Graduating into this economy?

Faline2
Fri, 06 Feb 2009 02:01:18 +0000

my son graduates with an Econ and another degree from Duke this year, and he has had a great experience with Duke friends, teachers, travel. The place he interned for last summer has hired him and it is in a finance institution. I should mention the stack of no gos before he found an internship with a relation of a friend last summer. I give him full credit for making an impression enough to get a job offer, but I do not believe A. they would have offered the job if they had known what was coming B. nor does he have a clue about the precarious state of things he will soon be immersed in nor does he have the perspective to comprehend the extreme worry and downsizing of dreams going on in those he will soon see daily with bills, mortages, falling assets, houses, families and responsibilities.
I remember starting college a few weeks after Nixon resigned, and a year after an energy crisis when morale was soooo low in the military culture where I grew up. However, we lived simply, paid cash for things, didn’t expect to always be aquiring more status or possessions, thought doing without was rather normal and to be expected in our twenties… and did not think much about acquiring material things as a way to measure one’s worth. We didn’t have any credit cards or put things on layaway. I am glad I remember living that way. Amazing truly amazing how fast things are altering.
Anyone read Alice Walker’s piece on Obama in Newsweek? I liked some of her advice a lot.