In Towns Hit by Factory Closings, a New Casualty: Retail Jobs

[Lafayette]

I guess they can all polish robots for Amazon, but you won't be hiring many $400 a day tile setters on what Amazon pays!

Which is why I keep harping about the Minimum Wage. At present the average MW is $7.25 an hour. Or $15K a year. Let's presume that a couple are both working at minimum-wage levels. The family income thus becomes $30K annually.

The Poverty Threshold is at $24K of annual revenue (for a typical family of four*), so this means (if both are working) they are just above the PT. And in this recent downturn (sparked by the Great Recession), a great many women lost their jobs.

Should any country as rich as the US allow such idiocy to continue? Methinks not**, but expect nothing to change with this Replicant governance in place ...

*With four kids (below the age of 18), the income necessary to stay above the PT rapidly rises to $28K.
**Doubling the MW to 15$ an hour will cost you 20/50 cents more on your BigMac.

 

[spud_meister]

Where are all the people who say when old industries fail, new industries always come along?

 

[Lafayette]

Still calling for the freebees lifestyle, I see. That doesn't really make sense, you know, unless the kids can read and have the socialisation to make something out of all yhat investment.

(Still the needless sarcasm, I see.)

We need not worry about reading 'n writing. Even the dropouts manage to make that level.

I maintain that a nation that offers free (or nearly free) postsecondary education will be better than a nation where 5% of the kids drop out of high-school and 45% never attain a post-secondary degree.

Both of which are sine-qua-non for an "average existence" anywhere on this planet, and more so in the "developed countries" like the US.

Just what does developed mean? That we can put a man-on-the-moon but 43 million American men, women and children must live below the Poverty Threshold?

What sort of "developed country" would ever put up with that sad fact?

Only one fooling itself ...

 

[joG]

Ha. Millions of Americans now live off of Top Ramen and McDonald's too, because they can't afford good food. People are bypassing fresh meat and produce, because they can't afford it, and buying processed foods instead.


I just looked up wages for butchers... unbelievable. An average butcher earns $13.34 an hour. Less than what my dad made as a butcher 30 years ago.

How did that happen? Well...

Meat processing across the Midwest largely done by immigrants

https://www.pri.org/stories/2013-05-15/meat-processing-across-midwest-largely-done-immigrants

These things are certainly true as far as they go. What is also true is that production, processing and distribution of food have become more efficient under today's technological circumstances. Taking the butcher for example, forty years ago he would have learned a trade from slaughter to sales. Today's normal butcher will stand at a production line without any prior understanding or training required. While there was a smallish group easily available to employ in your father's day, practically anyone off the street can be employed for the job today.

 

[Lafayette]

I know very well they have no idea…and perhaps you can describe how going to post-secondary helps in that department? A very small percentage of grads even have an idea of the jobs available [in there major] let alone what they want to do or how to do what they want to do. So please expand. How does post-seconary lead to kids who know what they want to do?

The explanation is self-evident to anyone who's been through the process.

You obviously do not see the "evidence" that it takes both time and effort for the personality to develop. The effort is to submit the personality to different alternatives. Which is precisely what both secondary and post-secondary education are all about.

Then there is the self-training necessary when personality aberrations appear that interfere with self-development (and one's ability to work productively collectively*) ...

*We live in an "economic collective" (called the United States). Our behaviour is therefore collective in nature. There can be degrees of collectivity. Artists are less collective than office workers. But one aspect is perfectly clear - we need the collective to survive. But the collective does not need any one particular person to do the same. (Since the dawn of human existence when we banned together for self-protection and survival.)

 

[Lafayette]

BRAVE NEW WORLD

Well yes and no, the internet is a vast database of learning to do pretty much anything and more importantly for the young adults who get successful, probabaly the only way for them to get in contact with people who can help them get where they want to go.

The internet adapts, methinks, to human-behaviour and not the reverse.

It simply accelerates human interactivity. Hopefully for the betterment of mankind, but that is not necessarily yet an obvious conclusion.

