“Generational Theft” is a term frequently used to describe the Democrats purchase of current entitlements and payouts to politically connected groups using borrowed money. The consequences of these type of actions can be seen in Europe, where the younger generation is left hopeless.
I focused on Greece in an earlier post, Greece Syndrome Defined. The problem is not limited to Greece.
The New York Times has an interesting article on the problem throughout southern Europe, focusing on the highly educated 20-30 something generation:
Francesca Esposito, 29 and exquisitely educated, helped win millions of euros in false disability and other lawsuits for her employer, a major Italian state agency. But one day last fall she quit, fed up with how surreal and ultimately sad it is to be young in Italy today.
It galled her that even with her competence and fluency in five languages, it was nearly impossible to land a paying job. Working as an unpaid trainee lawyer was bad enough, she thought, but doing it at Italy’s social security administration seemed too much. She not only worked for free on behalf of the nation’s elderly, who have generally crowded out the young for jobs, but her efforts there did not even apply to her own pension.
“It was absurd,” said Ms. Esposito, a strong-willed woman with a healthy sense of outrage.
The culmination of decades of socialist welfare policies in western Europe coupled with massive and stifling governmental bureaucracy has resulted in more than an economically lost generation.
Unless we change course, we will leave our children and grandchildren not only feeling sad to live in their own country, but sad to be young. I can think of few things worse than that.
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Related Posts:
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Experience Europe Without Leaving Home
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Comments
Professor, we are seeing Ms. Esposito's problem here already. Unemployment rates for those ages 20-34 are significantly higher than those for older Americans. Since the current unemployment rate is being touted by government and media as "the new norm", it is reasonable to expect age-demographic rates to remain approximately what they are. I also argue that the handwriting suggests unemployment will go higher with the increase in energy (particularly oil) costs. I expect a double-dip this summer, caused by the same forces that got us here in the first place. This is not good for succeeding generations.
Italy has a fertility rate of 1.31 for 2005 to 2010 (which is up from 1.18 for 2000 to 2005). That is a fertility rate that leads to national suicide and makes the welfare state unsustainable. If we start with a generation of 100 people and that fertility rate, they have 65 children, 42 grandchildren, 28 great grandchildren, and 18 great-great grandchildren. As low as Italy's fertility rate is, it is higher than China's and Japan's.
There is no number more important for the future than fertility rates, and yet very few people know anything about them. Maybe that is a legacy of the ZPG propaganda of the 1970s.
I cannot bring myself to read the NYT…..I appreciate your doing it and summarizing the article for me/us.
Did the article ever articulate the generational theft resulting in the despair of the young? The LSM and our liberal leftist cronies here in the USA don't ever allow them to be equated, since that would mean their agenda is the problem. Just curious if they managed to be honest and connect the dots this time (but not enough to read the "fishwrap of record").
Another rather disturbing note from your excerpt: the woman seems rather upset that old people are getting the jobs (or not leaving them) and that she (along with other young educated Italians) should be holding the jobs and opportunities instead. How long before the elderly/aging are forced out of their jobs to allow the younger generation to work? Or the older generation is cut off from pensions, forced out of work, thus opening jobs to the younger generation – what then?
We need to stop this from happening here – any further than it has already. There are too many unintended (and likely violent) consequences to this "social experiment."
Okay, I sucked it up and read the NYT article. As I thought, they danced around the problem. The children resent the elderly, as I surmised from the quote, but no one – the author of the article, the BU prof, nor the Italians – see the problem as their socialist economic model, and that the solution is deregulation and to change quickly to capitalism (along with elimination of the public unions over time). The NYT seems to portray the problem of the unions as a vague, troubling idea to the young. This highly intelligent, "exquisitely educated" lawyer Francesca is missing the obvious – the socialist economic model is causing European countries to collapse.
Connect the dots, "smart people!!" Your way of life is going to crash, and your elderly "who vote" are selfishly allowing the collapse to protect themselves from losing, not willing to admit that ALL will suffer when the country's economy collapses. These youth now need to address this crisis head on, but yet they don't have the education/intelligence/smarts (read "common sense") to see what is the root cause of this tragic outcome. I am sure the universities teach that socialism is good, just like here in the USA.
So sad to think that the conclusion of this young woman is that she wishes she had never gone to university, but had "worked from the start." To what end? She would perhaps be making some kind of living, but without a union guaranteeing her job and pension, would she really be in any different straits? Enslaved either way, IMHO.
Maybe if these young people were allowed (by their government! Europeans' rights are not "endowed by their Creator" but "endowed by government") to follow capitalism, use innovation, and allow entrepreneurial spirit emerge, there might be some hope. With all those "certificates" and such high intelligence, will these young people see the glaring, obvious solution?! Will we?
Ms. Esposito's story is a good example of what I fear my daughter faces.
As I look back over the first 32 years of my life, which consisted mostly of hard work and delayed gratification, I think it might have been a colossal waste of time.
I hope that my children don't review the story of my life and conclude that hard work and the American dream are for chumps and saps.
Looking the condition of our country as the baby are officially becoming senior citizens, I don't hold out much hope.
Ms. Esposito's story is a good example of what I fear my daughter faces.
As I look back over the first 32 years of my life, which consisted mostly of hard work and delayed gratification, I think it might have been a colossal waste of time.
I hope that my children don't review the story of my life and conclude that hard work and the American dream are for chumps and saps.
Looking the condition of our country at the very moment the baby boomers are officially becoming senior citizens, I don't hold out much hope.
Historically, the Young have helped the Old, partly out of family love, and partly because of a transfer of wealth from the Old to the Young. The Young have been paid for their services, to the extent they have worked for the Old.
Our politicians have now built a scheme where the Young will be expected to work for the Old, for nothing. The Young will be ordered to pay the amounts promised by Medicare, Social Security, and union and government pensions. Lavish healthcare promises, and lavish pensions.
There is nothing real in the "Social Security Trust Fund". There is only a political promise to find the money somewhere that has already been spent. This is 1000 times bigger than the Bernie Madoff fraud of $50 billion. It is a gigantic Ponzi scheme pretending to be a sensible government program. Collecting more tax for that scheme will not change anything.
The Old will wave pieces of paper at the Young calling for perfectly legal, high taxes on them. This will be presented as a given, the amount of transfer duly voted under law by the Old for the benefit of the Old.
In exchange, the Young will be told that they too can collect from their children in turn. The Young will be slaves to the Old, under the suggestion that they too can enslave their Young.
If the Young have any sense at all, they should tear up those pieces of paper in contempt for the Old who decided to enslave them.
The Young will have contempt for the government and "the Law" that arranged this enslavement. They will break the Ponzi scheme of Social Security. They will blame the government that pretended to plan for their future, but instead spent it all, expecting the Young to supply what was never saved.
Make the US treasury bondholders pay, not the populace. The result will be a loss of trust in "sovereign debt", and governments will not be able to borrow so easily in the future. This would be a great outcome. The populace can renounce a debt that was incurred by thieves, and arrange at the same time for future politicians to be less able to carry out the same thievery.
There will be a revolution that changes much of our current law. Government bonds, then refered to as the "old government bonds" will be worth the paper they are printed on.
–> Ponzy Schemes Like Social Security
There is nothing real in the "trust fund". There is only a political promise to find the money somewhere that was paid in and already spent. The shortfall is about $15 trillion in today's dollars, about equal to the entire yearly income of everyone in the US.
–> Obamacare Bails Out Medicare
Obama's "Healthcare Reform" is a huge increase in taxes combined with rationed medical services.