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The Unemployment Thread

MillMill Registered User regular
edited February 2017 in Debate and/or Discourse
Early last week I happened to see an article on Bloomsberg regarding the faces of unemployment.

Worth the job market being shit, technological advances and a bunch of fools in the US electing a madman. I figured it would be worth having a discussion on the current face of unemployment. I don't want to turn this into a general labor thread, since that seems to broad and we've already had a few labor topics that have spawned their own threads. I'll get to specify what those threads are, after covering some points in the linked article. Though IMO, I wouldn't describe any of the 5 issues as new and that is probably an indication of just how badly the public discussion of unemployment has been.

The first story they discuss, mostly has to do with the impact of towns being gutted by the primary employer leaving and essentially taking most of the other jobs with them. It does cover a few other things, but I think some of the later stories do a far better job of covering the other issues. Small towns in rural areas that are heavily reliant on one business to stay viable isn't anything new, nor is society's inability to effectively address the issue long term. As we see in the story, moving out of the area is not something most people can do easily and even if they do, there just isn't a guarantee they'll find something. I'd argue this one of the reasons why Obama did the auto bailout early in his first term, was because he realized not only would it be hard to find those people jobs, but it would also be incredibly difficult to move so many people to places that did have jobs. We also saw this discussion come up during last year's US Presidential election. This has been a contentious issue because not everyone can move to place that might have a job, nor have some of these declining areas been friendly to the idea becoming than a "we're an X kind of town," be that coal, manufacturing or what have you. The sad reality to, is it isn't just coal towns that will become cost towns or manufacturing plant closures creating ghost suburbs in major cities. So the question becomes how we we deal with our current ghost areas and how do we diversify the remaining singular industry towns to prevent more from coming into existence?

The second story deals with how hard on crime fuckery has pretty much fucked people over for the rest of their lives. I'm sure everyone has heard the cliche line "You'll never work in this town ever again!" More accessible background checks, people feeling entitled to be pricks towards those convicted of a crime and assholes designing laws with the intended goal of fucking over a specific group, while not being obvious. Has more essentially created a class of individuals, that really aren't a danger to society or an employer, but can no longer get a job anywhere. I've seen how absurd this can get, a coworker of mine has a boyfriend that has to work under table because he did stupid shit when he was a teenager and despite keeping out of trouble for 10+ years, no honest person wants to give him a job. We have people who have done things more minor than what he has done and stayed clean for far longer that can't land a job because of their record. I'm deeply disappointed that there hasn't been much public discussion of addressing this issue because not all wrong doing is equal and not everyone that commits a crime is irredeemable, nor does every job require someone to have spotless background. Finally, through in the inequality issues within our own justice system, this unfair setup isn't even being applied to someone equally. There are people that have jobs they shouldn't have, but get to have them because they can afford to hire a top end lawyer to weasel them out of being convicted, while we have people barred from work, that did nothing wrong, but couldn't get adequate legal council.

Our third story deals with an issue near and dear to me. As an individual with a disability, I fully get how bullshit society's views are towards individuals with disability working. I also get that the people that make up this group of American isn't homogeneous and rather diverse. So despite having two disabilities, my CAPD isn't super obvious to begin with and I have had therapy to make it less obvious, while I'm currently taking remicade to deal with my ankylosing spondylitis, which make that one not very obvious these days. I know there are plenty of disabilities that people will pickup on and that could easily result in someone getting a bad deal because of the biases society has towards those with a disability. Again, nothing new, humans have always been terrible at the idea that they might need to accommodate someone's disability and I'd say current corporate culture has only made that worse.

Next, in our forth story, I'd argue that while, it primarily focuses on employers being unable to find people that can work or want to work the jobs they are offering, but it's also hard not to think about the number of times that employers have unreasonable standards, nor to think about how unrealistic societal standards have been harmful as well. I'm not going to touch base on automation, outsourcing or foreign workers here. I do think that we do have a real issue of many employer just asking for unrealistic standards with certain jobs, just think of how many positions now demand a 4 year degree, despite nothing having changed with the job. Also fun to think about how many employers have decided they shouldn't have to invest anything into training new workers and that someone else should front the time, resources and expenses for training the employees they want. Obviously, unreasonable compensation is another issue, but I feel that should covered in another thread. Finally, we do have the issue where a decade or two ago, many thought that everyone should go to college, which created a gloat of people that had either useless degrees from diploma mills or a degree in something where that just isn't much in the way of demand. Ironically, many of those probably would have been better served if vocational training was also presented to them as an equally valid choice to a college degree, which brings us back to the issue that MLP in the article is running into where they can't find enough qualified people (I think their expectation of sober workers probably isn't unreasonable, but we're getting well outside my area of expertise).

Our final story deals with age discrimination. We always knew this was a thing. Again not going to go into how the current bullshit compensation models probably contribute to this. It certainly is easy to spot age discrimination when we're dealing with older workers that can put forward an impressive resume and then get turned down for less qualified younger workers. What I do find interesting in this story is how easy one could miss the other form of age discrimination. The one where where the current job market essentially discriminates against younger workers because they aren't going to have the long resume that an older worker can put forward, nor do many young workers have the financial means get the training they need to pad their resumes further. Obviously, I'm looking back at some of what the fourth story might get someone to think of, without actually saying it.

