Why Is It So Hard for Employers to Fill These Jobs?

The Daily Signal ^ | August 23, 2014 | Stephen Moore

[2ndDivisionVet]

America has a deficit of workers. Willing workers. Capable workers. Skilled, or at least semi-skilled workers, who can do a job and do it well. There are at least one million jobs that go begging day after day if only employers could find workers to fill them.

This probably seems hard-to-believe. After all, how can America have a worker shortage when we have about 18 million Americans who are unemployed or underemployed? When the real unemployment rate is 12 percent?

Well certainly the economy isn’t creating nearly as many jobs as it should – in large part because of regulatory and tax restraints on hiring workers. Obamacare’s anti-employment impact, including the rule that caps employment at 50 workers or less at many firms to avoid the law’s higher costs, is just one example of a law that adds to unemployment lines.

But there are also millions of unemployed Americans who don’t have the skill sets to match what employers are in need of. To make matters worse, a lot of these frustrated job searchers have college degrees that are about as marketable as the paper diploma they are written on.

So what kind of jobs are going unfilled?

* Manufacturing – We always hear we are losing good manufacturing jobs in America and those bedrock middle class jobs aren’t coming back. Gregory Baise, the president of the Illinois Manufacturing Association, tells me that there are “some 500,000 jobs we can’t fill. It’s the biggest problem our industry faces.”. The industry needs welders, pipefitters, electricians, engineers. It needs people skilled in robotics and basic engineering.

* Trucking – At any time over the last several years there have been about 30,000 too few truckers to run long haul routes. The American Trucking Association tells me the number could be closer to 50,000. This is admittedly a tough and high-stress job with lots of time away from friends and family. But they are jobs that pay $50,000 and up, and a lot more than that with overtime.

* Energy – Bloomberg reports that “Gulf Coast oil, gas and chemical companies will have to find 36,000 new qualified workers” by 2016. Many energy towns have unemployment rates of less than 3 percent – in other words, there’s a worker shortage.

These aren’t menial or “dead end” jobs. They typically pay between $50,000 and $90,000 a year and with benefits the compensation can climb to $100,000. That’s rich in most nations.

Bob Funk, CEO of Express Employment Professionals, one of the nation’s largest temporary employment agencies located in Oklahoma City, places more Americans into jobs than just about anyone. With nearly half-a million hires a year he tells me, he can find a job for “any American with a strong work ethic and can pass a drug test.” He also estimates that the worker shortage – those with skills to fill available jobs – “is at least one million and probably higher than that.”

Why is it so hard to fill these jobs?

One reason is the curse of the so-called “skills mismatch.” American workers with high school or even college degrees just aren’t technically qualified to do the jobs that are open. This is a stunning indictment of our school system at all levels considering that all in parents and taxpayers often invest as much as $200,000 or more in a child’s education. We’re not turning our kids into competent workers.

Some governors like Mike Pence of Indiana have moved to make vocational education more standard in the Hoosier State. It’s a great idea and it’s a start.

But this won’t solve the whole problem because many companies are already willing to offer 3 to 6 months on the job training for trucking and manufacturing jobs. They will teach them men and women how to operate the machinery, the computers, and the scientific equipment. These aren’t sweatshop jobs.

Mr. Funk cites figures that more than half of the applicants for these kinds of jobs in the temporary job market can’t pass a drug test. “They are unemployable in that case,” he says regretfully.

Then there is the issue that these jobs don’t get filled because the work lacks glitz and glamour.

Too many Americans have come to view blue collar jobs or skilled artisan jobs as beneath them.

Contributing to this attitude is the wide availability of unemployment insurance, food stamps, mortgage bailout funds and other welfare. Taking these taxpayer handouts is somehow seen as normal and a first, not a last resort. One owner of a major trucking company told me last year, “drivers who get laid off don’t come back until their unemployment benefits run out.” This is documented by research from my colleagues at the Heritage Foundation who have found that “4 million Americans laid off in the recession faced effective marginal tax rates near or above 100 percent [because of welfare benefits], significantly reducing their attachment to the labor market.”

There’s no doubt America needs millions of more jobs. But we could put one million more people in jobs tomorrow if we get schools to train our kids with core competencies and if we could instill in Americans an old-fashioned work ethic. The only dead-end job is no job at all.

