Down and Out in White-Collar America

XorNand writes "Fortune has a pretty sobering article on the employment situation for white-collar workers. By many accounts, we've never had it harder--the slump in the 80's primarily hit blue-collar workers. While bleak, things might be inching towards the light; as my econ professor says, jobs are the last thing to recover after a recession."

Comments

White collars

[CptChipJew]

It's a good thing my shirts have green collars.

"But in the past two or three years companies have turned to India and the Philippines for much more sophisticated tasks: financial analysis, software design, tax preparation, even the creation of PowerPoint presentations."

Apparently Fortune isn't hiring software people either.

Re:White collars

[stinky wizzleteats]

Overseas outsourcing of the creation of power point presentations.

You know, I've always been disgusted that modern business people are incapable of conceptualizing thought without resorting to power point slides, but this piece of knowledge just places me on a whole new plateau of disdain and revulsion toward basically every human being in this country who wears a suit.

I guess it must be the combination of absurd dependence on power point to think and communicate combined with the sheer soul-whithering miserliness to actually outsource the development of slideshows to overseas labor.

It fills me with an urge to defile a golf course.

Re:White collars

[Cloud 9]

It fills me with an urge to defile a golf course.

Don't fight it, it's fun.

Re:White collars

[mike_oldlib_com]

Just a little Irony...I was sitting with our onshore reps from India and discussing a project that was to be offshored to Manila that another company was doing - and cheaper than India by half.

With a straight face, mind you, the Indian consultant looked at me and said..."But you won't get the same quality"

US National Debt

[Michael's a Jerk!]

American economy has been hit hard. Enron, etc, and september 11 couldn't have come at a worse time. Not trying to be flamebait, but the usual 'let's start a war or 2 to fix up the economy' hasn't worked :-(

According to the Debt clock, each Citizen's share of this debt is $22,684.87.

he National Debt has continued to increase an average of $1.47 billion per day since September 30, 2002!

The Fix? I don't know. Welcome to Globaliziation.

Re:US National Debt

[TWX]

"What's the basis of your conclusion? Do you expect an entire economy to make a U-turn in a few months? What would qualify as a "fixing" the economy in your mind?"

Well, one thing that leads credibility to his statement is that war/defence spending doesn't comprise nearly as much of the U.S. GDP as it used to. If I'm remembering stats that I heard on NPR properly, during WWII, the war spending portion of GDP was something like 22%. Granted, it was spending that went nowhere in a sense, since there was no return on the 'investment' that war bought, but it stimulated market aspects back into production that found something to do after the war ended. It didn't hurt that tensions between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S.A. escalated as well, generating R&D, assembly, testing, and materials jobs to build the infrastructure that carried us into the fifties and sixties. Once the government didn't have one single active enemy to be able to propaganda the country into paying to "fight" against, matters toward defence didn't get what they had.

Contrast that to the modern state, where GDP impact of a war is more like 4%, which can almost be written off as statistical noise, and you end up with a war not helping the economy as a whole. We don't build hundreds of planes a day for our "police actions", we don't crank out the carpet bombs, the tanks, the rifles. We have most of the war materiel stockpiled already, with personnel already trained in its use, and actively being paid already. We move them to the area affected, pay them more for combat duty, go through more ammunition, and put a little more wear and tear on the big items like tanks and planes, but we don't ramp up production. Things remain nice and stable. The fact that no additional money appears to be necessary to pay for the rest of the expenses from the Iraq invasion should be proof enough for that.

I personally am glad that our "problem" is mild enough that we don't even have 7% unemployment. 5% is considered regular, healthy unemployment, and if this is the worst that it gets, we're going to be just fine. I'm glad that we shouldn't need another multi-million casualty war in order to feed people.

Re:US National Debt

[Frymaster]

'let's start a war or 2 to fix up the economy' hasn't worked

of course not.

the traditional theory is that war is a stimulus for the economy because it is an instant export generator. materiel (bombs, ammo etc) is manufactured domestically and then exported to (ie, dropped on) a foreign country. george orwell outlines this economic theory quite nicely in 1984, and that's how it was back in '48.

however, the war against iraq and most modern interstate wars involving a developed nation are different for several reasons:

1. they are shorter. unlike world war 2 which lasted between 8 years (if you were japanese or chinese) and 4 years (if you were american), modern wars are measured in weeks. there is no time to ramp up domestic production. peacetime surpluses of materiel are expended so there is no productivity boost during the war itself.
2. modern weapons don't lend themselves to effective wartime production. during ww2, planes, tanks, guns were all simple to mass produce and were consumed en masse for the war effort. modern weaponry (planes for instance) require a long time to design and manufacture. they are best developed during non-war periods and then held on hand to be consumed during a conflict. replacement production during wartime is not really an option.
3. production is no longer exclusively or predominantly domestic. for better or worse (i suspect worse) oecd economies are globalized. foreign instability caused by war or threat of war has a greater impact on the domestic economy than during the isolationist 40's. look how badly wall street behaved during the lead up the iraq invasion.

the bottom line is, that war's traditional role of providing a fine way to just throw away production on a foreign "market" is obsolete. if the united states wants to develop a government-funded make work project, they should investigate something more productive... highways again maybe. or a second panama canal?

