Wednesday, April 2, 2014
Jobs and Skills and Zombies
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/31/opinion/krugman-jobs-and-skills-and-zombies.html?_r=0 DUE 7 April 2014. Some employers complain that they can't find skilled workers; what does Krugman say should be the economic remedy for this? Who do employers blame for the plight of businesses in our economy? Krugman states that the "skills myth" is shifting attention away from other economic problems in the U.S. Name 3 of these problems being avoided by employers and why.
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Even though this "skills gap" everyone is talking about is a myth, people keep talking about it, and it continues to spread. This leads to some employers complaining that they can't find skilled workers. Krugman says that if they are really looking for those workers, "they should be willing to offer higher wages to attract workers with those skills." Employers then blame for the plight of businesses in our economy on on the workers and stating that they don't have the skills the employers want. This "skills myth" is even taking attention away from other economic problems that are legitimate such as, bad fiscal policy and inadequate action by the Federal Reserve because people are too busy reading about the "failings" of American workers. It also distracts people from the increasing profits and bonuses of companies even as employment and wages stay the same (corporate executives may want to keep the myth around for this reason exactly.)
ReplyDeleteThe "skills gap" continues to be a bogus explanation for what most like to think is the issue for our poor economy. Really, it's just selfish businessmen. Some employers complain that they can't find skilled workers. Krugman says that the remedy for this issue is to raise wages. If a business really wants to bring in quality workers, higher wages will attract higher quality persons to their establishment. Going with the minimum wage stigma being associated with poor man's work essentially, a higher wage entails that you will be asked to do more "sophisticated", non-demeaning tasks for decent pay. Bring on the skilled workers! However, businesses continue to blame the workers themselves for...well...not being employed and not being skilled. Guess what, bub? That's what the business is for. Outside of education, you develop skills in the work force by BEING in work force actively. Krugman says beyond this petty "skills myth," we must draw our attention to bigger issues like the looming debt crisis, disastrous fiscal policy, and inadequate action by the Federal Reserve (monetary policy). The American workers are not to blame for the economy's plummet. Will the real criminals please stand up? *Congress and the Fed stand*. lol. Anyway. I'm getting carried away. Many of the issues that continue to cause businessmen to complain and holler are rooted from the government, particularly the Fed and Congress. We can fix the root of the problem and businessmen can still keep their heads in the ground and their hands clean... for now.
ReplyDeleteIt looks as if the so called "skills gap" is just another ploy used by the rich and snobby to explain the poor state of our economy. Krugman believes that the solution to finding more skilled workers is to raise wages. The higher you pay them, the higher the quality of the work they'll do for you. Doesn't seem too complicated. I mean, check out Costco. I don't think the owner of Costco is complaining about a "lack of skilled workers." This "skills myth" is taking away attention from much more important issues, like the fiscal policy issues, the monetary policy issues, and even issues like the profiting and bonuses given to the big businesses while the rest of America continues to search for well enough paying jobs. These issues need to be fixed, and once they are, the myth of "skills" will be just that in the eyes of the public: a myth.
ReplyDeleteKrugman believes the remedy for this is to raise wages. If you think about it, its really quite logical; increased wages attract higher quality workers.
ReplyDeleteThe stigma associated with that of minimum wage is the idea of poor man’s work. In other words, a minimum wage job is often thought of as one, in which individuals to complete numerous demeaning tasks for little pay. A higher paying job is typically thought to entail tasks for decent pay. Costco is the perfect example of Krugman’s theory. The employees of Costco are paid $15 an hour, high above minimum wage, and are generally higher quality workers.
Employers blame workers for the plight of businesses in our economy. However, this idea is ridiculous! Aside from education, workers become skilled by gaining experience from employment and active participation in the workforce.
The “skills myth” is shifting attention away from other economic problems of the United States. Instead of focusing on the spectacle of soaring profits and bonuses (even when employment and wages stagnate), the disaster caused by fiscal policy, and the inadequacies of the Federal Reserve, employers avoid them, and continue to blame American workers.
Krugman believes the economic solution for the so called "skills gap" would be to delete its existence entirely. The notion, which is not supported by any sort of data, is still being regularly talked about in the circles of the elite and influential. Due to the fact that this issue is so deeply embedded in the socioeconomic sphere, it has been nearly impossible to disregard. Krugman, realizing it isn't really feasible to delete the phony issue, suggests that companies raise wages in order to attract more skilled workers. Employers have been putting the blame on workers, saying that they are all unskilled and at fault for not being employed. However, workers at all levels of education are experiencing high unemployment. The companies that support the imaginary "skills gap" need to be allocating more funds to job training instead of focusing on issues based on complete hokum. The skills myth has shifted attention away from "disastrously wrongheaded fiscal policy and inadequate action by the Federal Reserve" and also the "soaring profits" still occurring as workers suffer. Employers are glad to create this attention shift for they can benefit themselves and save money by blaming workers rather than help fix real issues that impact millions of people.
