The Job Market

<aside to au1929>Hmm- Sounds like it was intended as a joke, but I think that it should stay here. I think that it is a good jumping off point for a discussion.

Why do you all think that this is happening? What ever happened to the concept of "Buy American"?

Phoenix
In order to buy American you must first manufacture in America. Obviously if an item can be manufactured more cheaply off shore that is where it will be manufactured. Manufacturing in the US based on the current trend will soon be a distant memory. Good paying blue color jobs are becoming extinct. IMO we are headed for a two tiered economy of haves and have nots.The vibrant middle class that made this country what it is, I fear is doomed. .

The Most Productive Job!


The most fulfilling job (and thus the most naturally productive) is one that someone would do for free. Instead of looking for a job to be given to us, I'd suggest creating a job. Start building. Write, construct, organize, paint, sell, think of ideas, put things together, create and do whatever comes naturally from ones aptitude and geniune interest.

Don't look for a handout like mommy is going to give you a job now. Do something constructive, then go get your paycheck from the value you added to people's lives. Help others live better, then of course they'll be glad to pay you for what you did.

Help first. Greed later.

Plus, if you do what you love, you will become quite good at it, ... better than most anybody else in the country and in the world. If a large number of people follow this approach, then a large number of industries would be advanced. If you're attached to the idea of a "country", then I'm sure the country will benefit most if people stop pursing money, and pursue value instead.

How else could people find their optimum position, for optimum productivity?

Welcome to A2k CodeBorg.

CodeBorg
That is idealistic claptrap that does not put food on the table, pay the rent or put clothes on your families back. Nobody is talking about a hand out just a job.

Touched by an Ayngel.

What part of "passion produces better results" seems wrong?
Or is it the idea of "take your paycheck from the value you provide"?
Or the idea of "Don't wait for a job. Create and do the job, then be recognized for it"?

What exactly do you disagree with? I use these principles actively and
directly every single day, but I'm constantly trying to improve them.

What might be a better approach -- that might make uncompetitive
American businesses more valuable?

Well, jobs market should not be restricted just to manufacturing. It is true that it is cheaper to manufacture in India or Mexico than in the USA, and no one wonders this. But R&D, personal and business services, information technologies (I mean development of ideas and not manufacturing the standard appliances), international trade, etc. may be the fields where Americans can earn for living: Third World still has serious retardation in these fields of human activities. Leave monotonous, ecologicaclly dirty and low-paid jobs for the Third World; earn money from occupations of the 21st century.

CodeBorg
Manufacturing is an essential part of the American economy. A part it should be noted that shrinks from year to year. I believe that is Americas Achilles heel. There are not enough feel good jobs to go around. And most feel good jobs don't pay diddly squat.

World Unemployment rates:

China 10% (urban); higher in rural regions
Japan 4.7%
Hong Kong 4.5%
Sri Lanka 8.8%
Singapur 3%
Korea 4.1%
India n.a.
Mexico 2.2% (urban); underemployment 22%
Taiwan 3%
Indonesia 15-20%
Germany 9.9%
France 9.7%
Brazil 7.1%
USA 4.0%

Source: The World Fact Book 2001

And we're not talking about hourly wages.

fbaezer
The US unemployment rate is now 5.8%. And if you understand how that rate is calculated you will also know the actual rate is considerably higher.

U.S. jobs jumping ship

Cheap overseas labor is not just for manufacturers any more -- is your job headed offshore too?
July 22, 2003: 3:27 PM EDT
By Mark Gongloff, CNN/Money Staff Writer


NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - As painful as the labor market has been lately, what's even more painful is that many of the 2.5 million jobs lost in the past few years are never coming back.
That's because U.S. employers in a wide range of industries are moving more and more jobs overseas.
That may be old news for manufacturers, who have been cutting jobs and moving them offshore for decades, but it's starting to gather steam in services, especially information technology, formerly one of America's best-paying industries.
"By 2004, more than 80 percent of U.S. executive boardrooms will have discussed offshore sourcing, and more than 40 percent of U.S. enterprises will have completed some type of pilot or will be sourcing IT (information technology) services," Gartner Inc. (IT: Research, Estimates), a technology consulting firm, said in a study late last year

If you are now employed will you have a job next Year?

http://www.cnn.com/money/2003/07/22/news/economy/jobless_offshore/index.htm

I just have a few random thoughts about the job situation in the States.

My wife and I both have masters degrees in engineering, and neither one of us can find a job in the States. We have several friends Stateside in the same situation. Our number one son graduates with his bachelors degree in engineering in less than two more years, and I wonder what he will be facing then.