Re:US National Debt

[Sycraft-fu]

You are not remembering correctly. During WWII we were spending in excess of 60% of our GDP on the military. For all intents and purposes, it was all we did. The only onther production that really existed was that which was necessary to keep the nation necessary. All industries that could be were converted to the war effort.

Now today, our spending on military is about 3.2% of our GDP. As you say, trivial. What is more interesting is teh comparatvie numbers. In overall spending, as in dollars, we are, by far, the biggest spender. However in terms of % of GDP we are rather low.

Re:US National Debt

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.nationalpriorities.org

Try the Interactive Tax Chart.

In my university...

[r6144]

I'm an EE major, and the teacher keeps saying, "If you graduated two year earlier, companies would literally fight for every one of you... But now...".

Welcome to the Global Economy.

[flacco]

Oh sure, eveything was fine when it was manufacturing jobs that were exported to other countries. Now that white-collar/no-collar jobs like software development are being exported, suddenly it's alarming.

Re:Welcome to the Global Economy.

[aergern]

Yes..and quite a few of those blue collar workers, some of them my friends morgaged their homes and went back to school to get degrees so that they wouldn't have to go through that again. Guess what ..every industry that goes really strong in the U.S. seems to eventually get shipped overseas.

I read an article on CNN's website about 19 of 50 states have outsourced their call centres to India. So if an unemployed person calls about their check they are talking to someone in India. Sorry buddy but I don't like that use of tax dollars when someone here could do that job. But I guess since they do it at $200 a month instead of $2000 a month ..it's ok. It saves money. They don't lower taxes because of it..they just shove the savings into another pork barrel.

I was never quite happy with U.S. companies be able to send blue collar jobs out of country and this doesn't set well with me either.

Re:Welcome to the Global Economy.

[MikeFM]

The problem is that blue colar folks can take some night school classes and bump their skills up to white collar. What happens when there aren't enough white collar jobs? Then those blue collar folks are shit out of luck along with a lot of the white colalr folks because there is no place to go. You can't have every American as middle management. How do you make the leap from flipping burgers to managing 10,000 employees in India without anything available in the middle? The way things are going only the lowest shit jobs and the highest rolling in the dough jobs are going to be left in this country. You could raise the taxes for the wealthy to support the lower classes but then they'll just move their assets out of the country to. Then what happens to the US? Nothing good.

Remember all those sci fi books where machines, ultra-cheap foreign labor, and the affordablity of shipping stuff around turned the USA into a flat broke smoking hole in the ground? Welcome to the future. Maybe if I get some bitchin swords I can deliver pizza.

Re:Welcome to the Global Economy.

[flacco]

No, you know what happens? Goods become cheaper and better. I don't have to pay through the nose because some guy thinks he should get $40/hour just to enter numbers into some data base or make a powerpoint presentation. Things become more affordable, more people can afford them, and everyone's quality of life goes up. THAT is what happens.

Yeah, I've noticed how affordable those Athlete-endorsed sneakers are now that they pay foreign labor sub-subsistence wages to make their product. They're down to - what - $175 now?

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Ties into an earlier Posting...

[SerpentMage]

My wife who like me is a GenX'r is now a manager in charge of hiring programmers, etc.

Well when the topic of GenX's who cannot get work came up in SlashDot I talked this over with my wife. She yeah she hires young programmers. I asked how come? She said that they learn quicker and are more flexible.

I looked at her with amazement and said HUH? Are you bs'ing me? I said you are just as bad as those other managers. Promptly I pointed out that I can learn very quickly, etc, etc. She said, but fine that is you, but not me. I have problems learning these days in contrast to previous years. And GenX's demand too much.

What I learned from this is as follows:

1) Managers suck! They look at their own perspective and think the rest of world must be like that.

2) People like to validate sterotypes. ONLY young people can learn new technologies and are flexible.

3) GenX's are screwed!

Re:Ties into an earlier Posting...

[Anonymous Coward]

Divorce the bitch. Get a younger one. That will change her tune.

Re:Ties into an earlier Posting...

[krumms]

What I learned from this is as follows:

1) Managers suck! They look at their own perspective and think the rest of world must be like that.

2) People like to validate sterotypes. ONLY young people can learn new technologies and are flexible.

3) GenX's are screwed!

I like to think of myself as a pretty fast learner - I'm 19, doing the rounds at uni, and have taught myself a bunch of different programming languages ranging from PHP and Python to C/C++ and Java.

