Angelique Vasquez Professor Susan Lago English 1100-41 15 October 2013 Identity Crisis When introducing ones self

to another for the first time of course names are exchanged, but quickly followed up by that is the each others profession or current occupation instead of what we are passionate about. Any activity in which you invest so much of your energy, your creativity, your intellect, and your resourcefulness will, for better or for worse, affect your life far beyond the scope of that activity (Sennett 307). Richard Sennett tells a story about a father (Enrico) and a son (Rico) and the different struggles these two faced working and supporting their families. Enrico lived out the typical American dream. He started from a poor immigrated community, he worked and saved up for years and ended up he owning a ranch house for him and his family. He was just a janitor but he knew this was his job, he would have it years to come and exactly how much he would have by time he retired. In todays work environment we do not have that security of a stable job for years to come. How do we identity ourselves with something that is an always-changing external environment? Today, a young American with at least two years of college can expect to change jobs at least eleven times in the course of working (Sennett 312). Carnevale gives plenty of percentages and the statics of unemployment rates depending on the degree level and major. His numbers are based on college graduates from all around the United States, he did not clarify if the percentages change depending on location, which it does. Carnevale states unemployment rates for psychology and those in social work is a merely 7.3% because they are growing industry sectors (Carnevale 298). However, there is a higher employment in

California (13,150) than in Michigan (2,120). In California, employment per thousand jobs is 0.92 while in Michigan it is 0.54 (Bureau of Labor Statistics). My mother graduated from Berkeley College with a B.A in businesses administration. She then went into a well-paying job as a title assistant in Title Company. Unfortunately, after only a couple of years she was laid off and for the last four years she has been a bus driver for NJ transit. I love hearing her stories on how the economy was at a much better state when she was growing up. She said When you wanted a job you just had to go get one, your education level did not matter as much as what you can actually do. After four years of working over time she is now on the list of top paid at work and can now take it easy. Even though my mother is not working in the field she studied for she tells me constantly that she doesnt regret going and receiving her Bachelors degree. A bachelors degree is one of the, as Carnevale puts it, best weapon a job seeker can wield in the fight for employment and earning (Carnevale 297). The quote Carnevale gives in his passage about a bachelors degree being the best weapon may have been true a couple of years ago but as the economy changes, competition for jobs become fiercer and requirements/ educational level has raisin. (Names have been changed of those I have interviewed for personal reasons.) As a college student Sallie Johnson had planned to begin working in her field and not attend graduate school after receiving her Bachelors degree in Sociology. She graduated and became part of the smallest full-time occupational category, which was being employed as a social science researcher. Miss Johnson had not received enough training in research methods, computer applications, and statistics as part of her undergraduate major to obtain positions in the science workforce. This affected her pay, her ability for promotions and the comfort of having a stable position. A couple years later she went on to graduate school and there she obtained internships as a social science

researcher. In the graduate programs she received training to learn additional social science and research skills. She explained to me that she wish she would of taken the advice she was giving and gone to grad school right away instead letting time just pass her by. Miss Johnson sometimes just sits and thinking of how further along she could have been by now if she had received her Masters sooner.

Works Cited Berhrens, Laurence, and Leonard Rosen. Writing and Reading across the Curriculum 12th Edition. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education, 2013. Print. Bureau of Labor Statistics. N.p., 13 June 2012. Web. 2 Oct. 2013. <http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes211029.htm#st>. Carnevale, Anthony P., Ban Cheah, and Jeff Strohl. College Majors, Unemployment and Earnings: Not All College Degrees Are Created Equal. N.p.: Center on Education and the Workforce, 2013. Print. Sennett, Richard. The Corrosion of Character: The Personal Consequences of Work in the New Capitalism. N.p.: Norton, 1998. Print.