Bye-bye engineering, hello massage therapy

Last week, Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao announced her Skills to Build America's Future" initiative. This is a "nationwide outreach and education effort designed to attract young people and transitioning workers to" the "key" occupations of the [near] future: "skilled trades."

This initiative, understandably, was proclaimed with little fanfare. While President Bush looks toward Mars, Ms. Chao can hardly be proud of her decidedly pedestrian prophecy that "construction laborers, operating engineers, carpenters, iron workers, cement masons, bricklayers, truck drivers and many other construction related crafts are among the trades expected to see the greatest demand in workers over the next 6 years." (This demand will be filled, I predict, by "guest workers," i.e., illegal aliens awarded shiny new government permits.)

Telling America's young people that the best they can hope for is careers as tradesmen certainly casts a pall over an administration given to grandiose planning and posturing. Essentially, the mathematically precocious – youngsters with aptitudes for science, engineering or accounting – must be yanked down to earth. Reaching for the stars in the America of the future will be the exclusive province of "American Idol" participants.

And according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics latest Employment Situation Summary, Ms. Chao's future is now. For all the din sounded over the addition of 308,000 jobs to the economy in March, the government-fed news filters failed to mention which job sectors were surging. Sure enough, it transpires that employment opportunities are optimal in construction, retail trade, food services, social assistance, and (naturally) in government.

As economist Paul Craig Roberts – a rare independent thinker on the issue – observes: "Only labor involved in non-traded goods and services is safe from foreign substitution." In other words, young Americans had better learn to live by their hands lest their livelihoods be outsourced.

If President Bush intends to revive America's space program, engineers will be at a premium. Yet the IEEE-USA, the world's largest technical professional society – representing more than 225,000 electrical electronics, computer, and software engineers – reports that "American high-tech firms shed 560,000 jobs between 2001 and 2003, and expect to lose another 234,000 in 2004." This contraction cannot be dismissed as the nadir of the dot-com correction. The jobless rate for electrical and electronics engineers was in fact lower in 2002 (4.2 percent) than in 2003 (6.2 percent).

Meanwhile, the Computing Research Association's Taulbee's Survey found that total enrollment in bachelor-degree programs in computer science and computer engineering fell 19 percent in 2003, a factor it attributes to "the decline in the technology industry and the moving of jobs offshore." (Curiously omitted are the impacts of the H-1B and L-1 work visas.)

College administrators are already hip to Ms. Chao's future. For example, San Francisco State University is considering the closure of its engineering school.

Indeed, today's college graduate cannot even expect to find entry-level jobs in the hi-tech industry, warns entrepreneur Rosen Sharma. Sharma heads a Silicon Valley start-up that "could not survive without outsourcing." Nevertheless, he fears for America's future. "As a father my reaction is different than my reaction as a CEO," he admitted to Time.

Pay no attention to such Chicken Littles, high-tech-industry lobbyists counter. Outsourcing is good for America, they claim. Their studies employ the "impregnable" science of econometrics to prove that outsourcing high-tech jobs creates more jobs than it kills. One such study, commissioned by the Information Technology Association of America, predicts 317,387 such jobs will materialize by 2008. The study's premise, however, begs the question, as it assumes the new jobs are and will be as good as the old (vanished) ones.

Why, they'll be even better, brags economist and outsourcing enthusiast, Catherine Mann. Dr. Mann, who also labors under the illusion that only bottom-rung jobs are vanishing, plays Pollyanna to a doubting Thomas, Ron Hira of IEEE-USA. Professor Hira confessed to Washington Post readers that he, an industry insider, had no idea what shape the "new" putative high-value jobs would take. "Is it nanotech, biotech, bioinformatics?" Of one thing he is certain, however: "Other developing and developed countries are targeting those very same industries and jobs."

Thankfully, author Virginia Postrel has located America's burgeoning (and indubitably "dynamist") occupations. She faults the Bureau of Labor Statistics for failing to recognize the rise of spa-related personal services – e.g., manicure and massage therapy – for the powerhouse growth industries they are. Of course, if Ms. Postrel is to remain faithful to the central thesis of her first book – that all change is always good – she is obligated to remain, like Ms. Mann, a Pollyanna, despite the new employment reality. Ms. Postrel's second book, the sum of which is that all that glitters is gold, even better encapsulates her enthusiasm for the role eyebrow waxing and other crafts will play in an economic recovery.

Although preliminary – even tentative – the Bureau's Employment Situation Summary suggests that high-value knowledge jobs are being replaced with low-value service and manual-labor jobs. The ensuing loss of income to American workers will surely outweigh the lower prices outsourcing engenders.

If I refuse to genuflect to this brave new world, it's because the idea of living in communities where applied scientists are unemployed while colonic hydrotherapists thrive isn't particularly enthralling. I'll leave it to the motion obsessed, ever-evolving Ms. Postrel to celebrate that kind of future.

Such is not the case with the RMB - there is a fixed exchange rate.

I've found another CIA source that gives the GDP of China in 2003 to be $5,000 per capita "measured on a purchasing power parity basis".

Link

GDP per capita in the U.S. in 2003 was around $37,000.

China has a long way to go before they have an equivalent GDP to ours. IMV, they will never do it without a large evolution toward freedom. A country that is highly free is not a danger to other countries.

84 - "You expect the taxpayers (like me) to subsidize your loans - why not take equity out of your house and stop being a leech?"

Because, Porterville is a true Free-Traitor. He wants no government interference in his right to make money, only government succor and support, paid for by the taxpayers, who he will rip-off.

