seeking gainful employment so they could support families, develop a sense of self-worth and be productive members of society. They went where the work was - their lives were disrupted and they mostly adapted.
We are in the midst of a dislocation from manufacturing labor to "knowledge work". If you are able enough to construct a coherent sentence for this comments section - you are lucky - congratulations! You will "fall" into gainful employment should you seek it. Those with lesser intellects as well as those subjected to our inner-city public school systems will not fare as well.
Get a job, think for yourself and help those that most need help. Yes, you are lucky.
I feel for the young people of today. It is not their fault that they were blind-sided by the events that led up to the economic collapse. It's also not my generation's fault (I'm 50) that we too were blind-sided and many of us are upside down on mortgages, drained our retirement accounts to survive, have student loans in repayment that we will most likely die with and cannot help our own children with their upcoming college expenses. I'm not feeling sorry for myself, I'm stating facts. I don't think I'd place them in the same league as "The Greatest Generation" because that generation sacrificed personal dreams for the greater good. I do credit Millennials with carrying forward a spirit of acceptance and tolerance for all people. If this is their mark on greater humanity, then I'm good with it. The fact that they are feeling the brunt of the economic times is not unique to their generation, though. Many of us are still questioning the American Dream and what it means.
They sound naive and entitled. I think they were sheltered by their Boomer parents.
It's always been hard to make it. Every generation has its challenges and advantages.
Welcome to the real world Millennials!
college tuitions are far more insurmountable than previous because since mid1970s universities have been inflating their tuition to even out-pace the student loan industry.
we baby boomers who take such pride in everything - it has been on our watch as we became an unworkable society - a culture of deep indebtedness. the new era of white collar indentured servitude. becoming married is not a safehaven because of the extreme builtin costs there too. sad. automation and globalization will continue to shrink the job pool and our universities are not teaching enough for the new world.
I didn't hear the whole program, but here's something I noticed. At one point there was a comment about the panelists not being completely representative of the generation being discussed - I think mostly that they were more privileged or better educated or something to that effect. After awhile a caller told about how he had worked hard, used public transit, etc, and now had a good job at Citibank. It bothered me then that one of the panelists said that he wouldn't want to work for Citibank. Maybe he just meant it wouldn't be a good fit for him, but it came across to me that he was putting down that kind of job and discounting the point that the caller was making about how it was possible to succeed these days with hard work.
I think that it would have been better to try to have a panel with members representing a wider range of circumstances and experiences.
@Sam Ewing
1. In absolute terms, perhaps. In relative terms, I'm not so sure. But we had good blue collar jobs that did not require a college education as well. Those jobs are gone, but the equivalent today requires technical competence that may involve schooling, but not necessarily college - which is completely overlooked by those who insist that college is necessary for everyone in order to get a good job ... like the current President.
2. If you are saying that someone is lucky or unlucky because of the generation in which they are born, then that is a pretty distorted view in my opinion. Do you think that those folks who you say got those good paying jobs with no college education said of the Rockefellers or the Carnegies that the only difference between them is that they weren't as "lucky"? Once again,for reference, see "you make your own luck".
As for "implying that the millenials are lazy" why don't you stick to what I say and not how you choose to interpret it. I think the millenials have high expectations for what life should hand them. And they are ready with an excuse when those expectations aren't met. But that's different than saying they are lazy and it's reflected in what I actually said, which was this, "Your premise is part of the problem ... if somebody is doing better than me, it can't be because of my deficiency, it can't be because they work harder than me, it can't be because they set better priorities than me, it must be because of something else ... it's how I was raised, it's because I was promised and the world didn't deliver (the radio guest's excuse), or maybe it's just luck - the ultimate unprovable premise."
A lot of good comments already so just a quick note. I had to laugh a bit when early on in the discussion Hannah opined that the Millenials are destined to become the next "Greatest Generation." The example she provided to support that claim is that a large number of Millenials accept same-gender relationships. Well, yes, I agree that such acceptance is "great," but it'll take a little more than that before the next Tom Brokaw (a blowhard, in my opinion) can bestow that exalted honorific on these kids. I have a feeling that we'll need all the generations working together to get out of the economic mess we're in. Also, let's hope that there are not any World Wars for the Millenials to fight. :-)
"I think that it would have been better to try to have a panel with members representing a wider range of circumstances and experiences."
Open Mind, that is a good point. I suppose the focus of this discussion was more about the subset of Millenials who are looking to change the status quo and to define "success" and "progress" differently. On the other hand, every generation has its subset that wants to do just that. As a "boomer," I came of age in the 60s, and boy did a lot of my fellow boomers see things differently. Maybe it was all the marijuana, mushroom and acid trips. Or, for the more conservative boomers like me, maybe it was all the tight pants, free love and rock-n-roll. I got the impression that the Millenials on this panel seemed to think that all of their egalitarian ideas are unique to them. :-)
Jim back in the "good old days" - the 60s and 70s - the majority of kids who graduated from high school, and even those who didn't graduate high school, could get decent-paying blue collar jobs with decent benefits (and decent company retirement plans). You didn't have to go to college to get a decent job, live a middle class life, and support a family. And for the minority of kids who went to college, usually to pursue professional white-collar jobs, college tuition was much more affordable than it is today. Of course, back then, the US was still the industrial and economic powerhouse of the world. We can't blame the rest of the world for wanting to move out of third or second-world status, which means that we are no longer the sole industrial and economic powerhouse of the world. So what do we now do with the millions of American kids who are barely competent at a high school education level? Does the new reality demand that they are stuck in an economic underclass?
Politicians in all parties talk about the importance of advanced education as the primary solution to America's economic problems, but how does that work exactly? The fact is, not all kids are cut out for advanced education. Even if they could somehow be motivated to put some serious effort into academic studies at the high school level, the next challenge is to get them sufficiently motivated at the college level. When my kids were in school I sometimes helped out as an after-school tutor for other kids. It was a huge struggle to help them with basic English and math skills, and it was all too obvious that most of them felt no real desire to learn. I'm not saying these kids were stupid, but academics was not for them. In the old days they would have been fine working in blue collar jobs. Are we going to replace all the lost blue collar jobs with high-tech jobs? I'm not at all certain there could ever be enough high-tech jobs to achieve full employment.
I work in the engineering field, and plenty of engineers have been getting laid off. I know many scientists and chemists who are getting laid off, too. I don't know any lawyers, but I've heard that profession is having a hard time. What is the prognosis for the US economy? I'd be interested in hearing the views on this from people in this forum. Feel free to be as optimistic as you'd like and paint me a picture of the future US economy. I'm not as interested in a pessimistic picture because that is all too easy to imagine. :-)
Each generation believes that they are the newest and most revolutionary. We of the 1960's sure did. But to cliam that they are having more influence than anyone else is simply ignorant. Study some history first. Didn't those who invented the railroad and telegraph change the world just much? The 19th century was if anything more revolutionary than the 21st. And it ended in World War I. We should not begrudge youth its enthusiasm. they will have enough time to become more realistic. But a discussion such as this one should also remind the youth that they are not the first ones on earth.