What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?

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What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by SMAZ on Tue Jul 26 11:49:17 2016 fiogf49gjkf0d besides posting on BusChat? ----------- What Are Young Non-Working Men Doing? The Atlantic Older men without a college degree are the core of Trump’s constituency. Perhaps it’s worth seeing how their younger selves are doing now. In February 2011, the Washington Post published a survey it conducted with the Kaiser Family Foundation and Harvard University on the U.S. economy. Although black and Hispanic families were hurt by the Great Recession, it was the "non-college whites" who held the darkest view of the country. These men used to the the backbone of an economy built by brawn and rooted in manufacturing jobs. But now, nostalgic and despondent in equal measure, more than half said that America’s best days were past, and 43 percent said "hard work and determination are no guarantees of success.” The survey feels portentous now that the category of “non-college whites” has become the core demographic of Donald Trump’s astonishingly strong coalition. Trump’s support is driven by racism, xenophobia, and other varieties of cultural unease, but it is also a reflection of a lost generation of men, enraged and adrift in an economy where a college degree is one of the few dependable life rafts. Non-college men in their 40s and older are shocking the country with their turn toward nationalism. But what’s the situation among non-college men under 35? If good, steady, well-paying work is the key to any person’s economic satisfaction, there are several reasons to be nervous about the upcoming generation. Since 2000, the labor-force participation rate of young men without a college degree has declined more than any other age-and-gender group. Since the turn of the century, the participation rate of 16-to-24-year olds with just a high-school degree has fallen 10 points to about 70 percent; for those without even a high-school degree, it's fallen 20 points, to 30 percent. Some of this drop is attributable to rising college attendance. But not all of it. Nine percent of Americans between 20 and 24 are neither in school, work, or training. So where do these men live? What are they doing all day? The answer to the first question seems to be that more of them are living at home. For the first time since at least the 1940s, young men are more likely to be living with their parents than with romantic partners. In 2014, 35 percent of young men between 18 and 34 lived with their parents, compared to just 28 percent who lived with a spouse. It's not the cost of college or the weight of student loans alone that is forcing young people to stay home. Young adults without a high-school or college degree are far more likely to live with their parents. For young black men, this trend is hardly new; even in 1980, they were more likely to live with their parents than with a spouse or girlfriend. As for what they’re doing all day, Erik Hurst, an economist at the University of Chicago, is now conducting research that suggests that non-college men who aren’t in the labor market are spending a considerable amount of their time in front of screens. Here is how Hurst explained his preliminary findings in a “Faculty Spotlight” profile on the University of Chicago’s website, as noted by the economist Tyler Cowen on his blog: In the 2000s, employment rates for young men with less than a four-year degree dropped sharply – more than in any other group. We have determined that, in general, they are not going back to school or switching careers, so what are they doing with their time? The hours that they are not working have been replaced almost one for one with leisure time. Seventy-five percent of this new leisure time falls into one category: video games. Detached from the labor force, with neither a college degree nor a steady job, these men have little income. But the technological revolution in media and entertainment of the last few decades has made it cheaper than ever to divert oneself on a phone, computer, television, or video-game console. Leisure is cheap enough that it apparently doesn’t require a steady W-2 or 1099 to have fun. And they are having fun, Hurst emphasized. “Happiness surveys actually indicate that they [are] quite content compared to their peers,” he told UChicago. In the short run, not working doesn’t seem to make men miserable at all. Cheap and abundant entertainment anesthetizes less-skilled and less-educated young men in the present. But in the long run, it cuts them off from the same things that provide meaning in middle age, according to psychological and longitudinal studies —a career, a family, and a sense of accomplishment. The problem is that these 20-year-olds will eventually be 30-year-olds and 40-year-olds, and although young men who don’t go to college might appear happy now, those same satisfaction studies suggest that they will be much less happy in their 30s and 40s—less likely to get married, and more likely to be in poverty. There is a rising generation of less-educated men, cut off from steady employment, but, for the moment, diverted by entertainment. They are, as far as Hurst can tell, not miserable now; and yet, there is little precedent for a large and highly satisfied group of non-married, middle-aged men living in poverty in an advanced economy. “This problem, if that is the right word for it, will not be easily solved," Cowen wrote on his blog. If these men back a political movement, it probably won’t look much like today’s Trumpist’s coalition. After all, Trump’s support skews heavily white, and many of today’s young men who didn’t graduate high school are black and Hispanic. But one possible lesson of this election is that feelings of cultural isolation and economic despondency are ingredients in a noxious and unpredictable compound, which can combust in surprising ways. Another mix may be brewing.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by SLRT* on Tue Jul 26 12:35:21 2016, in response to What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by SMAZ on Tue Jul 26 11:49:17 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d They're living with their parents, the much-hated Baby Boomers and GenX-ers. We're working on a lost generation here.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by Catfish 44* on Tue Jul 26 12:38:31 2016, in response to What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by SMAZ on Tue Jul 26 11:49:17 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Hanging out in Starbucks or the new Apple Store that going to open up in Williamsburg.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by Catfish 44* on Tue Jul 26 12:38:38 2016, in response to What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by SMAZ on Tue Jul 26 11:49:17 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Hanging out in Starbucks or the new Apple Store that going to open up in Williamsburg. Or waiting for zucchini park to stage another protest.