
I'm Gen Y, and I Don't Feel Special or Entitled, Just Poor - kefka
http://aweinstein.kinja.com/fuck-you-im-gen-y-and-i-dont-feel-special-or-entitl-1333588443
======
ChuckMcM
God it sucks to hit 35 doesn't it? That was a really rough couple of years for
me. You are like halfway to 70, and 70 is like way old. What is worse is all
these "You can be anything" dreams start becoming undeniably impossible, like
being a fighter pilot or competing in the Olympics. But the worst bit for me
was thinking "Wow, that didn't seem all that long, am I really going to be 70
in just that much more time?" And frankly a mixture of panic and depression
set in. I'm never going to be "somebody", I'm over the hill, all of my heroes
were famous by this age, Etc. It doesn't stop.

And for me it was the time where I really internalized that life isn't about
the goals, its about the trip and the stops along the way. Imagine your life
is to drive from the San Francisco Airport to JFK in New York and catch a
flight and fly back. That is your life. And sure you put goals in like "see
the Grand Canyon" or something which takes you down a side path but once you
have seen the Canyon, maybe hiked Zion, skiied the Rockies, you just have to
keep driving east. And you hit Kansas which goes on and on and on and on and
on.

I had started piling up things from the 'someday' pile into the 'remember
when?' pile, like from 'someday I'll have kids' to 'remember when we didn't
have kids?' When that 'someday' pile gets smaller you can imagine it has
nothing in it but 'someday I'm going to die' well that is a scary thing to
imagine indeed.

So it sucks, but what can you do about it? The thing I found that got me past
that was focusing really hard on what I had (a great family), what I could
change (where I wanted to be), and how I felt about the world (my outlook on
the future). By focusing on that I kept from looking at that ugly visage of
Christmas Yet to Come, and the fear and guilt that came along with it. I
stopped following the news for a while since it only wanted to reinforce my
fear of the future. I fed my curiosity and tried to seek out sources of wonder
again (rocketry, quantum physics, and robotics systems are all amazing things
to me).

That keeps me engaged and interested and learning, and in so doing keeps the
future away in the future.

~~~
pintglass
I feel like you didn't read the post at all.

He said 2 things:

1\. These are weirdly contrived generational categories...

2\. You have no idea about student debt, underemployment, life-long renting.
“Stop feeling special” is some shitty advice. I don’t feel special or
entitled, just poor...

So basically, the post is about the Huff Post author being detached from
reality. "You just want to feel special- get over it" is really shitty advice,
he's right. They teach you not to say things like that at work. At least I
hope they do.

I'm a bit above 35 (past the next "old" barrier that starts with 4), and
although I fall more into the Huff Post author's vision of the sad yuppie
close to the start of gen Y, it pisses me off that on Marketplace (PRI radio
broadcast on NPR stations) today they were basically trying to convince
everyone that no one knows what the middle class is and that we should just
get used to the new normal and should even consider wealth redistribution as a
way to deal with it (I'm not joking- this was really said and the Marketplace
idiot went along with it- seriously L.A.- are these the people you want
representing you?).

So, I'm with Adam Weinstein on this one saying, "F __k you ".

I didn't sign up for the economic situation we're in, and I feel that our
fiscally irresponsible government is to blame. Wealth redistribution? No, I
don't think socialism or communism is a good idea. The only countries in which
either are working having been abandoning them for capitalism, from what I see
(specifically, India and China).

Can we stop threatening to bomb people, open borders again fully to allow all
kinds of immigrants, hire ex-Israeli soldier elites to profile passengers and
replace the TSA and no-fly lists in our airports/etc. (like Israel does), and
have _less_ government. Our government has better things to do than to try to
tell us how to live and how we should manage our money. Did you notice how the
_Democrats_ were giving Yellen a hard time because she was female? Almost
completely washed over in the liberal media. Shame! So much bullshit. I cannot
wait to cast my vote next time to oust every single one of the losers
currently in office.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Actually I did read it, several times actually trying to tease out the angst
from the fiction.

The author, Adam, is angry, that much is clear. And he writes that he is angry
at people who write pieces like the HuffPo one [1] which is "full of crap".
That piece, basically labels people of a certain age (by calling them 'Gen Y')
and then disparages them as being unrealistic in their expectations and their
self image.

So what can we infer from that? Well first, if this was a single instance then
it probably wouldn't be emotional for Adam; Second, if the complaints that the
HuffPo piece was disparaging weren't complaints that Adam had been espousing
he would have ignored it, and third he chose not to argue the merits, rather
to argue the presentation and author.

Now, my opinion here is that the HuffPo article was a hit piece aimed right at
Adam to generate rage views. And the HuffPo author tapped into that mid-life
angst about how the world isn't what you imagined it would be, and twisted as
hard as he dared to maximize the rage views. As for the 'weirdly contrived
generational categories' every group of people gets exposed to the world (or
made aware of it) around 15 - 25. And the 'big themes' in that time period
become influential in their lives. These categories are self creating.

What _I_ was trying to point out was that the anger over life not being what
one hoped it isn't unique to any generation, the Economist article mentioned
in this thread talks a bit about that.

So to address your second point, awareness about debt and underemployment and
life-long renting. One can be aware, and care, and still have perspective.

And then you said, _" I didn't sign up for the economic situation we're in,
and I feel that our fiscally irresponsible government is to blame."_ This is
where you have to choose. (And this is why, for me, 35 was pretty painful) You
have to choose to either be a victim or to not be a victim. Do you look for
'blame' or do you look for 'fixes'. The Marketplace episode pissed you off
because it was wrong, you can either show them how it was wrong or you can
whine about it.

For me, when I hit 35 was when it sunk in that there wasn't any "they"
anymore, there weren't grown-ups which were going to fix things. That was up
to me, being one of the grown ups, _I_ had to start fixing things. And I was
irritated in the mess the previous generation had left behind.

[1] [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wait-but-why/generation-y-
unha...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wait-but-why/generation-y-
unhappy_b_3930620.html)

------
icambron
I don't love the article's tone, but I do like the implicit point that Gen Y's
sense of entitlement about success is not so different from older generations'
sense of entitlement about pensions.

"Aww, you promised that if you to get that fancy degree and then everything
would magically work out for you? And it didn't? Totally predictable--serves
you right."

Isn't so different from:

"Aww, you were promised that if you showed up to work consistently for 40
years, your employers would pay you to do nothing for the rest of your life
and cover your skyrocketing medical expenses? And that's not working out?
Totally predictable--serves you right."

~~~
vacri
One of the reasons why people think that Gen Y is self-entitled is because
they are so inward-looking that they (in general) never bother to think of
what it was like for those before. It's all about "I hurt now"

Example: _" Last weekend my baby had a fever, and we contemplated taking him
to the ER, and my first thought was - had to be - “Oh God, that could wipe out
our bank account! Maybe he can just ride it out?”"_

As opposed to previous generations who had much less access to healthcare in
the first place?

The boomers are such a target for Gen Y wrath, yet there's little reflection
on how growing up was different for the two. Boomers and before just buckled
down and got on with it, because life _is_ tough.

I was once having this discussion online with a Gen Yer, and I pointed out the
medical advances, civil rights advances, relative lack of scarcity, so on and
so forth. Not to mention growing up under the constant threat of the Cold War,
which makes the War on Terrorism look like child's play. Despite all this, the
entirety of her counterargument was 'some schools now require metal
detectors'. She just couldn't grasp what it was like to grow up in previous
generations - where instead of getting a false promise of a better life, you
got no promise at all, and fewer entertainment options for distracting
yourself. And as a woman, life would have been worse, with spousal and sexual
abuse swept under the carpet as a matter of routine, and entirely legal
reduced wages for the same work.

Are Gen Y better or worse off than previous generations? I certainly don't
think they're worse off, it's just not 'perfect'. This article shows a lack of
perception of the hardships boomers had and overcame, plus it quietly sifts in
some whinging because his choice of career is dying... which is _his_ choice
of career, unrelated to Gen Y, and I noted that there was no acknowledgement
of people in previous decades whose careers fell by the wayside (farriers?
manufacturers? miners?). He certainly didn't mention that there are entire
careers that now exist that didn't 20 years ago (pretty much all of the
internet-related environment, for example).

The simple test is: would you rather live as an average person now or in 1960?
If you're a young man in the US, remember that conscription is about to hit
you, big time. (edit: and common jobs are mostly manual labour - there's very
little in the way of 'designer' and the like)

~~~
angersock
So, here's some things that magically never seem to make it into the
bookkeeping:

\- We were at war with an enemy that actually felt credible. The Reds had
nukes, invaded countries, and could have (as both sides nearly did) brought
about the fiery death of the world.

\- Not only was this threat credible, the government did useful things to
protect its citizens: Civil Defense stockpiles and training, school drills and
films that educated, and so on. Our current .gov is willfully ineffective.

\- Healthcare was much more affordable, as basic care was cheaper and not
being eaten alive by soulless administrators with fuckoff-huge budgets in a
non-profit dickwaving contest. Resistant strains of bacteria weren't as
widespread. Insurance and malpractice was not as big a deal.

\- Not only was healthcare cheaper, there was not as much science as we have
today invested in feeding us shit food that tastes great and has no redeeming
nutritional value. There wasn't a McDonald's or Starbucks on every corner.

\- The prison-industrial complex was not as embedded as it is today, nor were
police as militarized.

\- You could get a good-paying job doing vocational work, and even receive
useful training for it at school. You might even get a good pension. Neither
companies nor unions had screwed everything up yet.

\- You didn't have to worry about your job being trivially outsourced, as
international shipping hadn't quite gotten together just yet.

\- You didn't have to worry about being bombarded with advertising target
directly at you every day from every appliance, because the 'net wasn't
around, nor was Facebook.

\- My alma mater had free tuition for the first half of the 60s. :|

\- Ma Bell had a _competent_ government-sanctioned monopoly, instead of the
patchwork fiefdoms from the 80s and 90s.

\- We put a man on the fucking moon, instead of ads in the browser.

~

So, uh, yeah. There were downsides to be sure--I'd probably be running some
ENIAC derivative or working at NASA (given my skillset) doing server monkey
work right now, I'd to write weird programs for weird machines in weird
languages, I'd have been bullied more growing up, and if certain classes of
accidents happened I'd be shit out of luck.

If I were not white, male, or straight I could expect more trouble; then
again, I'd probably have a more close-knit community to help me with those
problems.

I'll leave speculation on dating and gender relations for some other thread
and time.

All the same, I bet I could raise a family more healthily and more easily, and
with greater (if perhaps more false) confidence that Things Would Be Alright.

~~~
vacri
For sure, I think that there are problems today - I was just mentioning things
that are never said in these diatribes. I definitely agree that the prison
system is a new and significant problem in the US. I definitely disagree that
the war on terror is worse because the enemy is nebulous. I'll leave it there
because I could write pages and pages of crap about the ups and downs of this
stuff :)

------
FD3SA
Fascinating. I constantly wonder about the psychological mindset of
entrepreneurs in the US. It seems to me that being an entrepreneur is the
riskiest profession imaginable in the USA. Unless you come from a family of
means, failure becomes a one way ticket to homelessness, malady, and squalor.
The social safety net is extremely poor and unforgiving, such that one mistake
could be a life changer.

