I see someone who needs a size nine to the curb.

One simply cannot live on ones own on a retail or barista wage. Most places require that your income be 3-4 times the rent. Yes, you can try to get a second job, but each job requires that you be available to *them* at a moments notice. Yes, you can try to find a roommate, or move in with a bf or gf, but they will be in the same dire straits as you-- your whole life will be unstable in the extreme.

10 years ago I was able to live by myself on a full time, near minimum wage job. No longer, and probably never again.

For any assholes who think this is my fault somehow, you should know that job growth in the private sector has been at 1% since the late nineties and the overwhelming prevailing business model is to offer part time work only. I am a fucking dream employee. My boyfriend was with the same company for 14 years, but their business took a nosedive and he lost his job. He's got a stellar resume, but his choices are--be abused to the point of burnout as a manager for not nearly enough money or have less stress at work but be markedly poorer.

Living with Mom'n'Dad can be a bridge - family members should support each other - but it shouldn't stop you from establishing your own life.

It would be interesting to know what this woman studied in college. Almost certainly something soft; English Lit, sociology, or some other field with poor job prospects.

From what she writes, it's hard to tell what she's really doing to get her life on track, but it doesn't sound like much. It may be fun "working part time for a local filmmaker" - but that's a hobby, not a job. The same for "volunteering at KCRW" (a radio station). Her parents are doing her no favors by letting her drift along, pretending that her hobbies are going to turn into a career.

Well, hell, a job at Starbucks or Target wouldn't be too bad -- not enough to pay rent on her own place, but it would at least give her something to do during the day. That is, if she can get in ahead of the PoliSci majors who are also looking for work.

There's nothing wrong with moving back in with your family after college -- as long as you hate it.

My sister and I both moved back home after college. It was the early 80s in Detroit and there were NO jobs. My sister worked retail for almost two years before landing her first career job and now she's a VP at a Fortune 100 company. I had a crap job and realized that I would never get a good one with my liberal arts degree, so it prompted me to go to law school and I've done quite well for myself.

It used to be that crap jobs were a rite of passage: they were the jobs you took that made you realize "There is no way in Hell I want to do this for the rest of my life!" and motivated you to do better. The current younger generation (a) seems to have a sense of entitlement that makes them think that life should be fun & easy and (b) seems to think that they are the only people who have ever lived through a bad economy.

Life is rough. Economies go up and down. Accept the fact that there's nothing special about you and go get your hands dirty, dammit.

Mom and Dad won't be here forever, and are doing you no good by indulging you. That college degree is a license to compete with your peers for the few jobs available in your area, nothing more.

Why should anyone hire you? (That's not hollow rhetoric - if you can't answer that question, and convince an employer of your answer, you're not working. Welcome to harsh reality.)

There is an area with extremely low unemployment. North Dakota. It isn't what you want. It isn't where you live. Tough. It is where the jobs are. They certainly aren't in California. If you can buy shoes and a gym membership, you can buy a bus ticket. Can you cook or clean or do anything useful? North Dakota isn't Afghanistan, and no one will be trying to kill you.

There is a great book called "What Color is Your Parachute" - read it. It will help you figure out what you might be good at and how to find a career. I'm pretty sure you are not going to try North Dakota on my say so. If you were a risk taker, you'd already have a job.

What about the military? Lots of people (raises hand) learned useful skills which they could transition into civilian careers. It's five extra points on a Civil Service exam if that appeals to you. Yes, it costs you a few years, but you've got the time.

You will be on your own sooner or later. Try it. You'll be very proud of what you accomplish. Speaking as a dad who has three out in the world making their own ways, so will your parents. You can do it.

Okay, while the fact that she is living at home and likes it to some degree is sad, at least she is helping out. If you actually read the article, she says that she hasn't given up on her search and neither should anyone else in her shoes. She also goes on to say that those who return home need to be grateful, respectful, and helpful. All in all, not such a terrible message for those who find themselves in this situation.

