thegrindstone.com: This may not come as a shock to most people, but a new Cornell study revealed that college freshman are all about the Benjamins. What may come as a shock, however, is the class of 2016 seems to care more about being wealthy than last year’s freshman. According to The Cornell Daily Sun, the university’s survey showed that 86% of their newbies feel being wealthy is very important or essential–a 13.4% increase compared to the class of 2015. When the university compared the results with other schools’, it was shown that the change was not unique to Cornell.
25 comments:
As Amy Tennery said at the end of the article there is a "staggering lack of financial literacy among our nation’s bright new workers is not encouraging." I agree that many of the college student currently coming out of both undergraduate and graduate programs believe the propaganda from the departments in their schools that there will be jobs available for them in their field. It is extremely naive of people to think that they will have a higher paying jobs than their parents after the 2008 financial collapse. The world markets will be feeling that for at least another five years. Also with the dramatic drop of American supremacy in education and competitiveness in the global technology market I am surprised that people aren't bracing themselves to be living in European sized houses and dealing with their rampant school debt until they are retired. College is amazingly over emphasized and some people need to just go straight into the workforce but our current culture says that everyone should go to college but all that has gotten us is an amazingly over-educated group of Starbucks baristas. Colleges need to start bringing their standards for admission up and companies need to make themselves more globally competitive in order for the wages to increase. Basic economics would tell us that we as a society need to innovate and educate our way out of this rut that we have been in for the past two decades. We need to make our way back into the manufacturing business to increase wages throughout the gambit. Technology and technology production are the answer to get us back into the top wage earner spot. We also need to make an honest living and not create bubbles like so many hedge funds and money markets have done in recent years. We need accountability and sustainability before our wages can increase.
I am shocked - SHOCKED - to learn college freshmen feel entitled to earning huge amounts of money. Who would have guessed that a generation where people NEED to replace their iphone4s with iphone5s because, "Man - that 4 is SO SLOW!!!" would expect to graduate from college and go immediately into a career earning upwards of $73ooo/yr?!?
Perhaps I'm being too harsh. It's perhaps not illogical to expect, after working so hard to be accepted into a nationally respected university; and then working so hard academically throughout that nationally respected university's four-year program to graduate - very likely with a MOUNTAIN of student debt now to pay back - into at least a job, if not a career, that allows us to live fairly comfortably.
Not illogical to think [reads: Hope] that, but it nevertheless, impractical.
This article is one of the truest assessments on our age group I've heard in a while. And I will admit Im one of those who haven't wrapped my mind around financial issues yet. Especially in a career in the arts, estimating your future salary now is a very tricky thing to do. If someone has their heart set on only making money then, chances are, they won't tbe participating in very much experimental theatre, but instead going after the big hits that may not be as fun or artistically challenging.
Of course, wouldnt everyone love to earn big bucks their whole life? Of course they would. The reality, however, is that this will not happen for most (at least on the scale this article seems to represent). Our minds have been so polluted with social media, fimls, and even tv that this ideal of a rich life seems very probable, because of course, if Gossip Girl is living that life then I can too.
I don't think it's a shock at all to see that this percentage has increased since last year. And while I do agree with Jake that many students seem to feel very entitled and just expect some ridiculous opportunities right out of school, I think a much much larger part of it is exactly what the interviewed student from the article stated; "they don’t want to deal with the financial struggles they have seen their parents go through this decade". But I think it goes even further than this decade, and it may not necessarily even be the struggle they've seen their parents go through, but that they've seen a friend or relative go through. It's only natural to want to excel and ensure financial stability for yourself and future family.
Wait, really? That's not really a shock when considering the freshman I have come to know at CMU, but I didn't think that mentality applied to a nationwide statistic. I think the misconception coming from the idea that you need to be rich coming into college is that the whole point of college is to leave college to become richer than you were when you first came in, and be able to work to obtain that wealth on your own. This article also makes it sound like financial concern is a natural thing considering the economic recession, which I understand.
I like the fact that people are hoping to make more money. Hoping for more is the only thing that pushes people to get more. If one is satisfied they won’t take risks or fight for more. I also agree that the reason college kids are so concerned at being financially well off is because the issue of money is constantly being pushed in our faces. Currently we are bombarded with commercials and images about people who are out of work. We worry that that might be us one day and we don’t want to let that happen. We are determined to do better.
