PBS高端访谈:青少年失去暑期工作机会

 　　GWEN IFILL: The summer has long been a time of the year when many teens can find temporary work. But those traditions have been upended of late, as NewsHour economics correspondent Paul Solman reports in the second of two stories on this portion of the struggling job market. It's part of his ongoing¹ reporting Making Sense of Financial News.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: After graduating from high school in a low-income part of Boston, Issifu Suhununu got a summer job at web retailer² Wayfair.

　　ISSIFU SUHUNUNU, student: I wanted to get work at a place where I would just -- that would help me in the long run.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Suhununu heads to Centre College this fall on a full scholarship to study computer science and economics. Having moved here from Ghana last year, he feels incredibly lucky to have a job, even if just for the summer.

　　ISSIFU SUHUNUNU: There are no jobs for students in Ghana at all, because the adults are, like, competing for jobs. If you are in a different country and you look at America, America is like this God or something.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: You mean it's like heaven here.

　　ISSIFU SUHUNUNU: Yes, that is how you see it.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Without folks to find and prep students like him, however, Suhununu probably wouldn't have this job. Even in heavenly America, the teen unemployment rate is almost double what it was just 13 years ago.

　　NEIL SULLIVAN, Boston Private Industry Council: I think we're in an uncorrected depression for teenage employment in America, and the only thing we can do that's going to make a difference is mobilize the private sector³ to hire teenagers.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: As executive director of Boston's nonprofit Private Industry Council, or the PIC, Neil Sullivan is trying to mobilize through his youth job program, because youth jobs, including those once the staple⁴ of teenage summers, are now being taken by older workers.

　　NEIL SULLIVAN: You have college students pressing down into a labor⁵ market that used to be for high school grads. You have high school grads pressing down into a labor market that used to be for teenagers and dropouts. The geography of the labor market changed, and 16-to-19-year-olds fell out of the equation.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: The PIC's response is to prospect⁶ for ambitious urban teens like Suhununu, and then tout⁷ them to private firms like Wayfair.

　　NEIL SULLIVAN: We identify those teenagers who are ready to make a move. You know, that spark of motivation, you have to get it at that moment. And then we market them to employers in the professional labor market.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Suhununu is one of two teens Wayfair's Daniel Gerow hired through the PIC this summer. Firms like his have become increasingly selective.

　　DANIEL GEROW, Wayfair: We try to find people that are best in breed, if you will.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Best in breed?

　　DANIEL GEROW: Yes. It is a challenge to get folks that do show an aptitude⁸ for learning and for understanding, and that's really what's most important to us. It's that we can find someone that says, I may not know how to do this technically⁹, or I may not know how to run that sequel query¹⁰, but I understand the concepts that you're talking about. And that is a definite challenge.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Thanks to a citywide effort, Boston boasts more teen jobs per capita than any city in the country. This summer, the PIC alone lined up 3,000.

　　PROTESTER: What do we want?

　　PROTESTERS: Youth jobs!

　　PROTESTER: When do we want it?

　　PROTESTERS: Now!

　　PAUL SOLMAN: It's taken strenuous¹¹ politicking¹² to gin up public funding and direct pleas from Boston's mayor to recruit private employers.

　　MAYOR THOMAS MENINO, D-Boston: Hi. I'm Mayor Tom Menino. I'm asking you to hire a high school student for the summer.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: But despite a year-round focus, there are still substantially fewer jobs in Boston today than there were in the late '90s.

　　THOMAS MENINO: Once January starts, my number one priority is getting summer jobs for young people.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Eighteen-year-old John Tabares has one of those jobs in the mailroom of financial firm Eaton Vance. His family moved here from Colombia when he was five.

　　JOHN TABARES, student: It's been very rough for us, but my parents never gave up. They kept working two jobs, three jobs.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Tabares graduated from one of Boston's most competitive public high schools, is headed to Northeastern University in the fall. But finding work still took a push from the PIC and the power of positive thinking from his school.

　　Before, when we were talking, you started to use the word hopefully about your future, and then you -- you reworded the sentence.

　　JOHN TABARES: They kept telling us, never say hopefully. Always strive for what you want, because the people who succeed are the people that don't doubt themselves.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: And don't even say it out loud.

　　JOHN TABARES: Yes, don't even say it out loud. And just keep striving for whatever you're doing. Nothing is unreachable. There's always a way.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Well, maybe. Tabares had a 3.9 GPA, but he says most of his friends are jobless.

　　JOHN TABARES: It's not because they don't want to. It's because they haven't gotten the right help. If you give a helping¹³ hand to any kid, they will take it, so...

　　PAUL SOLMAN: There aren't enough helping hands.

