Of course you are correct, nobody is ever promised anything like the ability to fulfill their dreams or to live a decent quality of life. But maybe the universities could pay them a living wage for teaching six classes a week.
It seems to me that they think it's easier than being homeless.
I'm disgusted at the implication that 70k isn't enough to live in LA. Yes, it may not be enough to meet some arbitrary standard, but it's insane to say that the alternative is being homeless. This is just a spoiled rich kid who isn't making enough to keep their previous standard of living. There's tons of working class people in that same community getting by on way less than 70k who aren't getting articles written about them.
Not to “kids these days” it or anything, but the entitlement over not being able to afford a private, one-bedroom apartment in a fantastically-popular city center is just absolutely mind-blowing.
I used to think this way—that is, just like you—in my 20s. From my experience growing up, I was used to not having nice or even merely adequate things, and it was the norm to go without. I'm less cavalier about declaring it entitlement now. Why shouldn't an adult, even a brand new (i.e. young) one, not have their own place? I realized that I didn't have a good reason to justify the status quo (where a home of your own is out of reach), only that it was the status quo, and the thrust of my old position really just came down to something akin to the old saw that Hardship-<X> is good for you because "it builds character"—even though I'd never really found that argument persuasive when I'd encounter it elsewhere. (Just like the old retort "life's not fair", it seemed I'd only ever encounter it from someone in the process of actively trying to screw you over while trying to paint your indignance about it as unreasonable.)
Not saying everyone should expect the works, but I can't exactly fault anyone who would be content with a 12x10 kitchen attached to an 8x10 office that doubles as a bedroom but isn't able to have it. And that's without even addressing the fact that we're likely talking about a situation where you're losing all this money on something you didn't even get equity for!
And it’s not like it was a barely tolerable existence — I wouldn’t trade my five years living in a glorified flophouse for anything, even after that time my housemate attempted to clean their vomit off the bathroom floor at 3 in the morning with the communal Roomba. I guess that was hardship of a sort, but hardship creates friends and memories — I don’t think I built an ounce of “character”, but I had a hell of a time.
k. So you're not against strawmanning.
> And it’s not like it was a barely tolerable existence — I wouldn’t trade my five years living in a glorified flophouse for anything
That's good for you, I guess. Are you acquainted with Rob K. Henderson and what he calls "luxury beliefs"? Or abfan1127[1]? It's easy to discount having "a quiet place to study"[2] if you've never been harmed by not having it and your response to your roommates' youthfully stupid hijinx involves grins and not grief.
Any job, no matter how meager, should be able to sustain you, the individual, by yourself, should you choose to leave your situation.
Any other structure is a failure somewhere (policy, incentives, housing, structurally).
Fantastically popular city centers still require a huge number of people; what’s implied by having them waste their time on a commute and being unable to live near their job is that they’re “not worth” their presence - which, again, is required in the city center.
I think you'll find that there's a lot of overlap in the group of people who think this guy should be paid more and those who want more pay for the people you named.
> I think they are lot more deserving and necessary than people working in universities.
I'm not sure I'm prepared to cosign on the idea that the guy saving me a trip to pick up my own dinner is producing the same value as the guy educating the next generation of physicts.