Now, as to her job. Sounds like she got one of those new fangled " green" degrees and is looking for work in the green sector. Well chickie, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you might have to come down off the high horse and work in the old fashioned corporate world. The green economy is a myth that has been sold to youth by college professors who will never have to think about finding a private sector job. They sell kids on the new Utopia and forget to tell them that it doesn't actually exist yet. Oops! Eventually, she will be forced to lay down her principles and work just like the rest of us.

Seems to me she's done just about everything to get a job she can, I mean she 'hones' her resume and writes smart cover letters and checks her email several times a day.

I mean what else could she possibly do to get a job beyond that?

What more do you expect of this poor girl?

Its not like she can leave the house and go down to these places and try and talk to someone face to face being a parapalegic and all

...looking for work in the green sector. Well chickie, ...you might have to come down off the high horse and work in the old fashioned corporate world.

This. I am acquainted with a family where the daughter is in exactly this position. After graduating from college, and taking plenty of time off to pursue unrealistic dreams (on Mom'n'Dad's budget), she is now considering going to law school. But she has principles! She wouldn't want to practice just any kind of law; it's got to be "environmental" law. Right...

Part of this is her fault, of course. She's all grown up, and could open her eyes time now. But a large part is her parents' fault for being overly protective and shielding her from reality.

Childhood should not extend into your mid-20s.

This is a weird girl. She's more of a live-in servant than a daughter, cooking, cleaning, and doing other chores.

She evidently had a full-time job at Oprah's O magazine - an opportunity your typical state school English major would likely kill for - but promptly quit to go work on a farm in Santa Cruz for a while.

According to an interview in the Santa Barbara, Calif. Independent, the author graduated from Laguna Blanca School in tony Hope Ranch (current tuition+fees: $27,000/year) and then from Columbia University in Manhattan (current tuition: $21,544/term).

I believe Sara lives in Carpinteria, from which Santa Barbara is readily accessible via bus 20 or 21x. With her youth and attractiveness, a service job either on Linden Avenue or in Santa Barbara would seem to be easily within reach. However, having a job like that doesn't require a History and English double major from an Ivy League school.

My neighbor's kids are 9 and 7 and they are always watched by mom when they play outside (with helmets on even for the scooters). Mom shakes her head at the free-range kid down the street though she acknowledges that we had that freedom when we were kids.

Fast-forward a few years and you get the kids getting degrees at my university. They say (seniors, mind you) that they aren't quite sure what they will do when they grow up. Meanwhile they get a degree (astronomy) that is good for only a few jobs (teaching and academia) and when they eliminate those they still drift through the degree program with no real idea of where they are headed.

I think I'm with a_random_guy. A lot of this falls on parents who shelter and coddle their children for far too long.

Why get a joe-job when it's so much fun to take grandma to all the new movies?

This -- "She evidently had a full-time job at Oprah's O magazine - an opportunity your typical state school English major would likely kill for - but promptly quit to go work on a farm in Santa Cruz for a while" -- is the sort of luxury that I was not raise to take advantage of.

I got my dream job out of college by writing them a slew of letters, getting not so much as a whisp of a reply back, and then trying to sneak in and show somebody my student film. I then got caught by the guard, got sent outside, where I waited for somebody important to walk out, handed him the very funny resume I'd done (to distinguish myself from the probably hundreds who were also trying to get a job there) and asked him to give it to somebody who could do something with it. I gave it to the right guy -- the international head of creative (it was an ad agency and I was trying for an assistant producer job to learn filmmaking on somebody else's dime). He got me an interview and they liked me and hired me.

But, I'm guessing, it took being driven/desperate-ish to be hired there, which took being from a non-cushy background and knowing that there was nobody to make my way or make me "comfortable" but me.

It's never been my belief that the easy way out was an option for me.

Parents ultimately reap what they sow. I know many young people who are out of school, live with their parents and party all night. If you call them around 12 noon, you wake them up. No scruples, no morals - Oh yes, and then there are the grandchildren in some cases - interesting group of miserable people as they all usually hate each other.........then the drugs seep in.

Charming, the lot of them.

