Last week I did an interview answering questions from a recent college graduate, a few of which touched on the job market and economy facing people in his position. But those are my opinions, and I’m far divorced from ground zero in that discussion. Eighteen to twenty-four year olds might be a nice chunk of my audience, but I don’t know what it’s like to be in or coming out of college at a time like this. Everything’s been turned on its head, all the rules changed mid-game and no, the smart money isn’t betting its temporary. Hell of a shitstorm to face in your early twenties, and I’m not sure anyone can truly describe the experience other than the people in the eye of the hurricane – the kids graduating this year, scratching their heads and thinking “Now?”
I found one of them. His name’s Alex Mann. He majored in business, interned at a Wall Street bank in college but ultimately decided he didn’t want that path. He’s now in the process of getting an internet start-up off the ground. He’s also a writer, with a website at alexjmann.com. I asked him some questions about what it’s like graduating into the nastiest job market in history and he hit me with a few follow-ups. Here’s the interview, pretty much uncut:
PL: What’s it like graduating into this mess? I mean, what’s the overall attitude? I got out of school in a lame period in the economy, but this is ridiculous.
AM: Initially, it was a bit of a shock as the economic events unraveled before our eyes throughout the school year. No one expected it to get this bad–and then the situation continuously dipped far worse beyond anything we’ve experienced or been taught about. The surprise misery was followed by a sense of acceptance that it’s just a “rough time” to be graduating. The message that the universities attempt to signal to us is that economic downturns happen, but this time it’s just worse.
The most amusing aspect of the economic situation is the aura of sympathy the college graduate receives from older folks. When I hear the typical “congratulations on graduating!” delivered as a praise for a recent collegiate accomplishment, I sense a bit of “we fucked up” behind the nostalgic smile. But, the sympathy only goes so far in making us feel any better. Our frustration stems from the lack of control and little understanding we face. There is only so much we can absorb from reading the news online, because the real grasp of the current economic environment comes from actually experiencing it professionally, which few people my age have. You’d think the universities would use this as an opportunity to teach about excess leverage, regulation and the fallacy of systematic risk. But, no. Curriculum followed as usual, with little focus on “what’s going on” or “why it’s happening.”
The truth of the matter is that it’s messy on multiple levels. The jobs that used to be there, open-armed, ready for fresh, naïve college graduates, simply aren’t there. The whole “what are you going to do now?’ dialogue has gone beyond just being annoying and repetitive; it’s become an almost touchy subject. The answer, in most cases, is either “nothing” or “wait it out.” Some graduates start businesses, and some are going back to school. Some are sitting on their hands, just waiting. The overall attitude is generally apathetic.
AM: Who do we point our fingers at, if anyone, with everyone ducking aside to avoid blame? Sure the economy is cyclical, but how does someone my age actually arm themselves to prevent the shit hitting the fan this hard, again?
PL: The first question’s tough. It’s a combination of things. You’ve got people I’ve described in the piece I just did for the Fourth of July, and in addition to them the interventionists – the government agencies who pushed for more lending to increase home ownership among people with bad credit, despite the clear ridiculousness of the concept. It’s really amazing a guy like Barney Frank can blast bankers in hearings while his imbecilic support of subprime-friendly policies in large part created the environment in which this disaster took root.
The second issue’s easy. Never forget about gravity. The only people who profit from bubbles get in early. When the mainstream media’s stale analysis deems a market overheated, it’s already cooked. Never jump in because you think you’re missing something. Leap in late and all you’ll do is ski the backside of the curve down to the x axis. Shiller’s Irrational Exuberance explains the rest of it – the behavioral side – eloquently. Great book. You can apply its lessons to any bubble. I remember hearing about people living off home equity lines and thinking, “Where’s Shiller on this?” Sadly, though he wrote a few articles warning about housing, his follow-up, The Subprime Solution, came long after the horse had left the barn.
PL: Is the plan of college kids still pretty much the same? The rich kids work for dad or live off a trust, the middle and upper middle class kids go get internships at consulting and finance outfits and head off to those jobs where you work for twenty-five years at something you don’t really like and then hopefully retire early?
AM: It’s a mixed bag. I admit there is a healthy feeling of independence from most students I speak with. I sense that there isn’t a whole lot of pride in going to work for your father anymore, or at least admitting to it publicly. On the other hand, when no other paying options exist except that one some are willing to suck it up. However, you’d be surprised by the herds of anxious students still dying to get entry-level positions on Wall Street. With head count on the banks being cut and pay scales decreasing like an avalanche, there are still an unfortunate number of students chasing just dollar signs. It’s a perfect example of the entitlement my generation expects. Because they understand portfolio theory and the discounted cash flow model, they think a six-figure job should be waiting for them. Reality hasn’t caught up with the idealistic culture yet. Expectations are still high that Wall Street will turn around, and the money will flow again. It may or may not, but I don’t think anytime soon. And finally, there is nothing wrong with a job on Wall Street. But, many don’t know what they are getting into beforehand besides the paycheck.
The “work then retire” culture is the same, only because that’s still what is being taught. That’s what are parents are doing, so that’s the culture we know. But, a difference I’ve noticed is that there is the expectation that we’ll hold various careers in a similar field, with the more glorious, exciting ones coming with time. It’s still climbing the ladder, just with different shapes of notches. There’s the expectation of having to climb, with splashes of randomness every now and then.
AM: What options, if any, existed when you were graduating, besides the traditional ones? Did anyone that attempted to avoid the “work then retire” path look like a hippie? What were students running towards in your day? Were the “prestigious” (I use this term lightly) positions mainly found in law and medicine?
PL: My options were better than yours. Hiring wasn’t robust by any means, but most of my friends took the consulting or Wall Street route. Nobody judged the people taking alternative routes (skiing out West and living on Ramen noodles, working in a coffee shop and following some jam band, etc…) as “hippies,” but that might be more a statement about my social scene than about the generally pervasive attitude toward those types. And why I’m still close to many of my friends from those days. You’d have been considered an asshole to criticize people for following less trodden paths. I think quietly a lot of the people headed to work for Andersen Consulting (Accenture, now) quietly envied the guys going to live on an island in the Pacific and study marine life for the government. Medicine was a true calling, and as such it was always respectable. Law was never considered a prestigious career at my school. Among the types of people who cared about their careers, it was considered a stupid move. Too much work for limited upside – a terrible bargain. Kids aiming for Wall Street would never slum in law. It’d never even cross their minds.
PL: What do all these kids who planned to follow that easy track and had it pulled out from under them intend to do now? What’s the backup?
AM: If there is one upside to the economic downturn, it’s that suddenly we’ve been put in the position to creatively fend for ourselves. For instance, when all of the traditional career options that a business major typically approaches have gone thin, the desperation is followed by a wave of experimentation. The suit-and-tie guy type that majored in finance is applying to ESPN and the NFL, because he’s always loved sports and couldn’t get a job as a banker. The artistic-type who majored in advertising is applying for a job at an animal protection non-profit she supports, simply because the jobs on Madison Avenue have become obsolete. In my opinion, this is how it should be. College, or any form of education, shouldn’t create a path or destiny. It should create options to choose our own.