This is why I wonder, to this day, why a coalition of entrepreneurs do not
support a basic income. It is the ultimate hedge against failure in a
capitalistic society, and would severely curtail the risks of failed ventures
for every individual.

This would massively incentivize the fail-fast mantra of startups, and unleash
a scramble to create the most valuable and profitable companies with a long
term focus.

I'm not holding my breath for basic income in the USA, but if Europe or the
Commonwealth countries instigate it first, it would be a massive draw for
serious entrepreneurs in the long term. Of course, this would have to be
balanced by access to capital, which does not necessarily require presence in
traditional VC hotspots (many UWaterloo companies have gone thru YC and
received top tier VC funding).

This is the world I hope to see going forward. Basic income, single payer or
nationalized healthcare, and a long term focus on efficiency at the state and
national levels.

~~~
rlanday
“This is why I wonder, to this day, why a coalition of entrepreneurs do not
support a basic income. It is the ultimate hedge against failure in a
capitalistic society, and would severely curtail the risks of failed ventures
for every individual.”

Doesn’t that kind of sound like “privatize the gains, socialize the losses”? I
don‘t really see how entrepreneurs would benefit overall from a basic income;
successful individuals would have to pay for this through higher taxes, which
would probably disincentivize risk-taking overall. Intuitively, it seems to me
that any sort of scheme that tries to cheat the free market by subsidizing
people who take risks and fail at the expense of those who either succeed or
avoid risks probably overincentivizes risk-taking. Why should someone who
doesn’t think their idea is good enough to put their own money at risk and
can’t find anyone else who wants to invest and put their money at risk either
get a taxpayer subsidy?

This makes especially little sense in Silicon Valley: “OK, I quit my well-
paying tech job with health insurance and free food because I thought I could
successfully bootstrap the next big social media blogging platform with my
entire life savings, and now I’m somehow unemployable, bankrupt, and homeless,
I deserve a bailout!”

Obviously, there needs to be some amount of risk-taking, but I’m extremely
doubtful that it makes sense in general for the government to subsidize
starting tech companies, especially when there are so many willing private
investors. I agree that having health insurance be largely the employer’s
responsibility does complicate switching jobs and starting companies.

~~~
rhizome
_Doesn’t that kind of sound like “privatize the gains, socialize the losses”?_

Yes it does, and it exists for ventures above a certain size, such as banks.
Why not democratize that policy? The free market you mention and defend does
not actually exist.

~~~
rlanday
Doesn’t sensible policy have to be symmetric, like “slightly socialize the
gains, slightly socialize the losses”?

~~~
rhizome
"Sensible" is a value judgement, and as such does not have to be anything, as
we see in the current policy environment. We can say that the current policies
are not sensible (or symmetric), but that's a response to a different
question. The facts remain that the current markets are not free and that
there are policies in effect that do socialize losses while privatizing gains.

------
curiouscats
People born in the USA in the last 40 years don't have the same near universal
likelihood of a better economic life than their parents. I suppose you can
look at this as unfair to you.

You might want to realize you have been born at very close to the best place
and time economically for any human in history. You are likely in the top .5%
of lucky people though maybe not quite as lucky as someone born in 1950 in the
USA (if you were white anyway).

The 1960's in the USA was probably the richest middle class in the richest
society ever in human history. That you might be a bit less lucky than that
hardly seem like being super unlucky.

And frankly, while I agree, those born a few years earlier in the USA had a
better shot of bing in the top .5% of the world economic lucky winners than
those born in the USA today do I would still rather be born today (or
twenty... years ago). Basically I'll take the other gains and accept the
economic well being is not as largely in my favor.

The article seems to talk of blaming those born recently for their situation.
That is lame. They have almost nothing to do with why they have this economic
situation versus someone born 40 years ago. But that misses the main point.
Being born in the last 40 years in the USA is SUPER LUCKY. Yes you still
struggle with challenges but nothing like what hundreds of MILLIONS of people
born someone else the same decades you were in some other part of the world.
And other than a handful of people in human history and then maybe some fairly
large numbers born in the 1950 or 1960 in the USA, Europe, Japan and a few
other places you are EXTREMELY LUCKY.

~~~
einhverfr
The fun thing about these sorts of viewpoints is the lack of comparisons. We
can never really compare with other people regarding where we were born but
unless you have spent significant time living in other countries, I really
wonder about this. It's like saying "Budweiser is so great beer I will never
even try another!"

Now a different perspective. I have spent around four months in Ecuador living
with middle to upper class families there, and around three years total living
in Indonesia. What I can tell you is that poverty in these countries is
_qualitatively different_ than poverty in the US, so much so that it is really
hard to say one is worse than the other for most of the bottom 20%. For the
bottom few percent though there is no question. The availability of
affordable, nutritious food and basic shelter is much better here in Indonesia
(and in Ecuador) for the poorest of the poor than it is in the US. Water is
somewhat different but availability of water that won't kill you in the short
term isn't a problem (drinking boiled polluted water is however).

Economically the poor have more stuff in the US, but they also carry a lot
more debt, have more restrictions on what they can do, and they have weaker
family ties, which means they have access, paradoxically, to less capital.

So I am not sure. I think that the bottom 50% may not be that much worse off
in most other countries and I think there is a certain American arrogance
which looks at the way we destroy the families, neighborhoods, and communities
of the less well off as "progress." But if you never live elsewhere for long
enough to really get the sense of how other people live, you don't see it.

