10 ms·

Millennial Men Leave Perplexing Hole in Hot U.S. Job Market

56 points by flormmm 8y ago

Phrodo_00 8y ago
While the article did a lot of pointing at men not working, it did little to show what the Hole in the "Hot U.S. Market" was. Maybe the people they were talking about would benefit from that information.
- ghostly_s 8y ago
  Right. What exactly are all those "hot" jobs these men are supposedly refusing? Very frustrating framing.
  - Jtsummers 8y ago
    It's not the jobs themselves that are hot, it's the job market that is. We have low unemployment, but for some reason this demographic remains at a higher rate of unemployment than their age-wise peers from a decade ago, while other demographics have recovered or surpassed their prior numbers.
- bargl 8y ago
  There are a TON of Blue collar jobs that are only getting higher pay in the Seattle area right now. Entry level Electrician, 25/hr. After the Apprenticeship 50/hr (2 years I think). I believe plumbing, construction, etc are in the same boom right now. That's a really awesome job for someone who is struggling to make ends meet at a pizza joint (example from article). This is 100% anecdotal and regional. So take it with a grain of salt.
  - rootusrootus 8y ago
    My brother-in-law is a journeyman electrician in Seattle and the going rate is around 40-45/hour. Not a bad wage at all. But it does require about four years to get to that point.
  - barrow-rider 8y ago
    Similar prices to be had around NoVA / DC. Data center electricians with 2 years experience were at 35/hr, and the Master electricians with experience were roughly double. No shit, I was a data center manager then and contemplated switching jobs. Source: I hired both union and non-union (union guys on the side) for electrical work in DC area data centers.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- LitFan 8y ago
  > Weary of long days earning minimum wage, he quit his job in a pizzeria in June. Given these are the types of jobs these men are leaving, and assuming these are the types of jobs still available, it's these jobs. The market is hot because jobs are available. It's not hot because good jobs are available.
- Jtsummers 8y ago
  The hole is the 500k or so men who aren't working now (in the 25-34 year old demographic) who were working before the recession (well, the calculated amount based on percentage of that demographic who were working pre-recession versus who are working now). While other demographics (35-44 yo men and women, 25-34 yo women) have recovered (or done better) than pre-recession rates. And given the overall low unemployment figures, the question is why does this demographic seem to be missing out on the recovery?
  - Nasrudith 8y ago
    I wonder about the distribution within. Men are known to have a higher standard deviation in IQ. Perhaps it is a sign of hidden if not disabilities relative appitude disadvantages or relative socialization maladjustment - no judgement as to who is wrong if any. I personally had one hell of a time going through the hiring process despite my credentials.
sol_remmy 8y ago
I know a bunch of beautiful, accomplished women with great jobs who can't find good men to start a family with. Young mens' failure-to-launch is becoming a big problem....
- aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago
  Define “good men”.
  - dpeck 8y ago
    Same definition as it's always had. Either bring in money, do a good job caring for the home & family, or some combination those two. No one wants a partner, regardless of gender, that doesn't contribute.
    - RankingMember 8y ago
      By this definition, the example millennial male who is studying to become an EMT is on track to contribute but doesn't qualify as a "good man". Seems a little short-sighted.
      - dpeck 8y ago
        if he's not contributing to family life while he's studying then you're right, he's not. He may be aspiring to be a "good partner", but if he's _only_ working on bettering himself that is exactly what most people do not want in a partner.
  - DiabloD3 8y ago
    Also define "failure to launch". From what I can tell, women who consistently complain they can't find a good man wants a self-made man who's already succeeded, instead of one in the process of acquiring that success. This is identical to a guy who quits on the third day because he's not the CEO yet, even though his job is in the mail room and no one even knows his name yet. Want something in life? Work for it. There are no participation prizes in life: this goes for both the traditional male and traditional female roles. Success only sees success, no matter what you choose to do in life.
athenot 8y ago
> Weary of long days earning minimum wage, he quit his job in a pizzeria in June. He wants new employment but won’t take a gig he’ll hate. So for now, the Pittsburgh native and father to young children is living with his mother and training to become an emergency medical technician, hoping to get on the ladder toward a better life. Perplexing? The opening of this article gives a pretty straightforward answer: people in that demographic aren't buying the narrative that a minimum-wage job will necessarily come with growth opportunities. So instead of getting pigeon-holed, they are trying to jump into a career with better growth opportunities. Sometimes that requires leaving immediate money on the table.