So right now in my life I have a job for several hours 3x a week alongside some occasional overhire work on the weekends. Of course I'd like to work more, but with the CMU Drama schedule, it just isn't possible. Anyway, the money I make in those situations is what I consider my spending money. A lot of it goes toward gas, some goes toward food. Then there's the small bit for other things one would need for hygiene and survival. Assuming I manage to save a tiny bit of these earnings month to month, I'll get myself something I've wanted once I have enough.
Now, I also have overhead from my student loans which covers my rent, but it's strictly for that. I budget all of the above by myself and I don't get any money from my parents.
Not that I want to live on such a tight budget forever - I don't. I'd like to live comfortably. But I don't need to be rich. I don't really need to shop at Anthropolgie. And I'm having fun right now. I've got awesome people in my life, and I can have a good time whether I'm spending money or not.
That being said, I understand that I am an exception to the rule and there are a lot of people I know who care more about how much their socks cost and how cute they would be in that dress than anything else in their lives.
I agree with alot of the reasons why the article suggested undergrads are becoming more aware of the economy. I would hope that young people are age are taking note of how much harder it is becoming to get employed and have some concern as to which way the economy will turn after this election. Personally, I hope to be able to pay off my student debt at a reasonable time, but I didn't come into college to be wealthy and pay off that debt. I came to learn more about my interests so that I could us those interests in the future and hopefully make a living on the side. While I hope young people are taking note of the economic situation, I hope they are not going to college with wealth as their sole focus.
When I first saw this article, the thought that immediately popped into my head was that of course college kids want to earn money, we all have huge debts we're trying to dig ourselves out of! But now I realize that this article targets a larger scope; it refers to kids' ideas of what will happen after the finish college. $73,000 a year straight out of undergrad?? These poor students are in dire need of a financial education. It takes time and experience to get to a level where an employer would want to pay their employees that much, and this ignorant optimism may very well get these kids into trouble. We're in a recession and it is important to appreciate that we even get the privilege of attending college at all, of being able to get a higher education in a field we are passionate about so that we can pursue our interests as a career. Maybe high schools should make economics a required course - I know I benefited greatly from taking it, and now I am able to make more educated decisions about my future and, more immediately, in the elections tomorrow.
This article is a ridiculous extrapolation of a survey that is saying something almost entirely different than this article claims. This article is turning the honest and frankly quite understandable desires of a generation into an exclusive goal. Wealth and other career goals are not mutually exclusive. The article itself points out that growing up in a recession economy has made our generation more aware of the hardship of economic struggles, and thus more adamant about avoiding them. This article gives our generation very little credit by critiquing us on two opposing fronts. The content ridicules us for only just now making wealth a priority, but the sensationalist title: “New Survey Reveals Kids Just Want to Be Rich” criticizes the same desire for wealth that it later praises. This makes for a wishy-washy article that uses a lot of sensationalist language to say just about nothing.
Wait college kids want to make money? I had no idea. I have certainly felt the impact of the recession, and having to pay rent for the last few years, I would like to believe I have at least a decent understanding of money. I don't think if college kids didn't expect to make money coming out of college as many people would go through with it. Years of work that you pay absurd amounts of money to do followed by low paying jobs just does not sound appealing. That being said its certainly not about money for everyone. When I made the decision to pursue a career in theater I just kind of assumed it was a low paying profession and that it would be worth the trade off to do something I loved. I found out later that you can make good money in theater especially coming from somewhere like CMU. But that didn't factor into my career decisions.
Before reading this article, I was all set to agree with what most people said above: how could college kids these days think that they'll make 73K a year right after graduation because that's just false and ridiculous. I still agree with that statement, but I think that this article is misleading, and doesn't present the facts in a straightforward way, but instead uses them for shock value.
First of all, the study that started this article was about an increase in the percentage of undergraduate students who think it is important to be wealthy. Not at all a shock, since all of us have lived through this recession. However, this article then glosses quickly over the effect of the recession and the effects of the current political climate, and jumps into a "OR IS IT THIS OTHER SELFISH, IGNORANT IDEA THAT THEY ALL HAVE?" situation to try to imply that it's really just the ignorance of college students that's leading them to this conclusion.
