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Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

economist.com

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Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#381

Post by newacct13424 »

opportune wrote: post #285
jondubois wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$400k is what senior executives of major multinational companies get paid. It's also what top surgeons get paid. I highly doubt that blue collar workers get anywhere near that much. If they did, everyone would try to work in that industry because the barrier to entry is comparatively very low.

Senior executives get paid much more than that in stock (which is how these top-paid software people get most of their money too), also $400k is just a slightly above average surgeon, not a top surgeon. If you read my comment, I'm not really talking about blue collar workers, but more people who used to be bluecollar workers but eventually became small business owners of companies employ blue collar labor. My cousins…

So you're talking about businessmen, not workers. Businessmen are doing well across the board. It doesn't much matter what they did before they were businessmen.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#382

Post by crankylinuxuser »

turc1656 wrote: post #369
crankylinuxuser wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Work Ethic". I work because this society threatens us with destitution if we do not. I have plenty of ideas, things to do. I have to put them aside for much of each week because I want to survive.

And? That's true of a lot of people, including myself. Do you think that's a new thing? As if not being a productive member of society leading to poverty is this evil new capitalistic creation? Or that pursuing your own ideas should not include the risk it does? It's amazing to me that you choose to work for someone for an agreed upon salary, providing stability and security to you, and then have an issue with the co…

> Do you think that's a new thing?

No, but the extreme automation and beginning of human-like skills across all domains of knowledge are a new thing.

With automation of the essentials plus a bit more, we can finally start free ourselves from a lifetime of work. The wealthy already have, and choose what they wish to do. I only want that.

> As if not being a productive member of society leading to poverty is this evil new capitalistic creation?

No. That threat's always been there. But there wasn't a good answer how to fix it. Communism (ala USSR) certainly didn't work. They just changed the owner from a capitalist to a uncaring state. But one thing Marx failed to grasp was that computerization and automation was the way out of both old systems. That way, there's no compulsed labor.

> It's amazing to me that you choose to work for someone for an agreed upon salary, providing stability and security to you, and then have an issue with the concept of work ethic because if you don't work for them or someone else you will be poor.

Because it's not so egalitarian like you put it. You should full realize that there's a tremendous amount of asymmetry - They have the money, the legal, the govt clout. What do you have? Your labor. That's it. And you, the individual are expendable. I mean, who cares about where you sleep, what you eat, and basic necessities of life? I guess sleeping under a bridge is illegal for both the poor as it is the rich.

Unions served as a balance to that implicit, ever present threat. But they've been demonized long enough in this country, that US union membership is what, 15%? And in the tech sector, unions are non-existent. I certainly would want one myself.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#383

Post by potta_coffee »

Y7ZCQtNo39 wrote: post #34
nesyt wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you against this? Flexible working hours that can bend to accommodate very malleable human lives seems better than rigid adherence to traditional schedules for the sake of it.

Yeah, if a person really feels the need to sleep in, I can't imagine their productivity would be much different if you had a culture for pressuring for adhering to schedules. I think many people to fail to realize that writing software is very unlike producing widgets in a factory line. Some people hit periods of high productivity when they work quietly, alone, for an hour or two. And you might get more in that 1-2 h…

I normally have about a 3-4 hour window in which I can be extremely productive when coding. The rest of the day it's extremely difficult for me to get anything substantial done.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#385

Post by turc1656 »

harrumph wrote: post #327
turc1656 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure how someone can just graduate and yet have meaningful experience in the field. Seems like only a very, very select few people can every really say that. Also, it's not clear if you and your father have degrees in the same field. If you do, part of it could easily be a supply/demand issue. I've heard similar stories from lawyers who enter the field and find it very difficult to get anything above 50k for…

> Guess what, a lot of people are underpaid. > Contrary to popular belief, being a "company man" is usually still rewarded as long as you work for an employer which has basic common sense when it comes to employee compensation and morale. It is mind-blowing that anyone could write this summary, expecting it to be generally applicable, when every study of wages shows they have stagnated since the 1970s, and at the sam…

I did mention a pay ethic and you even quoted it - "...basic common sense when it comes to employee compensation and morale." I also indicated that if the OP didn't feel they were being fairly compensated they should have a discussion about it and if the outcome is not appropriate that they should leave, presumably because there is either a mismatch of opinion regarding OP's skill set and what it is worth, or that employer is part of the ones that don't have common sense. Employees leaving is one of the natural checks on the power balance between employees and employers in the free market. And in the industry that most here on HN work for, it is easier than most to find a job elsewhere as the tech industry is in high demand for skilled employees.

