We can continue to perpetuate this myth that Americans don't want to work or that there are jobs they cannot do, but the reality is that both parties have abandoned the American worker who has become a disposable commodity.
What do you think the labor participation rates would be if there was no such thing as food stamps, Medicaid, and SSI disability?
Households with children ought not have both parents slaving away outside the home to be able to afford having children. Bring back the stay at home mom.
A few observations from industries I am familiar with from my career.
There are a lot of commercial construction jobs that have a periodic work basis. Guys work at a craft for 35 weeks out of a 52 week year. Less in recession time.
These jobs require fit people that can work physically for a full work day as loafing is obvious when you are on a scaffold with five others.
They often are dirty jobs, cumbersome personal protective gear and are subject to bad weather, heat and cold. They also require compliance with elaborate safety protocol, require periodic drug tests and regular attendance without making a lot of false injury claims. They often pay a lot more than the local warehouse or delivery truck job for the same area — say double.
In many areas there are many more immigrants or first generation kids that will do the work meeting that standard than the locally youth who want to smoke grass, stay clean, miss work one day a week, get on work-comp, sell meth and not have to follow requirements.
This is one of the markets for immigrant employees but few illegals in most states in the last three years due to employers being able to easily e-verify for SSN.
I think that meat packing, feed yards, recycling and trash work, reclamation, shipping and the like hire a lot of illegals with the corporations turning a blind eye to the issue.
There really are jobs that we can’t get able bodied young americans to apply or qualify for and yes, these jobs are paying top dollar for their area.
My wife likes to talk about the freshman intern she interviewed a few years ago. He thought if he took a major in Healthcare Administration he could run a hospital after he finished college and had about two years under his belt with that undergrad degree. The concept of learning an industry from the bottom rung and using schooling to jump you through the first twenty years in ten is a lost understanding.