Under the COVID-19 pandemic, young people in different countries around the world have begun to re-examine their work and life, and new changes have taken place in career choices.
Nursing, carpentry, farming and other seemingly untapped occupations have regained a high "favorability" among "millennials" (a generation born in the 1980s to the mid-1990s) and "Generation Z" (generally referring to the "post-95s" and "post-00s").
In addition, flexible employment, freelance work and entrepreneurship have also become the new favorites of many people.
The pursuit of grounding
In the matter of choosing a major, British students now have some different ideas.
Uk Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) data shows that in 2021, registration for nursing courses in the UK rebounded after years of decline, with the number of around 60,130 applicants up 32% from 2020. At the same time, the number of applicants for medical, engineering, education and architecture majors has also increased significantly.
Pictured: A record number of people applying to study nursing at a UK university during the pandemic. Image source: GJ (same below)
In contrast, thousands of students have given up applying to humanities subjects such as language, history, and philosophy. The attitude of young people has reversed, and the deep reasons behind it have also attracted the attention of people in the British education community and the media.
UCAS chief Claire Marchett noted that it was the heart-warming stories that occurred in hospitals during the pandemic that led to a surge in the number of people applying for nursing professions.
Nick Hillman, director of the UK's Higher Education Policy Institute, said the pandemic had changed the way people thought about nursing and "nowadays, students generally consider it a respectable profession".
It was with this vision and respect that Florence Reeve, 25, chose the nursing profession. After seeing a friend who was a nurse during the pandemic, Reeve applied to the University of Plymouth's child care major. "Before the pandemic, people thought nursing was a simple job, but the pandemic has shown us how much the world needs nurses," she said. ”
According to the analysis of the Daily Mail, this also shows that under the epidemic, many students hope to embark on a safer and more stable career path in the future.
Hillman predicts that these trends may continue for some time, and the development of the epidemic may push people to work in public services to some extent.
For the love of adventure
In the face of the uncertainty brought about by the epidemic, some people are eager for stability, and some people decide to take risks after re-evaluating their lives.
According to US media reports, the epidemic has changed the priorities of some American millennials, "they decided to overturn the once carefully arranged chessboard of life and do what they like."
"If the people who make these choices have any slogan, it's YOLO (You only live once, 'You can only live once.'") The New York Times argues that some "people with financial buffering capabilities and scarce skills" are more likely to abandon their fears and anxieties and pursue the work and life they aspire to.
More and more Gen Z tends to be flexible.
Brett Williams, 33, is a lawyer living in Orlando. During the pandemic, he was physically and mentally exhausted after attending several rounds of online meetings at home. "I suddenly realized how painful it was to sit in front of the kitchen bar for more than 10 hours every day," he said. I was thinking, what else is there to lose? Maybe next year will be the end of the day."
So he left the big company as a partner, got a job at a small company run by his next-door neighbor, and gave more time to his wife and pet dog. "I'm still a lawyer," Williams said, "but I haven't been so excited to work in a long time." ”
Former Daily Beast reporter Olivia Messer is also a member of the "YOLO". After a long report on the outbreak, she resigned last February and moved from Brooklyn to Sarasota, not far from her parents' home. Since then, she has been engaged in freelance writing.
Messer argues that not everyone has the courage to "subvert," but she says the change is a kind of recovery, "with a whole new creative understanding of what my life might be like and how fulfilling it can be."
Others lost their jobs during the pandemic and passively started a "life of adventure". According to the International Labour Organization, some young people under the age of 25 have begun to turn to entrepreneurship and casual work during the epidemic, because they are three times more likely to lose their jobs than employees over the age of 25.
At the beginning of this year, Bargav Josh was the head chef of a high-end Italian restaurant in Mumbai, but he had no choice but to "lay off" under the impact of the epidemic. Since then, he has decided to put his cooking skills in his parents' kitchen and opened his own takeaway shop.
After more than five months of operation, Josh basically broke even. He said that this rare entrepreneurial experience not only made him feel full of achievements, but also rekindled his expectations for the future.
Susan Reicle, president and CEO of the International Youth Foundation, a nonprofit in the United States, said today's young people are becoming more entrepreneurial and look at careers, employment and education in a more unconventional way.
But challenges and risks often go hand in hand. According to The New York Times, "When savings are spent and new attempts are fruitless, some eventually return to stable jobs."
Blowing the "blue collar wind"
Aging, low levels of education... In the past, blue-collar workers were always labeled as such. Today, South Korea's "millennials", even "Gen Z", have changed their minds about the industry.
Lee Ya-jin, a 19-year-old South Korean girl who grew up in Australia and was influenced by her father, a carpenter, aspired to work in the field of architecture from an early age. In the second year of high school, Li Yazhen gave up her studies and decided to give her father a hand. After years of experience, Li Yazhen is now the youngest employee of a residential construction company in South Korea, and the salary is not cheap.
Ms. Lee said that where she grew up, high-skilled jobs such as house construction or carpentry were decent jobs that children dreamed of, but those jobs were left out in the cold in South Korea.
"Carpenters are craftsmen and artists, and they are involved in the construction of the houses on which people depend." Li Yazhen said that the society's prejudice against this profession is incorrect.
South Korea's "JoongAng Daily" analysis believes that more and more young generations in South Korea today realize that they can have countless choices in the labor market, and they are also tired of the narrow expectations of society. For them, blue-collar jobs mean more flexible working hours, less interpersonal stress, and even higher paychecks.
On the video platform Youtube, the "Woodworking Diary" channel, run by a group of young construction practitioners, attracts nearly 10,000 subscribers, who upload two videos about design and carpentry every week.
Pictured: Young Koreans working in the woodworking industry.
Zhao Xiusheng, a 35-year-old channel leader, said, "Even if some people disagree, it is a meaningful job for us. ”
Experts say the "shift" of young people to blue-collar jobs is long overdue. "This country needs much more than just doctors or lawyers, and all jobs should be respected and properly paid." Hugh Patrick, a Korean scholar at Columbia University in the United States, said.
Return to your hometown to start a business
Bidding farewell to the city and returning to the countryside also represents a new model of ideal life for contemporary young people. The United States, South Korea, India... Nowadays, in the countryside of many countries, many young faces have emerged.
Malfa, in Texas, was once an almost forgotten place. But suddenly, a group of "millennials" "fled" from cities such as New York and San Francisco, breaking the decadence and dullness of the place.
According to a survey, 48 percent of U.S. millennials said they lived outside of big cities in 2020, a 4 percentage point increase from the same period the previous year. This increase was even greater for Generation Z, from 41 per cent to 49 per cent.
One day in October, at the Yongzhong-myetsu Ungcheon Strawberry Healing Farm in Yongcheon City, Gyeonggi Province, South Korea, Ahn Hae-seong, owner of an electric bicycle, was using a mobile phone app to check the temperature, humidity and lighting of the farm. In 2020, he quit his job at a construction company that earns 80 million won (about 430,000 yuan) a year to build a smart farm in the countryside by combining artificial intelligence and big data technology.
Pictured: An Hai City at Strawberry Healing Farm.
According to South Korean media reports, young people often take the form of "half farming and half X" to start a business, "working in agriculture during the day, running a restaurant at night, holding art classes and other lifestyles that seek a balance between life and work, which is quite attractive to young people."
The data shows that among the people returning to their hometowns in South Korea in 2020, the number of young families in their 30s increased by 12.7% from the previous year to 1362 households, a record high.
Agriculture was one of the least volatile sectors in India during the pandemic, absorbing 42 percent of construction workers, as well as 40 percent of health and education talent, according to Indian media.
Some media analysts believe that ubiquitous competition, severe employment situation, and high housing prices and prices have all pushed young people out of the city, and the epidemic has made it more difficult to breathe in the already heavy urban life.
But rural life is not all about "flowers and roses" for these young people. For those who have never done farm work, every process of sowing, nurturing, harvesting is a new challenge. If you want to enjoy rural life, you must be prepared to give up the convenience of urban life.
It is not difficult to see that under the epidemic, contemporary young people are showing a different view of career choice than in the past. Whether you crave stability or give it a go, there is no absolute right or wrong in every choice. What suits you is the best. Learning to survive in difficult situations and being responsible for your future may be the most valuable "credits" in this process.
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