Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world. ~ Nelson Mandela
Now that the super-committee's decision-makers (what an oxymoronic phrase that is) have thrown in their towels and declared failure (blaming everyone else), the rest of us are left facing a probably bleak fiscal future to be dictated at some point by international bond markets. These 12 politicians now have been added to my growing list of cowards – afraid to solve pressing problems, like our lack of adequate growth and economic imbalance, with solutions that may either go against their rigid political orthodoxy or upset folks that fund their campaigns. I'm convinced members of Congress and virtually every other politician no longer have any idea about what really constitutes the public interest. They don't care; they only seek to serve narrow, private interests, not the broader, longer-term public interest. Our children are ultimately going to suffer most from this breakdown.
As I've said before, everyone of us 312 million US residents has a stake in resolving the over-riding issue of getting our country back in balance with equitable growth. However, as a parent with a son now in college, I have a particular concern about what can be done to prevent his generation (the Millennials) from becoming lost in the undertow of our persistent recession and political dysfunction. The Millennials' welfare is vital if the rest of us want to realize a sustainable future.
His generation has begun to show the rest of us how upsetting the lack of equitable opportunity can be; most clearly in venues with the Occupiers. In my view it's principally set off by three inter-related trends – the lack of sufficient economic growth, the unswervingly ideological basis for politicians' hypocritical non-decisions and the consequences of crony/predatory capitalism.
These trends have considerably weakened the axiom held by generations of Americans, "Going to college will guarantee you a good job." The table below shows the steady rise in the proportion of young adults who have received a college B.A. degree since the beginning of the 20th century, based on Census data.
Year | Proportion of Young Adults with a College B.A. |
1905 | 2% |
1930 | 4% |
1950 | 5% |
1960 | 10% |
1970 | 11% |
1980 | 20% |
1990 | 24% |
2000 | 24% |
2003 | 27% |
2009 | 30% |
Except now it isn't working out that way. Our children have been graduating from college in ever-increasing numbers, but real wages have been stagnant and "good jobs" have become an ever-distant prospect. I'm feeling the very disturbing prospect that my promise about post-college success may turn out to be baseless.
Here's my family history regarding college. I grew up in a household where there was never any doubt what I would be doing after graduating from high school: I was going to college. Beginning more than 50 years ago, many parents like mine have spoken this mantra to insure their kids' hopeful triumph as adults. Our kids are the fourth generation of my family who have gone to and graduated from college. When my grandfather graduated in 1905 from what would later become the University of Massachusetts, less than 2% of young adults – YA's – (then meaning almost exclusively men) got college degrees. When my mother and father graduated from their colleges in the early 1930's (not an especially propitious time), less than 4% had college degrees. The B.A. my mother received in 1932 truly distinguished herself, only 1% of females graduated from college. My, have times changed; last year more women attended college than men and received nearly 60% of the B.A.'s awarded.
I received my B.A. in 1967 when about 10% of YA's had college degrees. In the 1990's, when our daughters finished college, 21% of YA's had a college degree. By 2010, about 33% of high-school graduates entered college. Currently, more than one-half of children from higher-income families complete college, up from one-third 20 years ago. As the table shows, college-graduating has steadily broadened in the US for a long, long time. This has been a very good thing from many perspectives.
But now that 30%+ of YA's have college degrees there may be some downside consequences, especially when macro-economic growth is woefully inadequate. Unemployment rates of teenagers (16-19 yrs old) and young adults (20-24 yrs old) remain alarmingly high: the Oct 2011 rates are 24.1% and 14.0%, respectively.
In the moribund labor market, having a B.A. no longer assures young people of the "meaningful" jobs we parents (and their teachers) have been promising throughout their lives. Instead, more and more newly-minted B.A.'s are under-employed, waiting tables, selling shoes, flipping burgers or whatever – if they find a job at all. Competition for jobs by college graduates has become more intense. Thus, employers have become increasingly demanding about who they hire, even among college graduates. This naturally creates deep distress and resentment – a likely contributing factor to the advent of Occupiers.
In effect, having a B.A. is becoming the "new normal" minimum requirement for a broader number of jobs, some of which may not really require this skill level at all. This requirement wasn't present when a smaller minority of job market entrants had B.A.'s until the 1990's, when the US economy was growing strongly, and when roughly one-in-five young adults were college educated. But now things are different because having a B.A. is less distinguishing.
Does it remain true that an individual receiving a B.A. is a good thing when applied to ever more young adults? Most certainly, the US has long benefited from having more YA's receive B.A.'s. and will continue to. Nevertheless, from a macro perspective, the relative value of completing college is probably diminishing. The law of diminishing returns holds for B.A.'s as well as virtually every other good or service people purchase. This is in part why employers can be more choosy about job requirements – continued high unemployment magnifies this further.
Given this, you might argue that to really distinguish themselves YA's now need to get a post-graduate degree (a masters or OMG, a Ph.D.) – the way Boomers like me did with a B.A. in the 1960's and 1970's. Predictably, applications to graduate schools have been progressively increasing. In 2009, almost 8% of adults had received master's degrees; almost 3% have Ph.D.s. I'm not saying your typical YA needs to get a post-graduate degree to get a job; I am saying that as more and more YA's receive B.A.'s the relative value of this achievement will diminish as a distinguishing part of a resume.
Nevertheless, the formidable education industry still shouts from the tops of its classroom buildings, "You need a college degree to get a good job." And YA's and their parents understandably believe it, because there are a myriad of statistics that back this claim up. As an example, household income is strongly correlated to educational attainment; 2009 median weekly earnings for a college graduate were 64% more than that for a high-school graduate. But this increased expected income is now paired with much increased costs of getting that degree.
How can we adults help our children's generation secure a satisfying, remunerative future and not become "lost"? In the most general sense, we can do everything possible to increase macro-economic growth. [This week the Dept of Commerce reduced its estimate of 3rd quarter GDP growth to an abysmal 2.0%, from the previously-stated 2.5%.] With higher growth, more jobs will be needed and more Millennials will be hired. Growth of at least 3.5% will do wonders for everyone's economic well-being.
We also can invest in them, provide opportunities for them and insist that spending more funds on prisons than higher education is not a recipe for social or economic progress. Boomers must pressure politicians to increase the availability of Pell Grant and other federal and state college- and vocational-training funding. I don't have much issue when college tuitions increase at the same rate as inflation, but recent increases at the University of California and Cal State campuses (and many other public and private colleges) are up to four (4) times as great as inflation. This level of unjustified tuition increase has been all too normal and illustrates the significant inefficiency (and audacity) of many higher-education institutions.
Boomers should adopt an uncharacteristically magnanimous approach to insuring more balanced growth by agreeing to lessen our public retirement costs (see my Nov 11 post) as a means of funding the Millennial-targeted benefits discussed above. Why should we do this? Because Millennials will soon be paying for our public retirement and Medicare expenses. And because Millennials are our future; the better off they are, the more secure we Boomers (and the rest of the US) will be.
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