Around 1985 we were living in southeast Texas, and we decided to put up two ceiling fans in the house. I really wanted to buy US made fans, so we shopped around and bought two for $150 each, instead of the el-cheapo foreign imports. After less than a year, both of the US made fans burnt out, and we replaced them with the imports from Walmart at about 39 bucks apiece. They were still going strong when we sold the house five years later. I'm sure we all have stories like this to tell - doesn't bode well for our manufacturing base, does it?

The economy is improving? The recession is over? For who?
USA

Study: 1 in 5 laid off during recession

Posted: Monday, July 28, 7:01am EDT

Two-thirds of workers laid off in the last three years received no severance package or other compensation from their employer, according to the survey titled "The Disposable Worker: Living in a Job-Loss Economy."
The study found that one in five, or 18 percent, of those interviewed had been laid off during the 2000-2003 period. The study randomly targeted 1,015 working-age adults.

Carl Van Horn, director of the John J. Heldrich Center for Workf

orce Development at Rutgers,conducted the study.

Barely one-fourth of those surveyed said their employer extended their health benefits after they were laid off, and less than one-fifth said they received help finding a job, career counseling or skills training.

Despite the National Bureau of Economic Research's July 17 proclamation that the recession ended in November 2001 - because gross domestic product began rising then - Van Horn says he and many other economists disagree.

Businesses continue to announce thousands of layoffs. The national unemployment rate hit a nine-year high of 6.4 percent in June, and many economists think it could hit 6.6 percent before starting to decline, which probably won't be until at least the end of this year.

Thirty percent of those surveyed got only one to two weeks' notice their job was being cut, and 34 percent got no warning.

So? If you knew how it was calculated in other countries you'd have not said anything there.

If it were calculated the way it's calculated in the US Brazil's rate would approach 20%.

It never ceases to amaze me how much persons in the world's richest country can whine about the improvement in the lives of others who have far less.

e


I don't mean to sound callous and I really wish everyone could have a job but to complain about the US's condition is to be callous to the plight of millions.

Your anecdotal saying about engineers is hillarious to me because in some other countries MOST engineers can't get jobs.

In Brazil there is a tiny crappy little fast food joint on its biggest avenue that is called "the Engineer's bar".

It's a long standing joke by the owner who happens to be brilliant and who for 40 years was not able to get a job in engineering.

Sigh. People here act like they are entitled to a better life than the whole damn world. By most stadards even the unemployed in the US have a better life than the majority of the world's population.

So what do they do when faced with such wealth and opportunity? Cry about a slight improvement of the situations in countries that have it far worse off.

I wonder if people here would complain about our share of the world's wealth going under 50%. I wonder if they'll complain about our unemployed being only 100 times richer than the average EMPLOYED person in the world instead of 300 times...

The sense of entitlement is very very misplaced. Go tell the people in the third world countries that they don't deserve a job because you think it should belong to you. Even thhough you are hundreds of times richer than they are and even of they won the job fair and square in the global job market.

Craven
Are you saying it's OK for people to lose their jobs in the US because it's worse elsewhere. I won't buy that. I can feel for the unemployed worker in Brazil. But my concern is for my unemployed neighbor. I am sure you will find fault with that attitude.

Are you saying it's ok for your neighbour to find a job if it makes my neighbor lose his?

Why is it different for someone else's neighbour?

The US is losing manufacturing jobs because it is the richest nation on earth and because perfectly qualified people elsewhere are willing to do it at a fraction of the price.

This is how floating markets work. This is how survival of the fittest works.

The US has been winning this competition for years. But for an unemployed american to complain about the evolution of the job market is (in the eyes of many in the third world) for a millionare to complain that he didn't win the lottery.

Again, the unemployed here in the US are hundreds (yes hundreds) of times richer than the EMPLOYED in some places.

Minimum wage in Brazil is probably less than 50 dollars a month (I'm not sure about the exchange rate). And Brazil is one of the richest of third world countries and one of the world's largest economies.

Yes I say the complaints are self-centered. Take a walk in a favela and then tell the father of 5 that you want his 50 bucks a month back. Tell him to starve (because there is no social net, no "unemployment" for him) and tell him that his willingness to wake up at 5 AM to work for 50 bucks a month doesn't qualify him. And that he shouldn't be able to feed his family.

All because an American, who has had more riches than the man's entire bloodline thinks he deserves it more.

It's competition. If they are as qualified and will work for pennies to the dollar then it's fair for them to get the job.

Sure it sucks for our neighbors but in effect you are trying to say some people's lives are worth more than others.

Craven
You did not disappoint I could have written your response. IMO regardless of how you feel about it is my thinking is likely more in tune with the average person in the street than yours. They worry first about their own livelihood.