Quote:This part is so ridiculous it is hard to know where to start.  The generation before gave us this generation.  The middle class has been one horizontal line for 40 years.  

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/...story.html

 

Not surprisingly, facts are different from perception.  Drop out rates all time low and scores are up.  10% went to college in the 30's, 40's and 50's.  Now, enrollment is around 65%.  I remember TMD arguing how much better the old days were and how violent people are now a days except crime is down.  Those little facts still did not matter.

 

I thought this part of the article was great: “Going back to at least 1880, the business community has never said a nice word about public schools. Every generation of graduates is supposedly stupider than the last,” says David C. Berliner, a professor emeritus of education at Arizona State University. “The demonization of youth is a national pastime in the U.S.”

 

Answer this question.  Are you better off now at this point in your life than your parents were?  I don't know if you are old enough to have adult children, but if so ask yourself this.  Are they better off now than you were at their age?  What about the young ones growing up now?  Is the opportunity there for them to succeed?

 

It used to be that high school students would work part time and/or summer jobs in fast food and/or retail in order to have some spending money and also to save for college.  Today those jobs are filled by people that either dropped out of school or are unable to find gainful employment.  You have people that think that working as a fast food employee or a retail clerk at WalMart is a "career".  They are demanding higher (unrealistic) wages and benefits at the cost of the normal "average" wage earner.  Granted, there are many people that actually move up within a company and go on to be successful in those kinds of industry, but the one thing that makes them stand out are work ethic and the characteristic of working hard to achieve.

 

You don't see that today.  Many want to "get paid now" for work/positions that were once considered a stepping stone to a better career.  More important is the latest cell phone so they can "tweet", the latest cars, clothing, etc. as well as cable/satellite television.  They have been raised around it and expect it to be something that is "a given" rather than something to work for and achieve.

 

Typical trades such as being a plumber, carpenter, electrician, auto mechanic, etc. are "looked down upon" as "working class jobs" even though the skills necessary to perform those jobs are much higher than the skills required to work at McDonald's. People working in those trades are very much more higher skilled and earn (starting out) around what people that think that McDonald's is a career are demanding.

 

I would say that today's younger generation hasn't learned one important lesson that my generation and those before me learned.  SACRIFICE.  Nothing comes easy and nothing is a given.

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