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ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by Concourse Express on Mon Apr 23 02:14:16 2012 As if we needed any more reminders of the sobering reality new and recent grads face, here's yet ANOTHER article highlighting the sad situation many cats find themselves in. I could start talking about the whole student loan catch-22 business (e.g. need at least a bachelor's for even menial work but even those jobs are hard to come by, so students are left up the creek with student loan debt, said debt is higher than credit card debt, etc.), but I'll refrain for now.Combine this with the fact that roughly half of Americans are poor or have low income and what you get is a not-so-rosy future outlook for new/recent grads. :( Well, here's the link and here's the story (emphasis mine): ====================================================================== 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed By HOPE YEN, Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The college class of 2012 is in for a rude welcome to the world of work. A weak labor market already has left half of young college graduates either jobless or underemployed in positions that don't fully use their skills and knowledge. Young adults with bachelor's degrees are increasingly scraping by in lower-wage jobs — waiter or waitress, bartender, retail clerk or receptionist, for example — and that's confounding their hopes a degree would pay off despite higher tuition and mounting student loans. An analysis of government data conducted for The Associated Press lays bare the highly uneven prospects for holders of bachelor's degrees. Opportunities for college graduates vary widely. While there's strong demand in science, education and health fields, arts and humanities flounder. Median wages for those with bachelor's degrees are down from 2000, hit by technological changes that are eliminating midlevel jobs such as bank tellers. Most future job openings are projected to be in lower-skilled positions such as home health aides, who can provide personalized attention as the U.S. population ages. Taking underemployment into consideration, the job prospects for bachelor's degree holders fell last year to the lowest level in more than a decade. "I don't even know what I'm looking for," says Michael Bledsoe, who described months of fruitless job searches as he served customers at a Seattle coffeehouse. The 23-year-old graduated in 2010 with a creative writing degree. Initially hopeful that his college education would create opportunities, Bledsoe languished for three months before finally taking a job as a barista, a position he has held for the last two years. In the beginning he sent three or four resumes day. But, Bledsoe said, employers questioned his lack of experience or the practical worth of his major. Now he sends a resume once every two weeks or so. Bledsoe, currently making just above minimum wage, says he got financial help from his parents to help pay off student loans. He is now mulling whether to go to graduate school, seeing few other options to advance his career. "There is not much out there, it seems," he said. His situation highlights a widening but little-discussed labor problem. Perhaps more than ever, the choices that young adults make earlier in life — level of schooling, academic field and training, where to attend college, how to pay for it — are having long-lasting financial impact. "You can make more money on average if you go to college, but it's not true for everybody," says Harvard economist Richard Freeman, noting the growing risk of a debt bubble with total U.S. student loan debt surpassing $1 trillion. "If you're not sure what you're going to be doing, it probably bodes well to take some job, if you can get one, and get a sense first of what you want from college." Andrew Sum, director of the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University who analyzed the numbers, said many people with a bachelor's degree face a double whammy of rising tuition and poor job outcomes. "Simply put, we're failing kids coming out of college," he said, emphasizing that when it comes to jobs, a college major can make all the difference. "We're going to need a lot better job growth and connections to the labor market, otherwise college debt will grow." By region, the Mountain West was most likely to have young college graduates jobless or underemployed — roughly 3 in 5. It was followed by the more rural southeastern U.S., including Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee. The Pacific region, including Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon and Washington, also was high on the list. On the other end of the scale, the southern U.S., anchored by Texas, was most likely to have young college graduates in higher-skill jobs. The figures are based on an analysis of 2011 Current Population Survey data by Northeastern University researchers and supplemented with material from Paul Harrington, an economist at Drexel University, and the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington think tank. They rely on Labor Department assessments of the level of education required to do the job in 900-plus U.S. occupations, which were used to calculate the shares of young adults with bachelor's degrees who were "underemployed." About 1.5 million, or 53.6 percent, of bachelor's degree-holders under the age of 25 last year were jobless or underemployed, the highest share in at least 11 years. In 2000, the share was at a low of 41 percent, before the dot-com bust erased job gains for college graduates in the telecommunications and IT fields. Out of the 1.5 million who languished in the job market, about half were underemployed, an increase from the previous year. Broken down by occupation, young college graduates were heavily represented in jobs that require a high school diploma or less. In the last year, they were more likely to be employed as waiters, waitresses, bartenders and food-service helpers than as engineers, physicists, chemists and mathematicians combined (100,000 versus 90,000). There were more working in office-related jobs such as receptionist or payroll clerk than in all computer professional jobs (163,000 versus 100,000). More also were employed as cashiers, retail clerks and customer representatives than engineers (125,000 versus 80,000).