Shirley Saccocia is one of many adults who are alarmed that teenagers don't seem to do anything worthwhile over their summer vacations. She works at Naturalizer in Santa Fe Place mall, and said she notices the same teens walking past the store every day.

"I think it's sad because I see kids just walking up and down, up and down," Saccocia said. "They just don't have anything to do."

Saccocia grew up in Santa Fe and was a teenager here during the 1960s. Over summer vacations, she would go swimming or to the library. She explained that people in her generation were "anxious to start work early. We wanted what we wanted instead of what Mom bought." She managed to buy her own car at age 17 with the money she earned doing summer jobs.

Adults like Saccocia see teens just hanging out and they worry the younger generation has no work ethic. They wonder what the future will bring. However, many of these adults are not aware of the circumstances teenagers now face.

Teens have different summer plans that range from practicing sports to getting a summer job, which some teens are having difficulty finding. The teen employment rate is plummeting.

High-school and college students now have to compete with older people of retirement age for part-time jobs. Business owners are cautious when hiring new employees and they often prefer someone with more experience. One article titled "In a Tough Job Market, Teens Are Suffering Most" on Time magazine's website said that last October, the percentage of teen unemployment rose to 28 percent. A New York Times economic blog post echoed this report, saying this is the highest teen unemployment has been since the Federal Department of Labor began recording it in 1948.

The recession our country is going through is not the only factor contributing to the drop in teenage employment. A recent blog on politicalcalculations.blogspot.com says that in July 2007, minimum wage was increased by 70 cents nationwide. A few months later, the percentage of employed teens began to drop. As it dropped, the employment of people aged 20 and older went up. When minimum wage is raised, business owners get rid of lower priority jobs that teens usually hold. Many teens get laid off. This is not the first time a crisis like this has occurred for teenagers. According to Time magazine, it also happened during the recession in the 1980s.

Many popular jobs for teens that existed in the past are no longer available. For example, many boys used to work as paperboys or had factory jobs.

Joel Tapia, who was a Santa Fe teenager in the 1960s, recalls his job as a teen. "I used to work in a grocery store bagging and taking the groceries out to peoples' cars." He and other boys like him got paid minimum wage and were tipped for carrying out the groceries. Teenagers do still get hired to bag groceries, but taking them out to cars isn't always in their job description. Albertsons, Eldorado Supermarket and Kaune Foodtown will all hire teenagers, representatives from the stores said. However, Trader Joe's and Whole Foods won't hire people under 18. Whole Foods also doesn't hire people specifically as baggers; the cashiers do their own bagging.

"Teens should have jobs to stimulate themselves. Without a job, they won't know what it's like to be working," Saccocia said. When Saccocia was a teen, the DeVargas Mall was the only shopping center Santa Fe had. Amber Riordan, an administrative assistant at Santa Fe Place, says the old Villa Linda Mall didn't open until 1985. Saccocia believes that even if another mall had existed, teens wouldn't have spent time hanging out there. "We knew that malls where just for shopping in. We were encouraged to go outside, and we played jacks and jump-roped."

Before malls, teenagers may have been more creative about how to spend their summers. Saccocia said that if she found clothes she liked in a store, she and her mother would buy fabric and sew something similar themselves — a creative way to pass the time.

There are some teens who are lucky enough to find jobs and others who volunteer and find other ways to spend their summers wisely.

Amanda Portillo, 19, and Eug Matias, 14, both said they will work at the Genoveva Chavez Community Center. Viry Harrison, 16, agrees. "I plan to have fun and volunteer here at the Chavez Center," Viry said.

"About 500 youth come through each day to participate in the different activities offered here," said David Mascarenas, a supervisor at the Chavez Center.

Many adults and teenagers alike are unaware of how teen unemployment affects their culture as a whole. Hopefully business owners will begin to hire teenagers again so teens can once again be a productive part of their communities.

Summer is usually considered by many people as a time to learn new skills and earn money. Perhaps in the meantime, teens will become more creative about how they spend their free time.


Marielle Dent is a sophomore at Academy for Technology and the Classics. You can contact her at onyx-13@hotmail.com.