However, I fail to see the logic behind the idea that 'young people learn faster'. A person's ability to learn is not a function of their age.

I know for a fact, through all the personal research I've done into things related to software engineering, that in order to do the job properly a little more care (read: 'time') has to be taken to plan things out in advance. The inexperienced software engineer, otoh, will run into the problem and solve it with little thought - often resulting in a monolithic, incohesive mess that's impossible to extend should the need ever arise.

I know for a fact that most students my age don't give a fuck about good software engineering practices - 'software engineering principles' to them is just another unit to study up to the exam and then forget about. So they'll get out of uni and will no doubt get a job somewhere developing software, and most of them will do a shit job. But they're fast, and if they're fast, they make the managers look good in the short term. If the managers are made to look good, then they're going to keep doing what they're doing.

So I think it's not that managers 'look from their own perspective', but that they seek professional recognition from their bosses. And in order to stay 'competitive', so to speak, with other hirers-and-firers, they work towards what's best for them - not what's best for the company.

And besides, your wife has no argument. What the fuck sort of a reason is 'they can learn quicker'? So what? Seasoned developers have less to learn anyway!

I have problems learning these days in contrast to previous years. And GenX's demand too much.

Don't take this the wrong way, but your wife's a fucking idiot. Last I checked, you get what you pay for - and at the moment I'd bet she's paying for green, poorly trained, ill experienced code monkeys.

Here's hoping somebody comes across the shitty code written by all the people she's hired, and raises the alarm.

Don't forget about the president!

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget about the president's impact on the economy.

It's been a long time since we've had such an idiot in the whitehouse: not elected, taking away your rights, giving disproportanate tax cuts to his wealthy friends, ignoring corporate execs who have cost the economy billions, fighting questionable wars.

He's making us into servants.

I remember way back when I had a job.

[sakusha]

Back when I was a young'n, we had these things called JOBS. We had to walk 5 miles through 6 foot snowdrifts just to get to work, then labored until we were exhausted. And we LIKED it!

It is a sad trend

[Alizarin Erythrosin]

That companies keep outsourcing things to foreign countries. Of course, it saves them money, but at what cost? As they do that, unemployment in the US will only rise. I guess the prospect of higher profit margins outshines the prospect of giving a hard-working American a job.

Ok, let's say that these things do allow for more investment into other markets. But with the US economy in the shape it is in right now, will these companies want to spend the money on possibly risky ventures into new markets, or just claim the money as profit and make all their execs super rich with fat bonuses.

Or maybe I'm bitter because I can't find a job.

Re:It is a sad trend

[Mistlefoot]

Just as YOU outsource to foreign countries.

See where your car is made, your shoes, your computer, tv - the list goes on. But you save money. The problem isn't your country as much as it is you. Pay more, buy local or take your share of the blame.

Re:It is a sad trend

[kurosawdust]

I'm not proposing to know what the solution is, but a big chunk of the problem is that consumers almost never see their purchases as having any effect other than having them end up with X less money and Y more stuff. A choice between two companies' products, one at $1.99 and one at $2.99 doesn't involve consideration of the companies' practices in the mind of the consumer (in fact, extraordinarily few consumers know the policies/histories of _any_ companies whose products they buy). The choice is simply 2.99 > 1.99, therefore I'll go with the 1.99.

I dont mean to imply that I thoroughly research Wonder Bread's history of its management's dealings with labor before i buy a loaf; i have no clue what the companies who make most of the products i buy do, and (this is the worse problem, IMO) even when i do find out horrible things about companies, they rarely stick in my head long enough to affect purchasing decisions.

I think the incredible penetration of advertising into the culture and average person's home is partly to blame as well - for every one report of Nike's child-labor dealings a person sees on the news, how many Nike ads does that person see? 10? 100? 1,000?

Sorry, rambling. Just some thoughts to exercise my hands and burn up good karma :P

Interesting trend...

[TWX]

I've noticed that lots of people who were highly paid during the dotcom boom are not recovering well, despite the existence of jobs, only requiring a little bit of creativity to find them. I wouldn't say that things are in the overinflated state they were, with people being paid $100K for basic system administration, but jobs can be found. I think that the problem is that most of the people who were making the insane dollars they were don't want to take on a $30K-$40K job, even if basic administration or technician work will pay the bills. They can't forget the lavish lifestyles that they lived.

I was affected by it too, for I managed to get out of field techin' to start doing Quality Assurance Engineering. That job lasted a year. When it ended, I looked for other QA jobs, basic IS admin jobs, and the like, and I ended having to go back to what I knew very well, which was field tech. It's not the most fun, the most glamourous, but it does pay the rent, gets me away from a desk all day, and doesn't leave me sitting at home feeling dejected for myself for being unemployed for months and months.