~~~
curiouscats
I agree it is far from cut and dry. I have lived in Africa and Asia for 5
years - the rest in USA. Billions of people today do not have electricity and
clean running water in their house.

Air conditioning, that many in the USA act like is necessary wasn't available
in 1950 in the USA (in any significant way) and in much of the world until
fairly recently.

Even things like access to a library and school is far from universal today.
The internet is a great boon in providing access (and is available to more
than have access to a library).

I don't see any quick and decent way to compare making $40,000 in the USA
today with making 1/2 that much somewhere else. But I do know that what you
can live on for $40,000 in the USA today provides luxuries most people today,
and in all of human history, could never have afforded (electricity, indoor
plumbing, heat, air conditioning, TV, car, cell phone, internet, food,
clothes...). Yes you don't have as fancy stuff as you can see other people
have. But you have a ton of great stuff.

Getting into debt is a huge issue - as it can really get you into financial
trouble. And the current options for going to college are not easy. But it
isn't like it was super easy before either. Both my parents had to get
scholarships. I would have been out of luck probably.

We often are comparing our "shortfall" to this tiny little stretch of time and
location that was great and worrying that it isn't fair it isn't quite as
great as that.

I agree there are quality of life issues in the USA that are obscured by cash
wealth. I also agree that those in the USA often create a much worse financial
situation for themselves by taking on debt for useless junk and then
complaining they can't afford to live on so little... (this even happens to
rich people in the USA making over $100,000 a year).

~~~
einhverfr
> I agree it is far from cut and dry. I have lived in Africa and Asia for 5
> years - the rest in USA. Billions of people today do not have electricity
> and clean running water in their house.

I don't have potable running water in my house (in Indonesia). The water is
clean enough I feel comfortable brushing my teeth in it and showering in it.
Not clean enough I can drink it without boiling it. We don't have central hot
water (just some small units on the showers), only some rooms have air
conditioning, etc.

On the other hand we have some other luxuries. We have a bottled water
dispenser in our home that dispenses near-boiling water for tea or coffee
(with child safety devices no less). We have two maids who keep the house
clean and help with the children.

> I agree there are quality of life issues in the USA that are obscured by
> cash wealth.

I think the larger issues are this:

1\. Cash wealth != capital wealth. The median US household is far more
capital-poor than the median Indonesian family. I would define capital wealth
as accessible resources that can go into capital investments minus total debt.
It has little bearing on balance sheet wealth (and can be significantly above
or below that).

2\. We an extraordinarily multi-layered approach to discouraging small
business in the US. This includes regulation aimed at large businesses which
has, in some cases, made small business flat-out illegal (see the Consumer
Product Safety Improvement Act), complex tax codes which lead to large
corporations paying less taxes than small businesses, a health insurance
regulatory framework that chains people to corporate jobs (not new under
Obamacare, but exacerbated by that), and the like. Self-employment is the
privilege of the wealthy in the US, and that undermines everyone.

When I was in the US, my AGI was in the 70k range (after deductions and the
like) and it wasn't always that easy to make ends meet with children. Making
$20k/year over here would be an improvement to be honest in terms of quality
of life. Two of my three kids were born over here without medical insurance,
and the care set me back a lot less than the one who was born in the US with
insurance (which nearly put me into bankruptcy--- I think I calculated our out
of pocket expenses after insurance were over $10k).

> We often are comparing our "shortfall" to this tiny little stretch of time
> and location that was great and worrying that it isn't fair it isn't quite
> as great as that.

I don't know. I am more concerned that we tend to think of ourselves as
uniquely well off, but....

1\. Homelessness is criminalized in the US (especially in Democratic-voting
urban centers!) far more heavily than over here in Indonesia.

2\. Having a business is easier over here than in the US unless you are a
foreigner (why my business entities are effectively owned by my wife so I can
avoid the minimum investment limit).

3\. Care for the elderly is better because people care for their relatives
more closely. Also this means that people invest more heavily in their
children's education and businesses since children are retirement policies.

What we have done in the US is to substitute "things" for "people" among the
poor and the picture isn't pretty. So often I hear how we don't want the US to
be "a third-world nation" but the fact is we have a lot to learn from less
well off countries about how to live more socially and sustainably.

~~~
curiouscats
Well said, especially:

>>> What we have done in the US is to substitute "things" for "people" among
the poor and the picture isn't pretty. So often I hear how we don't want the
US to be "a third-world nation" but the fact is we have a lot to learn from
less well off countries about how to live more socially and sustainably. <<<

------
7Figures2Commas
> While you’re at it, stuff this economy. Not this GDP, not this unemployment
> level: this economy, this financial system that establishes complete social
> and political control over us, that conditions us to believe that we don’t
> _deserve basic shelter and clothing and food and education and existence-
> sustaining medical care_ unless we throw our lives into vassalage and hope,
> pray, that the lords don’t fuck with our retirements or our coverages.

How is that not entitlement?

~~~
jameskilton
I'm sorry, are you trying to say that _being alive_ is an entitlement, not a
right?

~~~
ctdonath
You have the right to not be deprived of life by others.

That doesn't mean you have a "right" to compel others to facilitate yours to
an arbitrary level of your choice.

~~~
ENOTTY
He didn't demand an arbitrary level of support, he wanted a basic level of
support.

