Thread: Here's a laugh - a prediction that will fall somewhat short

From the recent past: In their rampant, salivating lust for our jobs, apparently there was a brownout in their famous math abilities, or perhaps they also don't know much about history. Notice no one questioned Jeff Taylor's predictions, as he was telling them what they wanted to hear, no matter how obvious the errors.

Enjoy, and savor what eagerly printing things like this reveal about the psychology of the third world towards us.

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http://www.ciol.com/content/news/2004/104071503.asp

US to face worst labour crisis in 2008
Placement major Monster Inc. chief relates how crucial outsourcing would be to the US a few years from now and the opportunity it presents for India.

Thursday, July 15, 2004

BANGALORE: Dismissing the current outsourcing controversy in the West as a short term "pain" before the long term benefits of IT sourcing are realized in the US, Monster Inc.'s founder and chief Jeff Taylor predicted tremendous employment opportunities for Indian IT in the coming years.

"Right now, there are half-a million Indian IT professionals working on US projects. I expect the number to touch three to four million by 2008," he said. He predicts that by 2010, the US would issue H1B visas to a massive number of Indians to stem its yawning labor shortfall.

Tracing the industry trends in the US, he said, "It is predicted that the US would face the worst ever labor shortage in 2008, largely because the baby boomer generation which makes up for around 60 million of the US population, would retire by then. The number of entry-level workers would also be low at around 25 million."

Addressing his first Indian meet since his company acquired Indian online recruitment firm Jobsahead.com for $9.6 million in June this year, Taylor said that the Internet could be used as a catalyst for driving change and addressing the skills shortage.
Stressing India's employment potential, he said, "India produces three times as many college graduates as the US. We need to educate people about the long-term benefits of a India-US relationship."
Added to these labor woes in the US, is the spiraling increase of customer care job salaries. "Over the next 10 years, call center jobs in the US are going to dry up because they cannot afford to keep these employees. The industry would have to tap India's tremendous cost advantage."
Given this scenario, Monster expects to play a significant role in filling in the recruitment needs with the Jobsahead acquisition. The coming together of both companies has brought the total number of resumes to 2.7 million and membership clients to 4,000. He urged companies to use technology and the Internet effectively for retooling systems and increasing effectiveness.

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For the record: it was their salaries that skyrocketed, ours were flat and falling. Their own leaders were recently in the press lamenting that only around 1 in 4 graduates was really employable. And, the baby boom generation spans around 20 years, give or take, from around 1946 to 1964 or thereabouts.

The number of entry-level workers would also be low at around 25 million

We always hear about the sacred aws of capitalism and free markets, with supply and demand ruling the economy. Well if it's true that we have a labor shortage would that not cause a rise in wages? We all know that this is not the case as wages in most all of the service sector and trades industries have seen totally stagnant wages if not lowering of wages.

Here in San Diego, the going rate for an experienced line cook is about $8-10 an hour, the thing is, the rate for these positions in 1988 was... you guessed it, $8-10 an hour. Semi-skilled, hard working laborers like cooks and even highly skilled tradesmen like construction workers are making the same exact, if not less than they did 20 years ago. How can that be if we have as they report, a labor shortage?

What really pisses me off is the fact that in CA, they have the minimum wage set at $6.75 an hour and as of Jan. 1st, 2007 goes up to $7.50 an hour. So by doing nothing, unskilled, illiterate, do barely enough to not fired employees get an automatic 75 cent an hour raise. So you can have a person who works for many years gaining experience, say as a cook, bettering themselves, working hard to advance themselves and get better pay will soon make the same amount as say dishwashers who walk in off the street with no experience, probably not even legal, who can't speak a word of English who just do the bare minimum of effort to get by.

Why would anyone even try to better themselves to make a a higher wage by working hard, putting in the extra effort to advance when they can just stay an unskilled dishwasher and let the government give them raises. I have nothing against people being paid a fair minimum wage, but does that force employers to also raise the wages of people making slightly above the minimum wage? Not likely, they are given the message of why try to advance in life, when the goverment will create raises for you, just stay unskilled and lazy and we will make sure employers give you raises.