pax said:
Merit has its place but its been way overplayed.
Not on white collar professions. A good engineer, lawyer, or doctor can be ten times as productive as a mediocre one. One John Carmack can put out 10 times the amount of efficient, debugged, and relevant code than 10 graphic programmers with the same number of years working.
Just look at the number of people who enter the workforce during economic upturns.
Obscured by migration and immigration. California had a huge surge in its workforce during the 90s. Was that unemployed engineers returning to work, or was it millions of immigrants, new graduates, and illegal mexicans flowing into the economy?
The stats hide a lot of unemployment. Also look at what it takes for one to be taken into the unemployment stats. You must work less than 10 hrs a week and present yourself to your UI agent regularly.
Wrong
From BLS.GOV said:
Some people think that to get these figures on unemployment the Government uses the number of persons filing claims for unemployment insurance (UI) benefits under State or Federal Government programs. But some people are still jobless when their benefits run out, and many more are not eligible at all or delay or never apply for benefits. So, quite clearly, UI information cannot be used as a source for complete information on the number of unemployed.
It is done as a large survey every week, and to be classified as unemployed you need only express that you are still looking or want to work, or, you were layed off and expect to be recalled.
If you did work for pay (even if only 10 hours a week) you are classified as employed, and I certainly think that is correct.
At best, it's "underemployment" not unemployment, and you can argue until you're blue in the face over it since no one knows how to scientifically measure it, it is frequently used as an "out" by liberals who can't deal with economic figures.
If labor markets were that tight wages would be significantly going up. They arent.
Bzzt, they went up majorly in the late 90s for all income quintiles. Moreover, for
educated workers, they went up tremendously. My salary went up by $10,000 per year almost every year I worked. I started at $20k, now I make $140k. That's not counting stock options, bonuses, and other benefits (vacation, medical, etc) Ditto for my wife who is not exactly a top-tier computer programmer.
A huge number of MBAs and computer graduates fresh out of school started out as high as $70k. During the 90s, companies were paying up to $10,000 finder fees to anyone who could suggest an application. They were giving away $10,000 signing bonuses, and in one example I know of, giving each new employee (even junior programmers) BMWs.
Now the job market is facing an oversupply because of the economic downturn, but this is life. White collar Jobs are being outsourced to Indians overseas.
I figure, if my skills become irrelevent enough that I can replaced by someone in Bangalore, then I need to brush up my skills and make myself a more valuable product.