If the market picks up, and QA positions become available in the money and stability that I want, I may leave my current job for one. Until that time arrives, I'm going to be happy where I am. It's not perfect, but life isn't fair, and those that get off their asses and try to make something for themselves will be a lot happier than those who give up.

Solution? Try a different career...

[Rinikusu]

I know it's not glamorous, but think about it...
All of my computer-industry related friends bemoan the state of the industry, in general. Those of us who have jobs face lower pay, longer hours, and general harassment by management, as management knows if we don't, there's 10 others out there that will. Talk about bum luck.
However, most of my friends who are skilled "trademen" of some sort are all working. They may not make the big bucks (although most of them still make in the $12-15 range locally, which is a decent sum), they're working. And when there's no work, well, it's time to kick back and relax. Isn't this what life's supposed to be about? (fortunately, there's never been a prolonged period of no-work for them, I can imagine a long spout would trigger the same anxieties we've faced: How are we gonna pay the rent? Food? Utilities? Of course, most of them fall into the "Fuck the rent, I'm getting a tattoo" category, but that's another story). What do they do?
Plumbers. People still shit and piss and pipes still get clogged.
HVAC. Gotta have A/C in the summer and heat in the winter around here (your mileage may vary depending upon your locale).
Welders.
Construction workers (ever see Office Space?)
Painters
Tilesetters
Manual Laborers.

Like I said, it's not glamorous, but you may actually find you enjoy doing such work. And it adds to your skillset in general (Ever see those Carlton Sheets ads? Buy property, fix it up yourself, sell for profit. In today's economy, the interest rates are spot on and lots of property is available on the cheap). And it gets you out of the house. Your parents will be proud.

Bartending

[ari_j]

Not to give up my secret or anything, but I've figured out how to get through this, for me at least...

When you were laid off/graduated college to discover no jobs available/etc., where did you go first? Same place I did, I bet. The bar. And you probably spend most of the money you do come up with right there, tipping those bartenders that best help you drink away the economy...

So I just completed bartending school, and I'm already fighting off job offers. A perfect complement to my CS degree for sure, based on my new economic theory.

my experience

[ramzak2k]

I was laid off four months ago from a software development firm with 170 others working with me. In those four months - i had only 2 interviews (with one leading to an offer very recently) & i consider myself lucky to have had those because many of my collegues are yet to get their first call.

The four month period was a interesting experience & here are some things i learned/did in that time:
1. Remind yourself "often" that it is not your fault. Economy is bad and nothing stays that way forever.

2. Network: I created a simple discussion forum on my server (http://www.toastforums.com/) and asked all my 170 peers to register. It turned out to be very useful in discussing subjects like - how to get our unemployment benefits & severence packages/Over Time pay from our old firm. Many of them started posting job opportunities too as soon as they found themselves in a job.

3. Actively prepare towards something : How about a certification that those recruiters so much like ? Or simply read tech forums and keep updated on any new thing on your subject that shows up. This gave me an artificial feeling of getting somewhere which was very useful to keep my hopes floating.

4. Apply to every ridiculous job on the web, even to those recruiters with fake job descriptions. This could seem like a futile effort with many not even drawing a "hi there, i got you email response". But, again - its one of those exercises that help in keeping a healthy hope alive.

Thats about it.

Re:Will anything be done in developed countries?

[panaceaa]

I'm not an economist, but this is how I understand it:

International inbalance in supply and demand is mostly solved through exchange rate fluctuations. When jobs and investment are move out of the US, the American exchange rate is drops. This is because the things Americans make are too expensive compared to equivalents offered by other economies. But as the exchange rate gets lower, things become more affordable to other countries. And as it lowers, at some point the exchange rate will drop to a level where things are as affordable as they used to be. Trading will resume at the same level it used to in US dollars, even though people outside the US will be paying less for the same goods and services. Ignoring worker efficiency improvements, at this point the economy will return to normal.

However, the great tech boom of the 90s did a lot to improve worker efficiency. Now that corporate revenues are lower, companies are finally starting to implement systems for their cost savings. Software such as Enterprise Resource Management and Customer Relationship Management tools reduce the need for workers, while the Internet allows workers to be moved to more affordable locations. These technologies are causing the recovery to take longer, but at some time the supply and demand will be rebalanced.

Re:*cough* 30's? *cough*

[MikeFM]

Obviously, you don't know many dot bomb coders. I've known several that have struggled to eat, pay rent, and other basics. Especially those that are fresh out of school and didn't get any of the riches from the boom. The fucking IT market was flooded by schools pushing through no talent, no interest folks that just wanted the big paychecks. Now it's a real bitch to prove you actually know what you're doing. Several years of job experience? Means nothing now. People with several years of job experience and a couple degrees are lucky to keep decent jobs. If you live outside major cities your doubly screwed. Nobody is paying to relocate fresh hires these days and most won't even give you an interview if you're out of area. A lot of coders are being forced to compete for jobs flipping burgers in order to stay fed themselves. Did you ever try to apply for a job at Burger King when the 18yo manager hiring you can't even pronounce the qualifications on your resume? Uhh huh. I'll teach those smart asses the meaning of overqualified!

In related news....

[ebbomega]

Another Anonymous Coward loses his job due to Chronic Foot In Mouth syndrome.

Right. You have a job. You got job security? You got the code to prove it? Doesn't mean a licking difference, because a faltering economy means just that: FALTERING. Your job exists now, but will it in a year, month, week or will you get a pink slip tomorrow?

How do you know you won't be knocking on IBM's doors praying to be let in or accepting some shit job like Game Testing for EA or something like that? Because, frankly, there is zero job security in the tech world today.

And it was foolish...

[TWX]

... for companies to do so. Many were hiring people just to have them available to them for work. They never gave them anything revolutionary to work on (by and large), and ended up wasting them. It was a bad investment, planning for something that didn't pan out.

It didn't help that people *flocked* to technical programs at universities, forcing excessive weed-out classes to reduce admissions numbers. I ended up ceasing to ccontinue with my CSE major not because I didn't want to learn the trade to do something that I liked, working with computers in newer, exciting ways, but because I didn't want to do group projects with people who had no idea what a spreadsheet was, and we all were to be basically graded on the performance of the lowest member of the group. (yes, I am bitter)

People flocked to the programs for the money. There's no money now, and there are a lot of trained people who are very upset about not being able to make a five year career on a four year education. This is one fad that died.

I believe that it'll level out again, and that suitable numbers of college-training-required technical jobs will come back, but hopefully this period of bust will be remembered, and the trend won't repeat for a long time.

Re:*cough* 30's? *cough*

[malia8888]

I worked early in my life as a "headhunter" for corporate America. This gave me a rather different view of applicants for jobs than they have of themselves.

For example, from the Fortune article: Klinck earned more than $200,000 a year at MetLife, managed more than 1,000 people, and knows languages and programs ranging from Fortran to PeopleSoft, but cold-calling for jobs has been--well, cold.

I hope that Mr. Klinck reads my post and finds it useful. Klinck's problem or anyone at his high level in the employment food chain is that there are very few companies who could afford him. The "Catch-22" is that even if he says he will take a salary cut in half--$100,000--companies won't believe he will live happily on this relative pittance. He is screwed in corporate America.

Unless he is very lucky and lands a MetLife clone job, his best bet is to hire himself. Mr. Klinck has very little choice other than to become self-employed. He is the only person/company who can afford to hire him.

solution to national debt

[js7a]

It would be easy to get rid of the U.S. national debt, if we didn't have the lowest tax rate of all but one of the industrialized nations. Take a look at the country with the highest tax rate as a fraction of GDP, Sweden; they have very responsible debt levels (unlike ours), along with 4% unemployment (we just hit a nine-year record high above 6%) and very reasonable 2.2% inflation. Moreover, Sweden is way ahead of the U.S. in the only way known to make more citizens. While Sweden is the best place to raise kids, the U.S. has increasing crime rates (which tend to correlate with unemployment), and therefore likely soon-to-be-decreasing property values.

What is Sweden's secret? Progressive taxation. Average production workers in Sweden pay no income tax to their central government because the bottom bracket starts about a tenth above the average production worker's salary. The Swedish tax rate is typically about 57% of income earned above that base. Sweden only has two central government tax brackets: 0% and 25%, so their "federal" taxes are actually closer to the "flat tax" than ours are in the U.S. The additional 32% or so varies by local jurisdiction, as does the income bracket at which it takes effect.

The problem in the U.S. is that top-bracket income earners (including corporations, medium-sized businesses, and most of the top 1% rich, excluding some of the prominent top rich in the media spotlight) pay a huge amount of money in order to help elect government officials who will keep the top tax brackets low. This effectivly "saves" them an even larger amount of money, except for the externalities like crime rate, debt, and property values. We used to have regulations providing equal air time for federal candidates, but Reagan's FCC did away with those, so most candidates today, even most nationally prominent Democrats, sure know which side of their bread is buttered on. There are some notable exceptions, however.

Re:solution to national debt

[javiercero]

You sir know nothing about "moving money"

" Yeah, people are really worried about the long term ability of the US to pay its deb"

Acutally they are, why with continuous tax cuts under the Bush administration. People who are investing in dollars are getting the signal that the US is in no hurry to pay its debt. Therefore they are funneling all their money into Euros, because they can liquify their investment quicker when dealing with the European Central Bank. The federal reserve can not guarantee the current issuing of debt to 3th parties. And that is a fact, most Americans are unaware of how capitalism works, and that is quite sad.

