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Forced unemployment and second-class status: Google's data center contractors

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Re: Forced unemployment and second-class status: Google's data center contractors

#231

Post by lhorie »

Chris2048 wrote: post #230
lhorie wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You still need someone to pick your potatoes in the farm for you. If everyone has white collar skills, then that means one of two things: 1) white collar jobs don't pay as much comparatively to blue collar (meaning your supermarket potatoes now cost $50 due to high labor costs because there's no supply of workers) 2) people with white collar skills cannot find white collar jobs and are forced to take low pay blue col…

If there is a dire need for potato-picking manual labour, pay will increase, as will the price of potatoes, short-term at least, assuming the change is sudden and of immediate effect, which makes the scenario even more unrealistic. Realistically, rather than labourers becoming indefinitely well-paid, and potatoes indefinitely expensive, alternatives to manual labour will rapidly be developed, incentivised by high dem…

> This is what I asked - why do you think this is? I'm not convinced

The simplest way to explain is to just look at basic math: if there are 3 doctor jobs and 4 doctors, one gets the short end of the stick.

> master degrees, in what

In STEM, most surprisingly, but also other careers that sound fairly reasonable. You'd think stuff like civil engineering or accounting would be fine careers, right? But somehow, Uber drivers have the craziest life stories...

Re: Forced unemployment and second-class status: Google's data center contractors

#232

Post by Chris2048 »

lhorie wrote: post #231
Chris2048 wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there is a dire need for potato-picking manual labour, pay will increase, as will the price of potatoes, short-term at least, assuming the change is sudden and of immediate effect, which makes the scenario even more unrealistic. Realistically, rather than labourers becoming indefinitely well-paid, and potatoes indefinitely expensive, alternatives to manual labour will rapidly be developed, incentivised by high dem…

> This is what I asked - why do you think this is? I'm not convinced The simplest way to explain is to just look at basic math: if there are 3 doctor jobs and 4 doctors, one gets the short end of the stick. > master degrees, in what In STEM, most surprisingly, but also other careers that sound fairly reasonable. You'd think stuff like civil engineering or accounting would be fine careers, right? But somehow, Uber dri…

I've yet to see a doctor unable to either be employed or self-employ.

Re: Forced unemployment and second-class status: Google's data center contractors

#233

Post by lhorie »

Chris2048 wrote: post #232
lhorie wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is what I asked - why do you think this is? I'm not convinced The simplest way to explain is to just look at basic math: if there are 3 doctor jobs and 4 doctors, one gets the short end of the stick. > master degrees, in what In STEM, most surprisingly, but also other careers that sound fairly reasonable. You'd think stuff like civil engineering or accounting would be fine careers, right? But somehow, Uber dri…

I've yet to see a doctor unable to either be employed or self-employ.

Try looking a bit harder then. From my first google search:

"Among European countries that have grappled with the problem of unemployed doctors are Italy, with an unemployment rate among doctors of 17% in 1990; Austria, with a rate of 9%; Germany, with 8%; the Netherlands, with 6%; and Spain, with 5%. In the Nordic countries the phenomenon is more recent-throughout most of their history they have suffered a shortage of doctors. Since the early 1990s, the unemployment rate among doctors has increased rapidly in both Sweden and Finland, and is expected to reach 10 to 15% by the year 2000"[0]

[0] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/014107689608900...

Re: Forced unemployment and second-class status: Google's data center contractors

#235

Post by RHSeeger »

yaml-ops-guy wrote: post #78
RHSeeger wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Forcing freelancers into W-2 status is just another example of the government screwing people over "for their own good". It's the government screwing _some_ people over for the good of everyone else, where it's presumed that "good of everyone else" is worth more to society than what is lost by those that get screwed over by it. At least, that's generally the intent.

I’m very glad we’re only screwing over “some” people, good to have that cleared up, thank you for that...it’s still an abominable practice to put any amount of laborers through.

Are you of the belief that there are a set of policies/laws that result in everyone being happy and nobody being screwed over? Such a thing is not realistic. Every system of laws results in some people suffering for the benefit of others. The better law system result in less suffering for more benefit.

Re: Forced unemployment and second-class status: Google's data center contractors

#236

Post by Chris2048 »

lhorie wrote: post #233
Chris2048 wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've yet to see a doctor unable to either be employed or self-employ.

Try looking a bit harder then. From my first google search: "Among European countries that have grappled with the problem of unemployed doctors are Italy, with an unemployment rate among doctors of 17% in 1990; Austria, with a rate of 9%; Germany, with 8%; the Netherlands, with 6%; and Spain, with 5%. In the Nordic countries the phenomenon is more recent-throughout most of their history they have suffered a shortage…

  Among the unemployed doctors in countries with a large public sector of health care, there has been little interest in venturing out as private entrepreneurs. Instead, the medical profession is interested in protecting the position of doctors as employees in the public sector, which can secure their position in the division of labour in health care better than the private sector.
It can't be helped if an industry is socialised to the extent that professionals are dependant on the state. At that point the mechanics of supply and demand are affected by interference.

Re: Forced unemployment and second-class status: Google's data center contractors

#237

Post by qwytw »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #176
qwytw wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They They could hire a smaller of more qualified and invest more into automation. The only reason Google is doing this is because they don't want to spend the same amount on benefits and other overhead on 15$ per hour worker as they do for a 30$ per hour one.

"invest more into automation" Like they were sitting there and paying for all this work they could automate, but now they are gonna wake up and autonate it all in a day

Yes, as long as paying somebody 15$ an hour is cheaper.

Re: Forced unemployment and second-class status: Google's data center contractors

#238

Post by qwytw »

gkop wrote: post #125
Aunche wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should they be incentivized to automate? That just places even more downward pressure the price of low-skill labor.

$15 is already equal to the proposed federal minimum wage under the current administration. They should automate because lugging batteries isn’t a healthy fit for many of the humans that they are attracting at this low wage.

However working in an Amazon warehouse or a McDonald's is? It's not unlikely that a significant number of people lugging batteries at google would be forced to do that since Google would have no reason to hire them the.
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