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The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

nytimes.com

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Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#141

Post by bradleyjg »

ap22213 wrote: post #121
hyperpape wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is also an issue with disability benefits where they are structured with disincentives to work. The motivation to not pay disability to people who can work is understandable, but for people who can work some but whose disability hinders their ability to get a full-time job or one that's not highly paid, it's a disaster. http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2013/07/aid... This is a point that's not f…

If we consider the difficulty in obtaining disability benefits and the difficulty in keeping them, we should also consider why someone would go through the hassle. I don't think that the benefits are all that much (I could be wrong). What if we, as a society, could make it easier to obtain and sustain a good-paying job? Would people be still willing to go the route of disability? Maybe there are few jobs that many pe…

It depends on which program and what you consider a lot. There are three main disibility programs: SSI, SSDI as the dependant of a retired worker, and SSDI as a disabled worker.

Everyone is eligible for SSI but pays the least (maximum $733 / month federal, some states add a small amount). Someone on SSI whose parent has enough qualifying working quarters can switch to SSDI at 1/2 of the benefit the retiree would be eligible for at full retirement age. This currently tops out at around $1400 / month. Finally, if you yourself have worked enough qualifying quarters (6-20 depending on age) and become disabled you may be eligible for primary SSDI. These top out at around $2600 / month, but average much less. An additional benefit of SSDI, is that after two years a recipient becomes eligible for Medicare.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#142

Post by htns »

lpsz wrote: post #134
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #74

The silent yet steady substitution of unemployment benefits with federal disability insurance is well covered in an episode of This American Life [1]. We, as a country, have a shoddy system for re-training low-skills workers facing technological obsolescence. We have also set up a system under which unemployment benefits are largely a state liability. Disability, on the other hand, is federally funded. The intersecti…

I'm happy if my tax money can help someone in need. However, I'm unhappy if it leads to creation of permanent poverty traps. Have any countries (perhaps in Europe or elsewhere) successfully implemented support systems that are fair both to the needy and to the taxpayers?

As long as a raise of income of $N docks you at most N - (whatever you consider minimum wage) dollars in welfare, you won't be outright disincentivized from working.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#143

Post by [deleted] »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #69
melvinmt wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a common misconception that the inability of poor people to learn/grow is related to motivation or "laziness", you should read this book: http://www.amazon.com/Scarcity-having-little-means-much-eboo...

As both a lazy and a poor person I think there's definitely a significant proportion who could work but can't be bothered to, who could get a better education but can't be bothered to. I'm doing an online python course, but works busy at the moment and I missed my last deadline; I just can't be bothered, motivation is really hard to me (perhaps it is for everyone though). That's not to say that there can't be many pe…

[deleted]

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#144

Post by shoover »

IndianAstronaut wrote: post #7
brandonmenc wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's not as big a deal to me as it would be to men of my age 20 years ago. Less than 6% of workers are working computer or math jobs - of any kind - which suggests that the overwhelming majority of people still have a difficult time when they're listed as "unemployed."

One common trend I have seen in my social circle is the lack of any employable skills. They may or may not have college degrees, but in general their degrees did not give them concrete job skills or they don't have a degree and no skilled trade. What would ideally happen is people learn a skilled trade if they are stuck on the job market. This training should also happen in high school.

Agreed. Figuring out how to evaluate the trades and schools seems really important. I would be worried about ending up with more debt and still no job, in cases where the school was bad or the job market wasn't really there in the end.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#145

Post by VLM »

icantthinkofone wrote: post #97

One of my neighbors is 62 and brilliant. He's worked at Pixar and Silicon Graphics. He cranked out web sites for sites you probably go to. He lost his last job when the company went under. He now applies for jobs all over town and never gets a reply. If age is the reason, these places don't know what they're missing.

Its hard to do primate dominance rituals on "dad" or "grandpa" and the managers are probably in their 30s. So standard employment is not going to work.

He should consult, that was what my father was driven into, more or less for the same ageism stuff. I'm in my 30s and working a "regular corporate job" and I suspect its the last job I'll have for similar reasons. Contract / consultant work really isn't all that bad.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#146

Post by lpsz »

htns wrote: post #142
lpsz wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm happy if my tax money can help someone in need. However, I'm unhappy if it leads to creation of permanent poverty traps. Have any countries (perhaps in Europe or elsewhere) successfully implemented support systems that are fair both to the needy and to the taxpayers?

As long as a raise of income of $N docks you at most N - (whatever you consider minimum wage) dollars in welfare, you won't be outright disincentivized from working.