The few ambitious ones are going into entrepreneurial ventures. But, the majority of students are too scared to take that responsibility, because society tells us otherwise. A positive sign is there are plenty of students attempting to use the Internet to either market themselves, or to attempt to monetize their ideas. There are mini-movements of students realizing that they can leverage the Internet to do both what makes them happy and creates cash flow (yes, both!). It is uncommon though.
So, yeah, the economy sucks. Jobs aren’t being handed out like they maybe used to be. In my opinion, they never should have. Even if the money isn’t flowing, scarcity is forcing young adults to experiment with what makes them happy. I assume this works, until you have the pay the bills. That’s not so bad, is it?
AM: There’s a strong sense of entrepreneurship with people my age now, even if they aren’t all acting on it. There’s an itch to go do something on your own. Did you sense that with people you encounter my age? Why do you think it’s happening now, if it hasn’t before? Is there anyway to be entrepreneurial within a large organization?
PL: Yes. I think your generation is a lot more independent and skeptical, in a good way, than mine. We still believed in the system as it was, as a lot of the information showing the emperor had no clothes wasn’t available to us in the pre-internet-available-everywhere world. I don’t think I’m old enough or versed enough in history to say whether the urge to work for yourself has grasped another generation more or less than yours, but I don’t think the desire was nearly as prevalent in my generation.
There are few ways to be entrepreneurial in large organizations. Hierarchies by their nature slow processes down and create political environments in which idea-oriented types quickly become disenchanted. Corporations breed “safety-minded” employees, as in “obsessed with keeping their jobs above all else.” These types don’t put anything on the line and they view any suggestion of change as a threat.
Don’t get me wrong – corporations do a lot of good. The power of all those pooled resources delivering services and products changes a lot of our lives for the better every day. Problem is, their size and formalized structure also hold back a ton of innovation, and ruin a lot of good minds. I know loads of people who went into corporate life vibrant, filled with ideas, and are now just surfing, milking the machine, consummate “safety employees.” Hell, I was one at a couple points in my career. When the money’s good, you think, “Why fuck with things… What am I going to gain trying to make things better? It’s just added work.” It’s awful, really, the way that mindset permeates corporations. The only people who seem to have been taking chances in business recently are on the finance side, and they’re the only ones who shouldn’t have been.
PL: Kids aren’t dumb enough to be entering law school to duck the tough job market, are they? Those poor bastards are fucked. I see the professional service industries in this country headed for for the meanest of all reckonings. Even when the economy picks back up, corporations aren’t going to start paying consultants and lawyers the outrageous, unjustified rates they were getting in the run up to this collapse. The buyers are discovering the enormous amount of leverage they have in that relationship, and the servicers can’t bluff in response. They don’t have any reserves. If their hands aren’t busy with billable tasks, their cash flow disappears, so they’ve no choice but to take the work at the buyer’s demanded discount. If they play chicken, the buyer will find somebody else to do the work at a steeper discount. And the race to the bottom in unit price in those fields is only just beginning. The white collar services industries are going to have to wait a decade to see anything near their old rate structures.
AM: Sadly, your message hasn’t been broadcast loud and far enough. Law school, and even MBA programs, are still being used as excuses to “wait it out.” Some planned to do it, some didn’t. The ones that didn’t plan are attending more out of desperation. You’d think reading the news and having a basic understanding of economics would sway kids away from dishing out a few hundred thousand dollars for additional education right now. That’s a hefty debt that isn’t going to be easy to pay off like it used to be. And, I don’t think there is anything wrong with additional education. I just think it needs to be timed and aligned right, which is often not the case.
AM: Why do you think additional schooling, now more than ever, is facing diminishing returns? In which situations, if any, would you recommend someone to get their law degree or MBA?
PL: Waste of money. Better to go to b-school than law school, of course, but neither’s worth a quarter of the enormous tuition charged. I’d recommend you get a law degree only if you’re absolutely in love with the field, know what the business side of it is like, know what the industry’s future holds and still want to do it. In that instance, I’d also recommend you seek out a good psychiatrist, immediately. As to b-school, I can’t think of a reason to go other than mom and dad are paying for it. Nobody wants to hire a person who went to b-school straight out of college. If you need something to enhance your resume, join the Peace Corps or something like that – something that shows you have a soul. Differentiate yourself from the “wind up dolls.” If a person told me he spent $100k in loans to wait out a bad job market getting a superfluous degree, I wouldn’t hire him to watch my pets. How can you trust someone with judgment like that? But a guy who told me a story about building bridges in some impoverished part of the Third World? That’s a guy you’ve no choice but to respect. An interesting back story goes a lot further than the typical canned script.
“Well, I always wanted to work in securities litigation because I love the intellectual challenge and…” What’s an interviewer thinking hearing pap like that? Somebody, please… fucking shoot me.
PL: Is this stuff I hear about “Gen Y” or whatever they call you all demanding a work/life balance true? If so, I’m heartened, but do you really expect corporate America to cater to that demand? I would if I were in management. I’d see it as a great opportunity to use people sparingly, flexibly, at less cost to the company. I mean, why not let a person who wants balance work decreased hours? It’s a win/win. But I don’t think a lot of managers older than my generation understand that. I think they have this archaic notion of everyone having to “pay his dues.” Is this Gen Y phenomenon real, and if it is, what’s the biggest gripe it has with our current corporate employment structures? What makes recent graduates so unwilling to go along with old systems?
AM: The only people my age that actually refer to themselves are “Gen Y” are ones clueless enough that think the title entitles them to special treatment. It doesn’t.
But I do think there is a demand for more balance in our careers, but not in the most traditional sense. Rather than just time “away” from work, there is a demand for more correlation between what we actually want to be doing, and what we have to actually have to do, day-in day-out, for our job. You hear about companies like Google who offer their employees a few hours a day to work on something independently, and that is desirable. It’s not that we are lazy or don’t want to do work; that has nothing to do with it. It’s more of a demand for a selfish productivity that I’m sensing from people my age, where they want the work they are told to do to be related to what they want to do.
From my perspective, the “pay your dues” culture still exists, and it always will. Who doesn’t want to hassle the new guys? Currently, I think it’s more prevalent in the traditional outlets like law, medicine and politics. But, there are a lot of bigger companies that are avoiding it, or at least appearing to, for PR purposes. When these larger corporations come to recruit (or at least when they used to), their pitch revolves around the balance they offer new employees.
The biggest gripe we have, especially in this environment, is that we look up at the public executives, business leaders and media personas, and see a lot of unhappy personalities. Or, we read articles about 30-somethings, just 10 or so years older than us, that are glad to be fired in this down market, simply because it gives them an excuse to take a long-term vacation on their savings. There’s a certain dignity in not wanting to be a miserable fuck when you’re older, and that’s finally begun to sink in.
The reason the old system is being pushed aside, pried open, or at least being exploited, is because of the technical innovation. We have access to so many different career paths that didn’t exist 20 – 30 years ago. We also have access to valuable, publicly available information sources that are not taught in school. Our generational uniqueness is that we understand technical tools better than most people older than us. That gives us a type of stomping ground when we’re told what to do and how to do it. In most cases, we can do things faster and cheaper.
