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Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

economist.com

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Re: Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

#221

Post by marcus_holmes »

creato wrote: post #63
jongjong wrote: post #48

My theory is that bullshit jobs are one of the mechanisms by which large corporations maintain a protective anti-competitive moat around their businesses; instead of letting unused labor roam freely in the markets to potentially compete against their interests, corporations provide as many jobs as required in order to keep as many people's time fully occupied in order to minimize the number of people who can compete…

I can't believe this theory is so widespread. There's no high level conspiracy to hire people to keep them away from competitors, such a thing could not be kept secret, and it's a ridiculously expensive thing to do (even for a FAANG) for extremely dubious value that might be realized a decade down the road and no real way to know if it's working. Bullshit jobs exist because mid level managers are very averse to killi…

Agree. I've never heard a manager say "we should keep this person because otherwise they'll go and create a competitor who will cause us problems".

I have heard lots of managers say "yeah, I know they're not performing well, but I don't want to reduce headcount right before budget allocation, can we manage around them?" (or something to that effect).

In my MBA course we even talked about this as a thing - that mid-level managers create fiefdoms, and the effects that has on the organisation culture. There are lots of other effects on the organisation from this, too.

Re: Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

#222

Post by lizardking »

mschuster91 wrote: post #207
mkl95 wrote: post #9

We have gone from a zero interest rate economy to a high interest one within months. Whoever claims to accurately predict what's going to happen in the next few years is talking out of their ass. We know inflation should start decreasing within a year or so, but you cannot predict how millions of people will react to suddenly not being able to afford stuff.

> We know inflation should start decreasing within a year or so That is assuming the Russians eventually pull out of Ukraine, are completely beaten militarily and their assets will be used to fund Ukrainian reconstruction, and it assumes that China does not increase tensions with Taiwan or, heaven forbid, actually invade. Should the war drag on, the situation will grow completely unpredictable - eventually, governmen…

Support for funding the war could just as easily become an electoral liability in the west, in which case Ukraine loses some territory and the rest of the world moves on as they did when Russia seized Crimea. Either outcome is better for global economic stability than a protracted multi year war.

Re: Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

#223

Post by carlosjobim »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #57

I thought this was a bizarre (OK, I'll be honest, shitty) article. The beginning starts out by seemingly making the point that Japan has low unemployment because it has a lot of inefficient, "make-work" jobs, e.g. "smartly dressed women help you use the lifts" (subtext being who needs help using an elevator) and "a team of four people was involved in the preparation of your correspondent’s gin martini". OK, fair enou…

There's never been any kind of labor shortage in the West, just an unwillingness to pay sustainable salaries for work delivered. Young men and women working in Western countries are horribly squeezed by the massive amount of people demanding to live on their labour. Immense taxes, profits, pensions, rent, fines, mortgages all add up to an unsustainable situation, and people check out. You can't build a future in places like Western Europe without either gaming the system, having luck with inheritance and such, or making a wild shot at some unusual pursuit that could render profit if successful. That means a young person can not afford to spend time working in dead-end jobs such as sadly, almost all traditional jobs are now for people entering the work force.

I deeply regret all the years working hard in a traditional job, because it brought me no closer to having a career, a family, a place to call my own, or respect. Why should I ever expect any young person to do the same, when things are much worse for them now.

Re: Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

#224

Post by ianai »

carlosjobim wrote: post #223
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #57

I thought this was a bizarre (OK, I'll be honest, shitty) article. The beginning starts out by seemingly making the point that Japan has low unemployment because it has a lot of inefficient, "make-work" jobs, e.g. "smartly dressed women help you use the lifts" (subtext being who needs help using an elevator) and "a team of four people was involved in the preparation of your correspondent’s gin martini". OK, fair enou…

There's never been any kind of labor shortage in the West, just an unwillingness to pay sustainable salaries for work delivered. Young men and women working in Western countries are horribly squeezed by the massive amount of people demanding to live on their labour. Immense taxes, profits, pensions, rent, fines, mortgages all add up to an unsustainable situation, and people check out. You can't build a future in plac…

Not to mention all the customers and people who will tell you that you’re a piece of crap because you work such a job. (Part of why I go out of my way to be kind to people (and tip) is my experience working retail right out of college.)

