There were a great deal of lies and distortions spewed in Paul Ryan’s speech at the Republican National Convention on Wednesday evening. So much, that the news reports the following day recounted them point by point. That has already been diced up, and so there is no need to rehash the arguments against these easily refutable talking points. What has gotten significantly less play in the media is how Paul Ryan cynically uses the issue of college students who are unemployed and underemployed to attack President Obama.
The full line that Ryan got far too much credit for states that: “College grads shouldn’t have to live out their 20s in childhood bedrooms, staring up at fading Obama posters.” This was followed by much applause, of course because of the saddling of the current president with the blame for what the private sector is really responsible for. What is really terrible about this statement is that the Republicans have absolutely no solutions that they have put forth to deal with struggling college graduates, nor those who are struggling without degrees who still deserve help nonetheless.
What keeps college graduates in their high school bedrooms are a dearth of employment opportunities. Lack of decent jobs is what keeps people where they are, and does worse for so many. In fact, there are increasing reports and attention now on the more common issue of underemployment for graduates. To use this issue, will hopefully be seen for the dishonest ploy that it is. For the college students and graduates reading this, what do you think of this statement?
To see some information about a documentary in planning about underemployed and unemployed college graduates, view the video below. It is called Degrees of Separation.
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I can’t wait to see this documentary. Even worse than unemployment is underemployment, and far too many college graduates (and non-college graduates alike) are subjected to this. Whatever happened to values, principles, and boosting the morale of various work environments? What happened to passion and motivation? Are many just working today just to receive a paycheck?