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What the Hell Happened Circa 1980?

This is the key question. I agree something happened, actually, many things happened.


Nixon Travels — China

This was a start on the road to an excess of world wide LABOR. About 1.2 billion people who did not participate meaningfully in the world economy just joined. It took a couple of decades before it began to be felt, but this was the start in 1972.

- In 1981, IBM introduced the Personal Computer to corporate america. Before that, there were some Atari systems and Radio Shack TRS 80 (Trash 80's!) personal computers, but IBM legitimized it, and corp. america could depend on an adequate supply chain and standards for hardware and software. This ushered in the widespread use of spreadsheets, word processing, and database applications to the masses. There were also new custom applications like AutoCad that dramatically reduced the need for draftsmen, as one person could do the job of 10 working manually. The ensuing productivity kept lowering product cost for decades. This was hostile to labor.

- Robots, began entering the workforce in the 70's, use has become commonplace, replacing the need for humans. Robots don't call in sick on Monday.

Robot - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

- Widespread use of email. This has made many information based / information sharing jobs "geographically independent".

- Widespread use of the internet. This has made many information based / information sharing jobs "geographically independent".

- Advances in the quality of telephone services, especially internationally and vastly reduced cost of telephony. This has made many information based / information sharing jobs "geographically independent".

So, advances in computer and robotic technology are reducing the need for many traditional jobs in america, and widespread use of email/internet/telephony allow us to tap the huge job markets in asia, primarily China and India, but also Japan, S. Korea.

These are all 1970's to 1990's phenomenon, and they all add up to offshore jobs or eliminate traditional jobs. What we are left with is too many people in the US, chasing a smaller pot of jobs. For decades we have been told not to worry about the loss of those "low tech" jobs in the US, as they would be replaced with better "high tech" and "service sector" jobs that would not be so boring. One bad thing about service sector jobs, they are all "discretionary", instead of hiring someone to do them, we could just do it ourself when times get hard, and that is what we typically do. That is a big reason why unemployment remains high 2 years into the recovery. The nature of the jobs people did the last 20 years is not at all the same as the nature of jobs done in the 20 years before that, say 1960-1980.

The trouble I think is not really lack of jobs...here in southern Louisiana we have lots of good jobs that are going wanting for qualified applicants, and I believe that is true for other places in the U.S. The problem is having a workforce that is not sufficiently nimble to switch careers and move to where the jobs are.

Something that should come out of the Great Recession is that people need to be prepared to have their jobs become obsolete, and always keep their eyes out for the next up and coming field that they can get education in, so that they can be prepared for market shifts in the future. I am looking to move into health, environmental and safety management, a growing profession, and my wife is looking to get an education as a sonographer, a field that appears to have excellent growth for the future.

All throughout human history people have had to relocate to find better opportunities, from following herds of animals around, to moving from a drought stricken area to a more fertile one, and today to move from one area bereft of new job opportunities to one with better prospects. Nowadays you can often make those moves just by getting more education, but sometimes you will need to leave where you called home and move away. The Okies had to do it in the Dust Bowl, and now a new generation of Americans need to do it too.
 
The difference being Barack Obama inherited the economy when it was in shambles and it has only improved since he has been in office.

Improved? The unemployment rate went up! How is that improvement?

Obama just killed 20 thousand+ jobs when he nixed the trans-canada pipeline. Explain how that improved the economy.
 
The trouble I think is not really lack of jobs...here in southern Louisiana we have lots of good jobs that are going wanting for qualified applicants, and I believe that is true for other places in the U.S. The problem is having a workforce that is not sufficiently nimble to switch careers and move to where the jobs are.

Something that should come out of the Great Recession is that people need to be prepared to have their jobs become obsolete, and always keep their eyes out for the next up and coming field that they can get education in, so that they can be prepared for market shifts in the future. I am looking to move into health, environmental and safety management, a growing profession, and my wife is looking to get an education as a sonographer, a field that appears to have excellent growth for the future.

