If the world’s oldest profession is not in dispute, then let me stake a claim to the second oldest: Writing the odd article in middle age about how hopeless the young people are these days, and nodding sagely about how much better one’s own generation was, at being young. You’ll never go wrong in this job with a bit of “kids nowadays, honestly”.
That admission out of the way: Kids nowadays, honestly.
This morning’s data from the National Youth Council of Ireland says that 68% of young adults (18–22-year-olds) are strongly considering moving abroad for a better life. 90% of them say they struggle to find paid work. 89% can’t find housing.
“These findings should serve as a wake-up call,” said Grace McManus, Policy and Campaigns Manager at NYCI.
Well, don’t let them go, I say. Make them stay.
You know why? Because while 18-24-year-olds are certainly not responsible for the state of the country only recently having obtained votes, it is abundantly clear that they favour (as a collective) the very things that have put the country in the state that it is in. Not all of them. There are some very sensible young people. But as a collective, few demographics have done more harm to the politics of the country through their preferences.
And it would be criminally irresponsible of Ireland, in my view, to send these people off to Australia or New Zealand or even poor old Blighty, just so they could vote to make those countries more like Ireland. Which is what they would certainly do.
Why is Ireland such an expensive, house-free, little-hope-of-a-job wasteland? You can draw the line directly to policy: Every policy that makes housing more expensive finds overwhelming support amongst the youngest voters: Rent controls? They’re for them. Letting every sandal-wearing crank in the country object to a development on the opposite end of the country? They’re for that, too. High immigration? The youngest voters have always loved it more than anyone else, because it makes them sound, or something.
Higher taxes? Young voters love those, so that the money can be given to the poor.
Who, it turns out, are young voters. Young voters who get showered with free almost everything: Free education, free contraception, free school meals, free GP visits, and so on. Beats having a house or a job, I guess. In America or Australia or the UK or any of the countries these kids might want to flee to, they wouldn’t get nearly as much…. And yet young people in those countries find it easier to get housed and get a job.
Go figure.
These are the voters, remember, that the media and politicians obsess over. They are endlessly praised for their energy and their activism and their passion and how much they care. Politicians in Ireland have bent over backwards to accommodate their priorities: Senators and TDs didn’t pass the Gender Recognition Act to win acclaim from 50-year-old mammies in Thurles. A good portion of them want to lower the voting age to let even more of these children vote. (Today’s figures will no doubt amplify those calls).
This is, in large part, a country built in the image of the young, progressive voter.
I have, on various occasions in recent years, taken to referring to the Republic as “Student Union Island”, which does something of a disservice to our Unionist brethren who live on the island but are not subjected to the piety that emanates from its southern state. But that is what our politics resembles, and it is not a coincidence: Consider the current massive political controversy over whether to play a football match: Little noted in that is that the impact on global affairs of whether a football match is played or not is entirely negligible. Many people will care, but that is not the same thing as it mattering. I cared about the result of the New York Jets game at the weekend – put me in a bad mood all day Monday – but it did not ultimately matter.
This is a distinction modern Ireland, and younger voters, tend not to get. Younger voters at least have the excuse of being young enough not to understand the difference. Politicians, in hock to them, do not.
Here’s the bottom line: If you dramatically increase your population, the availability of housing and low-wage jobs will fall because they will be subject to increased demand. If you inflate college degrees to the point where everyone has one, then having one will cease to be an advantage, and you’ll end up with people with degrees working in McDonalds. If you spend all your money on free stuff, then you won’t have as much to spend on productive stuff.
These are life lessons that parents used to teach. Now, they are lessons that young people are learning the hard way all by themselves.
Actually, scratch that: They’re not learning them at all. That’s why they can’t be permitted to leave. The generation more responsible than any for the current politics of this country should be forced to stay here and live with the consequences.
After all, that’s what the rest of us have to do.
You've nailed the fogey vibe John.
Wow! Absolutely spot on and exactly the same in Old Britannia which, in the words of the song, loves you still.