- dleslie 8y ago
  The angle here is that minimum wage does not offer sufficient flexibility and access to satisfactory growth opportunities. That's a _feature_ for employers, who do not desire turn-over and training costs, and an _anti-feature_ for employees, who desire a better life.
  - supertrope 8y ago
    I don’t think employers cackle at the thought of employees being wage slaves. They are unwilling or think its impossible to offer a living wage so high turnover (e.g. 140% per annum) is just a cost they accept.
    - dleslie 8y ago
      They aren't cackling like saturday morning cartoon villains; they're applying a rational choice to minimize operation costs. This is less true the closer their personal connection to their employees is, I suspect; but many minimum wage employers have a bureaucratic buffer/barrier between the minimum wage employees and those making the decisions about operational costs.
      - barrow-rider 8y ago
        This is called Middle Management, and exists entirely to buffer high level decision makers from day-to-day workers.
patient_zero 8y ago
This article was pretty bad. "Hot" labor market huh? isn't it mostly low income service jobs and degree required jobs that are "hot"? I wouldn't know from this article, because it chooses to ask questions rather than provide info. I weep for the one young man who is studying to be an EMT. I learned recently that that job, which is tasked often with saving lives, pays ~12 bucks an hour. The "hot" labor market is a farce.
- rootusrootus 8y ago
  EMT is entry level, though, and you are basically competing against a workforce where most people have gone past that to become paramedics. Not to say that a paramedic salary is all that lucrative itself, but it's about 10K higher than EMT.
frgtpsswrdlame 8y ago
Purely my perspective but... There is a psychic toll to doing a job that really feels beneath you. If you're raised in a culture where all the men in your class didn't have to get an education after high school and were able to support a family on manual or trade work and then you try to follow in their footsteps and fall flat on your face straight into minimum wage service work that's a burden those men carry. And then they apply for 100 jobs through indeed or linkedin and maybe get no calls back or only called back from similarly shitty jobs. They have low prospects so dating is harder. They have a lot of pain so it's easier to justify doing drugs. It's a classic downward cycle but worse it's something we, as professionals, have created. The utilitarian logic backing open trade and frenzied automation widely spread their marginal benefits but closely concentrate their heavy costs. These are those costs come to light.
MIKarlsen 8y ago
"If you get to the point where you’re turning 30, you’ve never held a real job and you don’t have a college education, then it is very hard to recover at that point." I've raised this point to a fair few of my friends and colleagues recently. I think it is becoming increasingly hard to contribute to society, because everything is so gosh-darn technical. Companies _scream_ for developers - but not junior developers, or people who they can teach to program - but developers with 5+ years worth of experience. I think this will only get WAY worse in the future. Unfortunately, I also think it will mean that people who fail to get a job after taking their degree will be worse off than people with little or no education, who has always had a job (no matter the type of job). So if you're done with college/university (which is when you're around 25-30 y/o in Europe), and you can't get a job, and you can't put your education to use. You're pretty much shit out of luck in most cases. Of course you can always dig yourself out, but doing so would most likely mean working a min-wage job for 8-10 hours a day, and then spending all your free-time and weekends learning a useful skill, which doesn't leave much time for friends or family (or making a family).
- k__ 8y ago
  On the other hand, how many people can you train to become programmers?
  - MIKarlsen 8y ago
    Are you asking if it would be feasible for companies to take in well-educated people, and teaching them the programming/dev-craft? I don't know. But right now, companies are trying to solve the problem in other ways, which is ultimately not addressing their core need. I just feel like some sort of educational system (bootcamp'ish) would be able to make a good business case for most companies.
    - ams6110 8y ago
      When I finished my undergrad education, my first job was with a big consulting firm. Early 1990s. They did have a 6 or 8 week "boot camp" and they taught new hires how to program. Many of them had had no significant prior background in programming.
