The dream school, the debt school

Today the Village Voice came very close to home with an article about NYU student debt, which is the highest in the country. Is the education really worth all the interest and the headaches?

No. Unless you become a successful filmmaker/actor/creative superstar right after college, writer Nick Pinto suggests.

On the flip side, if you are like the wretched NYU grad Pinto dubs “Lyndsey,” (a subject too paranoid to be identified by her real name), you may become a  blubbering film alum living a “a blurred, twilight existence” between 70-hour work weeks that have nothing to do with the field you studied at NYU.

“It’s pretty murderous,” Lyndsey says. “There’s no time in my day to think, to breathe, to eat, to shop for groceries. Weekends I try to catch up on laundry, get groceries, cook as much as possible, and see my friends if I can.”

Still, the punishing work schedule was better than the alternatives Lyndsey sometimes considered. “I’m basically trying to avoid the more extreme ways of doing it: stripping and prostitution,” she says. “Stuff you can’t tell your parents and your friends about.”

Yikes, stripping and prostitution??

Later Pinto playfully rehashes some of the standard arguments about NYU’s soaring student debt rates: NYU is fundamentally an endowment-poor commuter school trying to buy its way into the big leagues with undergrad tuition. And the starry-eyed 18 year olds who agree to those terms are trying to buy (or borrow) a fast track to the big time as well:  A degree from Manhattan’s most powerful purple monster is supposed to look good on applications for a dream job in the big city. Assuming that dream job exists.

But I think the Village Voice is asking the wrong question.  The answer to whether NYU is worth $350,000 of debt (that’s how much Lyndsey owes after interest) is obviously a resounding UH NOOOOOO girl don’t do it!

But where do we go from here? Lyndsey is already in an enormous amount of debt, and she’s not alone: I have, as I’m sure everyone does, at least one NYU friend who is over his/her head in student loans. Plus, NYU isn’t the only university with bad financial aid: Students go into enormous debts and have trouble paying them back at increasingly unaffordable public schools too. In fact, this year marks the highest overall rates of defaults on student loans in the past decade.

— Arielle

Kids These Days

 The wealth gap between younger and older Americans has stretched to the widest on record, the AP reports.  

The typical U.S. household headed by a person age 65 or older has a net worth 47 times greater than a household headed by someone under 35.

Meanwhile, Business Insider reports that young people are happier at their jobs than older people, but are more eager to leave those j0bs.

Maybe it’s that today’s younger workers more commonly want to try out a series of jobs before settling on a single career trajectory, or that older workers have been at it long enough to be bored and jaded.

An Update on Mortgage Leveraging From My Dad

Well the good news is that at least one of our dads understands and appreciates Plastics. The bad news is that no one really knows what leveraging mortgages means.

How to deal with questions about your future this Thanksgiving

Happy holidays! Congrats on getting through midterms. Yes, they sucked. But look on the bright side: it’s almost time for Thanksgiving break!

Unfortunately, since this is the last Thanksgiving before you graduate from college, the experience is not going to be stress-free. In addition to enjoying great food and perhaps a sporting match, you are also going to have to face questions about your future from your relatives.

Here are some ways to deal with it:

1. Change the topic

photo by Matt McGee

Don’t want to talk about graduation? Get your relative blabbing about something else. Might be a little tricky to throw the question, but it can be done. So for example…

Uncle: So what are you going to do after you graduate?

You: Can you pass the cranberry sauce?

Uncle: Here you go. Now about graduation…

You: Can you also pass the gravy?

Uncle: Sure. Are you thinking about grad school?

You: So I heard you got an ulcer.

Uncle: Oh it’s been horrible…

2. Lie

photo by RMacDowell1

Just lie. Lie through your teeth. Lie until it goes away. You’ll have to get creative, but let’s face it, that’s pretty much all you’re good at anyway. For instance…

Aunt: So are you thinking about your plans after graduating?

You: Biomedical engineer.

Aunt: Oh I didn’t know you were into the sciences…

You: Lawyer.

Aunt: Oh that’s nice. Just like your other cousins. Can you pass the gravy?

photo by rfduck

3. Tell the truth

You can also be honest but I don’t recommend it. This can often lead to further lines of questioning, causing you to doubt yourself, hate your relative, and seriously dampen the holiday spirit. Such as…

Cousin: So what are you thinking about doing after May?

You: To be honest, I’m not quite sure. I’m really trying to focus on all my classes and my other work right now. I think it’s a little far away at this point to be making any plans.

Cousin: Really? Too soon? Wouldn’t you have to start applying to grad school right now?