Many psychologists think that Facebook is not the best alternative to reaching-out to our fellow mankind. Because it is "ephemeral", not personal, and not sustainable time-wise. Making a lot of "new friends" does not necessarily mean making "good friends". For instance, upon whom one may depend.

The Internet has advanced incredibly the speed of human interactivity - but who is really sure that such is really beneficial to mankind ... ?

PS: I had the great good fortune to meet one of the founders of the Internet - Tim Berners-Lee, when he was doing his initial development work at the CERN in Geneva in the late 1990s. I can assure you that in the various discussions we all had about "where is it going?" what has happened we'd not even imagined at the time. It's a Brave New World we are in.

 

[Cisero]

Youth unemployment numbers look pretty solid in switzerland ~ whats the downsides according to the youth/your observations?

I'm not sure I understand your question, when you say youth unemployment looks solid : do you mean it's low or pretty high ?
What downside ? The downside of apprenticeships ? Honestly can't think of one.

 

[joG]

(Still the needless sarcasm, I see.)

We need not worry about reading 'n writing. Even the dropouts manage to make that level.

I maintain that a nation that offers free (or nearly free) postsecondary education will be better than a nation where 5% of the kids drop out of high-school and 45% never attain a post-secondary degree.

Both of which are sine-qua-non for an "average existence" anywhere on this planet, and more so in the "developed countries" like the US.

Just what does developed mean? That we can put a man-on-the-moon but 43 million American men, women and children must live below the Poverty Threshold?

What sort of "developed country" would ever put up with that sad fact?

Only one fooling itself ...

True. We should be worried about the quality of education. And looking at what one means, when calling a country developed is certainly interesting, which I did academically for a few years at the university.

But that is not the issue I would have with input like you just made. It is more about the superficial way you go about selling destructive ideas packed in a populistically appealing form. Take the "45% never attain a post-secondary degree" or the "43 million American men, women and children must live below the Poverty Threshold".

I don't want to invest much time looking up the present and exact numbers, but would like to point out that the numbers you mention are nonsensical and the implications falsehoods unless one defines, what one means. How bad your presentation is, might be discerned by looking at the portion of the population "below the Poverty Threshold". In 2010 Germany had 15.5%, the US 15.1% and Indonesia 11.33% (in 2012) living below the country's Poverty Threshold. In Indonesia, however, 15.9 percent were living on under $1.90 a day in 2010 and in 2012 it was over 41 percent under $3.10 in 2012.

But the other numbers are just as wrong headed. As measured by the OECD in 2014 tertiary level attainment in Germany at 27 percent, in Lithuania it was 37 and in the US it was 50 percent.

Now, I would be the last to say that this is enough to sleep well on. But I would also say that the way you want to sell change is rather dubious.

 

[PIPEWRENCH]

I don't endorse this, and I hope you're kidding.

It is not a matter of us endorsing it unfortunately. It is a sad reality. We live on a finite planet. If you have a fish tank that can sustain 10 fish and you put 100 fish in it they will get sick and die. We have managed to kick the can down the road with antibiotics and other medicines. This is only allowing us to continue to survive as we keep adding fish to the tank.

No one expected the flu to kill so many but it did in 1918.

Then look at the arrogance of the medical people bringing Ebola to this country where it never existed. We have seen the effects of bringing small pox and other diseases to areas of the world where they did not exist and the results were catastrophic.

I am not kidding. Those medical personnel while admirably fighting Ebola in Africa refused to wait the 2 weeks it takes to make sure they are not infected and would bring the disease back to this country as well as the rest of the world. They were willing to bring this disease to every corner of the globe rather than wait the time needed to make sure they were not infected. How many other diseases are they doing this with. We will find out only after the genie is out of the bottle unfortunately.

 

[chuckiechan]

Which is why I keep harping about the Minimum Wage. At present the average MW is $7.25 an hour. Or $15K a year. Let's presume that a couple are both working at minimum-wage levels. The family income thus becomes $30K annually.