AM: When you graduated, did people your age refer to themselves with a stupid generational name, like someone owed them something? Was there any actual expectation that you were supposed to like your job, or would that have been naive? Is this new attitude just a reactionary trend to the current economic environment, or is it realistic that the majority of new professionals will be happy with their careers?
PL: Yeah, I think Douglas Coupland coined “Generation X” somewhere in the early ’90s and the media flogged the term into the ground. We didn’t expect to like our jobs. The expectation was that you got the internship or grad degree, got into a good job and busted your ass with an aim toward getting a huge payday or saving enough of a big salary to get out early and live a gilded long retirement. Not much analysis beyond that.
It’s not realistic that a majority of professionals would be happy with their careers. On one level or another, being a professional is doing somebody’s homework for money. And most of what pays well pays well because nobody wants to do it. It’s dull, irritating and stressful. In most jobs, dollars and enjoyment of work are inversely proportional. That’s the biggest point of friction I’ve seen between your generation and those above mine in the workforce. People my age are with you. We want you to change the system because we’re young enough to adapt and your attitude toward work is healthier and lot more sensible than the one we grew up with. The people above us, however – I’m not sure they’re fans. A number of them view this downturn as a validation of their ethic, and an opportunity to re-establish the, “It’s work, and work isn’t supposed to be fulfilling” mindset as the dominating ethos. I don’t think that’s going to succeed, however. I think most of your generation is fundamentally unable to abide unhappiness in your work lives. I don’t know why, but whatever the reason, that’s a good thing.
PL: I think your generation sits in a uniquely powerful position right now. On one hand, you have nothing to lose by opting out of the usual tracks and working for yourselves. Or you could be so frightened that you revert to a fifties mindset of just being happy you have a job and sucking it up with no complaints, lowering your expectations. You know which track I’d prefer to see people take, but as to the striking out on your own thing, the vexing issue is always, “In what?” What industries do you see emerging as opportunities?
AM: The one unique advantage my generation has over any other one is familiarity with emerging Internet technology. And, I’m not just referring to the repetitive skill of setting up a Facebook and Twitter account for a corporate client who doesn’t “get it.” I’m referring to solving actual, human problems using available communication tools, regardless if it’s called “social media” or not. The tools will never replace humans, but they can help.
Look at the reaction to the Iranian election online. A lightweight Internet application, Twitter, has created a sense of healthy transparency in a geographic arena that has been traditionally stubborn by design in the past. The conversation has always existed, but now it’s being funneled and aggregated online. The tools haven’t created the conversation; they just created an outlet. That’s more democracy than Iran has ever felt.
Certain saturated industries have still failed to catch on to the available technology. The education sector and political sector, as they have historically been, are laggards in adapting. I see this as an inefficiency with the potential to exploit for someone that understands the space. Obama felt the success of having a new media team, and now every politician is going to want one. An opportunity I am spotting is media tools and information sources for politicians. Also, the traditional textbook industry is dying before our eyes due to digital publishing, so universities are looking for digital, low-cost and collaborative classroom tools to use instead. Easy opportunities exist in plugging these holes of inefficiencies with already existing technology.
Finally, I don’t think “going out on their own” is necessarily the most productive path for many to take, even if it’s the most prideful. As you know, it takes extreme amounts of discipline that just aren’t common if you haven’t had a real job before. And, building a lemonade stand or writing a blog about sports won’t cut it. My recommendation for the entrepreneurial ones would be to join a younger, smaller company or start-up that is relevant to their personal interests. Or, find a position in a larger company that grants you the freedom and mentorship of a smaller firm. This way, you’ll get access to the individuals who have been on their own independently before, and if you can, have the creative freedom to make decisions without them being filtered out by too many hierarchies.
AM: Where are the opportunities in law? Is there any use, or even any need, for technology in your field? For a kid fresh out of school, would you recommend biting the bullet to start their own company? Like you said, no one is going to question the time lapse in your resume used for experimentation.
PL: Regulatory work, perhaps. Plaintiff’s law for a while. But neither has much of an upward trajectory. There’s a glut of people going into plaintiff’s work right now because there are no jobs at firms and there’s no barrier to entry in becoming a negligence lawyer. As to the regulatory stuff, as much as that area will grow, it’s not an zone of opportunity for new lawyers because it involves a lot of years of experience with the agencies one is working with and against.
Starting your own company is never going to be cheaper. If you can do that and you have a serious business model, not doing so would be letting a golden opportunity pass.
PL: Periods of creative destruction are gifts to those positioned to exploit them. Do today’s graduates see this as an opportunity or is the attitude more one of fear?
AM: There is level of fear on a large scale. What my generation has experienced is more than a down economy and high unemployment rate; it’s bigger, more grandiose than that. We’ve seen a complete breech of trust, from the top down. I mean, the companies that have gone down the drain are the same companies used as examples in our fucking textbooks! What does that tell you? It’s a complete global blackout that proved just how connected and coupled the world of business is, and how a small change can have massive, unexpected result. The piggy bank as we know it has been officially cracked open and flushed.
But, I’m optimistic. I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing that my generation has experienced a unique economic downturn. I think the less jobs that are simply “handed out,” the more picky students will be in the future to find something they actually want to be doing. And, I think that’s a good thing, even if it took a recession, lost jobs, and a whole lot of debt to make that idea a far-fetched reality. We don’t “want to die before we get old.” There’s a healthy, long-term vision, at least looking down the road, that we’ll find a sense of balanced, professional solitude that many older than us never found.
AM: Should someone my age be fearful? What does being fearful accomplish, if anything? Are things as bad as they seem, or at least as bad as the media makes it seem?
PL: The lower-to-mid middle class of this country is dead, all but destroyed. You’re alright. You have a facility with numbers and an understanding of finance, and those skills will always be useful somewhere. The trick is finding the next explosive growth area and getting in at the basement level now. Sucks to research that in such a fluid, confusing environment, but compared to the forty, fifty and sixty year olds getting wiped out in the downturn, your problems are gold plated. The only concern is going to be the taxation leveled on you and me to pay for all the people who are getting crushed in this economy. Until the cost of foreign labor meets the high cost of domestic labor, American workers with low level skill-sets are going to keep getting savaged. As are a lot of high end service providers. Law’s fucked right now and medicine could turn into a disaster for docs if this health care thing passes in the wrong form. But you’re not in these fields, and like I said, you understand numbers. You’ll be fine down the road. Your frat brother with the history degree? He might be fucked. Might have to write books for a living or something like that.
I went to school to become a Chartered Accountant in Canada. When I was graduating, I had stars in my eyes as my friends that were a couple of years ahead of me and had qualified as Chartered Accountants were being handed positions that are well above their experience levels (i.e. Controllers, CFOs) and outrageous starting salaries (i.e. $100k with bonuses). Also, the audit firms were hiring anyone with a pulse to fill the need.
I qualified last year, and my job prospects are significantly limited in comparison. When I first started, I thought that I would get the hell out of audit the moment I could but things have changed. So I said screw it, and moved to Bermuda. I am still in audit but at least I’m doing it in an interesting place.
