Wildguzzi.com
General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: Sheepdog on January 07, 2018, 10:56:47 AM
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A quick, but insightful read...
https://www.motorcyclistonline.com/im-millennial-and-i-ride-motorcycles?CMPID=010718&spMailingID=32491123&spUserID=NzM4NjM3NjU5NTYS1&spJobID=1200671413&spReportId=MTIwMDY3MTQxMwS2
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Insightful, yes, but sort of characterizes everyone who was born in a certain time period as the same way - helpless without their social media, dependent on their parents, believing that things "aren't as good as" they used to be (a fallacy they share with many of their elders), wallowing in student debt incurred for a useless "Gender Studies" degree, can't show up for work on time, all the "millennial" cliches.
I know a LOT of young folks that are nothing like this. I know many of them because they ride motorcycles. At a typical summertime Guzzi lunch, we might have almost half the crew be 20s-30s - Alec, Nate, Chris, Matthew, and Ben to name a few - all regular guys with jobs and riding motorcycles a long way.
The pajama boys are beyond our hope and ken. There's plenty of real men born in the 80s and 90s out there, never fear ... !
Lannis
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Insightful, yes, but sort of characterizes everyone who was born in a certain time period as the same way - helpless without their social media, dependent on their parents, believing that things "aren't as good as" they used to be (a fallacy they share with many of their elders), wallowing in student debt incurred for a useless "Gender Studies" degree, can't show up for work on time, all the "millennial" cliches.
I know a LOT of young folks that are nothing like this. I know many of them because they ride motorcycles. At a typical summertime Guzzi lunch, we might have almost half the crew be 20s-30s - Alec, Nate, Chris, Matthew, and Ben to name a few - all regular guys with jobs and riding motorcycles a long way.
The pajama boys are beyond our hope and ken. There's plenty of real men born in the 80s and 90s out there, never fear ... !
Lannis
:1: awesome ditto and more
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that's a good piece and thanks for posting the link. This comes up a lot in moto-circles as the aging of the current buyer base and the low opt-in among younger groups is causing significant nashing of teeth among dealers, manufactures, & retailers. The theme he brings up (lower wages, higher debt, less upward mobility) are real and I see it all the time among some of the 20-somethings I work with. I do think the industry sort of shot themselves in the foot too by obsessively chasing the boomer group to the exclusion of other segments. Until fairly recently finding a 500cc or less bike in the States anyway that was aspirational was pretty tough & odds are, most of us started on I expensive little 250-500cc bikes. I have noticed of the bikes I've owned it's not the mega-bikes that the 20-somethings tend to fawn over, it's the smaller retro roadsters like the V7 or Bonnie's. While larger social trends are surely at play, marketing 101 is hard to ignore: you need to make stuff that people want because unless you do that, no amount of viral video's or unveilings a trendy brew pubs is going to sell it.
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That's a good article. I enjoyed reading it, but it is distressing. The economy is indeed rotten for many young people. When I was their age, one could easily find full-time work. Not so anymore. "It's no wonder we aren't buying new motorcycles; we can barely afford to pay our share of the monthly rent."
I have four boys in their mid-20s to early-30s. The only one doing okay is son #2, and that is because he went to Afghanistan and risked his life in 300 firefights so he could go to HVAC school on the GI Bill and get a job as a tradesman. The other three are struggling to pay rent because all they can find is part-time, minimum wage work--even son #1 with a degree from Seattle Pacific University. Son #3 is about to be evicted because he is behind on his rent...
The three younger boys all rode motorcycles for a time, but financial difficulties have resulted in the loss of their bikes. I do not expect any of them to do better economically than I have (except possibly son #4, but only if he goes to law school).
I suppose I could bail them out, but struggling is essential to growing stronger and continuing to search for better work, even if it means joining the army and going to war... In the meantime, no more motorcycles.
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The motorcycle life style and mode of transportation may be changing in the U.S., but world wide, more motorcycles are sold in other market Nations every 11 days than are sold in the U.S.
There are a lot of people in the U.S. Not everyone has to be mechanically inclined. Skilled labor is a generic term. Demand will drive fulfillment of needs.
Electric motors are the future. Change is good. I think Humans will survive for a very long time.
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Another aspect to a 20 something buying a new bike is insurance. The same bike that costs me, as a more mature rider, $546 a year would cost my 26 year old son $2435 a year. Yes I carry him on my policy and he pays me back. Also do the same for his car.
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I know a few younger riders like this. Not much money but enough time on their hands to wrench on an old 70s era bike- usually anything BUT a Harley, instead it's Japanese bikes, Beemers and Guzzis. I think many see more "cred" with a cut down old bike than a showroom one.
Power to them.
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You are so right Lannis. My boy is one of the ones that became a real man, a God fearing man and a hard working man. I’m a proud Father.
(http://thumb.ibb.co/i4orWb/313_B945_B_5_A44_43_E7_B4_CC_9_B773713820_C.jpg) (http://ibb.co/i4orWb)
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I have three sons, 31, 28 and 25. 31 is an electrician married to a teacher. Has two older motorcycles and has ridden for ten years. Now has two old cars and a house that needs a boiler and a roof. No new bikes in his future. 28 is doing well as head of engineering for a small aeronautics firm. He's into cars and building a kit which he has no time for seeing he works 6-7 days a week. 25 picked up an old SV650 three years ago that was ridden hard but does him well. He is a school teacher with a significant other who is a hygienist. They are living with her mom saving for a house. No new bike in his future.
I think things are tougher for younger people than it was for us. Things keep getting tougher for all of us. I also think that one has to have priorities and I know that I would have to totally down and out to not have a bike of some sort. That being said there is a time for everything and some young people may not have the money where others just don't have the time.
How many bikes are out there for sale that are six or eight years old with 3000 miles on them. Those bikes are in the non millennium calculations. Just because some older people buy them doesn't mean they ride them.
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Not many millennials wii run with scissors either.
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I think part of the problem in respect to jobs is the older guys working in their 70's. I work in a department with about 50 guys. 4 of them are well into their 70's with no intention to quit any time soon. They all could live comfortable without working. One of the guys made the statement that he was making more money than any other time in his life. He is making about 60K at work, another 10K for retirement and another 30K SSN. I understand it would be hard to walk away from 60K, but ... I think his problem is he doesn't know what else to do. He worked 2 jobs most his life and is now down to 40 hours (random OT, 20 hours a year). His 2 adult kids very seldom talk to him. I've known him for 35 years and cannot recall him taking a vacation other than a family reunion weekend back in the 80"s.
Myself? Barring a financial catastrophe, I plan to work another year or so. I'll be eligible for full retirement benefits. I'll walk away and not look back. I won't be able to make impulse purchases like now but I think I'll be OK.
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Not many millennials will run with scissors either.
That's funny and I think rather true for many of them. Unfortunately, who made them that way?
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I think things are tougher for younger people than it was for us.
I sort of disagree. I think a combination of (1) The expectation of the work they need to do and (2) What they expect to own as a result - is much different than it was for us, and that makes it seem harder. Me, anyway.
Both my boys have got more stuff and are farther along in their careers (money, house, cars)-wise than I was at their ages ... And they didn't cost me much. One joined the Marines at 17 and the GI Bill took care of his M.E. degree when he got out, interned with an engineering company, 5 years there then a move up to another - the other went to a state university and worked summers, interned his final summer and took a job with the company he interned with, 7 years and doing well. I see an awful lot of success stories out there ....
Lannis
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Insightful, yes, but sort of characterizes everyone who was born in a certain time period as the same way - helpless without their social media, dependent on their parents, believing that things "aren't as good as" they used to be (a fallacy they share with many of their elders), wallowing in student debt incurred for a useless "Gender Studies" degree, can't show up for work on time, all the "millennial" cliches.
I know a LOT of young folks that are nothing like this. I know many of them because they ride motorcycles. At a typical summertime Guzzi lunch, we might have almost half the crew be 20s-30s - Alec, Nate, Chris, Matthew, and Ben to name a few - all regular guys with jobs and riding motorcycles a long way.
The pajama boys are beyond our hope and ken. There's plenty of real men born in the 80s and 90s out there, never fear ... !
Lannis
This afternoon oldbike54 called me and asked me what I was doing. At the time I was finishing up a clutch swap/oil change on my 1973 Honda Cb750 that was parked in my living room. Dusty wanted me to check out this thread and see what I thought and possibly put down a post. So far I've started writing twice and have deleted both posts. Third times a charm, right?
At 36 years I'm a little on the old side of being a millennial but I've always been somewhat of a throwback. When shopping for my first car in the mid 90's I made a life decision that I have stuck with. With a budget of $1500 I knew I wasn't going to get a kool late model car. It just wasn't happening. So, for months I checked local classifieds (pre Craigslist ya know) for something from the 60's. At the time muscle car prices were down and really nice grandma fresh sedans were dirt cheap. My $1500 bought me a 67,000 original mile 1966 Ford Falcon sedan. Was it a hotrod? No. Was it fast? No. Was it unique and a lot of fun to drive? Absolutely. Was it easy to work on and cheap to fix? Yes again.
I tell this story because it is a direct refection of the niche of motorcycles I've found myself in. Over a decade after buying my first car I decided to get my first motorcycle. At the time I was teaching and coaching full time with a stay at home wife and three kids. Not much room in the budget for a new HD Road King but I could pick up a complete Japanese bike for just a couple bills and have a pretty reliable scoot after some weekend wrenching. It's all about priorities. If you want to ride, you will find a bike.
Fast forward almost another decade. Most of my gearhead friends have branched out into motorcycles too. My buddies that I ride with range from 18 years old up into their 70's, but almost all of my friends that are millennials, have chosen to build Japanese bikes. Bikes are cheap, parts are cheap, and you can build something really nice for less than a down payment on a used Prius.
I found the article to be pretty indicative of someone who lives on the coast or perhaps a larger metropolitan area. The cost of living is simply higher and making ends meat seems harder. My buddies, that live in the midwest, are in their 20's and 30's all have decent jobs, I'm an elementary principal, others are cabinet makers, teachers, work the rail road, farm, etc. We all have houses, most have families, but we all are not afraid to get our hands dirty to accomplish goals. I can't think of any of us that are rolling in dough but like I said before, if you want to ride, you will find a bike and prioritize.
(http://thumb.ibb.co/cB5PZw/IMG_4537.jpg) (http://ibb.co/cB5PZw)
(http://thumb.ibb.co/bCStSG/Full_Size_Render.jpg) (http://ibb.co/bCStSG)
(http://thumb.ibb.co/nBTYSG/IMG_2898.jpg) (http://ibb.co/nBTYSG)
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At 36 years I'm a little on the old side of being a millennial but I've always been somewhat of a throwback. When shopping for my first car in the mid 90's I made a life decision that I have stuck with. With a budget of $1500 I knew I wasn't going to get a kool late model car.
Buying what you can afford, with whatever money you can get your hands on. No touching Dad for a big payment. BING! That's one.
I tell this story because it is a direct refection of the niche of motorcycles I've found myself in. Over a decade after buying my first car I decided to get my first motorcycle. At the time I was teaching and coaching full time with a stay at home wife and three kids. Not much room in the budget for a new HD Road King but I could pick up a complete Japanese bike for just a couple bills and have a pretty reliable scoot after some weekend wrenching. It's all about priorities. If you want to ride, you will find a bike.
Not only staying in the budget, but prioritizing bikes and handling it yourself. BING BING!
I found the article to be pretty indicative of someone who lives on the coast or perhaps a larger metropolitan area. The cost of living is simply higher and making ends meat seems harder. My buddies, that live in the midwest, are in their 20's and 30's all have decent jobs, I'm an elementary principal, others are cabinet makers, teachers, work the rail road, farm, etc. We all have houses, most have families, but we all are not afraid to get our hands dirty to accomplish goals.....
Live where the work is and where you can afford to live, and get your hands dirty when you need to .... BING BING BING!
The prize is yours, and your friends'. I saw no mention in there about "times are just too hard, it was so much better when YOU were young" "I can't find a decent job even with my B.A. degree" "It was EASY to get motorcycles when you old guys were coming along".
There's hope for this country yet! Thanks for an inspiring tale ...
Lannis
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As stated in a different thread , I have great friends , Thanks Bob :bow:
Dusty
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I know many hard working millennial's who are doing good. Cut the pitty party and tell the others to make something happen. Look at people of age in every decade.... there will always be "the doers" and "the complainers". As we sit back and say "things are not like the good old days"..... Someone younger who did not live then is succeeding thinking how easy it is!!!
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I don't want to sound like a "broken record" (you can look it up) but goodness, how can one say there are no good jobs?
Machine shops seem to have permanent "help wanted" signs out, every store/restaurant/auto repair shop is begging for people to come work,and after watching last night's Spacex launch I found so many freaking jobs just on THEIR website-many of which only require a GED. Heck I found several I could do.
Unemployment is VERY low. What in the world are people waiting for if they can't find a job?
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I think every generation has a bell curve of workers. Vast majority will do okay, a few will do real well, a very small few great. Also the other end of those that will do little or nothing.
I did a lot of career planning with HS students when I was working. Some were very frustrating to try to work with and others pretty well had it figured out and planned out. Even had one male student, probably with an IQ in the 80s but he was working at a dairy at 4 am on school days and still making it to school on time. I don't worry much about him doing okay even if not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
GliderJohn
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I think every generation has a bell curve of workers. Vast majority will do okay, a few will do real well, a very small few great. Also the other end of those that will do little or nothing.
I did a lot of career planning with HS students when I was working. Some were very frustrating to try to work with and others pretty well had it figured out and planned out. Even had one male student, probably with an IQ in the 80s but he was working at a dairy at 4 am on school days and still making it to school on time. I don't worry much about him doing okay even if not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
GliderJohn
A boy that went to school with my sons was always catching a hard time because when it came to "Career Days" and the high-school show-and-tell about "What I Want To Do", he always said "I want to be the janitor at the school". People would laugh, of course, and he didn't have the gift of repartee (I have no idea of his IQ but he didn't talk much), but it didn't seem to bother him.
So when he got out of high school, he went straight to work as a janitor at the schools. When he was old enough for his CDL, he also started driving school buses. After about 4 years they made him the janitor supervisor for the school system.
With the contacts he made as a janitor, he started a one-truck business contracting to pick up people's home trash twice a month for $25 a month per house. Started with a flat bed stake truck, then bought a used municipal compactor truck, then another ... then started getting customers in surrounding counties.
He's 32 years old now, still lives at home, not married, loves his work, and at the moment probably has more money than he'll have any way to spend in his whole life.
Just a quiet country boy, no money in the family (well, till now), and doesn't care about status or cool ... just likes being able to make it on his own. We need more like him ....
Lannis
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He's 32 years old now, still lives at home, not married, loves his work, and at the moment probably has more money than he'll have any way to spend in his whole life.
Just a quiet country boy, no money in the family (well, till now), and doesn't care about status or cool ... just likes being able to make it on his own. We need more like him ....
Lannis
A 32 year old living at home with his parents may not exactly be making it on his own...In my opinion...
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The problem with generalizations is that they are general, duh. There are recognizable trends, there are mis-perceptions, and of course there are those who go against the grain. And to make matters worse the grass is always greener. I'm getting a little sick of the "we did this, they do that" BS. YEAH, there are differences, yeah time marches on, but "All of this has happened before, all of this will happen again" as much as we like to think we're special, humans are pretty predictable in the long run.
So yeah, the industry is going through a rough patch and times will change. The pendulum will swing, at least as long as internal combustion engines are a choice, and we'll see where it goes.
Some kids will grow up and be ambitious and make it, others won't. Yes, as a generation many Millenials have crushing student loans, that's a long term problem which probably needs to be addressed. But there are many more pieces to the puzzle.
Life goes on.
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The problem with generalizations is that they are general, duh. There are recognizable trends, there are mis-perceptions, and of course there are those who go against the grain. And to make matters worse the grass is always greener. I'm getting a little sick of the "we did this, they do that" BS. YEAH, there are differences, yeah time marches on, but "All of this has happened before, all of this will happen again" as much as we like to think we're special, humans are pretty predictable in the long run.
So yeah, the industry is going through a rough patch and times will change. The pendulum will swing, at least as long as internal combustion engines are a choice, and we'll see where it goes.
Some kids will grow up and be ambitious and make it, others won't. Yes, as a generation many Millenials have crushing student loans, that's a long term problem which probably needs to be addressed. But there are many more pieces to the puzzle.
Life goes on.
All a motorcycle dealer needs to do is start taking Bitcoin and sales will jump 2000%.
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Some kids will grow up and be ambitious and make it, others won't.
This.
The guy who wrote the article picked apples to get by until something better came along, while some went to Wharton, graduated with no debt, received their trust fund and got a star on their forehead for being successful.
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Unemployment is VERY low. What in the world are people waiting for if they can't find a job?
We have a homeless shelter here in town for people who live in this county. It can handle 20 guys, 16 gals on two-high bunk beds in dormitory type rooms. I volunteered there for the last year, twice/month, breakfast shift, 6:00 to 10:00 AM. Got to talk with the "clients" that way.
The majority are in their 20's and 30's and are currently homeless because of "poor life choices" -- got in with the wrong crowd, education is not for me so dropped out of school, couldn't live by my parent's rules so they threw me out, experimented with funny smelling cigarettes and those lead to harder drugs, got on the wrong side of the police, etc, etc.
One common trait among most of them is that they feel "entitled". They're homeless and someone should be taking care of them, and the care should be "good". For example; it would be nice if this shelter had free Wi-Fi so I don't have to go to McDonalds or the Library to get connected -- we had this same breakfast food yesterday, don't we have something different for today -- do we have flavored coffee creamer, I don't like the taste of the non-flavored kind -- it goes on and on.
Our city is currently blessed with an extremely low unemployment rate -- <3%. Signs are up all over the place. All a person has to do is be qualified/capable of doing the job, be dependable and, in some cases, pass a drug test (a tough hurdle for some). Unfortunately, the simple facts are they don't want to work, it's easier to have someone take care of them.
Too bad.
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Concerning student debt, yes, this generation has had to use it the most. Student debt would have probably been a problem for the post WWII generation if it had not been for so many having the GI bill. But I also see too many students who are not realistic about school choices or career goals (little return income for money invested careers).
If a student is willing to use a community colleges and state colleges, live simply, work and basically take it all a bit seriously one can make it through with minimal if any debt. If you go into education or the medical field and are willing to work in need areas you can have all or part of your student debt paid off.
Many are not aware of training programs through unions either. For example locally the electrical union will take on a fresh out of high school student that shows potential and have them placed with local companies at $15.40 and hour (2014) and full benefit package their first year. Pay raises from their. The program takes four years which the student works FT and puts in about 900 hours of self study and about 30 classroom days over the four year period. Buy the end of four (age 22 for most) years the person is a journeyman rated electrician making around 90K with overtime. NO SCHOOLING COStS PERIOD!
GliderJohn
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A 32 year old living at home with his parents may not exactly be making it on his own...In my opinion...
Jay could buy several houses if he wanted to ... but since he works an awful lot, it doesn't make any sense for him to "have his own place"; what would be the point? He and his parents get along well, they like having him there, he helps them around the place ... it's not like he's laying around playing video games and taking an occasional class at the community college.
Heckfire, if a single son of mine owned his own business and was doing well, or wanted to farm this place and make his living that way (rather than me renting it out), I'd be all for him living upstairs.
It's not "at-home" kids that are a problem, it's freeloading kids that are a problem. Like Kev says, "generalizations" don't always work ....