Look at it this way, you have a "friend" who just asked you for money. At the same time you find out that he is buying a brand new car, house, stereo, whatever. And at the same time you have found out htat his employment status has been demoted from branch manager to the guy that has to flip the burgers. So common senes tells you that his income has been dramatically reduced, while his expenses have skyrocketed. Just after you find out (and he is making no effort to hide these facts in fact he is quite proud of his new lower position in the workplace and he drives his shinny porche everywhere), your friend comes asking you for more money even though he still has not payed back hte money he borrowed before. Mind that during the same time you have had to deal with a much more tight budget for yourself, i.e. you have to drive your old crappy car and you do not want to buy much stuff (you like to keep you bank balance in check).... so tell me: Will you lend more money to your friend?

The US is sadly setting itself for some rude awakening. Then again, welcome to capitalism... now that people have an alternative to the dollar, the US economy may have to actually get real! The US really has nothing to back up the inmense debt staked against its currency. The only reason why the US was getting away with it for so long was because it was the defacto trading currency, hence people had to support the dollar (even though they were not too happy to do it), but now... there is an alternative. Buh bye monopoly, now there is a real competition.

If you are still thinking like the money traders of the 80's and before, you are setting yourself for a massive reality check. Fine with me though...

Re:solution to national debt

[Hobbex]

Get a clue before you start painting pictures of socialist wonderlands. Sweden is everything but a positive example.

Firstly, the unemployment rate. The Swedish government plays number games, and uses artificial means to suppress the "open" unemployment down to under 5%. In truth, if you start including the people who have been given early retirement because they were deemed unemployable, or those in different government reeducation or temporary placement programs, the unemployment rate is closer to 15%.

Average workers do pay income tax, and a lot of it, they just don't pay the central government tax. The 30-35% of the income paid to on the local level (and it isn't actually local either, because richer counties are taxed for the poorer ones) is paid by all. And that is not everything: there are hidden taxes on labour, in the form of taxes on companies for employing people: the true tax rate, including these, is closer to half for people with low incomes, and to two thirds for people with "high" incomes ("high" starts at around $35k - hardly considered high income in the States).

Sweden has not thrived under it's cleptocratic government. In the last thirty years, it has fallen from being the second or third richest nation in the world, down to being among the poorest of the western countries. In the EU only Portugal and Greece are poorer, and that looks likely to change. If Sweden had enjoyed the same economic growth since 1970 as the US, it's per capita GNP would have been double what it is today.

Sweden lacking in innovation and corporate growth as well. Entrepeneurs, skilled labor, and even large companies are leaving the country at alarming rates mostly driven out by the standard of living. With such high taxation on labor, purchasing services is beyond the reach of the typical family, which leads to stressful do everything yourself lives and a generally unhealthy population. American leftists often laud the less time Europeans spend at work, but in truth people here are more stressed because they spend that time at home doing things which the a middleclass American family can afford to pay for (the result of which is a less efficient society and destruction of potential wealth).

And for the highest taxes in the world, what do we get? Sweden is hardly a great place to live any more. Crime victimization rates are actually higher here then in the US (the US has more murders and gun crime - for obvious reasons) and the justice system has been on the brink of collapse for 15 years. A minority of all crimes even get investigates. There is state health care, but it involves long waiting lines, deteriorating service, and is in a constant state of crisis. The school system is also fairing ill - the education is sub par compared to the rest of the EU.

If you want this so bad, then please take it. Sweden is a country drowning under it's own system, and unable to do anything except continually raise the taxes and devalue it's currency, slowly consuming the countries entire post-war wealth. Only Thatcher and Reagan type reforms could begin to save it.

My Experience And Predictions

[Bloodmoon1]

Back when I was in highschool (Class '01), I was sold on taking Cisco classes at our Community College for the better part of my day all year. My initial plan was to graduate early, get a job doing whatever, but I went for Cisco instead because 1) It was 13 free college credits and 2) EVERYONE was telling me how I'd be making $30k/yr easy, probably even before I got out of college. Took the classes, got my CCNA in Nov. '01, right about the time the economy officially turned to shit. I worked making collection calls for Ford until 6-02 when I joined the AF, got a medical discharge 6 months ago, and now I can't find a job anywhere. I know my stuff, I'm a CCNA, but I can't get a job. I do mean anywhere to. I never had a problem getting jobs when I was in high school, but now that I have a diploma, some college, a professional cert., and some life experience, I'm having to dig through the my sofa for change for food or gas.

Now, I'm really not trying to sound like I'm bitching, because I'm not, I'm just recounting my experience. I'm also not saying all those people who told me Cisco was great screwed me, but rather, I think they we're just going with the info they knew to be true. Problem is their info was from '99 or so. Now all the IT jobs I can find open want more experience and skills than I think any human could have, and want to pay them something in line with McWages.