All throughout human history people have had to relocate to find better opportunities, from following herds of animals around, to moving from a drought stricken area to a more fertile one, and today to move from one area bereft of new job opportunities to one with better prospects. Nowadays you can often make those moves just by getting more education, but sometimes you will need to leave where you called home and move away. The Okies had to do it in the Dust Bowl, and now a new generation of Americans need to do it too.

I continue to believe I am correct, and I don't agree with your post (although as a La. native, it pains me some to do so). When oil prices crashed in the 1980's, many people left La. and Tx. for jobs in other states. I left La. and got a job with Browning Ferris Industries here in Houston (BFI was a major national trash collector/landfill operator, since acquired). The exodus from Houston was so severe that U-Haul hired folks and gave them a 1 way ticket to Atlanta to go get the trailers and trucks and bring them back to Houston so more people could move out. People will still move to a better job. Now, as to having the proper skills, that is a problem sometimes, but a minor problem compared to the fact that so much of our manufacturing has been off-shored to China over the last 20 years, and many call center jobs were off-shored to India.
 
The difference being Barack Obama inherited the economy when it was in shambles and it has only improved since he has been in office.

Go directly to Lost and Found. Your mind is there.
 
We elevated avarice from a hell-worthy sin into the ultimate virtue of our society.
 
Marilyn Monroe was born into this great land.

I mean.... I was. :)
 
We elevated avarice from a hell-worthy sin into the ultimate virtue of our society.
I don't feel that Greed is a bad thing, as long as it's within the rule of law that is.
 
I don't know. Maybe.

But Michael Moore, Warren Buffett and Bill gates all vote Dem.

I'm sucking wind over here, and I don't see a Dem who gives a ****. What am I missing?

Not much. I'm a fanboi of Bernie Sanders. Independent.
 
I don't feel that Greed is a bad thing, as long as it's within the rule of law that is.

Ladies and gentleman, I give you Gordon Gecko.
 
I don't feel that Greed is a bad thing, as long as it's within the rule of law that is.

The problem stems from when the rule of law bends around greed, as ours has in the last several decades.
 
For serious.

1980 was the year we trashed Jimmy Carter.

I'm hoping 2012 will have a similar effect on our economic trajectory, and that our capitalist model will find new ways to increase profits

I hope not.

Job growth was much higher during the Carter years than it was during the Reagan years. You really can't compare the Carter years to the Obama years.

Also, ever since the early eighties our income disparity has been greatly increasing. While yes, there is much more wealth today, most of that newly created wealth went to the top 1%. The middle class has only been able to continue to increase it's standard of living by borrowing more and more, which is a part of the reason our economy is not doing very well today.
 
I don't feel that Greed is a bad thing, as long as it's within the rule of law that is.

There are actions that are perfectly legal, but very unethical or immoral. Lots of times I could have made a few more bucks in my business career, legally, if I would have screwed the other guy. Thats part of the reason I ain't rich.

It also depends on what your definition of "greed" is.
 
Oil crisis and computers, man. Oil crisis, because, right prior to it, Nixon took us off the gold standard...and so we made a deal with opec to make sure that only USD was used to purchase oil, this the birth if the petro dollar. Also, computers. Do NOT underestimate the impact of the dawn of the computing age on the effect of globalism.
 
Oil crisis and computers, man. Oil crisis, because, right prior to it, Nixon took us off the gold standard...and so we made a deal with opec to make sure that only USD was used to purchase oil, this the birth if the petro dollar. Also, computers. Do NOT underestimate the impact of the dawn of the computing age on the effect of globalism.

I agree that the computer is a key factor.

MUCH of the less-than-productive economic activity that has led to our current situation would be impossible without them.

Derivatives and credit default swaps. Currency trading. All those fraction of a cent trades per hour. Transfers of capital for speculation.

And not just as a tool of business but of propagandists/marketers as well.

A hundred years of market research, of human stimulus/response patterns, databased and cross referenced.
 
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