As someone who has done hiring. 'I prided myself on cover letters that used neat little turns of phrase like "excellent and intuitive" and "positive and professional." ' Would have gotten your resume laughed at. What she is, is "inexperienced and clueless".
She ran the gamut from Green for all to Google? Which have about 100 actual people working there. Makes me wonder is this just her "clever alliteration" which will annoy hiring managers, or is it that she only applies to very select places.

She has convinced herself that what she is doing is perfect, but it is self sabotaging, she needs to listen to people who do hiring, not English professors or her peers.

Her parents need to charge her rent and utilities, they are doing her no favors by letting her live like a teen on summer break, because who would leave that.

based on what I've read about her background and such, I'm thinkin' she's heading towards freelance writer and that sort of thing... She's basically done a lot of those sorts of nice in theory things that well heeled kids do instead of the money grubbing their parents did. Not necessarily judging this a bad thing. It's not like she's complaining bitterly. It's more like she's is just writing about it as it happens. Read more about her at the foodie blog:
http://girlfarmkitchen.com/the-girl/

I dunno that this is bad, rather just that this is a picture of someone who is well off, and may not realize what all that means. After all, how many people in the peace corps are from poor families?

SwissAmy, the author does seem to be complaining somewhat: "It's demoralizing to offer yourself up — all the college prep, the hours of internships, the years spent working for free — and come away not just rejected but unacknowledged."

How the hell can an aspiring writer who lands a full-time job at a national magazine consider herself rejected and unacknowledged? Just because she quit that job a month after graduation?

My favorite bit from the Independent interview by Charles Donelan: "The students currently enrolled in AP English Language and Composition at Laguna Blanca were so inspired by Sara’s writing (and her delicious recipe for bran pancakes) that they started their own AP food blog"

Bran pancakes! Oh the SWPL - it burns!

She is already loaded - it really doesn't matter if she ever supports herself or not, because she is taken care of for life and doesn't need a job.

Personally, I don't care whether she ever becomes employable or not, as long as she stays off welfare.

If I was independently wealthy I certainly wouldn't work. I would do

a) exactly what I felt like doing on any given day, which would probably be
b) very little, and give
c) no apologies for it.

"Now, as to her job. Sounds like she got one of those new fangled " green" degrees and is looking for work in the green sector. Well chickie, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you might have to come down off the high horse and work in the old fashioned corporate world."

Thank you, Sheepmommy. I got one of those, or the equivalent for the era. Chinese was all the up and coming thing, except it never came, or maybe it did, 25 years later. In the meantime I went into the Army. And as good as it *can* be for preparing you for other things, for me it was a good life in and of itself.

"This is a weird girl. She's more of a live-in servant than a daughter, cooking, cleaning, and doing other chores."

That's kind of a weird comment, Larry. Who else should do that work? Lupita? Mommy? Why is it such a come-down for Princess Orchid Fingers to do some of the housework in the house she lives in?

Good question lujlp.

For one thing she could start actually looking for a job.

Sending out resumes is fine, but that isn't what a truly earnest person does.

She could work as a freelancer right from her parents home with services like elance.com. I've hired a number of contractors through there, and they get paid quite well.

She should be joining professional organizations in her specialty, attending conferences for professionals, hell even joining facebook groups for those of her field...in other words, she should bet NETWORKING, not organizing her parents fucking CDs.

The longer she takes to get out of her parents home, the harder it will be for her to do so.

And for fucks sake, someone else her mentioned the military, hell she could go into that field, specialize in something that is employable on the outside, do it for a few years, come out with some experience AND some connections to people who get out before her and might be able to get her hired when she leaves the service.

This woman is going through the motions, and to her credit she isn't whining. But to her detriment she isn't really agitating and pushing for change either.

I couldn't leave my parents home fast enough at 19, and I actually like my parents.

This is what call the not-willings: not willing to change careers, not willing to move where there's more opportunity and lower costs, not willing to work for a boring bank or accounting office or law firm, not willing to work out in a suburban office park, and so on. They want hobby-jobbies that are properly the domain of bored housewives and trust fund babies.

