Are We Now Experiencing 'a Great Reassessment of Work'? (washingtonpost.com) 230
The Washington Post reports on "growing evidence — both anecdotal and in surveys — that a lot of people want to do something different with their lives than they did before the pandemic."
In a piece titled "It's not a 'labor shortage.' It's a great reassessment of work," they argue that "The coronavirus outbreak has had a dramatic psychological effect on workers, and people are reassessing what they want to do and how they want to work, whether in an office, at home or some hybrid combination." A Pew Research Center survey this year found that 66 percent of the unemployed had "seriously considered" changing their field of work, a far greater percentage than during the Great Recession. People who used to work in restaurants or travel are finding higher-paying jobs in warehouses or real estate, for example. Or they want a job that is more stable and less likely to be exposed to the coronavirus — or any other deadly virus down the road... Economists describe this phenomenon as reallocation friction, the idea that the types of jobs in the economy are changing and workers are taking awhile to figure out what new jobs they want — or what skills they need for different roles...
Even among those who have jobs, people are rethinking their options. Front-line workers are reporting high levels of burnout, causing some to seek a new career path. There's also been a wave of retirements as workers over 50 quit because they don't want to return to teaching, home health care or other front-line jobs. More affluent Americans say they are retiring early because their retirement portfolios have surged in the past year and the pandemic has taught them that life is short. They don't want to spend as much time at a desk, even if it is safe... [I]t's notable that the manufacturing sector has bounced back strongly, yet the industry has only added back about 60 percent of the jobs lost. This suggests many factories are ramping up automation in a way that allows them to do more with fewer workers.
The overall expectation is still for hiring to pick up this summer as the economy reopens fully and more people are vaccinated. But the past year has fundamentally changed the economy and what many Americans want in their working life. This big reassessment — for companies and workers — is going to take awhile to sort out and it could continue to pop up in surprising ways.
In a piece titled "It's not a 'labor shortage.' It's a great reassessment of work," they argue that "The coronavirus outbreak has had a dramatic psychological effect on workers, and people are reassessing what they want to do and how they want to work, whether in an office, at home or some hybrid combination." A Pew Research Center survey this year found that 66 percent of the unemployed had "seriously considered" changing their field of work, a far greater percentage than during the Great Recession. People who used to work in restaurants or travel are finding higher-paying jobs in warehouses or real estate, for example. Or they want a job that is more stable and less likely to be exposed to the coronavirus — or any other deadly virus down the road... Economists describe this phenomenon as reallocation friction, the idea that the types of jobs in the economy are changing and workers are taking awhile to figure out what new jobs they want — or what skills they need for different roles...
Even among those who have jobs, people are rethinking their options. Front-line workers are reporting high levels of burnout, causing some to seek a new career path. There's also been a wave of retirements as workers over 50 quit because they don't want to return to teaching, home health care or other front-line jobs. More affluent Americans say they are retiring early because their retirement portfolios have surged in the past year and the pandemic has taught them that life is short. They don't want to spend as much time at a desk, even if it is safe... [I]t's notable that the manufacturing sector has bounced back strongly, yet the industry has only added back about 60 percent of the jobs lost. This suggests many factories are ramping up automation in a way that allows them to do more with fewer workers.
The overall expectation is still for hiring to pick up this summer as the economy reopens fully and more people are vaccinated. But the past year has fundamentally changed the economy and what many Americans want in their working life. This big reassessment — for companies and workers — is going to take awhile to sort out and it could continue to pop up in surprising ways.
"Great Reassessment" (Score:3)
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I learned over a decade ago to not bother clicking some random YouTube link unless there's an explanation as to why it might possibly be worth my while.
Re: "Great Reassessment" (Score:2)
Hands off work. (Score:2)
Or they want a job that is more stable and less likely to be exposed to the coronavirus — or any other deadly virus down the road...
Virtual porn star.
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Virtual porn star.
It's called OnlyFans.
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Go watch one of those chaturbate streams for an hour
I'd imagine it would get pretty sore after an hour.
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You are most likely under 30. Most older people aren't interested in going for more than an hour. It's not a marathon.
https://www.healthline.com/hea... [healthline.com]
And from an article in GQ:
While there's no magic number, one study back in 2005 in the Journal of Sexual Medicine asked a bunch of sex therapists for their opinions on how long sex should last. Their guidelines separated sex into four categories: adequate, too short, too long, and desirable. They rated penetrative vaginal sex that lasted from 1-2 minutes as
Re: Hands off work. (Score:2)
A lot of cbate streams are money laundering ops. So how much of that is real interest is debatable.
and min wage needs to go up also end 80 hour (Score:2)
and min wage needs to go up also end 80 hour work weeks
I am Reassassing (Score:5, Interesting)
After more than a year working from home, being less stressed, having more money, and being more productive, I'm not sure I see a reason to go back into the office. It's like 90% negative.
If the bosses decide we're mandated to come back full time, I'm probably looking for another job. Plenty of businesses have realized they need to embrace the new normal. I can now look for jobs nationally that will allow me to WFH and not move. There's zero reason for me go back into the office full time.
I have an entirely reasonable commute. It's one of the reasons I live where I do. But what I thought was reasonable before a year working from home now looks downright barbaric and completely unnecessary. If companies haven't learned from this, they're going to be in a rude awakening in another few months.
