The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging • Hacker News Board

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#21

Post by antisthenes » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 6:54 PM UTC

cglace wrote: post #8

Boxbot wrote: post #7

> Now, fellers can earn as little as $18 an hour. So they get paid a little more than someone serving burgers in California but have to deal with much more remote, skilled, difficult, dangerous work. I'm getting really tired of articles posing this sort of thing as a "labor shortage".

They would have a significantly lower cost of living. So they should be able to save much more.

Oregon iirc, isn't a particularly cheap state. Even then, you're still making less in absolute terms, which reduces your mobility and long-term ability to move to another state if/when your logging job disappears.

At $18/hr, it's hard to argue that any of those risks are built into the compensation. That is approx. ~37,000/yr for the most dangerous job in the country, apparently.

If one is inclined towards the trades, it's not hard to see why they would pick something other than logging.

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#22

Post by beebmam » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 6:54 PM UTC

Boxbot wrote: post #7

> Now, fellers can earn as little as $18 an hour. So they get paid a little more than someone serving burgers in California but have to deal with much more remote, skilled, difficult, dangerous work. I'm getting really tired of articles posing this sort of thing as a "labor shortage".

This is exactly right. The notion of "labor shortages" is a farce. It is rhetoric used to bully politicians into making policy decisions that keep wages/salaries low.

There is no such thing as a labor shortage in a labor market.

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#23

Post by notadoc » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 6:55 PM UTC

cglace wrote: post #8

Boxbot wrote: post #7

> Now, fellers can earn as little as $18 an hour. So they get paid a little more than someone serving burgers in California but have to deal with much more remote, skilled, difficult, dangerous work. I'm getting really tired of articles posing this sort of thing as a "labor shortage".

They would have a significantly lower cost of living. So they should be able to save much more.

You haven't spent much time on the west coast if you think the cost of living anywhere out there is low.

If you want low cost of living, you need to move to the midwest or south, or throughout the NE in upstate or western NY.

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#24

Post by mikestew » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 6:56 PM UTC

I'm old enough to remember a time when shit jobs paid really well because, well, they were shit jobs. Let's take the bottom of the barrel: bailing hay in the August heat of the Midwest. Dead simple job: take heavy bail of hay, put it on truck. Alternatively, take bail from truck, put in barn. Anyone with two working synapses could do it. And it paid the equivalent to $16/hour in 2017 dollars. Great job for a high school kid who had no real skills. Hardest job I've ever had by a long shot.

Longshoreman? Hard, dangerous work, but pays really well. Logging? Who the hell wants to be a logger? Anyone that has few skills but wants a decent living.

But it seems that over the years these shit jobs have started to have the shit pay to go with it. I'm sure there are multiple factors involved, starting with a downturn of union membership, but something or things has changed. And now industries wonder why they can't find anyone. Well, actually, I truly doubt they are wondering, as they ought to know better than I do what the reason is. But "they" would like to continue to live in the fantasy land where people stand in line for a minimum wage job that is likely to get them killed or seriously injured.

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#25

Post by an27 » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 6:57 PM UTC

It's a dangerous job, it doesn't earn much, most people have better options and then there's the decline in societal appreciation of manliness, so I understand no one wants this job. No perks at all, not even bragging rights.

Perhaps it even is safer to join the military nowadays?

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#26

Post by cowsandmilk » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 6:58 PM UTC

cglace wrote: post #8

Boxbot wrote: post #7

> Now, fellers can earn as little as $18 an hour. So they get paid a little more than someone serving burgers in California but have to deal with much more remote, skilled, difficult, dangerous work. I'm getting really tired of articles posing this sort of thing as a "labor shortage".

They would have a significantly lower cost of living. So they should be able to save much more.

except that not all of California is large cities. The automatic minimum wage increases will occur even in parts of the state with cost of living very similar to rural Oregon.

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#27

Post by mikestew » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 7:00 PM UTC

anotherbrownguy wrote: post #12

Seems like a lot of these workplace injuries can be reduced by making the machines remotely operated. If the workers can be far enough to not be hit by the falling logs or trees, it would be no more dangerous than just another minimum wage job.

Kind of what I was wondering when I read the article: why does the operator need to sit in the cab? OTOH, it could be that "we just got these new machines to be usable with a human operator. We're working on it, give us time and we'll get to remote operation in the next few iterations."

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#28

Post by hkothari » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 7:00 PM UTC

I'm surprised the article doesn't mention any sort of social stigma against the work (beyond the low pay and danger). Logging is cutting down trees and in a world where we're raised now to conserve our forests I'm not surprised that logging as an occupation is not on the forefront of people's minds.

Even if it's done in an environmentally sound way, I'd assume that there's a stigma that would be hard to get past.

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#29

Post by hardlianotion » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 7:01 PM UTC

intothev01d wrote: post #18

anonacct37 wrote: post #9

This sounds like yet another market problem being blamed on "millennials". If you pay enough I'd imagine some people would take the job. If you can't pay enough, then I guess the market is speaking to you about the long term outlook for logging.

I don't blame people for not flocking to an extremely dangerous and grueling job only to be underpaid. There's plenty of other options. I get tired of older generations somehow trying to guilt trip us into continuing in their line of work when in reality those jobs weren't very good to begin with. Work smarter not harder. Maybe they never heard of that.

It's not an "older generation" thing. It is a "shitty employers try to have their cake and eat it" thing.

Re: The job no one wants: young people won't work in logging

#30

Post by notadoc » Thu, Aug 24, 2017, 7:03 PM UTC

cowsandmilk wrote: post #26

cglace wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They would have a significantly lower cost of living. So they should be able to save much more.

except that not all of California is large cities. The automatic minimum wage increases will occur even in parts of the state with cost of living very similar to rural Oregon.

Cost of living in the rural west is not cheap.

The pacific states are uniquely expensive. It's not at all like western NY or upstate NY, or the midwest, or the south, where everything is dirt cheap, and gets very cheap in rural areas.