"But there's a reason most of the world lives in extended family units. They provide the kind of community that carries the depth and perspective of many generations," she writes. Did she check this "fact" or does it just sound good? Maybe people live with their parents and in-laws because they can't afford separate homes--just like her. And "guiltily"? "Excellent and intuitive," "positive and professional"? This woman had a job as a writer at a major magazine?

> After all, how many people in the peace corps
> are from poor families?

The Peace Corpist I knew best was my age, about 24, and she was doing what 21-year-olds were doing in the workplace... But she was doing it eagerly and without resentment. She came from the kind of family that taught how to power through adversity, and to understand that even the most decently-chosen path will have downsides that cannot and should not be avoided.

But it wasn't a family with a lot of money.

(And when you asked if she'd found some Latin lover during her service to the impoverished of Uruguay, she'd smirk like an 80-year-old, and look right through you.)

Jim: My inartful comment was just to suggest that maybe the parents are holding her back from self-sufficiency because she makes their lives easier with her cooking, shopping, and other chores.

Lori: Good point about the writing. I'm skeptical that good writing on a resume is useful. Bad writing or other carelessness can hurt, of course. Presenting facts and specifics is crucial, but pablum like "excellent and intuitive" isn't going to stand out from the crowd. Hopefully copy like that will be replaced with something more useful, such as: "Los Angeles Times, 'Living at Home', March 18, 2012. Op-ed, 900 words."

I had to live with my parents for six months after college graduation, back in 1992. The job market was terrible, and all I could find at first was temp work. My third temp assignment turned into a full-time job, and even then the pay was so low that I had to get a part-time job working retail to earn enough to cover rent and utilities. So that's what I did. I couldn't WAIT to get a place of my own.

It was really tough for a few years. But eventually I got a better full-time job, and then I got a better part-time job, and by the time I was in my late 20s I was down to just one job.

My parents split the cost of college with me. I was ALMOST able to pay my half as I went, because I worked while I was in school, but I was still in debt about $12K when I got done with school, to my parents, because they made too much money for me to qualify for actual student loans. They charged me 8%, which they later lowered to 5%. I paid them interest only for about three years, and then I finally got a full-time job that paid $21,000 a year; shortly thereafter I got a part-time job that paid $9 an hour and only then was I finally making enough money to start repaying them principal. (I kept myself free of credit card debt, though.) When I had pared my debt down to about $8,000 my grandpa died and left me enough money to pay them back completely, which is exactly what I did with the money.

I think Lori makes a great point that a lot of people are simply unwilling to take a boring grunt job - they want "hobby-jobbies" (love that expression) even if it doesn't pay the bills. And yeah, the "the kind of community that carries the depth and perspective of many generations" made me roll my eyes, too. Is she referring to the part of her article where she mentions her parents calling her into their room with great disapproval because she came home late from a date ... at the age of 23? This is precisely the kind of bullshit that made me want to get a place of my own.

But it also seems to me that there are a lot of young 20-somethings who are totally willing to take crappy grunt jobs just like I did, but aren't finding even that kind of work.

We can yell at the young kids to get off our lawns and be disapproving of them because they're not moving out on their own. But I think the economy has gotten so bad that there honestly are a lot of willing young folks who simply cannot find employment sufficient to move out.

No matter what we, or they, think, getting places of their own is simply going to be harder for them than it was for us, and often simply unattainable (for a while, at least). If this gal has found a way to make it bearable, well, maybe other young people her age can follow some of her suggestions and make their own lives a little less depressing.

I'm reading a great book about the birth of the electronic computer. In a passage about the first days of the mathematics department at Princeton, the author describes how funding for the venture was requested, with the revolutionary idea that this could be a place where a handful of geniuses could follow their curiosity as they saw fit, without concern for productivity or exigencies.

One century and ten years later, generations of Americans consider this a birthright, no matter how far they are from genius. Financial services is the largest sector of the American economy: These folks presume to collect their livelihoods by sitting in Aeron chairs and running Excel macros, without concern for the numbers coming in or going out.