Alex63 8y ago
Some interesting things in this article. Given what appear to be changing attitudes to men ("long America’s economically privileged gender"), is this situation really surprising? When one considers diversity and inclusion goals, hiring more men seems like a lower priority. I was also amused by the comment, “I’m very quick to get frustrated when people refuse to pay me what I’m worth.” This seems like a conversation I have at least once a quarter with someone. You're worth what the market is willing to offer you, not what you think you are worth.
- ehrtt 8y ago
  > You're worth what the market is willing to offer you, not what you think you are worth. This is an absurd statement, the market is not a god. It does not have a value system.
  - divs1210 8y ago
    In a capitalistic society, The Market = God. Ever heard people claiming that The Market will fix things? Where have I heard that before?
    - geezerjay 8y ago
      > In a capitalistic society, The Market = God. Enough with the puerile poetry. In a capitalist society, the market is people like you and me who like to decide for themselves what's in their own best interests. The market fixes problems because people likeyou and me always find a balance between what they supply and demand, and what trade-offs they are willing to accept. There is no magic or witchcraft.
      - divs1210 8y ago
        i look around and see a world struggling with pollution and inequality. Do you have any data/studies backing your claim, or am I supposed to take it all on faith?
michaelbuckbee 8y ago
Anytime the issue of millenials and jobs comes up, I think you have to talk about what the structural differences in the economy and business world are now: "Thirty years ago, she says, you could walk into any hotel in America and everyone in the building, from the cleaners to the security guards to the bartenders, was a direct hire, each worker on the same pay scale and enjoying the same benefits as everyone else. Today, they’re almost all indirect hires, employees of random, anonymous contracting companies: Laundry Inc., Rent-A-Guard Inc., Watery Margarita Inc. In 2015, the Government Accountability Office estimated that 40 percent of American workers were employed under some sort of “contingent” arrangement like this—from barbers to midwives to nuclear waste inspectors to symphony cellists. Since the downturn, the industry that has added the most jobs is not tech or retail or nursing. It is “temporary help services”—all the small, no-brand contractors who recruit workers and rent them out to bigger companies." From the fantastic https://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/poor-millennials/ https://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/poor-millenn...
- mdo123 8y ago
  Ugh I hate Watery Margarita Inc!
  - forgottenpass 8y ago
    They're as bad as Heady Pours LLC
- uep 8y ago
  Doesn't this mean that middle-men are just being inserted who are absorbing some of the productivity (earnings) of the worker? It seems like this would only make economic sense if the end company isn't using them on a regular basis, so overall efficiency goes up by multiplexing an employee out to multiple companies as needed. It seems implied by "Rent-A-Guard", but I'm musing out-loud. I haven't had a chance to read your article yet.
  - barrow-rider 8y ago
    > Doesn't this mean that middle-men are just being inserted who are absorbing some of the productivity (earnings) of the worker? Essentially, yes.
lyonsntl 8y ago
Press F for the neets
tamaharbor 8y ago
Losers.
ravenstine 8y ago
> Men -- long America’s economically privileged gender It depends on how you look at it. Don't get me wrong, men have had lots of privileges, but they have long been expected to work. Those social expectations are rapidly disappearing, and somewhat shifting to women, and we're seeing rates of depression and suicide rise for women in roughly the same time frame. Calling it privileged is a very one-sided way of looking at it, as the "privilege" comes with lot of responsibility that quickly becomes burdensome. With affordable home appliances, online services through your phone, video games, Netflix, and PornHub, the house wife/husband is obsolete. Why take on the same burdens your fathers did when little to none of that existed? With wages being stagnant since the 1970s, the ridiculous housing market, the materialist debt-slave culture, the decline of marriage, and the decrease in sustainable jobs, why exactly should millennial(and increasingly Gen Z) men bother working as much as their fathers? I come from a very wealthy area and only one of the dozens of men my age, with whom I grew up with, own what their fathers did when they were their age. Millennial men are rife with disenfranchisement that flies under the radar because the economy has enough shit jobs to allow them to scrape by, and the media is generally not compassionate to the issues of men. I mean, just look at this article which is clearly written as an underhanded criticism of young men. Let me repeat the question in the last paragraph: Why exactly should millennial men work as much as their fathers?
