Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home • Hacker News Board

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#821

Post by Jetrel » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 7:33 AM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #478

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Degrees don't make you marriage material. This gets said so much on fora with men who regard themselves as “redpilled”, but it makes no sense to me personally. As a bookish and arts-inclined person, so much of my worldview, the things that occupy my thoughts during the day, has been formed by the canon of literature, music, films. No woman would seem dating and marriage material to me if she weren’t similarly erudi…

> Often the man claiming that men don’t care about a woman’s education, goes on to say that what matters is that the woman knows, for example, how to cook. That, too, has never made sense to me. I live in a country where for the childless, eating out good healthy food is not appreciably more expensive than cooking at home, and a woman who chooses to take advantage of that and use her valuable time for other pursuits,…

> if a woman is basically the mirror image of a man (degree, high paying job, spends most of the day at an office),

I have to be perfectly honest, but to me, this is entrepreneurialism, not intellectualism. Someone might go to college and get some massive degrees to become i.e a lawyer or a senior dev, or a doctor, but ... those are trade skills. There's a fair amount of overlap, but to me, intellectualism is something distinct.

For many of us, intellectualism is the "philo" part of "philosophy"; the love of knowledge. Not knowledge as a means to an end; as a means to a high-powered, eat-your whole-day career. But rather; knowledge for its own sake - knowledge that exists as a sort of purpose for life (whether secular or spiritual, it's practically the pursuit of curiosity and knowledge-seeking as a sort of borderline religious calling).

Guys like that are looking for a woman (or man, if they're so inclined) they can have fulfilling conversations with, every day, for the rest of their life. And it's not something you can do with your "pals"; there are some of these conversations you can only have with a soul mate. Hell, there are some of them you can only have with your lover - not a friend-with-benefits (which, sadly, includes a lot of spouses), but someone you've been willing to be truly vulnerable with and expose the depths of your soul to.

But yeah; for a lot of us, they have to have the same deep love of knowledge, curiosity, and sense of wonder about life - or there can't be love, there.

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#822

Post by watwut » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 7:35 AM UTC

majormajor wrote: post #409

Mirioron wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They don’t make those decisions for the benefit of men. They don’t have to. But isn't that the parent poster's point? They don't make decisions that make them more attractive for marriage, therefore they're less likely to end up married. The same argument applies to men too. Men don't have to do things that make them more attractive to women, but they shouldn't be all that surprised when they end up not being attra…

There's a group missing here. We're discussing stories talking about a demographic of women that are unhappy with the men they date, and also about a demographic of men that aren't dating at all. The men unable to get a date at all clearly have some work to do - even when there's so many unhappy women, there is something they're still doing or not doing that makes them even less appealing. The unhappy women and the m…

> There's a group missing here. We're discussing stories talking about a demographic of women that are unhappy with the men they date, and also about a demographic of men that aren't dating at all

We are not doing that. There is a lot of discussion about men who cant find partners. The common assumption in those is that women are never single if they dont want it. There is occasional pearl clutching about women who dont seek stable long term partner.

On HN, there is basically no discussion about what women think or want. And where such discussion is, what women say is ignored and instead male guesses are taken as gospel - even if man making those guesses interacts exclusively with males and dont know any woman close enough for her to tell him what she thinks.

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#823

Post by techsin101 » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 7:36 AM UTC

amin wrote: post #274

I know some guys like that, and all of them grew up without their biological father in the household. Anyone else notice this pattern? Could modern families (with step fathers, or without any father) contributed to men failing to become independant?

for whatever it's worth, my bio dad has been super hard on me, but it did push me to into going all out in terms of starting a career albeit at much psychological pain. was it worth it? i dont know maybe few years of pain for life long career.

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#824

Post by tacocataco » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 7:36 AM UTC

grammarnazzzi wrote: post #624

jdgoesmarching wrote: post #580

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s a lot of validity to the social struggles of men in a lot of online discourse, but to say “society“ punishes us for not being women flies in the face of almost every useful metric of socioeconomic success. Women did not create the society that is hurting men emotionally and economically. Buying into that victim complex is a distraction from your own self-development and healing.

> Women did not create the society that is hurting men emotionally and economically The extreme elements of 3rd wave feminism has influcenced society in ways that unfairly and negatively impact boys. Specifically the concept of "toxic masculinity". Toxic people are toxic. Toxic behaviors are toxic. Toxic people should be shamed and toxic behaviors should be discouraged. Boys should not be shamed for being masculine,…

Women can be influenced by toxic masculinity as well.

