Are millennials cut out for this job market?

Are millennials cut out for this job market? By Ruben Navarrette, Jr., CNN Contributor

This article sheds bad light on my age group and does not accurately represent our generation. I am not afraid of a red pen, compromise, criticism or washing both sides of a dirty dish. In fact, I do all of this each day. I understand the fact that you think we are lazy and self-obsessed because we want the perfect job, with benefits, paid vacations, ability to earn raises, and to rise up throughout a company, but isn’t that what you wanted at our age as well?


We are suffering through the biggest recession the United States has ever experienced. We are graduating from college with the highest hope, that you, yes you, the older generations instilled in us, that we would get a good job, but in reality we can’t. I mean isn’t that why we all went to college in the first place, to get a good job, to make good money, to be “educated”, to thrive like our parents did.

But don’t let me use the struggling economy as an excuse.

Even though these are our dreams, our realities are much different. Our realities are filled with the older generation’s leftovers. Millennials are working jobs that are well below our education and pay range. Instead of our dreams we are choosing other realities: lower pay, volunteer and community building positions, living with our parents (which is as much of a struggle for them as for us), entrepreneurship, etc. I’m sorry some of you think this means all 50 million of us needs a “reboot” or that we are failing as a generation, but that’s just your way of looking at it. When faced with a reality, we handle it. We may not make the same choices or vote for the same president or back the same ideals as other generations, but we believe in what we support and we stand behind it. So go ahead “reboot” the millennial generation, if you can. You’ll be losing some of the greatest assets you have in this struggling economy. You may not see it now, but one of these days you’ll be thanking us for who we are and what we believe in. And if that makes us arrogant then so be it.