　　JOHN TABARES: Basically. They need people to guide them. They need someone. If it's not there, nothing's going to happen.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: That's why Neil Sullivan has been working for the PIC for 20-plus years, during which time teen summer jobs have inexorably shrunk, jobs that are key, he says, to arming young Americans for the future.

　　NEIL SULLIVAN: It's not just about reading and writing and mathematics, you know, in terms of being a productive employee, a professional, a manager. It's about a set of skills that we learn experientially. We learn them on the workplace. So, if half as many teenagers in America are getting those experiences, it's going to have a profound impact on the work force that's transitioning to adulthood¹⁴.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Wayfair pays Issifu Suhununu $10 an hour. Is that an OK wage?

　　ISSIFU SUHUNUNU: That is way OK, because I try to convert it to like Ghanaian money, and I see, like, how do you make this amount of money in an hour? And that is like someone's pay for a month who is a teacher or he has gone to graduate school.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: But that's not why he feels blessed to be working this summer.

　　ISSIFU SUHUNUNU: Right now, the most important thing is the experience and the knowledge that I'm getting from the job. I got to make connections. I got to know how to use basic office tools and how to like relate with co-workers.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: Tabares is making $11 an hour. But he's not in it for the money either.

　　JOHN TABARES: I'm doing it to gain things that's going to help me in the future, because I know that if in the future I graduate from -- not if -- but when I graduate from college, I will look for something that's going to pay me more. And how did I get there? With the help of everyone, because of all the things that I'm learning at every single job.

　　PAUL SOLMAN: And, indeed, help from everyone may be necessary to put more of America's 16-to-19-year-olds to work, since there are 17 million of them, and 12 million of them are jobless.

1 ongoing   

adj.进行中的，前进的

参考例句：

• The problem is ongoing.这个问题尚未解决。
• The issues raised in the report relate directly to Age Concern's ongoing work in this area.报告中提出的问题与“关心老人”组织在这方面正在做的工作有直接的关系。

2 retailer   

n.零售商(人)

参考例句：

• What are the retailer requirements?零售商会有哪些要求呢？
• The retailer has assembled a team in Shanghai to examine the question.这家零售商在上海组建了一支团队研究这个问题。

3 sector   

n.部门，部分；防御地段，防区；扇形

参考例句：

• The export sector will aid the economic recovery. 出口产业将促进经济复苏。
• The enemy have attacked the British sector.敌人已进攻英国防区。

4 staple   

n.主要产物，常用品，主要要素，原料，订书钉，钩环；adj.主要的，重要的；vt.分类

参考例句：

• Tea is the staple crop here.本地产品以茶叶为大宗。
• Potatoes are the staple of their diet.土豆是他们的主要食品。

5 labor   

n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦

参考例句：

• We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。
• He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

6 prospect   

n.前景，前途；景色，视野

参考例句：

• This state of things holds out a cheerful prospect.事态呈现出可喜的前景。
• The prospect became more evident.前景变得更加明朗了。

7 tout   

v.推销，招徕；兜售；吹捧，劝诱

参考例句：

• They say it will let them tout progress in the war.他们称这将有助于鼓吹他们在战争中的成果。
• If your case studies just tout results,don't bother requiring registration to view them.如果你的案例研究只是吹捧结果，就别烦扰别人来注册访问了。

8 aptitude   

n.(学习方面的)才能，资质，天资

参考例句：

• That student has an aptitude for mathematics.那个学生有数学方面的天赋。
• As a child,he showed an aptitude for the piano.在孩提时代，他显露出对于钢琴的天赋。

9 technically   

adv.专门地，技术上地

参考例句：

• Technically it is the most advanced equipment ever.从技术上说，这是最先进的设备。
• The tomato is technically a fruit,although it is eaten as a vegetable.严格地说，西红柿是一种水果，尽管它是当作蔬菜吃的。

10 query   

n.疑问，问号，质问；vt.询问，表示怀疑

参考例句：

• I query very much whether it is wise to act so hastily.我真怀疑如此操之过急地行动是否明智。
• They raised a query on his sincerity.他们对他是否真诚提出质疑。

11 strenuous   

adj.奋发的，使劲的；紧张的；热烈的，狂热的

参考例句：

• He made strenuous efforts to improve his reading. 他奋发努力提高阅读能力。
• You may run yourself down in this strenuous week.你可能会在这紧张的一周透支掉自己。

12 politicking   

n.政治活动，竞选活动v.从政( politic的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• A lot of politicking preceded the choice of the new director. 在选新领导人之前进行了大量的拉拢活动。 来自辞典例句
• This colleague is always politicking. 这位同僚总是忙于政治活动。 来自互联网

13 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

14 adulthood   

n.成年，成人期

参考例句：

• Some infantile actions survive into adulthood.某些婴儿期的行为一直保持到成年期。
• Few people nowadays are able to maintain friendships into adulthood.如今很少有人能将友谊维持到成年。