Many factors contribute to unemployment, but I fear we as a society focus to much on some of the more obvious issues, while ignoring some long running issues that seem to give us trouble. Like how do we deal with the complete collapse of the job market in the rural town that just lost their only major employer. How do appropriately deal with those convicted of crimes and their ability to find gainful employment. What individuals with disabilities, how do we ensure a fair balance between their needs and the needs of employer, while also preventing bigotry from fucking them over. How do we deal with making sure people have the skills that employers want, while also making sure employers invest fairly into them? What do we do about age expectations in the work force, so that it doesn't unfairly impact a specific group? These are the kinds of things this thread is looking to explore. I think until the mods say otherwise, Trump unemployment policies not linked to EOs, immigration or whatever loser gets confirmed as his Secretary of Labor can probably do okay here.

Useful Tips (added to OP by request).
schuss wrote: »
Also, if you're unemployed and applying somewhere - try to find a contact for the job with a phone or direct email and ask for the hiring manager info for an informational interview to learn more about the job. Quite often in f500 land we're forced to use terrible recruiters and don't see all the apps. Doing the above gives you a chance at an in.

What this thread is not about:
1. Unions since there is a thread about them.
2. I'd like to avoid minimum wage and compensation in this thread, since that isn't really about unemployment, even though it can contribute. Someone would probably need to make a thread for this if they wanted to talk about it.
3. Those damn dirty robot, jumping manufacturing plant walls to steal our jerbs (we actually had a thread for these, but not gonna link one that has been inactive for over a year), nor about their thriving self-driving auto brethren, which has been discussed here.
4. Outsourcing and the impacts of immigration on the job market.

Mill on
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Posts

  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    I suppose I would start by pushing back against your age discrimination example #5, where someone is "essentially discriminated" against because they don't have the experience, because they're young. People simply aren't going to have an equal shot at a job and you have to start at the bottom... I don't think it's legitimate to complain about bias in the workforce when that bias is based on experience in the job market! To flip the framing on it's head, I think we'd probably agree that it would be ridiculous to expect an employer to evaluate two candidates equally even when one has done the job for many years, and the other has not.


    More broadly, your language seems to suggest a certain set of givens that I don't necessarily agree with. There seems to be a sort of assumed-but-unspoken opinion that Society needs to do something about your first example (and the others, to a lesser extent) or that there are structural issues we as a nation should take action to prevent. The only options I can think of are government subsidizing business, or government giving rural people money to augment the hopeless state of industry in the area where they live. Neither of these are especially viable options, and I feel like the sad reality is that sometimes we just simply are not going to be able to save people when all the jobs vanish. The human cost of a whole town pulling up stakes and moving is high, but perhaps we can blunt that by offering some targeted relocation services as part of an unemployment or Social Security package.

    You're dead right on the felony problem and frankly, this is the place where "Society" can do the most good. We should push a nationwide effort to expunge every minor drug offence in the nation, for every citizen currently living under them.

    My experience with the disability protection issue is probably atypical, as I've worked in healthcare IT for about half of my career and they seem not only good about following the current regulations, but also happy about it. Other industries are probably worse.

    Overall though, I'm not really sold on what seems to be the underlying idea that We Should Do Something.
    - The first issue we can only tinker around the edges at without a large socialization effort
    - the second we can act on definitely
    - the third I can't comment on besides wondering if we can perhaps strengthen workplace discrimination regs? They're quite strong now, including retaliation protections, assuming someone is willing to go through the legal fight. I just went through a training on this and heard story after story of companies that were sanctioned or actually eliminated due to the volume of lawsuits.
    - the fourth requires either mandating hiring guidelines (unacceptable) or ending government-subsidized 4yr university (harms the poor the most), though perhaps we could put some educational requirements on stafford loans and pell grants, i.e. we only pay for 10 Anthropology majors per state per year. This is a problem created by government, and we should probably fix it by having a lot less government involvement followed by toughing out the pain as the university system's bottom tier literally disintegrates.
    - the fifth I'm not sure is even a thing... age discrimination doesn't manifest as employers choosing the more qualified person. Maybe what we should talk about is a more robust retirement system to get workers in the 70+ bracket to move out of the job pool.

    spool32 on
  • SleepSleep Registered User regular
    So I spend a lot of time unemployed. I've just kinda gotten used to it happening.

    It's generally a mix of stories 3 and 4. I have ADHD, and it really fucks general productivity. It's technically covered under ADA, but there are really no reasonable concessions that can be made for it simply beyond planning for the work to take longer. I also work in software development. A cutthroat industry with idiotically determined and fast deadlines. An industry where I generally just refer to myself as a wizard because people have no idea what I do, how I do it, or how inane their requests are in regards to making things happen. People ask for magic, and expect it to be completed immediately.