ReplyDeleteKrugman says that "If employers are really crying out for certain skills, they should be willing to offer higher wages to attract workers with those skills." If you want to bring more skilled workers, you cant expect them to work for what unskilled workers are paid. The buisnesses blamed this "gap" on a phone survey that said “Which of the following do you feel best describes the ‘gap’ in the U.S. workforce skills gap?” followed by a list of alternatives. Given the loaded question, it’s actually amazing that 8 percent of the respondents were willing to declare that there was no gap. This is not efficient evidence that there is a gap, and that's why there are not skilled workers. One problem is that Instead of focusing on the way disastrously wrongheaded fiscal policy and inadequate action by the Federal Reserve have crippled the economy and demanding action, important people piously wring their hands about the failings of American workers.
ReplyDeletePaul Krugman believes that the solution for the "gap" is to have every employee-seeking employers raise the wage to attract potentially skilled workers. The one piece of evidence you might cite in favor of the skills-gap story is the sharp rise in long-term unemployment, which could be evidence that many workers don’t have what employers want. But it isn’t. At this point, we know a lot about the long-term unemployed, and they’re pretty much indistinguishable in skills from laid-off workers who quickly find new jobs. the skills myth is having dire effects on real-world policy. Instead of focusing on the way disastrously wrongheaded fiscal policy and inadequate action by the Federal Reserve have crippled the economy and demanding action, important people piously wring their hands about the failings of American workers. Because the employers are blaming workers for their own plight, the skills myth shifts attention away from the spectacle of soaring profits and bonuses even as employment and wages stagnate.
ReplyDeleteThe “skills gap” seems to keep spreading, although many believe that it is only a myth. It seems as though Krugman wants to erase the existence of it completely. The “skills gap” brings us up to the topic of employers complaining about how they can not find any skilled workers to hire. Krugman states that if the employers are clearly working their hardest at finding workers then “they should be willing to offer higher wages to attract workers with those skills.” The employers then take this information by putting all the blame on the condition of the businesses within the economy at hand. He also supports his theory by saying that the workers don’t have the skills employers are looking for. The whole debacle with skills and the lack of them is considered a deflector from the array of economic problems that occurring at this point in time. Such as, the Federal Reserve not doing their job, and bad fiscal policy. The “skills myth” is also pulling the attention away from the crazy amount of rising profits and bonuses even while the employment and wages remain the same, while the blame continues to be put on the American workers.
ReplyDeleteWhen people say that they are unable to find skilled workers for a job, Krugman states that the cure for this condition is to offer a higher payout or rewards for the skilled workers so they are actually tempted to get a job. The employers are blaming the plight of the business in our economy on the workers stating that the workers that are being hired doesn't have the specific job that the employers are seeking. The skill myth is shifting attention away from other workers as Krugman states. The other problems that employers are faced with is that they are not offering the absolute best, they also blame the state of other businesses in the economy, and finally they state that the employers don't have the specific jobs skills they want.
ReplyDeleteKrugman states that the problem isn’t just having to do with skilled and unskilled workers but with the fact that the economy wasn’t and isn’t doing so well. Just the fact that the person applying for a job has been out of work makes them undesirable and employers don’t even look at their qualifications. Krugman suggests offering higher wages to attract workers with the needed skills, but obviously they don’t care enough to do so. Employers blame the pool of unemployed workers who don’t seem to have the correct skills to qualify, and as stated before most of them don’t get looked at. The problems being avoided are the looming debt crisis, fiscal policy and the Federal Reserve.
ReplyDeleteThe "skills gap" is essentially a made-up explanation for what most believe is the issue for our poor economy. In actuality, the problem is just selfish businessmen. In recency, employers are complaining that they can't find skilled workers. Krugman says that the remedy for this issue is to raise wages. Krugman states that if the employers are clearly working their hardest at finding workers then “they should be willing to offer higher wages to attract workers with those skills.” The “skills myth” is shifting attention away from other economic problems of the United States. Employers are blaming the workers for the plight of businesses in our economy and stating that they don't have the skills the employers want. This "skills myth" is taking away attention from much more important issues, like the Federal Reserve not doing their job, bad fiscal policy, and the massive amount of rising profits and bonuses whilst the employment and wages remain the same. However, the blame somehow continues to be put on the American workers.
