High School Entrepreneur, College Sloth

The New York Times often has articles that are more enlightening side-by-side than taken alone. In the piece "Building Their Own Job Engine," Teens who are competing with thirty-year- olds and college-age students for summer jobs are described as turning to entrepreneurial ventures to make their own money. On the flip side is the article from today "Say Hello to Underachieving." This article describes college-age students who are home for the summer in lieu of traveling to exotic locales or working at an unpaid internship. Most of these older (and presumably wiser) students can also not find jobs, very much like their teenage counterparts. The difference is obviously the approach between these two age groups, in addition to their attitudes.

College is obviously a rite of passage into adulthood, but there are clear opportunity costs to spending four years of one's life out of the work force. I am not going to go into the breakdown of earning a plumber's license over a BA in liberal studies over a medical degree, but the idea of opportunity costs exists at every turn of our lives. There is also an indoctrinating force that happens. This speculation is fuzzy, but I am tentative to describe it as "liberal/socialist" etc. indoctrination. Maybe a more precise description has to do with book-learnin', getting good or bad marks for one's efforts, and only viewing life through the one-size fits-all version of the college education model.

Why can the college students view life through a lens of consumption and not production like the entrepreneurial teens? Do you find that the difference between these two age groups holds water, or is it merely an apples to oranges comparison between two New York Times profile pieces?