What causes unemployment?

[Drakken]

I wonder if this is a Quebec thing then. I know plenty of people who did pure data processing and then switched to client service.  I, myself, began on the client service side (did minor analysis, stats were outsourced) but I think many a company would benefit from researchers/analysts who were more data focused - and hence why they got brought up here and there when they apply for such positions.

Hence why, before I jump ship, I plan to have a talk with my bosses to let them know that I would like to have more responsabilities, and ask them what are the plans for me in the next five years for someone with my expertise and experience (I have been both data analyst and data processing manager, after all). My President and vice-presidents are my direct bosses on-site, after all.

If you don't ask you'll never know.

[Ideologue]

But in the nearer term, take your average McDonald's or Wal-Mart, and cut staffing needs by 90%.  Where do they go?  When you can answer that question, I will consider the argument refuted.  But I do not believe it is instructive to rely on the example of the fields emptying into the cities.  There is no sector to absorb the redundant.

I can see two possible futures once that happens: either humans are enhanced so that everyone can actually contribute with creative tasks, or a small elite will provide panem et circenses for large class of unemployed citizens.

Yeah, enhancement is actually an option, although my post was long and sci-fi enough.  Iirc, Stephen Hawking (granted, neither an economist nor a geneticist, but he' famous ) said something to the effect that it's a race between the maturation of artificial intelligence and genetic engineering.

Drak: life partner?  You must be the anti-Martinus, because I don't think you ever mentioned that.

[garbon]

I wonder if this is a Quebec thing then. I know plenty of people who did pure data processing and then switched to client service.  I, myself, began on the client service side (did minor analysis, stats were outsourced) but I think many a company would benefit from researchers/analysts who were more data focused - and hence why they got brought up here and there when they apply for such positions.

Hence why, before I jump ship, I plan to have a talk with my bosses to let them know that I would like to have more responsabilities, and ask them what are the plans for me in the next five years for someone with my expertise.

If you don't ask you'll never know.

Agreed, although I'd also say that you don't have to give up on the whole field. Plenty of market research outfits want their analysts/researchers to be familiar with stats programs.  As long as you can speechify a bit about want to help clients and the importance of analysis, you could go far - well around here, at least.

[Caliga]

Plumber = great choice, dude.  Seriously.  I've probably paid $10K to plumbers since I first got a house.

My great-great grandfather had to drop out of medical school in the 1880s because his mother lost their fortune, and ended up apprenticing as a plumber.  His son followed in his footsteps and by the time he died (he was killed in a car accident in 1969) he had a plumbing company with like 40 plumbers working for him.  They had a mansion in northeast Philadelphia with (black  ) servants, three cars, etc.  Even through the Depression he still did extremely well, because people didn't stop shitting even then.

[Tamas]

Plumber = great choice, dude.  Seriously.  I've probably paid $10K to plumbers since I first got a house.

My great-great grandfather had to drop out of medical school in the 1880s because his mother lost their fortune, and ended up apprenticing as a plumber.  His son followed in his footsteps and by the time he died (he was killed in a car accident in 1969) he had a plumbing company with like 40 plumbers working for him.  They had a mansion in northeast Philadelphia with (black  ) servants, three cars, etc.  Even through the Depression he still did extremely well, because people didn't stop shitting even then.

Not sure how much this is a deviation from the topic as I wasnt reading the thread for a while, but I think the apparent obsession with college degrees is not only causing all kinds of troubles, but also rather foolish.

In an urbanizing, specializing world a good craftmanship could become very profitable. Not make-you-super-rich profitable, but allowing for a decent honest living.
And sure it is less comfortable than telcoing ad infinitum as a project manager, but more useful

[Malthus]

The problem is that the chances to be a "big time" anything are pretty low these days. Is there any field people wishing to make a lot of money really ought to be exploring?

Perhaps some sort of entrepreneurship in the skilled trades - say, becomming a plumber or electrician, with the goal of running a firm of plumbers or electricians. I dunno.

