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The idea that American workers are being left in the dust because they lack technological savvy does not stand up to scrutiny. Our focus should be on coordination and communication between workers and employers.
Technology enthusiasts and entrepreneurs are among the loudest voices declaiming this conventional wisdom (see "The Hunt for Qualified Workers").
Two recent developments have heightened debate over the idea of a "skills gap": an unemployment rate below 5 percent, and the growing fear that automation will render less-skilled workers permanently unemployable.
Proponents of the idea tell an intuitively appealing story: information technology has hit American firms like a whirlwind, intensifying demand for technical skills and leaving unprepared American workers in the dust. The mismatch between high employer requirements and low employee skills leads to bad outcomes such as high unemployment and slow economic growth.
The problem is, when we look closely at the data, this story doesn't match the facts. What's more, this view of the nation's economic challenges distracts us from more productive ways of thinking about skills and economic growth while promoting unproductive hand-wringing and a blinkered focus on only the supply side of the labor market—that is, the workers.
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/608707/the-myth-of-the-skills-gap/
What do you think, is there a shortage of skilled workers ??
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 25 2017, @05:13PM (5 children)
> I also intend to pay shit wages, but I'll do so fully knowing that I'll never be attracting the next Elon Musk.
Of course you don't want the next Musk, anyone with that much drive will soon be their own boss. Don't waste time training someone who is just going to leave you.
I have been running my own small business for ~20 years now and from my experience, if you hire the best possible people it will make you and your customers very happy. Yes, you will have to pay more to get and retain top talent, but they will be productive and they will manage their own time (saving you many headaches on scheduling). Happy customers who get quality work will be repeat customers--this will save you a huge amount of time selling your services and if you want to expand, more time to go on the road to get new customers.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by hendrikboom on Friday August 25 2017, @05:46PM
I heard it in the sixties. Yes, that was a long time ago. The next sixties are now closer than the last sixties:
When hiring programmers, if you can't afford the top talent, you certainly can't afford the cheaper, inferior talent.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 25 2017, @06:05PM (3 children)
That right there is why businesses are in such bad shape. If you treat people like they're just going to leave, why would they stay? People don't generally like looking for work. It's miserable and degrading. But it's also the only way to get a decent raise anymore as companies are too shortsighted to properly compensate for the work being done.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 25 2017, @07:23PM
We had a story that was very much concerned with this topic:
Be your own boss.
Swedish Worker Cooperative Software Development Company Has No Boss [soylentnews.org]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 25 2017, @07:53PM (1 child)
I'm the AC above -- my little business is in great shape -- no debt, money in the bank and (touch wood) a great primary customer that has stuck with us for 15+ years now. Carried us right through the "great recession" with hardly any problems.
I pay very well and get top talent, it's a win-win-win all around (including my satisfied customers).
The comment "from the 60's" was also very apt, thanks for adding that.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 26 2017, @09:31AM
I think the thing you have going for you is the same I had in a little aerospace company I used to work for. You own the company. You control it. You have not sold out to stockholders, which bleed the lifeblood out of your company before they sell it short.
I saw what happened when a big military industrial contractor bought us.
When I joined the company, one man ( fine engineer too! ) flat owned the company.
It was similar to butchering livestock. First to go were the old men on "mahogany row" who were the original engineers the rest of us went to for technical guidance.
Soon, the work began piling up, and no one seemed to know what to do.
We no longer had those old men to ask. Those old men had done this before - and offered invaluable insight on how to go about doing what our customer wanted. Not only that, they had been working with the customer long before people like me came there. These men were way too valuable to spend their last hours on this planet doing things like parts lists and making drawings. I considered them what I aspired to be one day... they loved coming to work even though they were way past retirement age. This is what they loved to do. Teaching us. We lost them. By signature of someone who seemed to have no idea what we did - with their main asset a "leadership" degree from some diploma mill.
We made a lot of money - for about three years. Like heating your house by setting it on fire. It took about that long before our customer realized he was never going to get what he paid for. The land now has a church and welfare office on it.