I mean ideally I would like to stay in the same area I am now, but you have to go where the jobs are and do what ya gotta do. I'm not necessarily looking to relocate, and if I had to move I would have some preferences, but like I say a lot of that isn't up to me, but up to where the jobs are I guess. Very good point as mentioned before
If this is a primary factor, then you will need to adjust to those career fields that can be supported locally or regionally. It is not always easy, but it is certainly possible. I've done that in my home town while I've watched countless people come and go chasing jobs. To do this you need to look at a bigger picture than simply what fields interest you. You also need to look at local industries, regional employers, age demographics, and everything else around you while trying to see what fields may create sustainable employment.
To be honest, I've heard two schools of thought here, find something you love and are passionate about and make it your vocation. Doing so means you may always be the best in your field, but you risk burn out and disatisfaction with your passion. Flip side is do whatever pays the most, even if you hate it, for the least amount of time to set you up, then take the money and run. THen you have the funds to be choosy about how you use your time thereafter. Myself, I shot for something in the middle doing something I don't mind that pays decent but I neither love nor loathe it. I've also been very, very lucky in picking y employers because my work in manufacturing is certainly not the easiest way to make a living in the modern USA.
Secondly, be aware you are entering a radically different workplace than did your parents.
This is the god honest truth of the matter. You are likely to endure 4-6 different career changes in your lifetime. Not just job changes, but outright alterations in fundamental work. Knowing your range of skills and being flexible can go a long way towards preparing you for this.
A degree doesn't mean you learned anything. It's just a piece of paper that proves you can finish something. That's it.
In a big sense, it does and in your example is a good reason of what it candemonstrate. However, while college should give you the fundamentals of any particular career field, it also should be teaching the the critical analysis skills to look beyond the obvious and find trends and identify the frameworks and contexts that drive decision making. If it was simply to teach specific skills they would all be trade schools.
Can somebody go dig Reagan up and revive him somehow? We need him!
In general those weren't bad times, but they also set the foundation for a bunch of the troubles we have now. The deregulation of the financial industries that took place in the 80s created the mess that lead to the savings and loan collapses. Since we weren't smart enough to tighten things back up, Clinton took the game to the next level and allowed the "too large to fail" situation to morph in to exisitance in the financial industries. After that it was only a matter of time before derivitives would evolve and further deregulation would lead to a near total melt down. Just IMO, but I guess what I'm saying is don't put too much faith in politicians and be wary of everything they do because they don't really work as representatives of the people but rather promote the interests of those that assist them to gain power and seek to retain it. Republican or Democrat, conservative or liberal, they all serve the interests of PACs first while pandering to the rest of us.
Well you have 40-50 years of work ahead of you. Things change. The current events are a blip on the radar in the long run. Things will be completely different in 5-10 years. Here in So Cal there is success and money everywhere you look so it is all within reach. Sure things are bad but they are good too. Make the most of it.
Very true. This is the balancing act you have to achieve in that you need to learn the skills to survive now yet still be adaptable enough to change as things evolve in the coming decades. As I pointed out at the top of the post, research, analysis, trending, to steal the phrase: "thinking globally while acting locally" can put you in a position to be successful. There is no one simply answer to it at all, much like what you've read in here. opinions diverge and results change. Either you will need to be so indispensable that your field never changes, or you need to be flexibile to adapt to it as it changes.
