This is just an article I was reading earlier. The guy should have taken the job offer he got IMO. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/American-Dream-Is-Elusive-for-nytimes-1858628195.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=5&asset=&ccode= GRAFTON, Mass. — After breakfast, his parents left for their jobs, and Scott Nicholson, alone in the house in this comfortable suburb west of Boston, went to his laptop in the living room. He had placed it on a small table that his mother had used for a vase of flowers until her unemployed son found himself reluctantly stuck at home. The daily routine seldom varied. Mr. Nicholson, 24, a graduate of Colgate University, winner of a dean’s award for academic excellence, spent his mornings searching corporate Web sites for suitable job openings. When he found one, he mailed off a résumé and cover letter — four or five a week, week after week. Over the last five months, only one job materialized. After several interviews, the Hanover Insurance Group in nearby Worcester offered to hire him as an associate claims adjuster, at $40,000 a year. But even before the formal offer, Mr. Nicholson had decided not to take the job. Rather than waste early years in dead-end work, he reasoned, he would hold out for a corporate position that would draw on his college training and put him, as he sees it, on the bottom rungs of a career ladder. “The conversation I’m going to have with my parents now that I’ve turned down this job is more of a concern to me than turning down the job,” he said. He was braced for the conversation with his father in particular. While Scott Nicholson viewed the Hanover job as likely to stunt his career, David Nicholson, 57, accustomed to better times and easier mobility, viewed it as an opportunity. Once in the door, the father has insisted to his son, opportunities will present themselves — as they did in the father’s rise over 35 years to general manager of a manufacturing company. “You maneuvered and you did not worry what the maneuvering would lead to,” the father said. “You knew it would lead to something good.” Complicating the generational divide, Scott’s grandfather, William S. Nicholson, a World War II veteran and a retired stock broker, has watched what he described as America’s once mighty economic engine losing its pre-eminence in a global economy. The grandfather has encouraged his unemployed grandson to go abroad — to “Go West,” so to speak. “I view what is happening to Scott with dismay,” said the grandfather, who has concluded, in part from reading The Economist, that Europe has surpassed America in offering opportunity for an ambitious young man. “We hate to think that Scott will have to leave,” the grandfather said, “but he will.” [article continues]
‘Rather than waste early years in dead-end work, he reasoned, he would hold out for a corporate position that would draw on his college training and put him, as he sees it, on the bottom rungs of a career ladder.’ What an idiot. He doesn’t have to spend any more time than it takes to get a more desirable job. Now all he gets is more time with no income.
What I want to know is who still uses the term “Stock Broker.” What is this, Boiler Room 1990’s?
Brokers are everyone in retail
ASSet_MANagement Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > What I want to know is who still uses the term > “Stock Broker.” What is this, Boiler Room 1990’s? It’s an amazingly poorly written article, agreed, but the grandfather was probably a legitimate broker in the 1950s. They didn’t have etrade back then. 
Re: American Dream Is Elusive for New Generation - NYT seems like the kid found it - he’s sitting at home playing halo while someone else pays for him to be there. more american every day.
Most of these brats that have never had a job think the 4 years they spent partying while learning how to perform a basic NPV calc and stand in front of a powerpoint (things you can teach an 18 year old in 4 weeks) somehow equates to them deserving success. He should have taken the job because the market’s sending him a very clear signal about the value of his current skill set and he’s choosing to refuse it in all of his infinite wisdom grounded in his lack of professional experience. I took a contract job for 42k out of a MSF program (w/ 3 cfa levels passed and 2 years exp) to pay bills and increase my skill set (albeit in minor ways) until I found something better. What a spoiled tool. And he thinks he’ll get a job overseas, he obviously has no idea how difficult of a transition that is, sounds like his family is just as clueless. Only way that’ll happen is if he joins the ARMY.
Unfortunately, most of our generation (25-35) thinks the world owes us a great job because we graduated college or read a few finance books or passed the CFA exams. In reality, nobody owes us anything and times have changed. If we want a great job, we have to go and get it (i.e, market our skills, network like crazy, learn to communicate) and not sit around sending blind resumes, texts and playing video games.
the title is horrible main difference- his dad/ granddad took whatever opportunity came instead of waiting for the job they feel they ‘deserved’. No one during the great depression would pass off a 40k a year corporate job. Self-entitled brat… you cannot compare today to the GD.
What can you say its an entitlement issue, he has no sense of the value of a days work. He doesn’t have to his parents fit the bill and enable his behaviour. When I was 18 my parents told me if I was in school I was welcome to stay but if I was not in school I was to get a job and pay rent or get out. People need to get a life…go contribute to society.