You: Um…

Cousin: And what kinds of jobs would you be looking at? Journalism? That’s what you studied right?

You: Uhhh…

Cousin: And do you want to stay in New York? Or would you go somewhere else?

You: JESUS CAN YOU BACK OFF IT I JUST DON’T KNOW, OK? *SOBS*

— Jordan

Post-Holiday News Blues

Oh my goodness – the internet must be experiencing some sort of Post-Halloween sugar crash, because the Plastics-related news is pretty glum so far this week.

Yesterday the world wide web was just buzzing with commentary about the plight of young people, thanks to a new survey by the think tank Demos and the advocacy group The Young Invincibles.  The statistics it highlights aren’t uplifting. In fact, they’re pretty much along the same lines of gloom and doom we’ve been whining about all along: Our generation is underemployed, 20 percent of us live with our parents, we’re pessimistic, etc. And the last line of the report really adds insult to injury:

“About half of young Americans between the ages of 18 and 34 believe that a fundamental tenet of the American dream is broken — that the next generation will be better off than they are.”

Even The American Dream is broken?? I’m not really sure what to do with myself now.

The Huffington Post highlighted one of the more interesting portions of the study: Young white people are less optimistic about their futures than minorities. White people in the U.S. also control 20 times more wealth than black people and 18 times more wealth than Latinos.

Meanwhile, msnbc.com was able to muster up a fresh, witty headline for their article about the study:

Recession threatens generation of adults, inspires ‘Occupy’ protests

Oh my gosh the recession is affecting young people? AND you were able to connect this brand new finding to Occupy Wall Street?

In more concretely depressing news, Inside Higher Ed has a look at the decline of the few U.S. institutions that still offer free higher education. This follows Monday’s announcement that The Cooper Union, a college designed around the idea of providing free undergraduate education, may begin to charge tuition if its economic circumstances don’t clear up.

– Arielle

Jordan and I interview my dad

1970, in Pamplona, Spain -- Around the time my dad realized he was an adult.

Sometimes journeying very far away can help you realize that good advice was right by your side all along. At least that’s true in my case — during college I’ve called my parents up more than a few times to ask them what they would do in my situation. Yesterday Jordan and I were hankering to know what my dad, now a professor of psychology, thought about life when he was 21. So we called him up and had this conversation.

Jordan: When you were 21 how did you feel about the future generally? Were you excited to be a grown up?

Dad: I was kind of living in the moment, you know. I had already hitchhiked from New York to California and from New York to Florida and back, and I sort of had a taste for adventure. I was excited about leaving New York and just continuing the journey of discovering the world.

Arielle: So you used to write poetry and climb mountains and go on adventures … How did you know when you had become an adult?

Dad: Um, it wasn’t like a qualitative shift. It was more sort of gradual, but the balance seemed to shift around 27. I seemed to be able to reflect more about the potential consequences of my actions, which also coincided with – around 27 I climbed the volcano Cotopaxi, and I guess I had a realization that I could really die in some of the things that I was doing. I gave up my fantasy of immortality; I realized that I was not invulnerable.

Jordan: I know you’re from New York. Do you think that New York is the best place for a young person to be, or do you think there are other opportunities outside of this city?

Dad: I don’t think it’s the best place or the worst place. It’s glorious on one hand and it’s a hell hole on the other. A lot of what you run into in New York is circumstantial, don’t you think? It’s spectacular but it’s also nasty, it’s fraught with a lot of difficulties and it’s a little bit unpredictable.

Jordan: I also want to ask you about Arielle. We’re both confused about the next step after graduation, and I know that Arielle is a journalist and a writer at heart. Do you feel that way as well and what would make you think she is destined for writing or journalism?

Dad: Words don’t seem to be a struggle for her. They seem to come nicely and quickly and efficiently and she gets the job done so I’m really impressed with that. And also I know how literary she is and how much time she’s put into reading … all the external indicators of success are there. [Ed. Note: OK so my dad said a lot of other really nice things about me at this point, but he’s my dad and he loves me, so we won’t bother you with all the details.]

Arielle: Have you read our blog?

Dad: Yeah, I haven’t read the whole thing, but I’m kind of in marvel of it and looking forward to reading more. I actually don’t really know what the idea of the blog is; could you help me to get more of a focus on it?

Jordan: Uh, we’re kind of trying to figure it out ourselves I think.

Dad: So … it’s kind of an exploration of the world according to Jordan and Arielle?

Jordan: That’s about right I think.

Arielle: Um.

