{"id":86774,"date":"2016-03-17T06:52:59","date_gmt":"2016-03-17T10:52:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/countingpips.com\/?p=86774"},"modified":"2016-03-17T06:52:59","modified_gmt":"2016-03-17T10:52:59","slug":"the-worrying-skill-gap-that-threatens-america","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/2016\/03\/the-worrying-skill-gap-that-threatens-america\/","title":{"rendered":"The Worrying Skill Gap That Threatens America"},"content":{"rendered":"
March 17, 2016<\/div>
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By WallStreetDaily.com<\/u><\/a> \"Skill<\/p>\n

The United States has a manufacturing problem.<\/p>\n

We make more goods than ever before \u2013 but the sector\u2019s future is in doubt.<\/p>\n

There are a few reasons for its relative decline over the past few decades.<\/p>\n

The main one is jobs.<\/p>\n

Numerous manufacturing jobs have gone overseas, where labor is cheaper. The absolute number of manufacturing jobs in the U.S. dropped significantly from the 1979 peak of 19.5 million, to a low of 11.5 million jobs in 2010.<\/p>

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Some jobs have fallen victim to automation. And as the service economy grows, the relative importance of manufacturing jobs to the economy declines.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s not all doom and gloom.<\/p>\n

At the same time, output \u2013 the value<\/em> of manufacturing in constant dollars \u2013 is higher than it\u2019s ever been.<\/p>\n

Since those 2010 lows, employment has recovered, with the sector adding nearly a million jobs.<\/p>\n

And despite the disappearance of extremely high-paying autoworker and steelworker jobs, wages have increased, too.<\/p>\n

In fact, several specialty occupations are so short of workers, employers will happily pay over $100,000 for a capable candidate.<\/p>\n

The difficulty now is that the opportunities in the sector are so large, there aren\u2019t enough employees to fill them.<\/p>\n

And the problem is projected to get worse.<\/p>\n

Blue-Collar Opportunities Abound<\/h2>\n

A study last year by Deloitte for the Manufacturing Institute<\/a> found that not only is there a current shortage of manufacturing jobs, but between a skill shortage and the replacement of retirees, over two million jobs will go unfilled over the next decade because there aren\u2019t enough qualified Americans who want these jobs.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s two million jobs that will go overseas, or never be created at all, weakening the American economy.<\/p>\n

Meantime, millions of Americans are saddling themselves with enormous student loan debt to get degrees that won\u2019t help them get these jobs, or will make them feel they\u2019re \u201ctoo educated\u201d for them.<\/p>\n

So how is it that labor force participation remains so low, and so many people are complaining about their pay, when so many high-paying jobs are going unfilled?<\/p>\n

America\u2019s Worrying Skill Gap<\/h2>\n

It comes down to the skills that American workers need to get these jobs.<\/p>\n

A strong back and a good work ethic just aren\u2019t enough anymore. Manufacturing jobs now require employees to have the skill to work with a lot of automated equipment.<\/p>\n

American students\u2019 shortage of science and math skills is well-known, of course. But employers say today\u2019s workforce also lacks technology skills, basic problem-solving abilities, and technical training. Math actually comes fourth on their list behind those more basic skills.<\/p>\n

As it happens, they\u2019re also necessary abilities in the white-collar STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) fields.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s about as much of an indictment as you need of the current national drive to \u201cteach to the test,\u201d a program brought on by increased standardized testing in the wake of the \u201cNo Child Left Behind\u201d program and its successor, \u201cEvery Student Succeeds.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tomorrow\u2019s workforce needs skills that are almost exactly the opposite of the skills needed to pass today\u2019s standardized tests, whether students get jobs on the factory floor or in the development lab.<\/p>\n

But there\u2019s a bigger underlying problem\u2026<\/p>\n

Most people have no interest in entering manufacturing or similar blue-collar fields.<\/p>\n

Socially, they find the prospect demeaning, and there\u2019s a perception that factory or field work is dirty, dangerous, and doesn\u2019t require the critical thinking skills that executives find in such short supply.<\/p>\n

Prospective blue-collar employees also worry about job security in the face of increased automation and the natural cyclicality of industry.<\/p>\n

\u201cBlue Collar\u201d Doesn\u2019t Necessarily Mean Blue Collar Forever<\/em><\/h2>\n

Fortunately, manufacturers and other blue-collar employers are working to reverse those perceptions, showing potential employees that they can safely earn a decent living making the things that make America work, just as their parents did.<\/p>\n

So how are they accomplishing this?<\/p>\n

Some employers are holding \u201cmanufacturing fairs\u201d around the country, and through non-profit organizations like the Mike Rowe Works Foundation.<\/p>\n

They\u2019re also working with schools to teach students the skills necessary for a modern blue-collar job. These same skills will also be useful throughout their everyday lives.<\/p>\n

But there\u2019s one important thing they\u2019re not doing yet.<\/p>\n

Reading the cautionary Deloitte report, a serious divide still exists between \u201cworker\u201d and \u201cexecutive.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is arguably a snapshot of the U.S. workforce in general at the moment \u2013 a clash between the \u201chaves\u201d and \u201chave-nots\u201d and a wide discrepancy between regular workers, managers, and executives.<\/p>\n

If employers truly want to hire more than just \u201cworkers\u201d \u2013 i.e., those with critical thinking skills and able to bring more to the job than just grunt work \u2013 the message genuinely needs to shift from mere \u201cworker filling a need\u201d to \u201cworker with potential to move up the chain.\u201d<\/p>\n

And they\u2019ll have to be willing to provide the education and training necessary for workers to make that transition from blue collar to white collar.<\/p>\n

This is by no means impossible.<\/p>\n

At The Home Depot Inc.<\/strong> (HD<\/a>), for example, 79% of store managers \u2013 a position that pays six figures in much of the country \u2013 started as hourly employees. Sometimes, they even started as part-timers.<\/p>\n

For America\u2019s manufacturing sector, a change in fortunes starts with changing perceptions and changing the culture.<\/p>\n

To living and investing in the future,<\/p>\n

Greg Miller<\/p>\n

The post The Worrying Skill Gap That Threatens America<\/a> appeared first on Wall Street Daily<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By WallStreetDaily.com The United States has a manufacturing problem. We make more goods than ever before \u2013 but the sector\u2019s future is in doubt. There are a few reasons for its relative decline over the past few decades. The main one is jobs. Numerous manufacturing jobs have gone overseas, where labor is cheaper. The absolute […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-86774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","no-post-thumbnail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86774","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86774"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86774\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86791,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86774\/revisions\/86791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}