{"id":859,"date":"2006-02-27T13:57:42","date_gmt":"2006-02-27T18:57:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/mo-woe\/"},"modified":"2006-02-27T14:00:04","modified_gmt":"2006-02-27T19:00:04","slug":"mo-woe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/mo-woe","title":{"rendered":"Mo’ Woe"},"content":{"rendered":"

In January, I wrote<\/a> about Anya Kamenetz’ book, Generation Debt,<\/a> and Daniel Gross’ criticism of it<\/a>. I was mean (enough to warrant a smackdown challenge from Mrs. Kamenetz), but hey. Buy a dog.<\/p>\n

Today, we have more criticism of the book<\/a>, by Kerry Howley at Reason:<\/p>\n

Kamenetz, a 2002 Yale graduate, is the latest spokesperson for a paroxysm of anxiety among “emerging adults.” But you don’t have to accept Kamanetz’s absurd thesis\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00e2\u20ac\u009dthat a group of people among the healthiest, wealthiest, and most educated in human history deserve your pity\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00e2\u20ac\u009dto get angry about the way their prosperity has been manhandled. The term Generation Debt is nothing if not apt: Young Americans come of age in a world where heaps of their as yet-unearned cash has already been promised away. They are embodied I.O.U.s to Medicare, to Social Security, to extended obligations in foreign countries with unclear objectives and no end in sight. A glance at the latest projections for, say, Medicare Part D is fair game for some righteous anger.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As a bonus, Chris Farrell at BusinessWeek has an article critiquing the arguments<\/a> of another<\/em> book in the “WAH! We’re going to be poor” cycle, Tamara Drout’s Strapped: Why America’s 20- and 30-Somethings Can’t Get Ahead<\/a>: <\/p>\n

Drout takes a hardline stand in her book. She argues that the younger American generation faces a life of “downscaled dreams.” The traditional middle-class life is out of reach for more and more young people. Going to college, owning a home, and having a child — or two — is increasingly expensive. Paychecks are increasingly meager, so more and more, the younger generation is taking on onerous debt. “They will be the first generation who won’t match the prosperity of their parents,” Drout writes. <\/p>\n

Considering that a staple belief in American society is that each generation ends up a bit better off than the previous one, Drout’s charge is remarkable. And it’s also largely nonsense. For instance, she laments that recent college graduates, already burdened with student-loan obligations, have to rack up steep credit charges to furnish their apartments and buy a wardrobe for work.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In January, I wrote about Anya Kamenetz’ book, Generation Debt, and Daniel Gross’ criticism of it. I was mean (enough to warrant a smackdown challenge from Mrs. Kamenetz), but hey. Buy a dog. Today, we have more criticism of the book, by Kerry Howley at Reason: Kamenetz, a 2002 Yale graduate, is the latest spokesperson … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Mo’ Woe”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-literature"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-dR","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":975,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/the-egyptians-built-the-pyramids-with-interns","url_meta":{"origin":859,"position":0},"title":"The Egyptians built the pyramids with interns","author":"Gil","date":"May 31, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Will Wilkinson savages the NYTimes op-ed of the woman who wrote Generation Debt, in The Baffling Mind of Anya Kamenetz. I goofed on her book, secondhand, over here.","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":796,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/woe-is-you","url_meta":{"origin":859,"position":1},"title":"Woe is You","author":"Gil","date":"January 9, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"I've only taken a swing at one woman in my life (I was asleep, and she woke me up at 4am by sneaking into my dorm room), but I'd probably drop the smackdown on Anya Kamenetz. Fortunately, Daniel Gross at Slate does a much better job, with less bloodshed. (You\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 4 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 4 comments","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/woe-is-you#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1608,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/and-gin-makes-me-virtually-invulnerable-to-criticism","url_meta":{"origin":859,"position":2},"title":"And gin makes me virtually invulnerable (to criticism)","author":"Gil","date":"July 30, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Caffeine can help fight skin cancer! I bet it makes the cells so hyperactive they just get tired and conk out. Now I feel less bad about the monstrous caffeine addiction I've fostered over the last few years. Go, coffee!","rel":"","context":"With 1 comment","block_context":{"text":"With 1 comment","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/and-gin-makes-me-virtually-invulnerable-to-criticism#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12360,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/episode-328-emily-nussbaum","url_meta":{"origin":859,"position":3},"title":"Episode 328 – Emily Nussbaum","author":"Gil","date":"July 8, 2019","format":"audio","excerpt":"Virtual Memories Show 328: Emily Nussbaum \"I come out of the online community and I feel TV criticism specifically is a conversation. The debate-quality of TV that takes place over time is part of the allure of TV criticism.\" Look! Up in the sky! Is it really more like a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Art"","block_context":{"text":"Art","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/art"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/emilycomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C522&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/emilycomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C522&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/emilycomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C522&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/emilycomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C522&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/emilycomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C522&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":4302,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/the-blood-club","url_meta":{"origin":859,"position":4},"title":"The Blood Club","author":"Gil","date":"August 6, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"On Monday, I wrote that I was going to launch a recurring Thursday feature reprinting mean-spirited reviews I wrote for The Comics Journal back in 1998. It was going to be Klassik Komiks Kritikism, but my lawyers have informed me that title could be construed as a sign that I'm\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Classic Comics Criticism"","block_context":{"text":"Classic Comics Criticism","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature\/classic-comics-criticism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4371,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/classic-comics-criticism-black-hole-son-in-law","url_meta":{"origin":859,"position":5},"title":"Classic Comics Criticism: Black Hole Son-In-Law","author":"Gil","date":"August 20, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"My in-laws' tradition (on my wife's dad's side) for the big family gathering on Christmas eve is that everyone draws the name of another family-member and buys a present for that person. This is probably totally normal to the rest of you, but it's an alien concept to me because\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Classic Comics Criticism"","block_context":{"text":"Classic Comics Criticism","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature\/classic-comics-criticism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=virtualmemories-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0375714723","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=859"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}