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A couple of years ago it was reported that in 2012 more than half of all American wage earners made less than $30,000 per year. The Social Security Administration's new earnings report for 2014 is out and there's still much gnashing of teeth about the dying middle class. With earnings numbers that haven't changed much in 2 years, estimates running as high as 100 million working age Americans without a job, and no one tracking the population of H-1B visa holders, where are the jobs really?
The July 9, 2015, issue of The New York Review of Books carried a very thoughtful piece by Andrew Hacker. In "The Frenzy About High-Tech Talent," Hacker discusses a number of books and reports that address whether or not there really is a need for more tech talent, the justification for the H-1B visa program, and issues in the American educational system.
[...] Throughout his piece Hacker is basically questioning two things:
1. Is there really an unfilled need for STEM graduates, or are we actually graduating too many so that many end up unemployed or employed in different areas?
2. Are there flaws in the American education system, both at the K-12 level and in college, that lead us to be very dependent on foreign STEM graduates?
[...] The texts Hacker is reviewing, and his own information, seem to dwell predominately on overall job projections for the STEM fields. Nowhere does there appear a breakout of the job forecast for computing related job categories. With the increased ubiquity of computing across all industries and employment sectors, it seems unlikely that we will see the "deskilling" trend that may be occurring in engineering (whereby engineers create equipment that means they and others like them no longer have job opportunities). We know that there are many jobs in the "tech sector" but there are also a lot of computing jobs in banking, finance, manufacturing, agriculture, healthcare, etc. We can get an accurate picture of future job openings only if we can make a good determination of the computing jobs that exist outside of the "tech sector."
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday October 27 2015, @01:42PM
A number of people made similar speeches before 2000. Bill Clinton made a couple of speeches about some mythical "service economy" when he was pushing so hard for NAFTA. Others have attributed that "service economy" to Ronald Reagan.
Ronald Reagan (January 25, 1983)
Over the past year, our Task Force on Private Sector Initiatives has successfully forged a working partnership involving leaders of business, labor, education, and government to address the training needs of American workers. Thanks to the Task Force, private sector initiatives are now underway in all 50 States of the Union, and thousands of working people have been helped in making the shift from dead-end jobs and low-demand skills to the growth areas of high technology and the service economy. Additionally, a major effort will be focused on encouraging the expansion of private community child care. The new advisory council on private sector initiatives will carry on and extend this vital work of encouraging private initiative in 1983.
http://www.infoplease.com/t/hist/state-of-the-union/196.html [infoplease.com]
I don't recall that speech, personally, but there it is.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Thexalon on Tuesday October 27 2015, @02:04PM
Good point. I referenced the Summers speech because I watched him give it in person, that's all, but it was clearly US policy long before that. Summers was also behind the idea of NAFTA, for much the same reasons.
And of course, it turned out that Ross Perot was completely right about the effects of NAFTA. And yet the US government happily continues down that path with trade normalization with China followed by the TPP.
If it's useful, the stances of the various presidential candidates on the TPP:
Unequivocably Opposed - Sanders, O'Malley, Huckabee, Paul, Trump
Opposed because it's from the Obama administration - Cruz, Fiorina, Jindal
Ducking, spinning, and flip-flopping - Clinton (I interpret this as "likely to decide to support it immediately after Election Day")
Supports - Bush, Kasich, Rubio
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.