In the spirit of We Buy Houses model, would you hire a millennial?
Are you a parent educating a 18 - 22 year old?
For me I dont know if my 2 children will do a "traditional" 4 yr private college, it depends on their drive and focus and ability to double major in finance - political science or something that is economically useful for work. Just my HO.
What do the readers of BP think? Millennials in trouble?
I am a millennial and a college drop out. Well, drop out may not be the correct term. I truly believe one is never too old to go to school. I'm sure I'll return some day. Not sure when.
Anyways, I took a break from school to take advantage of the boom going on in North Dakota. It's been going well, and I'm making more money than I would if I had graduated and took an entry level job. The point is, millennials will do just fine if they have the right attitude and are willing to adapt there lifestyle. I know many friends & family who are doing much worst than I am doing. The problem is, they aren't willing to change how they live.
Millennials definitely face a tougher job market than we did. Even if they can get hired, decent pay is almost non-existent without a college degree. Even with a degree, unless it is in a STEM field, you are still struggling to find a decent wage even after earning your degree. While I agree with @John Ma that it should be about great ideas and wanting to change the world, it has to balance with being able to support yourself with at least a decent wage. If offered the option of working somewhere that makes a difference or challenges you for decent pay or working a boring job for higher pay, most of the millennials I know will choose the challenging job hands down, and I respect them for that. The issue these days, unfortunately, is that usually their option is more like making a difference for unpaid internship with a stipend they can't live on or boring job that pays $15/hour or less to start. It just seems there are fewer and fewer decent starting-salary positions out there and a lot more low-paying jobs. When I read the news, for instance, about a supposedly great program that re-trains workers at a local community college so after they graduate, they can get hired at the new company in town that's paying $13/hour for skilled labor, it just makes me sad. People just seem to be getting used to accepting less and less pay for more and more work, and that can't end well for the average millennial today.
Yeah, I have a BA in poli sci and history (once upon a time, I wanted to attend grad school), and will probably never use it. Although who knows where my life would have went had I majored in finance, it would certainly be more useful than talking about Operation Barbarossa.
Saying that "we can become anything we want to be" is fine, as long as the people to whom it was being told know that it takes real work. I do know some people who feel egregiously entitled, but for the most part, most go with the flow of everyday life and sometimes talk about what they want to become.
Ever since I had an internship in college geared toward local economic development, I've really clicked with entrepreneurship and have only recently really started to take concrete steps.
America could definitely do a much better job getting teens geared for the real world than what it currently does.