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Me too. Working from home 100%, maybe with just occasional visits to the office a few times a year, means I can live where I choose rather than where the job is.
Like you I will be looking for a new job if I am required to come back to the office regularly. Companies that don't offer WFH will find they can't retain staff. It's a watershed moment and one which we can't turn back from.
Re:I am Reassassing (Score:4, Interesting)
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A lot of those millions remain out of work by choice, because they were being paid more to stay home.
Before this whole pandemic thing started, I went to a Taylor Swift concert with my partner. Somehow, despite owning more money worth of real estate than most people will ever see in their lifetime [businessinsider.com], she still managed to drag her ass out on stage and put on a show.
You could probably say something similar about Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, or any other rich person who still shows up for work. If somehow, having way more money than you'd ever need for the rest of your life isn't a demotivator to wo
Why? Because it's happening now. (Score:2)
why do some people think receiving $300/wk for a little under four more months is going to encourage sloth?
Because we don't think, we know. It's already happening; people have gotten the shimmy checks and have checked out of the workforce as a result. Exactly as I said in my first message, you must have not read everything I guess.
Some people are just driven to work, yes... but you are seriously arguing that is even age majority of humanity? Conditions currently show such an odd notion to be utterly disp
Re:Is he the lucky one? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not that. It's that shit jobs pay shit wages. All of a sudden, people are getting paid to not work shit jobs. People who offer shit jobs are panicking because they can't get people to take their shit jobs and shit pay just to survive.
That's the worry - that when people are given alternatives, suddenly they leave the shit job. Janitor, waiter/waitress, etc are shit jobs with low pay and really unpleasant working conditions - as in. having to deal with an unappreciative public. Try having anti-maskers yell at you in your face and decide if $8/hr is worth the abuse. Even if all the other things in the job are great. Dealing with assholes and idiots who think you can do anything about it is a major drag.
And on the opposite side of the coin, well, rich bastards trying to pinch every nickel hate it because if they can't pay slave wages, then they can't earn as much money. Slaves are cool - because you know they need the job so you can treat them like shit and they have to take it because they need the job.
It's why people hate UBI and the like - because it suddenly makes shit jobs and shit pay a lot less appealing - where their shit comes from asshole idiots or asshole bosses. Suddenly leaving those positions is an option and it changes the power dynamic enormously - to attract people, all of a sudden the job has to pay more or the boss has to suck less.
Now that's a scary thought - and people in power know it. It empowers the lowly worker and empowered people are scary.
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Yeah, I just read three long articles locally about the lack of restaurant workers, the lack of daycare workers, the lack of bakers. The positions described were $12-20/hr, no benefits, in SF. One of the business owners was considering raising the wage by $2/hr but thought they wouldn't be able to afford it. So presumably that means that paying the workers $2/hr extra makes the business unprofitable?
The really crazy thing to me is that the small business owners in this case are not making much money anyw
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There are different kinds of work. Taylor and Elon clear derive a lot of personal satisfaction out of what they do. Its hard at times I am sure, but they are not entirely in it for the money. They enjoy the fame, prestige etc they get from their work. Lots of other professionals enjoy the respect they get from others, the position in the community their work, more than just the dollars associated afford them.
On the flip side, there is and will always be a lot of work that isn't prestigious and if your gig
Re:Is he the lucky one? (Score:4, Interesting)
I totally agree until we see the extended unemployment and eviction moratoriums go away we don't know who has 'reassessed' the value of their past employment vs who is just free-ridding while they can.
There is also employer re-alignment potential as well. Around here there are some fast food joins that have not reopened their dining rooms. I am pretty confident they could hire / go back to giving staff more hours if they wanted to - its not a can't find labor problem. Its more a "our drive thru is wrapped around the parking lot half the day, maybe we don't need to go back to having staff to clean and service the dining room and make public rest rooms available"; sort of problem. A lot of business have got customers accustomed to a lot LESS in terms of customer service. I think a lot of business might be in no hurry to go back offering those extras if consumers don't demand it.
Work? Really, after a year of relaxation? (Score:2)
I'm spoiled. I've had time to read /. from cover to cover every day. Why would I want to go to work and miss this important news? So I have a plan, and you can be too.
Here's the deal: I've saved up and I'ma buy myself a state-of-the-art industrial robot, suitable for use at some local factories. I will make a deal with management at a forward-thinking company and I will lease my robot to them. I will install and maintain the 'bot to assure it produces to management satisfaction, and I will live on the lease
Needed reassessment (Score:3)
Before the pandemic, many folks were looking for a recession to start up because it was time for one for the classic reasons... especially that productivity was not rising fast enough. Recessions come along periodically and give the push to get back on the track with productivity gains.
The great recession's manufacturing numbers showed that in spades. When US manufacturing output finally reached 100% of its pre-great recession levels, it did so with 20% fewer employees. Just because this recession was initially triggered by COVID will not exclude it from that pattern.
The problems in the hospitality industry are also needed. That industry includes some of our hardest workers. And the jobs are not "unskilled". People need to stop talking down people in these industries and try to do their jobs for a day. They deserve far better pay on a strictly humanitarian basis. We were already seeing movements to break this industries stranglehold on its employees prior to the pandemic. The pandemic just pushed the situation. Many have indeed now retrained into simpler but more lucrative positions like warehouse industry spots. If you want service, you need to pay for it. They aren't slaves.
