I think it is important to note that author is speaking in broad, generational terms. The HN community is definitely not representative of Gen-Y. I know many 20 and 30-somethings to whom the internet is a series of tubes.

Though the author might have had an old-fogey tone he does bring some interesting points to light:

1. why do young people in auto-centric cities hold off on getting a car? 2. why are young people not migrating to places where the jobs are? 3. there seem to be a correlation between recession-era kids and entrepreneurism.

I think these are very real issues that merit discussion.

On #1, I'd guess one factor is that the car isn't as big a part of teenage social life as it used to be. In much of the U.S., cars were central to high-school social life, with who had cars counting for a considerable amount of social status, and a lot of hanging-out activities (malls, movie theaters, arcades, etc.) requiring cars to get to. It's possible that also had advantageous effects for being able to get to jobs, but teenagers weren't mainly getting their licenses for those reasons. My read is that hanging out at the mall doesn't have the same role in high-school social life of the 2010s as it did in the 1980s.

1 Maybe they don't want to submit to draconian licensing restrictions which have trended politically toward the ridiculous and punitive under the guise of increasing road safety all whilst seniors losing their sense of sight continue to get involved in serious accidents on a regular basis? Not to mention the environmental / financial issues implicit in car ownership.

2. Maybe they don't see a need to migrate to places where physical presence is necessary to undertake these jobs when location independent work is a rising tide? (Thus further negating the entire point of having a car and / or submitting to the prior mentioned procedures from point 1?)

Speaking for myself those are the reasons I don't submit to the whole car culture thing and the reason I don't choose a location to live based on employment / economic factors, but then I'm 32, so I acknowledge I'm not generation Y. It stands to reason though that there are some people in that generation proceeding on the same basis as I am.

Boomers criticising any generation for not wanting to play the game strikes me as utterly hilarious. Especially from a guy with a book titled "Why you need and love the rat race". It's self parody at its finest.

“I spoke with a kid from Columbus, Ohio, who dreamed of being a high school teacher. When he found out he’d have to move to Arizona or the Sunbelt, he took a job in a Columbus tire factory.”

Perhaps this is also why working at Foxconn - migrating to a different city just to work long hours and live in dorms, seem so alien and cruel to Americans.

"And in case you're not convinced, allow me to submit some personal anecdotal evidence."

Totally agreed. I think, however, the author mentions an interesting point, but he fail to deliver it correctly. The documentary "High Anxieties - The Mathematics of Chaos", by David Malone makes a very historical analysis of the point the author is trying to make.

The "Good Luck Paying Off that Student Loan" Generation

"Good Luck Paying Off That Hospital Bill" Generation

Good luck paying off that mortgage generation