[DoughtyOne]

I believe we're mostly talking about high school or college age kids who want summer employment. The article did touch on the issue of more dropouts though. That would be permanent low skill jobs.

Try as we might, we are never going to produce 100% college degreed adults. That being the case, we must maintain low skill jobs in the nation for citizens.

The alternative is to have high crime and more people on welfare. In both instances, this will cause a drain on those who do have degrees, as they pay more and more for those who don't.

[DB]

Lots of jobs start out low skill and provide a path to advance.

Construction jobs, metal working, wood working, mechanic among hundreds if not thousands of others.

For many it's getting the opportunity to prove themselves with a chance to learn and be productive.

Minimum wage increases the cost of getting that chance.

[MARTIAL MONK]

I used to hire high school kids. I spent countless extra hours working with them to make sure they understood all aspects of business. Dozens of them went on to much better jobs on the basis of my stamp of approval, many directly into management after high school. I really enjoyed watching and helping them grow into competent adults.

Never again. Ever.

Something has changed in the basic character of the American teen. They are insolent, indolent and ignorant and they don't want to change. There are exceptions I'm sure but I'm not about to try to seek them out. Even the exceptions have been degraded.

It may be the maturing of our society, it may be a decadence that comes with too much wealth, it may be the corruption by the mass media, or all of these. I wonder about the influence of the commonality of divorce. At any rate it is real and it is big and it is getting bigger. It is a sea change.

I know hundreds of other employers who feel the same way. HR managers have shifted from being an entry way into careers to gatekeepers trying to keep the shiftless out.

If you put a hundred illegal 18 year olds on my doorstep at 7:00 tomorrow morning I could get on the horn and have jobs for every one of them, sight unseen, by noon. If you put one American high school male on my doorstep I honestly don't know who I would call. The tide is that powerful.

It may just be my situation but I don't think so. I don't like it but that is the way it is. I may be operating below the skill level of Americans or outside of the mainstream but even though I am looking for the developing dynamic of the new workforce, I just don't see it.