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Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

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Re: Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

#231

Post by sudosteph »

tbrownaw wrote: post #213
sudosteph wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A college degree may not be a panacea for class mobility, but lets not forget that class mobility without a degree is pretty much not possible in the slightest. Per a Pew study Brookings cites ( https://www.brookings.edu/blog/social-mobility-memos/2014/02... ): > children born in the lowest income quintile who do not earn a four-year degree are four times as likely to wind up in the bottom (47%) as those who earn a f…

...A 53% chance is "pretty much not possible in the slightest"?

Did you look at the graph that article linked? Do you think that moving from the first income quintile into the second one is genuine class mobility? People in the second quintile income range may not be relying on food stamps, but for most of America that's still a less than a comfortable situation, one that's still in the territory of living nearly paycheck-to-paycheck (23% of americans have no savings, and another 22% have less than 3 months worth), and it's not going to buy you many advantages in living situations or education opportunity for kids either. Of the ones without college degrees, 26% of that 53% you're calling out still ended up in that bracket.

So again, without a college degree, there's a 73% of people born poor, will remain lower or low-middle class. Only 3% will make it into the top quintile (vs 9% with degrees) and 8% into the 4th (vs 17% with degrees). So if we define only as 3rd quintile up as middle and up (which is questionable in itself given the shrinking middle class) a degree lands a lower-class person 52% chance of genuine upwards mobility, compared to 27% without. And it nearly guarantees that they at least won't remain in the very worst stratum of poverty. 52% for real mobility may not be great odds, but neither is 27% and if it was my future on the line, I definitely would not want to be staking it on 27%.

Re: Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

#232

Post by throwawaymsft »

wasdfff wrote: post #169
alkibiades wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“not enough money to go around” Where do people get this strange idea that if someone else makes money it somehow precludes others from doing it? Bill Gates got rich with an invention that also generated probably a trillion dollars in economic growth for everyone. Including most people on this sites income.

So you can’t see how a CEO being compensated 1000x more than whoever cleans their office is a problem? Money flows like a river, and when every executive diverts egregious amounts of money that they’d never spend in their lifetime into their little pools, theres less money flowing downstream along the river. Do you really think that Bill Gates needed to become one of the richest men on earth to proselytize ms dos? Be…

Do I care if someone has 1000x the artistic talent I do? Is there a shared river of inspiration we're all drinking from?

You seem to believe there's a fixed pile of money in the world that every human competes for (e.g., 16th century Mercantilism).

Go into the woods and turn a tree into a chair. Where did that value come from? Will it run out?

Re: Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

#233

Post by pgwhalen »

gdubs wrote: post #208
wutbrodo wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fully agree that you can't ignore the broader education that college provides, even when that diverges from marketability. But then you have to be clear-eyed about what we're talking about here: from the perspective of a college student, is it worth paying 1-200k[1] to become more worldly, with some auxiliary benefits to their income potential? I would probably still send my (future) kids to such a place, but then…

Today it’s hard to make an economic case for a well-rounded liberal arts education — but I’d bet that in ten years, computers will be pretty good at everything except the stuff you get from a good liberal arts education.

Ten years? Do you really think software development as we know it will be gone in ten years? I think it’s important on hacker news that we have perspective on our place in society and history and that we don’t think of ourselves (speaking for software engineers mostly here) as gods or something, but it seems very extreme to suggest that what we do will be gone or severely reduced in ten years.

Re: Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

#234

Post by SovietDissident »

irrational wrote: post #189
Bucephalus355 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make very good points above. I really enjoyed college, especially my liberal arts classes. That being said, with AWS Certs going for between $75-$300 how long do colleges think they can survive? If you were a 22 yr old who studied from zero-level computing knowledge for 12 months and got the AWS Solutions Architect Pro cert (somewhat possible assuming 2 hours / day) I can already guarantee you’d receive a written…

"That being said, with AWS Certs going for between $75-$300 how long do colleges think they can survive?" Colleges shouldn't be in the business of training people for jobs - that is what tech schools are for. If you just want to get a job, go to a tech school, don't go to college. College is (or should be) about expanding your mind, your horizons. It should be about exposing you to new ideas and thoughts you hadn't b…

Colleges sell themselves as providing remunerative employment training when it suits them, and hide behind this excuse when kids (esp. Humanities majors) can't garner gainful employment. "What, you thought you were paying $200k to increase your earning potential?! Crazy kids---this is all about personal development. Life is about more than money!" (Try not paying your student loans back, and you can see exactly how little they care about money.)

Even if we pretend that the majority of people attend college not for the purpose of increasing their value to employers and getting out of their parents' house, but for personal edification, colleges don't even accomplish this ostensible goal! Most students are more ignorant in most subject matter than the day they step foot on the campus - https://www.nysun.com/new-york/students-know-less-after-4-co... ; https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/01/whats-c.... Often they're propagandized for four years, saddled with debt, and told that they got an "education", so it's nobody's fault but their own if they can't find a decent job.

Three cheers for the AWS certs and modern-day educational options and good riddance to the corrupt university system (propped up by taxpayer-subsidized monies, of course).