It's not mind-blowing when you consider that productivity is heavily linked to technological advances. Let's take a historical example - the barcode scanner. Prior to its creation, cashiers had to know the price of all items or check the price tags that were manually stickered onto every item by someone else in the store. Then someone came along and made it possible to have UPC's printed right onto the original packaging and then scanned instantaneously at the register, with essentially no errors ever. That both reduced the skill required by the cashiers as well as boosting (drastically) productivity. Yet no additional effort, creativity, or skill was required on the part of the cashier. If a tool comes along that makes my job easier and/or more accurate my employer will pay for it, but I'd be really surprised if they suddenly gave me a pay boost because of it.

The other half of this is that welfare programs subsidize the lower income workers. WalMart would not be able to pay <$10 an hour if welfare did not exist. If people didn't have the government as a backstop, you can guarantee they would stand up and demand a higher wage so that they could meet their basic needs.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#386

Post by turc1656 »

chefkoch wrote: post #305
turc1656 wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not surprised. There are a lot of jobs outside of the main metro areas that don't pay that much. They could be, for example, a DB admin for a non-tech company where their priority is not IT because IT is viewed as a cost center. Or perhaps a third party B2B company that is the low cost solution for a larger, more recognized company. You might be surprised what some people make in those cases.

DB Admin is perhabs not the best example as this is one of the highest paid admin specialisation.

Maybe not. I have no idea. I'm not in the field. I'm probably confusing it with another DB role.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#387

Post by walshemj »

Retric wrote: post #358
linkregister wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which Clarence can you get without a drug test?

I know you can get a Secret and I have heard you can get a Top Secret depending on the agency. Though some agencies give random drug tests to people with Top Secret clearances and many contractors also have their own testing policy. They do however ask about drug usage both on the application and when doing their investigation.

Id be surprised for TS I looked at a job at Hanslope Park which would have required DV (TS) clearance and you had to have drug tests. Didn't get a second interview was well over qualified - but one has to keep the DHSS happy or id lose my nugatory benefits.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#388

Post by sandworm101 »

I'm unclear from this article whether wages are going up or costs. Wages are take-home earnings of workers. That is something different than costs to employers. I need clarification as to whether insurance/tax costs are part of this math.

Ideally, in such articles I want to see actual numbers. I want to see "the average wage for a carpenters in 2015 was X, and today is is X+10%". I'm not so sure that those numbers are changing all that much.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#389

Post by Simon_says »

discreteevent wrote: post #362
VLM wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

stealth intelligence test. For a variety of interesting historical reasons, the government hates intelligence tests as a hiring criteria and this is the blue collar stealth/workaround IQ test. Its the blue collar equivalent of fizzbuzz or a gitlab repo. Look, you got one task, one task only, it's not even hard to figure out, do not, repeat, do not, get high the week or two before your pee test. That simple. There are…

> who can't follow a test that elaborate and complicated. There's also the possibility that giving up an addiction is not an intellectual activity (if you think about it a little!)

Maybe ...

But the process of getting addicted certainly involves making some choices poorly.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#390

Post by walshemj »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #348
lostlogin wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate the drug testing bs. How is that relevant? If the worker is present, is sober, and not hungover what business is it of the employers what the employee does on their own time? The drugs that are readily detectable are mostly the ones that don’t matter too, while the ones that are more concerning (to me anyway) are either not tested for or are not detectable fairly fast. And alcohol is ok to abuse. Why? It would…

Every white collar job I've held in the last decade had mandatory drug tests.

Really assuming you don't work in a Job requiring security clearance that seems excessive.
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