Economy

http://www.economyincrisis.org/faq.asp

See Also http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,439766,00.html

Based on just my experience in the workforce right after college, I knew all of these things to be true. While the news channels spout statistics about US employment and economic growth, I have witnessed something different happening.

To begin, know of the experience of my grandparents is vastly different from my own generation. Back then, you graduated from high school, got a job, a house, and started a family. For just about everyone I know, that is something that is seems plain impossible now. They call this the “Boomerang Generation” because so many people are going back to live at home, but I don’t think the reasons for that are social. It is because getting a good job right out of school, and making enough to support your own home is tough. According to statistics though, we are supposed to be a much wealthier country than we were in the 1950’s and 1960’s, but somehow it does not seem that way.

There is a misconception in blue collar society that gives people the false belief that once you have a college degree you are made, but that is not the case. I graduated into a world of service jobs – something I did not foresee. When I began looking for employment I quickly found out that the only jobs available were demeaning and extremely low paying service jobs. Answering phones, waiting tables or working a cash register (did all three). It was truly a life changing experience. I had been told my whole life to stay away from the trades and get a college degree, but it turned out to be nothing more than student loan debt, a ticket to a cubicle and lower pay than if I had learned a trade.

I am extremely critical of the service economy, and I believe it is at the bottom of many of our social ills. When people have meaningful or well paying jobs, they are more content. But every year we lose those jobs and they are replaced with service jobs that consist of performing repetitive tasks for eight hours a day. Why are so many in the inner cities not working? I think that is an easy one. Look at what they are being asked to do – work a service job, slaving for the public to make peanuts. The fact is that many people would rather be homeless than choose that lifestyle. How can the independence and excitement of crime compete with answering a phone and performing the same process every minute for eight hours with no potential for wage growth?

What I have done personally about this situation is that I have gone double or nothing by going to law school (probably the reason why the majority of people go to law school). By the time I graduate I will have $160,000 in debt, and most of it is private. Since I did not place in the top %10-20 of my class, my job prospects are dismal to say the least (not something many people know about law school).

I have been looking to bankruptcy law lately for some of these reasons. Not only would I completely believe in what I am doing, but if I am right about the economic situation, there will come a time when bankruptcy lawyers will be very much in demand.