Re: Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

#235

Post by intended »

moorhosj wrote: post #29
Bucephalus355 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make very good points above. I really enjoyed college, especially my liberal arts classes. That being said, with AWS Certs going for between $75-$300 how long do colleges think they can survive? If you were a 22 yr old who studied from zero-level computing knowledge for 12 months and got the AWS Solutions Architect Pro cert (somewhat possible assuming 2 hours / day) I can already guarantee you’d receive a written…

==I really enjoyed college, especially my liberal arts classes.== I think this highlights the true question. Do colleges exist to promote education and intellectual curiosity or to train workers? According to PEW, Americans believe colleges are for work training: "Americans are split on the main purpose of college, with 47% saying it is to teach work-related skills and 39% saying it is to help a student grow personal…

The American college question is always a jobs question dressed up.

There’s no jobs for people.

Therefore people try to get college degrees, even if they aren’t suited for it or going to be happy with it.

This drives up the demand for college, and specifically for degrees that lead to jobs.

This degrades the image and purpose of college (students aren’t here to expand their mind. They’re here so that recruiters won’t ding them.)

All of which leads invariably to Downstream issues, like credential inflation and growing student debt.

Eventually, college = jobs, and one of the greatest achievements of America, its liberals arts education, will tarnish and crumble.

Re: Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

#237

Post by ivalm »

netcan wrote: post #10

" middle-class life to those without a college degree " Anytime you start delving into what has changed for a subset of people, over decades, the most important piece of the puzzle is decided ding who qualifies for the subset. I mean concepts like "middle class" or "without a college degree." A lot more people get degrees, in 2018. Does the graduates/nongraduates segment still represent a comparable group of people?…

>Does the graduates/nongraduates segment still represent a comparable group of people?

According to this [0] article from 2017 only 33.4% of Americans over the age of 25 have finished their undergraduate education. As such, MOST people are still without undergraduate education, and thus a median American does not have undergrad education. Since middle class should represent a median resident, it would follow that people without undergrad education should be quite solidly in the middle class.

[0] https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/326995-census-more-...

Re: Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

#238

Post by expertentipp »

mschuster91 wrote: post #221
graeme wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the lump of labour fallacy. Rest assured that life will be harder for young people if a sizeable portion of the population is old, out of the labour force, and needs to be supported by a rising share of taxes from a small number of young workers. We should hope that older works stay in jobs as long as they're able. The coming demographic bulge isn't pretty.

> and needs to be supported by a rising share of taxes from a small number of young workers And here is where it gets funny. I wonder how pension systems would look like if they were supported by the billions of dollars that especially FAANG but also other huge megacorps such as IKEA, McDonald's, Burger King "creatively avoid" in taxes. Or if minimum wages were set so high that a pension built on a life of minimum wa…

It’s unacceptable that social services are a zero-sum game between those employed and those not employed, while employers cut margins and funnel out basically all profits - the famous „socialize the losses, privatize the profits”. I hope FAANG, McDonalds, IKEA, Deutsche*, automotive companies, fossil fuels companies, investment funds, and whatnot will get the feel of cold talons of the social justice.

Re: Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

#239

Post by ams6110 »

hmmmDisagree wrote: post #200
irrational wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"That being said, with AWS Certs going for between $75-$300 how long do colleges think they can survive?" Colleges shouldn't be in the business of training people for jobs - that is what tech schools are for. If you just want to get a job, go to a tech school, don't go to college. College is (or should be) about expanding your mind, your horizons. It should be about exposing you to new ideas and thoughts you hadn't b…

College is (or should be) about expanding your mind, your horizons. College is not at all about that. One, college is really damaging to the social fabric of towns across the country. My high school friends are gone, and we all lost touch immediately after high school. Why? College. Did I make new friends? Friends at college? No. Not by the same measure of friendship. These people were cardboard cutouts. People to dr…

Sounds like you had a bad experience with college but I think you raised a couple of good points:

- college is in every way, dumped on teenagers as THE ONLY way forward

Absolutely true in my experience. High schools are entirely structured around two things: standardized test performance, and pushing kids into college. If you are not a college-bound kid, you essentially don't exist.

- No one is there to mature. No one is there to improve their concept of individuality. No one goes to college to learn for the sake of learning.

"No one" is too strong, but I think this is true for the majority. Most people in an undergraduate program (and probably also a majority in Master's programs) are there because they think it is the path to a good job. Because that is what has been drummed into them since elementary school. Learning, expanding horizons, etc. are secondary.

If most people at college were there simply for the sake of learning, enrollment would be a small fraction of what it is.

Re: Big Cities No Longer Deliver for Low-Skill Workers

#240

Post by [deleted] »

ken wrote: post #204
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the short term yes, but in the long term it will benefit them too. If there is less work to be done in the world, then everyone will work less on average. I firmly believe that one of two things will eventually happen: • We will find new industries which replace the old jobs. Companies in these industries will by necessity find ways to fill positions, either by paying enough that (even) more people can afford coll…

But now (i.e., the short term) is when we're all living. I don't pay my rent based on the long term benefits of the elimination of my job. By using "them" to generically refer to all workers, past present and future, it sounds like you're saying "Today's workers are screwed, but the next generation of non-rich people will be fine". You can't just tell people that a machine eliminated their job starting next month the…

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