"...in other words, she should bet NETWORKING..."

Okay, so I'm curious. I hear this term a lot, and yet no one seems to know exactly how to define it to me. So what does it mean to "network"?

((Note: I am **NOT** being sarcastic, please do not interpret this comment as being snarky, stuck up, or otherwise jokey. I am, however, high-jacking this thread.))

I have worked in the same library system for nearly ten years. It was my first job out of college, and I was good at it, found it fun, and stuck with it, promoting through the ranks. But now I realize that libraries are not a great long-term career option. And, quite frankly, I've promoted as far as I can go. So I've been talking with people about how to change careers and move on, and they all say that the way to get a job nowadays is to network.

But what is networking? "Making contacts". Okaaaay.... what does that mean? Getting someone's email and then hitting them up for a job because we both liked the same hamburger booth at the convention hall? Finding a dude on LinkedIn who may/may not be who he says he is? Contacting old coworkers who've moved on and saying "how's it going, mind finding me work?" This all seems rude, implausible, and weird.

Sorry, I just thought since it came up and I respect the commenters here, I'd ask.

> Sorry, I just thought since...

[1.] Never apologize.

[2.] I feel the same way about being creative. People think being creative is different from hard work, but it really isn't... Just as networking isn't much different than getting to know people.

[3.] See also critical thinking. People say critical thinking is different from regular thinking, but it really isn't.

"So what does it mean to 'network'?"

That's actually a reasonable question, and I think one of the problems a lot of young people have is that they don't know how...

Networking basically is getting in touch and keeping in touch. Yes, you make lots of contacts, but it's what you do with the contacts that makes it networking. You keep up with your friends and associates, ask them what's going on, take some interest. You go to conferences and professional association meetings, you shake hands, you ask questions. You keep up with what's happening in your industry and your community.

You join Linkedin and other Web sites that are related to your line of business. You read press releases and company announcements and note who has gotten new business recently. (You also note who is losing business, so that you don't waste your time with them.) You post your resume every darn place that you can. You take advantage of whatever connections you have. A lot of things are very indirect: your call your friend Joe and let him know you're looking. He doesn't know of any openings that his employer has, but he heard last week from his fishing buddy Bill that the company that Bill works for just got a new contract, and Bill's company has already filled their positions but they have a sub-contractor that's going through a major expansion and is begging for people who know anything about the widgets you work with. That sort of thing.

I can't tell you the number of different things I did when I was out of work last summer. The job offer I eventually received and took came from a company where I had worked in their facility as a subcontractor employee a few years ago, and some people there remembered me. The funny thing is, I'm still getting calls from recruiters for things that I applied for a year or more ago. I make it a point to return these to tell them that I'm off the market, because so few people do and I want them to remember me in the future, just in case.

As far as feeling like you're being pushy for hitting people up: While it's something you certainly don't want to over-do, you'd be surprised how willing people are to try to help out when it comes to finding jobs, especially in the current economy. I'm in a mailing list of people that I worked with on a project about ten years ago (it was a really tight team, and a lot of us have remained in touch). One of them is currently out of a job, and she's so desperate she's even tried Home Depot and Lowe's (they're not hiring). I got her to send me the posting number of a job she applied for with my employer, and I got the name of the hiring manager and sent him a recommendation. It only took a few minutes, and it was the least I could do for someone that I know to be a good engineer and a good teammate.

Here's an applicable webcomic for you Cornerdemon:
http://xkcd.com/1032/

More seriously, networking is something that should happen organically. It's making friends with your coworkers, maintaining old friends on Facebook and LinkedIn (make a point of using FB to send them a happy note on their birthday), joining activities that you enjoy that are applicable to what you want to do or where the people you want to network with hang out (golf, Toastmasters, writer's groups, beat poetry nights, political fundraisers, you get the idea). Networking is also making yourself useful to people who can give you a leg up.