The Poverty Threshold is at $24K of annual revenue (for a typical family of four*), so this means (if both are working) they are just above the PT. And in this recent downturn (sparked by the Great Recession), a great many women lost their jobs.

Should any country as rich as the US allow such idiocy to continue? Methinks not**, but expect nothing to change with this Replicant governance in place ...

*With four kids (below the age of 18), the income necessary to stay above the PT rapidly rises to $28K.
**Doubling the MW to 15$ an hour will cost you 20/50 cents more on your BigMac.

Minimum wage is just a bandaid to paper over the problem - we have an excess of labor and should start by kicking illegal labor the hell out of our country, and we need to do what it takes to keep getting more production back in the USA. A labor shortage leads to raises, training, and cutting employees with criminal records some some slack.

Globalism will eventually all into serfs unless we change the playing field.

Maybe we should finance the minimum wage with a tariff.

 

[PIPEWRENCH]

The government pushed for everyone to go to college. Barack Obama stated that he wanted every American to have at least 2 years of college.



The idea today is that those are jobs for legal/illegal immigrants. Also, most kids today have been brought up to look down on that kind of work. I can't count the number of students I went to college with who were taking psychology classes, because they just weren't good with math and science, and wouldn't be caught dead learning a trade. My college had a 2 semester waiting list for psychology and sociology classes. I wonder how many of the students I went to school with are sociologists and psychologists now.

The reason they look down on these jobs is they fail to see the importance of these jobs. One improper fitting in the drainage system of a home and everyone dies in their sleep from sewer gas. One improperly sized wire and a family dies in a house fire. People that are professionally trained, licensed, insured, bonded, and take continuing education to maintain their license and protect the health and safety of the people of this country. They should be respected and paid a livable wage. But that wage is being forced lower and lower by the illegal alien who is not trained, who is not certified, who is not insured, who is not bonded, who does not pay taxes, and does not take continuing education to keep up with the ever changing modern equipment.

I have had to take college courses to be able to work on the modern AC and Heating equipment. When my dad repaired a furnace there were a couple of thermostat wires and a transformer. Today you open up a furnace and it is like looking inside a computer. I have taken several college courses on controls. I am universally certified to handle refrigerants including automotive. I have taken hundreds of classes to become certified to install and repair the modern equipment that we have today. One of the biggest problems out there today is improper installation. Even making sure your home has the proper voltage is critical to these new units. Then you have these jack legs out there installing thousands of dollars worth of equipment that do not even have a tester or know how to use one.

 

[jimbo]

None of that matters if the population is going to increase by 100,000,000 people every 30 years. Even if 100% of the workforce is college educated, population trends will see wages diminish or remain stagnant for all but a select few.

The USA will reach 1 billion residents by 2100. This will be disastrous for quality of life issues. I'm convinced that the USA will be a slave labor state like China by 2100.

Many people here will be apathetic to what I just said, but this generation will one day be known for having had the opportunity to do something about this, but didn't.


Expert: U.S. population to hit 1 billion by 2100 - USATODAY.com

What could this generation do about it?

 

[ttwtt78640]

Which is why I keep harping about the Minimum Wage. At present the average MW is $7.25 an hour. Or $15K a year. Let's presume that a couple are both working at minimum-wage levels. The family income thus becomes $30K annually.

The Poverty Threshold is at $24K of annual revenue (for a typical family of four*), so this means (if both are working) they are just above the PT. And in this recent downturn (sparked by the Great Recession), a great many women lost their jobs.

Should any country as rich as the US allow such idiocy to continue? Methinks not**, but expect nothing to change with this Replicant governance in place ...

*With four kids (below the age of 18), the income necessary to stay above the PT rapidly rises to $28K.
**Doubling the MW to 15$ an hour will cost you 20/50 cents more on your BigMac.

