It's also regressive to cut taxes on some new privately owned businesses.
The right way to do this stuff is raze wages in Taiwan and Korea. Supply side subsidy race to the bottom when we have an aggregate demand issue is stupid.
> It's also regressive to cut taxes on some new privately owned businesses.
What does this refer to? Did someone suggest that?
> The right way to do this stuff is raze wages in Taiwan and Korea.
Is it a wage issue? Also, if we education and train American workers, maybe they can have higher paying (and physically and mentally better) jobs than manufacturing.
The last is a critique of the book, but one that disagrees about wages being too low in the exporting countries.
> Also, if we educat[e] and train American workers, maybe they can have higher paying (and physically and mentally better) jobs than manufacturing.
Also, manufacturing is fairly automated for quite some times now. Boosting manufacturing to create jobs no longer makes sense, as much as the nostalgics wish it would.
I don't think education is the problem here. The last 10 years were a credentials rat race because the labor maket was too slack. That does cause a "skills are going to waste, degrading education" problem, but that's very different.
If we can't boost demand enough without more environment destruction, then we must to cut working hours. (And we should do that anyways.) Either of those will create a genuine need for skills to increase productivity, not just to have the best résumé.
> The last 10 years were a credentials rat race because the labor maket was too slack. That does cause a "skills are going to waste, degrading education" problem, but that's very different.
I believe people in the HN demographic perceive a credentials rat race (and perception may or may not be accurate, of course), but my understanding is that for most of the population, higher education became less affordable. Also, I read several times that businesses needed more skilled workers than they could find; in SV, good programmers have a lot of economic power, as one example.
> If everyone gets a degree then a large percentage of them were not neccessary to begin with.
I don't see how that necessarily follows. For example, we might say 'if everyone becomes literate, than a large percentage of literacy wasn't necessary in the first place'. Why not?
The labor market is a buyer market. Demand is inflexible but supply keeps increasing on its own. The end result are anti immigration sentiments.
Credential wars are the obvious conclusion reached by the paradox of competition.
People get a degree to get ahead in the line, not because the degree is actually necessary. It can turn out to be a waste of time and thereby a net negative if everyone does it.
> The labor market is a buyer market. Demand is inflexible but supply keeps increasing on its own.
That's certainly not true. Since ~1930, the population in the U.S. has approximately tripled, and the average income has increased approximately 10 times (IIRC).
Income is not a pie that is divided up into smaller and smaller pieces. That's not how economics works at all. In fact, each new person produces more than they consume (otherwise, nobody would pay them), and they increase demand for goods, which increase demand for production.
> People get a degree to get ahead in the line, not because the degree is actually necessary.
What is the basis for that? I got a degree because it was both necessary, and because I wanted to understand the world better and have the best thinking skills I could get.
If the International Labour Organization had any clout, we might have wage-based tariffs. Tariffs would be set based on wages at the producing end. Maybe companies could get out of tariffs if they paid their workers more and their union certified that they were doing that.
The ILO is part of the United Nations. At one time, it was important. Not any more.
I'm not sure I'd want that or that it would help: First, much of the work is lower value, which is why it can be done by lower-skilled, lower-paid workers. How do we equalize wages for making socks between the U.S. and Vietnam, when nobody in the U.S. makes socks (or pick something else if I'm wrong about U.S. sock production)?
Also, low-cost products benefit consumers. It's odd that we are so focused on protecting (generally) wealthy owners of companies, by taking money from consumers. It also reduces the overall efficiency of the economy, but supporting inefficient use of resources.
Finally, I want U.S. to have higher-paying, higher-skilled jobs, not the jobs of 50-100 years ago.
MHO: The problem is that capital can move much faster and farther than labor. A factory can be moved from British Columbia to Cambodia much more quickly than the workers in BC can find a new job. Regulate that: Requires more notice depending on local availability of jobs, for example, and investment in training and moving costs. Invest heavily in education for the worker's kids, so they have a future regardless. Provide generous workers comp and healthcare, so workers can survive the upheavals.
The right way to do this stuff is raze wages in Taiwan and Korea. Supply side subsidy race to the bottom when we have an aggregate demand issue is stupid.