Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last? • Hacker News Board

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#221

Post by cesnja » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:02 PM UTC

nilkn wrote: post #193

mtone wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just favoring the early birds. Go look at statistics on lack of sleep, and consider the massive health, productivity and creativity implications. Surely, you will not assert that a third of the population lack sleep because of attitude or responsibility issues?

What is an earlybird? Is it someone who is unambiguously physically hardwired to get up early? Or is it someone who has made the choice to implement the sequence of changes in their life necessary to facilitate comfortably getting up early in the morning? I imagine both sorts of earlybirds exist, and I'd be interested in seeing how common each is.

I'm kind of the first type, I just wake up every day around the same time. I'm always ok in the morning (relatively no difference between getting 3 or 8 hours of sleep), but after lunch there is quite a difference depending on how much sleep I had the previous day. I have to make a decision and go to bed at the right time, otherwise I lose the next day's afternoon.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#222

Post by Retric » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:03 PM UTC

wingspar wrote: post #153

watwut wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Drug test measure whether you smoked weed anytime last weeks, up to three months if I recall right. It has little to do with whether you are high first day on the job. It has more to do with drug war then with incidents.

It’s more to do with liability/lawsuits and insurance premiums than drug war.

You can get a DoD Clarence without a drug test. Mass testing is often not about Drugs as much as a proxy for other things.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#223

Post by Aloha » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:04 PM UTC

logfromblammo wrote: post #78

bkohlmann wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing about manufacturing jobs is that they often involve operating heavy machinery. Drug use and intoxication drastically increases the chance of death or dismemberment - for the inebriated, or often, others around them. As a pilot, I seriously don’t care if you show up to work high or not - unless you’re doing maintenance on the jet I’m supposed to fly.

Why not just give an automated field-sobriety test for alertness, judgment, and reflexes at the start of each shift? Pass the test, and you can clock in and get to work. Fail the test, hit the nap room (unpaid) for a while, and try again when you wake up. It would catch people who are drunk, high, having a stroke, or just sleepy, rather than just the guy who used cannabis two weekends ago and is perfectly capable of…

I couldn't pass a field sobriety test well rested and stone sober most of the time - this isn't a reasonable test.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#224

Post by jaymzcampbell » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:05 PM UTC

kevstev wrote: post #213

CJefferson wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm happy to be at work at 9am on the dot, if my boss is happy for me to leave at 5pm on the dot, and not read any email or slack until 9am next morning. In my experience it is basically impossible in modern tech jobs to do that.

Seriously. Some companies want it both ways- constant access via email/slack/on call rotations, but a strict clock-out time of 5pm? "You aren't a team player."

So, so much this. I am really sick of the double-faced bullshit nature of companies extolling their work-life balance and then going nuclear when anyone exercises it. At some of my jobs it really didn't matter how much work you did during the commute or at home - no, what actually mattered was are you at your desk after 7pm showing your "dedication". You could've been literally watching /dev/random on your screen but it counted.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#225

Post by jamesmp98 » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:05 PM UTC

I keep hearing how great blue collar josb are, but looking at glassdoor, most of them seem to be in the $30k - $50k range in my state

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#226

Post by chrisbennet » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:06 PM UTC

moduspol wrote: post #132

rainbowmverse wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's almost as if extended poverty has ruined people's ability to function in a job market that wasn't there for them sooner. Poverty is called a trap for a reason. It's a self-reinforcing cycle as much as it's an income bracket.

Is there a case at all to be made for personal responsibility when such a large percentage don't even bother to show up? How can one possibly ever get out of poverty if s/he can't even make it to an interview?

They say "There are no bad dogs, just bad owners." I think the problems are cultural.

(a) Two working parents or a single parent family may result in children "being raised by wolves" to some extent. These are good parents/people but child rearing is a time intensive business.

(b) Lack of jobs for young people. In my neighborhood, a lot of lawn mowing jobs are done by services instead of the neighborhood kid. The "entry level" jobs are often taken by older people who can't afford to retire.

(c) Single child families where parents spoil their children resulting in a sort of learned helplessness. I can't think of anyone of my friends children that mows their parents lawn of shovels the driveway. The dad or mows the lawn and snow blows the driveway. My brothers kids are the exception.

(d) Lack of exposure to real world failure or responsibilities. How many parents are going to let their kids walk to school never mind use a chainsaw or go hunting by themselves?