~~~
ctdonath
I assume his "basic level of support" was at least at, if not higher than, the
USA-defined "poverty line" ... which is above 87% of world incomes (PPP
adjusted). He wants others to, under implied or actual threat of gunpoint, be
compelled to provide for what he considers basic needs (and much of the world
considers luxury) with no consideration of impact on _their_ lives. This
because he _chose_ a life of debt and rent, most likely in an area most others
could not afford to live in. Am I wrong?

~~~
ENOTTY
For a start, I would think a basic level of support would include decent
healthcare for his feverish kid that didn't bankrupt the parents.

I don't see why the poverty line or the world median income should determine
whether that level of support should be granted or withheld.

Did his kid choose to get a fever? Did he somehow cause his kid to get a fever
by choosing the life of a journalist or choosing to live in some expensive
American city?

~~~
tomrod
> Did he somehow cause his kid to get a fever by choosing the life of a
> journalist or choosing to live in some expensive American city

No, but he chose to live the life of a journalist in an expensive American
city. In doing so, he chose to sometimes be hit by negative shocks that might
bankrupt him, like a child's fever or a fender-bender or an apartment fire
without rental insurance.

Should the guy be able to choose that path in life? Sure. But I feel we fail
the uprising generation when we say to not worry about rainy days, to be
anything you want to be without the worry about financial stability.

Financial stability, for the record, isn't about employment stability, but in
having enough reserve to weather life's issues. If I go out drinking with my
buddies and spend $60 on a bar tab, that's $60 less of my income that I could
put away for a rainy day. Add that up weekly over a year, and you quickly find
a substantial rainy day fund. He and his friends could certainly find a less
expensive hobby, like poker night, LAN parties, Frisbee golf, or what have
you.

Is it his _fault_ his kid is sick? Absolutely not. Is it his _fault_ he isn't
seeking to structure his life in a way to weather small shocks (like a kid
having a high fever)? At least partially. Let's not deny him the right of his
own responsibility here.

~~~
angersock
That's well and good, but is it _his fault_ that the government, hospitals,
doctors, manufacturers, and insurance providers actively collude to keep costs
high? To keep costs rising? And then to mandate payment for services (read:
insurance) that basically only serve to make a bunch of investors richer? And
actively legislate and regulate to death anybody trying to fix the system or
implement an alternative?

No, no it's not his fault. Healthcare is fucked.

~~~
tomrod
Of course it isn't. But it is partially his fault for not getting some kind of
(cheap!) catastrophic insurance that's available.

------
dnautics
It's even worse: The real wages not keeping up with productivity, I don't
think is only because of mendacious CEOs but because that productivity is
going to pay off benefits and pension plans of the previous generation, so not
only are they telling us to 'suck it up' but they're leeching off of us.

Then there's systematic debt, like sovereign debt, social security, medicare,
which we're 'legally enjoined to pay off somehow'. Well, we could pass the
buck on that one, if the overleveraging of society doesn't cause another
economic realignment that burns our generation in our old age, just as it
burned us as we were seeking jobs.

~~~
WalterBright
> The real wages not keeping up with productivity,

Total employee compensation does (i.e. you have to include taxes, benefits,
etc.). It's easy to see why - if someone produces way more than they cost,
then employers will be lining up to hire them.

It's like as if you could buy widgets for $.10 and sell them for $1.00. You'd
buy as many as possible!

~~~
dnautics
>if someone produces way more than they cost, then employers will be lining up
to hire them

Not someone who buys into efficient markets in labor (or anything really): I
don't think that's true. The cost of additional employment can be burdened by
other things (human resources expenses, compliance) times the risk that the
employee is a dud. These can increase the 'activation barrier' inherent into
adding a hire. And what if you only need one widget? You wouldn't buy as many
as possible at all, because the rest will just be dead weight.

~~~
WalterBright
You're right that what matters is the cost of the employee to the employer,
which wages form only a part. But if the employee productivity far outpaces
that, then they'll be hiring, which will bid up those wages.

> You wouldn't buy as many as possible at all, because the rest will just be
> dead weight.

As I said, "if you could sell them for $1.00", which is not dead weight. Any
merchant badly wants widgets that can be sold for 10x cost. Heck, I'd even
start a reselling business if I could find such a product!

~~~
dnautics
well, sketchiness of the metrics aside, the 75% more productive is an average
value, not a median value (or a mode), so not all labor will yield "1.75x
cost"...

------
mgkimsal
I will never for the life of me understand "unpaid internships" as a career
path. I get that they exist, and they continue to exist because... they
currently exist and "that's how it's done", but... holy cow. "Come slave away
for months on end with no pay, and maybe one day you can continue doing it and
we'll give you a bit of money. Maybe". And people fall for it. And continue to
fall for it.

Perhaps it's a "prisoner's dilemma" problem (too late to find the better
analogy if it's not) but if _everyone_ stopped taking 'unpaid internships'...
those wanting the work done would have to pay.

~~~
crdoconnor
>everyone stopped taking 'unpaid internships'... those wanting the work done
would have to pay.

And if your other option was McBurger flipping after taking a journalism
degree... you'd readily take it?

~~~
mgkimsal
You'd take a job that provides real income, as would everyone else, and the
people wanting journalism work done would offer to pay up... ???

The problem is that there's always someone willing to go work for free, often
with crappy conditions, because they hope that maybe someday someone will
throw them a low wage bone because of all their 'experience' at working for
free.

~~~
tomrod
Depends. If the unpaid internship had a reputation of leading to a well-paying
job, it may certainly be worth pursuing over McBurger. This is called
"consumption smoothing" \-- we do it when we're young and when we're old, and
possibly in between, when we're unable to financially support ourselves.

It's not good to remain a permanent unpaid intern.

------
polemic
> _" Last weekend my baby had a fever, and we contemplated taking him to the
> ER, and my first thought was - had to be - “Oh God, that could wipe out our
> bank account!"_

For the sake of your family, consider moving somewhere in the world that
treats you like a human. It is happening elsewhere too ("this financial system
that establishes complete social and political control over us") but not
nearly to the extent that a gainfully employed individual can't reasonably
expect basic healthcare for his children.