All in all, my whole experience has me actually wondering if IT is even going to be a viable career for long. For some reason, I see it going to something of a plumber type occupation. Very few places have a in-house plumber and only call one when they are need for their specialized skills. With computers becoming easier to use and more stable all the time, I can see IT people no longer needed on a day to day basis and instead delegated to being the IT plumbers. Seriously, have you ever seen one of Apple's XServe's? I don't think it can get much easier than that. Maybe I can be a teacher, seems like I'm always hearing about more of them being needed...

Re:My Experience And Predictions

[AvantLegion]

And this, kids, is why we actually FINISH college, mmmkay?

In a saturated market, the guys without college degrees are the first ones crossed off the list.

A master sells his creation...

[poptones]

...and a serf sells his time.

Prophetic words from potter George Ohr. What we are seeing is a cycle we are doomed to until we get over this mass consumerist mindset. Sure, you can go to wallyworld and buy tons of crap you couldn't afford before - but for what? I'm willing to bet 70% of everything that comes out of that place ends up in a landfill within three years.

If you look around you'll see some people still doing just fine - or even better than last year. $40,000 cars still sell and automakers are coming out with $100,000 cars. People I know who make high end home entertainment systems are still doing just fine. Why? Because the people who can afford that stuff aren't the ones whose jobs are being shipped overseas.

I hate how this sounds, but it all comes down to values. Not family values but simple common sense values - like spending twice as much on an article that will last five times as long. Like buying something that represents craftsmanship and community instead of a cheap chinese trinket you had to get in order to keep up with the neighbor.

It's everywhere - even on those "home improvment" type shows. Every week I laugh in disgust as Steve Thomas and the boys tell us how great this new styrafoam and plastic POS they are gluing to the front of their project of the month is when compared to the old, outdated plaster and woodwork that it's replacing - never mind it's a hundred fucking years old and just now in need of replacment - this new same-as-ten-thousand-others piece of crap is "just as good"... yeah, right.

You don't have to be a millionaire to buy good shit - you just have to learn to not drive yourself into debt buying truckloads of cheap crap. Until the people of the US can accept this most basic bit of common sense, it's all downhill.

But don't worry... all that infrastructure - the roads, the abandoned factories, the empty offices - will still be here, and all those jobs will come back... in twenty years, when the US economy has finally and completely hit the shitter and the people of the US will once again willingly work 12 hour days in sweatshops for peanuts - producing cheap american trinkets for the up-and-coming EU market and all those freshly minted eurotrash capitalists from the FSU.

My attempt to explain some economics

[Imperator]

IANAE

You got it mostly right. It's easier to look at it the other way: when foreigners want to invest in the US, they need dollars. Thus the demand for dollars increases, and the price level of the dollar will rise. (This is of course in an idealized world where that's the only thing going on at the time--ceteris peribus, as economists would say.) A similar thing happens when people in other countries want to buy American goods and services.

When the "value" (price) of the dollar goes up, it means Americans (who own lots of dollars) can afford to buy more PS2s because it takes fewer dollars to buy a yen than before. Unfortunately, the Japanese can't buy so many, uh, whatever they buy from us because it takes more yen to buy a single dollar. So our imports go up and our exports go down when we have a "strong" (high priced) dollar.

When the factors reverse, we have a weak dollar, and the opposite happens. We export more and import less. (Before you assume this is ideal, think what happens to the prices of consumer goods when competition from overseas is lessened.) As you might guess, the ideal value of the dollar relative to the yen (remember, the dollar might get stronger against the yen but weaker against the euro at the same time) is something the US and Japan might not agree on.

Now, about worker efficiency. Economists have a term for this: productivity. It's not just a buzzword: productivity can be measured in terms of product per man-hour. To find a (somewhat meaningless) national productivity, divide the GDP by the total number of hours worked. For a time in the 90s some economists in the Federal Reserve (which influences the economy, but that's beyond the scope of this post) thought that technology advances were pushing up productivity faster than usual, allowing the "natural rate of growth" of the American economy to increase. (Some even talked about the "end of the [boom-bust] business cycle", in the same way people talked about the "end of history" and other such nonsense.) So instead of aiming to grow GDP at say 3%, they though they could get away with 5%. The result of this was an economy that starting moving faster than the Fed could control it, finally spiraling into a recession. The truth of the matter is there's very little hard data to suggest that overall productivity grew any faster during the last ten years than at any other time in the postwar period.