    I think a lot of these relate to an underlying issue that not a ton of people realize goes into it.

    Communication.

    Almost every time I've been let go the business letting me go has absolute shit communication that results in their expectations not being met.

    Essentially people making decisions about shit they have no proper comprehension about.

    For instance in my last company the last release cycle I was in my direct boss told me my time estimations for getting the work done were higher than he liked (then being surprised when it took as long as the initial estimation he forced me to revise). In the middle of the release cycle another team stole me because they didn't realize their change massively impacted my team's system, and therefore required me to spend two weeks testing their changes. Immediately following that I was diverted again from my own release so as to get the new third party automation team up to speed on my team's product. Another two week process. To note: my QA team was about a year out from being ready for such an undertaking. Our test documentation was no where near ready to deliver to people attempting to automate. A thing that would have been known had anyone actually just asked me about the possibility of automating our test suite.

    This is but a single example in a history of complete mismanagement that is indictive, to me, of a grander issue.

    There are tons of people out there trained only for management that have no idea how to actually do the work they are managing, and/or folks so removed from the work they are commanding (due to many years of not actually having to do the work) that they no longer have a concrete understanding of that work.

    This is why we are running into story 4 so much. Why folks have no interest in training new employees, and expecting them to know everything directly out the gate.

    Because the people doing the hiring have no ability to do that training, and just need people that can do the magic they have no comprehension of, or time for.

    For instance the job I just accepted, pulling me out of this bout of unemployment literally had no comprehension of what QA is. In my interview I asked everyone what the expected deliverables from me would be, what they expected me to do for them...I got straight up shrugs like the little blond girl from the memes. They currently fuckin "test" in prod, and that isn't a joke.

    My experience really only pertains to tech and software development, so I'm sure the issues are different for other industries but for tech these are my general observations.

    I could also just have the misfortune of always working for idiots and be way off base.

  • override367override367 ALL minions Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    My current employer spends a lot on training employees but pays well below par for Chicago for a job requiring a rather extensive amount of knowledge

    shockingly the turnover is really high after like 6 months despite everyone liking the place

    So I'm probably going to end up making the situation worse by punishing my employer for doing so much training because they're just training me for another, better paying job somewhere else

    override367 on
  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    my understanding is that "compensation clawbacks" for abandoning a job after they spent money training you are illegal under current labor law, and we've dissolved the social expectations that would keep you there out of a sense of responsibility, so there's really no way to square the circle.

  • AiouaAioua Ora Occidens Ora OptimaRegistered User regular
    spool32 wrote: »
    my understanding is that "compensation clawbacks" for abandoning a job after they spent money training you are illegal under current labor law, and we've dissolved the social expectations that would keep you there out of a sense of responsibility, so there's really no way to square the circle.

    Companies could offer their employees good compensation packages and provide realistic col and merit raises?

    Retention isn't a mystery, you just have to value it more than saving another 2% on payroll.

    life's a game that you're bound to lose / like using a hammer to pound in screws
    fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
    that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
    bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
  • Dis'Dis' Registered User regular
    spool32 wrote: »
    my understanding is that "compensation clawbacks" for abandoning a job after they spent money training you are illegal under current labor law, and we've dissolved the social expectations that would keep you there out of a sense of responsibility, so there's really no way to square the circle.

    Dissolved on both ends, why stick it out for an employer who will throw you away in a second?

  • override367override367 ALL minions Registered User regular
    spool32 wrote: »
    my understanding is that "compensation clawbacks" for abandoning a job after they spent money training you are illegal under current labor law, and we've dissolved the social expectations that would keep you there out of a sense of responsibility, so there's really no way to square the circle.

    If you think employees should have any sense of responsibility to their employers you shouldn't be such a strong advocate for at will employment

  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    Dis' wrote: »
    spool32 wrote: »
    my understanding is that "compensation clawbacks" for abandoning a job after they spent money training you are illegal under current labor law, and we've dissolved the social expectations that would keep you there out of a sense of responsibility, so there's really no way to square the circle.

    Dissolved on both ends, why stick it out for an employer who will throw you away in a second?

    agree completely! "Why stick around when they don't care anyway, I need to get mine before I get canned" is just as much of a thing as "f u employer, I got mine, why stick around now that I'm $15k more valuable somewhere else?"

  • Phoenix-DPhoenix-D Registered User regular
    spool32 wrote: »
    Dis' wrote: »
    spool32 wrote: »
    my understanding is that "compensation clawbacks" for abandoning a job after they spent money training you are illegal under current labor law, and we've dissolved the social expectations that would keep you there out of a sense of responsibility, so there's really no way to square the circle.

    Dissolved on both ends, why stick it out for an employer who will throw you away in a second?

    agree completely! "Why stick around when they don't care anyway, I need to get mine before I get canned" is just as much of a thing as "f u employer, I got mine, why stick around now that I'm $15k more valuable somewhere else?"

    You know that's not what they meant Spool. Loyalty is a two way street and most employers want all the benefits of employee loyalty while giving nothing back.