Re: Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

#225

Post by WeylandYutani »

spatley wrote: post #119
dd36 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I don’t know a single person that didn’t work.

Yeah, we need to stop talking about the pandemic experience like it affected people in any way similarily. Tech worked their fingers to the bone— 50 hour weeks and isolatng heads down grind. Everyone made money but it crushed their souls. Hospitality and entertainment stayed home and starved. Essential workers went in every day under crushing conditions, fear and literal death. We were all subject to one master. But…

America is not "the West". Everyone kept their pay check in my country.

Re: Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

#226

Post by WeylandYutani »

eftychis wrote: post #32
mkl95 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sort of trust the ECB, but I won't be shocked if they miss their targets.

I trust the ECB to miss their targets. It is part of the job description setup. You are trying to control a chaotic system with one knob and you have to follow a manual that gets rewritten with past learnings: a) if the issue reoccurs, the learnings are ineffective b) if the issue is new, how can you tell how to move the knob without pissing a lot of people and losing your job. It is a lose-lose game.

The ECB problem is that they have to run a collective of wildly varying economies. What's good for the Netherlands would destroy Italy.

The genius solution that they came up with is transfering billions of taxpayer money from the North to the South- which is not very popular among voters.

Re: Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

#227

Post by School-Cotton »

koudelka wrote: post #168
realjhol wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not due to covid - due to government's hysterical overreaction to covid

for the purposes of this conversation, that’s a distinction without a difference

It’s important to keep the distinction in mind. We can’t forget that the hardship we imposed on ourselves was a choice, and that we could have chosen differently.

Re: Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

#228

Post by School-Cotton »

spatley wrote: post #119
dd36 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I don’t know a single person that didn’t work.

Yeah, we need to stop talking about the pandemic experience like it affected people in any way similarily. Tech worked their fingers to the bone— 50 hour weeks and isolatng heads down grind. Everyone made money but it crushed their souls. Hospitality and entertainment stayed home and starved. Essential workers went in every day under crushing conditions, fear and literal death. We were all subject to one master. But…

> Tech worked their fingers to the bone— 50 hour weeks and isolatng heads down grind.

This may have been your experience but it was nowhere near mine. I think talking about “tech” as a whole is generalizing too broadly.

Re: Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?

#229

Post by mschuster91 »

lizardking wrote: post #222
mschuster91 wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We know inflation should start decreasing within a year or so That is assuming the Russians eventually pull out of Ukraine, are completely beaten militarily and their assets will be used to fund Ukrainian reconstruction, and it assumes that China does not increase tensions with Taiwan or, heaven forbid, actually invade. Should the war drag on, the situation will grow completely unpredictable - eventually, governmen…

Support for funding the war could just as easily become an electoral liability in the west, in which case Ukraine loses some territory and the rest of the world moves on as they did when Russia seized Crimea. Either outcome is better for global economic stability than a protracted multi year war.

> Either outcome is better for global economic stability than a protracted multi year war.

The problem is the political implications... for one, it would send a signal to China that a land-grab against Taiwan will yield a bit of trouble but nothing too serious. That's the worst case and I seriously hope that that alone (and the economic devastation associated with TSMC blowing up their fabs to prevent them from falling into Chinese hands) is enough to keep the support going.

The other factor is that it might lead to a complete fracture of the NATO - Finland, the Baltic nations and Poland will not accept any kind of Russian success out of that war. They're all no big economic players in the EU/NATO, but a major internal dissatisfaction in NATO may entice other players in the world to play rough again as well, not just China.

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