Low unemployment isn’t worth much if the jobs barely pay • Hacker News Board

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

#581

Post by DoreenMichele » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 12:28 AM UTC

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #579

DoreenMichele wrote: post #87

Labor market conditions are not acts of God, nor inevitable. They are shaped by policies, investments, and institutions. This is a point I keep trying to make about UBI and seemingly utterly failing. It isn't "inevitable" that automation will lead to high rates of chronic unemployment. I've been quiet of late on HN. I often am around Christmas time, but I also wonder if I'm just fed up with feeling like it's complete…

For those as ignorant as I was five minutes ago: "SRO" = "Single Room Occupancy".

Sorry, my bad. No one knows the term anymore because they are practically extinct. I usually include this link in anticipation of that issue:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy

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

#582

Post by AnimalMuppet » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 12:31 AM UTC

DoreenMichele wrote: post #409

majos wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To clarify, are you suggesting that current “low wages” or “wage inequality” are not that important because they fail to account for quality of life (food, shelter, entertainment), which is still achievable, especially by global standards, on a “low” American wage?

I'm trying to say something like: When your caterpillar morphs into a butterfly, harping on how your butterfly is "failing to thrive according to standard, well-established caterpillar metrics used globally for the past thousand years and certified as super duper accurate for caterpillars by many respected institutions." is basically gibberish that says damn near nothing about the state of the butterfly's actual heal…

Just yesterday on HN, there was an article about someone spending 1 billion dollars to own every pop song ever recorded. Well, I can go to YouTube and listen to any pop song ever recorded (or very close to any), for free.

So: How rich am I? I'm sure not a billion dollars rich, and yet...

As you say, the metrics don't compute very well.

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

#583

Post by SSSDFRO » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 12:41 AM UTC

tzs wrote: post #564

m0zg wrote: post #488

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They aren't "ignorant". They just can't admit Donald Trump did something positive. So they engage in logical contortionism like "tax cuts didn't help the middle class" (they did), "low-earner wages aren't growing" (they are), "he will start WW3" (he won't - he's the least militarist president since Jimmy Carter), "low unemployment doesn't matter" (it does - how else do you expect to create upward pressure on wages?),…

Most of the low earner wage growth is due to increases in state and local minimum wage.

Wage growth is on the rise due to tightening in the labor market. Minimum wage increases negatively impact businesses in the long-term and thus negatively impact wage growth.

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

#584

Post by bb88 » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 12:41 AM UTC

foogazi wrote: post #574

hacknat wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also it is a total lie and a very narrow definition of utility. Arguably, we’ve actually under priced some of the most important labor in our society (caregivers, teachers, social workers, etc), and over priced some of the dumbest (sorry, but if Uber disappeared tomorrow, society would be moderately inconvenienced, but little else). Finally, nothing in evolutionary biology teaches us that human beings ought to work.…

> we’ve actually under priced some of the most important labor in our society (caregivers, teachers, social workers, etc), Who is we? Who sets the price? People obviously don’t see more value in teachers or caregivers, price should not be mandated by law

Prisons are arguably less important to society than education (since it represents the failing of citizens being productive members of society). However, prison expenditures were increasing three times faster than education from 1990 to 2016 [1]. Much of it going to corporately run prisons.

And given the marijuana legalization trend as of late, I really don't believe that people see the value of locking people up we are angry at. People we're afraid of, sure, that's a different story. But a non-violent marijuana offense shouldn't get a 15 year sentence.

Let's be clear, government should control the market, not the other way around.

[1]https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/07/07/the-s...

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

#585

Post by decasteve » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 12:45 AM UTC

contingencies wrote: post #274

We must do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest. The youth of today are absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living. We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be employed at some kind of drudgery because,…

The amazing thing about Bucky is that his insights are more applicable today than when he conceived them ~50+ years ago.

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

#586

Post by Thorrez » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 12:49 AM UTC

hacknat wrote: post #513

carlmr wrote: post #499

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people don't have children, many people with children don't have children in school age. They will not be inconvenienced in the slightest by a lack of teachers (at least in the short term). The effect of teachers is concentrated in a smaller age group, so to those that need the service, the need is very apparent. Parents could teach their kids themselves, this would cost them time and energy. Of course it would…

You’re assuming they we a. Are accurately pricing teacher pay (if the upper bounds of private schools are any indication, we are not) b. The downstream effects wouldn’t be catastrophic. Certainly most American parents could not afford to properly educate themselves enough to do this job, let alone educate their children. Finally, a miseducated generation of children would probably end up costing us trillions of dolla…

> [are we] accurately pricing teacher pay (if the upper bounds of private schools are any indication, we are not)

Why would you look at the upper bounds?