* According to government projections released last month, only three of the 30 occupations with the largest projected number of job openings by 2020 will require a bachelor's degree or higher to fill the position — teachers, college professors and accountants. Most job openings are in professions such as retail sales, fast food and truck driving, jobs which aren't easily replaced by computers. College graduates who majored in zoology, anthropology, philosophy, art history and humanities were among the least likely to find jobs appropriate to their education level; those with nursing, teaching, accounting or computer science degrees were among the most likely. In Nevada, where unemployment is the highest in the nation, Class of 2012 college seniors recently expressed feelings ranging from anxiety and fear to cautious optimism about what lies ahead. With the state's economy languishing in an extended housing bust, a lot of young graduates have shown up at job placement centers in tears. Many have been squeezed out of jobs by more experienced workers, job counselors said, and are now having to explain to prospective employers the time gaps in their resumes. "It's kind of scary," said Cameron Bawden, 22, who is graduating from the University of Nevada-Las Vegas in December with a business degree. His family has warned him for years about the job market, so he has been building his resume by working part time on the Las Vegas Strip as a food runner and doing a marketing internship with a local airline. Bawden said his friends who have graduated are either unemployed or working along the Vegas Strip in service jobs that don't require degrees. "There are so few jobs and it's a small city," he said. "It's all about who you know." Any job gains are going mostly to workers at the top and bottom of the wage scale, at the expense of middle-income jobs commonly held by bachelor's degree holders. By some studies, up to 95 percent of positions lost during the economic recovery occurred in middle-income occupations such as bank tellers, the type of job not expected to return in a more high-tech age. David Neumark, an economist at the University of California-Irvine, said a bachelor's degree can have benefits that aren't fully reflected in the government's labor data. He said even for lower-skilled jobs such as waitress or cashier, employers tend to value bachelor's degree-holders more highly than high-school graduates, paying them more for the same work and offering promotions. In addition, U.S. workers increasingly may need to consider their position in a global economy, where they must compete with educated foreign-born residents for jobs. Longer-term government projections also may fail to consider "degree inflation," a growing ubiquity of bachelor's degrees that could make them more commonplace in lower-wage jobs but inadequate for higher-wage ones. That future may be now for Kelman Edwards Jr., 24, of Murfreesboro, Tenn., who is waiting to see the returns on his college education. After earning a biology degree last May, the only job he could find was as a construction worker for five months before he quit to focus on finding a job in his academic field. He applied for positions in laboratories but was told they were looking for people with specialized certifications. "I thought that me having a biology degree was a gold ticket for me getting into places, but every other job wants you to have previous history in the field," he said. Edwards, who has about $5,500 in student debt, recently met with a career counselor at Middle Tennessee State University. The counselor's main advice: Pursue further education. "Everyone is always telling you, 'Go to college,'" Edwards said. "But when you graduate, it's kind of an empty cliff." Associated Press writers Manuel Valdes in Seattle; Travis Loller in Nashville, Tenn.; Cristina Silva in Las Vegas; and Sandra Chereb in Carson City, Nev., contributed to this report. ====================================================================== *As an aside, I'll address this point in the article from an IQ standpoint. For comparative purposes, the average high-school grad IQ is 104, the average bachelor-level college grad IQ is 115, and the average Master's/Ph.D-level college grad IQ is 125 (source). This table gives an estimate of average college grad IQ by major. Students majoring in the fields used as a point of comparison in the article (engineering, physics, chemistry, and math, respectively) have estimated average IQs of 126, 133, 124, and 130, respectively (the 130 figure is for mathematical sciences; mathematics in and of itself was not included in the table). As each of these IQs are higher than that of the average bachelor-level grad (and since such IQs would account for smaller portions of the population of college grads), this could explain why the sum total of jobs in these fields numbered so few relative to the rest. However, my problem is with "the rest" - the MENIAL jobs the grads end up filling (i.e. the ones that don't require bachelor-level degrees but often require them at minimum for consideration). Methinks THIS exacerbates the situation; until this changes, the joblessness/underemployment problem new/recent grads face won't fade. *phew* Well, it's 2:14am EST so I'm hitting the sack now; discuss if you guys so desire. visit my blog! |
