Problems of unwanted youth, unmarried, social breakdown

[razz]

While this could go into several fora, it ultimately affects society so I chose to share it here.

This Canadian reporter has captured the problem quite succinctly, I think. Sad to recognize but what to do about it?

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/opinion/unskilled-unmarried-unwanted/article2130733/

"The decline of marriage has gone hand in hand with the decline in male employment. In Britain, the NEET rate among the young (NEET stands for not in employment education or training) is pushing 20%. In the U.S., the unemployment rate among black teenagers is nearly 40%. But the problem is by no means entirely racial. Male employment overall is in decline. In 1970, only 7% of American men didn’t work. Today, a fifth of American men don’t work. These men, as Fortune’s Nina Easton observes, are either “collecting unemployment, in prison, on disability, operating in the underground economy, or getting by on the paycheques of wives or girlfriends or parents.” Not coincidentally, non-marital birth rates among lower-income whites now resemble those of inner-city blacks.

Any way you look at this, it’s a time bomb. Mr. Cameron knows this, which is why he calls the riots “a huge event in the life of the nation.” Both Britain and America have developed a large, permanent underclass whose numbers are growing. Rootless, unmoored young men with no stake in society are a major threat to social order."

[flowerseverywhere]

excellent article. I particularly liked this passage.

"More social programs aren’t the answer either. We’ve been there, done that, for the past four decades of the welfare state. If there’s one thing we should have learned, it’s that the state is totally unable to compensate for broken families."

I certainly have no answer, more birth control earlier in the schools and easier access to abortions maybe? One of my girlfriends used to be the school nurse in an inner city middle school and every year a handful of the sixth and seventh graders got pregnant and had abortions.

[Anne Lee]

Actually, I think the answer is the return of manufacturing and more tech school programs. We need to localize our industries and start preparing the next generation of machinists, mechanics and engineering technicians to help us transition to non-fossil fuel energy.

[flowerseverywhere]

Actually, I think the answer is the return of manufacturing and more tech school programs. We need to localize our industries and start preparing the next generation of machinists, mechanics and engineering technicians to help us transition to non-fossil fuel energy.

Is there a market for goods produced by people getting good wages and benefits? It seems to me that everyone wants to run to a big box store and buy the cheapest toaster. Yet they have no problems spending money on coffee or designer bagels. So service jobs may be available but are there machinist jobs available? My friend who works in one of the last auto parts manufacturing factories makes little over $30,000 a year. And I know a lot of people who are university educated who are making in the 30's and 40's. So even if you have better high school education based on technology I can't see livable wages being paid. At least not the standard of living most people are accustomed to. Many people here could do it and have a very satisfactory standard of living but not the general population.

[Lainey]

Some say this is also the cause of the unrest in the Middle East. Millions of young unmarried unemployed low-education males ripe for attraction into violence of one kind or another.

You can criticize social programs, but one of the services cut in London was the local youth clubs. Rioters felt it was another example of how banks get bailed out but average people get nothing. One rioter said "I'm taking my bankers bonus." BIG Disclaimer: I do not advocate violence, but I do approve of peaceful protests as a civil right.

What to do? I agree with the idea of free or very cheap birth control and abortion widely available - adding unwanted children to this situation will obviously make it much worse. Also expand programs like AmeriCorps which would include some physical local labor projects that the younger men and women are suited for. If you're working some kind of major clean-up or construction project all day 5 days/week, you are going to be way too tired to raise much h**l.

[IshbelRobertson]

Many of the UK's looters/rioters are on Job Seekers Allowance, or Unemployment Benefit - they pay no rent as their (usually) single-parent mother gets housing benefit which pays the whole rent of her council house. They emerge from schooling (at least 5-16 years) almost totally illiterate and innumerate. They then say 'we can't get a job'. WHO would want to employ them? It's much easier to take on an EU national from one of the newer countries from that Union, for instance, a Polish plumber or a Lithuanian carpenter, who you know will give you a good job and value for money.

Most of those ferals who robbed and in some instance killed in those riots wouldn't have ever taken advantage of youth clubs anyway!

[Zoebird]

I think that there are a lot of layers to things.

one is a sort of institutionalized 'on the dole' situation. i met a young woman here (early 30s) whose family has been on welfare benefits for years and years. Now, I will say that, in general, I believe in welfare benefit -- i believe it's meant to help people in a tough spot, or allow them to get through until they get move into another way of life (eg, a friend of mine is a single mom, and the benefits she gets -- rent, child care, food benefits -- allow her to take care of her son and work part time to cover the rest of her bases. her son is young, and so when he starts school, her benefits will change because she can work more, etc).

But this woman that I met, she's different.

See, her partner -- who is also my friend -- owns her own business. like me, she knows that *reliability* is a HUGE part of that work. It's not just making appointments and keeping them, but also being available for appointments down the line.

Now, one day, my new friend "annie" was invited by friends to go go-carting. Annie wanted her partner "Sarah" to join them. Sarah said "but I have an appointment, so I won't be able to go." And Annie was upset: "Why not just reschedule?" And then sarah explained how it's about reliability for the clients; you can't "just cancel" like that! Annie said it just made no sense and that Sarah is a "workaholic" and so on.

Sarah only works 4 days a week as it is, and I would call her diligent, but she has a good work-life balance. In talking to Annie, since her whole family has been on the dole for generations, the idea of working more than part time, or working at all, is just. . . foreign. It means that you don't enjoy life, or value family, or value yourself because you "demean" yourself with work that is "beneath" you -- eg, any menial job is "beneath" you.

I find that fascinating because if it wasn't for Sarah (or me) who pay the taxes that pay the dole, then they would nto be able to not work, or not work part time, and I know darn well that "menial" work is not "beneath" me.

But I know a lot of people who feel that "bitch work" is beneath them -- and I meet this attitude even among educated youth. I had a yoga teacher who worked for me. She had just graduated from teacher training. I've been teaching for 15 years, the other teachers had been teaching for 10 years or more. She was new. So, she did not get preferential times, and -- like all of us -- she had to do things like, open the doors and half hour early to greet her students, greet her students and take their money, teach the class, clean the studio after class, and so on.

She considered not getting the best class times (which I took, because it's my business, and i'm most experienced, etc), and having to do all of the supporting work as "bitch work" and "beneath her level of education." Well, I was a hellava lot more educated than her: BA, JD, 8 years of yoga teacher training apprenticeship, and 15 years teaching yoga plus 7 of those years managing other yoga studios. She had a BA, 1 year of yoga studies, 200 hr teacher training, and never taught a class. But opening the door for clients was beneath her.

So, it's a much more complex issue than "giving them" menial work -- would they take it? or is it beneath them?

[Bronxboy]

Actually, I think the answer is the return of manufacturing and more tech school programs. We need to localize our industries and start preparing the next generation of machinists, mechanics and engineering technicians to help us transition to non-fossil fuel energy.
Agree. This is another part of the failure of schools to provide for physical learning. This lowers the achievement of boys overall, and causing an inadequate supply of people (male and female) able to do physical things.