My: "structural unemployment response /Moving back home" (at 08:17 2004-02-02 +1300) {at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LessIsMore/message/14025 after signing-in} is: · Here I'm talking about responding to _structural_ unemployment. D. At 01:09 2004-01-31 -0000, Gary wrote: > AARP:- 60% of college graduates plan to move back home after graduation. - > >... and I DON'T mean families where the adult children continue to feed off their parents in a state of extended adolescence, but ones where adult children contribute their time and skills for the benefit of the extended family unit. Gary > At 11:41 2004-01-31 -0600, Ardee-ann wrote: > >Unfortunately many of these kids are moving back home because they aren't willing to take available jobs and are moving back home to sponge off mom and dad. ... I personally find it appalling. Many parents don't want their children with college degrees to flip burgers so they coddle them and support them. > >This is a huge soap box for me... it is about a generation with unrealistic expectations and a sense of entitlement. > ... >I do not understand this changing mindset...a 23 year old may need some time to get on their feet...but many of these "kids" are just slacking... At 03:49 2004-02-01 -0000, Gary wrote: > >Yes, that explains some but not all IMO. The college grad stat I mentioned may reflect kids facing a bad Recession and needing to remain at home temporarily > ... >About those wishing to live off their parents, this reminds me of how many wealthy northern nations live as well. They live a higher quality of life by drawing off past accumulated wealth: nations off oil/coal reserves stored over centuries; kids off the wealth accumulated by their parents in America's financial glory days. And they also live off their own futures as well -- nations by using unreplaceable global resources and by generating high national debt levels; kids by getting deep in debt as early as college and refusing to live within their means later on in life. ... > At 07:36 2004-02-01 +1300, I (David M.) wrote: - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - · In the 50s and 60s there were more jobs than there were suitable people to fill them ... Now there are far more _applicants_ for skilled jobs than there are jobs. This is largely caused by _automation_ ... and has been welcomed by most employers, as an effective way of keeping wages low. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -=##=- · First, about the common attitude (admittedly more applicable in uncivilised USA where, for most people, the only way to get money to live on is to have a job that pays money - a money-oriented society), that: if there is _any_ job, a person _should_ take it. "Should": therefore an ethical/ moral judgement); e.g.: "to flip burgers". (Note both my sons worked for lengthy periods at KFC.) · This is _an_ethical/moral_judgement_ for this reason; in my: http://davd.tripod.com/davdsviewhowliv.html#y1998_024 I quote: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Academy/1223/rf_shorts_1998_06juna.html#y1998_024 (or via: http://snipurl.com/1qi7 ) which is professional economist Keith Rankin's: - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Three Ways of Contributing to Society (4 June 1998) Humankind is a social species, and is implicitly understood as being so by, I would guess, 95 percent of us. (The exceptions are the extreme individualist; the sort of people who go to bed with a copy of Ayn Rand under their pillows.) The social good represents the "grand commons" of our species, meaning everything that is shared (eg resources, cultures, environments, institutions, infrastructures, science, ideas, ideals). We grow up with the innate belief that everyone must contribute in some way to the maintenance of the commons, suspecting - consciously or subconsciously - that if some are seen to not contribute (free-riding) then others may be tempted to free-ride also. Societies die when too many people become free-riders. In Western and Confucian cultures - eg under the "Protestant Work Ethic" - the term "contribution" has come to be understood to mean "paid work". In reality, of course, there are other forms of contribution. In addition, much paid work does not contribute to any social ends, and may indeed be socially damaging while serving strictly individual ends. For me, there are three broad categories of social contribution. The first is socially responsible market production. Here, we must recognise that the contribution is the "net social product" arising from the work, and may be unrelated to the efforts, time sacrifices or wages of the paid workers. We should never regard market incomes as measures of contribution. Nor should we regard "income tax" as a measure of an individual's contribution to society. An individual who appropriates an excessive share of market income will be regarded as having paid more income tax than persons less able to claim large shares, but may have made a smaller net contribution. The second form of social contribution is non-market production. This includes a whole range of unpaid activities that take place at global, national, local and household levels. Raising children is a particularly important example of a non-market contribution; an example that occurs on all four levels simultaneously. Each parent, through reproduction, is creating the future (paid and unpaid) workforce of the world. The third form of contribution is "conservation", or "treading lightly". The purpose of social contribution is to maintain the integrity of the commons. One way to maintain that integrity is to adopt a lifestyle that, while not involving any form of measurable production, at the same time involves no destruction. Leaving the planet as we find it is a form of contribution. Two cricket metaphors are apt here: "A run saved is a run gained", and "Dropped catches lose matches". Contribution through conservation [good fielding] is as important as contribution through production [batting]. And the socially negative by-products of indiscriminate market activity [dropped catches] tend to far exceed any negative impact arising from those conservers who add little to the commons that sustain us. A welfare system that facilitates a balance of the three different forms of contribution is more valuable to human society than a system that forces everyone to contribute through just one of the three forms. Indeed, mass labour market participation may contribute even less, net, than mass idleness. Variety is the spice of life. Variety of contribution is the means of safeguarding society. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - · Summarising: The three broad categories of social contribution: (1) socially responsible market production. Here, we must recognise that the contribution is the "net social product" arising from the work, and may be unrelated to the efforts, time sacrifices or wages of the paid workers. (2) non-market production. This includes a whole range of unpaid activities that take place at global, national, local and household levels. Raising children is a particularly important example ... (3) "conservation", or "treading lightly". The purpose of social contribution is to maintain the integrity of the commons. One way to maintain that integrity is to adopt a lifestyle that, while not involving any form of measurable production, at the same time involves no destruction. Leaving the planet as we find it is a form of contribution. · Notice how: a money-oriented society, like the almost-no-safety-net USA, has ignored two-thirds of the ways people can make their social contribution · It used not to be that way (at least to the current degree) even in the USA, and these other ways to "hold your head high" are valued as they should be (in a civilised society) almost everywhere else in the world - the other 95.5 percent of the world. · So applying a proper ethical/moral judgement to this question of whether people (including young people) _should_get_a_job_ (whatever job): ** the answer, in my opinion, is found by asking: - what is the cost of their continued liiving? and - what social benefit do they provide? *** · _Both_ have to be asked, _not_ just the money version of the second. · So an artist (after satisfying some criteria) in New Zealand is supported with about $8,400 a year from the state - they are valued by the representatives of the general public (the government). · And for at least 50 years NZ has supplied a safety-net for the unemployed to ensure they keep their job-skills up, and are ready to take the next _suitable_ job (physics teaching, in my case). At $8,435 per year. {Details: http://snipurl.com/47qw then the link: Unemployment Benefit and Independent Youth Benefit: for people who are out of work (pdf document) :- Weekly payments after tax- - No children - 1 child - - - 2 or more children Unemployment Benefit •Couples - - - - - - - - - - $134.70 each - $143.14 each - $143.14 each •Single 25 or over - - - - - $161.65 - - - - $231.53 - - - - $252.60 •Single 20-24 - - - - - - - $134.70 - - - - $231.53 - - - - $252.60; - $161.65 per week is: $8435 after tax, per year.} {· I was on the unemployed register for over a year, for political reasons, - I have also supported the Auckland Uneemployed Workers' Rights Centre, even when I was living on less than US$900 from my savings plus interest - though I haven't applied for the Unemployment Benefit.} -=##=- · Back to my main point: · Everyone should ask, about themselves and their acquaintances, as well as about the young people the economy isn't providing suitable jobs for: - what is the cost of their continued liiving? and - what social benefit do they provide? · _If_ you provide little social benefit (to your family, friends, and the wider community), you _should_ (an ethical/moral judgement) minimise the cost of keeping you alive (monetary and emotional) until they are about even · Hence _my_ choice to live on US$900 _per_year_ (US$17.25 a week). · I agree with Ardee-Ann's description of young Americans (and many others elsewhere): "a generation with unrealistic expectations and a sense of entitlement." And with Gary's: (people and nations) "living off past accumulated wealth" -=##=- · Now, about responding to _structural_ unemployment. · My own children have been (and are now) in this position of finding a way of life in this economy-designed-to-make-the-rich-richer. · One (in Sydney Australia) has made himself valuable to an organisation he believes is doing good for all those who connect with it. He lives on very little indeed, supplied by that organisation. · Another has worked his way up in a service organisation and is now paid just enough to live on in London England. He's been able to do this by first, living with us until he just got too bored (he ate very similar food to my minimal diet and used _very_little_ money; no Unemployment Benefit). And second (after he got to London) flatting with others in squalid (I'm guessing) conditions, plus working _very_ hard as a hotel porter. · The third, after returning here following a year or two in China (on her own) and Switzerland, has just finished her BSc-BA conjoint degree and has decided on what balance to draw between applying for jobs she would hope to enjoy doing, and doing her own independent study (Physics, Classical Chinese and other things where she wants to fill in the gaps), tutoring English to recent immigrants, and enjoying being with (and often helping) friends. About a third of each fortnight living with us, the other days living elsewhere. · I told her yesterday that I consider her a Pathfinder into our future where a job and money are only a relatively small part of one's life. -=# A sustainable future #=- David.