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#227

Post by ashark » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:06 PM UTC

mtone wrote: post #93

foldor wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's more about the attitude of not being prepared. Someone who is prepared will go to bed early enough to allow them to show up on time without being exhausted.

That's just favoring the early birds. Go look at statistics on lack of sleep, and consider the massive health, productivity and creativity implications. Surely, you will not assert that a third of the population lack sleep because of attitude or responsibility issues?

A bit OT, but I blame artificial lighting and (especially) in-the-home, always-available, on-demand, hyper-stimulating entertainment on glowing screens.

I once spent a couple weeks living only by candlelight after 8:30 or so, no screens. It's hard not to get enough sleep that way. You can still read, play board games/cards, write, study, play or listen to music, prep/cook food, talk(!), and tons of other stuff, but go figure, those things don't tend to keep one from going to sleep at a reasonable hour (you may be surprised at what's a "reasonable hour" for you when literally far more total entertainment than was enjoyed over any entire given year in the Imperial capital of Rome isn't available at your fingertips).

Netflix, cable tv that's on 24/7 (not my thing, but lots of people use their TV that way), video games, news feeds, mindless browsing, "who was that one guy in that one thing? Hold on, I'll look it up", what's Trump up to now? (better check!), a few thousand lumens of artificial lighting after the sun goes down, and so on... you'll put off sleep for those, maybe without realizing it ("it's not like I even feel tired yet", sure, but you would if you hadn't been playing Playstation or watching Netflix or scrolling through Facebook in a bright room for 2 hours straight, and if you didn't have the option of doing the same or similar for another two hours)

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#228

Post by erikpukinskis » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:07 PM UTC

seibelj wrote: post #30

I keep reading that AI is going to eliminate all the jobs. Yet unemployment is at record lows and wages are rising across the board. Could it be possible that AI will instead free people to work on new jobs in new industries? Amazing! It’s almost like this time is not any different from any other time.

Instagram/Square/Yelp/etc are freeing white collar workers to quit their jobs and start new businesses. The businesses add jobs directly, and the quitting creates a vacuum that causes increased job supply at their old wage and below.

AI will accelerate this massively, much faster than automation can take jobs away.

Long term it will lead to a crash in the highest paying jobs, as the market is flooded with workers who have management and tactical experience. Rather than a big spread between $10k-$1m, we’ll see a huge cluster of workers around $100k.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#229

Post by jaymzcampbell » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:08 PM UTC

DavidWoof wrote: post #103

TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The younger crowd seems to be largely detached from the idea of responsibility that was drilled into previous generations. My father graduated college making $42k/yr. Inflation adjusted, that was about $60k/yr in today's dollars. I just graduated, have experience in the field, and am getting a salary of $35k/yr in today's dollars. Meanwhile, upper management is getting millions. In that kind of work environment, wh…

I'm always kind of fascinated by posts like this on this site. Could I ask what field you're in that pays 35k/yr, apparently in the US, is in the field of your degree, and yet is somewhat related to Hacker News? Or are you not in tech at all and this site is an outside interest? Or maybe you're just in a rural area? I don't mean this to sound challenging out all, I'm just kind of curious.

Not OP but I've worked places that in London (not exactly cheap to live), they pay a junior developer £18,000 or so - which is under $23,000. In ad agencies, in particular, this seems quite common. Usually by job hopping said junior can bump that by £10k in one go but it doesn't stop the fact people will try it and see if they can get away with it.

Re: Blue-collar wages are surging. Can it last?

#230

Post by Kalium » Tue, Nov 21, 2017, 6:08 PM UTC

eric_h wrote: post #88

toomuchtodo wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So don't give drug tests? While I agree that drug tests are a scam as a white collar worker, I do think they're necessary from a liability perspective if you're in construction, manufacturing, or driving a company vehicle. I fully support the use of recreational drugs on someone's own time, but you have to weed out (forgive the pun) those who are under the influence when loss of life or limb is a risk.

I would be okay with drug tests that didn't fail you for weed. That can show up on a test weeks after it's been consumed. The drugs that would actually significantly impair you (alcohol, opiates) clear out of your system in hours/days.

There are drug testing companies that exist solely to farm out the work to a lab and remove any marijuana hits from the results. Some companies in places where weed is legal use these.