Collegiate Times

I think that many people are familiar with the economic crisis that has plagued the front of newspapers and run rampantly across countless television news networks throughout the day.

Billions of dollars are flying around to help businesses in hope of avoiding a catastrophic financial meltdown. A barrel of oil has dropped to the lowest price anyone has seen in months, and multibillion-dollar companies are crashing into the rocks.

In all honesty I really don't have any opinion on the financial crisis. Of course I know the economy is failing. I see the stock market plunging and then slowly coming up for breath and quickly plunging once more, but in my mind this really doesn't affect me because I don't know what I am looking at. It doesn't interest me, and I almost forget that it exists at times because I don't have anything invested and I didn't lose anything but 20 minutes in a day sitting on the couch watching some numbers drop.

This is by far not the healthiest way to perceive something as serious as this. I really only care about financial aid as of now, which is quickly dwindling by the way, in the hope that when I finally leave this place and move on with whatever I plan to do to make a little money in my life, I will not have to pay anything for a college education. Second on my list is surviving until that point, and I plan to take it from there -- what I have always done through financial turbulence and what many others should begin to think about.

So when I read an article in the New York Times yesterday titled, "The Frugal Teenager, Ready or Not" written by Jan Hoffman, I was quite intrigued. It seems that most teenagers are being spoiled to an extravagant degree. Parents have had success in their lives after the late 1980s, ultimately giving them the ability to care for their children and essentially give their kids whatever they ask for, generally.

I can admit I was spoiled as a child and when I was a teenager as well. My parents have done everything to their ability, and so have many other parents. What interests me more than anything is that many of the teenagers in this article took spending less on designer clothes or whatever else teenagers want as an insult. Many of these kids have never been told no and they really don't like the sound of it.

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