Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire is there anyone under 50 who is willing to get up and go to work anymore?

My dad is 68(?) and is a true workaholic. Had to scratch like hell through the 1980-90's to make land payments/operating notes, etc..

Still 'pluggin along' as he calls it.


I couldn't handle it and moved away for about 10-12 years but came back 5 years ago. Since then he and my mom have been able to go on a few short trips together and that means more to me than anything.


But when he dies or gets too old to work we'll have to have a change of pace/plans.

I am not cut from the same cloth and don't want to work my life away.


Last full day off was November 20th.


We could really use another guy but anyone worth a chit has good job already.

This thread hits on something dear to me.

When I was 19 I went to Alaska to fish and work. I had a good boss that hired lots of young guys and knew how to handle them. He brought out the good in guys that didn't even know who they were yet. When I returned to the lower 48, I worked for the greatest man I've ever known. A true giant. When you work under giants they impact you, in my case for life.

So much of what's wrong with the workforce today is the lack of principled leaders that stand for something greater than themselves. Values, treating people well, right vs. wrong, putting customers over yourself, working beyond your stamina and ability, laying it all on the line for what's right.

Even as I write this I have to decide how to bill a customer for my workers hours, and what's a fair rate for their production. I find myself thinking most of what's fair and right, vs. what I could justify for the sake of maximum profit. Not to toot my horn, only to say that if the world had more leadership focused on the greater good rather than individual benefit, I believe most workers would respond with stellar production.

I believe leadership that is irresistibly focused on something bigger than "work" will bring out the best and most from workers. If someone suffers from lackluster workers, I'd bet it's from a lack of leadership.

I am glad you drew the line at 50 Roger.

I'm seeing quite a few good-hardworking-young people. The problem is they are in such demand that they quickly move on when the grass is greener elsewhere and I don't blame them. How could you blame somebody for bettering themselves?

I do hear quite a few employers complain about how hard it is to keep good help and how the help that does stay sucks. The simple answer is; pay more to the good ones. There are employers that are a training ground and there employers that offer a life-long career.

Here is a story I just read today in the New York Daily News about work habits of millennials:



Want to get work done? Don't hire a millennial, business owner says
BY MICHAEL LEVIN DAILY NEWS CONTRIBUTOR Monday, April 11, 2016, 6:50 PM A A A
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Millennials want to have jobs, one employer says — they just don't want to work.
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Millennials want to have jobs, one employer says — they just don't want to work.
As God is my witness, I will never hire a millennial again as long as I live.

Much has been made of the so-called millennial work ethic.

I'm convinced these people want to have jobs — they just don't want to work.

Admittedly, they have a healthier attitude toward work than my generation.

They fit work into their lives instead of scrambling to fit their lives around work, as do people my age.

The problem is that when they actually get to the office, nothing happens.

I've been through four different admins in the past year and a half, and each was worse than the previous one.

It's hard to tell if they can't do the work or if they just simply don't want to.

A look at the literature suggests that there are many reasons why millennials are so diffident about their role in the workplace.

Most struggle with large amounts of student debt.

Maybe they figure that there's so little hope of reducing that debt, based on their entry-level salaries, that they give up before they start.

The whole point of an entry-level salary is that if you stick around, the salary moves up as your responsibilities grow.

As the expression goes, your raise becomes effective the moment you do.

Last month, I hired a twenty-something admin with great credentials and outstanding references.

Two weeks later, I had to send her an email pointing out the sloppiness and inattentiveness in her work product and requesting a better level of effort.

I'm not talking about anything insane — just getting phone numbers and time zones correct. "Easy button" kind of stuff.

That very same day, she sent me an email reminding me that she had a bachelorette trip to Florida in three weeks that would cause her to miss three days of work.

Who takes vacations two months after they start the job?

Who has the tin ear to put in a vacation request the same day the boss sends you an email about sloppiness?

Millennials, that's who.

People who study these matters suggest that millennials grew up in a culture where everyone was made to feel special.

You didn't have to put forth an effort to win a ribbon or even a trophy.

Just showing up was good enough.

What a terrible lesson to teach young people.

I don't mean that adults should pace Patton-like in front of small children and inform them that the world doesn't owe them a living.

And yet, the world owes no one a living.

My soon-to-be former admin ignored being fired and prepared to come to work the following Monday, George Costanza-like.

So I had to fire her a second time.

This time, she finally understood that I meant business, and that she was out of the business.

She responded with a plaintive email reminding me that without her job, she no longer had a source of income. Did I have any ideas about how else she could make money?

Then she asked if she could list her position with my company on her resume and use me as a reference.

You cannot make this stuff up.

Last time I checked, jobs that pay more than $50,000 a year as a starting salary and include health insurance aren't that thick on the ground.

Ironically, she had been my second choice candidate for the job.

My first choice was a woman with an even more stellar track record.

Unfortunately, when I performed a cursory Google search of her name, I found photos of her on websites like sexilicious.com — you can look it up — where she expressed the fact that her greatest desire in life was to become a plus-size model.

I have no problem with the fact that she wants to be a plus-size model.

Everybody has dreams.

I don't have a problem with her being a plus size.

I struggle with my weight, too.

I do have an issue with the fact that my clients could Google her and find the same compromising photos I did.

They would also see the terrible grammar with which she described her plus-sized dreams.

The final straw came yesterday, when my millennial bookkeeper announced in an email that she was leaving "effective immediately" and would have nothing further to do with my company. She wouldn't even share passwords with her successor.

I'm sorry, millennials. You're all special. You're all smart.

And you're all fired.

Call it age discrimination. Call it self-preservation. Call it whatever you want.

