Give Our Young People a Break!

I find myself asking overseas-based friends and family if running away from Saint Lucia is worth the discomfort and discrimination they face elsewhere. Most times the answer is no; the unhappiness, the loneliness are not worth it. But it is the best way to earn some money. “I’m too old to stay in Saint Lucia with no work,” is what a recent graduate from a Taiwanese university told me when she was on her way to America, not knowing where she would live or how she would get the money to survive. All she knew was that there was nothing at home for her.

But, could I even blame her or say the noble, patriotic thing? “The country needs people like us who are young and can help change things.” Who would I be kidding? If something were to happen to her here, healthcare would be inaccessible. She would either have to wait 72 hours in a public health centre or spend between $120 to $150 to see a doctor and spend another $50 plus for treatment.

If she came back and found work, she wouldn’t be able to afford healthcare anyway. X-rays cost $80 and up, MRIs and cat scans are in the thousands (and tens of thousands by the time you travel to another country to get it done). A trip to any specialist is at least $200. What if something strange goes wrong twice in one month? It would be like paying off a loan.

So many people between 21 and 35 years of age want to leave their parents’ homes but are forced to stay because exorbitant costs of food, utilities and student loans are nearly impossible to pay off on an average young person’s salary. Our baby boomer parents enjoy saying how many children they had, the vehicles and the extent of land they owned, and the places they had travelled to by the age of 30. But $3,500 is barely enough to act like a 30-year-old and move out, rent or buy a house, make children and support a household today. My colleague accidentally told me recently about his $700 rent bill. I shouted in disbelief, “$700 rent on a journalist’s salary?” And then it struck me that I have friends who pay over $1,000 in rent and their salaries couldn’t be much more at 25 years old.

Maybe it comes down to managing your money properly, but there are countless odds that seem to be strategically stacked against young people in the work place. Youth unemployment is at 36.3%, as recorded by the Central Statistics Department, but for those who have jobs, the hurdle is even higher. Is it me or are some young people expected to endure extra difficulties at work just because “they can handle it”? As if youth exempts you from being tired, frustrated or anxious. 

I know of one young mother working in the public service who had to feed her newborn daughter for five months without her regular pay. Since returning to work after maternity leave, the treasury department has been unable to deliver her full salary.The excuses range from missing documentation, to a paper waiting to be signed for weeks. 

There’s Noah, 22, who was offered a job by the government three months ago but has not been paid since he started. He’s had to work, commute and eat with no remorse from his employer. Is it because he’s 22 and the government expects that his parents are helping him out?

Yet another man served at a media house that offered him a job by word of mouth. Up until the day he resigned—because of repeated physical manifestations of job stress on his body like costochondritis and hospitalization for back pains—he never saw a written or signed contract. 

Then there are those people who work hours enough for three employees in a month. 31-year-old Nancy, a mother with a young family, works over twelve hours most days, including weekends, barely able to spend time with her four-year-old daughter. With no degree, she is not offered an attractive salary or compensation for her time, but she works just as hard as somebody with one. 

There are hopeful, noble young Saint Lucians who study medicine to help with the crippled health sector, only to come into an internship with the government that requires them to work an 8 a.m.-4 p.m. shift, remain on call until 8 a.m. the next day and not get paid for those extra 16-hours. When working for 24-hours, doctors have an area to rest, but as for the nurses: “If we get to sit at a desk for a few minutes and put our heads down, that’s what we have to do.” 

That might be because of the trick question asked at job interviews: Can you work flexible hours? “Flexible hours” usually means overtime for free and if your answer is no, you do not get the job and your other options are not much different. I know, at the very least, ten young people who carry some of the overbearing workload home regularly just to get the job done but are given nothing extra. 

“These are hard economic times,” we hear over and over, and companies cannot afford to hire as many people as needed for the same number of tasks. More than likely, it’s the younger work force that carries the burden of filling in for what’s missing. 

Still, some young working  people need a side hustle on top of the extra hours to meet the month’s expenses. They’re forced sometimes to give up leisure and social activities, miss out on seeing family and sacrifice most of their out-of-office hours in exchange for an ounce of financial freedom or experience to get another taxing job in hopes of better pay.

In reality, it’s hard being a young person in Saint Lucia. The world is moving faster and there’s a tiring immediacy labelled on everything. If a young person wanted to slow down and enjoy their surroundings without the extra weight on their minds, anyone else would regard it as wasting time, even if the world moves faster but not for their benefit.

If you do not believe me, the phenomenon that young people work harder for less is known elsewhere in the world. For example, a report by economists of the US Federal Reserve titled ‘Are Millenials Different?’ states, “In the economic sphere, millennials appear to have paid a price for coming of age during the Great Recession: millennials tend to have lower income than members of earlier generations at comparable ages, although the income of young households has not changed much.” 

Also, “Millennials are less well off than members of earlier generations when they were young, with lower earnings, fewer assets, and less wealth.” Young people do not want workshops, consultations or discussions. They just want some financial stability and a light at the end of the economic tunnel without being abused in return.