Men being discarded from labor force.

[FrankOneParticipant 1442]

I’ve had good success with STEM (Engineering degree). But I regard the job issue as more of a dichotomy; for recent graduates, finding employment is a BITCH. Without experience, and spending years outside their field, the problem snowb~~~~. I saw this with recent graduates during the Great Recession period. They are then competing with new graduates. I was literally, seeing freshly coined Engineers working as lab techs and chemical plant operators. Ultimately, that was good experience, though — at least working in their field, and ready to move up when the economy improved.

In contrast, for experienced workers with a wide range of skills, finding employment is EASY. You do have to keep on top of your discipline. I expect I will find I am slightly less sought-after in another couple years when I turn 50, from what I’ve read — but I haven’t even found that with other older, highly qualified engineers.

There are also sectors that are boom-bust; e.g. oil & gas — during the busts, expect to get fired if you work in those fields.

I would agree Jan, there are some STEM fields that don’t pay as much — so it’s important to make a distinction amongst S and TEM. Take, for instance, Chemistry vs Chemical Engineering. I elected to go the Chem Engineering route, partly because I liked Engineering, but also because the starting salary is about $30K more for a BSChE than a BSChem.

You will also find this to be the case for Biology. ESPECIALLY if you have ONLY a BS in Chemistry or Biology. So yes, the ‘S’ in STEM may well be over-rated, and this has been the subject of articles http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/09/why-the-s-in-stem-is-overrated/279931/

A foreigner may well be able to do my job for $5K in his country. But my job requires residing here, it can’t be done remotely. And even if H1B Visas quotas are increased, foreign workers must still suffer the same cost of living as domestic workers. And offshoring of design work by engineering firms has often proved disastrous due to communications problems.

[HitmanParticipant]

Civil service.
Best game going.
Benefits and a pension. .
Job security.
No outsourcing.
Think a city bus driver can’t become a millionaire? ..
Think again.
As long as you don’t get married !

[BoarParticipant]

Anonymous wrote:

Automation is only going to get worse.

Yup. That is something I have had my eye for a long time now. And guess what, I hear rumors that China is looking to automate!

Underlying all of this is one question that leaves me feeling uneasy: there are more people alive than ever before and how much of our technology is designed to save labor?

I have been toying with starting a post about that question in the philosophy forum. I would value different perspectives because I see no viable answer for this.

Untamed wrote: Quit complaining and Go Your Own Way in whatever manner suits you best.

[sidecarParticipant 35862]

Tuneout wrote:

Careful with that too,I know several landlords and they curse their tenants,always on call,repairing something,
BS excuses about rent ect,trying to find that one good tenant is about as useless as searching for your Unicorn!

Which is why you need to be as careful about choosing your investment properties and choosing your tenants as you should be about picking stocks. Like with anything you have to do your homework.

Jan Sobieski wrote:

Chinese Radiologists read your X-rays. One company I worked at had Indians doing most of the IT support.

And do you know who to blame for that? Single mothers on welfare.

Chinese and Indian workers can afford to charge less for their services because their cost of living is so much lower there. And the cost of living is so much lower because the government isn’t siphoning of a pound of flesh from every transaction to buy votes form feckless single mothers. And that’s only the tip of the iceberg. Don’t get me started on all the f~~~ing regulations.

[AntipathyParticipant 4901]

The problem isn’t necessarily a lack of skills. My brother has a masters in programming, and is forced to take contracts.

Hitman wrote:

Less jobs means less money.
Less money means less pussy.
Less pussy means less headaches.

Lmao

Thinking outside the box 🙂

[FrankOneParticipant 1442]

Jan.Sobieski wrote:

Chinese Radiologists read your X-rays. One company I worked at had Indians doing most of the IT support.

Sidecar wrote: And do you know who to blame for that? Single mothers on welfare.

Chinese and Indian workers can afford to charge less for their services because their cost of living is so much lower there. And the cost of living is so much lower because the government isn’t siphoning of a pound of flesh from every transaction to buy votes form feckless single mothers. And that’s only the tip of the iceberg. Don’t get me started on all the f~~~ing regulations.

[/quote]

Partially true. Cost of living impacts wages/salaries profoundly. I could make a lot more in California than in the Rust Belt, but housing and other costs are much higher.

The second part, I disagree with. Feckless single mothers (a.k.a. ‘welfare queens’) are indeed a drag on the economy, but welfare was reformed in the US; AFDC became TANF; the T in TANF, as in ‘Temporary’. After welfare reform, spending in this particular area declined: http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/how-welfare-reform-left-single-moms-behind/361964/ — but of course, this doesn’t include EBT, Section 8, and wealth transfers from financial divorce rape/child support.

Countries with high personal and corporate income taxes must pay employees more. I would argue that, along with supply vs demand in a particular field, set wages. The Social Security ponzi scheme and many other government boondoggles, contribute much more to making America less competitive than TANF. Of course, we should get rid of TANF, along with Agricultural subsidies, the Dept. of Education, etc. And allow civil society charities to play this role, as they did before the Era of Big Gooberment.

