The youth of today are not ready for the challenges of tomorrow. However, the fault is not theirs alone. The way adults prepare our youth for the future is suspect at best. The world is changing in ways that have not been seen by recent generations. The advice of yesterday will not suffice in tomorrow’s world. All is not lost but a change of mindset is needed by adults for our youth to be prepared for tomorrow.

There seems to be three different categories of adults which have added to the future trials of our youth today. These groups have had advantages that have helped them be successful. Unfortunately, those advantages are not as readily available today as they were for earlier generations of youth. In addition, our youth of today can be viewed as a generation of “the entitled”. Because when they were born, they believe they “deserve” certain advantages and or material things that were only gained by hard work in previous generations.

The “golden generation” consists of people between the age of sixty five and eighty five. They had the advantage of timing. Being born at a time when the chance was good that they could graduate from high school and go right in to the mainstream work force at a very decent rate of pay. The sixty five and over were also able to save money making retirement very plausible. Our youth of today see grandma and grandpa retired and living comfortably. This gives our youth a false sense of security for their golden years and we as adults are doing very little to explain to them those days are long gone for most people.

The baby boomers or “debt generation” as I like to call them did not learn what their parents practiced. This generation’s answer to successful living was to acquire debt. If you want it, put it on a charge card and make the minimum payments. This group of people in their forties and fifties happen to be the parents of the children who are the older youth of today. The debt method has caused our youth to think they are entitled to everything they want. Furthermore, college costs just started rising as the baby boomers entered college. The college loan came to fruition which supported the idea of going in to debt. In addition, a college education was now needed to land a decent paying job in America. Our youth have learned this approach to making a living in the future very well.

The twenty and thirty something crowd is just now trying to develop stability in their lives. This group introduced the idea of entitlement. They laid the ground work for our youth. Technological advances made high tech devices seem affordable to this group of people. Of course to acquire these things, the popular choice was to “charge it” and create more debt. This group are the brothers, sisters, and cousins to the youth of today.

The message that a great portion of our youth is getting today comes from these three groups mentioned earlier. Cell phones, computers, plasma televisions, new cars, PDA’s, and designer clothes are just a few of the items that come with being a teenager. These items are a packaged deal. Our youth expects to have these things and all they see us do to provide them is swipe a card. Imagine the shock these kids will have when they have to use their own card to get what they are “entitled” to. Of course they have to find a job to meet all of the minimum payments they have to make on a monthly basis just to swipe those cards. Of course they have not been taught much about interest. That lesson will occur when the bill collector calls.

All is not lost; we still have time to train our youth to be successful. The values and mindsets of adults must change first so we can pass along the proper ways to lead a successful life in today’s world. As for the status of our youth today to face the challenges of tomorrow, they are probably the most ill prepared generation in the history of the United States.