ReplyDeleteKrugman believes that the economic remedy for the apparent "skills gap" myth would be to eliminate its reputation all together. This "myth," as he calls it, plays the role of the perfect excuse for the businesses to use when discussing the pivotal cause of today's high unemployment rate. This myth has caused the focus to shift from the real economic problems, to one that doesn't even exist. The dilemmas the country should really be working on include the extensive (and unnecessary) bonuses top employees are constantly receiving, wrongly directed fiscal policy by the fed, and employers taking advantage of the "skills gap" to not hire people who are, actually, skilled. Speaking of employers, they blame the the plight of the economy on the unskilled unemployed, but in reality, THEY are at fault. As Krugman stated, once they see that a person in unemployed, these big shots don't care enough to give them a chance, whether or not they are skilled enough.
ReplyDeleteIn reality, its not that there is not enough skilled workers in the market, but there are just no incentives for them to actually get a job. This is mainly due to business men who are selfish and want to pay themselves millions while they pay their employees very little. Krugman believes that businesses should start paying higher wages or better incentives so people will be more tempted in getting a job as a skilled laborer. These business company’s blame the people who don’t have the necessary skills that they are looking for, and these people are usually in the unemployment pool. Some of the other problems that we are turning our heads away from bad fiscal policy, the federal reserve not doing their jobs properly, and the major debt crisis that we are now in.
ReplyDeleteIt always seems like either someone is shifting blame back and forth or misconstruing data. In this particular article Krugman addresses both. Businesses purposely misinterpret the fact that 11 million people are unemployed and that 4 million people and blame this gap on the lack of skills. However, its the fact that this businesses don't provide incentive for these skilled people to be attracted to their companies.Higher wages, health care and retirement benefits would attract the skilled workers that they somehow cannot seem to find. And this is exactly what Krugman offers as a economic remedy to end this 'zombie.' The businesses are blaming the American workers for their lack of their skills and use the idea of the skills gap as a crutch for the lack of employment. Employers also shift attention away from the Federal Reserve's failure to improve the economy because the economy's state is beneficial to them. At this point, while the poor is getting poorer, the rich continues to grow richer and why would employers want to pay higher wages or hire more people to lower their profits?
ReplyDeleteHonestly, my favorite part of the article is when Krugman addresses the telephone survey. I actually laughed when i read the question which was obviously skewed. It didn't ask if there was skills gap but instead what the cause the skills gap is. Obviously this gives the assumption that there is in fact a skills gap, and its funny cause there isn't.
Some employers today are complaining because they cannot find skilled workers to hire as employees. In my opinion, this is not true. There is not enough evidence to support this theory, and even if there was, correlation does not equal causation. Krugman's economic remedy to the situation is to have employers pay skilled workers more if they really need them. Businesses are blaming the workers themselves due to their lack of skill and employment. Obviously, this is ludicrous, because workers WANT to be skilled and TRY to be employed. Krugman states that the "skills myth" is shifting attention away from other economic problems in the United States. He also states that " Unfortunately, the skills myth — like the myth of a looming debt crisis — is having dire effects on real-world policy. Instead of focusing on the way disastrously wrongheaded fiscal policy and inadequate action by the Federal Reserve have crippled the economy and demanding action, important people piously wring their hands about the failings of American workers". Three bad economic reasons are bad fiscal policy, poor efforts on the Federal Reserve's part, and the terrible economic slump our economy is currently in.
ReplyDeleteAll in all, just like Krugman states, "we need to kill this zombie, if we can, and stop making excuses for an economy that punishes workers".
If we actually accept and come to terms with the actual issue at hand, it will be easier for us to start combating it, or at least imposing new rules in order to help mend the issue's worst pangs.
Anita Pizzirani (Pizza)
Period: 1
The issue is not that there is a skill gap between the talented and the untalented, but that the wages for jobs requiring talent are far too low. Krugman says that companies need to be willing to offer higher wages to skilled workers if they expect to begin hiring. Nonetheless, employers continue to believe that, rather than the low wages they continue to offer, the "skills gap" is the major cause of unemployment in America right now. This is obviously false, you don't even need statistics to realize it. More people are going to college now than they were fifty years ago, yet a lower portion of people have jobs. If skill gaps were a real thing, then they should have gotten smaller over time. The skills myth has led to lower wages, and companies are doing nothing to fix the fact that people are not getting paid enough to want to work. Companies have forgotten to address the fact that there are college students that they can recruit to work, meaning no one is getting experience and soon there will be no one to fill management positions. Also, companies are ignoring the fact that the longer these jobs go unfilled the less incentive there will be to get a degree in the related field so the less likely there will ever be someone working that job. Companies are creating a gap, and failing to do anything to fix it.
