Job vacancies surge past one million in new record • Hacker News Board

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#251

Post by albertshin » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:15 PM UTC

adventured wrote: post #164

neilwilson wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Zombie businesses required to pay more for labour go bust. Raising the cost of labour is a far more reliable way of eliminating zombies than attempting to raise interest costs. No business can operate without labour.

> Zombie businesses required to pay more for labour go bust. They may survive for a long period of time in a perma low interest rate environment where debt has become cheap and stocks are highly inflated. Low interest rates, as well as enabling debt accumulation, also float the stock market, which provides shareholder dilution-based funding to businesses that otherwise would have far more severe problems. Uber is an…

I agree with the sentiment of lofty multiples, but what do you think happens to good product companies in that scenario? Sure their stock tumbles quite a bit but would it actually affect the business itself?

I heard the dot com bubble "garbage" was full of companies with no revenue, no customers, etc. I'm not sure many of the high growth tech companies burning $$s are cut from the same cloth though as they really do have products and customers in the present; it's just that the market expects an insane number of new services/customers in the near future...

For example, I'm guessing customers can't just cut off Snowflake easily (time wise and effort wise) so the cashflow would remain stable for a while. As long as they don't need to do a secondary offering (and have some cash), wouldn't they be able to weather a storm? Perhaps at the cost of some massive layoffs/refinancing but would still prevent an actual collapse?

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#252

Post by s0rce » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:18 PM UTC

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #69

When a few companies or industries can’t find enough labor, the solution is simple: Raise wages to attract a larger percentage of the labor pool. When every company and industry is struggling to hire, raising wages is still necessary but it no longer fixes the bigger problem. Those higher wages aren’t producing more labor, they’re just convincing employees with jobs to switch to other jobs. Switching jobs creates a v…

Many companies don't have sufficient margins to raise wages. Hopefully this isn't confused as me endorsing subpar wages, simply that those business can't be sustained or will just endlessly be looking for someone willing to work for cheap because hiring someone for more will actually cost them money. They may be better of turning away some customers vs. hiring someone for a higher wage to support more demand.

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#253

Post by pessimizer » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:18 PM UTC

ghaff wrote: post #186

api wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They won't in major cities which are all basically real estate cartels, which is why I am bearish on major cities as anything other than office parks for rich people and young professionals without families. Most other things like art, actual innovation, and child rearing are going to migrate to medium sized cities, towns, and the countryside for basic economic reasons. It's already slowly happening.

> It's already slowly happening. You're basically describing the norm in the US from post-WWII until about 20 years ago. Many large cities that many think of as desirable elite cities today (with real estate prices to match) were losing population into the 1990s. The attractiveness of living in downtowns to mostly college educated young people is mostly a fairly recent phenomenon and there's no guarantees it won't re…

> The attractiveness of living in downtowns to mostly college educated young people is mostly a fairly recent phenomenon and there's no guarantees it won't reverse.

Especially since it already was a reversal. The white return-flight was driven by suburban and small-town white kids growing up in boring sterile sundown towns (and paying a premium to live in them.) In the city, if you were willing to put up with crime, substandard housing, and living within a mile of a brown face, you would also be exposed to the cultures of those brown faces, and the creativity of people whose rent was low enough that they had time to follow dreams.

Of course, when they (and their employers) moved back, they accidentally recreated their mallworld hellscapes as all the brown/interesting people were forced out and to the margins. Living in their circumscribed neighborhoods is now even more expensive than the suburbs they fled. Now the only benefit is that the city-suburb they live in is somewhat walkable and they may not need a car, but they're now living very close to the poors that their grandparents moved to sundown towns to avoid, there are panhandlers and shit in the streets, and armed kids make expeditions into their neighborhoods to hunt them.

edit: It's only rational to get bored by this and go back home. Especially if you've gotten married, had the dog for two years, and now you've gotten pregnant. Especially with the internet and television taking up so much cultural space now. They work everywhere.