Man, what an article. As many of you have said, he should have taken the job. The poor little baby, he didn’t want it to stunt his career, so he opted for no career rather. Also, he might want to get off his a$$ instead of just trawling the net looking for jobs and sending off his resume and a cover letter. That is job searching with minimal effort. Why hasn’t he enrolled in a couple of short courses to brush up on a few skills? Why isn’t he out there networking his a$$ off? Making calls, contacting alumi, pestering secretaries. Jeez I’m not surprised he can’t get his dream job, he sounds like a lazy loser.
It was a huge mistake for this kid to turn down a 40K job. That said, the “American Dream” so to speak really is getting harder and harder to achieve with each successive generation. We no longer compete nationally, but globally. Millions upon millions of kids all over the world with dreams of landing even the most lowly job in finance. This is something the baby boomers will never quite understand. Thirty years ago any kid with a decent GPA and the necessary cash had a 50/50 chance of getting into a top MBA. Now, that finance degree BARELY qualifies you for a $12/hr assistant TO the regional manager job. The average salary for new grads keeps going down, while the cost of college and living in general has skyrocketed. “Career advancement” is a joke as most corporations are leaning out on the top end and would rather can your ass before they have to promote you. The whole system is messed up. America’s future isn’t in shambles because of my generation’s entitlement problem. My generation’s problem lies in the fact that we’ve become too reliant on the old ways. From age two on, we were told that if we didn’t go to college, our life would be oh so awful, and we’d never amount to anything. Now that we’ve graduated, we learn that society places ZERO value on education, other than having the prereq BA letters on your rez. And so we’re thrust into the world where otherwise brilliant kids go work as part-time English teachers in Korea or worse yet call center operators, most of whom will never amount to anything career wise. Just think how great America would be if we put less emphasis on getting some pointless degree, and more on entrepreneurship, job skills, and doing something you actually ENJOY. So if you want to bitch about my generation’s false entitlements, look in the mirror, because our values are really just a reflection of your own.
volante99 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > The whole system is messed up. America’s future > isn’t in shambles because of my generation’s > entitlement problem. My generation’s problem lies > in the fact that we’ve become too reliant on the > old ways. > “Career advancement” is a joke as most corporations are leaning out on the top end and would rather can your ass before they have to promote you. there used to be a lot of articles blaming the boomers for this. they occupy the current management roles and have become very fat/happy with their current 9-5 roles making 6 figs/benefits/vaca. they of of course only know the ‘old ways’ and don’t want to promote anyone below them in fear competition or having to learn something new. after the boomers retire there’s going to be a massive shift in american competitiveness. the next generation loves technology, is multi-tasking, and is very open to new ideas.
Lets just call a spade a spade here, someone mentioned it before. 99% of our generation is entirely too lazy.
^Can you summarise that for me
Muddahudda Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > ^Can you summarise that for me Sure. Why don’t you do it for me?
Cheers, can you pop that in a memo.
Sorry, we only summarize with a z here. You’ll have to go abroad for summareeze with an s.
My biggest problem with his behavior is not his sense of entitlement (which is rampant in my generation) or his naivete in assuming that there will be better out there. Its that he sent out “4 or 5 a week, week after week.” ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? That level of laziness is absurd and frankly, would immediately turn me off from this candidate. Last time I looked for a job I was sending out 5-10 letters/emails a day (while working), and taking at least 4 calls/interviews a week. I was also out hustling my network (I’m pretty sure Colgate has a good one, too). I wasn’t churning out good numbers for the first few weeks, which was discouraging, but after a while I got in a groove and interviews started rolling in. By the time I chose my current job, I had three offers on the table. I guess this goes out to all of those “how do I get a job?” posts as well. The key to getting a job in any market is hustle. Never stop looking on websites (which is a terrible way to source jobs, btw, unless its something like a GloCap or Ladders), never stop calling, never stop writing letters, never stop taking lunches/interviews/whatever until you have the options you want; and if the market cycle is not in favor for that industry/role, you find something else and keep hustling. Seriously, its not rocket science, it just takes hard work. As Jim Young says in Boiler Room, “Now be relentless, that’s it, I’m done.”
Not much new to add to the (deserved) savagery, but I do love this line: “a corporate position that would draw on his college training” Homeslice went to a librul arts school and got a poli sci degree. There are no jobs that will draw upon your college training. I can say this as a guy with a librul arts degree in the at least nominally useful mathematics field.