[Mr. Jeeves]

One reason is the curse of the so-called “skills mismatch.”

It's the "character mismatch." They aren't teachable. And I'm not talking about minority urban youth, here.

[John S Mosby]

Technical high schools, not colleges— to train highly trained blue collar workers in continuously upgraded skillsets to match technology needs.

NOT sending an illiterate barely passed high school “grad” to “college” on a student loan to learn.... “women’s studies” or
“interpersonal relations” or origami. 200k later no skills and a professional whiner and teat sucker.

[kabar]

The US has got to get serious about developing a generation of competent adults who have a work ethic and who want to take personal responsibility. Every generation has a good percentage of such people -- but, overall, our system seems less and less capable of producing the people we need. We have to fix our system -- and Common Core isn't helping.

All Employment Growth Since 2000 Went to Immigrants Number of U.S.-born not working grew by 17 million

Government data show that since 2000 all of the net gain in the number of working-age (16 to 65) people holding a job has gone to immigrants (legal and illegal). This is remarkable given that native-born Americans accounted for two-thirds of the growth in the total working-age population. Though there has been some recovery from the Great Recession, there were still fewer working-age natives holding a job in the first quarter of 2014 than in 2000, while the number of immigrants with a job was 5.7 million above the 2000 level.

[Alberta's Child]

In some cases "corporate executives" are under conflicting pressures to maintain high quality and encourage longevity among their workers, while at the same time keeping labor costs down. I'd say these are mutually exclusive in most industries. You're probably more likely to find this in publicly traded companies where there is a huge knowledge gap between management and ownership about how to manage the business effectively.

They don’t want to pay for training workers either.

I don't know what kind of experience you have, but from what I've seen this is not the case at all. If anything, there is a stronger emphasis on training now than ever before. This is driven by the fact that most industries encounter dramatic change over very short periods of time, and it doesn't serve anyone's interests to have workers whose knowledge isn't up to date.

[kabar]

[Mouton]

Something not mentioned in the article, but alluded to by stating the jobs lack glamore: most of these jobs require some degree of manual work IOW something besides sitting at a desk drawing a paycheck while “engaged” with a desk top or lap top electron channeling modification devise. Couple that with the notion of “well, without getting my hands dirty, I may get less money but at least I don’t have to get up every day” and you have what the welfare society breathes.

Pay someone to do it, even if it nothing, and you get more of it.

[wetphoenix]

~ They typically pay between $50,000 and $90,000 a year and with benefits the compensation can climb to $100,000. That’s rich in most nations ~

Is it a joke. From my knowledge everything including food, clothing, electronics, vehicles, even real estates are 50% to three times less expensive in the US comparing to Europe or Russia. How someone in a sane mind could ever consider a $90,000 job undesirable on this terms? I know that as an exception from the rule above legal advise and medical services are priced atrociously in US but you must be a really sick gangster to complain.

[ASA Vet]

Too many potheads

Bingo!

I'm working part time in a restaurant. If a drug test were required we'd lose half our work force immediately, rather then the normal 1 or 2 month turnover rate.

Real jobs with real pay and benefits mostly require passing a drug test.

[tillacum]

In the 1800s the British used drugs to win a lot of China, and it worked. America better be careful.

[TruthBeforeAll]

"Too many potheads."

The manufacturing industry is built on a sub culture of drugs and alcohol. It's amazing the number of guys who immediately smoke a one-hitter or start getting drunk before their cars are even out of the parking lot after work. Hell, they often start over lunch. Every day! If the manufacturing sector ever actually started to enforce drug policies, they'd lose 3/4ths of their employees. Many of whom actually do their jobs quite well. And this includes managers and foremen.

[atc23]

I'm a factory rep with a fortune 500 pump company. I supervise contractors installing and repairing industrial equipment in the energy, power and municipal water industries. I have unlimited access to every nuclear power plant in the world.

The pay for what I do and the associated risk is not anywhere near what is appropriate.

After 35 years in this industry, I'm leaving. The final straw was what obamacare allowed industry to do to our health plans - shift costs to employees - that and non negotiable wage increases which are less that the rate of inflation. Corporate America thinks they can find illiterate immigrants to do what I do? - I wish them all the luck in the world.