But if you're under 30, the unemployment office is two doors down.

Michael Levin, a 12-time bestselling author, runs BusinessGhost.com, a provider of ghostwriting and publishing services.

Dad was a member of our Greatest Generation and always instilled in me a strong work ethic. If start time's 7:00, you be there at 6:45. Be the first one on the job, the last one to leave, and give your employer 100% every day. My kids work hard, and their bosses are glad to have them. My daughter works 4 jobs on some days, three on many, and two virtually every day. Kids learn work ethic by what they see going on around them, and it's often hard to make the lasting impression be what they see from their parents. So many split families these days, so many lost opportunities to make things work for the greater good. When that's what they see, the work ethic definitely suffers. They see their friends slacking off and get the miss guided impression that that's okay. Good parenting doesn't stop at 18, or 21, or even 40-it's a lifelong job.

Around here there are few if any millennials doing labor, but there are people under 50 doing quality physical work. They are all Mexicans or what is termed "Other Than Mexican", by immigration officials. We contract with various services for our property maintenance and construction, in every case the crews show up are predominately of Latin-American descent. These contractors aren't hiring illegal aliens, rather they are using long term employees that are legally in the country. This is true across the skilled trades: plumbers, roofers, heating and air conditioning, concrete, painters, carpentry, windows, appliance repair, tree removal, planting and landscaping, and extends into automobile repair, body and paint, and upholstery. We have had great results from Diamond Certified contractors, and been impressed with the industriousness of their crews.

When I was working as a supervisor, my best summer help employees were similarly Latinos, while the white college students were, well - largely just bodies good for working the garbage and restroom details, and standing in the gatehouse selling tickets - if they could be taught to make change. Sad, really.

Even the Honor Camp inmate crews were more helpful and hard working than some of the permanent staff. Then they were enjoying work to offset the boredom of being in jail. Some even learned skills that lead to paying jobs on the outside after release. One young Latino I taught to assemble PVC pipelines really enjoyed it, he did a great job. He told me it was the first useful thing he did in his life. He returned a year later to reveal that he landed a job at a major landscape contractor, and subsequently was promoted to a foreman.

So there are people under 50 willing to work, and not just Latinos. We did find many hard working white and black kids that went on to be promoted and make a career, but like everything else, the pyramid is widest at the bottom.

I am going to step up and speak about my son.

He was a straight A student in H.S. and now is a straight A student in college. He works his ass off.

He has a part-time job at Tractor Supply moving and unloading pallets of feed.

He volunteers at a local hospital, which he has been doing since H.S.

He hunts about every weekend (turkey's now) and never misses a day of volunteering, school or work.

He drags his tired ass out of bed every Sunday morning to go to 8:30 service at our church.

He is majoring in genetics and plans to go to medical school to concentrate on hematology/oncology.

Our future is secure; that's what his ENT doctor wrote in a letter to him when he attended my son's Eagle Scout ceremony. His ENT is also an Eagle.

I have a son, a wife, two daughters, and two son-in-laws who do it...but I get your point. It is becoming a rarity.

I'm seeing a shortage in rocket scientist in our countries future.

Any of you thinking about having kids later in life?

Pretty similar path for me too. I'm a few months from turning 34, got into the apprenticeship at a local shipyard and became a journeyman fabricator and welder. Eventually made it up the ranks and now oversee a group of guys that do the structural planning for the yard.

Two of the guys working with me are in their mid 20's and show up everyday plus overtime. One of those two is a fine young black man with a wife, child, and what seems to be a well put-together life plan. I would take several more of him in a heartbeat.

I understand that this is not the rule though, but the exception.

It's funny, I do know a fair amount of millennials who are generally speaking worthless (ie my two brother-in-laws who are 25 yrs old living in mommy & daddy's basement) but in my professional career I've met a fair amount of experienced/seasoned guys in the 40+ age range that are pretty worthless as well.

I'd be willing to bet that my generation will be bitching about the generations to follow too....

The list of folks that I know that are under 50 and bust their ass daily at a whole host of jobs would take a damned long time to rattle off.

Of course, that wouldn't do anything here - facts very rarely matter on 24HCF.

Spot on. The land of simpleton generalizations.

The young GC and his assistant doing our roof sure are busting their asses.

He can't be over 25. He came recommended, and has done my Dad's roof as well.

Since he started the job, there hasn't been a single working day that hasn't either rained, or had wind gusts in excess of 20, or both - and that wind sure ain't helping metal roofing installation.

But they are almost done, and it isn't leaking.

Good kid.

I've worked in various positions for the same employer for over 35 years. All of our jobs pay well with good benefits. When I look around me, I see a pretty even mix of ages for the hardest working employees and the not so much. My immediate supervisor is in his early thirties. He works his butt off every day.

Where I see the lack of drive is mostly in what we all used to see as entry level jobs paying minimum wage or close to it - with little or no benefits. It has always been that way, for as long as I can remember.

This is a big part of the problem. If I was this managers superior, he/she would be chit canned.

You don't manage people over email period! Millennials especially, need face to face interaction and coaching if you want them to even have a chance to succeed.

Millennials have their issues but coward managers like the one depicted in this article are worse IMO.

I agree. Email and social media should never be used for correction or other negative personal communication. For some reason, it seems that a lot of managers think that's okay to do. And those aren't just younger managers.

Not making accusations against anyone in particular, but I have seen a long pattern of managers/owners blaming their problems on the workforce - when their own house is not in order. Then - usually - the real leaders manage to find a good team. It's always been a difficult thing.

Wonder sometimes if half the people on here work...