How much more will it cost someone for lawn care, getting their house cleaned, staying in a motel, seeing a movie or childcare? Choosing a fast food establishment as the "typical" low wage labor rate doubling example is fun but hardly represents the "typical" labor to total cost of a service.

What is the "correct" (fair?) wage for one making 2X the federal MW ($15/hr) now if the federal MW is doubled? How much of a COLA bump should that grant someone on social security? Many low income retired folks rely on those low wage workers for help around the home and will be impacted by a doubling of those wages.

 

[Fenton Lum]

Next step, the Big Retail Box plazas decide it's better business to let the banks foreclose on their REITs. No market for them and the banks can have another cardiac arrythmia like 2008. Maybe they can get Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to swallow those toxic portfolios. No change. "Privatize the profits, socialize the liabilities." Bend over, Citizen.
/

There it is.

Privatized gains versus socialized losses for the Wall Street bankster class
Internalized profit versus externalized risk and expense for the “job creator” class
Socialism for the aristocracy versus laissez-faire capitalism for the masses

 

[mike2810]

I think it's cultural shift due to a marketing campaign by the student loan industry. It's all 4 year college all the time. Despite all the calls and please for things like trade education it's not happening.

Could be. Then what I would ask is where is the parents in all this? Seems the parent(s) should be providing guidance to their children instead of letting some marketing ploy determine the path taken.

 

[Conaeolos]

I'm not sure I understand your question, when you say youth unemployment looks solid : do you mean it's low or pretty high ?
What downside ? The downside of apprenticeships ? Honestly can't think of one.

Fair enough. I meant the rate I found when searching ~7% is great, about what one should expect for a working program addressing youth employment.

I can respect you haven't looked at the cost benefit of the system as a whole was just curious as I do not personally have a reference point for Switzerland. I'll have to just do some more research myself Certainly wish that is what our system looked like ~ be a lot less struggling, dispossessed and frustrated young adults. Tangible skills and interaction with people who actually know what they are talking about go a long way.

I have spoken to many germans about their experiences with apprenticeship and academic system there; it is similar?

 

[Lafayette]

How much more will it cost someone for lawn care, getting their house cleaned, staying in a motel, seeing a movie or childcare? Choosing a fast food establishment as the "typical" low wage labor rate doubling example is fun but hardly represents the "typical" labor to total cost of a service.

What is the "correct" (fair?) wage for one making 2X the federal MW ($15/hr) now if the federal MW is doubled? How much of a COLA bump should that grant someone on social security? Many low income retired folks rely on those low wage workers for help around the home and will be impacted by a doubling of those wages.

Interesting conjecture, but no real relevance on a national scale. As long as the MW is made universal, there will be no competition between states (as there is now with a variable MW). Prices will rise uniformly and life normally will go on ...

PS: If the poor cannot afford help around the house, then there should be subvention for it uniquely for the poor. There are simply No Excuses for not raising the MW, which jails people in lives of poverty.

 

[Lafayette]

Minimum wage is just a bandaid to paper over the problem - we have an excess of labor and should start by kicking illegal labor the hell out of our country, and we need to do what it takes to keep getting more production back in the USA. A labor shortage leads to raises, training, and cutting employees with criminal records some some slack.

No, it is not a papering over the problem. It IS the problem.

Yes, we have an excess of Labor because of the Great Recession that has brought the Employment to population Ratio from 63% in 2008 to its 58.5% in 2010. It began its rise in 2014 and since is back up to 60%. (See here.)

What does that mean when the unemployment rate is unusually low at 4.8%, the E-to-p Ratio does not improve at a faster rate?

It means that for a variety of reasons, people are not declaring themselves unemployed. Thus the unemployment rates are much lower. Both rates (Unemployment, and E-to-p) must be used to understand market-economy usage of labor in relation to the want-to-work population.

Apparently, a great number of people who wanted to work in 2008 no longer do so presently. Which I find strange. I never thought an extended period of unemployment would do that to the country.