Re:Needed reassessment (Score:5, Interesting)
I feel like the recession's been papered over to an extent. As the stimulus money, unemployment benefits, etc start to dry up I'm looking for the sugar high to wear off and cracks start to appear.
Interestingly, what we've done the past 14 months or so is basically a pseudo-UBI. Implemented like shit, of course, but still, money for nothing to lots of people. It's barely been a year of it, and already you see wages going up as people gain the freedom to say "no" to bad jobs.
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At least in the United States, if you want to raise wages in the hospitality field, you need to start by cutting off the supply of cheap "undocumented" labor. For good this time, not just for a few years (and it never truly stopped, just slowed down).
Lousy Jobs (Score:2)
Lots of people were in lousy jobs. Like meat packing plants or restaurants, for example. Those jobs suck. But many of the workers didn't have enough experience to realize just how bad they ere, or that they could actually find better jobs. But then they all got laid off a year ago. Over the last year, many of them have found other jobs, and have no interest to going back to jobs with horrible working conditions or unpredictable schedules. People learned that they didn't have to stay in those dead-end
zero hours job needs to go as well (Score:2)
zero hours job needs to go as well
Thanks to out sourcing, H1-bs and Mergers (Score:4, Insightful)
That's your "realignment" right there. Anyone under 55 got a raw deal, and they're starting to want a new one. Time will tell if they get it, but I think the alternative is a fascist dictatorship like China.
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Colleges were heavily subsidized (Score:5, Insightful)
Gov't heavily subsidized affordable housing. Not the building of the houses themselves, but the preparing of the land. Throwing up a frame & Spackle is cheap. Grading land and running last mile utilities is not.
Unemployment used to be easier to get and pay more. That kept wages higher. Same goes for welfare programs. These things put upward pressure on wages, which is why big business (and poorly run small businesses) oppose them. Desperate people will work for peanuts.
And on and on and on and on. We've been doing Austerity since Reagan. It's gutted the middle class. Gov't is nothing more than everybody coming together to do stuff. The current every man for himself environment is great if you're a billionaire or even just a plain multi-millionaire. But if you work for a living (instead of owning stuff for a living) you need to band together or you get eaten alive by predators.
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I can't speak for the rest of your points, but education costs are sky rocketing because the colleges and the government conspired to create a guaranteed revenue stream at the expense of the students.
Econ 101, right? What happens when income is effectively unlimited? Costs go up. Cut that gravy train and you'll see college expenses stabilize, or even better go down. It's as simple as allowing student loans to be discharged via bankruptcy, although I'd like to take it a step further and put that debt bac
One last thing (Score:5, Insightful)
If you cancel a program folks like you hear about it. If you cut it's funding 10% every year in the name of "balanced budgets" it doesn't make the news. Meanwhile as I mentioned on another comment it puts downward pressure on wages. You and me earn less when the poor earn less because they have less to spend (and there's less people buying what we or our companies sell) and because those poor folks start gunning for our jobs (most don't make it, but enough do to hit us where it hurts, our pay).
Boomers never retired (Score:3, Insightful)
The generation of I'll never be old. Will not admit they they are old and not retire. This has created the problem were many business are not bothering with mentoring the kids within the organization for promotion, knowing that one guy who is in his 50's will probably be gone in a decade. So they would take someone under their wing, and be ready to take his job. But they are holding onto their job, as long as they can, and when they do retire, the organization has no one to replacement, so they hire from
They're relying more and more on H1-Bs (Score:3)
Personally I'd be fine with immigration if it was balanced with lots of social programs and single payer healthcare so that I benefited from a strong economy more than just "my boss isn't actively trying to cut head count and fire me". But it's hard to do stuff l
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Fascist dictatorship? How did this get modded up?
Can't say anything for the whole (Score:3)
Front-line workers are reporting high levels of burnout, causing some to seek a new career path.
I've got five friends who are "front line" workers. All of them have indicated that this pandemic has taught them that literally nobody gives a fuck about them. It helped none that people kept making their positions politically charged. All, but two, of them are seriously reconsidering their careers. The other two have already left.
From BLM defund the police and Blue line alpha male on steriods. To anti-vaxx/anti-mask crazies and SJW mask shamers, these folks I know have had to deal with a giga-ton of shit that just convinced them that a lot of society doesn't give a damn about people who actually put their lives out there or at least not what they're actually doing. And those that do care, tend to make it some sort of political BS that none of them asked for.
But that's folks I know so absolutely not indicative of the whole here. However, after everything and how politically charged this pandemic has become, yeah, no one should be surprised that a lot of people who helped/are still helping get us through this pandemic are pretty much done with their profession. The level of BS that a lot of uninvolved virtue cucks have placed upon these people is enough for anyone to just say fuck it and drive a forklift for $18/hr.
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What the f*ck is a cuck? Where'd you come from? What is this thing about virtue?
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The word is short for "cuckold". It seems strange in this instance, but the Urban Dictionary associates it with virtue signalling and not actually helping anyone.
RW Nutjob (Score:2)
Damn. And I was thinking RW Nutjob would have some pithy post. Aw man.
In six months (Score:2)
The only thing (Score:5, Insightful)
The only thing that is being " re-assessed " is the fact that a lot of work can be done remotely.