My suggestion to recent grads is borrow some cash and go travel for a year. Go to Australia on a working visa, go to Europe, go travel across Asia, go teach English in Japan, etc. That’s what I did and it actually helped me get a job because it gave me some life experience and something interesting to talk about in my interviews. If you are going to blow a bunch of cash to stall you from entering the job market, might as well have a good time instead of going back to school!
PL: And you get the benefit of explaining yourself to any prospective employer as honestly and as bluntly as you did here, and commanding respect for the effort. It’s a smart, rational way of handling the situation. Shows excellent opportunistic use of the circumstances.
But not everybody wants to or can afford to run off for a year. I think trying to start your own business or searching for a company in an emerging technology where you can get in early and get equity is just as good a use of the time, if not better.
Interesting read. I’ve still got a year of waiting it out to do before the party starts for me, and a year’s a long time (from some points of view), but it’s good to keep an eye on how other people are seeing this stuff.
I see it as an opportunity, but then, I’ve been involved in entrepreneurial ventures, courses, and people for as long as I can remember–if anyone could get funding in this climate, and had a decent business plan, they’d be golden. Unfortunately, funding is harder to get right now than the chick who sits in front of me in my logistics course.
PL: There is a “pushing water down in a bathtub” effect to the decreased cost environment. One problem’s always replaced with another. It’s the cheapest time to start something right now, but it’s also the hardest in which to find even that small sliver of cash you need to get it rolling.
But the pain of additional legwork beats higher hard costs, doesn’t it?
I think the life/work balance question is an interesting one, especially from my vantage point. I’m a Canadian doing his Ph.D. in the UK (in nanoelectronics), and I’ve noted a real difference between Canadian and European cultures towards work in doing so, and I think the difference is ever greater compared to the US.
Here, life/work balance has always been a huge focus, and that’s reflected in the recruitment pitches of companies, even the huge multinationals. 4-6 weeks vacation a year is standard (plus statutory holidays), and this is something that recruiters will advertise. I think a big part of that is the travel culture that’s pervasive over here. Before I left Canada, aged 25, I’d travelled to 5 countries. Now, less than four years later, it’s 19. Cheap flights and the existence of the EU making movement so much easier has really opened up these sorts of opportunities, but I think that culture is just ingrained more. It would be INCONCEIVABLE to not have a passport here. I literally don’t know anyone who doesn’t. yet in America, as much as 80% of people don’t by some estimates.
So I think that’s a cornerstone to it, but it goes beyond that. It’s all what you’re accustomed to , and the European culture seems to just have a better balance built in. Aside from the vacation time, there’s also an emphasis on shorter weeks (35 hours rather than 40), and more of a push to exist outside the office (there’s also a near-complete lack of cubicle farms). It’s hard to pin down exactly, but it’s a feeling that’s very clear, and a big part of why I want to stay here to work after graduation. I’m just not that keen on surfing a cubicle for 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year until I die.
PL: I’ve nothing to add to that except thanks. Well put and well placed.
@kevin: It’s not so much that funding is harder to find right now (there is actually too much money in venture capital), but more so that valuations have sunk. A good idea will be valuable in any economy; it just might be worth a whole lot less right now (or more, depending on what it is).
As someone who just graduated, I can confidently say that there are dumb kids still going into law. I’m one of them. It’s my Plan B. Plan A is buying lottery tickets, crossing my fingers, and hoping for the best.
PL: Unless mom and dad are paying for it, please, do yourself a favor and think twice. I’m serious. Rash decisions made in desperation almost always turn out to be the worst ones in your life. Sit back, breathe and take advantage of the time you’re being offered to consider alternatives to the “middle class peerage” professions society will tell you are your only options. As bad as it seems, this is an opportunity. Don’t piss it away.
For Christ’s sake, if nothing else, go learn a bunch of foreign languages – say Chinese, Russian, Arabic… What’ll that cost you? $1000? It’ll be worth a lot more than a $100,000 law degree.
If anything, reading this has given me hope. Graduating with a BA in Economics last year, I originally took that higher paying, sell-your-soul retail management job. Sure, for a few months I had more money than my friends but the industry tanked, I was fired, and now I’m trying to find that basement-level opening for a new future.
You’d think in bad economic times everyone would want to hire someone with a degree in Economics.
Ha.
I don’t have the wherewithal to join the peace corps. If getting an advanced degree isn’t the right direction to go – in a time where you need a Master’s or at least 5 years experience to make burgers at McDonald’s – then what options are there?
How can you convince a hiring manager that you’re capable of great things, if they’d just put a little trust in you?
PL: “Hiring managers” are a chief reason this country’s where it is. Giving gatekeeping duty to the most talentless crop of corporate invalids – HR drones – explains why the only people who’ve innovated a goddamn thing in this country in 40 years are in Silicon Valley and Wall Street. The average HR professional has the intellectual horsepower of a two stroke riding mower. Check the box, fill in the form, ensure the policies are followed. Repeat until clock hits 5:00. These people wouldn’t spot talent if it spread itself pink in their faces. And as to taking a chance on someone, they’re likely to embrace risk as they are to grow a third eye.
Stay the away from those people. They’ll only give you a fucking headache. The only way to get a job is to get connected, and the only way to do that is to be truly, really friendly with someone (as in sharing non-work related interests) who can “grease” you into a job you want. These people running around posting resumes and going to career fairs are chasing fantasies. 10,000 of them applying for those ten or twenty positions the company puts out for bid. Silliness. You want to work somewhere? Research the place, meet someone who works there and use social connections to get an interview. Everything’s relationships. People hire who they like. The trick is avoiding the HR monkey altogether.
Alex: There can never be too much money in venture capital, if what you’re looking for is money from venture capitalists :P.
But you’re right, that’s one of the reasons it’s hard to get. Not only have the lenders collective sphincters clenched, and the angels dried up, but the VCs that are still investing know how desparate the entrepreneurs are getting and are valuing accordingly. It’s ugly.
PL: The HR monkey in its current form is a bane on the existence of each and every one of us. Every time I’m handed a new exercise from the drones about ‘competency training’ or ‘core skills analysis’ I want to shoot myself.
That said, having someone whose job is to deal with the workforce is a good idea, if they got their heads out of their asses.
PL (in reply to the part directed to me): The only people who should ever work in HR are people who worked in the revenue producing side of the company in which they’re playing gatekeeper. Perhaps send older employees who want less stress into that line of work. As it stands now, having lifelong HR people doing the work is like having the guidance counselor in high school tell you what career you ought to go into. What the hell business does a person in that position have handing out career advice?
There are still four years until I graduate from pharmacy school, but there’s a definite feeling from the students that their future jobs are secure and definitely well-paid.
I’m not so sure. As you mentioned, the health industry could come crashing down. Any sort of smug security seems foolish; the students are slugging away at the required work, not even considering it may not pay off. I think I should be chasing down every other opportunity, just in case. In four years, I should be able to find at least a few? I hope.
One nervous student.
