generation limbo: 20-somethings today, debt, unemployment, the questionable value of a college education

the 'old economy' doesn't really have any solutions either. unskilled factory labor only exists where and when it's cheaper than high-tech machines doing the same work. this is going to continue to be fewer and fewer places - how much unskilled labor will necessary to build a car in 2050? like who cares who is a 'booster of the new economy', the goal is a functional society, and pretending like well-paid unskilled factory labor can exist in 2050 is just pointless.

xp yeahhhh I know "47.37%" was just gonna be pointlessly confusing tho

'will be necessary to built a car'*

guys i'm reading all this and i'm starting to wonder...is there some sort of intrinsic problem with capitalism's sustainability???

well environmentally yes, but another problem is the fact that we assume people always have to have jobs and work 40 hour weeks

like maybe we should work 20 hour weeks

factory labor wasn't and isn't that unskilled. certainly not compared to the vast bulk of "service economy" employment these days. also i'm not just discussing industrial jobs but the actual value created by industrial production versus most service jobs, including many fairly skilled ones.

xpost

For most people, even 40 hour weeks would be a good start.

factory labor 'isn't that unskilled' because all the unskilled factory labor is now done by machines.

yeah. germany has an extensive trade training program that skillz up folk to run the new, advanced machinery.

probably the earliest, most portable, most outsourced form of factory labor was light textile manufacturing. which is actually -- to do efficiently -- extremely skilled. and it could actually probably be done more efficiently with machines than it is done now, but it's cheaper to hire lots of very skilled people, since you can get them for cheap in certain places in the world. the lesson, among many, is that skill doesn't correspond to size of machines necessarily.

well environmentally yes, but another problem is the fact that we assume people always have to have jobs and work 40 hour weeks
--iatee

why, this sounds familiar

http://chronicle.com/blognetwork/castingoutnines/2012/04/15/the-bubble-within-the-bubble/

good article except for this

"Second, the Ph.D. pipeline will dry up as smart young people with the desire to work in higher ed will realize that it will boil down to a choice between their career and the rest of their lives, and choose the latter."

which doesn't seem like it's anywhere close to coming true. so w/ a very loose use of the term, you can say its a bubble in a bubble in a bubble because there's the general higher ed bubble, the phd bubble and the 'academic work' bubble... but the 3rd isn't unrelated to the 2nd or even the 1st

Yeah, I'd guess this realisation usually occurs during the PhD rather than before.

"While Robert Markley may be an outlier, I’ve heard many stories of faculty colleagues who routinely spend 90+ hours a week doing work, and seeing spouses and family only for an hour or so a day at the dinner table before disappearing to grade or work in the lab until 2 AM."

I certainly work 90+ hour weeks regularly, even normally, but that's only about 13 hours a day, & that leaves enough time to spend with family. But it's why I tell potential graduate students that you'd be better be sure you love what you work on more than you love anything else, & that's one thing tenure processes often try to suss out. That's problematic in particular for women who want to give birth during their time as assistant professors, but more & more universities are offering all new parents semester or longer tenure-clock extensions.

Well sure my work week days right now are basically seeing my spouse for an hour at dinner and then continuing work at home. But it's not like I'm doing that seven days a week every week.

but the "point" of that article is kind of idiotic. The insane demands placed on Ph.D's right now are in large part a by-product of competition resulting from oversupply. If the pipeline "dries up" as tens of thousands of would-be academics suddenly decide it's all not worth it (which I find doubtful would happen anyway) then there will be less competition and demands on PhD's will likely be lessened.

That's not entirely wrong, but I dunno: those of us in the game love the game, love the crush, love the competition. So I'm not sure the demands old go own, because those demands are largely self-imposed (provided you're competent & diligent enough to get tenure).

Argh, should read "demands will go away"

'competent and diligent enough to get tenure' is a changing game and a group that includes fewer and fewer people each year, which is the point

it's like saying 'well if you're *really* good at musical chairs, you don't have to worry'

nonsense

Uh

so what i get from this thread/euler is that being a trve cvlt professor is basically another version of being on the football team? i mean, it's cool that you're into being a spartan or an endurance sport champ or whatever but not everyone thrives on that. i mean, if that's basically the environment that grads are forced to jump into than yeah, higher ed is fucked and tbh i'm going to enjoy watching different parts of it start to crumble.