Finally, consider that there are other major causes for this recession. For example, a collapse in consumer and business confidence. This has been caused partially by the post-9/11 hysteria, fueled by FOX News and color-coded alerts. Also contributing is the government's increasing deficits. Gingrich and his radicals forced Clinton to balance the budget, and that worked great in good times. Now that bad times have hit, the government is going a little crazy with deficit spending--some is good, but it should be targeted spending, not tax cuts to people who already have lots of discretionary income. Government deficits have all sorts of reprecussions in the economy, few of them good. Another cause has been the amount of corporate crime that has recently been revealed (e.g. Enron). Businesses have been getting away with more and more under the last 4 presidents, and it sure doesn't give people confidence to think "my company could be next--where will the food come from if I'm out of work?". So people are saving more, and an economy built on rising amounts of consumer debt is collapsing.

In the long run the current shake-up in the economy is health. That sure isn't comforting to the man on the street, though. If you don't like what's being done about it, remember to vote in 2004. That's the only way you'll get people in power that share your views, whatever they may be, on what should or should not be done for the economy in tough times.

The real reasons managers like younger employees

[miu]

Easier to bully. Cheaper.

Re:*cough* 30's? *cough*

[Da VinMan]

Just out of curiosity: Isn't it possible for people like Mr. Klinck to keep salary considerations off the table? If he states something like âoeSalary requirements: Negotiableâ or âoeFlexibleâ or something like that, wouldn't that be a good clue for a future employer that he may very well be happy with the $50K or whatever they have budgeted for the position?

I think this whole "over-qualified" thing is a bit ridiculous when people clearly are willing to take on positions for which they might seem over-qualified. I frankly don't understand what "over-qualified" means. If someone is willing to take on the position and the corresponding salary, then I think the company ought to congratulate themselves on filling the position with someone that has considerable experience. Additionally, that person will probably feel a measure of gratitude for the break and offer back to the company a measure of service and insight to which the company would not otherwise have access.

What am I missing here?

Re:*cough* 30's? *cough*

[jmo_jon]

What am I missing here?

You're missing that an over-qualified person typicaly would start looking for a better position quicker than a person who's 'just' qualified. Hireing someone costs money, you need to teach the person how your company works and therefor you want to keep your employers for a long time.

Like with fliping burgers, if you had an engineer and a teenager applying of course the teenager. (S)he is more likely to stay.

look again

[js7a]

1) [Sweden is] a small boutique economy

With their citizens enjoying 2.4 years more life expectancy than those of us in the U.S.

2) They have a ... homogeneous work force

In that they have a 99% literacy rate, while the U.S. has 97% (what a joke! As a certified literacy tutor, I can personally attest that the U.S. English literacy rate, including undocumented workers, is closer to 85%.)

3) Because they are a small country, they can depend on other countries for things like defense

They spend 2.1% of their GDP on defense.

4) since they are a small country, their economy is a tiny fraction of something like the US

Their economy is 69% services, whereas the U.S. economy is 80% services. Which do you think is more robust?

debt != good

[js7a]

That $44 trillion of US Federal debt provides a tremendious amount of liquidity to world financial markets....

Like $20,000 of consumer debt provides tremendous liquidity to Visa and MasterCard? No way; the national debt is simply a means of passing the buck to the next generation. If the U.S. wasn't selling debt, then that $7 trillion that U.S. common stocks lost since 1999 would likely still be in people's pension and college funds.

It wasn't too long ago that our leaders in the U.S. prided themselves that "the buck stops here." It wasn't too long ago that we had a budget surplus. These days, we have neither.

Eliminating it or even reducing it below certain levels wouldn't be a good thing.

A good thing for who? Osama bin Laden? Every dollar Uncle Sam pays off the debt is several cents per year saved in interest.

Both social security and medicare are in need of massive reform.

You can say that again. Next time, please try it without the pathetic rationalizations.

Re:First ask yourself this.....

[js7a]

A) Have you ever lived outside the United States for longer than one Month?

Yes, in Germany.

B) If Yes, Have you ever had to deal with a Non-U.S. Gov for anything important?

Yes, assuming you think having a child, obtaining a birth certificate, etc., is important.

C) If Yes, Do you know anyone that was born and raised within this country?

Yes, many people.

D) If Yes, What does this person think about their system of government/taxation/health care/social services?

I would be hard pressed to find a single German citizen in a thousand who prefers the U.S. work week and typical vacation schedule. So their taxes are higher, so they get more time off. It's a wash. TANSTAAFL.

A challenge and questions for all /.ers

[Bull999999]

1. Many of you are complaining that you are putting in 60+ hours at work for low pay. May of you also have ideas on how a business should be run. Why not combine your willingness to put in great number of hours and great business ideas and run your own business?

2. We as consumers put mom and pop stores out of business because it is cheaper to shop at Wal-Mart, Costco, etc. Then why are we suprised that businesses are laying people off for cheaper labor overseas?

3. If we tax the shit out of businesses, won't they encourage them to cut costs by laying more people off?

4. For people who invest, do you not invest with hope that you'll make money off of your investment? Since share holders elect board members who in turn hires CEOs, why are you suprised when CEOs act in the interests of the shareholds?