86 - " I'll do what it takes to get mine, "

Ah, so we know Pvill is trying to emulate Rhet Butler - 'Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn."

A true Free-Traitor.

I've found another CIA source that gives the GDP of China in 2003 to be $5,000 per capita "measured on a purchasing power parity basis".

Okay, but that was not your original comment.

91 - "Make no mistake, China is a growing power. They are not our friend. One day, we will find ourselves in conflict with them - and, at that point, I will pointedly remind everyone that the American blood being shed is a direct consequence of feeding the Chinese dragon."

The radio talk show I am listening to as I go through this thread just had an applicable comment, commenting on how much the price of rebar has gone up lately, particularly in rebar, particularly because there is not enough steel, because China is building so fast, more in one city than in the whole US.

97 - "The most successful people will be those that repair things with their hands. You can't outsource that. And with our standard of living in the toilet, we will again be interested in repairing rather than replacing many items.
This explains the missing males in our colleges as fewer men see any future in higher education."

Astute observation. It explains a lot. And is very sad, no freightening.

99 - "Their total military budget in 2003 was 55 billion. Our total 2003 military budget was over 400 billion."

So, let's use me personally observed example as a rate of exchnge - A $500 US apartment which rents for $10 overseas. That means that the exchange rate in true value is 50 times what it is in fact. So $55 billion times 50 = $2750 billion versus $400 billion.

So FR, as the dollars were converted at the standard legal rates, purchasing power parity, means that the pleasant 2 bedroom apartment my driver rented when I was last overseas should rent for $10 per month here in the US, just like it did there? Please rent me an apartment for $10 per month FreeRuin.

A 2 bedroom apartment in China would rent for 10 U.S. dollars a month (purchasing power adjusted) because it is a 2 bedroom apartment in a Communist Country.

Cut out a piece of turf in this country, make it communist and then try to rent a room for more than $10 a month, XBoob.

So, let's use me personally observed example as a rate of exchnge - A $500 US apartment which rents for $10 overseas. That means that the exchange rate in true value is 50 times what it is in fact. So $55 billion times 50 = $2750 billion versus $400 billion.

Your premise is false. Your conclusion is false.

I've found another CIA source that gives the GDP of China in 2003 to be $5,000 per capita "measured on a purchasing power parity basis".

Okay, but that was not your original comment.

My original comment was to compare China's GDP per capita with the U.S. GDP per capita.

So instead of it being a $4,400 vs. $37,000 comparison, it was a $5,000 vs. $37,000 comparison.

My point remains the same.

108 - "A 2 bedroom apartment in China would rent for 10 U.S. dollars a month (purchasing power adjusted) because it is a 2 bedroom apartment in a Communist Country."

Ah, so you say the purchasing power is not adjusted.

BTW, I was not speaking of a communist country. I was speaking of a 3rd world country. While I have been to several communist countries, I have never worked in one.

109 - "Your premise is false. Your conclusion is false."

Sorry - it is your premis that the purchasing power, when listed in the same currency, is at parity. And it is pretty obvious, if you had a clue.

Based on salaries, my driver made $150 per month. So his apartment cost him 6% of his monthly salary. So, an for an equivalent amount of work, an equivalent apartment, at $500 per month, a driver here would have to be paid $8333 per month.

You mention steel. Recall how Japan was using every bit of scrap iron it could get from the US - just before it decided to expand?

Will China initiate a new Pearl Harbor style attack? And - will we be able to win this one?

Ronald Reagan thought up NAFTA, were you against it when he talked about it? Hes was also a free trader,you know.

Reagan also wasn't averse to using a little protectionism from time to time when necessary. Like in order to save Harley-Davidson from being driven out of business, for example.

109 - "Your premise is false. Your conclusion is false."

Sorry - it is your premis that the purchasing power, when listed in the same currency, is at parity. And it is pretty obvious, if you had a clue. Based on salaries, my driver made $150 per month. So his apartment cost him 6% of his monthly salary. So, an for an equivalent amount of work, an equivalent apartment, at $500 per month, a driver here would have to be paid $8333 per month.

Clue to you -- Cost of Living and Purchasing Power Parity are two different things.

I thought it was obvious.

The radio talk show I am listening to as I go through this thread just had an applicable comment, commenting on how much the price of rebar has gone up lately, particularly in rebar, particularly because there is not enough steel, because China is building so fast, more in one city than in the whole US.

Per capita usage of steel in this country is four times has high as the per capita use of steel in China. Why don't you look it up?

Ah...but you heard it on the radio -- you are a dupe!

113 - "Will China initiate a new Pearl Harbor style attack? And - will we be able to win this one?"

LOL - Well, let's see - we need to have China ship us the boots for our military (they are made in China), all our PC's (as all our 'American' PC's are made of parts made in china), and we will all starve, as all our can openers are made in China, and most all of our cooking pots are now made in China.

So, offhand - I would say no, not unless we use all the Chinese owned factories we have left, here in this country, and beg them not to forclose.

113 - "Will China initiate a new Pearl Harbor style attack? And - will we be able to win this one?"

Oh, I forgot, Boeing is no longer going to manufacture aircraft here in the US, only in China, and assemble some parts here, so I guess we will have to beg the Chinese to send us planes to bomb them with.

177 - "Per capita usage of steel in this country is four times has high as the per capita use of steel in China. Why don't you look it up?"

Wow - it was - I am talking about real time, right now, today, markets.

And let's see, even with your figures 4 times as high, they have 5 times as many people they are trying to bring up to our level.

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