However, it is possible that those no longer actively seeking employment are doing so because their trade-skills are no longer needed. So, they are indeed earning income, but perhaps being paid on a cash basis (off the books).

Much casual labor is of this kind ...

 

[Conaeolos]

The explanation is self-evident to anyone who's been through the process.

Not in my experience. So enlighten me. The beauty of the self-evidence is the simplicity of the explanation.List a bunch of employable benefits it develops.

You obviously do not see the "evidence" that it takes both time and effort for the personality to develop.

I fully see how personality forms in those years. I follow you on that point fully. Feel free to assume it.

The effort is to submit the personality to different alternatives.

Which secondary & postsecondary schools defiantly do not facilitate IMHO. And I love for you to explain to me how they do.

I learned a lot in my university years, did develop my professionalism and formed my personality don’t get me wrong; but we are talking employability here not value of time for personal contemplation and maturing well being held accountable by adults. We want successful well adapted kids ~ and university for the masses is a path of disappointment and disaster be it government paid or paid by families.

Let me touch on some of the general positive claim benefits:

• Critical thought - Nope (Its a cult of authority ~ days of skepticism long past)
• Scientific Method - sometimes however most of it is “cult of authority” including much in the hard sciences; universities would do well to do more critical science training and why certain papers are not peer review vetted…a brief overview is not teaching lower aptitude people they just follow the crowd. Is an experiment and experiment when it design by someone else and you just copy paste it in your own words?
• Exposer to experts - in some cases but rarely are the professors experts in the employable aspects of those disciplines even in say a very practical discipline like business/accounting. Your professor are likely mediocre at best in the real world applications and frankly not very good at their jobs hence why many move to teaching verse consulting. Being out of the field also many of the benefit of spending time with a mediocre trade person is beneficial as their skills, insights and knowledge base is out of date. And with something like engineering this is even more true…the trades do pretty darn good in this aspect. The liberal arts / psychology you can imagine are a joke. MIT labs and such an obvious exception.We could use more creative spaces and competions for students to play within.
• Creativity - if anything kills it by rewarding low-input parroting over any type of creative pursuit ~ although there is somewhat more room in this area with graduate studies or if you take the initiative to help on grad projects…
• Teamwork - nope, an university assignment is neither challenging enough nor contains enough aspects requiring a division of labour to develop anything resembling these as transferable skills.
• Certification - There are certainly fields that become a lot easier to enter if your properly certified. Universities do have the exclusive balance of reputation and resources to vet that certification but with the current exodus of high aptitude people as universities focus on other priories I think you can already see the falling reputation which mean certification will go to someone else in the not too distant future.

Which is precisely what both secondary and post-secondary education are all about.

Expand- How?how does it show what high-skilled employment looks like? However does it address finding entry-level work in your field of interest.

Then there is the self-training necessary when personality aberrations appear that interfere with self-development (and one's ability to work productively collectively*) …

So conformity? Or in HR terms: Professionalism?
I’ll give you that…too bad so many young Americans don’t have the in-demand skills where such professionalism might help them get somewhere….I can’t wait till the best argument of why employees that need a raise is “I am a good employee” LOL it almost as good as “look at my education, I am overqualified” :-D Bhahaha

Many psychologists think that Facebook is not the best alternative to reaching-out to our fellow mankind. Because it is "ephemeral", not personal, and not sustainable time-wise. Making a lot of "new friends" does not necessarily mean making "good friends". For instance, upon whom one may depend.

Very true.

The Internet has advanced incredibly the speed of human interactivity - but who is really sure that such is really beneficial to mankind ... ?

It a very powerful tool so many people don’t know how to use it for their benefit. Shouldn’t we be helping them with that?

 

[Lafayette]

But that is not the issue I would have with input like you just made. It is more about the superficial way you go about selling destructive ideas packed in a populistically appealing form.

Pathetic BS. Is that all you got for rebuttal?

I have every time exactly explained/justified my arguments, most often with evidential statistics that I post.

