In the modern world there’s an obsession with figuring out what field of study or job path is the “safest” or “best” from the perspective of guaranteeing a young person a good livelihood for life.
I am old enough to still be amused by the way the 1967 movie The Graduate addressed that question: “Plastics.”
Given that we now live in a world overrun with plastic, perhaps it wasn’t far wrong.
For the past couple of decades or so the answer has been something related to digital tech. That one is so strong that about the only argument against it comes from the tech bros themselves – they claim their so-called AI will make all jobs obsolete. (It won’t.)
But the next big thing isn’t going to be in tech (though some people working in it will use some high end computing). And it’s not going back to plastics and other byproducts of the fossil fuel years.
And I doubt it’s even going back to earlier times when what most people did was grow the food so all could eat, though there are some apocalyptic stories these days that set that up.
No, the next big thing – the one that will give people guaranteed work for their lifetime – is obvious from watching the weather news.
Disasters.
Over the past twenty years or so climate change has been upping the ante on disasters and now that the pot is far too rich for our blood, we’re getting more than we can keep track of.
There is no way the people on this planet run out of disasters anytime soon.
The climate expert Daniel Swain pointed out this week on social media that in addition to all the news about the damage Hurricane Helene did in the mountains of western North Carolina (and other places) and the real fears about Hurricane Milton, which went from tropical storm to category 5 in 22 hours and raced across Florida, there’s been a major heat wave in the southwest, setting records in Phoenix.
And while we all know Phoenix has hot weather, it’s October. Phoenix is usually delightful in October. (We also all know that Florida gets a lot of hurricanes, but I don’t think anyone is dismissing the current set.)
This last weekend in the San Francisco Bay Area we had a lot of temperatures in the upper 90s. That’s along the shoreline; it was hotter inland. Again, October. I mean, we get summer in September around here, but this is a bit late.
And of course it’s dry here, as it always is at the end of the summer in a place where it only rains in winter. I’ve been watching the fire news, but fortunately we haven’t had much wind, so nothing big has cropped up. But something could.
That’s just the United States. I can’t even keep track of the various storms and famines and droughts and other crazy weather events going on worldwide. And that doesn’t even get into war, which, like weather problems, leads to people having to leave where they live.
Working with disasters is definitely the job for the future. There is a ton of work in dealing with disasters, from emergency management planning to relief work to rebuilding infrastructure.
I’ve just finished reading Samantha Montano’s book Disasterology, which I highly recommend. Dr. Montano started out as a high school kid who went down to help out in New Orleans after Katrina. She’s now a professor of emergency management at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy. She got her PhD in emergency management from North Dakota State University.
I bet you didn’t know there was such a thing as a PhD in emergency management. (I didn’t.) There’s a job path right there.
If you follow her on social media, you’ll get a lot of information about the right way to manage disasters. There’s a lot going on there and we need a lot more people doing it.
Now you may think I’m auditioning for The Onion with this piece, but I’m absolutely serious. If you get some skills that are useful in disasters, you’re going to be in demand in the future.
And you can start developing such skills by volunteering, which, unlike the more official unpaid intern path, is often something you can do on the side while going to school or working at something else.
The fact that there are lots of volunteer opportunities in dealing with disasters doesn’t mean there aren’t paid ones. (In fact, there are probably even legal ways to rip people off and get rich, not to mention scams, though I hope no one is looking for those options.)
For one thing, we need emergency management people at every level of government. And while the abuse hurled at public health workers during the pandemic does indicate that emergency managers could find themselves overworked, underpaid, and being screamed at by everyone, still, it’s a job that needs doing.
And all those charities that show up to help, like World Central Kitchen or the Red Cross? They may bring in volunteers, but they need staff. Pick up some skills, and you might be able to invent your own job.
Someone’s got to distribute the relief funds. Someone’s got to fight the fires. Someone has to clean up the damage. Someone has to run the shelters. Someone has to keep the records.
And it’s not going to stop, not in my lifetime, or the lifetime of anyone currently on this planet and probably their multiple greats worth of grandchildren.
You want guaranteed employment? Take up disaster work.
I suppose that the line from The Graduate could now refer to the clean-up of plastics from our seas, our landfill, and our biomes. Sigh.
Good point.