The future of America’s Working Class
Posted : October 17, 2005 at 12:06 pm [America/Los_Angeles]
During the 1990’s optimists argued that better education and worker training could restore the economy’s ability to create good jobs…But that’s a very 1999 sort of answer. During the technology bubble, it was easy to believe that “knowledge workers” were guaranteed good jobs. But when the bubble burst, they turned out to be as vulnerable to downsizing and layoffs as assembly-line workers…Today, some of us like to stress the depressing effect of the dysfunctional American health care system on wages. A large part of the problem facing the auto industry and other employers that still provide good jobs is the cost of providing health insurance, both to their current employees and to retired workers. If we had a Canadian-style system - which is enthusiastically supported by the Canadian subsidiaries of U.S. auto companies - the big squeeze might be averted, at least for a while…What if neither education nor health care reform is enough to end the wage squeeze (for US middle class workers)? That’s the possibility that makes free-trade liberals like me very nervous, because at that point protectionism enters the picture. When corporate executives say that they have to cut wages to meet foreign competition, workers have every right to ask why we don’t cut the foreign competition instead. I hope we don’t have to go there. But denial is not an option. Something must be done.
— Paul Krugman, “The Big Squeeze”
We (members in my family) have wondered out loud about this issue many many times. Something does not feel right. Atleast it does not feel right when you take a step back and look at the way things are progressing. For reasons good or bad, there aren’t enough Americans in this country who want to do menial jobs. Result: Dependence on legal (and mostly illegal) Mexican immigrants to get these jobs done. On the same token, there seems to be a lack of interest amongst American kids when it comes to pursuing high-tech jobs. Result: Dependence on International students graduating with Masters and PhD, or worse, getting the work outsourced to countries that have the talent to get the job done. That leaves you with the not-so-great paying jobs in the service industry. We all know that the service jobs in US today are just about as secure and exciting career move as the jobs of autoworkers in US automotive industry, which is another way of saying not exciting and secure at all. What does that leave us with? Does the answer lie in what the author Richard Florida calls the Creative Class? Frankly, I have no clue. As I said, something does not feel right. 
- Anand
Category: US