People are asking themselves WTF am I throwing away two hours of my life everyday to commute to an office space when
this pandemic has shown it is completely unnecessary. WTF am I getting up at five am so I can get on the road by five thirty
am because unless I leave that early, there is no way in hell I will reach the office by seven am due to traffic.
People are asking themselves WTF am I wasting my life crammed into a cubicle farm doing a job that they loathe when, again,
it can be done remotely. Why am I putting so much wear and tear on my vehicle and spending $$$ per month in fuel when it is
unnecessary ? WTF am I spending $$$ per month in parking fees for the priviledge of working in a congested metro area while
upper level management gets to sit at home ?
With the exception of customer facing positions and / or hands on requirements, there really is little reason to cram everyone
together in a building and everyone got a real clear view of that reality during the pandemic.
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With the exception of customer facing positions
Even those can be done from home, with a quiet room, green screen behind your desk, and fibre connection, you can serve customers remotely through zoom, or through text chat. Your customers are mostly calling from home anyway.
The software to support your work already records you and track your every call, there is no worry of you slacking off.
The number of customer contact that actually required physical visit is quickly going to zero. Businesses that don't adapt will go out of business soon enough.
Re:The only thing (Score:4, Interesting)
Housing too. If you WFH 99% of the time then travelling an hour or two or three to the office a couple of times a year is okay, meaning you can live somewhere nice and relatively cheap.
It's also great for the environment not to have millions of people making pointless journeys every day, or using disposable items like food/coffee containers because they can make lunch at home.
If anything good comes from this pandemic it should be that we massively and permanently reduce our carbon footprints.
Hope so. I sure did. (Score:5, Interesting)
I was forced out of work due to a chronic disability. Nobody will hire somebody that need part time work with the flexibility I need. Doubly so for software programming. So I wait on the disability process.
Having done a lot of schooling in Computer Science, I thought I'd miss programming. I don't. The money was nice and in the beginning, there was a real engineering culture that was great to be a part of, but that's all gone now.
I would love to coach and mentor programmers, but there's really no demand for that. They just work until they burnout or find something different.
More like hyperinflation is here (Score:2)
So, time to get serious about BMI (Score:2)
And taxing the hell out of "investors" and the wealthy.
Early stage UBI (Score:3)
Universal Basic Income (UBI) is now upon us. I'm not sure whether or not it will work in the long run but the stimulus checks are really a form of UBI. People in lower paid jobs (typically service jobs or warehouse jobs) are being automated out of a job. We are seeing it in factories and grocery stores. If the stimulus checks become permanent (and there are some pushing for this) then UBI will have officially arrived.
I was against it for a long time but I'm starting to see how it will become inevitable. A lot of jobs are going to be replaced by machines and many of those people will have very few options on their next career. I can see how a combination of UBI and part time or Gig economy work will become the norm.
The welfare programs, while well meaning, have too many strings attached that prevent people from ever getting out of that hole. If a single mother has a man living with her she loses her benefits. That leads to too many single parent households and for people in the lowest income brackets that leads to a very high likelihood of the children growing up in poverty - and their children as well. I'd like to see a program where people can opt out of welfare and opt into UBI on a voluntary basis. The UBI payments would come with no strings attached. If the single mom wants a man in the house she can have one without fear of getting cut off and without having to report in to case workers. If she is willing and able to find a job to supplement the UBI she can do that. People that are disabled or unable to work can stay on welfare if they choose. UBI gives people choices and hope for a better future.
Just like UBI is in the early stages, capitalism is in late stage development. Back in the 1950s and 60s we saw less of a disparity between CEO salaries and salaries of average working people. People that worked blue collar jobs could realistically have a house in the suburbs with a white picket fence. Those days are mostly gone. Wealth is now determined largely by those that own assets like real estate, stocks, etc. and those that don't. Our tax code incentivizes ownership of real estate and stocks to the extent that the rich become richer. For those of us that have figured out all of this we are on the right side of the equation. For others, and young people just starting out, they are facing a very difficult climb up the ladder.
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but as Florida has proven, the strict lockdown measures were never necessary
In other news, Florida is experiencing a surge after Spring Break [go.com]. Nothing to see here move along,
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an increase in variants of the disease, not an increase in total case rate.
It mutating faster is better than more with the thing we've all already seen, how? I mean, I'm not here to split hairs, but that actually sounds even worse than an increase in total case rate.
more evidence you are a complete and utter fucktard
I'm not going to fight the battle that you started with the person you're replying to, but going to be awfully hard for anyone to take you serious when you jump straight into ad hominem attacks. But I mean you do you.
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If mutating faster doesn't result in more cases, then it appears to be mostly irrelevant. Plus you haven't demonstrated that the mutations are local. It may just be an accumulation of mutations from other sources (Brazil, UK, South Africa, etc).
Re: There's no shortage, just bad government poli (Score:2)
Short answer, no. Long answer, all the variants catalogued so far still use the spike protein that the vaccine protects against, and even natural immunity gotten from having a different variant mostly protects against the other variants.
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This is not flamebait. This is the truth. Just watch. People that lost jobs that were bringing in 300 a week are not going to ditch staying at home while receiving at least 250 a week in benefits. Going to work cost money. They likely also would qualify for some kind of food stamps, low income utility rates, and low income cable bill.
What we are starting to see is businesses are offering more money. I'm not sure it will be enough to get people to go to work though some may be smart enough to realize the gra
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:4, Interesting)
Who would buy a place they cannot move into and won't be receiving rents from?