I asked a couple hourly workers what EBT stood for, then I told them I thought it stood for ‘Eating Better than You’. I commented the system was a racket, but at least now, compared to the 1990’s when people tried to sell me food stamps discounted, outside a grocery store, it was at least electronic and you couldn’t sell them. One of them educated me/corrected me, that, even after switching to a credit card with photo ID required, people still sold food stamps — they’d go shopping with you. One even said he did this routinely to buy groceries, and another nearly punched him, saying he was paying taxes to buy the other guy’s groceries! I commented, if the druggie didn’t sell to his work colleague, he’s sell it to somebody else, and that he was just recouping his tax dollars, and the other guy should do the same. I jokingly called it his ‘patriotic duty to support addiction’, and told him he needed one of those ‘work harder millions on welfare depend on you’ bumper stickers.

That is, he went shopping with a welfare recipient who bought his groceries, and he gave the individual cash (less than the value of the EBT), so the individual could buy drugs/alcohol/cigarettes.

Total welfare spending is about 7% of total combined federal+state+local mob spending: http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/year_spending_2016USdn_17ds2n_F0#usgs302

[Maraudrz1Participant 2250]

Hitman wrote:

Less jobs means less money.
Less money means less pussy.
Less pussy means less headaches.

Hey Hitman, Is it ok if I use this? I love it.

Women's brains and vagina have one thing in common. There is nothing in there until a man puts something in there.

[Anonymous 0]

This is kinda why I get angry when I see men drop out/ don’t get skills. I’m not saying college but do something to make sure you have a future. Something. I know it isn’t popular to say this but make sure you have a plan.

[/quote] Hey I’m still in school. I know I made a thread about dropping and kind of did. But just took some time off now going to the same school but doing classes online. I’m thinking of getting a degree in accounting or business. My photography is going okay I have to get way better and since then had some people I shot for free and paid. I now learn from youtube and this website called creativelive. When you msg me (sorry didn’t write back) made me realise I can’t let them win.

[RealityBitesParticipant 2201]

I’ll chime in on this topic.
Most guys I know who are in my age group (50’s) would rather work than collect disability. But unfortunately applying for a job when you are in your 50’s is light years different than when you are in your 20’s or 30’s. There is a LOT of age discrimination going on.

I personally witnessed first hand; in the same room: some comments made by some young people on some job candidates for VP of Engineering, and their were comments: He’s too old.
I personally experienced what it was like trying to find a job when the market took a downturn and my company went under. It took over 2 1/2 years of busting my butt sending out hundreds of resumes; and just getting a tiny handful of interviews before I managed to get another job.

And that was when I was 40.

So I can understand the reason for a lot of older guys who just throw in the towel on upgrading their skills and looking for work and taking disability instead.

I have 2 STEM degrees as well as experience with .NET and Java programming with databases (SQL Server and Oracle). I also have experience as a SQA Engineer writing automated test scripts; and experience doing reliability engineering….and in spite of all of this…I had a hell of a time getting a job.

Bailed out of the private sector and now work in the public sector making less than 70% of what I made in private industry. Also built and am a co-owner of a business on the side.

Going to retire in 8 years, then live on a sailboat. Will deliver boats for cash on the side, and engage in the backpacker trade between Columbia and Panama ferrying college students on a boat with a stopover at the San Blas’ Islands (all cash under the table)

Average cost to live on a sailboat is 20K per year (that includes everything, Fuel, food, maintenance, docking fees, cruising permits, a large liquor bill, eating on shore, etc). It gets significantly cheaper if you cut out going to bars and you anchor instead of tying up at a dock or a mooring buoy. It is entirely possible to do it on the cheap at about $900 per month. But you’ll pay later on if you skimp on maintenance.

[Agent SmithParticipant 71]

Get into the IT & Technology sector if you’re still able to, and whilst you still can. Never had any employment issues and there’s hardly any women. Been a full-stack web dev for several years and now work in devops and support/solutions engineering etc. but really it’s a broad role that tackles pretty much anything and everything – so I’m constantly learning new things all the time. You don’t necessarily need a degree, but definitely some experience e.g. personal/freelance projects on GitHub, portfolio, certifications and such.

If you’re in the UK and need some help or interested in this area or struggling getting on the career ladder then let me know. 🙂

[DorkShitParticipant 4353]

Yes, automation is here.

My John Galt friend judges people’s abilities by how many buttons it would take him to replace them.

A woman once blocked him by telling him that his request is like everyone else’s and she would get to it in turn.

John spent the weekend writing vb code and sent her an email sunday that contained one button that said “click me”.

Monday morning she clicked the button and watched as her computer did her job. John had a box open that said “go get your coffee, I’ve got this.” She went to John and agreed to pass his stuff through first.

He filters his email and 90 percent are auto replied. People think they are dealing with a human. He left the company and was recruited back 6 months later. He said that his email had continued since IT only deleted his name account that he doesn’t use for work. He uses sub group account’s. People commented that they didn’t know he was gone.

This is an example of stealth.

Peace brothers

[SkeptiskParticipant 3679]

http://money.cnn.com/2013/02/26/news/economy/over-50-unemployables/

This is pretty old news, but reliable.

The reason is that corporations finds it’s easier to employ younger people who they can ‘break in’ into their jobs/culture. So, I’d always say it’s smart to have a back-up plan.

"Expecting to find a decent woman on a dating site is like dumpster diving and expecting to come out with a gourmet meal." Won'tGetFooledAgain

[Author]

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