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#825

Post by lordnacho » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 7:38 AM UTC

sgt wrote: post #279

d_burfoot wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a slow motion tragedy. From an environmental perspective, this kind of minimalist lifestyle actually seems quite healthy. They don't drive, and I assume they don't fly or buy a lot of stuff, so their carbon and other resource footprint is small. They don't take up much extra space, so they reduce suburban sprawl and land required for housing. They probably won't have kids, which further reduces their environme…

In the future, it may even be more efficient to hook them up to a large computer that is able to use them as a power source, too. We could offer them a virtual reality completely indistinguishable from reality.

The problem is it's hard to get right. I saw a documentary where people broke out of the dream and it caused all sorts of issues, they were able break out other people using pills and teach them to fly and other unrealistic things.

I guess it's just not ready yet.

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#826

Post by techsin101 » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 7:41 AM UTC

90% of the problem is housing prices literally rent/buy both are out of reach of all. Why work if you job wont even cover full rent?

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#827

Post by parafactual » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 7:44 AM UTC

madaxe_again wrote: post #794

developer93 wrote: post #775

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, decades ago, men did run the world, to all intents and purposes. They're still in most positions of power (politics ceos etc), most things are designed by men, etc. This doesn't mean that it's the fault of every single man, any more than as a Brit who benefits from a legacy of empire that I'm personally responsible for whatever massacres. You can be aware of it without taking the blame.

If you’re happy and willing to take the benefits of structural inequality and its legacies, by refusing to acknowledge that being a white British male is a profound privilege, then you absolutely are to blame. You would hand on heart say that women in the U.K. are 100% equal to men? I’m a white British male. Every time I do anything that takes advantage of my position, which is pretty much daily, I am to blame. By pa…

Can you give an example of how one would work against the structural and cultural biases stacked in their favor?

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#828

Post by throw737858 » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 7:46 AM UTC

noisy_boy wrote: post #760

buildingmateri wrote: post #710

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Especially a problem because for almost all men a career and supporting family (maybe the hardest thing to figure out in life) is non optional, whereas half the female friends I have from college have abandoned careers to saddle up to a breadwinner ... I mean I kind of want that option but men don't really have it. Does anyone ever really discuss this social reality that makes it different for men v women in real wor…

For those lambasting the parent comment, ignore the phrasing and let us go by stats. Count how many women with successful careers you know that are married to unemployed men (to stick to the point the parent makes, let us skip cases where both husband/wife are working). Now do the same count with genders switched. Observe the differential - for the record, it is clear that there are complex reasons behind this differ…

It is not "socially normal/acceptable" to be single parent, yet 60% of young parents are single.

You are both out of reality.

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#829

Post by noisy_boy » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 8:06 AM UTC

throw737858 wrote: post #828

noisy_boy wrote: post #760

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For those lambasting the parent comment, ignore the phrasing and let us go by stats. Count how many women with successful careers you know that are married to unemployed men (to stick to the point the parent makes, let us skip cases where both husband/wife are working). Now do the same count with genders switched. Observe the differential - for the record, it is clear that there are complex reasons behind this differ…

It is not "socially normal/acceptable" to be single parent, yet 60% of young parents are single. You are both out of reality.

What would surprise a person more in today's context in US: hearing that child's parent is divorced/single parent (which by your stats is 60% for young parents, so pretty common) OR hearing about a successful woman with a husband who has chosen to be unemployed? You can keep twisting things but we are talking about what is "typical".

Re: Fewer young men are in the labor force, more are living at home

#830

Post by tonyedgecombe » Sat, Jun 12, 2021, 8:19 AM UTC

fb13 wrote: post #654

twh270 wrote: post #648

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. I've had many conversations about this topic with my son (and on occasion some of his friends -- both male and female), since he was in middle school (a decade ago). They're well aware of how men are portrayed versus women. We've transitioned from "A women's place is in the home (barefoot, pregnant, and cooking a delicious meal for her husband)" to "A woman's place is whatever she wants, and men are the reason f…

It's the chicken egg problem. Woman birthed man. Who's to blame? In all seriousness, if we are to succeed as a society, then ignorantly maintaining what are mostly over generalizations and stereotypes related to gender is a failing proposition. And that involves anything that existed pre-the-whole-world-is-now-connected. That means > It's not a binary decision, people. We don't need to decide which gender/sex is "bet…

That and similar feelings explains the increase in massacres, hatred, ...

Violence has been falling substantially in the US:

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/11/20/facts-about...