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by R2ChinaTown* on Tue Jul 26 12:41:40 2016, in response to What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by SMAZ on Tue Jul 26 11:49:17 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Perhaps they should be in the que for one of those shovel ready jobs that Obama promised about 7 years ago. I hear that they are almost ready.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by TonyG* on Tue Jul 26 13:15:17 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by R2ChinaTown on Tue Jul 26 12:41:40 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Those "shovel ready" jobs aren't ready because the GOP has stopped Obama at every turn.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by Spider-Pig* on Tue Jul 26 13:26:22 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by SLRT on Tue Jul 26 12:35:21 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Maybe we need to have a massive war, so we'd be forced to reinstate the draft and thin out their ranks a little. Of course, as many of these men are fat and of poor physical fitness, they would be little more than cannon fodder.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by R2ChinaTown* on Tue Jul 26 13:26:53 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by TonyG on Tue Jul 26 13:15:17 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d LOL. when Obama promised the shovel ready jobs, the democRATs controlled Congress too.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by R2ChinaTown* on Tue Jul 26 13:28:33 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by Spider-Pig on Tue Jul 26 13:26:22 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d That's just what Roosevelt did
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by SLRT* on Tue Jul 26 13:29:48 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by Spider-Pig on Tue Jul 26 13:26:22 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Or maybe we could have more jobs. As to fat and cannon fodder, you think all the guys who entered the military were fit? By the end of Basic they were.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by Spider-Pig* on Tue Jul 26 13:42:31 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by R2ChinaTown on Tue Jul 26 13:28:33 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d God bless Franklin Roosevelt.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by ftgreeneg* on Tue Jul 26 14:10:04 2016, in response to What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by SMAZ on Tue Jul 26 11:49:17 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Not suprising as this country move to a more service based economy and away from production. Recommendation would be what i tell my relatives on the same situation either A. Go to college or B. Learn a trade and even these aren't a guarentee of success. It's tough out here many who say just get a job don't realize jobs aren't falling off trees.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by salaamallah@hotmail.com* on Tue Jul 26 14:12:49 2016, in response to What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by SMAZ on Tue Jul 26 11:49:17 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d sell cds and dvds and get shot by police !
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by R2ChinaTown* on Tue Jul 26 14:26:39 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by salaamallah@hotmail.com on Tue Jul 26 14:12:49 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Great career path. Then your family gets to sue for million and buys that Beverly Hills mansion you always wanted.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by TonyG* on Tue Jul 26 14:40:25 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by ftgreeneg on Tue Jul 26 14:10:04 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d In fact, with the increase in automation there will even be less jobs out there in the coming years. Anyone who drives/pilots a truck, bus, car, or aircraft for a living is about to lose his/her job in the next 20 years.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by ftgreeneg* on Tue Jul 26 14:49:44 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by TonyG on Tue Jul 26 14:40:25 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Exactly much like the coal industry is it the govt fault? Or is it just the dark side of progress progress? (Automation or with coal a cleaner way to do what coal does was found) imo thats where getting a trade comes in find the jobs that cant be replaced by someone in another country. As long as there's construction someone will need a crane operator, as long as we have toilets we will always need plumbers etc. The problem is there's more ppl in need of jobs than jobs. Of course there's always entrepreneurship is another option.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by orange blossom special* on Tue Jul 26 14:53:07 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by ftgreeneg on Tue Jul 26 14:49:44 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d We have a President who said his goal was to have the gov't make them all unemployed. Now I know no one else here will ever go to area's where they have coal miners, democrat snobs on subchat and all, but with automation, new arc furnaces and all, they still have a lot of employees. Who were just laid off in the last few months. However, there is one issue with the service industry as well, that you all have brought up. Service industry will not grow as fast as it could, government mandated wages. Robots really are cheaper. They're using them in China now to save 15 cents per bowl of noodles.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by salaamallah@hotmail.com* on Tue Jul 26 15:07:51 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by R2ChinaTown on Tue Jul 26 14:26:39 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d no chance ! the pigs always get away with it
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by ftgreeneg* on Tue Jul 26 15:20:35 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by orange blossom special on Tue Jul 26 14:53:07 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Coal is very polluting and there's cleaner alternatives than coal it's unfortunate but we owe it to our future generations to leave them a planet thats actually habitable. Hopefully places like West Virginia can find an alternative economy but it's not realistic to keep coal production when theres a better ways to produce energy. I do agree automation will take more and more jobs. Heck i walked into a McDonalds in Manhattan a couple wks ago and had to order off a computer screen. Some restaurants have you order off of tablets. The dark side of progress...