I honestly think that the biggest factor that affected this percentage jump is the election and all of the press and media attention put on Mitt Romney and this election season. There's huge uncertainty about affordable health care and tax cuts/raises and federal aid programs, and it's no wonder that young people have come to think that it's so important to be wealthy: if they were wealthy, all of these potentially huge issues that are up in the air wouldn't really be a problem anymore. I'm not at all saying that everyone is a Republican and everyone is just concerned about making money, but those without money (which is a lot of the college student population) are more worried about their financial situations than they ever have been before, and so wealth is seen as more important.
Another huge issue I have with this article is the last paragraph, where they say that among "teens today" the expected starting salary is 73K. That is NOT at all the same thing as college students. College students are 18-22, and are generally not referred to as teens. Teens to me implies high schoolers, and so this statistic makes so much more sense, if that's the case. Many high schoolers have no real concept of non part-time job salaries and the amount of money it takes to live, since most of them do not live on their own and do not pay for things like food, utilities, etc, and do not get full-time paychecks. Maybe this is just me picking apart his words too much, but I can't help but feel that this teen statistic is different than what college students would answer.
I suppose it makes a lot of sense that college kids want to make a lot of money, considering that many of them are paying a great deal to go to school. I would assume that many of them made the decision to pay huge tuition prices with the hope of paying them back. Coming from a theatre program, the idea of making $73000 coming right out of college is ludicrous. It is true, though, that people in other majors will be making significant incomes upon graduation. From what I have been told, $50,000 is normal for an engineer early in their career. So yes, many of these students just don't know because no one has ever told them, and they want to do well. But this article is of no help, considering it does not take the time to state what an average starting salary is for a college graduate.
Although we are currently living through a decline in the economy I do not believe that is what trigger the want or the feel that we need to make money. I think that our childhoods are more to blame. Many of use spent our time in a society that has been placing more and more emphasis on material things. As a result I think this has prompted us to feel the need for money. Another contributing factor has been an increase in the connecting of success and money. Our generation has also been unfortunately also been subject to the believe that the more money a person makes the more successful in live they are. With both these facts combined I think it is no surprises that the class of 2016 wants to make more money and outs an emphasis on making money.
I'm Not quite sure how to feel about this article. Of course college students want to make a lot of money; in our society it is drilled into our heads from a very early age that we will be defined by our financial success and what we "are" and want to "be" refers to our occupations as opposed to our general happiness or emotional stability. I do however, find it very interesting that this year's freshman class cares more about money than last classes before it. I wouldn't go so far as to say that they feel entitled to large amounts of money, I would say they're more wide-eyed and naive. Maybe it's just because of where I'm from, but for most of the people I know, money has never really been something that they've had to worry about. As college freshman, we are on our own for the first time trying to figure out what it means to be an adult, and for most of us, our parents are still paying our way. From some people, earning and managing money is a hard concept to figure out. If it was never something to worry about before, of course these kids are going to expect that things will always be the same. Of course, the people I just mentioned are a much smaller part of the population than even I realize, but that's really the only explanation I can come up with. ...Unless the class of 2016 is somehow extremely optimistic... and if that's the case then I find that impractical.
I attribute the $73,000 figure to just ignorance and unrealistic expectations among teens. They asked teenagers what they want to make--what do they know about the real world? What I find shocking is the fact that 86% of freshman "feel being wealthy is very important or essential." Not the unrealistic expectations of wealth, but the fact that freshmen are making this a priority. As drama students, obviously, this is not a priority for us. Yes, some of us might have extravagant careers and be incredibly wealthy, but if wealth was "very important or essential," you would go into another business. We do it for the love of the craft first, and hopefully will make a little bit of money afterwards. If students put base their priorities on making money, we're gonna end up with a generation of unhappy people.
This really should not be surprising to anyone. One of the main reasons kids go to college is to hopefully acquire themselves a secure job with as high an income as possible. I don't personally agree with this mindset but it is undeniably present. I feel that one should go to college To learn about something they are sincerely passionate about and hopefully the money comes along with it.
This article reminds me of a conversation that I was unfortunately surrounded by on this bus yesterday. There were a bunch of high school students talking about the election and their "when they grow up" ideologies and how they care nothing about the election or the candidates. People know what they are taught or what they have experienced. Children whose parents allow them to live with their heads in the clouds I think were represented in this study. I do not believe that freshmen who follow politics, current news or updates on the recession or have parents with a lick of sense would fall into the apparent "shock" results of this study. Heck, I wanted to be rich after Undergrad and I want to be rich and make that sort of salary when I leave CMU, but does that mean that I think that it will happen? I find that this article focused on what students wanted rather than what they thought was possible or realistic. I would love to have seen those results. Also as others have said, many students who enter college have no idea what an average worker makes, or even have an idea of salaries or wages. I know for sure that I didn't and that is because I never had to think about what my parents made or what I wanted to make. This only happened after my first theatre job and my total disgust at what some people consider an acceptable payment, in comparison to what I wanted to be paid with my Bachelors degree. Interesting article, but too little facts to back it up.