~~~
paul_f
Seriously? Because you have to make $50 co-pay at the hospital, our society
doesn't treat you like a human?

~~~
enraged_camel
>>$50 co-pay

I take it you have never been to the ER. Hope it stays that way!

~~~
throwit1979
Kaiser charges a $100 copay for ER visits. $50 does not sound too outlandish.

The bigger question is why GenY thinks a simple fever is cause for helping to
overcrowd our emergency rooms even further. A thermometer costs $20 and will
help determine if the fever is severe enough to require medical intervention.

~~~
enraged_camel
Four months ago, one of the VPs in my company called in sick to work. In the
email he sent to his team, he said he had food poisoning and needed to let it
run out of his system. The next day he sent another email saying he's still
struggling with it and not feeling well, but had started taking some
antibiotics.

He died on the third day.

Because you see, what he thought was a simple food poisoning was actually a
rare form of staph infection that reached his heart and destroyed it. By the
time his family realized he should be taken to the ER, it was too late.

You may want to think about that the next time you have a "simple fever."
Because the fact of the matter is that people are not doctors and should not
try to self-diagnose themselves when they feel sick. They should go to the
doctor, or if the symptoms are non-trivial, the ER.

------
moron4hire
Whoa, people are considering as early back as '77 "gen-y"? Since when? I was
'82 and people have always told me I was "too old to understand gen-y, the
gen-x-er that you are."

My wife was '78, and I _know_ she doesn't consider herself gen-y.

But I do commiserate. Actually, I think we have it a site worse. At least our
youngers should have had the chance to see the college-degree-bubble-writing-
on-the-wall. We were the first to get fed into the meat grinder.

~~~
karlkatzke
I was born '80 and consider myself to be in the nebulous area. My sister is
'83 and is firmly 'Y'.

I saw the college bubble popping. It's why I went to night school and
graduated debt free from a state in-state urban public university with a
solid, practical program and a degree in business. It was a tough few years,
but it also set the expectation that life would suck for a few years and then
would get better, and I would find a way to do what I wanted after I met the
goal.

Too many people, the author of the linked rant (I won't dignify it by calling
it an article) seem to have been sold a promise of a fulfilling fun college
experience and fulfilling fun career if only they mortgaged themselves.
Mortgaging yourself _never_ is a good idea. That is a horrible approach. I
hope that the generation now in high school learns from their errors.

------
ilaksh
Its not just journalism of course. I am a programmer (born in 1977) and have
found myself for many years without full time employment or benefits. Now
that's a misnomer because I certainly worked full time but I just wasn't given
regular employee status at those jobs. I have also had jobs where I had to
work at an outsourcing rate. Because if the lack of health insurance I have
been unsuccessfully dealing with health problems for many years which has also
made it more difficult to secure regular employment rather than contract work.
Now I also do not have a degree so I'm sure some people will chalk up all of
my difficulties to that. But I believe that we are actually in tough times for
workers of all sorts and have been for some time.

------
wavefunction
All I'm going to say is that the Forbes 400 (America) saw their total wealth
grow 300 billion(!) in one year between 2012 and now. That was 17.6% in a
single year.

------
aristus
Oh, calm down. People said the same crap about "Gen X".

~~~
gchpaco
And if you notice, they're _still doing it_. And it was still _just as wrong_.

~~~
D9u
The burden is heaviest for those who bear it...

Existential angst...

I try not to adhere to any chronological ranking scheme, but rather rate
individuals based on demonstrated ability.

------
presidentender
Pretend the graph doesn't exist. Pretend the statistics don't exist. Pretend
you have no way of knowing that "the 1%" are reaping the lion's share of the
recovery, that they all live off in an Elysium we'll never know about.

Compare yourself to your parents, given that. You have the internet. If it's
killed work for "the creatives," it's given the rest of us free access to
their works. You have a cell phone, where your dad might've broken down on a
highway north of Phoenix and prayed for a pay phone. If your kid runs a fever
and the treatment wipes out your meager savings, at least he'll live, where
his uncle might've died under the same circumstances.

I'm blessed with a good job. Maybe my luck clouds my vision, and there's a
huge structural problem I refuse to recognize. Maybe it'd be different if I
had a wife and kids, but I can't help but think that's... optional, especially
for those of us in our 20s.

So maybe I just don't understand the plight of the author or those like him,
but I can't help thinking that the primary drive behind the complaints is
jealousy. The HuffPo article tries to say it nicely, and explain it with
unfairly inflated expectations, but it still comes down to the same thing.
Young people are jealous because other people have status, and it's just not
fair.

~~~
jokermatt999
Cell phones and the internet are nice, but I've bills and debt and crap job
that I can't support myself on. I've got a mother in law dying of cancer, and
once that's over with, the debt from the meager medical care she's received
will burden her family for years. I've got a fiancee that can't find work in
her field so she's stuck in a crappy job as well. The circuses are nice, but
I'd rather just have some damn bread.

It's not "jealousy" when I'm asking to be able to support myself. Is it unfair
to expect not to start out in life heavily burdened by student loans, unable
to get a job that provides any sort of benefits, or to be able to pay bills?
I'm not asking for the shiniest and newest, I'm asking for a basic living.
It's not status; it's not being stuck living at home.

------
wavesounds
This! Why do we let these rich robber barrens get away with having the lowest
tax rates since the 1950s when the middle class is clearly falling off a
cliff? This is ridiculous people! Lets raise taxes on these guys back to what
it used to be under Clinton when we were doing fine, it won't hurt them one
ioata, then we can fix all the problems with schools, hospitals, social
security and build infrastructure to get some money back into the economy so
people have some disposable income so they can buy things and get a healthy
economic system moving again. This isn't that complicated, we can just be
apathetic and go back to being peasants ruled by a few elite or we can demand
they pay their fair share!

------
ctdonath
_You have no idea about student debt, underemployment, life-long renting.
“Stop feeling special” is some shitty advice. I don’t feel special or
entitled, just poor._

Uh...yeah, we do have an idea. We've just lived long enough to take a look
around, discovered there are alternatives, decided to stop making stupid
decisions, realized that life isn't fair, learned that shouting "fuck you" at
others results in a pretty poor life, and decided to _make it better_.

[http://xkcd.com/23/](http://xkcd.com/23/)