  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    spool32 wrote: »
    Dis' wrote: »
    spool32 wrote: »
    my understanding is that "compensation clawbacks" for abandoning a job after they spent money training you are illegal under current labor law, and we've dissolved the social expectations that would keep you there out of a sense of responsibility, so there's really no way to square the circle.

    Dissolved on both ends, why stick it out for an employer who will throw you away in a second?

    agree completely! "Why stick around when they don't care anyway, I need to get mine before I get canned" is just as much of a thing as "f u employer, I got mine, why stick around now that I'm $15k more valuable somewhere else?"

    It'd be nice if you'd have conversations in good faith. You know this isn't what Dis' meant and your reply is needlessly flippant. If you're going to disagree with people there's no need to do so like this.

    The vast majority of employers treat their employees like expendable resources. Many of the largest ones lobby to erode their rights and protections. And that started well before it became common to jump companies every couple years.

    Quid on
  • Captain MarcusCaptain Marcus now arrives the hour of actionRegistered User regular
    Phoenix-D wrote: »
    You know that's not what they meant Spool. Loyalty is a two way street and most employers want all the benefits of employee loyalty while giving nothing back.
    Indeed. My last job had a ridiculous amount of turnover, simply because folks would get hired, discover that we were the only clinical department in the hospital that had been denied any and all raises for the past five years (and that also didn't get the annual organization-wide holiday bonus) and promptly bug out after six months.

    Cue managers and the higher ups whining about the "lack of loyalty" in today's workers.

  • override367override367 ALL minions Registered User regular
    Phoenix-D wrote: »
    You know that's not what they meant Spool. Loyalty is a two way street and most employers want all the benefits of employee loyalty while giving nothing back.
    Indeed. My last job had a ridiculous amount of turnover, simply because folks would get hired, discover that we were the only clinical department in the hospital that had been denied any and all raises for the past five years (and that also didn't get the annual organization-wide holiday bonus) and promptly bug out after six months.

    Cue managers and the higher ups whining about the "lack of loyalty" in today's workers.

    I mean, this is literally the free market fucking the employer over

    we could impose some kind of communist thing where employees can't leave I guess

    or they could respond to the market forces and offer better compensation like the finance sector does

  • Dis'Dis' Registered User regular
    Phoenix-D wrote: »
    You know that's not what they meant Spool. Loyalty is a two way street and most employers want all the benefits of employee loyalty while giving nothing back.
    Indeed. My last job had a ridiculous amount of turnover, simply because folks would get hired, discover that we were the only clinical department in the hospital that had been denied any and all raises for the past five years (and that also didn't get the annual organization-wide holiday bonus) and promptly bug out after six months.

    Cue managers and the higher ups whining about the "lack of loyalty" in today's workers.

    I mean, this is literally the free market fucking the employer over

    we could impose some kind of communist thing where employees can't leave I guess

    or they could respond to the market forces and offer better compensation like the finance sector does

    Nah that is literally why serfdom came about. Oh the peasants are leaving the landowners for the [city/frontier/better landowners]? Better make it forbidden for them to move without permission.

  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    What the shit?

    I actually was agreeing with him! I think that there exist both an unwillingness on the part of employees to stay in a job once they've received training that lets them move up at a different company, and a problem where employees correctly and sensibly believe their jobs are never safe, and that they owe nothing to an employer who offers no guarantee of stability even in the short term.

  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    spool32 wrote: »
    What the shit?

    I actually was agreeing with him! I think that there exist both an unwillingness on the part of employees to stay in a job once they've received training that lets them move up at a different company, and a problem where employees correctly and sensibly believe their jobs are never safe, and that they owe nothing to an employer who offers no guarantee of stability even in the short term.

    If you want people to know you're also upset about that last part you should mention it in your post rather than only talking about the problem of employees lacking loyalty.

  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    Quid wrote: »
    spool32 wrote: »
    What the shit?

    I actually was agreeing with him! I think that there exist both an unwillingness on the part of employees to stay in a job once they've received training that lets them move up at a different company, and a problem where employees correctly and sensibly believe their jobs are never safe, and that they owe nothing to an employer who offers no guarantee of stability even in the short term.

    If you want people to know you're also upset about that last part you should mention it in your post rather than only talking about the problem of employees lacking loyalty.

    " "Why stick around when they don't care anyway, I need to get mine before I get canned" is just as much of a thing...."

    It's right there. Sorry if i wasn't clear enough to prevent the fucking hair trigger from going off.


    Jesus.

  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    I've said it before and I'll say it again: Universal basic income would help a ton with unemployment. Both in helping people maintain a basic living while unemployed and in allowing them to train/retrain for better work.