PL: You’ve got time. Get a focus on what you need to do to make it in your chosen field. Ask some people in the profession and get the inside information, not the general stuff professors will tell you. Figure out where you want to be (got to pick a place with good growth), learn about what business models are emerging as most profitable right now and figure out what you have to do to get positioned to work in the most advantageous position for you.
Stick with the plan and enjoy the shit out of the next three years. They’re the best you get. Blow the doors out.
Currently we have access to a huge array of stuff that is practically dirt cheap compared to how things were 20/30 years ago. Computers being the prime example of it. This changes the trade off between the work/life balance. We can already get most of what we need at affordable prices. So more of our external needs have been met. But the current systems leaves us unfulfilled in more personal areas. We now have options and examples of other companies who are able to provide a better balance. Couple this with the fact that many of us have seen our parents work in a large company. Seeing what my father is currently going through and the sacrifices my parents have had to make because of their dependence of a large company that is currently struggling to survive makes me not want any part of that.
If I am going to work my ass off for something, it will be for what I want, not some big company. Otherwise wants the point.
PL: 300 channels and nothing’s on. You’ll enjoy this book: “The Paradox of Choice: Why More is Less,” by Barry Schwartz.
As to the rest, working for yourself is the worst form of employment… except for all the other forms that have been tried from time to time. (Can’t go wrong stealing from Churchill.)
I know what you said about Europe makes a lot of sense at first. Just keep in mind, in American we are not guaranteed education past high school or health care either. I think a lot more American would feel more comfortable working less and relaxing once you removed those stresses.
PL: I don’t think anyone has a “right” to higher education or health insurance. Your rights in this country, in my opinion, are to be left alone by the government, and left to succeed or fail on your own, climbing or falling from whatever station you start at.
That’s harsh, but fighting the nature of what we are, and the reality that without losers there are no winners, is a an inevitable ticket to national bankruptcy. We can’t afford the standard of living we have, let alone expanding it with entitlements. Sure, there are millions of solid economic reasons for universal health care. And hell, it would help me in a business I’m involved with. But philosophically, it sends a terrible message, and one that will create a disaster down the road. It elevates the message “we’re our brother’s keepers” above “you’re on your own save a couple necessary safety nets.” That creates a troubling set of expectations among many sectors of society and stanches ambition. And many years from now, long after you and I are gone, that may be the thing ultimately sinks us.
Great dual interview. . .
“But a guy who told me a story about building bridges in some impoverished part of the Third World? That’s a guy you’ve no choice but to respect. An interesting back story goes a lot further than the typical canned script.”
As a current college student, I really hope you are right. We’d all be better for it.
PL: Anything that wipes out the armies of upper-middle class, PSAT-obsessed, then SAT-obsessed, then LSAT-obsessed, then career-obsessed weasels who populate fields like law is fine with me. Talking to these myopic twits is like death by a thousand cuts. You’re sitting in a deposition and you just want some human communication… An amusement of sort sort for a moment and they give ya nothing. Nada. Zip. Blank stares, or the worst, stunted small talk you’ve ever heard.
It’s the boredom that kills you in these jobs. The endless, terminal boredom… and that nagging fear you’ll turn out a goddamn dullard for having been in it too long.
“Please – Please tell me another war story about that trial last year, Phil… Fascinating shit. If you hadn’t stopped to answer that email on your Blackberry, I swear I was going to soil my trousers at the climax of that story about how you won that motion in limine!”
@josh
Having a fucking story to tell is the best artillery you can have versus any employer. Every kid tries to throw around marketing buzzwords to sound entitled for their first position, when they really don’t know anything.
Try mentioning anything remotely interesting or off the grid (studying abroad, teaching abroad, Peace Corps, etc.) in a job interview. You’ll be amazed how quickly the conversation diverges from the original subject into your hands. Suddenly, you’re in control, simply because it’s a little different.
What if you wanted to get into the law not necessarily for money? I’m really interested in Constitutional law and I’ve come to accept that there’s a good chance I wont’ make alot of money at it, but it’s really a passion for me. Would it be worth it to go to law school then?
PL: Yes. If you really dig it and know going in that it is going to be a tough economic slog and still want to do it, as I said many times before, do it. But understand – if you work for a firm it will be more about business, and cookie cutter task work, than arguing constitutional issues. Con law is a narrow field. There aren’t tons of First Amendment cases walking in the door every day. Also, consider that firms don’t allow you to choose your field. You get placed where they need you, and that’s how the rest of your career goes. You might not get the experience in con law that you want, and you’ll have to decide between living decently working in an area of law you hate and living near destitute trying to make a living scraping together the rare cases one can find and be paid for dealing with constitutional law issues.
Sit down with a litigator at a small firm, a medium sized firm and a large firm and ask them what their job is like. Place your expectations against their descriptions. If one or all match up, go to law school and seek a job working in the type of firm that suited your goals. If they don’t, think again.
Go to technical school. Learn mechanics, welding, nursing, carpentry, machining. Become an electrician, a plumber, a machinist. Find a skill that you must be physically present to perform. Don’t get outsourced. Spend 1/10th of an elite graduate school program.
Use your savings to swing trade Chinese stocks overnight while selling jewelry on Etsy and t-shirts on threadless.
PL: That’s very good advice. Somebody will say that can be applied to law, accounting and consulting. In response to that, I offer Exhibit A: India. That’s where a lot of grunt work in those fields will be taking place in the future. Those jobs do not require anyone to be physically present on location.
I imagine, however, that many people will bristle at the lack of “prestige” in hands-on work. They’d do well to get over themselves. Guys with their own HVAC businesses can make a whole lot more than the average lawyer.
I graduated in May with degrees in econ and journalism. I chose to not even bother with campus career fairs senior year, recognizing the historic repercussions of this circus sometime last August; your site in large part averted me from LSAT-prep a couple summers ago. I decided to dive into the eye of the storm with almost zero net worth, moving 3,000 miles away with no initial plan. I’m now doing a ton of primary research on the industry segment me and two partners are forming a start-up around. I’m working all sorts of tax-free temp jobs for saving and rent at the basement chicago apt I’m in (helping people haul things when moving, cleaning work for small stores, etc.) at odd hours in the mean time, and taking a year-long Mandarin course on-line.
I’m enjoying each day, still poor, but learning a ton, slowly but steadily stacking cash – and debt-free. I couldn’t pretend to guess where I’ll be even a year out, but now understand how awesome that feeling is. This shit storm ultimately helped me muster the balls to embark on my own path, and it will do the same for many more (though not nearly enough).
PL: Good luck with it. As a person who’s rebuilt himself and continues reconfiguring himself, I’m with you. This shit isn’t easy, but I like the fact that good or bad, I’ve steered myself to where I am and have no choice but to continue holding the wheel going forward.
This article almost hits home with me. I’m 20, and just signed up for the third year of an accounting degree. I just quit my 20 dollar an hour summer labour job,which I hated, and have done fuck all the last two weeks. All I’ve been doing is drinking and chasing women, and I’m happy, up until that little voice in my head tells me I should be doing something with my life. I want to be “successful”, but I sure as hell don’t want to work 80 hours a week in accounting to do it. If success isn’t hanging out with your friends, playing sports,having fun, and hooking up with pretty young women, what is it? How does life get better than it already is? Why do I need this goddamn degree?