Arielle: Back to you Dad — I think there’s a sense that our generation is more pampered but less prepared for economic realities than your generation was. What do you think of that?

Orchard Beach -- 1956

Dad: I don’t know. I wasn’t prepared for it all. In a way I had a silver spoon because I went to City College, and it was 14 dollars a semester. I used to go to my mom and say, “Ma I need money,” and she would go into her purse and take out 14 dollars and that was the semester’s registration fee. And then I got a scholarship to graduate school; I never paid a nickel for my tuition and I had enough money for housing.

Jordan: Is there any particular skill that we don’t learn from our professors that you really should know when you embark on a life after college?

Dad: I think leveraging mortgages* and investing money is something that you should probably learn as quickly as you can. I learned it so much later in life. I grew up in New York and I couldn’t imagine anyone having a hundred thousand dollars to buy a house. To me it was like, you’re never going to have that amount of money so you better pay the rent, like you guys are doing. What about your parents — Are they homeowners, Jordan?

Jordan: Yeah.

Dad: Where are they living?

Jordan: They live in New York, about an hour north of the city.

Dad: Did they pass on any of that to you – about how to leverage mortgages and handle finances?

Jordan: No, I don’t really think they know how to do it either. I honestly don’t know how they function day to day but somehow they must do it.

Dad: It’s a lot of trial and error on my end, and somehow I’ve made it work. But if you guys could just take a course in it that might be really helpful.

Arielle : I think there probably is a course, but I would just be totally uninterested in it. What is your general advice for us for the future?

Dad: My own experience has been that I didn’t have to think so far ahead. That you follow your passion and it leads you to the right place. Always have some sort of safety net so you can have some food on the table, but other than that I say just follow the direction of your interests and don’t worry about money too much.

–

*After this interview Jordan and I realized we’re not really even sure what leveraging mortgages means. I’m not sure my dad does either.

A Very Plastics Halloween

Boo! Did we scare you? Just messing with you.

Halloween is one of our favorite holidays and today we were thinking, “How could we make this holiday any better than it already is?”

That’s when we came up with this dumb list of ways that you can dress up in the spirit of Plastics this holiday season. Enjoy! And beware….

1. Your Future

Cover yourself in felt question marks, or draw them on your clothes! This will symbolize how uncertain you are about the next phase of your life after college. Downside: you look like The Riddler.

2. A current event of your choosing.

Yes, you’re well read and witty and slightly self absorbed and that cute girl at the party is going to appreciate that about you goddammit. So dress as someone/something from a recent news story. Not something related to Occupy Wall Street or an Apple product. Please.

3. Underpaid adjunct professor
 
Wear lots of tweed and wire-frame glasses. Attach shackles to your wrists and ankles.

4. Arielle Milkman
 
Get a one-of-a-kind alpaca sweater and deck your wrists out with tribal jewelry. Find black horn-rimmed glasses and carry a 200,000 dollar degree.
 
5. Jordan Teicher
 
Find an almost identical pair of hipster glasses. Comb your hair into a wave approximately two feet tall. Wear only earth tones and corduroy or fabrics closely resembling corduroy.

6. Career counselor
 
Find brightly colored and oversized clothing and accessories. Add a wig or hat. Wear face makeup. Create or purchase a pair of clown shoes.
 
7. Your childhood self
 
Raid the boxes of old clothes at your parents’ house and re-construct your childhood wardrobe. Find your old little league baseball jersey, your Batman backpack, and your very first jean jacket. Downside: some people might mistake you for a hipster. 

8. The Graduate
 
Wear a bathing suit and sunglasses and carry a pool floatie. Look around nervously and play The Best of Simon & Garfunkel on your iPhone.

9. An interdisciplinary major.

Dress in mismatching clothes, shave one of your sideburns, and make sure you look like a maniac. Bring your own composting kit with you, quote Foucault as much as possible, and tell the guy who is hitting on you by the bar that you find his non-engaged approach to his own exercise of postcolonial violence to be really fucking problematic.

10. Your student loans.

Carry a loudly ticking watch to symbolize the rapid rate at which your interest is accruing, and write a bunch of numbers all over yourself. Downside: This one is most definitely too pathetic to earn you many points.

We were just studying in a Gallatin common area when this group walked in and started having an annoying meeting. Here’s the email exchanged that followed:

Dark Place

Let me crash and burn on my own terms. Fuck you for caring. — Arielle

Well guys it’s come to this. Arielle and I are really stressed and freaking and can’t even think about posting anything relevant to the mission of Plastics this week.

But we love blogging and we love you so we’ve decided to blog about whatever we want. We apologize in advance.