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Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by JayMan on Mon Apr 23 12:56:41 2012, in response to ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed, posted by Concourse Express on Mon Apr 23 02:14:16 2012. Here's a recent Facebook post of mine that pretty much sums up the problem:It's in a business interests to get as much out of their workers while offering as little as they can get away with in compensation. The boost in worker productivity over the years is almost entirely due to improved technology. It is this fact that has allowed the top executives to reap the gains of this improved productivity without passing anything on to their workers. As well, it is this fact, more than any, that is responsible for the economic slump. The economy simply doesn't need as many workers to produce what it needs, so there are no longer enough jobs for everyone. This is a dirty little secret that you won't hear from anyone in Washington, on either side of the aisle; there is no lasting economic recovery to be had because of this problem. Often many will say that new technology removes older jobs, it creates new ones in entirely new fields (say IT). The problem is that that is no help either; the new jobs usually require greater cognitive ability than the jobs that were rendered obsolete. You need to have a much higher IQ to be a software engineer than what you need to be an assembly liner worker. And of course, people aren't getting any smarter (if anything the reverse may be true). On top of losses to automation, competition from foreign workers in manufacturing and other fields has eroded the job market for those in the IQ range of 90-110 (50% of the White population), which was this group's primary source of decent wage income. As well, wages for service jobs, many in retail, which now make up the primary source of income for the working class has been eroded by the lower purchasing ability of people in this class. People shop at Walmart because it's what they can afford. A large part of the problem is that the bottom segment is especially underproductive because it has a much lower average IQ than in other First World nations. The large U.S. populations of Blacks (mean IQ 85), Latinos (mean IQ 90), Appalachian and other related lower class Whites (mean IQ 93) gives the country a huge segment of people who are, by and large, negatively economically productive. The low purchasing power of this group eats out the wages for those at the bottom, perpetuating a cycle of poverty and stagnant wages at the low end. As well, the globalized economy allows the top executives to gain wealth without passing it on to their workers. Extra taxation of those on the top (who don't pay as large a share of taxes as you might then when all taxes are considered; of which Social Security and Medicare are two) is a start, but won't remedy the problem by itself, due to the deep structural (mostly demographic) problems built into the system. The author of the article recognizes some of this, as we see here: While there's strong demand in science, education and health fields, arts and humanities flounder. Median wages for those with bachelor's degrees are down from 2000, hit by technological changes that are eliminating midlevel jobs such as bank tellers. Most future job openings are projected to be in lower-skilled positions such as home health aides, who can provide personalized attention as the U.S. population ages. College graduates who majored in zoology, anthropology, philosophy, art history and humanities were among the least likely to find jobs appropriate to their education level; those with nursing, teaching, accounting or computer science degrees were among the most likely. This passage is interesting. It sort of demonstrates, that, all else being equal, even in many shitty jobs, higher IQ (as determined by education level) is better than lower IQ: David Neumark, an economist at the University of California-Irvine, said a bachelor's degree can have benefits that aren't fully reflected in the government's labor data. He said even for lower-skilled jobs such as waitress or cashier, employers tend to value bachelor's degree-holders more highly than high-school graduates, paying them more for the same work and offering promotions. Aside from the structural problems I talked about above (automation, low IQ masses, globalization), the other problem is signalling. Many jobs that don't need a bachelor's level knowledge or ability to perform, still ask for them because a 4-year college degree is a signal of conscientiousness and discipline. You can expect that your worker will at least show up to work every day and will likely not steal or defraud you if he has the degree. Overall, this testifies to the fact that far, far too many people are going to college. Partly because of a misunderstanding of the source of cognitive ability (one doesn't get smart by going to school, it's only that smart people typically get advanced degrees), and the signalling problem I just mentioned. Another thing I would add, if it is true that highly educated foreign-born individuals are competing with American-born educated individuals, then maybe we need to even reassess the logic of restricting immigration to those with demonstrable ability. This is not wise if they're going to compete with native born talent. I know a lot of people would happily argue for curbing immigration of high-IQ East Asians, as they are out-competing Whites in certain areas (that's not even to mention high IQ people of color). Only eugenics offers any hope of a long-term solution, along with a serious thought of limiting immigration (even of high-IQ individuals...glad I'm already here). By boosting the share of people with high IQs, those cognitively demanding jobs in science and engineering—which now suffer from good shortages (as Arne Duncan likes to point out; he claims there are 2 million high paying and cognitively demanding jobs waiting to be filled; only he thinks that we can educate our way into those jobs), will be filled, no doubt opening up more opportunities in whole new fields, primarily for other high-IQ individuals. Even then, more higher IQ individuals would overall lead to increased consumer demand, spurring the economy and benefiting everyone. This of course is totally not going to happen, unfortunately. |
