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The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

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Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#41

Post by rorrr2 »

tzs wrote: post #25
mjfl wrote: post #11

What jobs are you going to give them? Cashiers these days have Bachelors degrees in Communications. It's the inflation in the system. America is not producing as many factories as it used to, manual labor jobs in construction are hard enough to get. If you drop out, it's going to be tough to get a job.

If that were the explanation, then wouldn't we expect white drop-outs to have unemployment rates that are similar?

Only if they have the same family/friends situation.

If you're white, you're more likely to have a father present, and not a single mother struggling with two jobs.

Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#42

Post by jlgreco »

readme wrote: post #23
bmmayer1 wrote: post #4

Minimum wage law.

Hardly. Lowering the minimum wage isn't going to make an unskilled and lazy teenager useful. We have programs for this: * http://www.jobcorps.gov/home.aspx -- This provides room, board, a stipend suitable for a teenager with no expenses, and vocational training for those under 25 years old (i.e, teens) * http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/ -- There's really no disputing this one. Any one of them can hoof it over to the nearest…

I think that there is value in dropping the minimum wage for teenagers dramatically, regardless of these issues. Giving teenagers another place to get yelled at for not working hard enough (besides just school and home) is clearly beneficial (as you note about the military) but the options that you list are not sufficient. They require too much of a lifestyle change which makes those programs seem inaccessible. Letting the sandwich shop down the road yell at teenagers for $4/hr is better than having teenagers go halfway across the state with Job Corps.

Teenagers in rural areas already have plenty of opportunities to be employed below minimum wage, but these opportunities largely do not exist right now in urban areas. I suspect this partially accounts for the employment discrepancies in rural and urban areas.

(Dropping the minimum wage for this should only be done for teenagers who have more social safety-nets than adults.)

Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#43

Post by jlgreco »

hkmurakami wrote: post #39
jlgreco wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds almost like a modern homesteading act. Interesting idea.

I wonder what fraction of the (let's call it) hopelessly unemployed would take up such an option if it's offered to everyone who wants it. As a whole our society has become much more entitled than back in those days, and the way in which we've been brought up, I wonder if some would see it as patronizing and reject the offer, even if it really would have meant a better future for them. Then again I have been incredib…

I suspect it would not do much to help the people who are homeless because they are struggling with mental illness or addiction (which I understand account for the majority of homeless people). Those are problems that need a more targeted program.

Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#44

Post by _wp3r »

phaus wrote: post #24
icelancer wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or shouldn't it be used to promote alternative methods of education that are accepted by many employers? STEM fields by and large are the most friendly towards alternative (or complete lack of) education. A well-manicured GitHub, a decent resume, and not looking like an idiot in an interview trumps most college degrees for mid-level developer jobs that aren't Facebook/Google/etc.

If you have a good resume but no degree, that almost certainly means you have job experience. Of course actual experience trumps a college degree, that's why its so hard for new graduates to get a job. I know things are going well on the west coast, but around the DC/MD/VA area most companies are asking for 3-5 years of 40 hour/week experience, a TS clearance with a polygraph, and a B.S. in Computer Science for entry…

That employment environment around DC is insane. The time-tables that the government operates on would prevent almost any jobless applicant from chasing a job. When I got out of the Marine Corps year before last, I of course applied for many government contracting jobs within my field. Of the 30-40 jobs I applied for that specifically required my unique skill set, I received request for interviews from 25. I applied for these jobs in September, and received the first follow up contact from the employers in July of the following year. Keeping in mind that I have 10 years experience in a very specialized field with a TS/POLY, and extremely high demand for my skill set. Not sure what I am trying to point out except that government job creation would takes years to actually affect change on unemployment numbers.

On a side note, I did find a job with a startup, but that was because of a chance encounter while trolling the right bars every night for 3 weeks looking for that chance. Smiles and handshakes always trump resumes.

Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#45

Post by sjtgraham »

rorrr2 wrote: post #37
quaunaut wrote: post #18

Honest question: Have we, as a society, looked into possibly supplying people with short-term loans, with a guaranteed open position for someone at a place in more rural parts of America? Originally, I was born in Fresno, CA. We didn't have the most healthy job rate when times were good, let alone once the recession hit. I spent five years looking for a job- and didn't find one until I got the help of a friend online…

You had a computer, and it took you five years to find A job? I find that hard to believe.