Lannis
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Many are not aware of training programs through unions either. For example locally the electrical union will take on a fresh out of high school student that shows potential and have them placed with local companies at $15.40 and hour (2014) and full benefit package their first year. Pay raises from their. The program takes four years which the student works FT and puts in about 900 hours of self study and about 30 classroom days over the four year period. Buy the end of four (age 22 for most) years the person is a journeyman rated electrician making around 90K with overtime. NO SCHOOLING COStS PERIOD!
GliderJohn
This too!
If you draw the "earning curves" and integrate under them for "total income earned" for the guy who does what you just described AND for a guy who goes to medical school to be, say, an orthopedic surgeon, the electrician is WAY ahead of the doctor for most of his life. The doctor won't catch up to the electrician in total compensation (considering that the doctor was hemorrhaging money for 14 years while the electrician was earning) until they're in their late 40s or early 50s.
That's just money, now; job satisfaction or dealing with a "calling" is on a different page ....
Lannis
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Jay could buy several houses if he wanted to ... but since he works an awful lot, it doesn't make any sense for him to "have his own place"; what would be the point? He and his parents get along well, they like having him there, he helps them around the place ... it's not like he's laying around playing video games and taking an occasional class at the community college.
Heckfire, if a single son of mine owned his own business and was doing well, or wanted to farm this place and make his living that way (rather than me renting it out), I'd be all for him living upstairs.
It's not "at-home" kids that are a problem, it's freeloading kids that are a problem. Like Kev says, "generalizations" don't always work ....
Lannis
In my opinion, the point is independence of body and soul...And based on what I have seen in other similar situations.... But it's his life not mine...
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Concerning student debt, yes, this generation has had to use it the most. Student debt would have probably been a problem for the post WWII generation if it had not been for so many having the GI bill. But I also see too many students who are not realistic about school choices or career goals (little return income for money invested careers).
If a student is willing to use a community colleges and state colleges, live simply, work and basically take it all a bit seriously one can make it through with minimal if any debt. If you go into education or the medical field and are willing to work in need areas you can have all or part of your student debt paid off.
Many are not aware of training programs through unions either. For example locally the electrical union will take on a fresh out of high school student that shows potential and have them placed with local companies at $15.40 and hour (2014) and full benefit package their first year. Pay raises from their. The program takes four years which the student works FT and puts in about 900 hours of self study and about 30 classroom days over the four year period. Buy the end of four (age 22 for most) years the person is a journeyman rated electrician making around 90K with overtime. NO SCHOOLING COStS PERIOD!
GliderJohn
One of my millenials was accepted to the Newport News Apprentice School only because I made him consider it. He decided to spend 6 years at a University getting an engineering degree and a lot of debt instead. Time will tell if he was right or I was right.
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Concerning student debt, yes, this generation has had to use it the most. Student debt would have probably been a problem for the post WWII generation if it had not been for so many having the GI bill. But I also see too many students who are not realistic about school choices or career goals (little return income for money invested careers).
If a student is willing to use a community colleges and state colleges, live simply, work and basically take it all a bit seriously one can make it through with minimal if any debt. If you go into education or the medical field and are willing to work in need areas you can have all or part of your student debt paid off.
Many are not aware of training programs through unions either. For example locally the electrical union will take on a fresh out of high school student that shows potential and have them placed with local companies at $15.40 and hour (2014) and full benefit package their first year. Pay raises from their. The program takes four years which the student works FT and puts in about 900 hours of self study and about 30 classroom days over the four year period. Buy the end of four (age 22 for most) years the person is a journeyman rated electrician making around 90K with overtime. NO SCHOOLING COStS PERIOD!
GliderJohn
I was a member of the IBEW as a construction electrician and retired from the trade ....If you mean the building trades it's not exactly as you say...Factory unions can be like that...
But the skilled trades are overlooked....
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In my opinion, the point is independence of body and soul...And based on what I have seen in other similar situations.... But it's his life not mine...
Yep, family means different things to different people. Sometimes independence and physical separation makes for a better family relationship; sometimes it's the other way around ...
Lannis
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Concerning student debt, yes, this generation has had to use it the most. Student debt would have probably been a problem for the post WWII generation if it had not been for so many having the GI bill. But I also see too many students who are not realistic about school choices or career goals (little return income for money invested careers).
If a student is willing to use a community colleges and state colleges, live simply, work and basically take it all a bit seriously one can make it through with minimal if any debt. If you go into education or the medical field and are willing to work in need areas you can have all or part of your student debt paid off.
You make some good points, but it's not all black and white.
I mean there's a reason areas are under-served and what you save on student loan forgiveness you might lose on personal income and building your own savings/retirement. For instance a typical physician comes out of school and training (residency and fellowship) a full decade behind other professionals with regards to earning income and putting away money for retirement. And the under-served positions typically offer much less competitive salaries and benefits. So they may lose some debt, but they remain woefully behind in other areas. I have to imagine it's similar for teachers.
I also have to wonder about how one defines realistic career choices, and how to assign value to things that are less obvious than an accountant, physician, or teacher?
But let's look at tuition costs immediately post WWII vs. today.
Looks like U Penn 1945-49 tuition and room/board etc. was around $1k/year:
http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/features/tuition/1940.html
According to this calculator $1000 in 1945 = $13,703 today.
http://www.in2013dollars.com/1945-dollars-in-2018?amount=1000
A typical undergrad student at UPenn in 2018 should expect to pay $60,000-$72,000/YEAR depending on whether they live on or off campus, and/or at home.
and judging from a number of recent college grads and college students in our family (including my eldest who is currently in a PA state college studying to become a teacher) one can generally expect to spend $20k (state schools) to $60k (private schools) and in between.
So even state schools today are more expensive then Ivy league right after WWII.
There's no doubt it's more expensive than ever.
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Yep, family means different things to different people. Sometimes independence and physical separation makes for a better family relationship; sometimes it's the other way around ...
Lannis
There's also a huge difference between a freeloading/soul-sucking basement dweller and a person who contributes and supports his/herself while remaining close to/involved with, or even continuing to live with their family.
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There's also a huge difference between a freeloading/soul-sucking basement dweller and a person who contributes and supports his/herself while remaining close to/involved with, or even continuing to live with their family.
Well, quite.
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Granted, scrappy, driven, hard-working people will always find a way to thrive. However, the US economy has changed dramatically in the past several decades. Manufacturing jobs have gone elsewhere, and the composition of the labor force is markedly different.
Yes, there is work available, but much of it is part-time minimum-wage work, not full-time jobs with good pay. Further, on average, real, inflation-adjusted wages have fallen, not risen.
This is not meant to be political. It is simply reality. Things are indeed different now.
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A boy that went to school with my sons was always catching a hard time because when it came to "Career Days" and the high-school show-and-tell about "What I Want To Do", he always said "I want to be the janitor at the school". People would laugh, of course, and he didn't have the gift of repartee (I have no idea of his IQ but he didn't talk much), but it didn't seem to bother him.
So when he got out of high school, he went straight to work as a janitor at the schools. When he was old enough for his CDL, he also started driving school buses. After about 4 years they made him the janitor supervisor for the school system.
With the contacts he made as a janitor, he started a one-truck business contracting to pick up people's home trash twice a month for $25 a month per house. Started with a flat bed stake truck, then bought a used municipal compactor truck, then another ... then started getting customers in surrounding counties.
He's 32 years old now, still lives at home, not married, loves his work, and at the moment probably has more money than he'll have any way to spend in his whole life.
Just a quiet country boy, no money in the family (well, till now), and doesn't care about status or cool ... just likes being able to make it on his own. We need more like him ....
Lannis
Great storey!
I put myself through school as a janitor in the 70's and early 80's, worked evenings from 5:30 to 11:30 - 3 ~ 4 nights a week, it was a great job, paid well and there was real satisfaction seeing the department store I worked for shining at the end of the shift. The kids who worked in the record or sporting goods department looked down on the janitors as they left at the end of the day but we were getting paid twice the wage.
Now as I get closer to the end of my career I look back at those years as a janitor and still think it was one of the best jobs I have had. When I meet a new project team for the first time at a job kick-off meeting everyone goes around the table introducing themselves and some spout off all kinds of titles and credentials, usually chest pounding nonsense. When its my turn I have the same refrain, "my name is Jim Carey, and I am the janitor for my firm, I clean up the mess."
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Granted, scrappy, driven, hard-working people will always find a way to thrive. However, the US economy has changed dramatically in the past several decades. Manufacturing jobs have gone elsewhere, and the composition of the labor force is markedly different.
Yes, there is work available, but much of it is part-time minimum-wage work, not full-time jobs with good pay. Further, on average, real, inflation-adjusted wages have fallen, not risen.
This is not meant to be political. It is simply reality. Things are indeed different now.
I don't know what's happening in Oregon, but my goodness the manufacturing sector is booming here in Massachusetts. Lack of job applicants is the main problem.
Maybe Oregon youth interested in manufacturing/machining should consider moving.
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For our reading enjoyment:
http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2016/10/06/1-changes-in-the-american-workplace/ (http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2016/10/06/1-changes-in-the-american-workplace/)
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Matthew Crawford in his book "Shopclass as Soulcraft" makes a good case for the decline of trades and manual compedency in general in favor of "information workers". In 1960 10-15% of the US population had a college degree, right now more than a third do. White collar demand has increased but not at that level. At the same time trade and other manual skill jobs often go begging. Schools are kicking out kids with degrees that are of less value while at the same time saddling them with MUCH higher debt. That is a hole that takes a long time to dig out from and I see it all the time among the 20-somethings I know. Larger social trends are surely at work and stereotypes are not individuals but do think the direction we are pushing kids in terms of training is out of sync with needs. After all, you can farm out you engineering or accounting work via the Internet to India but it's pretty damn tough to hammer a nail or fix a boiler online.
