Generation whY: Don’t wait out. Act.
Sociology called it Generation Y, the New York Times called it Generation Limbo and as much as I dislike Oliver Stone, his latest movie, the sequel to Wall Street, said it right on: the NINJA generation. No Income, No Jobs, No Assets.
We are the generation of post-corporate greed, financial market miscalculations, economic bubbles and failed intelligence that led to expensive for-profit wars. We are the generation facing the new war for global energy dominance, the once that grew up with the standard of living of yesterday, but will have to put up with the one of tomorrow. We go under the slogans of dot-com bubble, uranium bubble, US housing market bubble etc. We are living in bubbleland and those bubbles pop one after another. Morality, relationships, ambition, dignity and sooner or later humanity bubble will also blow-up in a massive proportions. Let it blow.
So while English literature graduates from Harvard are playing guitar in an underground punk rock bands, “waiting the economy out” and hoping that the juicy and over-paid jobs of yesterday will be available tomorrow, I am laying down a different strategy. And if you are a member of the generation whY, I suggest you do too.
Fancy-titled jobs with attractive pay and sweet yearly bonuses come and go. Don’t go over your head, thinking that today’s most profitable industries will be here to stay, managing the same level of highly paid positions and corporate goodies. No. Get sober and think logically. Oversee the today’s economy, learn what the indexes of Dow Jones and NASDAQ mean, read yourself some history of the world markets and economies, ditch the corrupted mainstream media and feed yourself with facts that will tell you what the future most likely will hold. And if you don’t see yourself and your college degree in this future, take a step now, while you still can.
Nobody here is talking about getting shamefully rich, but if you don’t want to be the No Income, No Jobs, No Assets generation member, change your priorities. If you want one day to own a home, assets, have an income that will allow you to have a normal standard of living, don’t wait it out, but act now. Act yesterday.
I have an AP/Foundation degree in Multimedia Design and Communications with a follow-up top-up BA in Mass Communications. I don’t see myself entirely devoted to this industry, especially after I worked in both print media and the advertising industries. But I am getting the best of it – as much as I can and my skills allow me to. Education is never a waste. But instead of banging my head against the wall about a bad decision making back then, I chose to re-orient my career goals in an industry that will be here to stay. Forever and ever. You might have heard this from your parents and their secret wishes that you will chose to be a doctor, lawyer, engineer, architect or etc. others well-established career paths, that are always in demand. Maybe it is not a bad idea to listen to your parents every once in a while. The folks have been in the game long before we showed up, so maybe we don’t know the whole story.
So, my advice – analyze the future labor market demands and the most profitable jobs of the future, considering the current and soon-to-be-worse economic situation. Choose one. And start fresh. In the meantime, you can do what I do. Cut down on your advertising driven consumption, expensive and/or nasty habits. For several months I dropped alcohol, went vegetarian (on the edge of becoming vegan, since I haven’t ate an animal product, e.g. eggs, cheese in weeks), started using my car only for long distance travels, dropped public transportation and started using my feet most of the time, started being conscious about my consumption and spending on monthly basis and simply learned how not to spent the money I though I have to spent before. I re-oriented my career goals into health care and I am soon starting an accredited long-distance education, which will free me out of a lot of the expenses I would rather have if I go on-campus student. And if we have to be honest, education does not always go hand-in-hand with on-campus teaching. If you are not willing to educate yourself, you won’t even if you get enrolled in Harvard. And as far as qualification demands go, after receiving a decent amount of job interviews training, I have come to conclude that your diploma isn’t worth the paper it was printed on, if you don’t have the actual skills to back it up.
So, stop asking whY and start thinking how, is what I mean to say to all those jobless 20-somethings, holding to their precious college degree’s and whining about the lack of job opportunities in their chosen field. The economical structure in which we were brought up is failing. Adapt.