  • JavenJaven Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    When you spend decades of hailing business owners as "job creators" it stands to reason they begin to believe it, and view the very act of employing the workforce they require to actually run the business as some act of infinite charity. We've reached the point where giving someone a job, nay, a livelihood, is akin to a life debt

    Javen on
  • LostNinjaLostNinja Registered User regular
    spool32 wrote: »
    I suppose I would start by pushing back against your age discrimination example #5, where someone is "essentially discriminated" against because they don't have the experience, because they're young. People simply aren't going to have an equal shot at a job and you have to start at the bottom... I don't think it's legitimate to complain about bias in the workforce when that bias is based on experience in the job market! To flip the framing on it's head, I think we'd probably agree that it would be ridiculous to expect an employer to evaluate two candidates equally even when one has done the job for many years, and the other has not.


    *snip*

    I think that it is very much a thing, though again it has less to do with actual age discrimination and more to do with employers being disinclined to pay people what they are worth.

    Younger workers are being "discriminated against" in that even entry level jobs at this point require 2-5 yrs of experience. This puts fresh out of school workers in competition with people who have the experience that, without this shift, should ideally be applying for associate level positions that pay better. So the problem is, in truth, that true "entry level" jobs have ceased to exist.

  • OghulkOghulk Tinychat Janitor TinychatRegistered User regular
    Phoenix-D wrote: »
    You know that's not what they meant Spool. Loyalty is a two way street and most employers want all the benefits of employee loyalty while giving nothing back.
    Indeed. My last job had a ridiculous amount of turnover, simply because folks would get hired, discover that we were the only clinical department in the hospital that had been denied any and all raises for the past five years (and that also didn't get the annual organization-wide holiday bonus) and promptly bug out after six months.

    Cue managers and the higher ups whining about the "lack of loyalty" in today's workers.

    I mean, this is literally the free market fucking the employer over

    we could impose some kind of communist thing where employees can't leave I guess

    or they could respond to the market forces and offer better compensation like the finance sector does

    This is also a good thing though. Employers may be losing employees, but if they aren't changing their tactic to raise compensation packages relative to other jobs even in the same city then they're needlessly treading water.

    This kind of competition is great for employees, and might be part of a reason why monopolies not only screw over consumers but also employees: they can't easily move to another job with higher compensation for the same skill set.

    And honestly I'd rather be able to leave for a different job if I want. A job I'm starting soon has a 6-month training program and we have to sign a contract saying we'll work for 3 times the amount of time spent in training, which seems perfectly reasonable to me given the length of training and what not. But once that 18-month period is up, if I want to leave for higher paying work I'm free to do so.

    I'm actually surprised this kind of contract isn't more common among higher-paying workplaces.

  • CauldCauld Registered User regular
    Oghulk wrote: »
    Phoenix-D wrote: »
    You know that's not what they meant Spool. Loyalty is a two way street and most employers want all the benefits of employee loyalty while giving nothing back.
    Indeed. My last job had a ridiculous amount of turnover, simply because folks would get hired, discover that we were the only clinical department in the hospital that had been denied any and all raises for the past five years (and that also didn't get the annual organization-wide holiday bonus) and promptly bug out after six months.

    Cue managers and the higher ups whining about the "lack of loyalty" in today's workers.

    I mean, this is literally the free market fucking the employer over

    we could impose some kind of communist thing where employees can't leave I guess

    or they could respond to the market forces and offer better compensation like the finance sector does

    This is also a good thing though. Employers may be losing employees, but if they aren't changing their tactic to raise compensation packages relative to other jobs even in the same city then they're needlessly treading water.

    This kind of competition is great for employees, and might be part of a reason why monopolies not only screw over consumers but also employees: they can't easily move to another job with higher compensation for the same skill set.

    And honestly I'd rather be able to leave for a different job if I want. A job I'm starting soon has a 6-month training program and we have to sign a contract saying we'll work for 3 times the amount of time spent in training, which seems perfectly reasonable to me given the length of training and what not. But once that 18-month period is up, if I want to leave for higher paying work I'm free to do so.

    I'm actually surprised this kind of contract isn't more common among higher-paying workplaces.

    It kind of is. It's common to have vesting periods for 401k matches, profit sharing, stock grants, stock options, etc. It's even common for bonuses to be given a few months after the prior year ends, but only to current employees on the date they're disbursed. All of these things apply more the higher a position is.

  • Commander ZoomCommander Zoom Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    the hardest thing... well, one of them, along with the constant rejection and consequent damage to my self-esteem, etc etc - is that the process of getting a job has little or nothing to do with doing most jobs; the former is sales, the product is yourself, and you have to succeed at that job in order to even get a chance to prove yourself at the other one. And I've never been very good at sales. :(

    Commander Zoom on
  • NarbusNarbus Registered User regular
    2, 4, and 5, to me, are primarily stories about a surplus of labor, driven by high unemployment lingering from the financial crisis.

    5 is a story about older workers whose retirement plans were derailed when their savings - their savings/401k accounts and their home value - tanked during the crisis. They stayed in the labor force longer than they otherwise would have, adding to the surplus of workers that a massive recession already created. The way its written, you're suggesting that this result was more of an "intended" than it really was. This one is more of a long term issue, as these aged workers will eventually leave the workforce, either through reaccumulating savings, or by dying. This could leave businesses scrambling for experienced workers who just don't exist anymore, since new workers aren't getting that experience.

