Hi all (by all I mean, like, next to nobody).
This started out as an email and developed into a blog post. I was reading an article my sister sent me. And here's the article:
http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/
It was a good article--except for the part where the author said that lots of people with asthma work. I spent a month having an asthma attack this winter, during which time I was definitely unable to work. For the first couple of weeks I would have been unable to even get myself ready to go to work, and for the next couple of weeks I still wouldn't have been able to walk from my car to my hypothetical job. I'm happy for people who can take a couple of puffs of an inhaler and go on with their lives.
But I try not to obsess over things like that.
I think the author, Mr. Joffe-Walt, has hit, in a tangential sort of way, on part of the reason for our society's economic problem.
Our standards for being an employable have gone way up over the last fifty years.
It used to be easier to get a job. If you were Mr. Joe Farmer and you wanted to provide for your family, common knowledge was all you needed. Most people knew enough about animal husbandry and planting a crop and food preservation to get the job done. Anything you didn't know, somebody around you probably did. You didn't need a degree, and you didn't have to fill out an application. And if you wanted to start a career as a blacksmith, for example, you might be able to get an apprenticeship.
You didn't even have to know how to read.
It's different now.
It's partly an intelligence issue. And we as a society are completely unwilling to address this. Half of our population has IQs under 100. Some of us can't read and write, or can't read and write well. And for some of us, no amount of education is going to change that. And we need to find a place for those of us who, through no fault of their own, are not going to succeed in the workforce as it is now.
A single person who wants to make enough money to have a decent life--an apartment, a car, utilities, maybe some decent clothes and furniture and an occasional meal out or a movie--is going to have to get a college education (unless they get very lucky). Even an individual who belongs to a couple who, between the two of them, want to make enough money to survive, is going to have to be able to fill out a job application, and is probably going to have to be able to type up a resume, and some of us just can't do it.
(And don't get me started on the paperwork in our society right now, in every aspect of life, not just job-hunting.)
Farming is a good example. It isn't what it used to be. You have to have a big tractor, and keep up with the EPA regulations, and do a lot of paperwork. It's not just the back-breaking labor of digging in the dirt any more. Manufacturing jobs are paying a lot less than they used to, and requiring a resume or job experience to begin with. Almost any decent job requires education and previous work experience.
If you have an IQ of 110, you can probably do reasonably well in school, and go to college, and enter the work force having a little job experience, and you might make it. Your parents probably made it, because there's a (dare I say it?) strong hereditary component to IQ. So you have their shoulders to stand on.
If your IQ is 90, well....
So there are a whole lot of people out there who would be happy to work if only they qualified, but they have no hope of doing so.
And then, in this dismal economy, employers don't have to be the nicest people. Let's face it, it's always been this way to some extent. If you're making $100,000 a year, your employer is statistically likely to be a lot nicer. People making $10,000 a year often get treated like dirt. Having had many different jobs over the years, I can attest to this personally. There are two very different worlds out there, one world where you wear nice clothes and eat out for lunch and get treated with respect, and another world where people are a lot less educated and polite and where you'd better learn your place very quickly. You shut up, keep your head down, and do as you're told.
Add to that the proliferation of two-employee families with children (not that I want to pass a law against that (shudder)), and you have another problem. An employer who insists you can only accrue sick days at one day a month (and vacation days might be a thing of the past). Once you have children, somebody has to take care of them when they're sick, take them to appointments, etc. Maybe you don't make any appointments you don't have to. And heaven help you if you get sick. A bad case of the flu that takes you out for a week or two may very well cost you your quite-undesirable-but-very-necessary-minimum-wage-without-benefits job. And good luck getting another one after you've got that blot on your record. And these people are not generally understanding if you have to leave work at five to go to a night class....
And if I'm right it's just going to get worse. Life is not showing any signs of getting less complicated.
Now if only I knew how to fix this....
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