A guy that runs a bulldozer. Flatten it and sell the lot to a developer.
We had a couple of rental houses on a large lot near me where this happened. County was going to add some rental control regulations. Owner cleared the tenants out. A backhoe showed up. It was parked there for a couple of months until a few days before the regs were due to take effect (Jan 1). On Dec 28th the houses were flattened. Piles of debris remained for several more months before the guy had it trucked off. But he made it under the deadline.
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Nobody is willing to buy a rent-controlled property. That is the reason you see so many empty housing complexes in large Democrat-run cities, the owner declares bankruptcy and abandons the property, nobody wants to buy it even at discount rates. Look at one of those house buying websites and you can often find multi-unit properties for $30-50k which have been on the market for months.
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I agree, it's stupid to pay people not to work. Instead, we should give everyone enough to live off of with no strings attached. People who only want to survive might continue to stay home and do nothing, but those who want spending money or a good retirement or who simply don't want to be bored day in and day out will work jobs, or will start their own company, or go back to school--aren't these all good things?
What would you do with your life if you didn't have to worry about putting food on the table?
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:4, Insightful)
Instead, we should give everyone enough to live off of with no strings attached. People who only want to survive might continue to stay home and do nothing, but those who want spending money or a good retirement or who simply don't want to be bored day in and day out will work jobs, ...
Noting that those satisfied with the minimal stipend won't need extra for a "good retirement" ... they're already "retired". Also noting that was suppose to be the reason for Social Security Insurance -- a bare minimum if all else fails, but I don't think it's ever been enough to live on as a sole income.
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I won't have to, but I could live off my social security benefits as a sole income. I'd have to be a little more frugal, but I could still live in my house and keep doing the things I enjoy.
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:4, Insightful)
What would you do with your life if you didn't have to worry about putting food on the table?
People are so hell-bent on making sure deadbeats are "punished", that they don't even stop to think that by removing unwilling workers from the labor pool, their own willingness to roll up their sleeves and work would become all the more valuable of a trait. Work still needs to be done by somebody; supply and demand applies to labor, too.
Anyone who gets up every morning and goes to work for a boss should be pleased as punch to hear that other people don't want to get off their ass and go to work. It means you, as a willing worker, are now more valuable. If only the folks listening to the right-wing talking points about deadbeats not working payed a little closer attention to whose interests are actually being served (hint: if you work for someone else, it's not yours).
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People are so hell-bent on making sure deadbeats are "punished"
What you call punished, is what I would claim is not rewarded. If you have no interest to exert any effort in your own upkeep, why should that duty fall on me or anyone else?
Anyone who gets up every morning and goes to work for a boss should be pleased as punch to hear that other people don't want to get off their ass and go to work. It means you, as a willing worker, are now more valuable.
It also means I have to pay higher tax rates to support those who cannot be bothered to support themselves.
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:5, Insightful)
It also means I have to pay higher tax rates to support those who cannot be bothered to support themselves.
If you come out ahead in net pay, who really cares? It's a game of percentages. If the people who choose to not work raise the demand for labor to the point you're worth 10% more to an employer, unless your taxes go up by an equal amount (which is highly unlikely due to the fact we use progressive taxation in the USA - the wealthy will be forced to carry the bulk of increased tax burden), you'll come out ahead.
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:5, Insightful)
If you have no interest to exert any effort in your own upkeep, why should that duty fall on me or anyone else?
Most people do have interest, but the CURRENT system discourages them from doing it because working three jobs doesn't cover basic needs. It costs EVERYONE more in the long run.
It also means I have to pay higher tax rates to support those who cannot be bothered to support themselves.
Instead, you have to pay higher and higher taxes for "police", as more and more people cannot afford to live even minimally, and police aren't there to fix society's problems.
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Oh, you're going to end up paying for it eventually. It's just a question of how the costs are transferred. People bitch and moan about how much taxes would increase if we had universal healthcare, but when you actually look at the numbers, you'd end up paying far less than with the current privatized system. Who cares if your 'taxes' go up when you literally have more money in your pocket? If that means subsidizing the dingaling down the road who'd rather waste away in front of the TV all day, so be it.
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People bitch and moan about how much taxes would increase if we had universal healthcare, but when you actually look at the numbers, you'd end up paying far less than with the current privatized system.
Citation needed. Healthcare is not magically unaffected by the laws of supply and demand.
Who cares if your 'taxes' go up when you literally have more money in your pocket? If that means subsidizing the dingaling down the road who'd rather waste away in front of the TV all day, so be it.
There is nothing at all preventing you from starting a charity for the upkeep of "dingalings" who refuse to care for themselves. You can feel free to donate as much of your paycheck as you feel necessary. Personally, I'll have to respectfully decline my offering. I believe the expected result would be a large proliferation of needy dingalings which will erase any income boost or tax savings you might imagine that pr
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:5, Insightful)
Taxes go towards a lot of things you don't directly benefit from. My tax dollars pay for roads I'll never drive on, fighter jets I'm not allowed to fly, and a whole host of things that go towards supporting rugrats, even though I have no intention of ever raising kids. At some point, you've just gotta make peace with the fact that it's just an aggregate cost of living in a functioning society.
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At some point, you've just gotta make peace with the fact that it's just an aggregate cost of living in a functioning society.
