To be fair, this is a direct result of the cultural zeitgeist of "get good grades, graduate college = worry free middle class livin!" that is deeply embedded in American thinking, from parents to educators and constantly instilled in young people. You can't really blame kids who are brought up through the meaninglessness doldrums of public education with the constant reassurance that all will be well if the Good Grades are achieved for not actualizing self-independence or even figuring out what that would entail. Besides "societal forces" are real. We're not living off our own land anymore. Policy decisions in e.g. China very much affect whether or not American college graduate A gets hired. So between the reality of economic dependency and the model of dependency as dominant doctrine in America, it's not completely fair to blame abysmal youth labor stats on kids being lazy video game addicts.
