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Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

brookings.edu

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Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#221

Post by Gatsky »

Ozzie_osman wrote: post #37

Great article, but I find it only takes the "wage" side of the equation and not the "cost" side. I'm not an economic expert but the biggest line items for most people seem to be housing (high and regular), healthcare (high and irregular), education, and childcare. If we fix these I'm sure the equation changes a lot for many, many, people. If the market is broken for pricing these main things, then even if everyone su…

The standard macroeconomic approach is to keep inflation low so that wages will ‘catch up’ to costs. This isn’t working though, low wages seem to be sticky. This implies that there aren’t enough new jobs, and there are plenty of people who will take whatever they can get.

Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#222

Post by dmwallin »

bigcohoneypot wrote: post #191
endothrowho333 wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your hypothesis does not hold up to the data. Your data is not relevant to the hypothesis. The surveys were conducted in different time-frames (Canada: 2009-2014, USA 2005-2010), which I shouldn't need to tell anyone why that dataset is not useful for rigorous comparison, but I will anyway: one surveys people who were just recently hit by a recession and tracks them throughout the economy's recovery; while the othe…

For those of us familiar with science, and not social science can you explain why we can't conclude anything from data without further experimentation? Or is this a claim about the scientific method as opposed to say how art is criticized.

It’s the equivalent of running an experiment and then looking for correlations. The likelihood of it being chance is drastically increased. There’s an important reason why you are supposed to come up with your hypothesis before. Social science has the issue that theres lots of data to review ex post facto and it’s hard to run rigorous experiments. This means you need extra rigor to avoid spurious correlations.

Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#223

Post by SaintGhurka »

jellicle wrote: post #175
avsteele wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your AGI is below ~$27K you have medicaid. As i understand it, CHIP covers kids higher the he income scale this too.

For a single individual, if you make $18K gross you make too much for Medicaid. In 14 US states, if you make $0 you make too much for Medicaid.

I don't understand this. Are there 14 states where nobody gets Medicaid?

Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#224

Post by jkoudys »

behringer wrote: post #116
CivBase wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heath insurance is a benefit offered by some US employers as an alternative form of compensation. Employers get discounted rates because of how many customers they bring to the insurer and they pocket some of those savings while passing the rest on to the employees. You can get health insurance without having a job. It's expensive, but it's not like it's cheap through employers. Just cheap er . Health care - at least…

You can't get treatment for life-threatening "conditions". You can only get treatment for life-threatening "emergencies". You got a tumor? Good fucking luck. You got a seizure because of your tumor? Come on in and we'll make sure to send you an absurd bill later.

Yep. And I don't see it being fixed in the US, because the anti-single-payer crowd erroneously believes that US healthcare exists under a "free market". In truth, the budget per capita for healthcare in the states is actually _higher_ than in Canada. So Americans pay more for a lot less.

It turns out a few turn-your-head-and-coughs in your 30s is a way better deal than waiting for it to become a trip to the ER in your 50s.

Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#225

Post by grawprog »

jkoudys wrote: post #22

America has a weird sense of superiority about its lower unemployment numbers vs Canada. The difference is the US, you basically need a job, or else you're one broken ankle, complex childbirth, or infected hangnail away from complete financial ruin. People being able to take extra time to find the right job is a good thing for the economy. Better than being driven by an abject fear of not having a job.

As a Canadian, who's been unemployed in Canada...just what??? Being unemployed was one of the most stressful times of my life. I had to hustle for odd jobs to pay bills, and the ≈$700 every two weeks for about 4 months I got from ei wasn't even enough to cover rent. I barely made it through and kept my place. The only reason I didn't end up homeless was finding a job within the last few weeks of my ei. There were days I didn't eat though.

Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#226

Post by ikeboy »

jiofih wrote: post #89
ikeboy wrote: post #23

>In a recent analysis, we found that 53 million workers ages 18 to 64—or 44% of all workers—earn barely enough to live on. Their median earnings are $10.22 per hour, and about $18,000 per year. Right away, they're presenting some large number that's actually double the real number of people below that threshold. If the median is $10.22, that means only half of them make less than that. They then make a bunch of broad…

> then productivity would be higher in other jobs, which would increase pay for their example jobs due to the Baumol effect. Laughing hard here. You just invented “trickle-down pay raises”! If everybody has a degree, the degree doesn’t matter anymore, does it? Being a bachelor of economics will not make you a better burger deliverer. Plus the effect only hold due to a few sectors like IT paying disproportionately - o…

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AVHWPEUSA065NRUG

Here's hours worked, shows a clear decline over time.

Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#227

Post by DubiousPusher »

endothrowho333 wrote: post #147
dcolkitt wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your hypothesis does not hold up to the data. The unemployed in Canada experience the same penalty in life satisfaction as the unemployed in the United States: > On average, the unemployed experience lower life satisfaction than the employed by about 0.3 standard deviations in Canada and the United States, by 0.32 standard deviations in the United Kingdom and by 0.47 standard deviations in Germany.[1] Your claims rel…

> Your hypothesis does not hold up to the data. Your data is not relevant to the hypothesis. The surveys were conducted in different time-frames (Canada: 2009-2014, USA 2005-2010), which I shouldn't need to tell anyone why that dataset is not useful for rigorous comparison, but I will anyway: one surveys people who were just recently hit by a recession and tracks them throughout the economy's recovery; while the othe…

Not to mention that people's personal moods do not necessarily reflect the quality of their material position.

Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#228

Post by ralmidani »

Regarding health benefits, can I float a crazy idea?

Let part-time and gig economy workers pick their own insurance plans, and in exchange for every hour in their contract (or hours driven, etc. in the case of gig economy workers), require the employer (yes, we should close the loophole nationwide like California is trying to do) to contribute around 1.5% toward the monthly premium, until the employee/worker has, say, 60% of the premium paid for. This would work well for people juggling 2-3 part-time jobs or gigs and, at least in terms of health benefits, put them on par with FTEs.

Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#229

Post by refurb »

jkoudys wrote: post #22

America has a weird sense of superiority about its lower unemployment numbers vs Canada. The difference is the US, you basically need a job, or else you're one broken ankle, complex childbirth, or infected hangnail away from complete financial ruin. People being able to take extra time to find the right job is a good thing for the economy. Better than being driven by an abject fear of not having a job.

America has a weird sense of superiority about its lower unemployment numbers vs Canada.

As someone who lives in the US, I’ve never heard anyone even mention Canada’s unemployment rate.

It’s just not on the radar.

Re: Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay

#230

Post by Consultant32452 »

rumanator wrote: post #207
k33n wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If working a job will prevent financial ruin, then it's a good job. No job has to be permanent.

> If working a job will prevent financial ruin, then it's a good job. No job has to be permanent. That seems to be the definition of an acceptable job. To me a good job is one which you wouldn't mind doing every day for the rest of your life. The occupation needs to actually be desirable in the long run, and a decent paycheck does not fit the bill.

I've been noticing things like this and I wish I could come up with a good name for it. It's about noticing how the scale has slid up quite a bit in just a generation or two. The "American Dream" used to be something a 1200 sq ft house in the burbs with a white picket fence in a clean/safe neighborhood. Just a couple generations ago that was the dream that most Americans worked towards. Now when people talk about the American Dream they talk about Gates, Musk, Kardashians, etc. Of course many people still live in unsafe neighborhoods, but things have gotten so relatively good for so many people that now the scale has slid up and the dream is to become millionaires/billionaires. I think you are presenting a similar thing with your concept of acceptable jobs. During the Great Depression a GREAT job was working for the CCC digging up the bowels of the Earth for $1/day, most of which you sent home to feed your family who was on the brink of death. And there was no "health insurance." If a boulder fell on you and crushed your legs, your family just starved. Another poster parallel to you brought up, "What if your job isn't safe?" Imagine that notion just a few generations ago. Now, just a couple of generations later a job that prevents financial ruin is merely "acceptable." And I agree with you in that depiction. It's amazing how far we've come.
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