The Soapbox

Joined: 11/17/2011 Posts: 3039
Likes: 5546

What's this?

I think this is a generational thing.

There is nothing that makes "skilled" labor any more economically valuable than "unskilled labor". What makes some labor economically valuable is the shortage of those skills. High demand and low supply makes some labor valuable. Low demand and high supply makes some labor less valuable. But skill is absent from this equation (except for the sense that skill takes time to develop and it might lead to lower supply of it).

So why do I say it is a generational thing? There are more people going to college today. More degree holders and more people fighting for the positions that require those degrees. This has led to supply of skilled (in the college educated sense) workers to go up. Demand in a lot of fields has not kept up. Imagine if everybody became a computer programmer tomorrow, then those salaries would fall as well.

I also see intense specialization in my generation. This is great and can lead to a person being skilled in a narrow field and having economic power. But I also see economic disruption. The cost of going down the wrong path that is technologically disrupted has risen because it the investment to get there is higher, and the transferrability is lower.

I will respond to your bigger post later but I have to run.

(In response to this post by BocaHoo91)

Posted: 08/18/2018 at 4:56PM

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