Upon some more research, it looks like Earned Income Tax Credit [1] attempts to provide some minimal incentives along these lines.

Simplified analysis, goal is situation C. Let's say my monthly welfare income is $1000.

A. I start earning $200. My welfare decreases by $200. Why don't I just stay on welfare?

B. I start earning $200. My welfare decreases by $300. I've lost $100, a penalty for working.

C. I start earning $200. My welfare decreases by $100. I now have an incentive to work. Over time, this leads to a future situation where I gradually earn much more than I could ever with welfare.

Also consider: What if I find $1000 sufficient to live on? What about $1100?

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earned_income_tax_credit

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#147

Post by kaitai »

maxerickson wrote: post #117
cryoshon wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One entire million injured? Something must be off there, otherwise the injury rate would be ludicrously high relative to the small number of troops we had in the wars.

It's apparently this story: http://www.ibtimes.com/va-stops-releasing-data-injured-vets-... Which I think uses these numbers: http://www.publichealth.va.gov/epidemiology/reports/oefoifon... Which are the numbers of veterans that accessed VA facilities for health care, not the numbers of veterans that were injured (disabling injuries are one of the major eligibility factors for the VA, but there are other veterans tha…

In particular, young veterans use the VA mostly in the case that they don't have private health insurance (a job with health insurance, mostly), so the healthier young veterans don't use the VA. Older vets often use the VA because they're retired and it has good services. My grandfather uses the VA without any service injuries because they've got comprehensive care for older guys -- all the services in one building; a great-uncle used them for hearing aids (slightly service-related) but not anything else; younger vets I know just use private care for now.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#148

Post by fredophile »

lpsz wrote: post #146
htns wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as a raise of income of $N docks you at most N - (whatever you consider minimum wage) dollars in welfare, you won't be outright disincentivized from working.

Upon some more research, it looks like Earned Income Tax Credit [1] attempts to provide some minimal incentives along these lines. Simplified analysis, goal is situation C. Let's say my monthly welfare income is $1000. A. I start earning $200. My welfare decreases by $200. Why don't I just stay on welfare? B. I start earning $200. My welfare decreases by $300. I've lost $100, a penalty for working. C. I start earning…

It's actually more likely that your A and B scenarios are the same. I'd consider a more realistic A scenario to be:

I start earning $200. My welfare decreases by $200. My expenses increase by $100 (transportation to/from work, childcare while at work, clothes specifically for work, etc).

Once you realize that work usually has more costs than just time A and B become the same.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#149

Post by kaitai »

hessenwolf wrote: post #32
brandonmenc wrote: post #3

> The places with the highest rates of male nonwork include parts of Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, Kentucky, West Virginia, Arkansas and Michigan. The areas of high unemployment in Arizona and New Mexico overlap almost exactly with the Indian reservations. A problem deserving its own analysis.

Does that mean that more Indians are unemployed, or that the reservations were placed in the greatest economic crapholes that could be found?

Both. Many natives are unemployed because reservations were placed in really inconvenient and resource-poor places. Check out the employment rates in neighboring areas: also low.

There's also been a huge transfer of land from tribal to non-tribal/non-Indian ownership [1]: the US government held a lot of land in trust for the tribes, identified a lot of it as "surplus to their needs," and sold it to non-tribal members, and on other reservations they transferred ownership to individual tribal members and then economic pressures pushed them to sell, especially if they traditionally did agriculture and the land wasn't farmable. This land wasn't developed, in general, so there's really not that many places to work on a reservation...

[1] https://www.iltf.org/resources/land-tenure-history/allotment

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work – And What They Do Instead

#150

Post by maxerickson »

kaitai wrote: post #147
maxerickson wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's apparently this story: http://www.ibtimes.com/va-stops-releasing-data-injured-vets-... Which I think uses these numbers: http://www.publichealth.va.gov/epidemiology/reports/oefoifon... Which are the numbers of veterans that accessed VA facilities for health care, not the numbers of veterans that were injured (disabling injuries are one of the major eligibility factors for the VA, but there are other veterans tha…

In particular, young veterans use the VA mostly in the case that they don't have private health insurance (a job with health insurance, mostly), so the healthier young veterans don't use the VA. Older vets often use the VA because they're retired and it has good services. My grandfather uses the VA without any service injuries because they've got comprehensive care for older guys -- all the services in one building;…

The statistics I link are specific to veterans of Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF), Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF), and Operation New Dawn (OND).
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