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by Dave* on Tue Jul 26 17:06:22 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by SLRT on Tue Jul 26 13:29:48 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by Dave* on Tue Jul 26 17:08:43 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by salaamallah@hotmail.com on Tue Jul 26 14:12:49 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Are you describing your retirement goals?
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by salaamallah@hotmail.com* on Tue Jul 26 17:16:27 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by Dave on Tue Jul 26 17:08:43 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d WTF !!
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by BILLBKLYN* on Tue Jul 26 20:48:49 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by salaamallah@hotmail.com on Tue Jul 26 14:12:49 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d ONLY when you refuse to put your right hand where the police can see it and not reach for your gun. (as recorded on film. Yes, I technically know a cellphone camera is not film)
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by Spider-Pig* on Tue Jul 26 21:32:14 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by BILLBKLYN on Tue Jul 26 20:48:49 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d It's still called filming. Like dialing a non-dial telephone or taping something with a DVR.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by ntrainride* on Tue Jul 26 22:10:31 2016, in response to What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by SMAZ on Tue Jul 26 11:49:17 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d nothing makes "some" people happier than reporting on how the "young white" demographic is faring poorly. all my life, the glee of these folks presenting these facts has been evident.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by BILLBKLYN* on Tue Jul 26 23:27:46 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by Spider-Pig on Tue Jul 26 21:32:14 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Yes, you and I know that, but the Asperger Army will take me to task for it!
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by Terrapin Station* on Tue Jul 26 23:39:29 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by BILLBKLYN on Tue Jul 26 23:27:46 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d No they won't.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by SLRT* on Wed Jul 27 10:10:14 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by Dave on Tue Jul 26 17:06:22 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Oh yeah, they give you a nice haircut too. Actually, "give you" is not quite right. You pay for the haircut; every week during basic training.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by Spider-Pig* on Wed Jul 27 11:14:54 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by ftgreeneg on Tue Jul 26 15:20:35 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d That sounds excellent. Which McDonald's was this? I ordered from an automated kiosk at a Jack in the Box in Downtown Los Angeles back in 2009. Much better experience than traditional ordering. I also only order Starbucks and Dunkin' Donuts using the app. Five Guys and Panera Bread also have mobile ordering. Anyway, at least for now, they still have a person prepare your order for you. In many restaurants, these are the same people. So this only makes the operation more efficient.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by SLRT* on Wed Jul 27 13:23:24 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by Spider-Pig on Wed Jul 27 11:14:54 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Bring back the Automats! Although, truth to tell, I'm not certain Automats were so much more labor-efficient than other cafeterias. The food still had to be prepared and monitored since it needed to be continually restocked. And the various devices needed to be serviced.
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by salaamallah@hotmail.com* on Wed Jul 27 13:25:48 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by BILLBKLYN on Tue Jul 26 20:48:49 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d i dont do that
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by salaamallah@hotmail.com* on Wed Jul 27 13:29:59 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by BILLBKLYN on Tue Jul 26 20:48:49 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d even when you co operate you still get shot MURDERED
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Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?
Posted by BILLBKLYN* on Wed Jul 27 21:21:02 2016, in response to Re: What Do Young Non-Working Men Do?, posted by salaamallah@hotmail.com on Wed Jul 27 13:29:59 2016.* fiogf49gjkf0d Well, Brown and Garner were NOT cooperating!
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