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Comment by incision | Hacker News Reader

I must be old...

I feel like I read stories about horrible jobs and tough times finding work from young college grads regularly and the news would seem to corroborate them [1].

Apparently, these people end up serving coffee or answering phones for clown shop start-ups.

Meanwhile, I know people trying to hire for what I'd consider traditional entry level jobs (clerks, reception, no-risk security, no-experience necessary apprenticeships) offering full benefits plus 35-45k+ salaries who would be overjoyed to see a single college-educated applicant.

What's going on here? Do people believe in this Amway-esque pitch for a "world of opportunities"? Do traditional jobs feel like giving up? Are they too restricting?

1: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2014/0...

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Well, do you have links to the open job positions for 'traditional jobs'? Are they in nowhere, midwest? Are you sure they really exist? Are they advertising entirely on the bulletin board of nursing homes? Are they just advertising for 'secretary' without listing salaries and benefits? Lots of reasons why they might not get applicants, but I don't think any of those reasons are 'kids these days'.

The jobs you mention don't exist. Unless you count prison guards. I know someone who double majored with good grades and is now a corrections officer working with mostly non-college graduates because the only other job opportunities were things like 7-11 cashier.

Also, I know people see a lot of "openings" for "decent" positions, but most of them seem to be fake spam positions from companies that don't really want to hire people considering that every person I know who has ever applied for one has never heard anything back, except for a couple people who've had it explained to them that an opening wasn't for college graduates.

> The jobs you mention don't exist

But doesn't it sound like it would be a supremely profitable relationship if such a job did exist?

I'm not "old," but I'll give it a shot...

I agree - it seems like every day I read a story about how my peers can't find jobs, how the job market is terrible, etc. But then I see thousands of postings for those typical desk jobs. I don't fully understand it, but if I had to venture a guess, I'd say it has to do with the "coolness" of the job.

It seems much more superior these days to say you work for the latest startup over a traditional multi-national corporation. Also, people entering the job market today really seem to value the work environment. I read an article on HN recently about how the finance industry is losing applicants to the tech industry. Recent grads hate the stuffy 9 to 5 culture, not getting free lunches, wearing suits to a job where they sit at a desk all day, etc. etc.

Regardless, I would think they'd rather have a job somewhere like that than no job at all, but that's been my limited experience talking to 30 or so new grads.

Looking at my peers, who mostly have science and engineering backgrounds, there is a perception that we need to work in "our field". Not using our degrees makes the entire expense and time of college seem like a waste[1], even though the degree can still help get unrelated work.

On top of that, we treat searching for jobs in a very focused way: I'm looking for a job in "x". I'm sure there are lots of other jobs, but if I never think to search for them it's like they do not exist.

1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunk_costs#Loss_aversion_and_th...

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