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Surviving in the new service economy


Jay
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Read these articles and think real carefully about how they apply to whatever you are doing in college or whatever.

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/21/AR2006032101133.html?referrer=emailarticle

 

http://www.vdare.com/roberts/050808_crumble.htm

 

and..

http://www.vdare.com/roberts/occupational_hazard.htm

“In Oct. 2001, this country passed an ignominious milestone: For the first time ever, the number of college-educated unemployed surpassed the number of unemployed who don’t have high school diplomas.”

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  • 1 month later...

Huh? You found that on a national job site someone somewhere wants a software engineer and you think this refutes the article?

 

Here's another excellent, excellent article.

http://counterpunch.com/roberts09302006.html

 

Will, I think civil engineering should be OK though as they can't ship the roads and highways overseas.... I don't think. I also get the idea that you've motivated yourself to do this and really don't want to see anything negative interfering with your motivation. Still maybe someone else might want to know.

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Read these articles and think real carefully about how they apply to whatever you are doing in college or whatever.

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/21/AR2006032101133.html?referrer=emailarticle

...

 

 

"...Every other advanced economy -- certainly, those of the Europeans and the Japanese -- has a conscious strategy to keep its most highly skilled jobs at home. We have none; American capitalism, dominated by our financial sector, is uniquely wedded to disaggregating companies, thwarting unionization campaigns and offshoring work in a ceaseless campaign to impress investors that it has found the cheapest labor imaginable."

 

But even so, keeing an underpaid, abused/slave labor force is essential to our brand of Capitalistic system "working." There really is no other way in which everyone will be/is "equal" in this society -- it just can't happen.

And the continuous influx of "immigrants" and the bipolar nature of its tolerance/acceptance is just one reflection of this. We need them; this is how it works here: We always have had slave labor, which is what built this country and what makes it "work" now; it has just evolved, of course, but it's basically the same. I suppose some could argue, in context, it's even worse now.

It's the keeping of this "American Dream" alive in the folks who will never achieve it and their belief in it that keeps them continually voting/existing/hoping against their own interests.

 

I don't see everyone becoming equal, educated and the extinction of classes; it would no longer benefit those who hold the power now.

There really aren't any ideas I've read or heard about that sound good to me -- even Meyerson's suggestions don't do it for me. Of course, I cannot think of anything, myself, that would work in the context of our system the way it is right now, either...

Perhaps it really would take a revolution of extreme change. But, again, it won't happen, failing We blow up the planet and start over on Pluto, maybe. I'm guessing we'll be traveling from planet -- or non-planet -- to planet looking for good real estate to exploit soon anyway after we're done decimating this one (or isn't that what we are doing?).

Maybe not a bad idea...I think I'd like the idea of starting a brand new way...we could have a solar system of planets with varying ways of life from which to choose -- kinda like that idea . I'd like a vegan planet, myself.

 

Do you have any ideas of your own, or have you read about any that sound workable within our system as it is now?

 

 

"...Overall, there has been no job growth in three years... The few areas of job growth are concentrated in lowly paid nontradable services."

 

This is a good place for a spin -- "There is growth!"

 

There was a good exchange last week on "The NewsHour" between William Rodgers and Diana Furchtgott-Roth; needless to say, the spinning and numbers juggling has been mastered so well, you can make anything sound like improvement. I agree more with Professor Rodgers.

Speaking of spin, I just saw "Thank You For Smoking" (film -- parody -- of the cigarette lobby) and it shows how blatant and absurd spinning is; yet, it's acceptable and employed with great "success." Money wasted on studies, hearings, etc., -- on such nonsense.

 

Here's another excellent, excellent article.

http://counterpunch.com/roberts09302006.html

 

..."At a Brookings Institution conference in Washington, D.C., in January 2004, I predicted that if the pace of jobs outsourcing and occupational destruction continued, the U.S. would be a third world country in 20 years."

 

That's so true. I remember my dad always saying that -- that eventually, that is what we would become for various reasons -- and he also would say that we would end up with a society/similar situation (bombings, etc.) like the Middle East.

