No school, no job, no worries, say kids (3 Viewers)

[David Spade]

No school, no job, no worries, say kids

By Greg Stolz
The Courier-Mail
August 10, 2009 07:19am
http://www.news.com.au/business/story/0,27753,25907438-462,00.html#









The young and the jobless
Queensland's youth unemployment rate has reached 19 per cent, well above the State's overall...

No worries ... Jemma Gillies, 16, is studying at TAFE and says she has no time to work. Pic: Paul Riley

• Youth unemployment hits 19 per cent
• Generation of kids don't want jobs
• Say they can get money off mum and dad

AT 16, Brandon Hinneberg is out of school and out of work. The Gold Coast youth says he has been unemployed for two years since leaving school in year 9.
"I was just over it, I'd had a gutful," he told The Courier-Mail yesterday at one of his favourite hang-outs, the Varsity Lakes skate park on the Gold Coast. "The teachers were picking on me so I left."

Brandon is not on the dole, however. "Mum and Dad give me money," he said.

Asked how much, he replied: "It just depends on what I want."

Were his parents hassling him to find a job?

"I've been looking for a job but it's so hard to get one," he said. "I'm not worried about it though. I'll get a job one day."
While the Australian Bureau of Statistics puts the overall unemployment rate at 5.8 per cent, its figures show young people are three times more likely to be without a job.

Brandon's friend, Jemma Gillies, 16, said she was not surprised to hear unemployment for 15 to 19-year-olds had hit 19 per cent because too many teenagers were content to "bum" off their parents.

"They scab off their parents for the rest of their lives pretty much," she said.

"Their parents give them money so they think 'I don't have to work, sweet as. I don't have to do anything'."

Jemma said her parents wanted her to get a part-time job even though she was studying at TAFE.

"I'd have no time to see my boyfriend if I had to work," she said.

"I left school because I hated it but I'm now doing grade 10 studies at TAFE so I can hopefully work in child care." Also at the skate park, Josh Akehurst, 16, said he quit school last week and was "just chilling".

"I was over school – I'm into recreation activities," he said.

"My parents are right with it because it's my decision. I'll probably look for a trade."

Michael Clark is also 16 and also left school early.

But he has his future mapped out after landing a mechanic's apprenticeship, starting next week.

"I was always pretty confident I'd get a job," he said.

No school, no job, no worries, say kids | Business | News.com.au
















Hehe smart kids, going places for sure

 

[untouchablecuz]

woe for australia

 

[Omie Jay]

i dont have a job, because i go to uni and i have very shit time management skills, but no school? I'd be working at LEAST 6hrs a day, 4 days a week.

 

[tallkid34]

As far as I'm concerned, these individuals need to exist.

Many Australians have reached such a high rate of education that nobody wants to do all the menial, blue collar jobs anymore.

 

[David Spade]

not really

these kids are different from your kids who chose to be a builder over going to uni

 

[whatashotbyseve]

Haha. This reminds me of an episode of Frontline.

 

[BigBoyJames_]

she will regret it when she is 25

 

[blue_chameleon]

this shouldnt be an issue in the future when they introduce compulsory year 12

If they don't want to be there, making Year 12 compulsory wont do much at all. They'll get through their HSC with abysmal results if they aren't interested, and what benefit would a HSC be if it's clear to employers that you weren't interested?

 

[AlleyCat]

i dont have a job, because i go to uni and i have very shit time management skills, but no school? I'd be working at LEAST 6hrs a day, 4 days a week.

exactly how many contact hours do you have a week omie?
i find it hard to believe that you couldn't fit a job into your busy schedule.
i am sure your parents, who you have previously described as difficult and strict, would cut you so much slack if you were to get out and make something of yourself.

 

[Omie Jay]

like i said, i have shit time management skills, also im super lazy.
a friend of mine will soon be quitting his current job, i'll be taking his place. 9-4 weekends.

 

[katietheskatie]

i have shit time management skills too. i go to uni and generally work like 30+ hours a week, harden the fuck up

also lol varsity lakes

 

[Omie Jay]

hey im not complaining about it.

 

[AlleyCat]

all i'm saying is that you cant come into a thread and complain about lazy good for nothings when you are in fact one yourself.

 

[S.H.O.D.A.N.]

Um, who cares? If they're less than 21 then give them a break. They'll get there.

 

[Graney]

youth unemployment rates in my area are running at a staggering 37.6%

No joke.

I would love to be working full time, but fuck.

 

[Omie Jay]

all i'm saying is that you cant come into a thread and complain about lazy good for nothings when you are in fact one yourself.

i may be lazy and good for nothing, but im also a uni student.

these kids dont even go to school. If i chose to do a gap year or not go to uni or dropped out of school after year 10, i'd be working 5 days a week.

