On my mind this morning - does great power come with great responsibility, or does absolute power corrupt absolutely?
The current model of capitalism is supposed to work around supply and demand. What the people want gets produced; what they don't want falls off the table; pricing gets worked out based on a natural balance between what people want and how much of it there is.
But it's based on money alone. What happens when it's quality jobs people want, but they aren't being produced? Or a meaningful voice in democracy, but aren't being listened to?
Youth unemployment hits both of these issues. It's all well and good for elites to tell youth they need to suck it up, work hard, invest in education or networking programs or whatever else, but they're also saying two other things:
- hey youth, you deserve what you want, go buy it!
- hey youth, we aren't interested in buying what you have, but keep sending out those CVs, it's good practice for something.
The wires in this message are crossed in ways the old-guard doesn't seem to see - the reason they got ahead was because people were willing to invest in them, to take a risk. An immediate ROI wasn't the issue.
Now, and immediate Return on Investment is everything. If there's no immediate return, don't do it. But we're telling youth to work hard, for years, to get to maybe hopefully get to a place where they can start paying down student debt, much less getting ahead. Where's the immediate or even long-term ROI on that?
It doesn't exist.
Why would a business invest time and money in fruitless endeavours? Why produce products and services when nobody's buying them?
This is the predicament that youth face - a predicament caused directly by laissez-faire capitalism.
It's an unintended consequence, I'm sure, but still a worrisome one. If the people at the top accept no responsibility for empowering the next generation, if they're so committed to scoring more cash for themselves by whatever means and hoarding it, then circulation doesn't happen. There's a growing generation that is being completely left outside of our economic and political systems.
Which is even more backwards, because the silver surge on the inside is going to find themselves in very short order wholly dependent on those disengaged, increasingly spiteful millenials. One system is becoming more concentrated, but it is entirely surrounded by a new, poorly organized system that can't but consume what came before.
We keep hearing talk about iterative failure, and how success in the new economy means taking risks, dedicating investment into the process to ensure the best result and prioritizing small wins, not just big, bold ventures.
Until organizations and individuals with money and power walk the walk, though, it's just talk.
You'd think the baby boomers would recognize when youth are done with talk and are prepared to move towards action. They have become what once they railed against.
And the cycle repeats, until we once again equate great responsibility with great power.
In the long-term, it's the only smart way to proceed, and yet we don't.
Maybe it's time to reframe the conversation from one about return on investment and risk to one about having a little faith in our youth and what they can do with a little help from the rest of us.
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