~~~
mratzloff
Your post has basically zero content. Care to be more specific?

~~~
ctdonath
Considering it was upvoted, others did see worthy content therein. But to
spell it out...

 _Yeah, we do have an idea._ We have either experienced or studied such
problems, including many which are much worse. We've variously experienced
crushing debt, empty bank accounts, war, death, injury, illness, loss, etc. If
the peak of your whining is school debt and rent payments, and you don't
notice the comfortable indoor HVAC + balanced nutrition + comfortable
convenient transportation + easy instant access to the bulk of human knowledge
+ clean water, you've got it pretty darned good over most.

 _We 've just lived long enough to take a look around._ We've lived longer
than you, some of us by several times over. We've seen more than you have, and
discovered the range of options is much bigger than you think it is. We
chuckle when we start telling you what those options include, and you cut us
off to cling to the limited range you don't want to let go of - but insist we
fix everything for you.

 _discovered there are alternatives._ YES you can live on $1/meal, with fine
nutrition and taste, if you're willing to research and get dirty. YES you can
own your home outright, if you'll not demand expensive location & structure,
do some serious research, be willing to move, and do some work yourself. YES
you can get a good education with little debt, no debt, moderate cost, and (if
sufficiently flexible & hard working) they might even _pay you_ to attend. We
also have noticed that taking the "sign here" easy path is _very_ expensive.
NO you don't have to put a gun to someone's head (be it by implication thru
proxy) and make them pay for you.

 _decided to stop making stupid decisions._ "Life is tough. It's tougher when
you're stupid." \- John Wayne

 _realized that life isn 't fair._ It's not fair. In no way is it fair that
over 87% of people on the planet are doing worse than you. It's also not fair
for you to, after making the choices you did and in the health you enjoy, to
demand the other 13% improve your lot in life while giving nothing in return.

 _learned that shouting "fuck you" at others results in a pretty poor life._
The link I provided sums it up pretty well. BTW, should be obvious I was
referencing the first two words of the thread & article's title. If that's
your attitude toward prior generations, don't be surprised if they become
disinclined to help you more than they already are (which they _are_ and
obviously are unappreciated for). ETA: I see the first two words of the
thread's title were removed subsequent to my prior post; I wish the original
title, being that of the linked article, was retained in full as it set the
tone as the author clearly intended.

 _and decided to make it better._ In the rather immortal words of a notable HN
thread, and in the language which the author seems to understand: fucking
figure it out. Solutions to the problem are not impossible, quite achievable
actually, and everyone else you're demanding support from have their own
equivalent problems that they're figuring out. Yes that debt sucks; you signed
up for it, you CAN pay it off, yeah it might hurt but that was your choice,
everyone else you want to pay your bill have their own voluntary debts they're
working on paying off and they're not making you pay. Yes that rent sucks;
move somewhere land is cheap and building materials affordable and start
swinging a hammer. Yes the kid's illness threatens the bank balance; take that
as a red alert warning klaxon telling you to _start saving money now_ because
unexpected expenses DO happen, and just because you didn't prepare with
adequate savings or insurance doesn't mean you get dibs on the funds of those
who did prepare.

Enough people have said the above, and a whole lot more, on HN. I assumed
you've read it, and grokked the reference thereto in my post above. Accused of
"zero content", there's some elaboration short of handing you a copy of
_Foxfire_ and a link to Google ... aw, heck, here ya go:
[http://www.foxfire.org/thefoxfirebookseries.aspx](http://www.foxfire.org/thefoxfirebookseries.aspx)
[http://www.google.com](http://www.google.com) ... there, now you've got
everything you need to solve those problems yourself.

------
bedhead
Could it possibly just be that he's poor because:

1) he's not a good enough writer to earn more. 2) he's chosen jobs that have
little hope of a lucrative payoff. 3) his personality is such that he gets
fired from everyplace he works.

Or is any of that too far-fetched?

~~~
vacri
Journalism is dying. It's entirely unrelated to being Gen-Y.

It's a pretty bad logical error on his part.

~~~
tomrod
It's hard for people engaged in a career path to recognize the end that's
coming.

Much journalism is literally farmed out to content mills and pays fractions of
a penny per word. This implies a labor supply glut. I wonder sometimes if we
see this in web dev too?

------
NovemberWest
I am not gen Y. I also don't feel special or entitled, just poor.

~~~
vacri
Admittedly, few entitled people are going to say they /feel/ entitled.

~~~
NovemberWest
I am currently homeless. So, like, fuck you.

