Reply to Are we being complacent about disappearing white collar jobs?

Forum Index » Jobs and Careers

Reply to "Are we being complacent about disappearing white collar jobs?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]We are being complacent, but for those of us in middle age, there's nothing to do except dance until the music stops.

I'm 44. If I could do it over I would be a house builder. But 44 is too late to start that journey.[/quote]

If you had started in construction at 20, what would you do at 44+ when your body is giving out? An economy dependent on manual labor requires a robust social safety net. That's why there were so many union actions before the tech revolution.

Our politicians want everybody (else) in manual jobs but they don't want the workplace safety, healthcare, pensions, etc that people literally fought and died to get in order to make those jobs tolerable. [/quote]

This is a common myth among people unfamiliar with the trades. Owner-operators and small businesses are very common in the building trades. I'm not saying it's easy, but it's a non-white collar path with some security and inherent value. A lot of my friends who started in construction in their late teens (when I also worked construction in the summer) are owners of small-mid construction businesses now.  Basically, anybody who didn't get sidelined by heavy drinking or a nasty divorce is in a very comfortable situation. So am I, but I wouldn't recommend my white-collar route to my son with AI coming fast.[/quote]

This is one of those things like when people say "if you don't like working for minimum wage, just find a better job" that while it can be true for anybody, it cannot be true for [i]everybody.[/i]

Yes, many blue collar workers successfully transition into management or ownership, but it's impossible for everyone to do it because every step up the ladder you go, you're winnowing out multiple people. You hand wave the winnowed away saying they are drunks and divorcees but there are assuredly plenty of people for whom they were not able to become managers or owners simply because there aren't enough of those job available for every single blue collar worker to transition into. [/quote]

Those types of comments are typical guilded age oligarchy BS comments. Let’s have an economy of all managers.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics