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Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

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Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#11
post #7

Another powerful demographic force in the USA is the number of men who are ex-convicts: ""Few of us today are aware of the staggering size of this group. In a forthcoming study, Sarah Shannon, a sociologist at the University of Georgia, and five colleagues estimate that America’s criminal class (people with a felony conviction or prison time in their background) roughly quadrupled between 1980 and 2010 — from 5 milli…

> This implies that at least one in eight adult men in the at-large population has been sentenced for a felony.

That's an astounding statistic. I don't live in America, and I obviously don't run into a perfectly uniform sampling of society, but I'd guess way less than 1 in 8 people I meet have done something that deserves being thrown in prison.

Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#12
post #9
post #2

> “We find that 94% of net job growth in the past decade was in the alternative work category,” said Krueger. “And over 60% was due to the [the rise] of independent contractors, freelancers and contract company workers.” So, not exactly temp workers, but contract workers who require less overhead and are easy to fire.

People talk like this is a bad thing, but I don't get it. If working for your employer became a negative ROI, you'd quit your job. If employing somebody becomes a negative ROI, I don't see why it shouldn't be equally easy to stop employing them. As long as the relationship is mutually beneficial, neither party will terminate it.

It's a bad thing that the demographics of the US are now such that this has happened... that most employee / employer relationships are no longer mutually beneficial.

Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#13
post #2

> “We find that 94% of net job growth in the past decade was in the alternative work category,” said Krueger. “And over 60% was due to the [the rise] of independent contractors, freelancers and contract company workers.” So, not exactly temp workers, but contract workers who require less overhead and are easy to fire.

Exactly why we need universal healthcare in the US

It’s something every worker should be fighting tooth and nail for

It would go a long way to breaking up the neoliberal corporate hegemony

Sadly, and regardless of education and political leanings, Americans seem in love with a fictional account of the countries history. That it was all great 50 yrs ago without universal healthcare (when they were kids and not really paying attention) so of course it’s just fine to keep it that way.

I encounter people of all ages and backgrounds with that notion kicking about, every day. Having lived and traveled the world, Americans are unique in their ignorance that the world was just as corrupt a generation ago.

Now let’s go watch some TVLand and chill

Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#14
post #9
post #2

> “We find that 94% of net job growth in the past decade was in the alternative work category,” said Krueger. “And over 60% was due to the [the rise] of independent contractors, freelancers and contract company workers.” So, not exactly temp workers, but contract workers who require less overhead and are easy to fire.

People talk like this is a bad thing, but I don't get it. If working for your employer became a negative ROI, you'd quit your job. If employing somebody becomes a negative ROI, I don't see why it shouldn't be equally easy to stop employing them. As long as the relationship is mutually beneficial, neither party will terminate it.

Most employers can adapt to the loss of a single worker much more easily than a worker can adapt to losing their job. And much of our social safety net currently operates via employers - things like pensions, maternity leave, healthcare, and even unemployment are tightly coupled to the single-long-term-employer model. Maybe they shouldn't be, but fixing that will take time and in the meantime people will slip through the cracks.

Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#15
post #2

> “We find that 94% of net job growth in the past decade was in the alternative work category,” said Krueger. “And over 60% was due to the [the rise] of independent contractors, freelancers and contract company workers.” So, not exactly temp workers, but contract workers who require less overhead and are easy to fire.

Pretty much.

I fit into this category and my anecdotal experience tells me that hiring managers favor contractors for that reason as well as the fact that the money to pay them sometimes is listed as a different line-item on the budget. I think the combination of the two helps as well - when looking at a large contractor line-item, knowing that it can be scaled back with less headache than a Full Time Employee (FTE) makes it easier to stomach I think.

If you're comfortable with hustling for work when the time comes, then contracting can be a much better arrangement. I work from home, basically whenever I want, and I make more money than I would as a FTE (even when factoring in the outrageous cost of health insurance these days).

The biggest thing I think is the mental shift. As a FTE, there's a stronger sense of job security. But really, layoffs happen all the time and as a FTE I feel like I'd be less prepared to find another job, whereas being a contractor means I have to constantly be thinking about the future.

Pick your poison I guess.

Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#16
post #9
post #2

> “We find that 94% of net job growth in the past decade was in the alternative work category,” said Krueger. “And over 60% was due to the [the rise] of independent contractors, freelancers and contract company workers.” So, not exactly temp workers, but contract workers who require less overhead and are easy to fire.

People talk like this is a bad thing, but I don't get it. If working for your employer became a negative ROI, you'd quit your job. If employing somebody becomes a negative ROI, I don't see why it shouldn't be equally easy to stop employing them. As long as the relationship is mutually beneficial, neither party will terminate it.

The employee is usually in a much more precarious situation, and usually more concerned with cashflow than ROI.

Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#17
post #9
post #2

> “We find that 94% of net job growth in the past decade was in the alternative work category,” said Krueger. “And over 60% was due to the [the rise] of independent contractors, freelancers and contract company workers.” So, not exactly temp workers, but contract workers who require less overhead and are easy to fire.

People talk like this is a bad thing, but I don't get it. If working for your employer became a negative ROI, you'd quit your job. If employing somebody becomes a negative ROI, I don't see why it shouldn't be equally easy to stop employing them. As long as the relationship is mutually beneficial, neither party will terminate it.

It's bad because the overwhelming majority of people don't enjoy the process of finding a new job and cannot afford to spend time finding new work.

I think a lot of the talk is also due to unhappiness with the economic trend that is drawing the median and minimum incomes closer together, which is a reversal of a trend that gave widespread optimism and contentment.

Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#18
post #9
post #2

> “We find that 94% of net job growth in the past decade was in the alternative work category,” said Krueger. “And over 60% was due to the [the rise] of independent contractors, freelancers and contract company workers.” So, not exactly temp workers, but contract workers who require less overhead and are easy to fire.

People talk like this is a bad thing, but I don't get it. If working for your employer became a negative ROI, you'd quit your job. If employing somebody becomes a negative ROI, I don't see why it shouldn't be equally easy to stop employing them. As long as the relationship is mutually beneficial, neither party will terminate it.

Because of the massive imbalance of power between employer and employee. Which is why employment protection is a lot stronger in every other developed country than the US.

Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#19
post #9
post #2

> “We find that 94% of net job growth in the past decade was in the alternative work category,” said Krueger. “And over 60% was due to the [the rise] of independent contractors, freelancers and contract company workers.” So, not exactly temp workers, but contract workers who require less overhead and are easy to fire.

People talk like this is a bad thing, but I don't get it. If working for your employer became a negative ROI, you'd quit your job. If employing somebody becomes a negative ROI, I don't see why it shouldn't be equally easy to stop employing them. As long as the relationship is mutually beneficial, neither party will terminate it.

Most people can’t just quit their job, they have monthly recurring bills that must be paid. Those of us that work in tech are quite fortunate to have realistic alternatives. However, even many of us are restricted due to location, and before it’s mentioned, yeah we could move but we have families with children in school and spouses who have non tech careers. Moving is expensive. The employment system in the US, especially in states like mine, ensure that employers have persistent power over employees under the guise of “right to work”.

Re: Most US jobs created since 2005 are not conventional full-time work

#20
post #2

> “We find that 94% of net job growth in the past decade was in the alternative work category,” said Krueger. “And over 60% was due to the [the rise] of independent contractors, freelancers and contract company workers.” So, not exactly temp workers, but contract workers who require less overhead and are easy to fire.

Has the increasing cost of health insurance motivated employers to start using more contract workers?
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