Anya Kamenetz, born September 15, 1980 in Baltimore, MD, is a freelance writer living in Brooklyn, NY. She is a contributing writer for Fast Company magazine and a columnist for Yahoo Finance. During 2005 she wrote a column for The Village Voice called "Generation Debt: The New Economics of Being Young." The Voice nominated her for a Pulitzer Prize in feature writing for her work on a 2004 feature series of the same name. Her first book, Generation Debt (ISBN 978-1594489075), about the economic obstacles facing young adults, was published by Riverhead Books in February 2006. Her writing has also appeared in New York Magazine, The New York Times, The Washington Post,Salon, The Nation, the The Forward newspaper, and Vegetarian Times. She is the daughter of Rodger Kamenetz, author of The Jew in the Lotus and other books on spirituality, and Moira Crone, fiction writer and author of Dream State and A Period of Confinement. Kamenetz grew up in Baton Rouge and New Orleans and graduated from Benjamin Franklin High School and Yale College.
Reviews of Generation Debt
Her 2006 book Generation Debt discusses how student loans, credit card debt, the changing job market, and fiscal irresponsibility imperil the future economic prospects of the current generation, which is the first American generation not to do better financially than their parents. As Publishers Weekly wrote, Kamenetz "intertwines an analytical overview of the new economic obstacles with interviews of the financially strapped and descriptions of her own experience struggling to make ends meet as a freelance journalist."[1] Some critics of Generation Debt have complained that Kamenetz is not critical enough of her own perspective. As a writer at Slate wrote, "it's not that the author misdiagnose[s] ills that affect our society. It's just that [she] lack[s] the perspective to add any great insight."[2].
Other critics disagree and praise the book for its research and personal approach. "Generation Debt is an impressive book, especially when you consider Anya Kamenetz wrote it at twenty-four years old. It is well-researched, well-reasoned, and interesting enough that I didn't feel like putting the book down despite the battering ram of depressing news it offers. While one book won't change the underlying causes that threaten young people's prosperity, Generation Debt may help older generations understand the young, and help the young realize they're not alone." [3]
Her fans, who come from a wide variety of backgrounds themselves, note that the readers she seeks to educate on financial management are distributed along a broad financial spectrum. She often points out in her writing that debt affects almost all classes in America.