    2 and 4 are both stories about employers who have far less demand for labor than what is supplied, again due largely to a massive recession. If Business Corp gets 1000 qualified applications for every 1 opening, then they would have to invest a massive amount of resources into finding the one best candidate using the "normal" channels of interviews, etc etc, while themselves stuggling with revenues depressed by a recession. Its just much, much easier to raise the bar for employment, either by requiring more education or requring a clean criminal record. The solution to this is to have government tighten the labor market by investing in infrastructure renewal. With more people employed, it will be harder for private business to justify these unnecessary standards.

    This also brings us to the issues of towns dying as the one industry leaves. Government isn't there to maximize profits, it's there to maximize social wellbeing. Why not throw a regional VA headquarters in an old rust belt or mining town, one that digitizes and maintains VA records? Or a Social Security office? Its 2017, we can embrace the internet and have some of these government agencies move into regions that have been devastated by globalization and clean energy needs to counteract the depressive effects.

    In each of these cases, it makes no sense to expect profit-driven private businesses to do anything but what they're doing. That means the government needs to step in.

  • The EnderThe Ender Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    We talked about this a bit in [chat] yesterday:

    Modern services that are ostensibly about helping people find work are, by and large, dog shit.

    I went to a place to help me find work about 3~ years ago; they provided me with tools for critiquing & building a resume (fine, that's a good service to have even if I didn't really need it due to having a computer & Internet available), assigned me an ' employment counsellor' who was worse than useless (completely out of touch with how job hunting works these days - how many places use strictly online applications, won't accept resumes at the front, etc), did not have the things you'd expect (job leads, contacts with companies looking to hire, etc) and was there to essentially 'tweak' resumes based on feedback from prospective employers. Except you'd rarely get any such feedback, so... :|

    I never say this about government services, but my experience was that the place was just a fucking leech taking-in tax money and providing nothing that you couldn't get through the library.


    There's just less man hours needed to do things, and the expectations haven't adjusted to the current reality. And it ain't getting any better - unskilled human labor is less and less necessary on large scales.

    One solution would be to just open post-sec right up, put literally everybody through college / university and fill out the gaps in skilled labor (we really need a lot of doctors up here, for example, and literally every developed country needs a pile of new legal professionals), another would be to implement something like basic income. But the unskilled labor market is shrinking and just flat-out won't support the lion's share of the labor market anymore; if nothing is done, and efficiency continues to increase, we'll probably hit some awful tipping point in the relatively near future that just bottoms-out the economy like in the 30s.


    EDIT:
    At a 200-foot-long steel-rolling machine in Scottdale, Pa., two workers in yellow hard hats monitor screens filled with flashing numbers as they refine rough wire into pencil-thick rod calibrated to a thousandth of a millimeter. This work takes years of training, and MLP Steel Chief Executive Officer Jeff Pfeifer struggles to find employees to fill the job.
    Years ago, he spoke on local radio news about the shortage of skilled workers, bringing a line of 100 job seekers to his gravel parking lot.

    “Two-thirds of people who came in to interview failed the drug test,” Pfeifer says, shaking his head. The company had to pay to test the applicants, so “it got to be a very expensive radio show.”
    MLP’s business model is built around delivering custom cold-drawn steel, deformed wire and other steel products faster than foreign competitors possibly could. That means workers need to be on top of their game or they dent thin margins and cost precious time.

    “We’re not out there with shovels and coal anymore,” Pfeifer says. “We’ll just about hire anybody that we can get our hands on if the person comes in drug-free and they show up for work on time.”

    The complicated jobs, which pay $12 to $20 an hour, plus health care and benefits, require sober workers. Sitting in his office behind a wide wooden desk strewn with manila folders and steel samples, Pfeifer explains that his company has a zero tolerance policy: If you’re using drugs, you’re out.

    “They present a safety problem to everyone,” Pfeifer said. “We need people in here who are good, they’re alert.”

    Like much of the Rust Belt, western Pennsylvania is combating an opioid epidemic that’s devolved from painkiller abuse to rampant heroin addiction. “With booze, we could tell it right away; with heroin and whatnot, you can’t,” Pfeifer says.

    Policies like this sure don't help any. If you literally can't tell except with a pee test, then there isn't a problem. The cart is being put well before the horse - casual drug use doesn't necessarily track with poor craftsmanship. They should be testing for the fucking craftsmanship, not Goddamn lingering traces of drugs.

    ZERO TOLERANCE, PERIOD is always stupid, has always been stupid and forever will be stupid. May as well test for grey hair, since everyone knows that olds can't see, and olds have grey hair, ERGO...


    >.<

    The Ender on
    With Love and Courage
  • Commander ZoomCommander Zoom Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    uhhh... or you could just not do the drugs?
    (If you can't not do the drugs, that's another sort of problem.)

    and it's not like they don't lay their reasoning right out in the section you quoted.

