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Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

economist.com

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Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#371

Post by citrin_ru »

pfisherman wrote: post #213

My pet theory is that we are experiencing stagflation, but only people >70 years old have ever really experienced it before, so most people are just scratching their heads wondering how it’s possible that stocks keep going up (inflation) while jobs are disappearing (stagnation). I am most definitely not an economist, nor am I qualified to play one on tv.

My theory is that all money which could have been invested else where went to AI. It can end up either in investments paying off which will result in AI investors becoming even more rich (poor don't invest in the 1st place) and the rest of society poor or investments will have no returns and it will be wealth destruction on a grand scale and everyone will come poorer afterwards.

Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#372

Post by torginus »

pjdemers wrote: post #141
csomar wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Home Depot is a chain, so the backend is probably being handled from some R&D center somewhere. Your maneuvering area at the local home depot is probably pretty slim.

Back in the early 2000's I did consulting work with Home Depot's backend developers. Their office is the "store support center", which is in the NW suburbs of Atlanta. I remember the team as being very good, but surprisingly small.

These things tend to corellate :)

Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#373

Post by kome »

modo_mario wrote: post #367
donatj wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The number of just straight out NO's I've gotten has been surprising and disheartening. I've been a developer for 20 years and genuinely don't think I've gotten an outright "no" before this year. Usually just no response. I've gotten maybe eight or nine actual rejections this year. It's honestly worse, emotionally. Ideally I want a job outside my wheelhouse to learn and move forward, but it seems like no one these da…

>I genuinely have zero idea what you're looking for if the literal perfect fit isn't it. Maybe someone on a visa that can't leave and will take peanuts.

how the tech world is becoming trumpian-like is a funny thing to witness - try to unionize next time

Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#374

Post by reactordev »

Marsymars wrote: post #276
echelon wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dividends are immediately taxable. Stock buybacks are designed to let the shareholder see the same upside, but decide when to take the taxable event. Long term gains are also preferable to non-qualified dividends.

Even worse for non-American stockholders of American companies - the IRS charges a 30% foreign withholding tax on dividends. If you ban stock buybacks in favour of dividends, it’s a big tax increase on foreigners, so US stocks lose a whole pile of value for American stockholders when foreigners dump American equities until the ROI equalizes. (Roughly 20% of US equities are foreign-owned.)

They’ll funnel it through a US based shell company. C’mon now.

Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#375

Post by baq »

echelon wrote: post #115
markus_zhang wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with you, but I forgot to mention that in the original reply I meant to say that "After the economy turns around, there is no point to hire me, an older guy with maybe a couple of gap years, who worked as a Uber driver for the last two years and can't leetcode". But yeah, new graduates is going to suffer anyway. And I'm scared of the collapse of the existing world order. Maybe we won't see a turn around for m…

New folks will never be hired. RIP to the CS degree. Old staff will be exited. Especially senior and mid level management. If you lose your job, you won't get the same comp again. The days of $500K TC are long behind us. It's the era of downsizing and outsourcing while blaming AI. None of this has anything to do with AI. That's just a scapegoat. Google and Amazon are culling entire US teams and rebuilding them in Asi…

> If you lose your job, you won't get the same comp again. The days of $500K TC are long behind us.

I wouldn't be so sure about that, unless you mean $500K TC in 2019 dollars.

ZIRP might just come back, but it'll come with a higher price tag than the one from 2008.

Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#376

Post by windward »

QuiEgo wrote: post #151
echelon wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

New folks will never be hired. RIP to the CS degree. Old staff will be exited. Especially senior and mid level management. If you lose your job, you won't get the same comp again. The days of $500K TC are long behind us. It's the era of downsizing and outsourcing while blaming AI. None of this has anything to do with AI. That's just a scapegoat. Google and Amazon are culling entire US teams and rebuilding them in Asi…

I’ve been told for 20 years that in 5 years my job is going to be offshored. If they could have they would have long ago. My theory: We had a crazy bubble of hiring during zero rate interest. We are living through a nasty correction. AI is moving the needle too, but it’s mostly being used as a scapegoat to save face and explain away cleaning up failed ZRIP yolo plans that didn’t pan out. We’ve also haven’t had a seri…

You're zooming out and considering this negative sentiment with similar times in the past. I think that's wise. I think we should keep zooming out to other industries. Imagine you're an engineer for GM in Detroit in the 70s - would you consider the mean to be your contemporary middle-class lifestyle, or what it is in 2025? Similar for steel and semiconductors.

It goes for other places, too. Is the US's financial strength of today its mean, or is it where the UK was pre-Suez Crisis? Where Japan was in the 80s?

Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#377

Post by cjs_ac »

reactordev wrote: post #338
karlshea wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm gonna have to hold your hand when I tell you this: when you tell the younger generation to "save" or "invest" they are going to walk away from that conversation knowing they were just speaking with one of the most mind-numbingly naive Olds they're going to encounter in probably the next several months. Please, if you ever want any respect from anyone younger than you ever again in your entire life, do not say tho…

At some point you are going to have to grow up and take matters into your own hands instead of blaming everyone for your situation. I’m not old. Just wise.

I appreciate the point you're trying to make, and I agree taking responsibility for one's own life circumstances is the only way to improve them, but surely you understand that 'save and invest' is wholly unsuitable advice for someone with no disposable income or no income at all.

Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#378

Post by baq »

bequanna wrote: post #52
arnonejoe wrote: post #43

It seems we are nearing the bottom of the business cycle. I lived through 2001 and 2008. Both were worse than now. It will get better.

How do we know this is the bottom?

it isn't, but the post-covid inflation and subsequent rates increase has caused something like a recession, just not everywhere at once - so you see sectors busting and coming back, but overall kinda-sorta chugging along economy.

now what happens if the rates won't go down much from here might just be everything slowing down all at once and then they'll drop the rates to 0 again, so it'll get better... two years later.

Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#379

Post by reactordev »

cjs_ac wrote: post #377
reactordev wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At some point you are going to have to grow up and take matters into your own hands instead of blaming everyone for your situation. I’m not old. Just wise.

I appreciate the point you're trying to make, and I agree taking responsibility for one's own life circumstances is the only way to improve them, but surely you understand that 'save and invest' is wholly unsuitable advice for someone with no disposable income or no income at all.

Who else is responsible for you?

You have two options. Continue to point fingers and complain and be broke, or start putting $100/mo in VOO and save what little money you have for your future?

I know it sucks. I know income inequality is huge. I know the only way out of this is to put in sweat equity. I know the only way to put food on the table is to have a second job at a gas station. I’ve been there. However, as much as you DON’T want to hear it - the only way out of your mess is by you working your way out of your mess.

Re: Is America's jobs market nearing a cliff?

#380

Post by __MatrixMan__ »

defrost wrote: post #252
mbfg wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

also, there is the case of the mismatched quantities for shopping, ie, the old hot dogs come in 10 packs, and rolls in 8 backs, etc.

Good grief .. you're serious? Flour comes in sacks, meat comes in cuts - we've a quarter lamb in the freezer, part of that in the fridge, and yeast and flour enough for bread for the next six months. We shop cheap, like the family has done for the past 100+ years, much of our food comes from the garden - our excess gets swapped with others excess (we have a lot of fruit, we never buy eggs, they come from people that…

To cut mbfg a bit of slack here, your approach doesn't work in all situations. I admire your functioning community and supportive family and the fact that you've got time and space for things like gardening.

If people can't live like you do, it's probably because they've been placed on some kind of economic hamster wheel, and rather than figure out how to get a quarter of a lamb their better bet is to emigrate or to disrupt the system that's making McDonalds feel like a relevant factor in a survival equation by building the kind of community that you're describing. That's a big ask if you've never been part of such a thing (I know I haven't).

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