All I really want with my life is to make enough money to do what I am doing at the moment. For now. But maybe feel like I’m doing something meaningful.
PL: This leads to a broader question about why we have an almost mechanized system that drives so many to slow down and do what they don’t want to at an age where no human being is suited to sit behind a desk doing what he can’t possibly stand. And how this could possibly be anything be destructive to society.
See the Chapter of my book titled “Twenty Six” and another called “Squirrelfucker.” The human animal at 23 years old is not built to sit behind a desk and slowly, methodically, terminally be fattened and aged with sterile, slow toil, while simultaneously shunted toward a slow consumption based lifestyle that will have few highs or lows and simply amble forward toward retirement and death.
“The wealthy aren’t like us.” You’ve heard Americans say that before, right? A lot of the middle class suggests that’s because with money comes corruption – that with money the nuclear family, the stability of being a churner, is removed and people become unmoored, unhappily so.
Incorrect.
These decadent wealthy aren’t like us because they have enough money to control their destinies. They can crash and burn what they like in their lives and simply start over. And really, it has little to do with their money. That’s just what gives them freedom to do what they want to do. You can be of quite modest means and never get in debt and be as free as 90% of the people out there with unlimited wealth. You won’t live exactly like them, of course, but if you’re willing to realize what you are early and eschew the kids, the mortgage, the trappings that come with ego (expensive crap people buy to show off they’ve made it), you can probably travel your life away, seeing the world. The only caution I’d offer is that could get lonely at some point. Not many people can be so self-realized, and if you want a relationship, there are compromises to be made. And few of us know at 23 who we’ll be and what we’ll want at 35. But if you think you’re really cut out for the lifelong bachelor gig, by all means, don’t let the fact that everybody else is doing otherwise influence your life. Do what you like.
Although my peers have realized they will no longer have a chance of working at BB investment banks or the BBM consulting firms, I don’t know if I should be surprised at the utter lack of entrepreneurial mindset. Usually, maybe 10 – 20 people get those jobs from my school and among us graduating in the next year, only one has. Surprisingly few, if any, are taking the law school approach, and the one friend who is thinking about law got a very quick referral to this website. The problem, however, remains that most are just remaining ignorant and are avoiding the problem, and to me this seems dangerous. What if next year isn’t an option either(probably not)?
Coming out of a competitive high school, I was told you had to be a doctor , lawyer, or business executive to be successful…and at this point in my life I was dumb enough to believe this theory. Now I am an accounting major and couldn’t hate it more. In 20 mins I have to go to obligatory lunch with a Big 4 partner (we have to do an internship to graduate and this point I might as well finish it off) where my peers will ask inane questions: “If I suck you off, will you give me this job?” But when I ask the difficult questions about the leaching nature or the collusion I get looked down upon (Our counselor even said YOU CANNOT NEGOTIATE, how much are they paying her? Any thoughts on this PL?)
Honestly it is a dream of mine to start a sports news/analysis website, but being a business major makes the task just that more daunting; knowing versus ignorance of the tasks ahead. At this point, I am considering moving to California and staring a “bakery.” Just had to get this off my chest.
PL: Rant away. That’s what this place is for.
As to next year being an option, your friends are in for a cold slap in the face on that. This recession is technically ending, but that’s little more than semantics – something for half wits on the news to blather about. The job market won’t be thawing, and that’s what’s going to hold any real recovery back. W-shaped recovery? Bullshit, I’d bet. This is going to be a negative plateau. Flat for as long as the eye can see.
I’ve been a longtime avid reader of this site, and this is the first entry that compelled me to comment, if only for that fact that not only did I graduate in this climate, but with the now-nearly worthless degree in journalism. Needless to say, the two months from there to here contained a lot more alcohol then interviews. The ones I did get saw the same old song and dance: polite interview, followed by no contact.
I’ve been re-reading a lot of the articles on this site lately, and it took the low I’m in to really grasp one of the core points you’ve been trying to get across for all this time: Fucking Do Something. I’ve run out of money for staying where I am, but after recuperating with the folks, I want to either take a technical course or find a friend who can draw worth a damn and start a webcomic(I’ve always enjoyed the world of comics, and my one marketable skill right now is writing the pants off of what I choose). Better to be stamped out by failure than be silent and waste the life away.
PL: Fucking do something’s about as eloquent a way of saying it as there is. That is one of the messages. Odd shit can happen when you start exploring. I never thought I’d write a book. I figured it was a fucking pipe dream. Then it happened, almost literally withing sixty days. Now, getting a book deal isn’t as difficult as some think, but it isn’t usual to go from miserable drunk lawyer to author, and author who had his book optioned for television and nearly bought by a network. All in crazy short period of time. As I said at the end of the book, fucking doing something got me the answer the question that haunts so many of us – “What if?” I might be down a lot of money over the last two years, but I’ve managed in my own silly way to have created something nobody can take away from me – something that stands as a souvenir of a funny (and desperate) time, immortalizing some of my friends and an ethos we otherwise might forget as we age. And on top of that, I’ve amused and perhaps enlightened the audience who’s bought it, and the much larger audience that’s taken the time to follow this site. All for just deciding to get off my ass one day and stop bitching about what annoyed me and start writing about it. That and, of course, the benefit of great editors, agents, managers and supporters behind me.
Guys like you… Without debt, without a family and business obligations to attend to? If you decide to Fucking Do Something, you can do about a hundred times more than I could. Good luck with it.
I’m a slack college student in my mid 20’s and I’ve hit a crossroads. I’m starting to realize that a career cubicle, a mortgage, a wife and two kids isn’t what I want out of life. I’m not quite sure what I want, but I know I don’t want to be tied down. I’ve thought about joining the Army reserves to get me out of my rut and add a little excitement, but that’s a crucial decision in times of war. I’m basically freaking out because I’m starting to break away from what I’ve always been told: get a degree and start at the bottom. I just want to be financially comfortable without a degree, I suppose. Any advice?
I would like to say that this post and the comments that ensued have definitely eased my tensions for the time being.
PL: Then don’t get a degree. Find a job that pays what you need and has little stress and puts you in a place you want to be. And think about what you really need to live on. If all you want is to be able to go to the beach, get a low stress job near a beach and live frugally. You’ve heard the story about the fisherman who meets the businessman on vacation. The businessman says he wants to make enough money to retire to a small fishing village where he can fish all day and do nothing but what he wants. The fisherman then tells him, “That’s what I do.” Sure, it’s a dumb old cliche, but it holds. If you want a simple, enjoyable life, it’s within reach. But you’ll have to live with never being “funded through retirement” or having Cadillac-grade health coverage. There are trade offs.
Thanks for fascinating interviews and insights. Must confess being the same age as Philly, I have often written these new kids off as fucked up coddled babies who simply don’t want to work. But perhaps this view is just the selfish baby boomer envy that has seeped into my mind-view also.
As Philly says, the law firm business, i.e., racket, is about done. Greed killed it and is still killing what’s left of it (Philly, if you can believe it, it has gotten even worse with the downturn, it is like some mutant darwinism out there!). I have billed 5 hours this week and I am a regulatory lawyer, so much for cover. But know what, I am not worried in the least, unlikely I get canned and if I do, I sold my overpriced house and can get by for a year on what has not been rolled into the new one. Part of this lack of worry is a partial embrace of the new generation’s ethos. Hell, I moved to DC with only an air mattress, bike and TV and if that is where I wind up, at least I still have my mind, health and spirit.
PL: If you’ve seen someone get sentenced to thirty years in jail or had a friend or family member diagnosed with terminal cancer or a dangerous chronic illness at a young age, you know – as bad as your problems might be, they’re gold plated. Nothing we’re worried about here is all that important, and that’s one of the things that really pissed me off about people in the career, and myself. That fear the career creates inside you, that feeling that if you fall off the career track just for a second you’re fucked and you’ll cascade through a bottomless doom spiral – believing that horseshit for the years I did was such a pathetic weakness. I should have told a whole lot more of the people I worked for what I was thinking. Fuck it… Water under the bridge. The annoyance of it all brought me to a better place and, I see, you as well.
But I wonder, what’s this doing to so many of the “wind up dolls” who bought into the system and have now been laid off from the only thing they lived for? How do those hopeless fucks stave off suicide?
Thank you for telling the truth. I live in Calgary, and everything revolves around the oil industry. I grew up with 2 geologists as parents, and all of my friends had parents who were either engineers, geologists or consultants. I am 19 and went to one year of university because as soon as you graduate high school it is expected you go to school and get the same mundane job as your parents so you can have that cabin on the lake where you only spend 2 weeks out of the year, and the BMW that everyone on your street drives as well. Because of your vision I finally have the courage to do what I want, I am going to audio engineering school. Although my mom took away her support I will figure things out because for the first time I am motivated by passion, not by pressure. It’s scary and most of my university friends think its dumb but I am excited to see where it takes me.
PL: Thank you for the compliment, and best of luck to you on the career. I’m frankly kind of shocked your folks would react that way. Mine don’t understand me, but they’ve more than supported me over the years. My mother, in fact, pushed me every time she saw me – accused me of not having the guts to get out of my career. And my father understood. Wasn’t keen on it, but he understood. Shit, everyone understands if they just take the time to think about it. Hate to sound repetitive, but life isn’t meant to be spent going through the exact same routine every single day and feeling like you’re a slave to the whims of some dickhead who sits above you in a hierarchy by dint of nothing more than the fact he happened to have been born a decade before you. I don’t think I’m some special talent who needed to break out and share a “gift” with anyone. I don’t think anybody who feels trapped in an office is that arrogant. We just know there has to be more to it than what we’re doing there, cranking out mindless busywork behind a desk for someone else.
By the way, I’ve been thinking about audio engineering a good bit lately. I’ve a short in the truck’s audio system (this complex thing with twelve different speakers I’d have never gotten if I’d had the choice) nobody seems to be able to locate. Absolutely maddening, and the quest to locate it is ungodly expensive. I’ll be screwing along on the highway, cranking a live Allmans disc and – POP – the fucker just cuts out. Then I have to turn it on and off twice to get it on again and by the time I do that Duane’s already fifteen notes ahead in a solo.
Oh, and as to those German cars, all they are is headaches. Fun to drive fast and all, but absolute shit in snow, and a goddamn fortune to have serviced. In fairness, however, I will say that those folks do make a bulletproof engine. On balance, however, the Japanese stuff puts their product to shame. You can get 200k out of most Japanese cars with 1/3 the service costs of the German ones. You’re missing nothing if you skip out on keeping up with the Joneses on your block in that regard. I view my purchase in that arena as a waste of a pile of bonus money better spent on anything – Vegas, a large screen TV… a pile of GM stock. Well, maybe not that last one.
Phily, speaking of Allmans, one thing to add. In one of your epic stories, you had a line about seeing Allmans at Redrocks. Well, September 5 they will be there and so will I, 2000 miles from home for 3-day weekend of Allmans and Rockies mountain biking. Thanks for the inspiration.
PL: Great minds think alike… That line was almost clipped from the book, but my editor here at the time, Donika, said it was a favorite of hers.
Hopefully, you’ll see a “You Don’t Love Me/Soul Serenade” and hopefully, Warren will have the good sense to leave Derek to take over the solo. Nothing against Warren (I love Mule), but Warren does not fit in well with the Allmans, in my opinion. He makes the sound too aggressive and he uses too much distortion.
Dickey needs to start playing with them again. He’s as much part of the genius that made that band what it is as any of the original members.
As a recent grad who ditched the traditional Grad School or Banking mentality to join Teach for America in New Orleans this article hits home. Most people laugh at the fact that I went to a “prestigious” school and came out a public school teacher, but fuck them. The work has already been the most challenging and rewarding I have experienced. I have no clue what I’m doing after my 2 years, but I do know it’s going to involve surrounding myself with people who value people who create their own paths. I hope this economic mess creates more of them. Keep up the good work.
PL: I think a lot of people are going to have no choice but to carve their own non-traditional paths. Like I said, until unemployment and underemployment turn, we’re going to be in a period of malaise. You’ll hear people run off at the mouth about how consumer spending is not as important as assumed. To borrow from Tracy Morgan, That’s crazy talk. Yeah, the financial sector can focus abroad and decouple the market from the domestic troubles, but the underlying issues that will vex young workers who haven’t yet established a skill-set – an overall lack of worthwhile employment opportunities – remain. Those will drag down corporate America and depress any expected uptick in hiring.
Hence, we need another bubble. Somebody, please, cure cancer. Or invent a cell phone that gives blow jobs.
Great article. Your input (from comments) about what a waste of space HR really nailed the reasons why so many things are the way they are right now:
Kind of an offshoot of my old post and I was hoping you could clear some things up for me: http://messageboard.tuckermax.com/showthread.php?p=846888#post846888
Call me a naive college kid still, but I actually think its possible to find a way to get people to do education+careers with all their heart and I want to make finding this “what I want to do with my life”. It’s become normal to complain about school+your job but I don’t think it has to be this way. I think of it like this: our satisfaction from these 2 parts which consume a big portion of life is a work in progress-kind of like how eating, travel, and reading probably wasn’t as enjoyable when we were cavemen compared to today.
My options as I see them? Work as a research assistant for various think tanks, esp those in education. Yeah, I’ll probably wind up just like Jeremy in constitutional law where they won’t let me work on any of the issues of my own but at least it will make me a better candidate for Grad school-which is pretty the absolute minimum for anyone to take you seriously in this field.
That is further down the line though-because I still have to pass by recruiters that know jack shit about what a suitable candidate for a technical position is or how well a person fits with the corporate culture that they didn’t even help build(yet represent the company to me as a jobseeker) because they came from a staffing agency. How the fuck is a recruiter that used to work in IT supposed to know anything about recruiting teachers? HR/Management functions should be a skill that is grown throughout one’s time with a company and not something like accounting where you can freely transfer from one to another. I think you’ll find it interesting to note that companys like boeing/northrop do HR as more of a promotion from within.
