DISINHERITED
How Washington
Is Betraying America’s Young
© 2015 by Diana Furchtgott-Roth and Jared Meyer
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First American edition published in 2015 by Encounter Books, an activity of Encounter for Culture and Education, Inc., a nonprofit, tax exempt corporation.
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FIRST AMERICAN EDITION
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Furchtgott-Roth, Diana.
Disinherited : how Washington is betraying America’s young / Diana Furchtgott-Roth, Jared Meyer.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-59403-810-5 (ebook)
1. Generation Y—United States. 2. Age discrimination—United States. 3. Intergenerational relations—United States. 4. United States—Economic conditions—21st century. I. Meyer, Jared. II. Title.
HQ799.7.F87 2015
305.2—dc23
2014037248
To my millennials—Leon, Deborah, Francesca, Jeremy,
Chani, Godfrey, Theodore, and Richard
—D.F.R.
To my grandparents—Belva and Tom Kane,
and August and Barbara Meyer
—J.M.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction and Summary: The Overarching Problem
Part I: Stealing from the Young to Enrich the Old
CHAPTER 2 Paying for Parents’ Health Care
Part II: Keeping Young People Uneducated
CHAPTER 3 The Failure of Primary and Secondary Education
CHAPTER 4 Drowning in College Debt
Part III: Regulations That Cripple the Young
CHAPTER 5 Licensing Requirements Keep Out the Young
CHAPTER 6 Banned from the Job Market
Part IV: Where To from Here?
CHAPTER 7 Reclaiming the Disinherited Generation
CHAPTER 8 Conclusion
Acknowledgments
Endnotes
Index
GLOSSARY
AARP – American Association of Retired Persons
ACA – Affordable Care Act
ACT – American College Testing
AFT – American Federation of Teachers
BLS – Bureau of Labor Statistics
CBO – Congressional Budget Office
CEO – chief executive officer
EMT – emergency medical technician
ESA – education savings accounts
GDP – gross domestic product
GPA – grade point average
HI – hospital insurance
MOOC – massive open online course
NCAA – National Collegiate Athletic Association
NEA – National Education Association
NOC – Neighborhood Outreach Connection
OASDI – Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance Program
OECD – Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development
PISA – Programme for International Student Assessment
P.S. – public school
ROC – Restaurant Opportunities Center United
SMI – supplementary medical insurance
STEM – science, technology, engineering, and mathematics
UFCW – United Food and Commercial Workers International Union
INTRODUCTION AND SUMMARY: THE OVERARCHING PROBLEM
In a speech to high school graduates in Topeka, Kansas, in May 2014, First Lady Michelle Obama told the assembled students: “I am so proud of all that you’ve accomplished. . . . And I cannot wait to see everything you will achieve in the years ahead.”
But these days many Americans born between the early 1980s and the beginning of the 21st century, often called “millennials” or “Generation Y,” have not seen success. For them, achieving success will be more difficult than it was for young people in the past.
This is the first generation of young Americans that our government systematically disfavors and the first generation of Americans whose prospects are lower than those of their parents. They have been disinherited from their birthright.
Many older Americans think that they