    Commander Zoom on
  • SleepSleep Registered User regular
    uhhh... or you could just not do the drugs?
    (If you can't not do the drugs, that's another sort of problem.)

    and it's not like they don't lay their reasoning right out in the section you quoted.

    Why should a company get to determine what it's workers do in their off time?

    Why does the corp get to be the final arbiter of all your fuckin life decisions?

    Sure yeah, if they come into work fucked up, or do drugs on company time, fuckin boot em. Especially if they are working with heavy machinery.

    The idea that the corp paying me should get to make all my decisions even when I'm not at work is fucking abhorrent. They don't fuckin own me. We are in a mutually beneficial arrangement. They need work done, I'm good at that work and do it for them, and in return they pay me money. End of fuckin deal.

  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    It's a significant risk to put time and money into a person you know is committing crimes after work.

  • SleepSleep Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    spool32 wrote: »
    It's a significant risk to put time and money into a person you know is committing crimes after work.

    Maybe, if you can't get any new employees because they are all committing the same exact crime after work, you should look into how to get the law, or its enforcement, revised.

    Or maybe invest in getting them fucking treatment.

    And to one up this one even further. I live in Massachusetts, where weed is now legal. I have to pass a drug test in the next three weeks in order to attain employment that makes no exception for weed (Because the base company is in fuckin Missouri).

    I'm not committing a crime, they merely wish to exert control over me outside of work.

    I am literally not even being paid by this company yet, and they are already making decisions about how I spend my free time.

    Sleep on
  • Commander ZoomCommander Zoom Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    Sleep wrote: »
    uhhh... or you could just not do the drugs?
    (If you can't not do the drugs, that's another sort of problem.)

    and it's not like they don't lay their reasoning right out in the section you quoted.

    Why should a company get to determine what it's workers do in their off time?

    Why does the corp get to be the final arbiter of all your fuckin life decisions?

    Sure yeah, if they come into work fucked up, or do drugs on company time, fuckin boot em. Especially if they are working with heavy machinery.

    The idea that the corp paying me should get to make all my decisions even when I'm not at work is fucking abhorrent. They don't fuckin own me. We are in a mutually beneficial arrangement. They need work done, I'm good at that work and do it for them, and in return they pay me money. End of fuckin deal.

    This, for me, is the big deal. People are really, really bad at self-reporting/assessment, especially when it comes to doing what they feel like right now vs. what will be good/smart for them later, and/or when there's money involved. I know there have been times when I've stayed up too late because I really really wanted to finish something, and gone to work the next day sure that I was good (or hoping I would be), but in actual fact and hindsight, my performance definitely suffered. And that's just mild sleep dep and office work, not industrial processes where big money and/or lives could be on the line.

    spool raises the issue of criminality, but again, for me it's more about the drunk/stoner who's one hunnerd percent sure he's drive to good... good to drive, and has a significant financial incentive to convince others (and themselves) that they are. When they may not be even close.

    Commander Zoom on
  • SleepSleep Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    Sleep wrote: »
    uhhh... or you could just not do the drugs?
    (If you can't not do the drugs, that's another sort of problem.)

    and it's not like they don't lay their reasoning right out in the section you quoted.

    Why should a company get to determine what it's workers do in their off time?

    Why does the corp get to be the final arbiter of all your fuckin life decisions?

    Sure yeah, if they come into work fucked up, or do drugs on company time, fuckin boot em. Especially if they are working with heavy machinery.

    The idea that the corp paying me should get to make all my decisions even when I'm not at work is fucking abhorrent. They don't fuckin own me. We are in a mutually beneficial arrangement. They need work done, I'm good at that work and do it for them, and in return they pay me money. End of fuckin deal.

    This, for me, is the big deal. People are really, really bad at self-reporting/assessment, especially when it comes to doing what they feel like right now vs. what will be good/smart for them later, and/or when there's money involved. I know there have been times when I've stayed up too late because I really really wanted to finish something, and gone to work the next day sure that I was good (or hoping I would be), but in actual fact and hindsight, my performance definitely suffered. And that's just mild sleep dep and office work, not industrial processes where big money and/or lives could be on the line.

    And yet I am commanded by every job I get to go under distinct sleep deprivation in order to meet unrealistic deadlines set by people that have no idea what they are asking for.

    I also assume that many of these workplaces that test for drugs let people pull doubles or triples that put them into severe sleep deprivation, that's more imparing than many drugs would be, and punish them if they are unwilling to push themselves in such a manner. Taking no blame should such sleep deprivation result in catastrophe, and tossing the offending worker unit immediately instead.

    As I said I get firing people for being fucked up at work, but outside of it, get the fuck out of my business.

    Sleep on
  • OghulkOghulk Tinychat Janitor TinychatRegistered User regular
    Yeah I don't particularly buy the whole drug-testing for the sake of the company thing. If they're at work like that, yeah fire them but you still don't need a piss test for that specific thing.

    Companies routinely fuck over their own employees, overwork them, put them in hazardous conditions, etc. It's sheer hypocrisy for an employer to complain about legal drugs in one's off time but still pay shit, overwork to the point of sleep deprivation, and what not.