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Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by Concourse Express on Mon Apr 23 18:46:53 2012, in response to Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed, posted by JayMan on Mon Apr 23 12:56:41 2012. About your Facebook post:Indeed, part of the problem stems from advances in technology which has wiped out jobs. I also agree that the new fields created by these advances (mostly in IT and hardware/software engineering) require higher IQs than the positions such technology replaced. However, you're not going to increase the productivity of those in the "normal" IQ range without proper training, so I will again insist on education reform (though I believe you also said something along those lines, in the form of vocational/trades/training programs for cats in the normal IQ range). One solution is the combination of higher standards with integrated psychometric testing at the high-school level (e.g. via a more g-loaded SAT on par with the SATs of old); thus your "standardized" tests now give IQ scores that can be assessed against the average bachelor-level IQ of 115. That said, I'll refer once again to the table of IQ scores by major I linked to in the OP; the lowest estimated average IQ score among college grads is 103 (social work major; note that this is one point below the high-school grad average). Most branches of education are marginally higher; education majors themselves are estimated at 110. This may also be a problem; you mentioned a dearth in science/engineering due to jobs not being filled (presumably not enough high-IQ scientists/engineers). You'd presumably need higher-IQ individuals to properly teach advanced scientific/engineering concepts AND enough people of high enough IQ to grasp the material! (There's that understanding thing again!) About demographics and the vicious cycle of poverty: Curb illegal immigration - period. That'd be step 1. However, you'd probably have to reform wages also; so long as unemployment/welfare checks are higher than a typical low wage position, there is little incentive for individuals in those situations to seek work. Now I'm not saying cut welfare/unemployment (I'm against such cuts), but methinks you'd have to do one of the following: 1) Raise the minimum wage (such that the min-wage job offers more than welfare/unemployment and thus incentivizes such work among the lower IQ/working classes) 2) In lieu of idea 1, reform the low-wage jobs such that there is upward mobility (i.e. modest raises/promotions for achieving certain benchmarks on the job). Many jobs may already have this, but I believe many more don't. all else being equal, even in many shitty jobs, higher IQ (as determined by education level) is better than lower IQ...Aside from the structural problems I talked about above (automation, low IQ masses, globalization), the other problem is signalling. Many jobs that don't need a bachelor's level knowledge or ability to perform, still ask for them because a 4-year college degree is a signal of conscientiousness and discipline. If employers are using the bachelor's requirement for "signalling" purposes then this is another problem, though I'm not entirely convinced this requirement is used solely for this purpose. I say this only because a person's connections may enable him/her to get jobs they'd otherwise be unqualified for, even taking IQ into consideration. I've even heard stories from friends about how cats embellished degree/experience info on their resumes and were offered high-paying gigs as a result. Meanwhile, cats who are honest on their resumes and who also have what it takes are left up the creek. You can't accurately gauge conscientiousness on this wise if cats regularly lie or embellish info. That said, I guess that'd be another argument for psychometric testing... Only eugenics offers any hope of a long-term solution, along with a serious thought of limiting immigration (even of high-IQ individuals...glad I'm already here). I'm not convinced. For one, the option of voluntary sterilization already exists (although it is mainly for contraceptive/health purposes; see here for a description of one such organization). Secondly, I wouldn't curtail immigration of high-IQ foreigners while leaving the illegal immigration problem unsolved (and even if/when such problem is curtailed, I still wouldn't favor such a measure; the combination of reduced illegal immigration and legal immigration of high-IQ individuals might collectively raise the average IQ of the nation). visit my blog! |
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Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by orange blossom special on Mon Apr 23 19:25:23 2012, in response to ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed, posted by Concourse Express on Mon Apr 23 02:14:16 2012. But the numbers for graduates are better than young men at large.Lowest numbers of younger men in the workforce than in anytime in history. Things are looking up they tell us. |
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Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by Concourse Express on Mon Apr 23 20:11:41 2012, in response to Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed, posted by orange blossom special on Mon Apr 23 19:25:23 2012. Things are looking up all right - for student loan lenders. :(But things won't look up for the economy and a sizable chunk of the population if all these grads remain stuck in unemployment/underemployment and saddled with student loan debt. :( visit my blog! |
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Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by Spider-Pig on Mon Apr 23 20:14:06 2012, in response to Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed, posted by Concourse Express on Mon Apr 23 20:11:41 2012. OTOH student loan lenders benefit LESS from this since they don't benefit from default. |
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Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by Concourse Express on Mon Apr 23 20:26:57 2012, in response to Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed, posted by Spider-Pig on Mon Apr 23 20:14:06 2012. Good point. No real winners in the case of default...visit my blog! |
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Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by orange blossom special on Tue Apr 24 07:54:29 2012, in response to Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed, posted by Spider-Pig on Mon Apr 23 20:14:06 2012. It's the lenders of student loans that go outside the justice system in default. Remember the 90's era laws.Default and you get garnished w/o a hearing, and any and all tax refunds and other services get offset. Nothing else gets this. And then to get out of default? Whoa nelly. I think they do win. |
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Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by JayMan on Tue Apr 24 09:11:28 2012, in response to Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed, posted by Concourse Express on Mon Apr 23 18:46:53 2012. Indeed, part of the problem stems from advances in technology which has wiped out jobs. I also agree that the new fields created by these advances (mostly in IT and hardware/software engineering) require higher IQs than the positions such technology replaced.That's not just part of the problem. That is THE problem. All this garbage we hear about economic ups and downs (in the sense that most people expect the economy to recover from this downswing, which it won't really) serves to distract from this issue. About demographics and the vicious cycle of poverty: Curb illegal immigration - period. Oh most definitely; that goes without saying. We need to take a serious look at immigration in this country. People decry places like Alabama for their tough stance on immigration, and that the exodus of illegals from state has only served to leave crops lying unpicked in the fields, but this is only because the system is setup to be reliant on illegal Mexican labor. Cutting off the supply might allow the system to adapt to their absence—or maybe not, we'll see. Ironically, those are jobs that we would seriously like for technology to replace, but it has thus far failed to. However, you're not going to increase the productivity of those in the "normal" IQ range without proper training, so I will again insist on education reform (though I believe you also said something along those lines, in the form of vocational/trades/training programs for cats in the normal IQ range). One solution is the combination of higher standards with integrated psychometric testing at the high-school level (e.g. via a more g-loaded SAT on par with the SATs of old); thus your "standardized" tests now give IQ scores that can be assessed against the average bachelor-level IQ of 115. Yup, I agree. But here's the problem with that: there aren't enough jobs in the skilled trades for people with middling IQ. Even if these people that are now wasting their time in college instead went into skilled trades more suited to their IQ level, the vast majority of them would find that there's nothing there waiting for them. Technological advance has gutted many of these jobs. However, you'd probably have to reform wages also; so long as unemployment/welfare checks are higher than a typical low wage position, there is little incentive for individuals in those situations to seek work. Now I'm not saying cut welfare/unemployment (I'm against such cuts), but methinks you'd have to do one of the following: 1) Raise the minimum wage (such that the min-wage job offers more than welfare/unemployment and thus incentivizes such work among the lower IQ/working classes) 2) In lieu of idea 1, reform the low-wage jobs such that there is upward mobility (i.e. modest raises/promotions for achieving certain benchmarks on the job). Many jobs may already have this, but I believe many more don't. I have said much along these lines. I have stated that, especially at the bottom, work simply doesn't pay. If it wasn't for the projects, for example, no one could afford to live in New York City on minimum wage or on what most low-level service jobs pay. A good percentage of people refuse to participate in the labor force for this reason (not that there's much out there for them at this point). Labor at the bottom needs to be subsidized, but not by raising the minimum wage—that would only tax businesses and raise the price of basic goods and services as well as discourage hiring. I was thinking along the lines of a negative income tax, as Robert Reich has proposed. There is a little problem with that however: it would lower the prestige of certain lower-end but not bottom barrel fields. How good would the EMT or CNA feel if their jobs, which currently don't pay a whole lot but somewhat more than minimum wage, suddenly paid the same as a McDonald's burger flipper? That aside, I still think it'd be worthwhile. If employers are using the bachelor's requirement for "signalling" purposes then this is another problem, though I'm not entirely convinced this requirement is used solely for this purpose. I say this only because a person's connections may enable him/her to get jobs they'd otherwise be unqualified for, even taking IQ into consideration. I've even heard stories from friends about how cats embellished degree/experience info on their resumes and were offered high-paying gigs as a result. Meanwhile, cats who are honest on their resumes and who also have what it takes are left up the creek. You can't accurately gauge conscientiousness on this wise if cats regularly lie or embellish info. No, but I'm not sure how much you can do about this problem. No matter how fair you make the market place, the well-connected are always going to be better off than the unconnected. But also remember that success takes more than just IQ; it also requires certain personality traits. Self-discipline is one, but in some fields, say business, connections matter not only from what they bring, because having connections in and of itself itself is an effect of personality. For example, there are some fields that have a dearth of East Asians (business and law are examples), but this certainly not because they don't have the brains, but because they don't have the personality traits to excel. E. Asians tend to be introverted and "nerdy", where as these fields call for more type A personalities. More "alpha" types are likely to have large networks of connections as well. >>>>Only eugenics offers any hope of a long-term solution, along with a serious thought of limiting immigration (even of high-IQ individuals...glad I'm already here). I'm not convinced. For one, the option of voluntary sterilization already exists (although it is mainly for contraceptive/health purposes; see here for a description of one such organization). True, but there are no incentives for the people who we don't want to breed to undergo it. Incentives need to be put in place to encourage the economically unproductive to curb their reproduction. We also need to encourage the productive individuals in society to breed more, but to be honest, I can't think of anything that's likely to be effective at that task. The Europeans would sure like to know. Many of these countries have been trying to raise their abysmal fertility rates by actually paying women to have children, to uncertain success. France has an about replacement-level fertility rate, but this is primarily due to births among their sizable North African/Muslim minority. Not exactly the result they had in mind, I'm sure. Steve Sailer has argued that curbing the low-IQ population growth would encourage more reproduction among higher IQ groups. He claims that without needing to flee low-IQ ghettos, the cost of living would be lower and more higher-IQ couples could raise families. I can't say that he's wrong, but I'm not sure what the magnitude of that effect would be. As an aside, I will add that among NW Euros and their descendants at least, there seems to be a density sensitivity when it comes to breeding. Germanics seem to like having open space and plenty of room to themselves (I can't say that I blame them:  ).I think that when too many of them are living close together, for a variety of reasons, child-bearing drops. You will note that all the states with a high White fertility rate are vast open nothingnesses, where the typical family can claim a lot of their room to themselves (and, by extension cost of living is low). I'm sure this is true of all human groups, but perhaps some are more sensitive to it than others. Secondly, I wouldn't curtail immigration of high-IQ foreigners while leaving the illegal immigration problem unsolved (and even if/when such problem is curtailed, I still wouldn't favor such a measure; the combination of reduced illegal immigration and legal immigration of high-IQ individuals might collectively raise the average IQ of the nation). As I said, cutting off illegal immigration is a given. However, immigration reform alone is unlikely to have the desired effect. And even still, high-IQ immigration isn't necessarily a good thing, as we don't want foreigners to out-compete native-born Americans for cognitively demanding jobs. Overall however, America would be in a better place if it didn't have the low-IQ masses that is does. |
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Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed |
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Posted by Concourse Express on Tue Apr 24 15:39:01 2012, in response to Re: ARTICLE: 1 in 2 new graduates are jobless or underemployed, posted by JayMan on Tue Apr 24 09:11:28 2012. We need to take a serious look at immigration in this country. People decry places like Alabama for their tough stance on immigration, and that the exodus of illegals from state has only served to leave crops lying unpicked in the fields, but this is only because the system is setup to be reliant on illegal Mexican labor. Cutting off the supply might allow the system to adapt to their absence—or maybe not, we'll see.Indeed, a reform of such a system is needed. Unfortunately, the political will isn't there; as I'm sure you know, politicians use the "immigration" issue to garner Hispanic votes in election seasons (which pisses me off for several reasons - one, immigration isn't the top issue for all Hispanics (it certainly isn't for THIS Hispanic