Yeah, I get that we all have to pay for shit we don't like...but... How is taking money from workers and giving it to people who refuse to work "a functioning society"? Fuck anyone who thinks it is.
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Would you rather they live off your tax dollars or they break into your house and take your money at gunpoint?
This was a serious question by the way, there are enough studies that show that an overwhelming amount of crime is done out of desperation and that countries with high social security have lower robberies.
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Are those their only options...No. Are jobs available...Yes. And if they want to break into my house, I'm well prepared.
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:4, Interesting)
*I'd go crazy, just as I am now*. I just finished a 15-year stint recovering from a very near-fatal car accident. (The other driver ran a red light.) I had a headache non-stop (on a scale of 0="no pain" to 10="please cut my head off, I'll grow a new one", it was never below a 7) until July 5, 2019 when some new drugs which weren't supposed to work in me, took over until I got two vaccines on October 15, 2019 and the pain resumed on October 18, 2019. October 12, 2020, the pain was gone and has been until today (counting on my fingers & toes with a funky chisenbop makes today 210 days). I've been looking for a month. I can't move.
Before I was benched from the accident, I'd been working in tech since I was 17 -- people say, "That's a late bloomer" and I reply, "in 1979?" By then, I'd taken college courses in Lisp, Fortran, and Cobol, then taught myself assembler & Basic. I started on mainframes & mid-ranges until 1990 when I switched to PCs. I've been on the Internet for 32+ years. I've had one non-tech job in my life: I helped a guy open a restaurant in 1984, knowing I'd probably be doing tech for the rest of my life, so I decided to do something fun that Summer.
And yes, I've got a B.S. in CompSci (1984) with a minor in Systems Analysis and a near degree in pure mathematics. Someone finally confided in me recently and said, "No matter how big the tech shortage might seem, no one is going to hire you with a 15-year hiatus." I'm only 59 - I'm not looking for my retirement job as I've always intended to work as long as I can - I *like* working in tech...hard. So I'm working with LLVM just to help keep my mind sharp with the intention of releasing my work as open source as proof my brain isn't fried. And I decided to make it interesting by defining a lot of the infrastructure in XML so the duplicated material is defined in a single location so XSLT can create the final definitions. This means if something needs to be changed in two places and someone only changes it in one, you won't get something soft & fleshy caught in your zipper.
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It sounds like you're already working/looking for work for other reasons besides "worrying about putting food on the table".
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Good luck. I got my first coding gig off the back of some open source work.
we need medicare for all / more to start maybe 55- (Score:3)
we need medicare for all / more to start maybe lower it to 55-60 right away.
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What would you do with your life if you didn't have to worry about putting food on the table?
This is the argument many use in favor of UBI. But we don't have to guess. Millions of people work long after they're able to retire. Or they retire from a high-paying tedious job and take one that's more meangingful/enjoyable. Seems like that supports your argument. On the other hand, even more millions retire early and do nothing. The slackers far outnumber the self-motivated contributors. It's about wasted resources.
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:5, Insightful)
People that lost jobs that were bringing in 300 a week are not going to ditch staying at home while receiving at least 250 a week in benefits.
This talking point keeps coming up, but have you actually looked at your own budget? Unless you live in some shithole flyover state where the cost of living is stuck in a time dilation field, for anyone who truly needs to pull their own weight (to say nothing of supporting a family), collecting unemployment is no substitute for a real job.
And really, so what if some people choose to sit on their ass for a few months rather than work some shitty job that doesn't pay a livable wage? It's a win for the people who actually want to work, because they can have an easier time finding a job and make a higher salary. Personally, I'd rather earn more money at my job than worry about deadbeats getting starvation wages for sitting on their asses.
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Re: There's no shortage, just bad government polic (Score:2)
I'm not from the US, but from what sometimes read, working is in many cases also not enough. The proverbial single mom working two jobs to get by is... well... proverbial :-)
So to such a person, the choice is between working and not getting by, and not working and not getting by.
I definitely know what I'd choose...
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:5, Insightful)
I can already tell you have a bias by your comments: "Unless you live in some shithole flyover state where the cost of living is stuck in a time dilation field, for anyone who truly needs to pull their own weight (to say nothing of supporting a family), collecting unemployment is no substitute for a real job."
News flash buddy... these "flyover states" you want to write off as irrelevant and unworthy of living in make up the vast majority of land constituting the United States! I was born and raised in the midwest, and I moved to the East coast to relocate for a tech job. After 8 years of it, I moved back. That whole area disgusts me with how far Left people are, living in their little bubbles where they're sure they're all that matters in the nation, and their ideas are the best solutions for everybody.
When I first moved out there, I was blindsided by the housing costs that were easily 2x what I was used to seeing, but I managed to do a LOT of searching and find a small town that was affordable enough for our family, despite a long daily work commute. But the promise of all the tech jobs that would pay "so much better", it would all be worth it? No way... didn't materialize at all! All I did was spend all the money I made on things like utility bills 2x higher than I was used to paying, and really high taxes. The public school system was as bad or worse than what we had in the midwest, but somehow they collectively thought they were "incredibly good and progressive" while demanding ever-higher taxes to pay for it all.