As an example of that last note, if I wanted to incorporate our hostess Amy into my network, I wouldn't just send her an email out of the blue that says "I'm an editor, can you help me get a job?" What I would do is comment regularly, send her links to articles she might like, and I would offer to help edit if she mentioned that her copy of Strunk & White had been eaten by termites. In other words, act like a friendly person. Only after that relationship was built would I mention I was looking for work and ask if she knew anyone.

Too many people start networking only when they need something. People want to help friends, not pushy strangers. This may sound mercenary, but if you add value to their lives before you ask something from them they will be far more inclined to help.

On a more-related-to-the-article note for all you Boomers who are proud of your hard work and intend to (or feel the need to) die in the traces:

You guys are clogging up the works. You're the largest generation ever and until you start retiring or dying it's going to be much harder for us post-Xers to get work that isn't absolute shit.

(Yes, this is tongue in cheek.)

"plumb jobs"?

Working in the trades is probably more lucrative than a white collar job and doesn't require an advanced degree.

Perhaps you meant picking fruits in the genus Prunus?

A career in social work perhaps? Helping people get straightened out?

...sorry. I'm very picky about spelling mistakes.

Well looking at her website I don't see her resume anywhere. There is no indication she is looking for a permanent job. Even if it was a resume with just her first name and last initial, experience, and an e-mail address -- the full one could be provided later. I don't have one on my website, yet, but I will later as I decide I need to find a new job.

Also just setting up a website is going to cost about $150. The yearly cost is going to be in the $100 a year range.

Third, what are her degrees in? Is it a major in art history and a minor in Spanish? A minor in Spanish -- go south for about 600 miles and you will get all the Spanish you need.

Holy moly. Over Christmas break of my senior year in college, I prepared and mailed ONE HUNDRED resumes and cover letters to companies all over the country looking for work. If I'd gotten a follow-up from a business, but it wasn't where I wanted to work? I still would have jumped through their hoops and tried to get a job, whether it was in Florida or Maine, Texas or Montana.

Those hundred mailings netted me a grand total of five interviews, which I considered a good return.

I attended regional and local meetings of professionals in my field, sucking it up even when I didn't know anyone. I would introduce myself, make conversation, talk about what I was doing. I had "personal" calling cards printed up with my name and phone number. I would say over and over again, "If you hear of anyone looking..."

During spring break, I would make 10-hour round trips for interviews that sometimes lasted 20 minutes. I asked for internships and temporary tryouts. I finally landed a crappily paying job in a city I did not like living in and worked my tail off for a year, while living in a garage "apartment" with no heating or A/C except the space heater and box fan I brought along.

When the economy crunched and I was laid off, I lathered, rinsed, and repeated, sending out resumes, driving all over for interviews, asking if, in the absence of "openings," they could take me on for an internship or temporary position.

That's how you get a job.

Hey Amy, when you moved away from Detroit to another city, how did you do that if you didn't already have a job lined up and no money? Where did you sleep?

If your eyes ever actually audibly scream, have your boyfriend shoot video with his Eyephone and post it on the internet. You'll be famous.

If your eyes ever actually audibly scream, ... -- Crid [CridComment at gmail] at March 22, 2012 2:20 PM

Crid, that was just creepy.

I look at my job as this is what I need to do to have an income. I try not to say no. I try to hit deadlines. I'm also good at it.

When my last company let me go after 10 years, my new job was looking for a new job. I spent a minimum of an hour a day doing it and had a 150 mile range. I did at least one application per day. I was unemployed for five weeks.

I still get calls and e-mails from a resume that is two years old online. She can't find a job by now -- she isn't truly working at it or her degrees are useless.

"are a lot of willing young folks who simply cannot find employment sufficient to move out"

Friend of mine just got his masters in bioengineering. It was a real bitch for him due to racism from the foreign Chinese and foreign Indian professors who openly prefer and give paid grants to people from their own country. If you are white/hispanic/black/other asian good luck getting any sort of help from your professor.

My friend had to work shit jobs in order to do the research necessary to get his masters. While other students just got paid wages for their research assignments.

He finally graduated.....only for the economy to sink and it took him months to find a job.