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Spot The Labor Force Collapse Culprit
A few days ago we disproved, in what we hoped would be the last time, any insinuation that the collapse in the labor force is due to demographics (a topic we had covered before) when we showed that it was just 10 short years ago that the Bureau of Labor Statistics itself was forecasting an increase in the overall participation rate - here we assume logically that America's demographic profile was known to its labor market experts in 2004 - only to slowly at first, then very fast, revise it ever lower... and still it was unable to catch up to the unfolding gruesome reality.
Yet somehow, so called finance experts, econ PhDs, central planners and other ivory tower dwellers still refuse to let this topic go, and continue to reference the participation rate and demographics in the same sentence. So to truly end any speculation that the plunge in the labor force is due to "old people", defined as workers 55 and over, retiring, here is a chart (which in an update of a post we did first in October 2012 and it took the rest of the media world only 14 months to catch up) of the cumulative job gains broken down by "young", or those 16-54, vs "old", those 55 and over.
Spot something wierd?
It seems that the "old" age worker group - that which is supposed to be bleeding workers to retirement - has had zero job losses since the start of the Depression in December 2007, while it was the "younger" workers who according to the BLS' Household Survey, have hit the labor cliff and seen their number collapse, dropping as much a 6 million, and only slowly rising, with another 3.5 million jobs left to catch up before pre-recession levels are met.
In fact drilling down in the "young" worker category reveals that the most impacted group of workers is those in their prime working years: Americans aged 25-54.
And just to put the final nail in the coffin of this silly debate, first here is the Labor Force Participation rate by "old" workers, or those most prone to retirement, and where the Fed is now desperate to scapegoat the collapse in the Labor Force, compared to all other age groups. The chart, which shows that the "55 and over" worker group has now normalized its participation rate to pre-crisis levels while that of younger workers has tumbled to levels not seen since the 1970s, speaks for itself.
... and second: the employment to (civilian non-institutional) population ratio. The only recovery, if one may call it that, is for old workers.
So enough with all this "they are retiring" bullshit, and call it for what it is: millions of Americans of all ages, but mostly of prime working age, bailing out of the labor force by the millions because of equal or better opportunities elsewhere, opportunities which almost without exception are increasingly reliant on the ever more unsustainable and insolvent US welfare state.
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You finance folks call that last chart a "death cross," yes?
the technical term is "death bed"
In 2050 we'll all have robots and won't have to work anymore!!!
or...
all robots will have a job and a human pet...
.... and the SPCH will have many human breeds available for a neutering fee
Zager And Evans - In The Year 2525https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izQB2-Kmiic
Arf! or Meow!
'Better Opportunities elsewhere'? Seems to me that conclusion is just as ridiculous as the 'they're all retring' line.
The dole, and we don't mean Bob or pineapples.
They want to open a million jobs next week? Offer healthcare security for those putting off retirement only because they can't risk losing their life savings to a medidal calamity without insurance. I know a dozen people who said this was concern #1 regarding non-retirement.
The fact that people over 55 are retiring is the biggest bunch of propaganda I've been in a long time. Most of them don't have money and they are loaded up with debt. The few that do have money are afraid they will run out so they continue to work and save until they at the very minimum hit 62 and can collect SSI. Most want to hold out until they can get Medicare at age 65.
That generation did a shit job of planning for retirement (as has been discussed here).
When you work for the government till August each year and have to live on the rest it's hard to save for retirement. And if you did save the government rehypothecates it. At least we've got the best weapons in the world.
emm maybe not.. you take a look at the bad ass missiles russia has? Makes our carrier groups sitting ducks.
Collateral and Trust were things one could hold and touch 100 years ago.
Now Collateral and Trustis just a trigger - for US at least.
"When you work for the government till August each year and have to live on the rest it's hard to save for retirement."
Stuck on Zero, you wouldn't happen to be a park ranger now would you?
And a Free Shit Army eating sirloins, lobster and shrimp cocktails.
All the lovely inflation raised their the nominal level of salaries and home prices making that generation think they were richer than their parents-so why scrimp and save for retirement? Therefore, they spent more on ipods and borrowed against the rising value of their homes for college costs for the kiddies. Now, as they close in on retirement, they have massive credit card balances and zero home equity. Not to mention healthcare cost insecurities. No, the +55s are never going to retire. They can only break even if they drop dead on the job.
I have already decided I am going to keep operatiing dozers until I fall off and break my hip and 2 weeks later it is dirt nap lights out.
That is a rather broad brush to paint with.......
Suppose one was frugal and clever enough to save 1 million US dollars.
What does 1 million at 1% (if one is lucky) get you?
$10,000 in interest.
Which is also taxable.
Perhaps one's stock portfolio went poof, home value went poof, marriage went poof, job went poof, health went poof.
One can not plan for every single possible outcome, any or all of those can severely damage or destroy one's plans for retirement in an instant.
It's the debt side of that equation that's really amazing (-ly different than previous generations).
My own father is in debt in his retirement. I keep asking him when he's going to pay off my student loans. I keep warning him that he'll never be financially independent until he gets rid of all debt. I point out that I graduated college 24 years ago and he STILL hasn't paid off my loan. Unbelievable. Does he think that loan is going to pay itself off?
Let us accept that post as outrageous sarcasm--a rare event on ZH...
maybe you can help pop pay of your college loan...just saying.
We are in a time where famialy helps family...no more more by standers where help is needed, just jump in and help out, dad deserves a good old life, he got caught up in the banks scams of dept for everyone.
I don't use /sarc tags and I never will. You get it or you don't.
Funny stuff. My 4 adult chiidren moniter their ACS parent plus loans that I am the cosigner on. ACS and Sallie Mae make it ridiculously difficult to figure who's loans are whom's; I have loans with them too.
I gave them my user ID and password so they can go on and see their loans and due dates etc.... Presently I get the write off on the interest paid even thouigh they pay their own loans. I told them they could get the loans put in their name but no one has done it yet.
I called up a rep about the loans , and found out that if the loans are in my name, and I die the loans are forgiven. If I get old and sick enough, perhaps we can have a family euthanasia party to get rid of their debt.
@ Dr. Engali,
Everything you say is true, from my experience. When I retired at 64, I was shocked at the number of co-workers and friends who admitted that their own retirement was receding into a dim future. Two people even used the same words: "You show that it is possible at least." And some of these people were older than I was. What a bummer. One of my younger brothers, who had retired early and who had thought he had enough money saved, ended up taking social security early because his retirement fund started evaporating.
I have talks with clients as they are saving and every year they always talk about pushing it back one more year. They are scared to death about having one trip to the hospital take it all.
They are scared to death about having one trip to the hospital take it all.
Obama and the state knows that fact very well hence Obamacare's real intention as a Marxist wealth syphoning vehicle.
Doc you need to come to the tri state area where everyone is retiring at 55. I mean why not? They have a 125k pension (150k tax free if their Dr. signs off and their neighbor does not post them on FB hauling a Marlin). Free healthcare and usually a few hundred grand lump sum payout as a big thank you from the 20 somethings who don't know they gave it.
I guess that's one of the perks when you live in the belly of the beast. I live in Indiana where men are men, and sheep are scared........seriously they are fucking petrified. Not too many people have those luxuries here.
In 2012, the oldest baby boomers turned 66. At 66, boomers can claim the full amount of Social Security they qualify for, and the penalty for working and claiming Social Security benefits at the same time disappears.
They are waiting until they turn 66.
I already tried retirement. ONE word for that is BORING. How many fish can you catch and gardens can you grow b/4 you long to climb back on that D10 Cat and rip up some serious shit?
As always, Zero Hedge has us properly informed. I don't think it is too much of a mystery why this trend is occuring and accelerating. The Boomers have simply NOT saved enough. I know because I am one of them. They have saturated the work force in the past when it did not matter as much. Now it most certainly does as they are living longer and taking up jobs that could be going to our youth but likely won't for another 20 years or so when they begin to drop dead on the floors where they are working or are somehow forced to retire. The problem is the jobs that replace them will not be any where near as good.
This is why the labor force participation rate looks the way it does and why it will NOT change any time soon. The economic model that was designed for them will not work with future generations as there simply is not enough people to feed into this.
Simply out it would be nice to retire but when you have to work you have to work.
Shit Marcus, I worked in the oil fields and we went through 20 to 30 somethings like changing underware. The 40s to 60s KNOW what hard work is and actually stick it out. Was packing some pipe with a 30 something and he fell on some loose rock with the pipe landing on his nuts and he just laid there and cried. Next day he was a no show. Pathetic. The younguns just dont want or maybe are to weak to actually work hard.
Do they need help with their girlfriends?
That's nothing - I came across a guy on a bench crying, and when I asked him what was wrong he said he was sitting on his nuts but was too lazy to get off.
The 30-something was probably faking it so he could stay home and fuck his girlfriend all day long....talk about hard work.
In Williston, North Dakota there is no such thing as "girlfriend".
Let's have a chart of the public vs. private sector retirees. That would solve the mystery.
Another one I would like to see is the FIRE sector. I'd imagine that I & RE have taken a hit and F is still whistling past the graveyard.
Public sector never truly retires.
One way to solve this is to perpetually raise the retirement age. That way we never lose people from the workforce and employment goes up.
Soon the forced religion of choice will be boudisme... where you can retire when you reincarnate as a worm.
You're missing the obvious: women are giving birth to 58 year olds. And they're taking our jobs!
I thought the drop was from soylent green?
The real culprit.... "so called finance experts, econ PhDs, central planners and other ivory tower dwellers". You forgot to add lying ass weasels, etc.
At the previous location I worked, there were no fewer than four people (out of a department totalling about 15 depending on turnover), all eldering boomers, who needed neither the job nor the money but were hanging around for other reasons. In three cases out of the four the reason was benefits. In the fourth case it was nothing more than a personal desire to be away from the house. Think about it: something like 20-25% did not even need the job. And yet because of their seniority and their being part of the clique, they got the best hours, the highest pay, and a host of intangible considerations which it would be difficult to describe in detail, but all of you familiar with workplace politics will have little trouble guessing what I mean. Is it any wonder the younger people are stymied? I could hardly blame them when they walked away from the job. I would even pull them aside from time to time (the ones I liked), and would explain to them how it is. If you have a better option you should take it, I'd say, whether it was going to school, getting a different job, or working in the family trade.
When this all ends it isn't going to be pretty. The old folks can't hang on to their sinecures forever, but they will probably hang on just long enough to drain the pension-and-benefit plans of all their pulp and to gut the company of any human worth. By that time most of the younger generation will have simply made other arrangements.
***EDIT*** Why is this crap about Michelle Obama automatically inserting itself into my comment?
.
"...something like 20-25% did not even need the job. And yet because of their seniority and their being part of the clique, they got the best hours, the highest pay, and a host of intangible considerations which it would be difficult to describe in detail, but all of you familiar with workplace politics will have little trouble guessing what I mean. Is it any wonder the younger people are stymied?"
Thank you for pointing this out. As a younger man this is something which I'm highly conflicted over since I both wish to honor those who came before me but cannot even dream about starting a family on the pathetic pay and terrible hours I'm given despite doing the most work. I actually worked with an older gentleman who loved to tell me stories of the days when he was making $100,000+ each year and is constantly being called to return to those jobs. Instead he worked with me (I was making about $12 an hour) and talked all the time about how didn't need the job and it was mostly just to make money for playthings. His position was permanent, included healthcare benefits, and allowed him to essentially sit behind a desk and talk to people all day. As a Vietnam vet, I respected the guy but found this kind of talk to be the worst type of vitriolic crap.
Do these boomers have benefits outside of work? Because if not, that alone is a BIG reason to stay employed.
The cost of heath care insurance outside of employment (and Obamacare subsidies) for the 55-65 age group is very expensive, even without pre-existing conditions. The insurers know they are getting to the age where health problems begin to crop up and charge them accordingly. The expense of health care can eat through nesteggs pretty quickly.
You seem to be making a lot of assumptions about their motives. If we had universal health care, I believe a lot in that age group would choose to make way for the next generation and retire early.
I agree there are two sides to the argument, spooz.
But universal health care would NOT solve this problem. It would simply "universalize" it in the sense that the entire youth cohort would be stuck behind the entire aged cohort. You couldn't even escape by changing jobs.
There doesn't seem to be a perfectly equitable solution though.
Many boomers can't retire they lost a lot of their retirement in the crash. Just think if the bankster puppets get their way and you are forced to put your money in 401 type retirement investments that they control.
BTW how come we always hear social security is supposedly going broke (even though it's self funded and the government owes the fund $2.6 Trillion dollars) but we never hear that welfare is going broke?
Could it be that the Banksters want a new fund to manage and make money off of?
More income redistribution and voluntary (LOL for now) taxes.
Hall of Famer Fran Tarkenton Joins AMAC for Social Security Power Playsnip
"AMAC’s prototype bill would provide a voluntary, tax-deductible supplemental payroll deduction that would be administered as individual retirement accounts and 401(k)s are now."
He concluded: “Neither the President nor the Congress need to punt on a Social Security fix anymore. They can address and resolve it this year – in a simple and straightforward manner that renders Social Security solvent for 75 years and guarantees low income recipients a base COLA of 3%, capped at 4%, and that does not increase taxes.”
10 things 401k plans won't tell you
Hidden fees, paltry choices and lousy investment returns could delay your retirement -- or prevent it entirely.
ZH audits the "official story" by taking "official data sets" and populating them into a few pivot tables/charts in excel.
BLS fail.
Request to Zero Hedge:
At some point, will you please also include a chart of the welfare in Welfare State?
Thank you.
EDIT: I found what I was looking for here but it is from May of 2012:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/two-charts-exposing-americas-record-shadow-welfare-state
As labor particitpation rate chart points down, then these should be higher by now unless there is another source of funds not being tracked.
If you are an employer you know you can hire people who are willing to work less than full time, and for less pay. You also know that many seniors are better educated, are more polite, and have a better work ethic than many younger workers today. You also know that a part time young worker making $10 an hour is going to jump ship when a better opportunity comes up. And do you really want to hire anyone out of today's high schools that have followed the new socialist curriculum and textbooks?
So in this platitude, my choices are hiring (1) people who need a job and have yet to prove themselves so they accept lower pay or (2) people who have nothing better to do but they're polite and were better educated 35 years ago when they last stepped foot inside a classroom?
For me, the retirement age for full benefits from Social Security is now 67 years 10 months and I am sure the gov hopes I die before I can qualify for full benefits. That's why the retiring age is pegged where it is. You just grin and bear it.
When I show up at the office to enroll for SS benefits, they'll tell me to get lost. Dumbass boomer, get the hell out of here.
I have only one choice and that is to work until I die. Not that I can afford to die, so I'll keep on living and when I can finally retire, I can be on Social Security for all eternity.
I gave up almost $500/mo to take early SS @ 62, TAKE THAT JOB AND SHOVE-IT !
The only way we can survive on SS is to leave the country. There are a lot of other countries that one could live well on 2000 a month. But my bets are there will be no SS available in 10 years because the same people that forced it into existance stole it. Funny how this shit keeps happening isint it?
What's hilarious is to see people cry about $2000 for doing nothing as if it's some kind of poverty wage, then turn around and rant about the unpralleled opulence of a $7/hour minimum wage or the unlimited bounty of food stamps.
"no SS in 10 years... WRONG. They will adjust it and inflation will erode it, never eliminate - WE PAID INTO IT. my .02
"They" wont do shit if/when "we" finally decide to rid ourselves of "them"
Unless you are 66 years old, retirement age will never come for many of us under 40. It will perpetually be raised, just out of reach.
Realistically, for someone under 30, retirement age might be 80 by the time they are 70 (assuming kind uncle sam doesn't suffer an aneuryism between then and now).
Baby-Boomers were a spending self-centered group that for the most part has to keep working. They spoiled their kids rotten into giving anything they could give. Their kids are ill-prepared for a real depression.
Depressions build character and clear out bad debt. We have soft ivory-tower PhDs at the fed that are buried deep in their economic theory.
As we can see the Fed has not fixed the problems with QE, they just pushed it further into the future and made it larger.
Economics is still an art and these group of Fed Keynesian zombies are no artist.
What about a shovel ready program for those in extended "benefits"? Dig a grave for what once was an enterprising country.
And as reminder history may not repeat but sure as hell does rhyme.
Young Man Blues
And The Who was covering an older tune by Mose Allison
The old man got all the money and a young man ain't got nothing in the world these days...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZtRedcmTIQ
and an even more blistering version.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWRmsoBXAUw
and as the song ends they ain't got nothing, they ain't got shit.
This was written over 40 years ago and still holds true today.
God help the baby boomers if the 'youngins' take this to heart including that blistering intensity of youth that is so suppressed these days.
Companies only want experienced help.
I'd like to know what happens when that pool evaporates and the next 2 generations are in their 30's and 40's with zero job experience?
This is just another desperate moment to cling on to the current system that will also backfire.
Better hurry up and build those robots lol. Not sure who will buy the shit though.
they don't want applications after a year+ on unemployment...
How could the overall labor participation rate be less than 64% (1st graph) while the rate for 16-54 is over 69% and the rate for 55+ is just below 71% (4th graph)?
Something in these graphs is fucked up.
Where it says RH axis on the 4th graph it refers to the R(ight) H(and) axis, and an LFP of just below 38%
Got it now - thanks
But still seems messed up - from 2009 forward (4TH graph) both groups (16-54 and 55+) show an increase in LPR - 1st graph shows the rate declining.
I can see why this would happen - if the size of each group is changing - larger 55+ group (with lower LPR) relative to the 16-54 group drags down the overall average combined rate.
Which would mean the demographics is changing - which is what this article is trying to say is not happening.
You were correct: that LFP chart was mislabled and is in fact the employment to population ratio which has been flat for young workers, and improving for older ones. The added LFP chart shows a collapse particularly among younger workers.
At some point we will all have to be entrepreneurs. The only way to job security is to create your own. I would imagine that in the near future it will be more beneficial to learn how to make shoes and boots than to have a Masters in Poli-Sci.
The quicker younger people realize this the better off we will ALL be.
Gunsmithing.. bullish
I've been thinking that more and more as time goes on...I feel like they have me "working" for them to keep me from working against them or something.
I think if you have something you really enjoy doing, you go for it. As long as it benefits others and they are willing to pay for it. In my own experience, I love to grow things and I had a want to be around animals. I had no real experience with either. I gave up a proprietary trading career and went for it.
Now I own an organic farming operation and raise goats and chickens.
My income is way less than I am used to, but, my quality of life is off the frickin' charts. I also have less expenses and no debt.
I wish that on everyone.
Working on it. Couldn't figure out how to make software development work for me. So much of that industry is fools cheating fools. Selling toys and games on the side now. Slower going than expected. Doing it all alone instead of climbing the corporate ladder of stupid. Economy remains derpy though. Have to get out of debt, eventually break the chains of employment.
Dude, rock the fuck on. Keep at it. The key to what I did was get out of debt. That way when the income isn't what you are used to, it doesn't really matter, as long as there is no banker calling you every month. If I could find someone that can install solar inexpensively, I would finally get totally off the grid. Not trying to sound like a doomsdayer, just saying when you are off the grid you only have the bills you WANT.
When I was 21 I formed a Corp. W/assets of 2k and a beat up van.
It sustained me for over 35 years 'til 08 fallout.
You may not make it on your own but I guarantee you won't make it giving your life energy to 'da Bossman.
Shakin' the tree boss - Shakin' the tree.
+100 for the Cool Hand Luke reference!
(Nobody can eat 50 eggs, Luke, nobody!)
I think people are exaggerating the youth work ethic a little bit. I know several young workers who can't get a decent job out there right now despite them not feeling entitled etc. The global economy has destroyed the working class people with its effect on wages etc. and it is true that businesses just want to keep wages down at all costs.
Children learn from their parents' experiences.
When children see their parents' lives devastated due to job loss via layoffs and reneged promises of pensions and benefits it has effects.
The WWII generation working for big corps came under fire in the 80's being forced into early retirement around age 58. They were still able to collect pensions and usually had retirement benefits but this group was not ready to retire. Baby boomer children of this group began to question corporate loyalty.
Now Baby boomer workers have been destroyed en masse. There are few corporate pensions now. Forget retirement insurance benefits. The children of boomers now KNOW that corporations will use them and discard them as required to pay big monies to the small group of top level executives.
It is evolutionary that the current crop of youngsters are ruthlessly self centered and lack loyalty.
Good points, and I too agree that the work ethic of younger people is somewhat unfairly portrayed in a negative light.
The youngsters I see in the sales & marketing arena bust ass. They are smart and work long hours (a requisite if you want to get ahead in today's business environment), constantly tied to their smart phones and tablets. And, the ones I associate with do not spend a lot of time with social media.
In the offices of the corporations I deal with, I see the same thing with their young employees...long hours with reduced pay and bennies. The older workers in these places are very unhappy, too, having watched their workplace become more hellish by the year.
In business, ALL problems are management problems, and the "professional" management of the corporate world today has screwed things up almost beyond repair. Loyalty is a 2-way street, but their employees are treated like little more than numbers to be manipulated. Management teams are shifted around far too often as well, and virtually every executive has a resume in his or her desk drawer. There is also a social contract, which corporate America, multi-nationals especially, wants to completely ignore.
Are there a lot of what appear to be slackers among our youth? Well, maybe, but the absolute smartest thing most kids can do for themselves today is to learn some type of trade, or figure out how to create their own job. Some of the happier people I know run their own businesses, including my mechanic, a good friend who is an electrician and another who has a Heating & Air business. All worked their skill set to prosperity, and none can be outsourced.
I don't care what age you are - things are tougher today than at any time during my working life, and I am 66. Still going at it, too. My partner is 73, and so is he - not because he has to, but because he likes to work....and so do I. We start early and finish late, but I readlily admit that it is not as much fun as it once was. Now, it's just complicated.
But don't tell us to retire and make way for someone else. Very few youngsters are venturing into the water to work as independent sales agents. The expenses keep going higher and the commissions keep being reduced. The hours are long, the work is demanding, and the reward is often elusive and slow to come. Everyone wants to eliminate middlemen, too....until they have a problem.
Great thread, great comments. In particular your area of independent sales seems nearly obsolete, I've worked with and around sales reps for decades, used to be a fun deal. I have one friend age 70+ still going at it, and he keeps hiring other guys his age to help out - doesn't like what he sees in younger guys. But to be fair younger guys want more base salary and he can only offer 100% commission, and is struggling himself, does not seem positioned for retirement. But even his principals are now mostly younger people who don't even understand anymore how the channel works. These days sales is the Internet, email campaigns, Google ads, and PDFs. Hah.
Independent.....it's a word corporate America hates, and it seems like the government does, too.
All of us in business are predators, and there must be some government control of this instinct to keep society from absolute domination by monopolies.
In today's business environment, management is constantly sniffing around for any pockets of proffitability to grab. Small companies are crushed by big ones, and it gets harder every day to stay below the radar of corporate raiders. The big guys get the rules written for their benefit, and if you get in the way, their lawyers show up and litigate you to death. I have to deal with retail chains, and they abuse their vendor base brutally with outrageous demands and conditions, unreasonable deductions, and failure to honor agreements. This is not the way it once was.
Still, I love the career I have had. There is no greater incentive than commissioned sales. You either earn it, or you don't....and that means every day you have to prime the pump if you want to drink. At the same time, as an independent broker, all you really have is your reputation, and ethics is not a foreign word in this profession. For decades I have been told that pople like us were going the way of the dodo bird, but I don't believe it. It is harder, but there is still no better way to place prodcut on the retail shelf than having someone sit across the table from someone else and say, "here, look at this". Pioneering new products is fun, and my moto is simple:
"The whole world is looking for an honest broker."
So this is good news?
Mike Shedlock has written several times showing the only age jobs NET created since 2009 are 55+, the causes are dissability fraud, THE FED's ZIRP allows corps to borrow and buy labor-replacing tech they normally wouldn't have incentive to do, with the usual outsourcing and overseas corp tax avoidance. But this shows the 55+ are giving up on their WalMart greeting jobs.
Until the transferees start letting the crumbs fall off their plates, it's not going to get any better:
http://www.smh.com.au/world/richest-85-boast-same-wealth-as-half-the-wor...
Central planners admit that previous prosperity was due to baby boomers spending money instead of saving.
Now they're saying baby boomers are retiring because they saved so much money.
GET YOUR STORY STRAIGHT. Idiots.
damn double post
I am tired of the older managers an boomers around here complaining about work ethic of younger people like my self. I am 36, I come in early to work and stay late when needed to get the work done, not just to rack up the OT. I dont bitch and complain all day.
To the managers out their you get what you pay for... you complain about no loyalty and work ethic, when you pay some $10/hr with no health insurance, retirement and no benefits.. Well guess what... that is the going rate for that kind of labor.
It is capitalism, you dont get to say give me all these things for free(ie. best worker ever) and we'll pay you subsistence wages. Subsistence wage is for warm bodies nothing more nothng less.
The best or good workers cost money. period.
You want someone who is educated...Up the price
You want someone who is experienced...Up the price
You want someone who comes in early to work... Up the price
You want someone who bust their ass all day.... Up the price
You want someone who will think of ways to save your busienss money....Up the price.
You want loyalty...Up the price and dont make promises you cant keep.
Nothing is free, if its free or cheap isnt going to last or work well.
And your job gets outsourced to China. Or they make a robot that can do it, track it. Or a computer program. They don't complain about these issues.
I am not saying it is right.
I am saying adjust your frame.
The last 30 years has seen such an acceleration in what you describe I am almost led to think the first Terminator movie may not be far off from reality.
The problem is, most younger people do not know what it was like without as much technology when a person could quit a job on a Friday and have another one by Monday. Those days are gone.
I gotta give it to my old man. He saw robotics replacing his job so he became the robot repair man. It was completely out of character for him to do something like that, I'm sure four kids in the house had something to do with it.
This conversation is an old one. I'm sure in the 1900's the automation in farming and manufacturing freaked them out too, but we are getting to that point where automation is really going to start reducing the number of people needed to do physical work and we have not addressed how to handle it. We won't need everyone to program the machines. I'm guilty of it. My company recently updated the automation of a yogurt fill line that replaced about a dozen low skilled workers. Now the only people required are a few high skilled technicians and the output is double.
There is a skills gap. We go around to the local high schools begging kids to get into the electrical apprenticeship and they sort of give us the "you want me to do what?!" look. They comment that they don't want to do the physical part of the job, and the guys that are willing aren't smart enough for the technical part.
I am an old guy who hires young people. They are bright, hard working and loyal. I find older workers at times to be guilty of what you say.
Business has been poor in the off season, I scramble to make payroll and am late on occassion.
My young employees hang in there with me, knowing they come first before I take anything.
We have to work as a team to succeed. A team doesnt work if one or two are sucking up all the profits.
I have experience, they have new ideas, somehow it works, at least for now.
Cherry picker, you nailed it on the head. A company has to work to gether like a team to succeed. And its a constant dynamic struggle that takes sustained effort and social skills, as well as good management and hard working employees.
Supply/demand, price equilibrium - same is true for labor. Go open your own business - get up every day unemployed and go out and generate demand for your goods and serveis. Work hard, save and live below your means... invest the surplus. Then watch as your are demonized by the Free Shit Army. Nothing is free, so stop whining and adapt.
No one who does legit work is paid what they are worth.
If they were, you wouldn't be able to afford anything. Not even a Big Mac.
Delayed gratification is measured in decades, not months or even years. Tell that to your friends who can afford compliments of easy credit the newest BMW (lease), iPhone, McMansion exensive colleges, tattoos, or bag of dope instead of paying for Obamacare...which the young overwhelmingly voted for.
You youngins did get a raw deal. The boomers shit the bed, and now you have to wipe ass, unfortunately. We all do.
It could have been worse. You could have been born during a world war or great depression. Your boomer parents got lucky and were born when they were. And confused freedom and abundance with debauchery.
But becoming socialists and pot heads will not help you....I suggest you all stop. You know that when someone promises OPM, there are strings attached. Enough to enslave you.
You have enough going against you as it is. You don't need any more enemies. Stop hurting yourselves.
It still comes as a surprise to young people that, although they might not be able to make bus fare across town, not everybody else is forced to take life up the ass.
People with money have options - and voting as through the wealthy are sitting ducks for their gub'mint to pick clean will only drive capital underground or overseas.
Unless an unemployed worker in the 55-65 age group has significant savings or other sources of income making them eligible for Obamacare subsidies or able to purchase an expensive unsubsidized plan in the private market, they will be forced to use Medicaid when health problems begin to arise. In such cases, any assets they have, including their homes will be "recovered" from their estates after they die to repay the government for any Medicaid services they are unfortunate enough to have consumed, as a feature of Obamacare. This means that mom & dad won't be able to leave their house to their increasingly under/unemployed kids. Some of them will decide to take a McJobs for the gap years before they're eligible for Medicare, just to be able to be able to leave a modest gift for their heirs. Another middle class asset stripping device, along with QE/ZIRP and the Wall Street casino.
In any case, it is a myth that this group, in general, would choose to retire early.
I grew up poor, spent thirty years as part of the working poor (not complaining), work part time now and continue to be poor.
However,
I find I am less poor than many people who have just recently become poor due to poor planning, extravagance, debt, and a recent job cut or loss.
Should this trend continue, I will soon be considered wealthy. So I got that going for me.
"which is nice."
Welcome to the bottom end hierarchy! Just like for a millionaire or a multimillionaire, there's always someone above you on the scale and always someone below you, so it is when you're down and out! There's always someone poorer to compare yourself with ... until you're drunk and freezing to death on a door-stoop anyway!
Part of remembering ourselves as human beings, not just talking monkeys located somewhere in the monkey-chain, is to stop spending time and energy on our place in the chain and who's above, who's below us.
I take the attitude that wherever I go, whether it's a boardroom, an event at the country club, a break room at the local WalMart or a free meal at the Salvation Army, of course I belong there. If they don't agree, FEITCTAJ!
What I'm seeing on the ground here in a small New England city is people over 50 or 55 being devastated by loss of their careers in midstream, taking the bottom-end jobs that used to go to young people. Many are retiring early but working because they are unable to live on a minimum early Social Security. The BLS counts us as employed. Marginally employed is a better description.
For some reason our unemployed movement is made up mostly of white people over 50, while the statistics and stories we hear show that we're not the hardest hit group. Perhaps it's because we're the ones who haven't lost our capacity for outrage?
Unemployed workers in the 30-50 range may be out of work and desperate but have no interest in a political group that won't help them get a job next week or next month. Those under 30 have simply no belief in the ability of our system to ever again provide good jobs, or of political action to produce any result. Indeed most have no idea what a good job looks like, having never had one.
Plus everyone is scared - of exactly what I'm not sure but I've often heard "I have to keep my nose clean".
Employer friends all tell the same story you're hearing here, of the lack of work ethic, responsibility and honesty of the younger workers. The same attitudes and habits that make them bad workers make them really hard to organize. It's not just the system and all the old rules they've lost faith in; they don't believe in themselves.
Plus everyone is scared - of exactly what I'm not sure but I've often heard "I have to keep my nose clean" = prison industrial complex.
I just read JD Keller's comment. He's right, and I feel ashamed I participated in the youth-bashing here. The younger folk have a very legitimate gripe. I've watched young workers turn around when they got a really fair shake and started to believe it was real.
What? You're telling me those investment commercials where retired people fly out to a remote lake in Alaska to fish are bullshit? I"M SHOCKED!.............ah, not really....
Don't worry. The "pound your dad in the ass" retirement home offers the same luxury in the confines of a prison like atmosphere via Nintendo Wii.
...and a humpback whale performs for them close by and they don't get wet? Damn, my dreams are crushed. I am going to jump off a bridge...nothing really to look forward to.
More boomers would retire, if they could get a yield on their nest egg. ZIRP screws savers.
The baby boomers I know who have kids are sickened by the lack of living wage jobs available to them. When the only jobs they can find are those providing five hour shifts, and the only way to make ends meet is having two such soul killing jobs or take advantage of the skimpy government programs for the poor to supplement their crap wages, it is hard to give them advice on how to plan for their futures.
NakedCapitalism had a post today "Robots Are Coming For White Collar Jobs". In the comments section, commentor JGordon made a bizarre prediction:
"The other day I realized that even consumption will be automated soon. And I am certain that even now Google is developing automated consumers to take over the carbon-based consumers of today.
I’m sure that in economic models carbon and silicon based consumers have exact parity (and extending the definition of “person” to include corporeal robots, considering that it already includes incorporeal corporations, shouldn’t be too tough), so these robot consumers will be a great boon for GDP numbers when they are introduced."
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2014/01/robots-coming-white-collar-jobs.h...
it is hard to give them advice on how to plan for their futures.
Robotic maintenance
No, we should build robots to rob banks or something. Good God, pre-Crisis Lex Luthor suddenly makes sense.
Now is a great time to be a creepy gay guy. You can get tons of straight guys to suck a dick for cash. The economy is that bad.
I was trying to think of what kind of person would conceive of such a "solution". Then I noticed your moniker.
Funny, I am one of the older suckers, and I don't feel like employment has been a fun bed of roses.
I cannot even imagine how it would be to have kids facing a lifetime of this...
When people ask me what I do, I tell them I'm semi-retired.
I just tell um i'm semi.
Introducing the Roach Motel of "public" medical insurance. You can check in, but you can't check out. This is good for the economy, no?
My family and I (myself, brother and cousins) run different small businesses. I often help them in personnel selection since I retired and closed my business. What I find is most of today’s kid’s work as hard as yesterday’s kids. In general they are the same as previous generations except in two areas.
Too many kids today are hard wired to get “fast” pay increases and benefits just because they work hard during the year. I worked hard with 60 hour weeks but it took many years to grow the business and get the rewards I deserved. Kids today believe a business owner is a fountain of profits that are going to be dumped in their lap every year (I blame the MSM). I just ain’t so! It takes time and effort on the whole teams part to get to the point where all benefit from business growth with increased pay and benefits.
Electronic media, I believe, has socially retarded many of today’s kid’s face-to-face social skills. My brother hired a brilliant engineer to increase his sales in steam fittings. The engineer was fantastic except he locked up when it came to closing his sales proposals (the key part of the job). The young engineer could not sit down face-to-face with middle aged business owners and explain his sales proposals. It cost him the job. He is one of many we have had to let go because these kids had face-to-face communications problems.
But, you couldn't train this kid to do proposals? It's not rocket science. I've worked tech sales support jobs in tech sales support organizations. You've just got to spend a few days explaining it to these left-brain types. For that matter, nobody ever expects the techies to close the sales, just to support a sales professional who does so, usually over drinks and hookers after the engineer has been sent home. Have things really changed so much?
.
if you go to a news site, say the New York Times, and NYT is using google, their ads will appear on ZH's site - google's algo that advertises where you have been.
you have to leave "tracking on" in your browser of choice.
you can then click the fucking hell out of NYT ads - revenue goes to ZH and NYT pays for it
love the MSM - just as smart as ever
All this talk about work makes me sleepy.
Are the Boomers also working jobs under 29 hours/wk?
If they are they are also working another job also. The young can cry and stomp because the bomers won't retire but it would not make any diffrence. The young today won't work like thier parents and grand parents because that would be below them. The young expect and rightly so everything at once with no sacrifice or pain.
I saw this quot the other day on another post.
"Everybody, sooner or later, sits down to a banquet of consequences." - Robert Louis StevensonThe interesting facts that the MSM DO NOT COVER, ever:
December Employment: Half Total Job Growth Needed To Absorb Last Month’s Immigration
The Labor Force Participation Rate for Men is at the lowest level since the BLS started collecting this statistic in the 1940's. It's down from 86.4% in 1950 and 83.3% in 1960 to 74.1% in 2005, dropping steeply to 70.2% in 2012. Sources:
http://www.bls.gov/emp/ep_table_303.htm
http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2007/jan/wk2/art03.txt
Directly related to the demise of small business.
Importing labor by lax border enforcement and increased H1B Visa issuance (buried within NAFTA/other trades agreement) is the deliberate policy to beggar the entire US working population.
Qui Bono?
Immigration is a scapegoat, an excuse.
Most saved production from immigrant workers goes back to the host country, none of the domestic believe in saved production being capital.
If the American businessman knows his needed capital comes from worker production and savings he will treat labor as human capital. Currently labor is a liability, capital comes from printing presses backed by war and future earnings.
And a higher labor force participation rate is good for society because...?
Do we need more people working or the ones who work to be making more money?
Question... My old roommate currently is full-time employed and also moonlights part time (mostly weekends) at another job. Does he get counted twice in these stats or is he only in the "full-time" category? If he's there twice this data is even more dire...
The Participation Rate is based on BLS Household Survey data, so he would not be counted twice. He would show up twice on the Employer Survey data.
Put the charts on the same Y-axis. It is intellectually dishonest to have four divisions per percent on the >55 and one division per percent for the < 55 group.
because that won't make it look nearly as bad!
The Last Sentence Has Got To Be Hyper-Bullshit or sardonic. I'd hate to see an, otherwise, great article ruined by some cheap shot at the end.
Hear! Hear!
Absolutely. And what is this "prime working age" and who is it "prime" for? If the purpose of this exercise is to make sure rich people see nothing but upward-sloping income graphs, then we absolutely need a higher "labor force participation rate". But we still have not established that more people working is better for society.
soldiers years not wanted in labour force
to much azi and betas, have to be wasted
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serpent%27s_Reach
Can we agree on this: The future is bleak for the youth of America?
On the one hand I applaud the anonymous Mr. Durden for drawing our attention to the collapse in labor participation by the prime-working age workers. On the other hand the conclusion that young people are CHOOSING not to gain employment is classic STUPID.
There are 3 people today chasing one job. The economic ministers are focused on keeping inflation low, outsourcing US jobs, and DO NOT CARE about the domestic job situation.
That is the REAL truth, Mr. Durden.
Multinationals and Oligarchs are selling off this country's silverware, its factories, its intellectual property rights and skipping out on their responsibilities.
The new class of self interested and powerful elites are screwing YOU and our society and the youth of America.
No, we cannot agree that the future is bleak for the youth of America. There's always the chance that they'll start sharpening the guillotines and making a list of our economic overlords and economists who believe we need workers to be more "lean".
If they start making the list from the top down, there's a good chance that their future will be a hell of a lot rosier than the baby boomers'.
Hey!..."Guillotines" is my line! Give it back!!
Seriously, that is a great point but it acknowledges that the future prosperity is predicated on whether citizen's take ownership of this land, get off their knees, and take dramatic steps all the while facing a repressive militarized police force and sell-out politicians.
Them's pretty long odds. I think. But hope seems to be there, in any case.
Like where you went with this one, lets make the ones that caused this pay and not our children.
Nice
That's certainly not my experiance. I have an opening in the mining industry in the Midwest. No not data mining but good old fashioned work, in the weather, hot , dirty, dangerous. Starts at over $17/hour with medical, dental, vision, prescription etc. I'll be lucky if I can get three Millenials through a drug test so I have a group to choose from.
I still want someone to explain why a rising labor force participation rate is a good thing for society.
Do we need more people working or working people making more money? Why is it better that single-breadwinner households are now practically extinct? Why is it better that both parents are working? If all we need is more people working, then maybe we should just start pulling kids out of high school and middle school and get them to work. Why should those toddlers feel entitled to just sit around the house in a dirty diaper instead of bringing in a paycheck? Why should that 68 year-old lady who cleans your hotel room think she's entitled to retire? I mean, she can still walk, right? So she better walk her lazy ass to work because we need that labor force participation rate to go up, up, UP!
There's another chart that goes along with this one, and that's the one that shows American workers are seven times more productive today than when this chart starts around 1950. Seven times more productive, but we still need more people working. And working harder and for longer hours. For whom? Who benefits when it takes two family members working to support a household where it used to take one?
Its because governments are run by politicians who get your vote by borrowing money you have to pay back.
There solution to this borrowing is your sweat.
Your comment is hardly worth responding to but in essence, this world is not about corporate success. It is about raising the children in a fashion that creates a productive citizen. Now I do not know about you, but a man who has nothing to do all day is destined for trouble, and if he has kids, well, they will have the opportunity to observe their father with no skills, no purpose and no hope.
The rich are useless to us when they do not provide jobs. Why are we forced to have 85 people in this world with as much wealth sa the rest of us? WHAT GOOD DOES IT DO for one man to sit in a stately home in some paradise with all the fucking wealth while millions are faced with life in lawless city jungles fighting to get a piece of bread?
THE RICH ARE A WASTE OF JUST ABOUT EVERYTHING.
This world is for the children you fuck.
At the beginning of this chart the small business employed near 70% of all workers in this country. Now it is down to less than 55%.
Labor was once considered human capital, now it is considered a liability.
Consider this - if capital is saved production does the labor class get left out ? Predictable effect of printing capital against future earnings as opposed to obtaining capital through saved production.
If we want labor to reign as king again we must rely on it to foster the formation of capital. Instead we now consider capital to be debt from a bankster, provided by government deficits.
I'm a female boomer, self employed for many years and started out with nothing. Worked as a commercial realtor for 3 big brokerages (only woman broker for first few years) and managed to stay afloat on a strait commission starting out at age 26. Had left home for a new city so didn't even have any contacts for friends starting out. First woman in US to be hired by Coldwell Banker Commercial. Started my own company 26 years ago. I was terrified everyday! The risk and responsibility of being self employed cannot be understood by those who have never experienced it. I made a good go of it; kept overhead low and hired help only when I needed it--did all my own secretarial work, research, everything myself. Now I am 67, and have over $1,000,000 in assets besides my house. Would have more if hadn't lost in the market of 2009. Never took paid vacation, or a day on unemployment, carried my own health insurance disability etc. My grandparents lost everything in the dust bowl and depression and moved to Oregon to start a dairy farm. I worked every weekend of my childhood on that farm, driving tractor, baling hay, running milking machine, combine etc. I learned to work and I saw what happens when you have no money. Talk about motivation! My parents saw that i got an education and had high expectations of me. My Mother's famous words to me when I was stuck on a problem was "figure it out". I see kids today and shake my head. There "work" looks like play to me. A lot are plugged in but really tuned out. There parents, boomers like me, didn't want them to work as hard as they did and consequently spoiled their kids. The kids have the misplaced value system that says what you are wearing and how you look are what count, not what you know and what you do with what you know. If a big black swan ever does hit this country, we are in trouble.