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basically companies are being forced today to train in house and take their lower skilled employees and train them to be higher level employees.
I think there is a lot less of this going on now than there was in the 80s. It was common practice when I was starting out. Seems like there are a lot fewer companies willing to make the investment, rather they complain and then lobby for hiring foreign workers.
Automation, robotics, global competition, and even illegal aliens have chipped away at the low skilled jobs. That trend is only getting worse. Some people, rruff, seem to think Americans are too stupid to be educated and to gain the needed skills.
Even if people could get the "needed skills" for the jobs of today, that wouldn't keep them from becoming obsolete quicker than they can be obtained. It's a problem that is fundamentally impossible to solve in this manner.
I think there is a lot less of this going on now than there was in the 80s. It was common practice when I was starting out. Seems like there are a lot fewer companies willing to make the investment, rather they complain and then lobby for hiring foreign workers.
i am seeing more and more of it today as the work force is getting tighter and tighter with the best of breed employees who are already experienced and skilled in an industry are going no where else . their companies are now taking good care of this group .
so more and more companies are having to start maintaining their own bench and training and promoting from within .
we have had picker packers from the warehouse move through the ranks in to outside sales where they are earning 6 figure salaries after a year or 2 .
we have inside sales people who were once our drivers .
the demand is so high that although i retired they want me to work and train employees as much as i care to work . it has created a great situation to be in for me because i can be so flexible and work whenever i want as i enjoy it and have zero stress..
You seem to want to point the finger at others and ignore the point. The point is simple, very simple, and very important. Low level, unskilled jobs are going, going, gone. No one can count on getting a good paying job without appropriate skills. Even a college degree that could be earned by a dead cow is only worth so much. Automation, robotics, global competition, and even illegal aliens have chipped away at the low skilled jobs. That trend is only getting worse. Some people, rruff, seem to think Americans are too stupid to be educated and to gain the needed skills. I don't think that is the case. It seems a culture that downplays and even ridicules education is partly too blame. Laziness and feelings of entitlement don't help.
I find skill rhetoric little bit more than slave conditioning "Hey, man, you've lost, you have no skills, drop dead and just dont spoil the view for the rest of us". Something like that. Self blame is the best jailer. When in fact "skills" it takes to participate in the dumbed down modern work place are increasingly rudimentary "data entry" kinda skills requiring minimum or no understanding of anything just meticulous following a tabulated, computerized procedure, blue or white collar, yes, R&D and engineering - same thing, automated&tabulated to the point where knowledge of underlying processes etc. becomes optional and frequently forgotten, use it or lose it. So it is not about "skills" per se, it is about owning class distributing feeding slots, and ultimately. economic output and resources according to some fairly whimsical rules of thumb among steadily shrinking number of the "worthy" individuals when more or less identical individuals are denied the same feeding rights. An economic game of musical chairs. Yes, self blame is a powerful social control tool, it keeps losers in check quite well, but if the number of losers reaches certain threshold, self blame will not be sufficient. As I look at increasingly sociopatic people in power, I can see that they push hard for some mighty nasty dystopian master-slave future, partly because they are not afraid of the sheep they mark for culling. They are correct for time being, they can go social darwinian really far with little resistence, but they cannot stop.
Even if people could get the "needed skills" for the jobs of today, that wouldn't keep them from becoming obsolete quicker than they can be obtained. It's a problem that is fundamentally impossible to solve in this manner.
Being educated means learning how to reason, analyze, adapt, solve new problems. Those skills don't become obsolete. What you are talking about is specific vocational training that can indeed become obsolete. If all you know is how to screw some parts together, then those skills become worthless when the product is no longer needed.
Even so Mathjak is right. Companies are hiring people to screw that part together and then trying to upgrade and do additional training so they can retain those employees for different jobs. Being lucky and working for the right company can help but it is a lot better for the employee to take control and develop the knowledge and abilities that are in demand. Education and learning are not supposed to end the day someone walks out of school with a degree. For most of us and for most jobs, learning is an ongoing need.
RememberMee, you are absolutely right. Your life will turn out to be exactly what you expect it to be which apparently is not much. You will never have the right skills. You will always be a victim of those masters in power. The best you can hope for is a feeding slot.
Did you ever wonder why some people are losers and others are not?
RememberMee, you are absolutely right. Your life will turn out to be exactly what you expect it to be which apparently is not much. You will never have the right skills. You will always be a victim of those masters in power. The best you can hope for is a feeding slot.
Did you ever wonder why some people are losers and others are not?
Some people are like vegetables, or like pigs running to a trough full of swill and disregarding everything else around them. Some of us look farther than a personal trough of swill. Just because your trough is full it does not mean that a cattle truck is not on its way. Personally, having all the right skills and personality to become a kapo in a concentration camp doesnt inspire me, but an opportunity like that would thrill your kind.
Being educated means learning how to reason, analyze, adapt, solve new problems. Those skills don't become obsolete.
Since when are those things taught in school or any training?
The university I went to prided itself on teaching scientists and engineers "how to think". The emphasis was exclusively on solving problems that did not resemble anything discussed in class. Though if you really understood what was taught, and you are able to reason creatively and quickly, then you should be able to figure it out.
They didn't teach anyone how to think. They just weeded out those who couldn't. I believe there is a lot that can be done in this regard when the brain is developing, but it's too late by college. And there is still a broad spectrum of innate ability, and those on the low end are never going to make it.
Besides, it's a moot point. You are fighting the last war, while this thread is focused on the future. And no matter how good you get at reasoning compared to average humans, AI is going to clean your clock.
Critical thinking schools supposedly teach... it is such a crock. Most students find really fast that compliance and going with the flow is the best graduation strategy. Same with keeping a job in the real world. Perhaps a few deluded souls could survive a school with a few critical thinking circuits intact, but the real world would take care of those ASAP. Besides sheer amount and complexity of knowledge to be crammed in a short amount of time leaves no time for much thinking about anything, critically or otherwise.
Last edited by RememberMee; 06-22-2017 at 05:11 PM..
Critical thinking schools supposedly teach... it is such a crock. Most students find really fast that compliance and going with the flow is the best graduation strategy. Same with keeping a job in the real world. Perhaps a few deluded souls could survive a school with a few critical thinking circuits intact, but the real world would take care of those ASAP. Besides sheer amount and complexity of knowledge to be crammed in a short amount of time leaves no time for much thinking about anything, critically or otherwise.
There you go, right again. I suspect you are accurately describing what you learned in school, how you made it through to graduation, and how you have been able to keep a job. Yup students are really pushed to cram in a lot of knowledge. The average college student takes maybe 12 or 15 credit hours per semester. That means they need to show up for classes around 2 or 3 hours a day. That leaves no time for "much thinking about anything, critical or otherwise". Your life sure has been tough with all that compliance and conforming and being constantly pushed around by teachers and employers. Well, at least you learned to go with the flow.
Again, maybe there is a different path that some others take. Which is exactly what I am advocating.
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