That's pretty much the way I settled for. I return to professional high school next year to learn plumbery with that exact plan in mind : working a few years to create myself a clientele and experience, and build my own business. I do it because I find it inconceivable that passed 30, after years of service, I would still be payed below the Canadian or even Quebec's average net salary. So I go where the money is, even if it means doing manual labor. I consider my years of university a few years wasted of my youth that led nowhere but to idle dreams, and my diploma a useless piece of paper.

Construction is the only sector with currently a massive demand for workers and actually paying bigger money for it : First year of apprenticeship would pay me 50% more of my actual salary - after five years of service.

I don't agree with CC - our generation is getting shafed big time and the promise that openings would come as the baby boomers weed themselves off toward retirement ended up untrue : either they stay or their job get closed by attrition. When a big chunk of your age bracket literally begs to work for free as interns, something's utterly wrong. It is white-collar employment paid way, way below minimum wage or fruit-handling Mexican labor. So what people perceive as "entitlement" is simply asking to be given decent wage to live, create a family, and finance a house through mortgage like their parents did.

Way I see it, there is a lot of class-based inertia - that is, kids want a university/professional education and not one in the trades because an office type job is seen as more prestigeous. Though with cubicle monkeys being paid diddly these days, dunno if that is true anymore ...

[Malthus]

Plumber = great choice, dude.  Seriously.  I've probably paid $10K to plumbers since I first got a house.

My great-great grandfather had to drop out of medical school in the 1880s because his mother lost their fortune, and ended up apprenticing as a plumber.  His son followed in his footsteps and by the time he died (he was killed in a car accident in 1969) he had a plumbing company with like 40 plumbers working for him.  They had a mansion in northeast Philadelphia with (black  ) servants, three cars, etc.  Even through the Depression he still did extremely well, because people didn't stop shitting even then.

This being my point - but just like not every law student ends up as a big-time rainmaker (or even a middling regulatory lawyer  ), not every plumbing apprentice ends up owning their own company - I actually have no idea which course, if pursued today, would on average lead to the money.

[Eddie Teach]

Drak: life partner?  You must be the anti-Martinus, because I don't think you ever mentioned that.

I thought Drakken enjoyed being the sleazy guy in the bar mouthing lame pickup lines. 

[Monoriu]

This being my point - but just like not every law student ends up as a big-time rainmaker (or even a middling regulatory lawyer  ), not every plumbing apprentice ends up owning their own company - I actually have no idea which course, if pursued today, would on average lead to the money.

Office work is the only way.  Even if the pay is the same, at least the office monkey sits in an air-conditioned room, instead of having to deal with someone else's shit 

[Barrister]

Drak: life partner?  You must be the anti-Martinus, because I don't think you ever mentioned that.

I thought Drakken enjoyed being the sleazy guy in the bar mouthing lame pickup lines. 

Nah - D has said he has a girlfriend.  Just that he won't ever marry her is all.

[Grey Fox]

I think about becoming a plumber too but I'm not very handy.

[Malthus]

Drak: life partner?  You must be the anti-Martinus, because I don't think you ever mentioned that.

I thought Drakken enjoyed being the sleazy guy in the bar mouthing lame pickup lines. 

Naw, I thought Drakken just enjoyed all of the fame, respect and glory of being thought to be the sleazy guy in the bar mouthing lame pickup lines.   

[Malthus]

This being my point - but just like not every law student ends up as a big-time rainmaker (or even a middling regulatory lawyer  ), not every plumbing apprentice ends up owning their own company - I actually have no idea which course, if pursued today, would on average lead to the money.

Office work is the only way.  Even if the pay is the same, at least the office monkey sits in an air-conditioned room, instead of having to deal with someone else's shit 

There is indeed that.

But they guy who owns a plumbing company also gets to sit in an office ... 

[garbon]

I think a lot of office workers are still way overpaid.  Any Drakken, look into what I said, there's definitely opportunity out there - maybe more on the market research side than just the pure opinion research but methods are virtually the same so I don't see what would hamper you ---- unless of course you are as socially gifted as you are here.

[Ideologue]

I think a lot of office workers are still way overpaid.

Well I know one who is.  ZING!