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Matthew Crawford in his book "Shopclass as Soulcraft" makes a good case for the decline of trades and manual compedency in general in favor of "information workers". In 1960 10-15% of the US population had a college degree, right now more than a third do. White collar demand has increased but not at that level. At the same time trade and other manual skill jobs often go begging. Schools are kicking out kids with degrees that are of less value while at the same time saddling them with MUCH higher debt. That is a hole that takes a long time to dig out from and I see it all the time among the 20-somethings I know. Larger social trends are surely at work and stereotypes are not individuals but do think the direction we are pushing kids in terms of training is out of sync with needs. After all, you can farm out you engineering or accounting work via the Internet to India but it's pretty damn tough to hammer a nail or fix a boiler online.
Good point and well stated! Journeyman electricians, plumbers, mechanics, machinists, and boiler-repair techs can make a good and honest living and never be out of a job and can virtually go anywhere in the country and find work... :wink:
Another area is health care...my wife worked in this field (Ophthalmology), very successfully for >35 years, and she was NEVER out of a job. Another area that is tough to outsource... :cool:
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I have two sons 24 and 26. I told them early on that the most important things I considered when hiring was 1) show up every day on time, 2) Follow directions to a T, paying attention to details to get it right, and 3) Care about the company goals and keep them your focus. My oldest followed them pretty well and is doing OK for himself. Youngest kept hearing at University a bunch of crap telling him it was all about first impressions, dress, and who you know. Now that he has entered the work force, he acknowledged my 3 points because using them he got a promotion after only 6 weeks. And is being considered for a special position they were looking for a few "motivated" individuals for.
Also, when I was their age, I drove a good but inexpensive economical car, couldn't afford much furniture for my rented place, and had a couple bikes I was able to get cheap. And I lived very frugally while always having an extra job on the side (from construction work to being a janitor at night) apart from my full time job. It wasn't special, just what I thought I had to do to get by. Now that I have been working for 3-1/2 decades, things are much easier.
Maybe the senior discounts should be given to the ones getting started instead.
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From Kev M:
A typical undergrad student at UPenn in 2018 should expect to pay $60,000-$72,000/YEAR depending on whether they live on or off campus, and/or at home.
It also depends on what part of the country: In KS a typical community college, est. all costs comes to about 15K a year, at Emporia St, full time undergraduate is est. just under 20K. Now if a student can earn some scholarships, and work that number is quite manageable.
I had a student with a mild learning disability in my work-study program that earned 26K in nine months her senior year of HS working as a med aid at local nursing home.
GliderJohn
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This was an ok article. Really though, it's vastly too short to be of any real information.
My real reaction here is to some of the board members making their posts about millennials needing to be "real men" and do "real mens work". I would really hope that this board would be lower profile in the toxic masculinity department. Half of all millennials are women, are they supposed to jump on the "real men" bandwagon as well?
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I had a student with a mild learning disability in my work-study program that earned 26K in nine months her senior year of HS working as a med aid at local nursing home.
GliderJohn
I hear you, but that still makes my point for me.
I was basically expounding upon the historical contrast between post WWII and current college costs, trying to keep it apple-to-apples.
But your figures say that even something as relatively affordable as a "typical Kansas community college" costs more per year in today's dollars than an Ivy League school in the immediate post WWII era.
Yes, there are ways around it or to make it more affordable, but most are paying a lot more for their college educations today than a half a century ago, or a 1/4 century ago.
I had a student with a mild learning disability in my work-study program that earned 26K in nine months her senior year of HS working as a med aid at local nursing home.
GliderJohn
That sounds impressive.
https://www.indeed.com/salaries/Medical-Assistant-Salaries,-Kansas
At the average medical assistant salary of $14.25/hour, that's 1824 hours of work in 9 months, or about 202 hours per month and about 45 hours per week! That's a full-time job while going to high school.
Did the fact that it was a work-study program help the salary or having the time to do that while maintaining her high school grades?
What was the goal, to stay in the medical assistant field or go on to nursing or medicine? (Just curious as it would seem unlikely the average student would be able to maintain that kind of work load if they were going forward in nursing or pre-med).
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This was an ok article. Really though, it's vastly too short to be of any real information.
My real reaction here is to some of the board members making their posts about millennials needing to be "real men" and do "real mens work". I would really hope that this board would be lower profile in the toxic masculinity department. Half of all millennials are women, are they supposed to jump on the "real men" bandwagon as well?
No they can be real women and do real men's work but get paid less. Sad but true.
Seriously though just a bunch of old farts telling walked 10 miles in a blizzard to get to school stories.
Don't read too much into it.
Dave
Galveston
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Quote from: gliderjohn on Today at 12:32:24 PM
I had a student with a mild learning disability in my work-study program that earned 26K in nine months her senior year of HS working as a med aid at local nursing home.
GliderJohn
That sounds impressive.
https://www.indeed.com/salaries/Medical-Assistant-Salaries,-Kansas
At the average medical assistant salary of $14.25/hour, that's 1824 hours of work in 9 months, or about 202 hours per month and about 45 hours per week! That's a full-time job while going to high school.
Did the fact that it was a work-study program help the salary or having the time to do that while maintaining her high school grades?
What was the goal, to stay in the medical assistant field or go on to nursing or medicine? (Just curious as it would seem unlikely the average student would be able to maintain that kind of work load if they were going forward in nursing or pre-med).
Yes, she did basically work full-time, She was able to leave school two hours early as those two hours were under my program. She went on and became an RN. Not all can do that but when motivated much can be accomplished.
One of the good things about when I was an undergraduate was that it was in the mid 70s when being unmaterialistic was cool. Didn't feel pressured to have the latest clothes, etc. Low end vehicles were fine too. I drove a $500 64 El Camino and my to be wife an $800 69 Falcon. Seems like that is coming somewhat back into fashion.
GliderJohn
GliderJohn
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This was an ok article. Really though, it's vastly too short to be of any real information.
My real reaction here is to some of the board members making their posts about millennials needing to be "real men" and do "real mens work". I would really hope that this board would be lower profile in the toxic masculinity department. Half of all millennials are women, are they supposed to jump on the "real men" bandwagon as well?
Well, maybe the "real men" comment could be walked back a little bit. The intended implication is that it's a person who:
1) Realizes that they have to take control of their lives.
2) Not wring their hands and moan "Oh woe is us, things aren't as "Good" as they used to be so I'm in trouble".
3) Figure out how to get trained (or train themselves) to do useful paying work.
4) Figure out how to show up for work and be an asset to themselves or their employer.
Whatever that is is what I was intending ....
Lannis
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I’m the father of a 26 yr old boy who never finished school but has managed to secure gainful employment in a call centre.
Will it lead somewhere? Who knows but it might have better prospects than other things he’s done (SMH)
One of my two step sons has learning disabilities and goes to school about 1/5 time. He’s 9 and basically cannot read. He’s got great ambitions but hasn’t been able to make the connection between reading and life skills.
The other boy is coming 11 and sharp as a tack. He’s in grade 5 and reads at a grade 9 level and frequently skunks us in serious strategy board games. I have no worries about him.
On to other topics:
I think that the push for secondary education, namely university vs. trades is hurting the economy.
I’m 1986 I remember talking to a apprenticeship rep and he said that in the entire province (Alberta) that year exactly one person signed up as a masonry apprentice.
As far as I know nothing has really changed. Trades are not promoted as heavily as university yet the cost of university is crippling unless you are a genius and get scholarships.
My nieces husband signed on with a small plumbing company, got his ticket and bought the company. Only apprentice in his class that owned a company.
Ages ago I read this book: https://www.amazon.ca/Millionaire-Next-Door-Surprising-Americas/dp/1589795474
Fascinating read. Most interesting fact I recall: the most popular vehicle among American millionaires is a Ford F-150.
‘Nuff said!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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It is true that we do not educate young people in trade skills, especially in the US. For some reason, we dislike "tracking" or "labeling" our young people and want them all to go on to college.
In the US, fewer than 5 percent of young people train as apprentices. In Germany, the number is closer to 60 percent, and not just in advanced manufacturing but also in IT, banking, and hospitality.
A head-hunter friend told me not too long ago that there are hundreds of thousands of welding jobs open but unfilled in the US...
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I think where you live is a big part of jobs and pay. I'm an electrical contractor in Connecticut. In 1999 I was burned out and went to work for a non union company. Starting pay at that time was $25.00 per hour. I worked there for 2 1/2 years leaving 2002 making $28.00 per hour. If I were to go back SIXTEEN YEARS LATER they would start me at $28.00 per hour. 401K contributions are the same. Cost of health insurance has gone up for both employer and employee which probably has a little to do with slow to little wage increase. THIS IS A FACT I'M NOT WHINING.
Consequently the lack in pay increases has caused many to start their own businesses which has created more competition. Since the great recession spec house building is almost non existent which has brought all those electricians into the renovation market.
Trades are good but not as good as they used to be.
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I think where you live is a big part of jobs and pay. .......
.....Since the great recession spec house building is almost non existent which has brought all those electricians into the renovation market.
Trades are good but not as good as they used to be.
You're exactly right about the "where you live" part. Here where I live, spec houses are going up everywhere to accommodate the burgeoning population (probably coming from Connecticut!!). A building trades guy has his choice of jobs.
Being that we're on this subject, I spent 45 minutes talking to the Millennial who installed my new dishwasher yesterday morning .... he used to work for a big builder, but went out on his own doing appliance installations for the various appliance places. He's 33, has two kids of his own plus his wife has two kids from a previous marriage so he's raising 4 boys ages 7 - 11, parked a 2017 Dodge 3500 dually megacab out front, and enthusiastically loving life ....
Location, location, location. If where you live is "Home" and there's no changing it, then your fortunes rise and fall with that spot. If that's not working, you go where the work is ....
Lannis
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"my name is Jim Carey, and I am the janitor for my firm, I clean up the mess."
:grin: Dorcia's oncologist introduced himself the same way..
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My $0.02 as a non-millenial (from 1972)... what I see is that many technology related university studies prepare you for a computer job. If you've done electrical or mechanical engineer for instance at a place like MIT or Stanford, once you go in the workplace your job is to design and build stuff on a computer. Circuit design, mechanical design etc etc, all done in software on a computer.
