If I have a whole lot of people competing for a very few jobs, will **average** salaries go up or go down?
Posted on 07/31/2003 11:53:32 AM PDT by Florida_Irish
During a Wednesday morning (July 30th) press conference, President Bush was asked a question about jobs going overseas as a result of technological innovation. His response was:
"I fully understand what you're saying. In other words, as technology races through the economy, a lot of times worker skills don't keep up with technological change."
Many people have taken his response to mean that unemployment in the high-tech sector is the result of American workers who allowed their skills to become obsolete. This is an unacceptable explanation.
(Excerpt) Read more at capwiz.com ...
If I have a whole lot of people competing for a very few jobs, will **average** salaries go up or go down?
If two people make $50K a year and one person makes $200K a year, the average salary is $100K. If one person is laid off, the other goes to $30K and the last person goes to $300K a year, the average goes up, yet two of the three are in worse shape. Plus a lot of people have just given up looking for work, and they don't even enter the equation.
Taking pot shots at me isn't going to help your argument. Bush rephrased the reporter's question (that's what it means when someone repeats your question back to you prefaced by "In other words..."). The question had two different components to it. Bush answered one of those components.
Yet people have eagerly siezed upon Bush's answer and deliberately misconstrued the alleged context.
That's an easy tactic if your agenda is to make Bush look bad, but it hardly gets at the truth of the matter.
So what's your goal, to make Bush look bad even if you have to take his quotes out of context, or is your goal to find the truth?
Are you prepared to go the next step and actually make this type of statistical claim and then support it with hard data, or is this yet another instance of where you will first talk loudly but then later back off of your claims?
Are you going to continue glossing over the problems that millions Americans are having nowadays? There's an old saying - statistics are like a bikini - its the important parts that are covered up. You're living proof of that maxim here.
Considering that you took pot shots at me on this subject, don't bitch when fire is returned.
Bush rephrased the reporter's question (that's what it means when someone repeats your question back to you prefaced by "In other words..."). The question had two different components to it. Bush answered one of those components.
Try reading the entire response by Bush, instead of just the first paragraph, and get back to me.
Help Desk Workers Suffer 2002 Salary Drop
By Robyn Greenspan and Sharon Gaudin
U.S. help desk workers took it hard in the wallet last year, with the sluggish economy dragging down 2002 salaries across the board, according to a study by the Help Desk Institute (HDI) .
The survey shows that salaries dipped in all service and support-related jobs last year. Directors and senior support managers took the hardest hit, though, with a 7 percent decrease in pay — or an average drop from $82,484 to $76,805. All salaries, according to the institute's researchers, dropped about 3 percent.
I gotta remember your propensity for not being very clear as a way to wiggle out of your claims.
So I take it that you are once again backing away from providing any statistical data of your own that might even remotely support your wild-eyed theories of labor pricing...
Uh, see post 530. The ball is now in your court. I forgot that you're fond of making claims without substantiating them yourself.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. Staying with that theme, although there are some signs of improvement in the economy, there are sectors in the work force who feel like they're being left behind. They're concerned about jobs going overseas, that technology is taking over jobs. And these people are finding difficulty finding work. And although you're recommitted yourself to your tax cut policy, do you have any ideas or any plans within the administration of what you might do for these people who feel like there are fundamental changes happening in the work force and in the economy?
THE PRESIDENT: Sure. Listen, I fully understand what you're saying. In other words, as technology races through the economy, a lot of times worker skills don't keep up with technological change. And that's a significant issue that we've got to address in the country.
I think my idea of reemployment accounts makes a lot of sense. In essence, it says that you get $3,000 from the federal government to help you with training, day care, transportation, perhaps moving to another city. And if, within a period of time, you're able to find a job, you keep the balance as a reemployment bonus.
I know the community colleges provide a very important role in worker training, worker retraining. I look forward to working with our community colleges through the Department of Education, coordinate closely with states, particularly in those states in which technology is changing the nature of the job force.
I've always found the community college -- and this is from my days as the governor of Texas -- found the community college to be a very appropriate place for job training programs because they're more adaptable, their curriculums are easier to change, they're accessible. Community colleges are all over the place.
And -- but you're right. I mean, I think we need to make sure that people get the training necessary to keep up with the nature of the jobs, as jobs change.
--------------------- That's the exact quote there.
So I take it that you are once again backing away from providing any **meaningful** statistical data (oh, gee, I almost forgot, you managed to dig up salaries for the single field of help desk techies....guffaw!) of your own that might even remotely support your wild-eyed theories of labor pricing...
Southack, you are celebrating the fact that average salaries last year basically kept place with inflation, or even dropped slightly below. That means that, within that flat average, if top salaries increased, lower salaries decreased, and that does not even reflect the millions of unemployed - so you've basically proven my point for me. You can spin flat average incomes all you want, but the fact is, you're trying to downplay economic misery that millions of Americans are facing. You can celebrate that all you want, but it will only impress a few hard-core clymers.
Federal government average weekly wages increased by 5.9 percent over the year.
Oh, that's great - the fedgov probably amounted to the strong majority of the overall increase in average wages. Which means productive workers in the private sector most definitely did not keep up with inflation on an average basis.
No, I'm posting facts. The facts in this case **refute** your claim that average salaries declined in 2002.
Salaries went up by 1.7%.
Now, are you going to continue posting that salaries declined, or are you going to accept this fact?
What are you claiming was the rate of inflation for last year?
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