Any advice on how to get past the “resume black hole”(where I’ve emailed HR but don’t hear a response from them)?”Don’t call us, we’ll let you know”. Sigh. More time spent justifying their existence than doing their “job”.
PL: You have to get connected to someone above the HR monkey. That’s the only way, and the bigger the corporation the more automatic and less thinking the process. You want to come in from a posture above that bureaucrat, with the bureaucrat understanding that someone of actual importance to the company deems you a candidate to be evaluated outside the usual mindless processes. It’s hard, but the only way to get ahead is milking connections. Who you know is worth ten times what you know. There is no such thing as a pure meritocracy. People work with people they like, or at least people they respect. I know it’s hard at an early stage to get connected, but it’s the only way. Work like a private investigator if you have to. Connect the six degrees between everybody and locate the college acquaintance whose uncle is in upper management at the organization and contact him for help. And don’t be afraid to ask or be a bit pushy. It feels tawdry to seek out favors, but that’s how business works. Talent’s cheap; it’s all relationships.
I am currently supposed to be in the thick of this topic as well, as I’ll be graduating in December. I appreciate this post and all the comments, but you know what…
Who cares about all this economy horseshit?
There’s always going to be some crisis or some other bullshit for idiots to worry about — it makes $$$ for the TV networks who show “news” about it 24 hours a day. If you are waiting for the world to be perfect to start your life, you are gonna be waiting a long damn time. I got news for you, if you are reading this you are living life right here, right now.
Remember that show “Frontier House” on PBS or something, where they take a modern day family and make them live like old-timey frontier people? Now THOSE motherfuckers back then had it hard: If the food you planted didn’t grow, you and your family starved to death! Now THAT’S a crisis. As far as I can tell, no one in the United States today is starving to death (yet!).
So if you wanna live a life you love, go for it RIGHT NOW. Despite the economy, whether good or bad. NO ONE is standing in your way of doing WHAT IT TAKES except for worries and fears. Are you gonna do it when you are 70 and on dialysis? Hell, you may not even make it that far, you could die anytime from something stupid and unexpected.
So you got an education in a worthless major? Boohoo for you. Deal with it. Everyone fucks up, so learn from your mistakes, fix them and move on, or else add them to your pile of worries and excuses for not living the life you want.
PL: Most people can’t just up and do what you suggest. In a lot of ways, nobody’s ever really free because there’s that pesky paying your bills thing. Technically, your option is open, but most people have to go “off the grid” to do what they really want to do. Not sure many want to go that far.
I watched Into the Wild last night and these were my thoughts throughout the entire movie: Wow, I’m going to do this. I’m going to travel and see the world. I want to go to Alaska. Look how beautiful it is. He’s so effing brave. Oh my God I’m doing something like this right after I graduate.
Then the dude died in the most depressing, lonely way.
I still want to see the world. I still want to somehow lead an interesting life and veer away from Corporate America. But I don’t want to die alone and starving, either.
I guess that might be the tradeoff in some cases though. A harsh reality.
PL: No, not at all. There’s a middle road, and unless you fuck it up, your generation is going to carve it. This Great Recession thing? It’s a long term correction, or contraction. Things aren’t going to snap back quickly because we’ve promised too much to too many and there’s no new bubble happening here that’s going to come anywhere close to funding us out of it, at least not as far as I can see for the next five or more years. We’re coming off a jobless recovery under Bush, so the real unemployed/underemployed numbers are probably five points higher than DC says.
I don’t offer this to scare, but to empower. Even before this mess, people were saying they’d had enough of the old system. We’ve had wonderful technological advances that make the old employee-at-the-office structure seem an unnecessary expense. Who needs all that overhead? By hiring independent contractors, employers can compete. They can shed health care costs, expensive leases, etc. It was moving in that direction before and there’s no reason the process shouldn’t accelerate now. Perhaps your generation can be the first to shift us from a more traditional model to a more contractor based model. If you have that, you’ll have freedom. You can finish a project and instead of having to beg for two weeks vacation to see New Zealand from your boss or the dipshit in human resources who staggers people’s vacation schedules, you can Just Go.
Sure, it’ll never be comfortable, but from a guy who worked for other people for a decade, whether you’re an employee or a 1099′d contractor makes no difference in terms of comfort. Nobody’s going to feel safe for a long time, and nor should they. Innovation isn’t born in a sunny meadow. It’s created when people are put under the gun and forced to develop ways to do things more effectively. Your generation is never going to have the job security mine did, just like mine didn’t have the security of those before me. But this mess is a gift in terms of life balance. You guys might enjoy a balance few did before, and I happen to think that if you do work as contractors and you get more time to yourself – to travel, to read, to not be harried in this stupid, stultifying 9-5 horseshit we’ve call the “American Dream” – you’ll be more well rounded and our economy will benefit from your improved insights. Maybe that’s naive, but if everybody gets to indulge an “I have dream” moment here and there, that’d be one of mine.
That and being in a threesome with Brigit Bardot in her prime and Adrianna Lima.
@Mike: I’ve been abstaining from commenting, because I graduated and have it really good, actually, and no one wants to hear that. But I’m happy because I made my own luck, followed my gut, and most importantly, stayed the fuck away from public accounting. Seriously…it is a worthless business model where you’re treated like shit for no good reason. Do yourself a favor and get an internship where you actually learn something. Then, when you have proven skills, you are actually in a position to negotiate your salary. And don’t let anyone tell you differently: you can always negotiate, unless there is an ample supply of idiots giving it away for free. Then you just differentiate yourself, and prove why you’re worth more. But seriously: fuck public accounting…it’s just a low-rent version of corporate law.
So I just graduated law school and am jobless. I’m using the recession as an excuse to do whatever I want, so I’m probably going to move to California and take whatever job wherever in order to finance it (after four years at Syracuse and three in NYC I can’t take another northeast winter).
It’s probably been said here numerous times before, but this generation is going to have to revise individual goals in order to be happy. A few generations ago acheiving a middle class income and lifestyle, and being happy, were not mutually exclusive. Somewhow the expectations got all out of whack, and everyone my age believes that, in order to be happy, special and significant things must happen in your life, and that your life must have an impact on the world in a significant way. Not to say that such aspriations aren’t something to strive for, and if these things happen, that’s great. I’m not advocating shooting for the middle. I’m just saying that for the average 25 year old, without a family of his or her own, it might be a good time/idea to make a list of the things that make you happy. I can almost guarantee that this list will not have anything on it that costs very much money. So, time to re-prioritze. Maybe careerism for its own sake is not a fantastic idea if you don’t want to suffer from depression at 35. Even baby-boomers took some years to find themselves before becoming career/family oriented; how is it that everyone my age decided to skip this part? We stay in school forever and worry tremendously over where we are in relationship to everyone else (even hipsters do this). And we buy dogs that we dote over in lieu of children. Maybe just relax a bit, no?
Everybody is concerned about what their options are without realizing that they’re virtually limitless if you just re-adjust your goals and stop worrying about whether you can retire by 50 (you can’t). Doing nothing, and for that matter, being a law student and contributing nothing, is boring NOW. I can’t imagine how boring it would be with a 50 year old body.
PL: I’m not adding shit to this except, Thanks. Well put.