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Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#46

Post by pornsrus »

icelancer wrote: post #20
ne0codex wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. Shouldn't this be used as incentive for parents and families within those communities to promote school attendance and encourage academic performance?

Or shouldn't it be used to promote alternative methods of education that are accepted by many employers? STEM fields by and large are the most friendly towards alternative (or complete lack of) education. A well-manicured GitHub, a decent resume, and not looking like an idiot in an interview trumps most college degrees for mid-level developer jobs that aren't Facebook/Google/etc.

I work for a 600 people company. We are at least one level below Facebook/Google. I once interviewed a guy from Microsoft for a senior position. Everybody liked him. But we couldn't make him an offer because he doesn't have a degree. Blame this on the stupid US immigration policy. If we hire him, we'll have to let go all the H-1B holders, me included, on his team because the logic of US immigration service goes like this: "If you can hire an American without degree for this position, what are these foreigners with degree doing here?".

Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#47

Post by jussij »

bmmayer1 wrote: post #36
jussij wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If minimum wage law was such a determining factor why is it countries with a higher minimum wages than the USA have lower (including youth) unemployment rates. I'll give you my take on this. What creates employment is consumption and people earning next to nothing don’t consume. So if you cut the minimum wage all you'll end up doing is reduce the overall consumption, which in turn will drive up unemployment. The trut…

The countries with the highest minimum wages are the democratic socialist states of Europe which all have much higher youth unemployment rates than here. One of the lowest youth unemployment rates in Europe is Germany, which has no minimum wage law.

Here in Australia we have a minimum wage twice that of the USA and our unemplyment is 5.6 percent.

Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#48

Post by csense »

zanny wrote: post #34
runawaybottle wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A minimum wage job?

There is no market demand for unskilled labor at $7.25 an hour. Even if you removed minimum wage laws, you would still need to pay people enough to eat and stay functional in the workplace, which nowadays I imagine isn't much lower than $7.25, especially considering the only practical unskilled labor roles today are physical toiling, since almost everything else can be very easily automated away, so you need to fix t…

You're describing a situation where most of the economic work of producing the necessities of human life can be done by robots (food/clothing/shelter/electricity/transportation of those goods to the humans that need them).

When that happens, the human race will be able to retire -- communism / Basic Income will actually work in that world, everyone will be able to get the necessities of life, and the small proportion of people who are willing to work for fun, or unnecessary luxuries that aren't necessary for survival, will be very small compared to today's pool of human labor, but still enough to maintain the robots and do the remaining jobs that robots can't do.

Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#49

Post by jiggy2011 »

jlgreco wrote: post #42
readme wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hardly. Lowering the minimum wage isn't going to make an unskilled and lazy teenager useful. We have programs for this: * http://www.jobcorps.gov/home.aspx -- This provides room, board, a stipend suitable for a teenager with no expenses, and vocational training for those under 25 years old (i.e, teens) * http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/ -- There's really no disputing this one. Any one of them can hoof it over to the nearest…

I think that there is value in dropping the minimum wage for teenagers dramatically, regardless of these issues. Giving teenagers another place to get yelled at for not working hard enough (besides just school and home) is clearly beneficial (as you note about the military) but the options that you list are not sufficient. They require too much of a lifestyle change which makes those programs seem inaccessible. Letti…

This is precisely the policy that we have here in the UK. https://www.gov.uk/national-minimum-wage-rates

Re: The Jobless Rate for Poor Black Teen Dropouts is 95%

#50

Post by [deleted] »

readme wrote: post #23
bmmayer1 wrote: post #4

Minimum wage law.

Hardly. Lowering the minimum wage isn't going to make an unskilled and lazy teenager useful. We have programs for this: * http://www.jobcorps.gov/home.aspx -- This provides room, board, a stipend suitable for a teenager with no expenses, and vocational training for those under 25 years old (i.e, teens) * http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/ -- There's really no disputing this one. Any one of them can hoof it over to the nearest…

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