First Job Initiative
Monday, 9/28/2020
Announcement: Two things to make you aware of...
1. Later this week, I'm so excited to be able to share a long form essay I've been working on. The title is "Building Ourselves as Monopolies" where I take some of Peter Thiel's business concepts from his book Zero to One and apply them to our lives. There is one big thing you could help me out with, though. If you enjoy it or know someone who would, share it around! You can forward them the newsletter or direct them to the website. I'll make sure to provide a link. As always, shoot me any thoughts, good or bad, you have about it as well.
2. I begin a new chapter of my life in public accounting on Wednesday. MWF isn't going anywhere, but there might not always be a piece right at MWF at 8. I'll continue my best to deliver good content along with some essays sprinkled in now and then.
Thanks everyone for reading, and here's to hoping the 4th quarter of 2020 ends on a positive note (*nervous laugh*) !!
Weekend Recap
Who is Amy Coney Barrett, Trump's Supreme Court nominee? The big political news over the weekend was Trump's selection to succeed Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The nomination comes on the forefront of one of the most contentious election seasons. (NBC News)
Ransomware Attacks Take On New Urgency Ahead of Vote: If you thought the last election saw some voting controversy, we are on track for an eruption of voting conspiracies, regardless of who wins. (NYT)
Oklahoma goes down, Mike Leach is back, and the college football Saturday we didn't know we needed: The SEC kicked off this weekend, and it feels very good to have football back in the south. Catch the recap from all that happened on Saturday. (ESPN)
For Fun
The Carnival Cruise Ship That Spread Coronavirus Around the World
Space mining: the new goldrush
Brainstorm 110
First Job Initiative
Brainstorm 110 is our course on thinking. Let’s connect two unrelated things and see if we can’t play Shark Tank. The key here is developing our creative thinking. This skill is widely important in any line of work. Just because you aren’t the boss doesn’t mean you can’t come up with ideas. Start developing this skill now to uncover things later.
Go back to your first job for a second. Not the first job in your career, but your very first job in high school or college. Remember the feeling of being overwhelmed at the start? You put in extra effort to make sure your work is adequate early. Slowly, it becomes clear that the job is relatively trivial, so it begins to be more comfortable. At the end of it (more than likely a finite tenure), the job might not have been your favorite, but it serves as a building block for future jobs along with recommendations. For these few reasons, a first job is important. I would argue it’s essential for teenagers to have some sort of job exposure before they reach age twenty. What are some ways we can ensure they do?
I’ll put my policy maker hat on for a second and propose a First Job Initiative. In the future, I might dive into this and make it an essay topic, but for now, here is an outline of what the policy would look like:
Requirements
The whole idea behind this is to engage youth with work opportunities. For high school students, this would be reinforced through the school system. Businesses could get approved by the school system and then recruit teenagers for term employment. Terms could range from the summer to a full semester part-time.
Similar to a college fair, companies could set up a high school job fair to gain exposure. Not every student is molded to pursue the four year college route. This would be a great time to shed some exposure to high school students on some other career paths available. On the flip side, if you were planning to go to college, you could still gain valuable skills in various jobs.
State Specific
Naturally, a lot of the employment opportunities that would be available would be locally. There should be no federal oversight in this (similar to how schools should be). It wouldn't make sense to apply the same rules to Montana and Maryland; there are completely different opportunities.
Likewise, per this chart, many people tend to end up living in the state they were born in. This makes building connections a vital asset for where you grow up. Engaging in employment opportunities early help create that.
There are so many more details to iron out, but the substance is there. The jobs wouldn't be glorious work. I'm not saying let's get on the phone with Google and start getting sixteen year olds into the mix. My first job was a cart boy at a golf course. Was it glamorous? No. Did it teach me responsibility and how to work hard? Yes.
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