This is the type of work that can be done from anywhere in the world. So the reality is that this work will be done by a cheap person in a developing country (India for instance) where people are just as smart as in the US, but willing to work for a fraction of the salary.
If you read through the posts above, a common theme with the success stories that these are jobs that cannot be done remote from a computer. A janitor doing garbage collection needs a local person, is the type work that cannot be done remotely over the internet....
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You're exactly right about the "where you live" part. Here where I live, spec houses are going up everywhere to accommodate the burgeoning population (probably coming from Connecticut!!). A building trades guy has his choice of jobs.
Being that we're on this subject, I spent 45 minutes talking to the Millennial who installed my new dishwasher yesterday morning .... he used to work for a big builder, but went out on his own doing appliance installations for the various appliance places. He's 33, has two kids of his own plus his wife has two kids from a previous marriage so he's raising 4 boys ages 7 - 11, parked a 2017 Dodge 3500 dually megacab out front, and enthusiastically loving life ....
Location, location, location. If where you live is "Home" and there's no changing it, then your fortunes rise and fall with that spot. If that's not working, you go where the work is ....
Lannis
Yes, money is where the work is.... Do you think a young man with a bunch of kids, wife, a $60,000 truck isn't in debt up over his head?
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Yes, money is where the work is.... Do you think a young man with a bunch of kids, wife, a $60,000 truck isn't in debt up over his head?
He says he's not. It's a $41,000 truck, and he said he made sure it was paid for before he leaped off on his own. Used his 401K to do it, penalties and all, now starting again on that from 0. I asked, and I don't have any reason not to believe him.
He's also very aware of "Cash Flow", and not profitability, as the main killer of small businesses, was way ahead of me on that ...
Generalizations are OK and I use them a lot, but when you have specifics that are different, I like to think of those as "inspiring" stories ....
Lannis
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He says he's not. It's a $41,000 truck, and he said he made sure it was paid for before he leaped off on his own. Used his 401K to do it, penalties and all, now starting again on that from 0. I asked, and I don't have any reason not to believe him.
He's also very aware of "Cash Flow", and not profitability, as the main killer of small businesses, was way ahead of me on that ...
Generalizations are OK and I use them a lot, but when you have specifics that are different, I like to think of those as "inspiring" stories ....
Lannis
Do you really think raiding your 401K to buy a new truck is good business practice? Why a 41K dually pick up instead of a used van ? I was in the trades all my life and a contractor, I have heard all the stories and seen the results...I'm not saying the man isn't motivated and sincere, I just see the potential for disaster....
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Do you really think raiding your 401K to buy a new truck is good business practice? Why a 41K dually pick up instead of a used van ? I was in the trades all my life and a contractor, I have heard all the stories and seen the results...I'm not saying the man isn't motivated and sincere, I just see the potential for disaster....
A brand new Ram Big Horn 4dr Mega Cab 4WD SB (5.7L 8cyl 6A) lists at $62K. Even if it isn't 4WD the price couldn't be down to $41 unless he purchased this as a used vehicle. And I agree, starting off on his own he should have purchased a used van and added a trailer if he needed to haul more inventory to a site. Cashing in his 401K at the age of 33 for such a purchase is not such a wise move IMO.
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Really it's about living well. And you have to balance the now verses future ratio. I have seen both philosophies work and fail. From the guy who scrimps and saves, denying himself and extras till retirement only to have a catastrophic health issue ruin his future plans or the guy who is up to his head in debt all the time but is broke when he is old and can't work any longer. I believe in a balance of the two.
And I think young folks today have it easier/better in some areas and much harder in others. The way I see it, for the average young person back then and today, there isn't much disposable cash until they have been working for a while. And where they are or were in economic cycles do play a role. As far as education, each has to find themselves a marketable skill that they are comfortable with, some are harder/more costly to get than others. Pay your money and take you chances.
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I would recommend the trades over a profession to any young person. One of my sons is finishing his 4th year electrical apprentice, average journeyman electrician wage here is $37.00 / hr, Older son has 6 years post secondary and a design degree and makes $30.00 / hr.
Trades are very much in demand in my area as many of the skilled tradesmen and women are approaching retirement. Average journeyman wage for a welder, plumber, refrigeration mechanic, instrumentation tech, heavy duty mechanic and electrician is $37 ~ $40 / hr. A registered nurse averages $43/hr.
The potential to earn a lot more is there for a profession but the cost of education, completion for jobs, risk of being a self practitioner etc. is a real consideration and for many the path to a profession does not make financial sense. A skilled tradesman can become a successful entrepreneur and earn far more than your average professional.
I have to agree that buying a big fancy new truck is one heck of a lousy business decision.
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"I have to agree that buying a big fancy new truck is one heck of a lousy business decision."
Honestly I think we all know the big fancy truck isn't a business decision, but a personal one that uses the business to help offset the costs. Just like our motorcycles are not the most economical means of transportation. It's a passion thing.
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"I have to agree that buying a big fancy new truck is one heck of a lousy business decision."
Honestly I think we all know the big fancy truck isn't a business decision, but a personal one that uses the business to help offset the costs. Just like our motorcycles are not the most economical means of transportation. It's a passion thing.
There may have been other extenuating factors which played a part in the decision to buy the truck.
Maybe he needs to tow some huge trailer or something not related to his work.
Not arguing for or against the use of retirement funds for present day purchases.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Do you really think raiding your 401K to buy a new truck is good business practice? Why a 41K dually pick up instead of a used van ? I was in the trades all my life and a contractor, I have heard all the stories and seen the results...I'm not saying the man isn't motivated and sincere, I just see the potential for disaster....
I raided my 6-year-old IRA in 1989 (when I was 35) to get the money for the land that the house that Fay and I built and are living in today. We were able to pay for the materials as we went along (it took 5 years) and we supplied the labor. House was long since paid off.
The guys wife has an older Camry - the truck is sometimes his work truck and sometimes the family car. That's about all I know about it.
I still had 28 years to build my IRA back up to where it was (and where I retired) - he's probably got 32. I don't predict disaster, he's a smart guy.
Neither of us will be around to know, I suspect ... :undecided:
Lannis
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A brand new Ram Big Horn 4dr Mega Cab 4WD SB (5.7L 8cyl 6A) lists at $62K. Even if it isn't 4WD the price couldn't be down to $41 unless he purchased this as a used vehicle. And I agree, starting off on his own he should have purchased a used van and added a trailer if he needed to haul more inventory to a site. Cashing in his 401K at the age of 33 for such a purchase is not such a wise move IMO.
He just now bought it used. He HAD an old Dakota with a trailer and the repairs and lack of capacity were making him miss commitments.
I have the advantage of talking to him in my kitchen for almost an hour, so I have a little more info than I have time to type in here .... He's doing like I did, and like I hope my sons will continue to do ...
Lannis
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He just now bought it used. He HAD an old Dakota with a trailer and the repairs and lack of capacity were making him miss commitments.
Lannis
OK, if he bought used and he was losing money by the lack of reliable transportation then I understand the risk. And he is young.
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OK, if he bought used and he was losing money by the lack of reliable transportation then I understand the risk. And he is young.
Well, I've been thinking "Why did raiding my IRA 29 years ago work out for me?"
It was a subjective thing, and it meant that I could go forward without any debt (or minimal debt, which was paid off early). Since I knew that I would not retire if I still had debt, and since I knew that the interest rates on debt would almost ALWAYS be higher than the return on my savings ... I did it for peace of mind.
I haven't gone back and calculated what would have happened if I had left the IRA alone, carried the debt, and paid that as I went. I would have paid more money out over that time 1989 - 2017, BUT I might have had more money in savings in 2015, and it might have been more than I paid out servicing debt.
I just know that I had 27 years of Peace of Mind knowing that I could jump either way MUCH more easily during hard times in an emergency with no debt than I could have with a bigger IRA ...
Maybe not for everyone, worked for us. Betcha it's gonna work for the young guy with the truck!
Lannis
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I'm not against taking money out of a retirement fund to start a business....I was just wondering out loud why he needs a $40000 truck to install appliances..I'm a minimalist ,less baggage is better...
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I'm not against taking money out of a retirement fund to start a business....I was just wondering out loud why he needs a $40000 truck to install appliances..I'm a minimalist ,less baggage is better...
I don't know, to be honest.
Maybe it helps that he can write off the capital and operating expense for the truck (or mileage) off on his taxes.
Maybe he's doing a bit of combining business with pleasure - like me when I commuted to work on a motorcycle. It cost more (considering tires, wear and tear, etc) to ride the bike as part of my work rather than going with the absolute cheapest option, which would have been to spend an hour and a half in a used Honda Civic every day instead of on a bike. Maybe it's sort of like that, but likes a big truck instead of a bike.
At any rate, he's a Millennial who ISN'T worrying about whether wages and prices are in the same relationship as when the old graybeard he's installing a dishwasher for was working. He ISN'T sitting around moaning that he has $100K in college debt and he can't seem to find a job. He ISN'T all woe is me about his employer isn't treating him right and the CEO makes 100 times what he does.
He's a millennial who's out there finding opportunities, taking risks, getting his hands dirty, making some good decisions (and maybe some marginal ones), working hard, and making it happen for himself and his family.
I still say there's hope yet!
Lannis
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What Millennial's (and sadly many other folks these days) seem to forget is that the $40K spent on a new truck is after tax dollars, the gross up for pre-tax dollars means that most people are spending at least 1.3 X the retail cost, or $52K for the truck. The vehicle will depreciate a minimum of 10% per year so in three years its worth at best $28K on an initial investment of real earned dollars of $52K. In three years the truck cost the owner $24K to own.
If the same purchaser bought a $20K truck with a gross up factor of 1.3 for a real dollar cost of $26K, depreciated for three years the loss is $6k, for a year three value of $14K, The three year cost to own the truck is $12K of earned dollars. Take the $12 saved and pay down a mortgage or invest in a mild risk fund averaging 7% growth and in the same three year period earn $2600 on the investment.