There are definitely people I knew out in that part of the Northeast U.S. who *were* collecting the higher pandemic-boosted unemployment instead of trying to find a job. Basically, they were people already doing a little part-time work they enjoyed, and were able to keep doing "under the table" for cash. Their options were, "Either take a full-time job doing something I dislike, or collect the UI benefits as long as possible, which free up my time to do this stuff I like, randomly, whenever the guy would like me to do it - and come out ahead financially."
Re:There's no shortage, just bad government policy (Score:4, Informative)
Like I said to another poster, most states won't let you take unemployment if you deny credible job offers. They have hiring portals linked to the unemployment system. The only way to draw is to sign up for the hiring portal and list a resume. If they catch you "gaming the system" they boot you off unemployment. Lose state unemployment and you lose fed unemployment, since the payments are handled through the state system.
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I don't know about your state but mine suspended that rule. The republican controlled legislature is trying to bring it back because restaurants are crying about not being able to find workers. You're telling me that people don't want to work for $2.38 an hour? That is what restaurant workers get paid without tips.
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That is what restaurant workers get paid without tips.
So? They do get tips.
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Reminded of this incredible article from a week or two ago:
Amid labor shortage, these Pittsburgh companies are filling open roles. Here's how.
"It was instant, overnight. We got thousands of applications that poured in," Maya Johnson, general manager of Klavon's, said. "It was very overwhelming, very. People were coming in by the next day that it broke on the news, they were coming in, filling out paper applications. I was doing on-the-spot interviews."
Amazing, how on Earth did they manage that?
Then, on March 30, the parlor announced it would more than double the starting wage for the roles, going from $7.25 an hour to $15 an hour, a scoop that seemed to captivate workers throughout the region and one that earned a significant amount of local media coverage.
https://www.bizjournals.com/pi... [bizjournals.com]
The donor class are much bigger freeloaders. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's really not hard. If you give people free money for not working, and promise to keep giving it to them with no strings attached, they'll choose to not work.
Once the benefits end in September, the "labor shortage" will suddenly be gone as the freeloaders will suddenly have to find actual jobs instead of sitting at home.
So first of all, give me a little free money to not work, but more to work and I'll work. Everyone I know will happily work to live a life of comfort than sit at home and barely make ends meet. I find this a stupid argument that no one will ever do anything if they didn't have to. Maybe some losers will, but most of us won't.
However, more importantly, fuck off with the freeloader comment unless you're going to apply the same label to every wealthy investor who reaps the benefits of American infrastructure and then lobbies to pass tax cuts we cannot afford. Running the United States costs money. If we're going to pass tax cuts like Trump signed into law in 2017 that we cannot afford, that means we have a shit ton of billionaires not paying their share either. If you want to cut taxes, good...just be sure to cut spending, but the RNC never seems to want to do that in any meaningful way. Sure Bezos has a private jet and probably smells better than the person you're envisioning, but he's freeloading FAR MORE than any unemployed bartender collecting money.
I'd much rather pay workers to not work than give Amazon.com and Apple corporate tax breaks, which they never needed because interest rates were so low. Give a poor person money, they spend it. They pay off bills. They buy goods and services from the companies my employer does business with...my stock portfolio goes up, tax revenue goes up, evictions go down, crime goes down, everything is better. Give Apple tax breaks, what do they do?...stock buybacks....almost no jobs created from those. I even have almost 100k worth of Apple stocks...so yeah, my shares go up slightly faster, but we're just accumulating national debt we cannot afford to pay off and kicking the problem down the road....making CEOs and investors wealthier and screwing the rest of us who can't afford to relocate to our summer homes in the Carribean when the United States finally collapses. I don't know about you, but I actually love my country and want to see it succeed. In order to do so, we can't have stupid reckless financial policy. The tax cuts of 2017 were reckless and a terrible investment. It supported investors who didn't need the money and really didn't use it to invest in their businesses like people hoped. I know the RNC leadership knew this would happen. They managed to fool their voters and did their donor class a huge solid in the process. Those sociopaths don't care what happens to the USA in 20 years. They'll either be dead or have enough money to relocate to somewhere with a functioning government.
Paying poor people is a good investment that helps my local community and helps my local businesses and my employer and my government and keeps me safer. Paying Jeff Bezos barely does shit for me. I'd rather strengthen the middle class than donor class. I honestly don't even care how much work people do to earn their money. With advancements in automation, there will someday be less jobs than people. I would argue that there are less jobs paying a living wage than people today. In order to keep our economy moving, at some point, we're going to have to pump money in from the bottom up so people can afford to pay their bills and buy goods and services from our employers. I'm not sure when that day is, but it is coming and probably in our lifetime. I don't think hostility towards the unemployed is helpful. I'd rather just see them employed and if not employed, at least contributing to the local economy.
Re:The donor class are much bigger freeloaders. (Score:4)
or do we want to set up a system where people can literally drain the system?
It's been that way for over 50 years. Welcome to Lyndon Johnson's Great Society.
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They can do more than that.
At least by current standards, do you want to know what any parent can do that will make their kids a much greater credit to the public school system (at a minimum) than anything else?
Teach them the alphabet and a few rudimentary words by preschool (age 4)
Teach them to count to 10 and beyond, maybe to add numbers if possible
Teach them primary colors
Get them a vocabulary of at least a few hundred words
If you are a "deadbeat" stay-at-home parent, doing any of those things with even
Re:The donor class are much bigger freeloaders. (Score:4, Interesting)
Proven wrong? There's a large group of such freeloaders in my country, who immigrated from the east over the past decades.