[DakotaGator]

Contributing to this attitude is the wide availability of unemployment insurance, food stamps, mortgage bailout funds and other welfare. Taking these taxpayer handouts is somehow seen as normal and a first, not a last resort.

This is the heart of the problem. People don't need to work. They just live off the government.

That is why real unemployment is over 25%.

We are in a depression. It has been engineered to put totalitarians in power and keep them there.

[GeronL]

70% of illegals in Texas are on welfare and many are probably in jail, so I don’t think anyone with half a brain cell functioning would see that as a “solution”.

[kabar]

So a kid with a 200,000 education is too unskilled to get a 0-100k job but an illegal sneaking over the border has the skills?

We bring in 1.1 million PERMANENT LEGAL IMMIGRANTS A YEAR. 36% of them have college degrees and 20% lack even a high school degree. In addition, we import 640,000 guest workers a year with many of them being skilled. The Gang of 8 bill wants to triple legal immigration and double the guest worker programs. Do you think that will have an impact on the American worker?

[atc23]

Corporate executives do not want to pay free market wages for workers. They prefer a system that will supply indentured servants with no recourse in the political or economic arenas. They don’t want to pay for training workers either. That is the reality behind the so-called “skills gap>

BINGO

[neal1960]

I agree 100%. Our department is always needing young high school kids for summer help. If we are lucky, we might get 1 out of 15 who pass the drug test. When we do get a kid who passes, he might work for 2 weeks before going back to leeching off of mom and dad.

[hoagy62]

There are other problems as well.

We have positions open where I work but have a heck of a time filling them. It’s not that there’s a bunch of people who can’t do the job. We get a good number of applications from qualified people.

From what my boss tells me, the problem arises when they try to interview. I work on a military post. When the potential applicant comes to the security office at the gate to get a temporary pass to get on post, they do a preliminary background check right there. The vast majority find they can’t get on post due to past problems with the law. Can’t access the post, no interview. My boss says that it’s a rather high percentage of applicants that get stopped at that point.

[ASA Vet]

80% think they are overqualified

I had an interview once, at which I was told that I was overqualified for the position. I told the HR person, "I promise to work below my ability." That didn't help.

[SamAdams76]

I'll come out in just say it. Most Americans do not have a work ethic. Once the balance tilted between leisure time and work time, Americans decided that they would rather take the leisure time. Thus they demand "flexible hours" at work, insist on taking all the "sick" days that are "due" to them, and generally come up with every excuse in the book for not coming to work on a particular day. "My aunt is ill...my basement is flooded...I have to take my car to the mechanic...my heat won't come on...my kid is home from school and I have no babysitter..."

And on and on. As somebody who runs a large department, I've heard them all. Every little inconvenience in life is presented to me as "high drama" and thus a reason for them not to come to work or to show up late.

Employees have taken days off to binge-watch a season of a TV show on Netflix. They've taken the Friday before the Super Bowl so that they can "prepare" for the party - and then of course, they needed to take the Monday after off as well. One employee was taking her daughter to a Justin Beiber concert that night and she needed the afternoon off to pull her daughter out of school early and get ready for it.

Many Americans do not take their jobs seriously. They generally do not aspire to move up the ladder either. They are content to do a "simple" job so that they can punch in and punch out of on a regular schedule so they can get home to have leisure time. Yet they are the first ones to gripe when they get a 2% raise or are asked to work a little overtime.

I think the bottom line is that there is so much leisure available that work has now become a nuisance for most people. They would rather stay home and watch their television shows or surf the Internet than to get up and come to work in the morning. And if they can fake or exaggerate a "disability", they will sit home and collect Worker's comp, SSI, or even welfare as long as we keep sending them checks.

[Smokin' Joe]

Mr. Funk cites figures that more than half of the applicants for these kinds of jobs in the temporary job market can’t pass a drug test. “They are unemployable in that case,” he says regretfully.

That's a big part of the problem, right there. Besides, they won't need their own insurance until they are 26...

Some of it, in all fairness is the location, weather (climate) considerations, and sometimes the expense of living there.