Summer Jobs Rare In College Towns
Pullman, Washington-- The economy has really tanked over the last few years, and hasn’t made much of a recovery so far. How long it will take to return to normalcy, nobody truly knows. Unemployment rates have reached the highest level since 1976, and people are struggling to bring in much of an income.
During a college school year, the university employs hundreds or thousands of students. Most students can only afford a few hours a day due to their busy schedule; therefore several students are used for a basic eight-hour-per-day shift. Many places all over campuses employ dozens, but tend to be closed during the summer. Teachers no longer need assistants, dining halls are used at a minimum, and all other school resources go unused, causing student jobs to vanish.
Another down side of a college town is the tight knit community that knows each other very well. It’s easy to see someone you know living in a small city rather than one like Seattle or Portland. People in these small cities tend to have been born and raised or have a significant history in the area. This comes into effect when high school students need jobs, too. Local high school kids have more connections to the area, thanks to family and friends that are well associated to the community.
“I have been rejected a job that has high school kids and 40 year-old adults working there,” jobless Washington State University student Nick Martin said. “I don’t have a degree, nor do I know the area very well.”
The economy and paranoia surrounding the cities causes backlash and hesitance from store owners and operators. During the summer, business hours are being cut short, stores are not surviving and eventually closing down, and older adults have the upper hand for typical college-aged jobs.
With middle aged people getting laid off from companies cutting back, the unemployment rate skyrocketed. With what minimal jobs are available, there now becomes a larger audience vying for those positions. Instead of having a certain amount of college kids fighting for a job, they are now fighting older adults going for the same position. The older crowds typically have a better resume, having most likely finished college, built a longer and more impressive resume, and become jobless for something out of their control rather than being fired.
College kids in a small town seem to be at the bottom of the food chain. Jobless middle aged adults have the upper hand, as do kids in high school that are more familiar with the area and store owners. The college students, who actually can’t say they have a college degree, have it as hard as anyone else, if not harder, to make money. They are at that transition point in their life where the parents aren’t paying for much, yet they don’t have the credentials to make a lot of money yet.
A lot of college kids are paying their own way through or at least using student loans. They don’t want to start of their careers with a lot of debt needing to be paid off. Not getting jobs during the summer or having to stop your job for the dead season takes away a lot of potential money kids could be making. Families who lose a single source of income still have their significant other to depend on for the time being. Most college students are not yet married, and therefore rely on only themselves. The more the kids sit around without a job, the more dept they will build up.
Most of the jobless talks are focused on middle age people who lost big corporate jobs and are having a hard time raising kids. They usually have a house, a few cars, and several other assets. Kids in college are being released to the new world and not living off of their parents anymore. They have minimal assets, minimal money, and a lot less free time to work.
“I can’t get a job anywhere in Pullman,” unemployed WSU student Chris Darling said. “I have filled out multiple applications and been rejected or ignored every time. I need to pay for summer school and I’m running out of options.”
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