Most societies consider young people "the future", a generation that should be encouraged and nourished, but yesterday's Budget couldn't have tried harder to ignore us. The young don't always vote, so we don't matter and the Government has skewed absolutely everything toward protecting the interests of older generations instead.
The State pension will increase by €5. All weekly social welfare payments, including the carer's allowance, disability allowance and jobseeker's benefit and allowance, will rise by €5 per week.
You would think that our Government would give the same amount to everybody but this doesn't apply to young people. Under the new increases, those aged 18 to 24 who are getting jobseeker's allowance will get a miserly €2.70 per week more and 25-year-olds will get €3.80 per week extra.
The National Youth Council of Ireland has strongly criticised the Government on this measure.
"We're very disappointed with this measure," said James Doorley, deputy director with the organisation. "It's miserly, it's mean-spirited and it's further discrimination on young people.
"Young people are already trying to survive on €100 a week. This creates further gaps in support for the young and old."
When it comes to the job market, I think we can all agree that today's young adults are deserving of a few extra pity points. I hear your objections. The 1980s weren't a picnic and being young has never been a financial cakewalk.
The job market still has a giant, recession-shaped hole in it. Our overall unemployment rate is 7.8pc but this headline figure from the Central Statistics Office obscures ongoing problems with youth unemployment.
Youth unemployment has actually risen to 16pc from 15.4pc, according to the latest data. The problem is that young people will suffer for it all their lives, as research shows most people never regain their footing after bouts of unemployment and are destined to a life in and out of low-paid work.
Creeping credentialism means graduates are spending more and more years (and money) to get worse and worse entry-level jobs. Sometimes these jobs don't pay at all but the Government calls that JobBridge. Recent grads are landing in entry-level positions that haven't historically required four years of studying (not to mention the exorbitant "student contribution charges" that are really just fees in disguise). Get used to the most erudite generation yet of baristas and waiters.
If you're on the minimum wage, you didn't get that extra fiver either. The 10 cent increase meant that if you get 39 hours a week of work, you got €3.90 in the Budget. Young people are the ones most likely to be on these kind of starvation wages.
In fact, almost 40pc of all those on the minimum wage are under 40. Yet the fact that Millennials are more educated and more impoverished than their parents' generation at a similar age hardly makes it onto the political radar. Just in case you'd forgotten, there's a housing crisis right now. If there's one thing that doesn't scare politicians, it's 'Generation Rent' even though there's about 720,000 of us. The average monthly rent nationwide is now at its highest level ever but 2011 brought the first in a series of reductions which will see rent relief phased out completely by 2017.
More importantly, for young people entering into the rental market, an individual who began renting for the first time after December 2010 wasn't entitled to this relief at all. We need a serious national conversation about the rental market; the fact that today's young people may well be renting later in life, even once we've had families and need stability, yet tax relief on our rent money isn't considered important.
Recessions are hardest on the young, but this Government has been almost vindictive. Our rites of passage have become dead ends of disappointment. Some people do soar but many more of us than previously will not find work to match our skills, talents or even quite modest ambitions for a job, a roof, floor and furniture. It's also exacerbating class divisions: those who can make withdrawals from the bank of mom and dad versus the stuck.
Rescuing the lost generation should be our Government's main mission - with jobs, homes, help and hope.
The latest emigration figures show that 31,800 of us left Ireland between April 2015 and April 2016, some in optimism, lots more in desperation at a system that protects the privileges of the older and better off.
Why not free bus passes for under-25s, paid for by means-testing elderly people's free passes?
You see, the elderly have power, money, votes and demographics on their side.
But if the young aren't going to riot, then at least we'd better declare an intention to vote with a vengeance and rattle Leinster House's cage.
Irish Independent
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