There's now a whole generation of them with next to no work experience. Basically as soon as mandatory employment ended after the fall of communism, they found their way through the hoops of social welfare. One of the popular tricks is to fake being disabled, because the disability pay sets you for life. Another popular trick is to claim your children's father is someone very old, which guarantees a nice orphan's pension, because challenging the fatherhood is considered "unethical".
They have 60-90% unemployment rates (varies by location), yet above average natality rates.
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That's not entirely true. Most, if not all, state unemployment programs require you to accept any credible job offer you get while taking unemployment payments. Once you're off the state unemployment, you're off the federal unemployment too. So either:
a). people are milking the system in states that DON'T have a work requirement, or
b). people aren't getting any recognizable employment offers, or
c). people are cheating the system somehow to deny employment while still taking benefits, or
d). people are jus
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That's not entirely true. Most, if not all, state unemployment programs require you to accept any credible job offer you get while taking unemployment payments.
In most states, you simply have to state that you looked for a job. No one verifies that it's true.
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Mod me to Hell, butthurt Trumpies, I don't care.
Actually, Trump was pretty big on pushing out money for people to sit on their ass. I'm assuming the majority of his motivation behind this was as a futile attempt to "buy" his reelection, but the end result was still quite a bit of stimulus money and an executive order to reinstate the lapsed $600/wk unemployment boost at $300/wk (albeit, one that ran out quickly).
This was one of the areas where Trump really did not align with the typical groupthink of the GOP. Usually, when times get tough, the GOP expe
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Actually, those on the lowest end of the wage scale got hurt the most from 1970-1979. After that it's been pretty flat.
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Actually, those on the lowest end of the wage scale got hurt the most from 1970-1979. After that it's been pretty flat.
Yup, those on the lowest end of the wage scale have seen their real incomes drop precipitously whereas those at the top (i.e., those born into The Club(TM)) have seen theirs skyrocket. The rest of who have to work for a living have seen their incomes pretty much flat or dropping slightly over last forty-plus fucking years. Meanwhile, worker productivity is way up.
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Well, sort of.
Also, FWIW, the front-line workers I know aren't burning out. They're moving to higher-paying high-demand traveller jobs.
Just because front-line workers move on, doesn't mean there isn't anyone replacing them. The very term "front-line" implies there will always be a front line, and a need for front-line workers.
And I know plenty who are burned out. "Front" lines, define damn near every type of manufacturing factory that was forced to stay operational during a pandemic. Doesn't matter if you're making bombs or bubble gum. Burnout, is burnout.
Re: It's like the Black Plague all over again! (Score:2)
They are being replaced by the next generation, which is as it should be. Our restaurant has replaced every single worker at this point with a teenager.
There has been stagnation at the top, with Boomers not retiring, and a smaller age group younger than them filling the job spots as they open , but much slower than it used to. 30 year olds are tired of working at the bottom, so they are jumping to new jobs.
Iâ(TM)m hoping that this will also allow a slew of promotions within companies, moving the next g
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They are being replaced by the next generation, which is as it should be.
Uh, this isn't quite that simple because of the reason this is happening. Not exactly organic. If the pandemic rages on due to virus variants or whatever else, then those replacements are going to get burned out too. And they will quit. A lot sooner than planned.
Then, you will not be facing "as it should be."
Sure, this may be great for the younger generation who has stagnated due to lack of opportunity, but as I said before burnout is burnout. That can make anyone from a 15-year old to the 55-year old
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There has been stagnation at the top, with Boomers not retiring
That was before COVID
https://www.aarp.org/work/work... [aarp.org]
https://www.wcnc.com/article/m... [wcnc.com]
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there will always be a front line, and a need for front-line workers
Much less of one than you think, probably. Every store that I've been to in the last six months has expanded its self-checkout lanes, and Amazon Go stores already don't have any cashiers (and there are several competitors selling similar technologies). Delivery of food and goods has skyrocketed, and robot delivery vehicles like Nuro, Starship, and Amazon's Scout are already being deployed. The same technology which automatically stocks selves in warehouses is being adapted to stock shelves in stores (cur
Re:It's like the Black Plague all over again! (Score:5, Insightful)
People have treated the bottom end working class like total dogshit through this. I’d finally had enough of being bitched at about masks, toilet paper, or being out of organic free range oatmilk. I’d had enough consoling weeping cashiers who’d been screamed at for the same. The attitude that workers in bottom tier jobs are fucking servants to mistreat has got to go. The customer is WRONG bob.
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Damn, I have mod points and already posted. My wife worked in retail for over 20 years, she accumulated her share of horror stories too.
Re:It's like the Black Plague all over again! (Score:4, Insightful)
I've never understood that attitude. During COVID, when I had to go into stores, I was just HAPPY that someone was working there at all. I kind of went out of my way to try to be nice to the people in there. I had a couple of staff get a little weepy when I told them "hey, thanks for working while everyone's out at home."
I get it that people are stressed, but treat people well.
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See, you're just talking about treating people like humans. The problem is something like 10% of the population sees not wearing a mask and yelling at the store worker who tells them its required by law/store policy as a courageous political stance like charging the beaches of Normandy.
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Maybe 80 hours a week of grind to barely make ends meet isn't fun either. Some people might be ok trying something else.