Jobless in America

NBC news did a piece tonight on the dismal job market for new College grads. They reported that there are no jobs, that people are desperate and that most are willing to take much lower salaries than grads who job hunted in good economies. They also reported that these poor souls will never make up the loss in salary. 

While everything that they said is true, and sounds alarmingly hopeless, it is actually good news because now people are going to get creative. Creativity usually results from a shift in the order of things. In this case, there has been a big hit to the linear path of graduating and finding employment. For all these energetic young people, they will have no choice but to come up with innovative ideas to pay the bills. After all, there is nothing worse than moving back in with your parents after you have tasted freedom for four years. 

Enter the entrepreneur. 

Until the job market recovers, and this could take years, making a living is not going to be so easy in the conventional sense of the word, and we are going to see a huge increase in the number of business that are started. I have no idea what these businesses will be but I am sure we are going to look back on this time and say that it was incredible. We are going to hear stories of countless people who couldn't get work in predictable ways so they started businesses and never looked back. 

Until access to credit loosens up, they are even going to have to be creative about getting financing for these new ventures. I've seen it before, they will. They will borrow in innovative ways from innovative sources and they will get their businesses off the ground. The economy is breeding a new crop of risk takers, idea people, who will learn how to play by these new rules and beat everyone at their own game. 

Happy Graduation Class of '09!