    Just reminds me of the GOP mantra of "boo big government, local government all the way, state's rights!" till it comes to the bedroom

  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    Sleep wrote: »
    spool32 wrote: »
    It's a significant risk to put time and money into a person you know is committing crimes after work.

    Maybe, if you can't get any new employees because they are all committing the same exact crime after work, you should look into how to get the law, or its enforcement, revised.

    Or maybe invest in getting them fucking treatment.

    And to one up this one even further. I live in Massachusetts, where weed is now legal. I have to pass a drug test in the next three weeks in order to attain employment that makes no exception for weed (Because the base company is in fuckin Missouri).

    I'm not committing a crime, they merely wish to exert control over me outside of work.

    I am literally not even being paid by this company yet, and they are already making decisions about how I spend my free time.

    No you're still committing a federal crime

    it's fking stupid, but you still are. :/

  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    I mean, I kicked off my participation by calling for a nationwide decriminalization of weed. I think we all feel like it's stupid. But we're not there yet.

  • AiouaAioua Ora Occidens Ora OptimaRegistered User regular
    here's what I see when I read that

    "This work takes years of training" followed by "The complicated jobs, which pay $12 to $20 an hour, plus health care and benefits"

    hey

    here's your fucking problem

    that's not enough money for a job that takes years of training on industry specific machinery

    forget the drugs this is basic economics, supply and demand

    you can go get $12 an hour doing basically anything, that's not a number that brings in talent

    life's a game that you're bound to lose / like using a hammer to pound in screws
    fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
    that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
    bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
  • AiouaAioua Ora Occidens Ora OptimaRegistered User regular
    especially when it's in rural PA, apparently?

    I could bust my ass working dangerous machines in the middle of nowhere with nothing to do after work but heroin, all for $15 measly bucks an hour

    or I could go into the city and get paid the same, or better, to wait tables

    low CoL is only a benefit if people actually want to live there

    life's a game that you're bound to lose / like using a hammer to pound in screws
    fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
    that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
    bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    edited February 2017
    Aioua wrote: »
    here's what I see when I read that

    "This work takes years of training" followed by "The complicated jobs, which pay $12 to $20 an hour, plus health care and benefits"

    hey

    here's your fucking problem

    that's not enough money for a job that takes years of training on industry specific machinery

    forget the drugs this is basic economics, supply and demand

    you can go get $12 an hour doing basically anything, that's not a number that brings in talent

    With razor thin margins and ultimate speed of delivery the only thing that keeps them competitive with overseas entities.
    Where does the money come from to make the job worth doing? idk.

    spool32 on
  • KPCKPC Registered User regular
    spool32 wrote: »
    Aioua wrote: »
    here's what I see when I read that

    "This work takes years of training" followed by "The complicated jobs, which pay $12 to $20 an hour, plus health care and benefits"

    hey

    here's your fucking problem

    that's not enough money for a job that takes years of training on industry specific machinery

    forget the drugs this is basic economics, supply and demand

    you can go get $12 an hour doing basically anything, that's not a number that brings in talent

    With razor thin margins and ultimate speed of delivery the only thing that keeps them competitive with overseas entities.
    Where does the money come from to make them job worth doing? idk.

    Then maybe it's not a great business plan if you require cheap labor to even make a profit?

  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    KPC wrote: »
    spool32 wrote: »
    Aioua wrote: »
    here's what I see when I read that

    "This work takes years of training" followed by "The complicated jobs, which pay $12 to $20 an hour, plus health care and benefits"

    hey

    here's your fucking problem

    that's not enough money for a job that takes years of training on industry specific machinery

    forget the drugs this is basic economics, supply and demand

    you can go get $12 an hour doing basically anything, that's not a number that brings in talent

    With razor thin margins and ultimate speed of delivery the only thing that keeps them competitive with overseas entities.
    Where does the money come from to make them job worth doing? idk.

    Then maybe it's not a great business plan if you require cheap labor to even make a profit?

    True, they could just close the plant and pay everyone $0 and then we rotate back to example #1 in the OP.

  • PaladinPaladin Registered User regular
    I think that with the permanent volatility of the housing market and the internet, enough of us will be nomads that #1 won't be that bad of a problem. I only get to see my family once a year and my friendships last an average of 3 years before we stop caring about communicating. Other people have Facebook I guess, but without physical proximity even those people just become status symbols. Without a community, there's no need to own a home or take root somewhere. So I think problem 1 will sort itself out.

    Marty: The future, it's where you're going?
    Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
  • TraceTrace GNU Terry Pratchett; GNU Gus; GNU Carrie Fisher; GNU Adam We Registered User regular
    uhhh... or you could just not do the drugs?
    (If you can't not do the drugs, that's another sort of problem.)

    and it's not like they don't lay their reasoning right out in the section you quoted.

    I'll quit the moment everyone who works at that zero tolerance company also quits drinking on their off time.

    because otherwise it's not "zero tolerance" it's "you use the drugs I'm okay with on your off time, not those other drugs"

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