Which is more than I can say for you ...

 

[Conaeolos]

Interesting conjecture, but no real relevance on a national scale. As long as the MW is made universal, there will be no competition between states (as there is now with a variable MW). Prices will rise uniformly and life normally will go on ...

PS: If the poor cannot afford help around the house, then there should be subvention for it uniquely for the poor. There are simply No Excuses for not raising the MW, which jails people in lives of poverty.

And as to then addressing the inevitable loss in low wage employment opportunities?

Although it is in my opinion generally a bad approach to the problem I am not against minimum wage off hand. It does create more living wage positions which is good, so I am interested as an advocate of taking a minimum wage approach how you suggest we avoid leaving more people unemployed so a select few working poor can have a slightly better lifestyle and greater chance of leaving poverty.

 

[joG]

Pathetic BS. Is that all you got for rebuttal?

I have every time exactly explained/justified my arguments, most often with evidential statistics that I post.

Which is more than I can say for you ...

I didn't say that you didn't use statistics to try and give the impression of weight. What I said was that the use was false and thus amounted to deception.

 

[ludin]

A friend of mine who was going to trade school to be a plumber told me something his teacher said which made a whole lot of sense:

"You know, nowadays, a lot of people are looking to go into computer science. But you know what? You're in a better field, because no matter how advance our technology gets, people are always going to need someone to unclog their toilet."

IMO, trades are woefully unrepresented as viable options for people. Plumbers, electricians, auto mechanics, landscapers, all these folks can make good money, doing good, interesting work. It's really nothing to look down on, either. One needs intelligence and skills to do these jobs.

Being skilled in those fields pay good money as well.
I am thinking about taking a welding class if I can find one for free or something.

No matter what people will always need welders.

 

[chuckiechan]

No, it is not a papering over the problem. It IS the problem.

Yes, we have an excess of Labor because of the Great Recession that has brought the Employment to population Ratio from 63% in 2008 to its 58.5% in 2010. It began its rise in 2014 and since is back up to 60%. (See here.)

What does that mean when the unemployment rate is unusually low at 4.8%, the E-to-p Ratio does not improve at a faster rate?

It means that for a variety of reasons, people are not declaring themselves unemployed. Thus the unemployment rates are much lower. Both rates (Unemployment, and E-to-p) must be used to understand market-economy usage of labor in relation to the want-to-work population.

Apparently, a great number of people who wanted to work in 2008 no longer do so presently. Which I find strange. I never thought an extended period of unemployment would do that to the country.

However, it is possible that those no longer actively seeking employment are doing so because their trade-skills are no longer needed. So, they are indeed earning income, but perhaps being paid on a cash basis (off the books).

Much casual labor is of this kind ...

Mandating a higher minimum wage is no different than raising the price if steel or oil. The cost is part of the product, and inflationary, and the increased cost of living will wipe out any temporary gain.

 

[pinqy]

No, it is not a papering over the problem. It IS the problem.

Yes, we have an excess of Labor because of the Great Recession that has brought the Employment to population Ratio from 63% in 2008 to its 58.5% in 2010. It began its rise in 2014 and since is back up to 60%. (See here.)

What does that mean when the unemployment rate is unusually low at 4.8%, the E-to-p Ratio does not improve at a faster rate?

It means that for a variety of reasons, people are not declaring themselves unemployed.

Well, what it means is that the percent of the population not trying to work is going up. Most of the increase in Not in the Labor Force has been from those 65 and older and those 16-24.

Apparently, a great number of people who wanted to work in 2008 no longer do so presently. Which I find strange. I never thought an extended period of unemployment would do that to the country.

Retirees and disabled and students make up the biggest chunk of those not looking for work.

However, it is possible that those no longer actively seeking employment are doing so because their trade-skills are no longer needed. So, they are indeed earning income, but perhaps being paid on a cash basis (off the books).

Much casual labor is of this kind ...

Under the table employment is still captured by the monthly survey.