ReplyDeleteEmployers are complaining that they’re finding it hard to find workers with the skills they need but aren't willing to pay for skilled employers. Krugman’s solution to the shortage in skilled workers is to raise wages. The workers have skills that they've acquired through schooling and experience. They should be held in higher regard than the unskilled workers. He believes that if employers really want more skilled workers, they must raise their wages to attract them. Employers are blaming workers for the plight of businesses in our economy rather than blaming the true culprit. Fiscal and monetary policy issues and even the issue of profiting and bonuses given to the big businesses. Important people wring their hands about the failings of American workers.
ReplyDeleteAccording to Krugman, the economic remedy for employers not being able to find skilled workers is for them to “show the money.” If employers need the skilled workers so badly, they would be willing to pay better wages in order to attract a better pool of applicants. Since employers haven’t been offering nicer wages, it’s harder to come by the workers with skills they require. Nowadays, it’s hard to find groups of workers getting big wage increases. Since people always like to get swept up in nonexistent conceived problems and throwing the blame from one group to another instead of fixing real problems, employers have decided to agree that this employee qualification problem is a real one. Like always, they’re blaming the plight of businesses in the economy on the workers for the lack of skills that “keep them unemployed.” Mostly so they don’t have to do anything about it, since after all, it’s every unemployed person’s own fault for their situation. The reality of the situation is that employers are using this false yet convenient myth of a skills gap to justify blaming workers for the lack of employment and to hide the fact that the benefits provided to workers are continually dwindling and they aren’t offering high enough wages. Stupidly, this skills myth thing is taking away attention from important things-a recurring theme these days- and having a negative effect on the country. This issue has people worrying about the failings of the common American worker when they should be worrying about Congress and the failing fiscal policy and action of the Federal Reserve. People aren’t demanding action where it should be taken. This stance where the worker is the blame also distracts the public by making them too insecure about their claimed inadequacy when really, businesses have soaring profits and bonuses for some while employees’ wages have stagnated.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/31/opinion/krugman-jobs-and-skills-and-zombies.html?_r=0 DUE 7 April 2014. Some employers complain that they can't find skilled workers; what does Krugman say should be the economic remedy for this? Who do employers blame for the plight of businesses in our economy? Krugman states that the "skills myth" is shifting attention away from other economic problems in the U.S. Name 3 of these problems being avoided by employers and why.
ReplyDeleteKrugman says to offer higher wages. However, Ms. Meachum says that crane operators are paid very well due to high demand yet there is still a shortage of those. Employers blame a skills gap. Not enough people with the skills they need for certain positions. To a degree it's kind of true. When someone is a philosophy major, if they land a job, they will be asking you why you want fries with that. But that has been happening for years. So I don't think the skills gap is causing a bad economy. I think it's just something that has been there and will be there especially with how advanced out technology is getting. Income inequality is ignored by employers as a problem because they don't want to pay higher wages. Krugman says also that we should be blaming the fed and congress for our monetary and fiscal actions being mishandled but I don't know enough about that topic to outright agree with him that we should focus on that issue or I would be a zombie. I think we should focus on gearing education towards jobs that have vacancies and in high demand or at least offering options like that in school. Maybe even having more career oriented classes in high school.
Krugman says that the remedy for this issue is to raise wages. If a business really wants to bring in quality workers, higher wages will attract higher quality persons to their establishment. Employers blame workers for the plight of businesses in our economy.The “skills myth” is shifting attention away from other economic problems of the United States. The skills myth is shifting attention from the spectacle of soaring profits and bonuses even as employment and wages stagnate. Some of the other problems that we are turning our heads away from bad fiscal policy, the federal reserve not doing their jobs properly, and the major debt crisis that we are now in.
ReplyDeleteThe "skills gap" that we have going on in america does not really exist. Employers saying that they can't find workers for work is because a lot of people are not specialized in that field of work for which employers are looking for. The jobs that we have inj america that is availoable to people are jobs that require degrees or a professional tittle. Which is what a lot of Americans do not have so its hard for people to get into a line of work without that degree tittle. people are blaming businesses for the dilema, when really we should be blaming congress bec ause they are the ones responsible for job creations. The skill myth that we have is shifting the attention away from our economic problems such as the debt we are in, our terrible fiscal policy as well as the fed not doing what they are supposed to be doing.
ReplyDeleteKrugman claims that if employers really could not find as many skilled workers as they needed, that they would offer higher wages for someone to fill that demand as quickly as possible, but in reality, this is not happenning, making it a "myth". Employers continuously blame potential employers themselves for not having the necessary skills to work for them, when really, they are at blame. Putting the "skills gap" myth to rest is necessary for the country as a whole to continue on to much more important issues that are taking the backseat to this non-issue. For instance, according to Krugman, there is the way in which the Fed has wronged the economy through inadequate fiscal policy. There is also the fact that wages are decreasing steadily, as profits are growing more and more. The fact that these potential employers themselves are the ones spreading this zombie myth just brings it full-circle.
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