To the Tantrum Generation: Forget college

I'll admit my college days are long behind me. I was an undergrad from 1980-1984 and a graduate student from 1993-1995. What do I know of modern campus concerns?

So call me an old fuddy-duddy, but it sure seems college students are becoming dumber and dumber.

First there's the serious issue of studying utterly useless subjects. It seems institutes of higher education are entirely unfamiliar with the basics of economics (i.e. the laws of supply and demand) since they're feeding millions of impressionable young people with information that can never, ever be useful in the real world.

And far too many parents send their kids to college regardless of their interests. After all, a college degree is necessary in today's competitive marketplace ... isn't it?

No. The laws of supply and demand still apply, even to college degrees. Too many young people waste time and money getting useless degrees for which there is no demand – or even have a negative value – then wonder why they're working as baristas at Starbucks with a master's degree in social justice and $90,000 in student loans.

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There's no question student-loan debt has skyrocketed in the past 20 years, along with college costs (these go hand-in-hand, so don't assume this is a coincidence; it's called the "college industrial complex"). But what on earth inspires a teenager to take out tens of thousands of dollars in loans to acquire a useless degree to begin with? Who advised them in this matter? Parents? School counselors? Don't they know any better?

I know it's a radical thought, but before you spend many years and thousands of dollars obtaining a degree, make sure there is a suitable market for that degree in the first place. Will your efforts provide something vital to the free market, or will you only be employable in a government make-work job or in a position not commensurate with your education?

Second, it seems these days colleges do little more than spend four years indoctrinating students into socialism/fascism. Consider the "Million Student March" protest that occurred on Thursday, in which students from more than 100 universities demanded 1) tuition-free public college, 2) cancellation of all student debt and 3) a $15 minimum wage for all campus workers.

Criminey, what a bunch of spoiled brats. Free college? As a friend put it, "One word – slavery. In order to make something free, somebody must produce it without pay." I don't see behavior or attitudes like this at non-government-funded places like Hillsdale College, where an entitlement mentality isn't cultivated.

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I can't just blame the parents for raising twits like this, since colleges and universities also breed them like rats. After four years of hearing why socialism is a flawless ideal and rich people are mean because they're rich, even formerly sane students emerge with an unprecedented sense of entitlement and victimhood.

This "Million Student March" was supposedly organized by a social justice warrior named Keely Mullen who will be graduating from Northeastern University in Boston with a staggering $150,000 in debt. What is Ms. Mullen majoring in? This information is carefully concealed in numerous articles touching on the march, which leads me to believe she majored in something über-useless. Doubtless now, she is facing the terrifying thought of working for the next 40 years as a barista at Starbucks, desperately trying to pay off the student loans she stupidly acquired to begin with to study a useless subject. And if she isn't concerned about this fate, it's probably only because she foresees a long career as a taxpayer-funded rabble-rousing activist espousing more nonsense that will lure others into debt slavery.

So who's to blame for this debt Ms. Mullen acquired? Who's at fault for her choices? Did someone point a gun at her head and force her to major in peace studies or sociology to the tune of $150,000? Of course she wants her debt dismissed. (This is called "freeloading.")

At what point do young people begin to take personal responsibility for the decisions they make in life? In my opinion, Ms. Mullen is the epitome of the stupidity being bred in colleges today – no concept of supply and demand, a strong sense of entitlement, the notion that socialism will cure all problems and an insistence they should be given for free all the things other people spent decades acquiring through hard work. Goodness, I sure as heck wouldn't want to hire Ms. Mullen, even if I owned a coffee house and needed a barista.

Who do you suppose did not walk out of their classes on Thursday? I'm willing to bet it was the mature, intelligent, practical students who are meeting the demands of the marketplace by obtaining useful degrees in the STEM subjects. These are kids who know their future depends on their grades and don't have time for silly nonsense that won't accomplish anything. Presumably, after graduation they won't be demanding the government supply them with pointless "social justice warrior" jobs, either.

So I have a modest proposal for what's been termed the "tantrum generation": Before you're allowed to attend a school of higher education, you need to spend four years attending the School of Hard Knocks. In that school, you'll learn a valuable skill such as plumbing, sewing, welding, woodworking, upholstery, wiring, cooking, manufacturing or other useful things people need and are willing to pay for.

You won't get a corner office. You won't get a company car. You won't get a month's paid vacation. Yon won't receive a bachelor's degree in victimhood or a master's degree in scamming and entitlements. You will, however, get a real education. Too many people graduate with elegant degrees but can't plumb, wire, build, sew, cook, weld, butcher, repair, saw, tinker or think their way out of a paper bag and must hire well-paid experts to do this for them. The School of Hard Knocks would solve that problem.

Consider this Marine who tweeted, "I wanted money for school, so I marched too." This young man, James Erickson, is paying for his higher education through military service, including long marches with heavy packs. But unlike Mr. Erickson, most of the twits marching on campus are doubtless too cowardly to pick up a weapon and serve our nation.

As one person pointed out, "If students need a safe space, they should go home, put on their jammies, grab their teddy bears, suck their thumbs and come back when they grow up and can face the real world."

So to all you college cupcakes, if you really want to make yourself employable, skip the social justice warrior route and instead spend your time cultivating the intangible but valuable skills all employers seek: a strong work ethic, discipline, self-control, a dedication to your commitments, the ability to arrive on time, to perform a task without complaint and (after training) without supervision, the ability to write coherently instead of like a texting monkey, the ability to speak clearly without saying "like" or use an expletive every fourth word, and other indefinable skills that raise you head and shoulders above the crowd.

Forgo that internship with the ACLU or embarrassing public demands for coerced handouts. The world doesn't need more shakedown artists.

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