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In my opinion, the point is independence of body and soul...And based on what I have seen in other similar situations.... But it's his life not mine...
:1: Unless this fella has mental issues we don't know about.
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What Millennial's (and sadly many other folks these days) seem to forget is that the $40K spent on a new truck is after tax dollars, the gross up for pre-tax dollars means that most people are spending at least 1.3 X the retail cost, or $52K for the truck. The vehicle will depreciate a minimum of 10% per year so in three years its worth at best $28K on an initial investment of real earned dollars of $52K. In three years the truck cost the owner $24K to own.
If the same purchaser bought a $20K truck with a gross up factor of 1.3 for a real dollar cost of $26K, depreciated for three years the loss is $6k, for a year three value of $14K, The three year cost to own the truck is $12K of earned dollars. Take the $12 saved and pay down a mortgage or invest in a mild risk fund averaging 7% growth and in the same three year period earn $2600 on the investment.
What we forget is that some people are into trucks like we're into motorcycles. They're not looking for the most penny-pinching financial deal, any more than we're looking for the cheapest way to own a motorcycle. They want one they enjoy and does what they want. Ask Rocker.
Anybody's $18,000 Cal 1400 or Triumph Trophy or BMW 1600GT is a mortally stupid financial decision that could be easily fixed by buying a $8,000 motorcycle instead .... !
Lannis
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Anybody's $18,000 Cal 1400 or Triumph Trophy or BMW 1600GT is a mortally stupid financial decision that could be easily fixed by buying a $8,000 motorcycle instead .... !
Lannis
Agreed, but when you are young and getting started, supporting kids and paying a mortgage, stupid decisions are very costly in the long run. If we can teach young people to forgo a $40K pick up truck for a couple years there is hope for his generation.
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I would recommend the trades over a profession to any young person
Trades are very much in demand in my area as many of the skilled tradesmen and women are approaching retirement. Average journeyman wage for a welder, plumber, refrigeration mechanic, instrumentation tech, heavy duty mechanic and electrician is $37 ~ $40 / hr. A registered nurse averages $43/hr.
The potential to earn a lot more is there for a profession but the cost of education, completion for jobs, risk of being a self practitioner etc. is a real consideration and for many the path to a profession does not make financial sense. A skilled tradesman can become a successful entrepreneur and earn far more than your average professional.
You make some some good points and I don't think it's black and white, but then again, if it's not black and white then your opening statement might require some softening of the absolutes.
For instance, that registered nurse comment. Are you suggesting nursing is a trade?
It's not in the US (anymore, if it ever was). The RN is no longer being hired or promoted, they are being required to complete their BSN if they don't already have it. And the BSN is largely considered the most difficult undergraduate degree. I would call that professional status without requiring an advanced degree.
And though the trades hourly figures you quote are good for sure. There are a number of professional degrees from medicine to law that can demand $100, $200, $300/hr.
There are professionals in sales, technology, and the financial segments I know who are earning like that.
Then again I know a real estate agent (bachelor's degree, real estate license, and decent entrepreneurship) who is earning like that too.
I will say happily the the school districts around here offer the option of VOTECH high schools which have academic tracts for things like HVAC, plumbing, electricians, automotive technician, childcare, food services industry, floral industry, etc. So it's not all being ignored.
But yes, I'd say it's not all black & white, and there are a fair amount of factors to consider when thinking about an educational and career path.
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The young fellers who have worked on our property all seem to be doing well, one bought an airplane (cash) last summer.
He sold the company to 2 of his employees, just starting out but with a big client list.
Hell, when I was 18 I spent every dollar I had and then some on my new Guzzi. Worked out fine.
I'd trade all the money I have with any penniless 20 year old if I could. The kids are all right.
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I have 2 millenial kids, 31(girl)and 33(boy). Grew up small town USA, live in St. Paul/Minneapolis.
Both are hard working, as their friends are, good jobs in both trades and professions.
One of my son's buddy's started a motorcycle cooperative.
Warehouse, with tools, a dozen+ bike lifts and rents space by the hour, week or monthly memberships. Smart kids, very polite and hard workers.
I gotta say though, the difference between their generation and mine (BabyBoomer) is they have a better balance between work and play.
I am retired, and my son asked me what I would do differently if I was starting over.
I would have worked less and played more.
They get it, they work to do the things they enjoy. More power to them IMHO.
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Agreed, but when you are young and getting started, supporting kids and paying a mortgage, stupid decisions are very costly in the long run. If we can teach young people to forgo a $40K pick up truck for a couple years there is hope for his generation.
And we also need to teach these youngster to stay away from expensive and dangerous motorcycles, so they can just go through their mundane vanilla existence and be exactly like everyone else in a perfect cookie cutter world. Or not. :evil:
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For instance, that registered nurse comment. Are you suggesting nursing is a trade?
No negatives meant towards nursing, my wife has been a RN for almost 40 years and has earned a BSN and MSN, and ended her career teaching. I have a lot of respect for nurses and she would disagree with me on this, but Nurses are not seen as professional's as Lawyers, Doctors, Engineers etc, are, some of this due to historical male bias and that the they are typically not self employed running a consultancy or practice. and carrying the exposure to litigation. My wife is a council member of the College of Registered Nurses in the Province and has strong feelings that nurses should have the official professional designation.
I included nursing as an alternate to a typical degree program in general science, arts, etc, that do not offer graduates a sure path to employment. Most hospital staffing models are not based upon RN designation (requires a BSN now in the Province) and are staffing with LPN graduates and the odd RN. The LPN gets about 3/5 the wage of the RN for less than half the time spent in post secondary education.
My recommendation for trades over post secondary is for 'most' kids, the ones who do not have a 3.8 or better GPA and not likely to be accepted to Law, Medicine, Engineering etc.
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I think that there are always bad examples that folks tend to latch onto...the young people today are really not so different than they have ever been. Sure, there are lots of malingering young �uns out there, but there are lots of Boomers that are no different, their advanced age notwithstanding. I have two kids in their thirties that have thrived as adults. My daughter joined the Army as a journalist and did a whole bunch of combat video while in Iraq. Her work was so good, she was offered any assignment she wanted upon her return. She asked for and got a slot in flight school and finished as an honor graduate. She flew scouts (OH58Ds) for about ten years and now runs a Shadow platoon in the Oregon Nat�l Guard. The Army has paid for all of her education. My son got into sales and recently moved to New Orleans and scored a job with a high end audio outfit. Despite being their youngest sales rep, he led the store in sales for two years and was made manager last week. He has no student debt, either. Both of them have had their own health insurance since 2006.
Back in the sixties, all the older folks thought that America was doomed by all the hippies and liberal-thinking young people. In the twenties it was the Flappers and the people who listened to jazz. What is this tendency for us to judge our young people so harshly? Human nature, I guess...but enough good ones are out there that we will carry on just fine.
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No negatives meant towards nursing, my wife has been a RN for almost 40 years and has earned a BSN and MSN, and ended her career teaching. I have a lot of respect for nurses and she would disagree with me on this, but Nurses are not seen as professional's as Lawyers, Doctors, Engineers etc, are, some of this due to historical male bias and that the they are typically not self employed running a consultancy or practice. and carrying the exposure to litigation. My wife is a council member of the College of Registered Nurses in the Province and has strong feelings that nurses should have the official professional designation.
I included nursing as an alternate to a typical degree program in general science, arts, etc, that do not offer graduates a sure path to employment. Most hospital staffing models are not based upon RN designation (requires a BSN now in the Province) and are staffing with LPN graduates and the odd RN. The LPN gets about 3/5 the wage of the RN for less than half the time spent in post secondary education.
My recommendation for trades over post secondary is for 'most' kids, the ones who do not have a 3.8 or better GPA and not likely to be accepted to Law, Medicine, Engineering etc.
Oh I know, and I didn't think you were being derogatory at all. And I might argue that it's mostly the "old guard" that might not see nurses on the same sort of "professionals" as doctors, lawyers, etc. I think that perception is rightly (but slowly) changing. I'll also add that in the US the days of doctors having independent practices have been rapidly coming to a close. Big business discovered medicine at least a decade ago and around here major hospital healthcare systems are buying up all the practices and employing doctors.
I'll also throw out that I know a good number of lawyers, doctors, and engineers who didn't have 3.8 or better GPAs.
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I know a number of "professionals" who don't have degrees at all. Perhaps the popular belief that a university degree is a guarantee of good employment has brought us to our young people's impasse. A sheepskin only opens the door...it is hard work, loyalty, and creative problem-solving that makes a successful professional. Particularly the ones who can create a positive team environment through the development of trust relationships...
John Rockefeller, Henry Ford, Steve Jobs, Michael Dell....none of them had a degree, yet they innovated and succeeded nonetheless. Perhaps we're not educating our kids completely. Perhaps they need to know more about the intangibles of success...
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My dad came home from WWII and started out pounding stakes into the ground as a surveyor’s helper and 30 years later retired as a “Resident Highway Engineer” with no more formal education than grade 6.
I still have a number of his math and engineering texts neatly marked up with his notes.
I don’t know if that kind of career progression is possible today.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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I thought being an RN is equivalent of a 4 year degree. :huh:
Just because you earned a degree doesn't mean you are automatically competent in that genre. It just means you got the basics you will need for that skill. OJT is where you will earn your real competence or not.
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I thought being an RN is equivalent of a 4 year degree. :huh:
Just because you earned a degree doesn't mean you are automatically competent in that genre. It just means you got the basics you will need for that skill. OJT is where you will earn your real competence or not.
No the RN was basically a 2 year associate's degree in nursing which was once the standard to enter the industry.
And yes I think that's true in most fields that school teaches the basics and training/residency/fellowship/apprenticeship etc. teach how to apply that in the real world.
I'm told the German education system does a great job teaching varied skill sets through different tracts.
One area that the US could really learn from is in how doctors are educated in much of the rest of the world.
In the US doctors waste 4 years and tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars on largely irrelevant courses in undergrad degrees to prove themselves and gain admissions to med school.
Then they spend 4 years in school, and 3-7 additional years of training through residency and fellowship.
In much of the rest of the world they at least skip the 4 years of undergrad.
Which would have meant my wife could have finished school/training by 28-29 instead of 32-33. Which may not seen like much but already being close to a decade behind other professions for salary, retirement savings, and even starting a family, can be tough.
Of course we're currently going the wrong way in this forcing nurses into BSN's instead of RN's. As it seems the only real differences are those general study courses there make up the non-nursing related bachelor's content.
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I haven't followed the whole thread, but when saw this article in The Economist I thought it would be appropriate to let you in on it, as it to some extent illustrates parts of the thread.
Lengthy, but I found it very interesting. Is the second-to-the-last paragraph sort of summing it up?
AT THE gates of Santa Monica College, in Los Angeles, a young man with a skateboard is hanging out near a group of people who are smoking marijuana in view of the campus police. His head is clouded, too—but with worry, not weed. He frets about his student loans and the difficulty of finding a job, even fearing that he might end up homeless. “Not to sound intense,” he adds, but robots are taking work from humans. He neither smokes nor drinks much. The stigma against such things is stronger than it was for his parents’ generation, he explains.
Young people are indeed behaving and thinking differently from previous cohorts at the same age. These shifts can be seen in almost every rich country, from America to the Netherlands to South Korea. Some have been under way for many years, but they have accelerated in the past few. Not all of them are benign.
Perhaps the most obvious change is that teenagers are getting drunk less often (see chart). They start drinking later: the average age at which young Australians first try alcohol has risen from 14.4 to 16.1 since 1998. And even when they start, they sip rather than chug. In Britain, where a fifth of 16- to 24-year-olds do not drink at all, the number of pubs is falling by about 1,000 a year, and nightclubs are faring even worse. In the past young people went out for a drink and perhaps had something to eat at the same time, says Kate Nicholls, head of the Association of Licensed Multiple Retailers, a trade group. Now it is the other way round.
Other drugs are also falling from favour. Surveys by the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction show that the proportion of 15- to 16-year-olds who have tried cigarettes has been falling since 1999. A rising proportion of teenagers have never tried anything mind-altering, including alcohol, tobacco, cannabis, inhalants and sedatives. The proportion of complete abstainers rose from 11% to 31% in Sweden between 2003 and 2015, and from 23% to an astounding 61% in Iceland. In America, all illicit drugs except marijuana (which is not illicit everywhere) have become less popular. Mercifully, the decline in teenage opioid use is especially steep.
Nor are young people harming each other as much as they used to. Fighting among 13- and 15-year-olds is down across Europe. Juvenile crime and anti-social behaviour have dropped in England and Wales, and with them the number of juvenile convicts. In 2007 almost 3,000 young people were in custody; by 2016 the number was below 1,000.
Teenagers are also having less sex, especially of the procreative kind. In 1991, 54% of American teenagers in grades nine to 12 (ages 14-18) reported that they were sexually experienced, and 19% claimed to have had sex with at least four partners. In 2015 those proportions were 41% and 12%. America’s teenage birth rate crashed by two-thirds during the same period. As with alcohol, the abstention from sex seems to be carrying through into early adulthood. Jean Twenge, a psychologist at San Diego State University in California, has shown that the proportion of Americans aged 20-24 who report having no sexual partner since the age of 18 rose from 6.3% for the cohort born in the late 1960s to 15.2% for those born in the early 1990s. Japan is a more extreme case. In 2015, 47% of unmarried 20- to 24-year-old Japanese men said they had never had sex with a woman, up from 34% in 2002.
In short, young people are less hedonistic and break fewer rules than in the past. They are “kind of boring”, says Shoko Yoneyama, an expert on Japanese teenagers at the University of Adelaide. What is going on?
They tuck you up
One possible explanation is that family life has changed. A study of 11 countries by Giulia Dotti Sani and Judith Treas, two academics, found that parents spend much more time on child care. In America, the average parent spent 88 minutes a day primarily looking after children in 2012—up from 41 minutes in 1965. Fathers have upped their child-care hours most in proportional terms, though they still do much less than mothers. Because families are smaller, the hours are spread across fewer offspring.
Those doted-upon children seem to have turned into amenable teenagers. In 28 out of 34 rich countries surveyed by the World Health Organisation, the proportion of 15-year-old boys who said they found it easy to talk to their fathers rose between 2001-02 and 2013-14. Girls found it easier to talk to their fathers in 29 out of 34 countries. The trend for mothers is similar but less strong. And even teenagers who do not talk to their parents seem to listen to them. Dutch surveys show that teenagers have come to feel more pressure from their parents not to drink. That is probably the main reason for the decline in youthful carousing since 2003.
Another possibility is that teenagers and young people are more focused on school and academic work. Across the OECD club of rich countries, the share of 25- to 34-year-olds with a tertiary degree rose from 26% to 43% between 2000 and 2016. A larger proportion of teenagers believe they will go on to university.
As a result, they may be staying at home more. Mike Roe, who runs a drop-in youth club in Brighton, in southern England, says that ten or 15 years ago clubs like his often used to stay open until 11pm on school nights. That is now regarded as too late. Oddly, though, teenagers are not necessarily filling their evenings with useful work. Between 2003 and 2012, the amount of time 15-year-olds spent doing homework fell by an hour a week across the OECD, to just under five hours.
Meanwhile paid work is collapsing. In 2016 just 43% of American 16- to 19-year-olds were working in July, during the summer holidays—down from 65% two decades earlier. The retreat from lifeguarding and burger-flipping worries some Americans, including Ben Sasse, a senator from Nebraska, who argues that boring paid work builds character and resilience. Teenagers are no fools, however. The average 16- to 19-year-old American worker earned $9.20 an hour in 2016. Though an improvement on previous years, that is a pittance next to the cost of university tuition or the large and growing wage differential between professional-level jobs and the rest. The fall in summer working has been mirrored by a rise in summer studying.
Ann Hagell, a British adolescent psychologist, suggests another explanation. Today’s young people in Western countries are increasingly ethnically diverse. Britain, for example, has received large flows of immigrants from Africa, south Asia and eastern Europe. Many of those immigrants arrive with strong taboos against drinking, premarital sex and smoking—at least among girls—and think that only paupers send their children out to work. Ms Hagell points out that teenage drinking is rarest in London, where immigrants cluster.
Finally, technology has probably changed people’s behaviour. Teenagers are heavy internet users, the more so as they acquire smartphones. By their own account, 15-year-olds in OECD countries spent 146 minutes a day online on weeknights in 2015, up from 105 minutes in 2012. Chileans lead the rich world, putting in an average of 195 minutes on weekdays and 230 minutes on weekend days.
Social media allow teenagers’ craving for contact with peers to be squared with parents’ desire to keep their offspring safe and away from harmful substances. In America, surveys known as Monitoring the Future have recorded a decline in unsupervised hanging-out, which has been especially sharp since 2012. Teenagers who communicate largely online can exchange gossip, insults and nude pictures, but not bodily fluids, blows, or bottles of vodka.
The digital trade-off comes at a cost. Sophie Wasson, a psychologist at Harvard-Westlake, a private high school in Los Angeles, says that some teenagers seem to use social media as an alternative to face-to-face communication. In doing so, they pass up some opportunities to develop deep emotional connections with their friends, which are built on non-verbal cues as well as verbal ones. Ms Wasson believes that social media widen the gap between how teenagers feel about themselves and what they think their friends want them to be. Online, everybody else is always happy, good-looking and at a party.
Technology also enhances surveillance. Parents track their children’s phones and text frequently to ask where they are. Benjamin Pollack, a student at the University of Pennsylvania, remembers attending a camp in Israel when he was in high school. He communicated with his mother every day, using Facebook Messenger and other tools. As it happens, his mother had attended the same camp when she was a teenager. She contacted her own mother twice in eight weeks.
Worries about teenagers texting and playing computer games too much (and, before that, watching too much television) have largely given way to worries about smartphones and social media. Last November Chamath Palihapitiya, formerly a Facebook executive, said that his children were “not allowed to use that shit”. But strong evidence that technology is rewiring teenagers’ minds is so far lacking. American and British data show that, although heavy internet use is associated with unhappiness, the correlation is weak. One paper on Britain by Andrew Przybylski and Netta Weinstein suggests that heavy computer and smartphone use lower adolescents’ mood much less than skipping breakfast or skimping on sleep.
Still, something is up. Whether it is a consequence of phones, intrusive parenting, an obsessive focus on future job prospects or something else entirely, teenagers seem lonelier than in the past. The OECD’s PISA surveys show that the share of 15-year-olds who say they make friends easily at school has dropped in almost every country (see chart). Some Western countries are beginning to look like Japan and South Korea, which struggle with a more extreme kind of social isolation in which young people become virtual hermits.
Perhaps they will get round to close friendships in time. One way of thinking about the differences between the youth of today and yesterday is that today’s lot are taking it slow. They are slow to drink, have sex and earn money. They will also probably be slow to leave home, get married and have children. What looks to older generations like indolence and a reluctance to grow up might be, at least in part, a response to medical developments. Babies born today in a rich country can expect to live for at least 80 years. Goodness knows at what age they will be entitled to state pensions. Today’s young people have all the time in the world.
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I thought being an RN is equivalent of a 4 year degree. :huh:
Just because you earned a degree doesn't mean you are automatically competent in that genre. It just means you got the basics you will need for that skill. OJT is where you will earn your real competence or not.
RN is offered in two and four year degrees.... Some nursing positions do require a BSN, some health facilities may prefer a BSN over associates degree...
Dealing with the IBEW construction wiremen apprentices, top standing in the book learning was no guarantee of good practical job skills. Some were fearful of heights or claustrophobic...An d some were just not good with the tools..And some were just not cut out to be a construction worker....
