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It’s a Tough Job Market for the Young Without College Degrees

nytimes.com

71–80 of 101 posts

Re: It’s a Tough Job Market for the Young Without College Degrees

#73

A college degree is the new high school degree. You pretty much top out in the upper teens per hour without a degree: and that's if you're lucky. I've been on both sides. Since getting my undergrads in Comp Sci and MIS I make more money than I ever thought I would. Before this I got a job driving buses for the city making ~$10.50/hr and I thought that was all the money in the world.

Same boat here. High school dropout, semi-professional musician / food-service worker, then got my CS degree at age 27. Being on both sides is interesting, and in some ways I'm thankful I lived off a low without even a high school degree just for the life experience. I still ride the same bicycle, drive the same car, etc. I try not to forget how much a dollar is worth but it can be hard sometimes. My life back then w…

Surely flipping burgers is a step up from Java coding? Asking if they want fries with that is better than having to endure the shit-fest of eclipse, and the horrors of Java development

Re: It’s a Tough Job Market for the Young Without College Degrees

#75
No college? No problem. Google how to make websites and start making websites. There's an infinite number of small businesses, grandpas and grandmas needing a website for whatever reason. Learn html and css, which are probably the easiest languages to know, and you can already start making money. No computer? No problem, go to a public library.

Re: It’s a Tough Job Market for the Young Without College Degrees

#77
post #75

No college? No problem. Google how to make websites and start making websites. There's an infinite number of small businesses, grandpas and grandmas needing a website for whatever reason. Learn html and css, which are probably the easiest languages to know, and you can already start making money. No computer? No problem, go to a public library.

[deleted]

Re: It’s a Tough Job Market for the Young Without College Degrees

#78
post #29

What America needs are institutions similar to that of the apprenticeship programs of Western Europe. I came out of a one year job training program operating out of a non-profit with corporate partners (similar to the way it works in parts of the EU) that consists of college credit classes and industry experience. This lowers the barrier to entry for most young adults (like myself) to get into the job market and jump…

The American story, reinforced regularly with research and articles like this one, has no category for professional or vocational training. The story is simply "how much university education do you have". If you go and train to be an electrician, you're the same as a high-school graduate.

So yeah, I agree, this is a big cultural problem the US faces.

It seems like skilled trades are kind of ignored in tech circles, largely because we rarely use them. (Calling the HVAC repairmen is the landlord's job.)

Re: It’s a Tough Job Market for the Young Without College Degrees

#79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same boat here. High school dropout, semi-professional musician / food-service worker, then got my CS degree at age 27. Being on both sides is interesting, and in some ways I'm thankful I lived off a low without even a high school degree just for the life experience. I still ride the same bicycle, drive the same car, etc. I try not to forget how much a dollar is worth but it can be hard sometimes. My life back then w…

Surely flipping burgers is a step up from Java coding? Asking if they want fries with that is better than having to endure the shit-fest of eclipse, and the horrors of Java development

To be fair, if you get to use IntelliJ it's on par with working at Olive Garden, or working as a garbageman.

Re: It’s a Tough Job Market for the Young Without College Degrees

#80
post #48
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you are tracking (and cherry picking) is the inflation rate, which naturally goes up and down over time. My point was, and remains, people are paid more today on a minimum, than they ever were intended to be when this program was created in 1938. Minimum wage was intended as a baseline for unskilled entry-level jobs. Our issue today is we have a tremendous amount of folks, more than ever imagined, attempting to…

Inflation rate is just that a rate, not adjusting for it after 7 years because fuck people with limited mental capacity is sick. As to trying things for 78 years we have very different problems now vs 78 years ago. To pretend otherwise is to simply act the fool. There are many popular ideas that simply don't work. Pretending everyone is a healthy, intelligent, well educated, and they can just make everything better b…

Purchasing power is going down even faster than inflation for housing, child care, and education. Even if minimum wage was keeping pace with inflation, the very things low income earners need most are outpacing inflation.
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