January 02, 2011

European demographic disaster in the making

I'm not sure Mama Cass would have been so optimistic had she seen this situation coming. A 29-year-old lawyer who speaks five languages shouldn't have trouble finding work, but in Italy that's the case. Posted by Linkmeister at January 2, 2011 12:24 PM | TrackBack
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Giuliano Amato, an economist and former Italian prime minister, was even more blunt. “By now, only a few people refuse to understand that youth protests aren’t a protest against the university reform, but against a general situation in which the older generations have eaten the future of the younger ones,” he recently told Corriere della Sera, Italy’s largest newspaper."

Thanks to 30 years of selfish tax cuts and insistence on Boomer generation gain at the expense of everything from infrastructure to the social safety net, America faces the same situation. Our authorities just refuse to be as candid about it.

Posted by: Christopher at January 2, 2011 01:02 PM

That story mixes two issues. Yes there is a big potential problem looming in most of Europe in that when we introduced most social policies we put them in instantly, meaning that you don't pay into a fund for when you get old, you pay for the people who are currently old. And we've never got out of that cycle, the budget isn't about having the money there in 10 years, if you don't need the money this year - cut taxes! This is why retirement ages are increasing, and in fact I have to pay into the public pension fund despite having been told it will not be an option allowed to me.

In terms of youth unemployment though, big alternate issue. In the case of that lawyer I would strongly suspect it's like in the UK - there are more lawyers than jobs. We're a generation that has been told we can all have "good jobs", and lawyers get paid well right? So far too many people train as lawyers and we've seen a massive increase in what are best described as ambulance chasing law firms. People love degrees with Good Careers these days, so we have too many CompSci grads, and too many MBAs. it's a lie to say there are too many people from older generations crowding her out as I strongly suspect the percentages across demographics are the same as 20-30 years ago, it's just there is an increase in youth wanting these kinds of jobs. We're being taught that a piece of paper is an entitlement to a certain life, and people are trying to find excuses when reality isn't like that other than "we missold education to our children". And that is in reality what has happened. this is why we have masses of unemployed lawyers, but we rely on an immigrant population for jobs such as plumbers and electricians; fine trades, but regarded as "manual work" and beneath a generation sold a lie about the purpose of education.

Posted by: Kevin at January 2, 2011 01:25 PM