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That's a good article. I enjoyed reading it, but it is distressing. The economy is indeed rotten for many young people. When I was their age, one could easily find full-time work. Not so anymore. "It's no wonder we aren't buying new motorcycles; we can barely afford to pay our share of the monthly rent."
I have four boys in their mid-20s to early-30s. The only one doing okay is son #2, and that is because he went to Afghanistan and risked his life in 300 firefights so he could go to HVAC school on the GI Bill and get a job as a tradesman. The other three are struggling to pay rent because all they can find is part-time, minimum wage work--even son #1 with a degree from Seattle Pacific University. Son #3 is about to be evicted because he is behind on his rent...
The three younger boys all rode motorcycles for a time, but financial difficulties have resulted in the loss of their bikes. I do not expect any of them to do better economically than I have (except possibly son #4, but only if he goes to law school).
I suppose I could bail them out, but struggling is essential to growing stronger and continuing to search for better work, even if it means joining the army and going to war... In the meantime, no more motorcycles.
Be a robot engineer, or be engineered by robots. Law will be pretty much fully automated by 2025. Come to Australia, plenty of work for those who want to.
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Pebra - great article. A lot of that makes sense and rings true.
RN is offered in two and four year degrees.... Some nursing positions do require a BSN, some health facilities may prefer a BSN over associates degree...
Ooops, you're right I'm confusing ADN as an equivalent for RN, when really it's an RN may have an ADN or BSN.
http://www.innerbody.com/careers-in-health/nursing-degrees
That said, all of the major health systems anywhere near have been pushing lifelong career RNs who have only an ADN to get a BSN. So I don't think the 2-year degree ADN is really much of an option anymore or won't be soon enough.
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Pebra - great article. A lot of that makes sense and rings true.....
The article may certainly indicate things that are going on world-wide in an "aggregate" sense.
But I think as all the examples that have been called out in this thread indicate, an ambitious youngster, with his nose pointed toward the main chance instead of his phone, and who is not letting graphs and statistics worry him, will do very well ... maybe better than we did, maybe as well, maybe not as well.
But 90% of it's up to THEM, not up to some scary power beyond their control ....
To loop back to the OP, it's like the risk associated with riding a motorcycle. The overall STATISTICS give us one picture, perhaps a daunting and scary one; but the STATISTICS include people riding drunk, people riding with no protection, people riding with insufficient skills or training, people riding too fast for conditions. Eliminate all those, and just leave guys like you and me and the rest of this board who wear protection, who have taken training, who don't ride impaired, who maintain their bikes, and who watch for road conditions?
Completely different outcomes .. ! And I think it's the same for kids today ... eliminate the coddled, phone-addicted, introverted, afraid-to-jump ones (or most of them, per generalizations), and it looks a LOT brighter.
Lannis
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The article may certainly indicate things that are going on world-wide in an "aggregate" sense.
But I think as all the examples that have been called out in this thread indicate, an ambitious youngster, with his nose pointed toward the main chance instead of his phone, and who is not letting graphs and statistics worry him, will do very well ... maybe better than we did, maybe as well, maybe not as well.
But 90% of it's up to THEM, not up to some scary power beyond their control ....
I don't see where the article contradicted any of that?
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Pebra, thanks for posting that article, I always enjoy well written pieces like that one.
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I don't see where the article contradicted any of that?
Doesn't really contradict any of it. Just a generic commentary to counter the usual generalizations ... !
Lannis
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I think part of the problem in respect to jobs is the older guys working in their 70's. I work in a department with about 50 guys. 4 of them are well into their 70's with no intention to quit any time soon. They all could live comfortable without working. One of the guys made the statement that he was making more money than any other time in his life. He is making about 60K at work, another 10K for retirement and another 30K SSN. I understand it would be hard to walk away from 60K, but ... I think his problem is he doesn't know what else to do. He worked 2 jobs most his life and is now down to 40 hours (random OT, 20 hours a year). His 2 adult kids very seldom talk to him. I've known him for 35 years and cannot recall him taking a vacation other than a family reunion weekend back in the 80"s.
Myself? Barring a financial catastrophe, I plan to work another year or so. I'll be eligible for full retirement benefits. I'll walk away and not look back. I won't be able to make impulse purchases like now but I think I'll be OK.
I know too many people who would not know what to do outside of work. Kinda sad really. Me...I would have that problem. Gotta get the house paid for, then I'll retire.
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From HDGoose:
I know too many people who would not know what to do outside of work. Kinda sad really.
Never been able to figure those folk out. Been retired now for 2.5 years and an still not caught up on projects and am doing something outside of home about every day. Leaving in a bit to do Meals on Wheels with blowing snow and -2 windchill. They are going to need a hot meal today. Where is that shiver icon?
GliderJohn
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From HDGoose:
Never been able to figure those folk out. Been retired now for 2.5 years and an still not caught up on projects and am doing something outside of home about every day. Leaving in a bit to do Meals on Wheels with blowing snow and -2 windchill. They are going to need a hot meal today. Where is that shiver icon?
GliderJohn
:1: Keep those Karma points stacked high!
Good to remember there's still a bunch of you good people out there!
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From HDGoose:
Never been able to figure those folk out. Been retired now for 2.5 years and an still not caught up on projects and am doing something outside of home about every day. Leaving in a bit to do Meals on Wheels with blowing snow and -2 windchill. They are going to need a hot meal today. Where is that shiver icon?
GliderJohn
I want to become more active in the VFW or American Legion. Need time to do that. I will be busy in 'retirement' with 'work' I'll choose.
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I want to become more active in the VFW or American Legion. Need time to do that. I will be busy in 'retirement' with 'work' I'll choose.
That's exactly the right thing to do ... just make sure you go into it with your hand ready to grab the brake real hard! Once people know that you're retired, word will get around and it'll be "Ol' Gary" (or Lannis or John as the case may be) "is retired, HE'S got plenty of time and he's good at that stuff, ask him, he'll do it ..."
The principle of "If you want to get something done, give it to the busiest person you know of ..." applies even more in retirement than it does work.
With your shy and retiring personality and your unwillingness to let anyone know how you feel, you might be in real danger of this happening to you. Or maybe NOT! :laugh:
Lannis
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^^^^^ What Lannis sez. Trust me on this, Gary. It's an easy trap to get into. "Oh, I'm not working any more.. I'll have *plenty* of time to do that.."
BTDT.. don't fall for it. :smiley:
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Book III of Odes, circa 20 BC, Horace:
Our sires' age was worse than our grandsires'. We, their sons, are more
worthless than they; so in our turn we shall give the world a progeny yet more
corrupt.
“We defy anyone who goes about with his eyes open to deny that there is, as never before, an attitude on the part of young folk which is best described as grossly thoughtless, rude, and utterly selfish.”
The Conduct of Young People, Hull Daily Mail, 1925
“It’s an irony, but so many of us are a cautious, nervous, conservative crew that some of the elders who five years ago feared that we might come trooping home full of foreign radical ideas are now afraid that the opposite might be too true, and that we could be lacking some of the old American gambling spirit and enterprise.”
The Care and Handling of a Heritage: One of the “scared-rabbit” generation reassures wild-eyed elders about future, Life, 1950
“A few [35-year-old friends] just now are leaving their parents’ nest. Many friends are getting married or having a baby for the first time. They aren’t switching occupations, because they have finally landed a ‘meaningful’ career – perhaps after a decade of hopscotching jobs in search of an identity. They’re doing the kinds of things our society used to expect from 25-year-olds.”
Not Ready for Middle Age at 35, Wall Street Journal, 1984
“Cinemas and motor cars were blamed for a flagging interest among young people in present-day politics by ex-Provost JK Rutherford… [He] said he had been told by people in different political parties that it was almost impossible to get an audience for political meetings. There were, of course, many distractions such as the cinema…”
Young People and Politics, Kirkintilloch Herald, 1938
“The Chairman alluding to the problem of young people and their English said his experience was that many did not seem able to express or convey to other people what they meant. They could not put their meaning into words, and found the same difficulty when it came to writing.”
Unable to Express Thoughts: Failing of Modern Young People, Gloucester Citizen, 1936
“Parents themselves were often the cause of many difficulties. They frequently failed in their obvious duty to teach self-control and discipline to their own children.”
Problems of Young People, Leeds Mercury, 1938
And then, there's this:
“And while [millennials] vary internally as much as any age cohort, I’ve generally been struck by the disconnect between the way they’re portrayed in the media and the way they go about their business. From what I’ve seen, they work harder than my cohort did, and for less payoff. (We could say the same about ourselves, relative to Boomers.) They’re more polite than I remember my own group being at that age. Yes, they’re always checking their phones, but so are we. Most of them are juggling jobs, classes, and family obligations, along with the relationship drama that comes with that age.”
In Defence of Millennials, Inside Higher Ed, 2017
“He felt that the people who were giving that kind of charge, that sweeping condemnation, were generally out of touch with the young people… ‘I think that if we knew the boys and girls — and I am thinking particularly tonight the young people of Britain — of those modern times, we should feel that after all they are very much like ourselves. They think very much like ourselves only their expression of their thinking is a little bit different.’”
Modern Young People: ‘A Glorious Lot’, Cornishman, 1934
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That's exactly the right thing to do ... just make sure you go into it with your hand ready to grab the brake real hard! Once people know that you're retired, word will get around and it'll be "Ol' Gary" (or Lannis or John as the case may be) "is retired, HE'S got plenty of time and he's good at that stuff, ask him, he'll do it ..."
The principle of "If you want to get something done, give it to the busiest person you know of ..." applies even more in retirement than it does work.
With your shy and retiring personality and your unwillingness to let anyone know how you feel, you might be in real danger of this happening to you. Or maybe NOT! :laugh:
Lannis
My dad used to say, � When you retire there is just as much work to do. However, you have far less help...”
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My experience with the quality of doctoring is a steady slide downhill, not to mention finding one with a European name is difficult. I seek out Nurse Practitioners as they seem to still care