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#254

Post by bryanrasmussen » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:18 PM UTC

bin_bash wrote: post #230

bryanrasmussen wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I think anyone earning in the top 2% should be able to do this, yes. After all, central London contains 2.3% of the UK population. If they're all at the top then by definition it should be possible. Ok but if you're barely in the top 2% that would sound like you'd afford the worst in London - is it the worst you're going for or are you expecting to be the quality of what you'd get other places? Obviously I don't kno…

Clearly some of the top 2% would live outside of London as well

good point, I wonder what percentage is. someone should make a top percentile view of this https://www.ons.gov.uk/visualisations/dvc1370/ for just London to make it easier

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#255

Post by rm445 » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:21 PM UTC

ndr wrote: post #11

"We advertised locally for 70 fruit-pickers and we had nine applications. On follow-up, only one was still available... in terms of recruiting locally, we failed completely," says Ali Capper, the owner of Stocks Farm in Suckley and chair of British Apples and Pears. At her orchard, harvest has just started. It must be done quickly and requires many pairs of hands. Ali had to turn to specialist recruitment firms and h…

Seasonal agricultural labour has been a problem in the UK for literally centuries, since the move away from subsistence farming and the beginning of the industrial revolution. Traditional solutions, as well as migrant labour, include benefits such as subsidised housing and a minimal off-season social safety net. Which I guess are a form of higher wages, but more directly applied.

I suspect that the mix of crops could change in the medium term, to less labour-intensive and more automation-friendly ones. Expect lurid headlines and more expensive strawberry jam.

It will be interesting to see whether the government caves to ag-industry pressure and puts in place special summer visa schemes or similar. On the one hand, the current government is fairly right-wing. On the other; they are quite interventionist, aligned with business interests, and dependent on rural votes. And most of all, media-led. I'd guess they'll respond to headlines about fruit rotting on trees with some madcap scheme.

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#256

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:22 PM UTC

snarf21 wrote: post #215

Factorium wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you permanently reduce immigration, including deporting unauthorised migrants, you can achieve both of those things. Given the cost of land and building, we should consider Western nations 'full' and only allow immigration 'swaps' from other highly developed countries.

So your solution to inequity is to pull the ladder up behind you? What did you DO to deserve to be born in a Western nation?

[deleted]

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#257

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:23 PM UTC

bko wrote: post #133

nivenkos wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The answer is to control the housing market and stop it being used an investment against inflation. Force people to invest in industry against inflation - not rent-seeking in housing, or cryptocurrency pyramid schemes. Only allow resident citizens to own the one property they live in, and have the government handle rentals like the old council housing / Folkhemmet homes.

> Only allow resident citizens to own the one property they live in, and have the government handle rentals like the old council housing / Folkhemmet homes. How can you say you "own" something if you're not allowed to sell or rent it to anyone you want?

[deleted]

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#258

Post by lovich » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:23 PM UTC

M2Ys4U wrote: post #220

benbojangles wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. Also, High streets don't have to 'die' due to excessive rent either, the government could hike taxes on vacant stores 1000% then make possession orders on unpaid premises after 18 months. Then the gov can nationalise shop rents according to reasonable incomes.

I'd advocate for scrapping council tax and business rates, replacing them with a land value tax payable by the freeholder rather than occupant. I just don't see the current Tory party touching it with a barge pole.

How does that tax not just passed onto the occupant? When I was renting I was basically paying all my landlords costs for the property + profit on top. If there’s not enough units available or if the landlord class acts as a cartel in pricing then every cost is going to the occupant

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#259

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:26 PM UTC

outside1234 wrote: post #242

Factorium wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you permanently reduce immigration, including deporting unauthorised migrants, you can achieve both of those things. Given the cost of land and building, we should consider Western nations 'full' and only allow immigration 'swaps' from other highly developed countries.

You'll also have nobody to work in the hospitals or pick food for you :)

[deleted]

Re: Job vacancies surge past one million in new record

#260

Post by thelamest » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:30 PM UTC

Factorium wrote: post #193

nly wrote: post #44

Housing is anything from a third to 50% of the average UK earners take home income. Median house price to median income ratios are at historically high levels[0], and rents are now also rising[1] Either wages need to rise or house prices need to fall. [0] If you look at somewhere mundane like Essex the median 'affordability ratio', as measured by the Office of National Statistics ( https://tinyurl.com/x5jatcx8 ), was…

If you permanently reduce immigration, including deporting unauthorised migrants, you can achieve both of those things. Given the cost of land and building, we should consider Western nations 'full' and only allow immigration 'swaps' from other highly developed countries.

No place on Earth is remotely close to being "full", and the economy isn't a zero sum game. Migrants aren't different from newborns (and simply people in general) in the way they don't "take away" some fixed pie of jobs and homes, they're how new jobs become needed and new homes get built (cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy).