U.S. Economy Trades High-Paying Jobs For Low-Paying Positions

The U.S. economy is rapidly trading high wage jobs for low wage jobs. According to a report from the National Employment Law Project, higher wage industries accounted for 40% of the job losses over 12 months but only 14% of the job growth. Lower wage industries accounted for just 23% of the job losses over 12 months and a staggering 49% of the job growth.

 

The low wage abundance found in the US isn't a recent phenomenon. It apes somewhat the other Anglo-Saxon economies, with labour market flexibility providing a skewing of resources to a low skilled equilibrium.

 

I think that is wonderful! I am sick of Americans wanting it both ways. You want top dollar and want to pay dirt. America is getting her come uppins. You got a problem with it (*)(*)(*)(*)ing shoot yourself in the head along with every other person who (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)es about it. Or you could try and become an activist and buy only American and push for people to stop buying anything not made in America at Christmas time.

 

An irrational goal that would only harm the American consumer

 

Irrational? Perhaps a little, harm? How would not buying anything made outside of the US be a long term harm to the consumer? Short term? Yes it would hurt the seasonal employment boosts and corp profits but the Food sector would remain untouched and the Industrial/manufacturing sector should get a boost as US made durable goods take over.

 

You're asking them to deliberately restrict their choice, reducing their utility and corrupting comparative advantage

 

Well Reiver it is like this:

They can (*)(*)(*)(*)(*) and cry about it and wait for the nanny state to throw more money we do not have at it or they can grow a pair, man up, suck it up, stand up and take action.

Care to explain your take on the comparative advantage?

 

The consumer should be focused on minimising price paid. That will naturally lead to specialisation according to comparative advantage. That is the only way that we can maximise economic activity and the well-being of all countries involved. Economic nationalism is, simply put, cretinous

 

Yeah that is where I thought you were going. While I do not wholly disagree there need be a balance here and Americans are too (*)(*)(*)(*) cheap for their own good.

 

The lack of balance is actually a skewing in favour of the US and Europe. We can perhaps blame how GATT became a permanent feature, rather than an International Trade Organisation with economic development as its core aim

 

To me the issue is people think with their pocket books but are really to dumb to form a rational thought I guess you could say that at the present time I work for the Chinese as high end technical marketing person. I really have nothing against them my issue is with the Americans who (*)(*)(*)(*)(*) about China and all the jobs leaving and they will not spend a dime of their own money on what they claim to believe in. Me? Home made in USA, Cars, truck, van and SUV American and my bike is 100% Japan. My televisions are not made in the US but the companies I buy from have capital invested in the US.

 

Sounds like you're closer to some evolutionary school or post-Keynesianism. The focus on bounded rationality of course can have important implications for our understanding of economic result (typically missed by the orthodox)

Televisions are the textbook example of how comparative advantage is dynamic in nature, with trade therefore characterised by some rapid (at least in contrast to the long term gains that can occur from economies of scale) movements in production activities.

Gives the economic nationalists another thing to whinge about (even though its a positive phenomenon)

 

A few years back I would have been more agreeable as Corning exported quite a bit of the glass for those televisions. My point is there are Americans without jobs buying Chinese made products with tax dollars that were a stimulus to the US economy twenty years ago. To me a stimulus package would be re-opening the textile mills and providing jobs for those not working. Modernizing the steel mills and reopening them. As we are seeing high tech and service sector alone are a death sentence to America.

 

And that's a jolly good thing. It is the way that we maximise economic activity after all (and ensuring that the economy shifts to a more efficient result)

 

The effects of uncontrolled high levels of immigration cannot be ignored. In the 32 years since the year 1980, the United States population has grown by 38%, all of this growth fueled by immigration and the second generation children of these immigrants. If these immigrants had never been allowed in, the population of the United States would have actually declined.

There were simply never enough good paying jobs for all these additional people. And so the United States will be stuck for quite some time with a larger portion of its population in low paying jobs. Not only will most of the children of all these immigrants never obtain decent work, but many of the children of long-established American families will also be displaced out from decent paying jobs, as all the additional people crowd out everyone else trying to climb the job ladder.

 

Yes it can. Using it in reference to a country of immigrants isn't very cunning!

Which would be a decidedly bad outcome!

Rubbish! Immigration creates opportunity in itself, given the inward shift of skill sets

Rubbish! The low skilled equilibrium is a demand-side issue. It has nothing to do with supply.

 

Okay let me get this straight here. You say that it is jolly good that American tax dollars are stimulating the Chinese economy? Jolly good that the monetary cycle can not reach even 1/4 of its full effect?

 

Industry wont come back to America till American labor costs come down to competitive rates.

There is too many people in the 3rd world willing to work for way cheaper than Americans. We can not compete. Also, I ain't paying 40 dollars for a box cutter, or 10 dollars for a pair of socks. Screw that.

Factory workers need to take a pay cut or let someone else work for lower wages.

 

So what do you do for a living? No matter your tax dollars will pay for them. Wait you should have a pay cut as well. Freaking cheap skates the lot of you. Think your time is gold and everybody else's is (*)(*)(*)(*).

 

Wages for low-skilled jobs are already low, and even wages for many of the skilled jobs are only modest.
And for service jobs, much of the reason for the higher labor costs is that workers have to pay so much in rent or housing to live near the expensive cities. The workers would be able to work for less if the price of land in these areas were not so high.

That's right, Americans cannot compete. There are Chinese steel workers being paid the equivalent of 72 cents per hour. There needs to be some tariffs to protect American wages.

It's not so bad when wages are so much higher also. We can see how things are in Sweden. That little 15 cm SubWay sandwhich may cost (the equivalent of) 9 dollars, but you can earn 14-18 dollars per hour mopping floors (true, taxes will take half of what you earn, but on the bright side you will get most of those taxes back through various government-provided services).

How would you like to pay 1 dollar for a box cutter, but be stuck in an unpleasant minimum wage job?
Outsourcing to low cost countries would not be so bad, but the problem is there are not enough decent paying jobs for everyone in the USA.

 

service jobs can't be ship overseas yet, or the corps would do it, maybe when they can have avatars that can be controlled from other countries that will be next

 

They are already beginning to outsource service jobs. Legal assistants, bookkeepers, and even radiologists have begun to be outsourced. The paperwork is simply faxed back and forth to India. And what cannot be outsourced is insourced. Think about all those Fillipino nurses working in the USA for 12 dollars per hour.

 

sadly I do not think either party is going to address this issue and eventually corps well be the end of America, not sure that we are not too far down that path already, maybe at this point we are just slowing down the inevitable


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Basic error! Trade stimulates all economies

 

Fair trade but not trade that is so one sided Reiver.