~~~
zaphar
I was homeless with 5 kids and a wife roughly 6-7 years ago. So I know how
much that sucks. I hope your situation improves soon.

~~~
NovemberWest
On the one hand, it would take a miracle or three. On the other, things have
been very, very slowly improving. I cannot tell if things are about to crash
and burn or finally start coming together.

I am sorry you suffered. Thank you for the well wishes.

------
Aloha
I'm 30.

I have a good job, for a telecom carrier, I make more money than I thought a
could, enough to live in one bedroom apartment and save a little for a rainy
day. That said, I have no stability (I'm a contractor who's project could
vanish at any point in time), no retirement (my retirement plan right now is
death), no insurance I can afford (would cost over 10% of my take home to get
it).

I long for stability, permanence and benefits.

I know right now it sucks - but I know in a couple years the boomers will be
exiting the workforce in droves, and there will be room for me in the
permanent roles. I just have to bide my time, be patient, and wait, and it
will all work out. I hope.

------
kevin_rubyhouse
Seriously? It's like the author, Adam, and I read a completely different
Huffington blog posts. And why the hell does he need to drop the f-bomb so
much to grab attention? I'm at the very end of Gen Y, born 1993 and 19 years
old right now.

Adam says 'So take your “revise your expectations! check your ego!” Horatio
Alger bullshit, and stuff it.' Are you kidding me? The Huffington blog post
said the opposite! It said that Gen Yers should _stay_ ambitious, _but_ be
more humble. We need to keep being ambitious, but expect that we need to work
very hard to fulfill those ambitions.

Furthermore, Adam is ranting that he chose something he really wants to do
_and_ is poor, because his job doesn't pay enough. It sounds like he is very
capable and could get a better job if he wanted to. He is expecting that the
job he likes to do will make enough money to support his family and lifestyle
(whatever it may be.) That sounds a lot like what the Huffington Post was
saying too ("career path expectation.")

I think the Huffington blog post is fantastic, and many of my friends could
benefit from its advice. At first though, it does seem to bucket and portray
Gen Yers unfairly, but the post's conclusions make up for it.

------
zcarter
Seems a fitting time to remind those put off by this sort of complaining that
it is not sufficient to merely convince like-minded bystanders to blame the
victims. Victims must blame themselves for true peace and quiet.

I say carry on with the social hectoring of those who seek a better state of
affairs and don't (yet) feel personally responsible for the outcome of their
(increasingly loaded) societal dice roll.

------
dreamdu5t
Sounds entitled to me. He feels that his degree entitles him to wealth and
financial security. It does not.

He acts surprised that other people aren't providing for HIS child. Again with
the entitlement, as if he and his kid are somehow owed something from someone
purely by virtue of their existence.

------
contingencies
What he says is true. A 26 year old economics major approached me yesterday
here in Asia and revealed that in lieu of any obvious job he was making a play
in to journalism and researching resident foreign sentiments of the local
environs. I sort of shrank in horror that he would see journalism as a viable
career path, but stranger things have happened.

The one potential escape our subculture has is remote work and the option of
living in lower cost parts of the world. I'm here, and it's nice. If anyone
wants such a job - permanent gig, frontend dev - I've got one going _right
now_.

------
TheZenPsycho
Take away any semblance of job security, benefits and any possibility of
advancement, then stand back and act surprised that Gen Y isn't totally loyal.
Huh.

------
smoyer
Maybe words are less expensive these days because so many of them are being
published ... When I was young, we could either read the newspaper, magazines
or books. Each newspaper had exponentially more eyeballs looking at them
because they were (in my town) a monopoly. I think what he's describing as a
writer is simply a case of supply and demand. We're all writers now (notice I
didn't say good writers).

------
mratzloff
What an utter shock that those so minimal affected by the economic changes
taking place over the last 30 years (tech community) are among the most
skeptical that those changes are harmful to the vast majority.

Someone mentioned US economic prosperity. Any definition of "economic
prosperity" must include prosperity for the majority.

------
collypops
"I’m doing what I love, and it makes me completely miserable".

I've got a suspicion that he's not actually doing what he loves, only what he
loved once, or hoped he'd learn to love.

------
EarthLaunch
This person believes he represents his generation, and he is advocating for
things that reduce economic prosperity. He should not be surprised about the
results he's seeing.

~~~
crdoconnor
The same religious economic dogma we've had pushed on us for decades predicts
that the things he's advocating reduce economic prosperity. They don't.

~~~
EarthLaunch
> religious economic dogma

Whatever this means that you feel persecuted by, the science of economics is
clear enough about what promotes economic prosperity. History corroborates.

You should be making a moral argument, though that would also be wrong.

~~~
Volpe
Which science, and history are you referring to?

Australia and Canada have pretty good prosperity and have a number of things
he is advocating for (in the US).

US economy... while it's HUGE, would you call it prosperous?

------
stephengillie
Isn't it nice to have the _luxury_ of living when we have the _choice_ of
whether or not to take an infant with a fever to the hospital? Our
parents/grandparents didn't have that luxury, they had to ride the fever out
and hope their family member lived. Options like that are _why_ our society is
so expensive to live in today.

~~~
mratzloff
How old _are_ you? My grandparents (nevermind my parents) could rely on
hospitals, and they lived in rural Kansas on lower middle class incomes.

My Depression-era great grandparents had to make that choice (and worse), but
implying we should be so lucky that we as a society are regressing 80 years is
not such a good thing.

~~~
stephengillie
I'm 32, but my grandparents were depression-era. My parents are baby boomers.
Longer generational strides?

------
thenerdfiles
State Change for a biological species involves drastic shifts in population
density, for like no reason.

We're supposed to be teching fast enough from our barracks, but we're not.
Move.

------
jimmcslim
First World Problems?

~~~
netpenthe
he has a baby who had a fever that he couldn't afford to take to see a doctor.

that's not a first world problem.

~~~
c1sc0
That's a revolution-worthy problem. Add some hunger to that & you're getting
close.