Euler, how does a 13h work day leave enough family time if you're sleeping 7-8 h/ night?

ppl at college I heard invented new time, they get an extra 4 hours a day to read and be nerds while the rest of us punch at our privates and wonder why our balls hurt all the time

my srs answer is lmao that anyone sleeps 7-8 hours

i do because if i don't i feel sick but i don't have time to do anything interesting between work/commute/sleep. i do not have a phd and will never have the energy or desire to give birth.

7-8 hrs of sleep a day, p much zero commute, 3ish hours of non-work a day, including meals with my family. Works fine for me!

OK. If that's what these constant moves for fairly low-paying contract positions are leading towards, I should perhaps start looking seriously at teacher's college or something. No dis, I'm glad it's working for you.

Well, I'm happily tenured at a research university, so I'm a freak. It's just worth being clear on what you want.

With a schedule like that, I imagine it's basically necessary to have a very accommodating spouse/partner, especially if you have kids.

My wife is incredible, but we both have Ph.Ds & in fact my wife will have an academic position of her own starting in the fall. I'm around the house a lot too, as I work mostly from home; I teach & hold office hours on campus but I write at home. & so I'm super flexible about being to get the kids from school (also a short walk). Location is key to pull this off.

I guess what I was saying is that she "gets" the insanity.

That makes way more sense, because I was pretty sure your wife was also an academic iirc and the whole only being w family for 3 hrs a day was...that's like stockbroker/Goldman-Sachs wealth manager levels of uninvolvement. And they pay people to do everything else for them, or so the movies tell me.

So when she starts her job will she continue to do everything except get the kids from school? I wish her luck.

But it's why I tell potential graduate students that you'd be better be sure you love what you work on more than you love anything else

haha

i am just making a face and thinking about my life

Well, our salaries are going, er, up, so we'll be hiring help. We'll still be in the Midwest so housing & labor is inexpensive, except for Big Ten faculty evidently (re labor, no housing discounts unlike U of California faculty)

Euler when did you start and finish your PhD? How many years were you in non-TT positions before your current job?

finished in the mid 2000s, had one non-TT for 2 years, but at a sexxxy place with as much grad teaching as undergrad teaching

It feels like for professors, work is this much more fluid thing than for most of us. I lived with/was in a relationship with a professor, and she would say (not inaccurately) that she worked 12 hours a day, but at the same time that 12 hours included taking the dog out for a walk, watching tv while answering emails, etc. It is most certainly an incredibly demanding job, but 12 hours a day researching/professoring does not equal 12 hours a day on a factory floor or even in a stereotypical office environment.

Also 4 months a year of total geographic freedom, so boo-hoo you ivory tower elitists; get a real job digging ditches.

eh, not really. every professor I've ever known uses summer and school breaks to write and conduct research, which necessarily takes the back burner during the school year. It's not exactly the same as backpacking across Asia for four months.

(I was joking)

nah, that's otm, the working conditions are incredible. Though I know PhDs who've quit the profession bc it demands too much self-directed ness & they couldn't do it & preferred a steady office job with a boss telling thm what to o ech day. My life's ...not like that.

that 12 hours included taking the dog out for a walk, watching tv while answering emails, etc

OK, I don't count these as work hours. Yeah, work is fluid but I only count the actual hours I spend focused on work as my work hours. If a 13h workday includes like thinking about articles while getting groceries or doing laundry or doing dishes, then that schedule suddenly sounds much more reasonable.

(I was seriously wondering how you ever got to post on ILx!)

I don't follow things here closely, just a flutter now & then. But yeah, work time is fluid.

http://chronicle.com/article/faculty-salaries-barely-budge-2012/131432

But yeah, work time is fluid.

haha ive been thinking about yr 90 hour work week since you posted it...