 

[Graney]

Man, who gives a fuck what these kids do, good on them. They're doing what they want. Drop out, fuck off school and work, spend a few years smoking bowls and playing wii. Those dead-end jobs and pointless degrees are always going to be there waiting for some idiot newbie to throw themselves onto the bonfire of overachievement and stict-to-it-iveness.

 

[yer8899]

i may be lazy and good for nothing, but im also a uni student.

these kids dont even go to school. If i chose to do a gap year or not go to uni or dropped out of school after year 10, i'd be working 5 days a week.

but aren't you failing your degree bigtime? drop out and actually contribute to society imo

 

[Graney]

In response to SHODAN:

if they were non-anglo the ultra-conservatives, aka racists, would call for their deportion at a whim - it would also be front page on the daily telegraph - and would be a top priority for Jonesy aka parrot

just illustrating the disproportionate society that we live in out there

A Paxtons chronology

?? January 1996 Sunday Age runs article on unemployment, featuring the Paxtons


19 February 1996 First Paxtons episode airs on “A Current Affair”

It showed Shane Paxton going into his younger brother's bedroom and saying "Mark, get up, it's 12 past 12, get up."

Apart from the clichéd shots of unemployed youth sleeping-in, however, this was was no ordinary fly on the wall insight. With an election looming, Shane Paxton was goaded into disclosing that he intended to vote Labor – for the simple reason that it was the pro-dole entitlement party. The story was also intercut with the opinions of an outside rent-an-expert, Bob Gregory, who stated that smoking cigarettes (as the Paxtons did) and keeping a dog (as the Paxtons also did) seemed to be unwarranted luxuries for people living on the dole.

Nine didn't get that footage straight away. "It took us three days of shooting to get that, because one of the boys wouldn't get out of bed," said ACA's executive producer, Neil Mooney.

Nonetheless, a fiction that this was a straight fly on the wall story prevailed and persisted at Nine. “This started as a program on generational unemployment in Victoria. And Shane Paxton was the person who showed our crew around, you know, pointing out the houses where no one had a job” (Peter “I wish we had more stories like that” Meakin)


1 March 1996 Election-eve Paxtons “teaser” on ACA (?)

On a Friday, it is usual practise “A Current Affair” to publicize, via short teasers, big ACA stories that will be screening the following week. (I have no information on whether this actually occurred; if anyone can corroborate (or authoritively deny) it, please let me know)


2 March 1996 John Howard wins Federal election


4 March 1996 Second Paxtons episode airs on “A Current Affair”

In which the three Paxton kids were flown to South Molle Island, where they knocked back kitchen-hand, lawn mower, and food service jobs.


5 March 1996 Third Paxtons episode airs on “A Current Affair”

The “public outrage” starts. Victorian Premier Jeff Kennett gets a on-air vox pop. A neighbour of the Paxtons, who has a grievance against them, vents on-air.


6 March 1996 Fourth Paxtons episode airs on “A Current Affair”


7 March 1996 Fifth Paxtons episode airs on “A Current Affair”

Brief doorstop of their mother, Dawn Paxton.


11 March 1996 Ray Martin interviews new PM, John Howard

The Paxtons come up as topic


13 March 1996 Sixth Paxtons episode airs on “A Current Affair”

Host Mike Munro has on-air stoush with Les Twentyman, a youth worker who calls himself the Paxtons' defender


15 March 1996 Seventh (and final) Paxtons episode airs on “A Current Affair”


?? March 1996 Radio journalist, Paul Barber sacked

Paul Barber, a journalist at the Melbourne radio station 3AW, attacked A Current Affair's treatment of the Paxtons and urged a public boycott. He was then sacked when Channel 9 withdrew $300,000 worth of advertising.


?? March 1996 Daily Telegraph runs Paxton story on front page.

Headline: STOP THEIR DOLE


?? March 1996 Mike Munro writes article in the Herald-Sun

Munro wrote in the Herald-Sun, in a piece entitled "They aren't the victims. We are", that he didn't set out to do a hatchet job on dole bludgers. Quite the contrary. "I wasn't convinced they were lazy... they just seemed different... I wanted to portray them as a social problem, not as kids not trying hard enough."

What the cat dragged in: 08/17/2003 - 08/24/2003

 

[lala2]

Hey, let's give Omie a break shall we? I worked 9-5 on Saturdays at a pharmacy an hour's commute away (yes, I was desperate to get some experience somewhere and it wasn't in a bad area either) with about 25 contact hours from October 2007 to June 2008, and it was simply too tiring. I wouldn't say the toll directly contributed to my failing a subject in semester 1 2008, but it did have a toll on my energy and motivation levels and that cannot be a good thing for anyone.

Now, I have far less hours and a day off, but I'm really relishing the time off. I know that, even if it weren't for the fact that if I don't take a break now I won't get one for another 1.5 years, I would still treasure the time off.

I'm worried about these kids. No school, and no job? What do they do? I get so bored out of my mind in uni holidays, and that's only for a few months of the year. I can't imagine living such an empty and unproductive life for years on end!