> Private school teachers make way less than public school teachers. Average salaries are nearly $50,000 for public, and barely $36,000 for private.

https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/10/why-ar...

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

#587

Post by alchemism » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 12:50 AM UTC

scaryclam wrote: post #392

300bps wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

often you won't get hired if you've had more then 8-10 months of unemployment without reasonable explanation. I do a lot of hiring. You are correct and further - literally any gap at all is viewed as suspicious. And there aren't many reasonable explanations that help the situation.

I also do a lot of hiring, and can say that it's also NOT correct. We'll query it, but it's rarely a problem. Different companies have different process and expectations, so let's steer clear of absolute statements like "this is correct" and "this is not true" as it's unhelpful to folks in the situation. Generally speaking, if you have a gap, make sure to explain in a cover letter. These are important and can make th…

I must disagree, anecdotally.

I walked off one job, and went traveling for six months. Another job I was on the losing end of a political maneuver, and used my severance to take another six month sabbatical.

Each time I returned to the market I received 20%+ compensation over what I had before. The second time I was promoted into management with hiring authority.

Let me know who you turn away for gaps in their resume. Maybe I'll hire them. :-)

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

#588

Post by Supermancho » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 12:52 AM UTC

wolco wrote: post #387

ckdarby wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Grocery checkout automation is atrocious, which is why higher end chains like Whole Foods don’t have them, even though they’re better able to afford automation. No, Costco for example I expect to not have automation because I'm bulk buying and don't want to deal with trying to fit all that on their weight scale for self checkout. Also, Whole Foods doesn't SKU on all their produce products which makes this a pain fo…

Walmart has security at the door. However you pay will not change if they will ask you for your bill. Things like eye-contact encourage that.

Walmart also has a loss prevention arm.

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

#589

Post by xyzzyz » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 12:54 AM UTC

zozbot234 wrote: post #383

rayiner wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole idea of “bullshit jobs” is ignorant. You’ve got armies of managers and bean counters trying to squeeze nickels out of processes, and yet we are supposed to believe that we’re keeping all of these people employed for no reason? It’s the same sort of juvenile thinking that causes someone to look at a vast legacy codebase and decide “oh we could easily rewrite that.” The reality is that automation is progressi…

> The whole idea of “bullshit jobs” is ignorant. You’ve got armies of managers and bean counters trying to squeeze nickels out of processes, and yet we are supposed to believe that we’re keeping all of these people employed for no reason? Yes, at least in a sense. Coordination failures are a thing. (See e.g. https://equilibriabook.com/toc/ for a readable introduction to the issue.)

Author of this book has never held an actual job, FWIW. He is smart, and a good writer, but I'd take his opinions about how business world works with a huge lump of salt.

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

#590

Post by Buge » Mon, Jan 13, 2020, 1:01 AM UTC

Proziam wrote: post #424

jpalawaga wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Controversial opinion: I think everyone should have access to good education, and I don't see why a public system is incapable of providing it. Private systems aren't outcome orientated, they're profit orientated. If a public school and a private school are both given $n to educate a kid, the private option will maximize the proportion they get to keep. Elite schools are a different story because they have significan…

I am one that actually agrees with the spirit of what you're saying. Unfortunately, where I have to admit shortcomings with that philosophy is that there's no evidence that the government of the United States can reliably yield good education for students. My own public schooling was a nightmare, and I know many who had an equally bad experience. Part of this is due to the fact that there isn't (and probably shouldn'…

> Another part is the fact that quality education is insanely high-priced because a parent has to pay for the public and the private system concurrently. This pressure pushes private tuitions upward and makes the private schools more exclusive because they can't take on kids below certain income thresholds at all.

How does that hurt public schools? I would assume that would help public schools. Because instead of the top 50% of kids (e.g.) going to private schools, now only the top 10% of kids go to private schools. Thus public schools are filled with smarter kids.