I don't know about you guys, but I am going to make a boat load of money. I have been hearing this word "Recession" for the past couple of years...Boring. I don't care about how much debt I have right now because I know that the cash is going to start flowing the minute I leave school. I don't know what the worry is about, the economy doesn't matter, I'm a desired worker. I mean come on...I'ma be rich yall.
[Heavy Sigh] Sometimes I feel like an idiot for coming back to school. Mountains of Debt vs. Loose change!
I think this article is a little unfair. For the most part college students do not have money and so therefore are optimistic to pay off huge debts. I also think the limited amount of financial knowledge most college students have is frightening. I think that students truly aren't getting a full understanding of money during high school/living with their parents and this just puts them drastically behind when they move out into the real world. People these days simply do not understand the meaning of money.
I can understand kids not wanting to go through what there parents went through, being one myself. So the importance of money is greater for us. Also some of us are probably relating money with happiness which in this case would make since being in an economic depression has put strain on many families causing unhappiness. so the importance is super heightened.
With the rise in college debts, I can see why college students feel that they should leave college with a large salary. Maybe they think that they will receive a salary big enough to cover their college debts. The economy definitely has an effect on the situation. I agree that students have no idea what starting salaries are. They might see their parents working hard and receiving a decent salary, yet they fail to realize that their parents have been working for a long time. They also fail to realize that few companies are hiring many students. I know a few friends in Arizona who are having a very hard time finding jobs because companies are not hiring inexperienced workers. Personally, I'm not expecting a very high salary after college. In theatre, it's all about experience, and I will have to climb the ladder to make a name for myself.
Few days ago, I read an article about the top 20 college and major with highest first income after graduation. Then, I saw CMU has taken about 5 spots for the ranking, but it were all MCS, H&SS, CS or CIT. Just by reading this article and how people create a ranking based on the income after the graduation, I realized how much students start to care more about money and being rich. Relatively, I don't see the result of the survey as shocking because who doesn't want to be rich. For me, doing what I want and enjoy is the first and foremost thing that I care because my parents always have been telling me, but being wealthy is my another essential goal in my life. Not just because I want to spend all of the money to buy luxuries, but because I don't want to be a burden for my parents anymore. Since I am at a prestigious college where my parents have to pay all of tuition for me, my biggest hope is to be paid back as much all of effort put in during these four years. i think that because many incoming students know that getting into a top-ranked college does not guarantee high income or success because of current recession, many students would want to be more successful in terms of financial issues. Still, I hope that in near future,our society can be developed better in a way that students can be more relaxed and focusing more on getting more education from college than becoming so eager to be successful after graduation.
Warning: this is my old man rant for the day and will likely be exceedingly sarcastic. Please abstain from reading if you take yourself too seriously. Now; if I had to chose a population sample I could guarantee to be least capable of understanding the value of a dollar earned and at the same time most unrealistic in estimating the value of their own skill set, it would be the typical college freshman. I know because I was one once. Our society continues to push further and further down the line the age at which a person is expected to finally actually take care of themselves. In this curmudgeon's opinion, this can only lead to an ever more inflated sense of entitlement, to money, to success, to iPhones, to everything the t.v. promises, in each successive generation. I was spoiled on "Creature Double Feature" Atari 5200; my kids will be spoiled on Virtual Disney Land and trips to the money pool.
This is not surprising at all. I think a huge part of this is social media. Now, it is easier than ever to flaunt your wealth to your friends, as well as total strangers. On the flip side, it is also easier than ever to view other’s wealth, become jealous, and feel pressured to conform to this measure of social standing. Additionally, advertisements on Instagram, Youtube, even Snapchat promise that if you use their app or get a job as a representative of their brand, you will either get rich quick, or recieve a ton of free samples and gifts from their company. Then there are all of those social media stars and makeup gurus who brandish their Supreme clothes, Kylie makeup, and expensive things in general, training young adults, teenagers, and even younger people to see wealth as the goal.
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