male)...and two, I'm against amnesty for illegals; methinks it makes no sense for legal immigrants to go through hurdles of red tape while illegals get a free pass...) Labor at the bottom needs to be subsidized, but not by raising the minimum wage—that would only tax businesses and raise the price of basic goods and services as well as discourage hiring. I was thinking along the lines of a negative income tax, as Robert Reich has proposed. Reich's proposal also includes education reform in the form of smaller class sizes and higher teacher pay (i.e. to incentivize better teachers working in low-income communities); however, this won't mean much if low standards persist. The increased EITC proposal sounds very interesting; to address the "lowered prestige" issue you brought up, mayhap pay EMTs/CNAs more than the "burger-flippers" as you call them after adjusting for the modified EITC. No matter how fair you make the market place, the well-connected are always going to be better off than the unconnected. But also remember that success takes more than just IQ; it also requires certain personality traits. Self-discipline is one, but in some fields, say business, connections matter not only from what they bring, because having connections in and of itself itself is an effect of personality. For example, there are some fields that have a dearth of East Asians (business and law are examples), but this certainly not because they don't have the brains, but because they don't have the personality traits to excel. E. Asians tend to be introverted and "nerdy", where as these fields call for more type A personalities. More "alpha" types are likely to have large networks of connections as well. Is this why some companies give prospective/new hires personality tests in addition to/as part of the interviewing/hiring process? Definitely true that those w/connections are better off on average... I'm not convinced. For one, the option of voluntary sterilization already exists (although it is mainly for contraceptive/health purposes...). True, but there are no incentives for the people who we don't want to breed to undergo it. Incentives need to be put in place to encourage the economically unproductive to curb their reproduction. Like? If you mean financial, just how much "incentive" ($$$) is incentive enough? Moreover, there are other concerns: 1) The potential for abuse, as history shows; this could be further exacerbated by how cats in power conclude one to be "economically unproductive." 2) The additional costs incurred (i.e. by gov't and to taxpayers) by such incentives. We also need to encourage the productive individuals in society to breed more, but to be honest, I can't think of anything that's likely to be effective at that task... Neither can I, especially given the amount of sacrifice required to raise children in terms of time, money, resources, etc. (especially if we're talking about more productive couples having more children than they planned/provisioned for); additionally, the system is set up such that couples and even single mothers with children are already advantaged financially by tax breaks and subsidies compared to legally single individuals. Even if such breaks/subsidies/benefits were increased or new ones introduced, you'd probably have a very hard time convincing such couples to take on more responsibility than they're willing to handle. Steve Sailer has argued that curbing the low-IQ population growth would encourage more reproduction among higher IQ groups. He claims that without needing to flee low-IQ ghettos, the cost of living would be lower and more higher-IQ couples could raise families. I can't say that he's wrong, but I'm not sure what the magnitude of that effect would be. I honestly don't believe this would have a significant effect. Using gentrified areas as examples, the cost of living in these areas typically increases as properties are improved. Additionally, since it appears wealth and birth rates are negatively correlated, if the "need to flee low-IQ ghettos" is no longer present, it may still not be enough to "encourage" additional reproduction among these couples. I think that when too many of them are living close together, for a variety of reasons, child-bearing drops. You will note that all the states with a high White fertility rate are vast open nothingnesses, where the typical family can claim a lot of their room to themselves (and, by extension cost of living is low). I'm sure this is true of all human groups, but perhaps some are more sensitive to it than others. You may be on to something here (and that is a nice pic). I'd say you might be right about sensitivity; when I've visited family in rural areas the scenery was beautiful and peaceful but MAN are those places BORING. Mayhap that's a result of living in the Bee-Ex my whole life, but still... As I said, cutting off illegal immigration is a given. However, immigration reform alone is unlikely to have the desired effect. And even still, high-IQ immigration isn't necessarily a good thing, as we don't want foreigners to out-compete native-born Americans for cognitively demanding jobs. Tell that to companies that continue outsourcing; you're not gonna get Americans to work in those cognitively-demanding fields for scraps. Of course, you also have to take globalization into account; this makes preventing foreigners from "out-competing" native-born Americans tough at best ABSENT some of the reforms we've discussed at length. You're right that IQ is not the sole barometer of success; with America as a nation possessing a higher average IQ than many other nations, our mediocre standing in many fields relative to other nations REALLY speaks volumes. visit my blog! |
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