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Jay USF had 100% job placement for civil eng graduates last year. I'm not sure what it's like in other departments. I had to stop studying engineering though because I ran out of money and had to start working more hours. It's a shame because I really like structural engineering and was making almost all A's, but that's just the way it is. So I now I work 2 jobs at USF instead of studying - tutoring math and doing database work. They are always hiring computer people here see http://usfweb2.usf.edu/HR/Employment/CareerOpportunities.html look at A&P and USPS positions there are probably a dozen or so openings for compsci people ranging from tech to application developer. On the other hand, I would probably be making more money now if I never bothered with college and just enrolled in an apprentice program as an electrician or plumber right after high school... but its too late for that now

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Here's the problem:

For 100 years there have been a shortage for academics. So, everybody nowadays get a degree. Noone becomes a plumber, construction worker, machine operator or alike.

The law of supply and demand will kick in sooner or later. Most CNC operators will earn more than most civil economists in the near future. We simply need machine operators more then we need economists.

 

Alot of people seems to despise these proffesions though (I don't understand why?) so they go to college anyhow and then blame the "system".

 

This is capitalism:

You use your 2 hands and your brain to create something that you are good at creating. Since you don't need all of it yourself you trade some of your work for other items that other people have created that you need more than the things you've created yourself.

It's that simple.

Alot of people obviously have a problem with this so we have tried different approaches to destroy it. Or, more commonly, they just say that is bad and gives no solution whatsoever. So far only death and destruction has been generated.

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That page is lousy...you should look at VCU.EDU we have one of the best digital art programs in the nation and our website is so dull...

As for people not being able to do anything...it'll catch up to us. People put way too big an emphasis on education and not enough on training...unfortunately alot of people adept to training are going to college instead and not learning anything...just working lousy jobs with the degrees they slacked off to earn...big problem in the arts. Everyone who graduates med school can get a job being a doctor...less than 5% of undergraduate art students will get a job art related and maybe 10% of grad students but I doubt it.

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Do you have any ideas of your own, or have you read about any that

sound workable within our system as it is now?

Well it's a complicated thing.... For starters there has to be extreme MSM

reform. Right now the mainstream media is owned by the extremely rich

and has a pretty uniform bias in that respect. A bias which can be called

a "power elite" or "ruling elite" or "ruling class" or "unregulated pro-

capitalist" or "multinational corporate" or etc, bias. We need national news

media that has something other than billions of dollars behind it. That

doesn't necessarily mean getting rid of anything already existing, it just

means adding to it. Pacifica Radio for example should be a national media

outlet. They are in LA aren't they? Do you listen to them raVen? They

have DemocracyNow! I know.

 

 

The main problem is that the FCC has made it so that you must have a

ton of money in order to get heard. For example, I'd like to see Pacifica

at least on the radio where I live. I want to find out how much it would

cost. I'm guessing a ton. The FCC needs serious reform. They need to

open up the airways to viewpoints that don't have billions of dollars

behind them.

 

 

Once that's done, it's just depends. But there's no need to look beyond

that right now.

 

 

I have scroll back and forth to read this thread now.... annoying.

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Here's the problem:

For 100 years there have been a shortage for academics. So, everybody

nowadays get a degree. Noone becomes a plumber, construction worker,

machine operator or alike.

 

The law of supply and demand will kick in sooner or later. Most CNC

operators will earn more than most civil economists in the near future.

We simply need machine operators more then we need economists.

 

 

Alot of people seems to despise these proffesions though (I don't

understand why?) so they go to college anyhow and then blame

the "system".

Is that what's happening where you live?

That's not what's happening here. Here people HAVE to go to college

because there just aren't hardly any jobs for people who don't.

There aren't manufacturing jobs hardly anymore in the US like CNC operators.

That's what those articles I linked at the beginning were primarily

talking about. Manufacturing is down the toilet in the US.

For example, from 1985 to 2000 where I live, we lost 36% of our manufacturing

jobs while gaining 19% in service jobs.

That means CNC operators had to go work at McDs or be unemployed.

 

Also aside from offshoring, the increase in technology has resulted in a huge

unneeded workforce. If we were totally socialist this would mean people

working much shorter hours. Since were mostly capitalist it means the

unneeded workforce goes off to college to get useless degrees

(just jumping through hoops basically) and then they can go get a job

that as often as not they could have learned how to do in less than a year

yet they had to spend at least 4 in college.

 

This is capitalism:

You use your 2 hands and your brain to create something that you are good at creating. Since you don't need all of it yourself you trade some of your work for other items that other people have created that you need more than the things you've created yourself.

It's that simple.

Actually I think without money (just trading) most of the problems of actual capitalism

would go away. You know, things like monopolies that you somehow

forgot to mention. Things like 1% owning 95% of the land, etc.

 

Alot of people obviously have a problem with this so we have tried different approaches to destroy it. Or, more commonly, they just say that is bad and gives no solution whatsoever. So far only death and destruction has been generated.

Thats funny because the IMF and WB have been forcing extremist unregulated

capitalism on the third world for the last 30 years and

the results have been the worst disaster in history.

And there certainly is plenty of solutions by the way. Here's a list of books you

could read to learn more about things.

 

Manufacturing Consent by Edward Herman and Noam CHomsky

Killing Hope by William Blum

Globalization and It's Discontents by Joseph Stiglitz

The Bush Agenda by Antonia Juhasz

How the Othe Half Dies by Susan George

Edited by Jay
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Jay USF had 100% job placement for civil eng

graduates last year. I'm not sure what it's like in other departments. I

had to stop studying engineering though because I ran out of money and

had to start working more hours. It's a shame because I really like

structural engineering and was making almost all A's, but that's just the

way it is. So I now I work 2 jobs at USF instead of studying - tutoring

math and doing database work. They are always hiring computer people

here see

http://usfweb2.usf.edu/HR/Employment/CareerOpportunities.html look at

A&P and USPS positions there are probably a dozen or so openings for

compsci people ranging from tech to application developer. On the other

hand, I would probably be making more money now if I never bothered

with college and just enrolled in an apprentice program as an electrician

or plumber right after high school... but its too late for that now

Yes, like I said civil should be OK. So then I'm sorry that you've stopped

studying it, since you liked it so much. I never really cared for it honestly.

And comp sci is doing ...OK so far. But it appears to be a field that will

be susceptible to offshoring also. Actually I do know a plumber who is

rolling in the dough.

 

Again though, concerning your link. I'm not quite sure why you're

showing it to me.....? Do you think it refutes something in the articles

I linked to?

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Since were mostly capitalist it means the

unneeded workforce goes off to college to get useless degrees

 

Yes.

 

The WSJ reported than more women filed for bankruptcy last year than graduated college.

 

...I have scroll back and forth to read this thread now.... annoying.

 

Is it your initial post causing this or WillPeavy's link? Maybe, if it is yours, Willpeavy, you can bracket it -- .

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Again though, concerning your link. I'm not quite sure why you're

showing it to me.....? Do you think it refutes something in the articles

I linked to?

 

The link shows that there are lots of tech job openings where I work. They are always looking for people with good computer/engineering skills there

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Again though, concerning your link. I'm not quite sure why you're

showing it to me.....? Do you think it refutes something in the articles

I linked to?

The link shows that there are lots of tech job openings where I work. They are always looking for people with good computer/engineering skills there

The articles I posted are looking at the country as a whole. There are 300 million people living here so even with less "tech jobs" there can still be "lots of tech job openings", just way more applicants than actual jobs.

 

Would you mind doing something to that first link of yours so it doesn't mess up the width of this thread? (eh, not important.)

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  • 2 months later...

Last month I put my resume up on careerbuilder and monster looking for web developer jobs. Soon after I had the phone ringing off the hook with recruiters calling me trying to arrange interviews. I picked the three I liked best, and did the interviews. I got two offers and got my pick of jobs. ... As far as tech and IT goes --- if you've got solid code examples and can explain your methods to team leads in interviews, you can basically have your pick of jobs. But if you're writing sloppy code or using outdated technologies, and just expecting a job to be handed to you, then you'll be out of luck.

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What languages?

 

Visual Basic is a hobby of mine, and my favorite to use, but I know HTML (who doesn't?), VB, C/C++, Java, and I was toying with Assembler a couple of years back. I got more into health and wellness though, but I enjoy drawing graphics and things (2d games are my favorite to program).

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