- ben_jones 8y ago
  I'm looking at a $400 bill after insurance for a 15 minute doctor's visit. Nothing fancy he took my blood pressure and listened to my lungs and sent me on my way. I'm fortunate that I can easily pay this, but what if I was living paycheck to paycheck? It would crush me. When wealth is so fleeting as to be taken away by such a minuscule stroke of bad luck, why would people bother chasing it? I'm literally going to have to "shop around" for my next appointment should I need one.
  - lawn 8y ago
    There surely is a middle ground here between living paycheck to paycheck and not making work the most important thing in your life.
justfor1comment 8y ago
The millennial generation is also the first one in history to have mass exposure to the success of others due to social media websites. This could be a reason they want to seek better opportunities than the minimum wage jobs available to them. Retraining in schools does seem like a reasonable approach to pursue such better opportunities. Don't feel like millennials are in the wrong here.
deleted 8y ago
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specialp 8y ago
"So for now, the Pittsburgh native and father to young children is living with his mother" In the past that wasn't so much of an option. You had to survive. I grew up with parents working jobs like the one he eschewed. They wouldn't dare try to live with my comparatively much more wealthy grandma. So now living with your parents into your 30s is like taking basic income. This is all fine if someone is truly doing this to invest in more education to get out of the unskilled labor market, but bad when it is just an excuse to be lazy. I too worked low wage jobs when I was a teen and in college to pay my way, I find that when people leave the upward trajectory by leaving school or their job for "something better" they end up becoming lazy and end up worse.
- hindsightbias 8y ago
  And your parents get to raise your kids. And probably pay for their care and schooling. I can grok 'lazy' or non-participation, but adding kids to the mix?
- ams6110 8y ago
  Don't know why you're downvoted. It's very easy for a person to rationalize sitting at home by telling himself he is holding out for a job that will "pay what I'm worth" but not doing anything concrete to make that happen. When I was in my late teens/20s I never thought moving back home was an acceptable option. Working at McDonalds or delivering pizza and living with roomates felt more honorable than moving back in with my parents.
  - fatnoah 8y ago
    IMHO (and I emphasize that), the main difference is that when I was that age, getting a job, making money, and being independent were my goals. For the younger generation, they came into the world at a time of economic turmoil and skyrocketing student loan costs. By the time things recovered, housing markets in many areas were back to the races before they could catch up. Throw in more of an emphasis on doing, making, and experiencing things, and hustling for a buck is less of a priority.
panarky 8y ago
It's not perplexing at all. People forget that the market for labor is just like other markets. If you're selling a thing and the market price is lower than the thing is worth, then you don't sell it. If the minimum wage kept up with the increase in worker productivity over the last 50 years, today's minimum wage would be about $19.50. So workers who refuse to take dead-end jobs are simply rational economic actors refusing to sell a large fraction of their existence for a pittance. If employers have job openings they can't fill, while workers are idle because they won't work so cheap, then shouldn't the market-clearing wage increase? If not, what's preventing it?
- supertrope 8y ago
  Cue those who want to cut minimum wage and public assistance so unemployment is even more dire.
  - gwright 8y ago
    From a public policy standpoint, I think it would be better to have people at even a very low rate with public assistance as appropriate than to have people not working at all and dependent 100% on public assistance. Increasing the minimum wage results in some people getting a higher wage and other people getting $0.
- ams6110 8y ago
  > If employers have job openings they can't fill, while workers are idle because they won't work so cheap, then shouldn't the market-clearing wage increase? If not, what's preventing it? Other workers will work cheap. See, it doesn't matter what you think your time is worth. The supply of people willing to work is what determines what it is worth. Minimum wage jobs can literally be done by almost anyone who is not mentally or physically handicapped. You can "refuse to sell" your labor at that price, but when you have nothing in the way of skills or experience to offer, you really are just choosing to be unemployed.
  - irrational 8y ago
    But, what happens where there are no workers? Everywhere I go there are signs saying help wanted. But, unemployment is practically non-existent where I live. Everyone who wants a job, has a job.
throw_millenial 8y ago
People love to talk about privilege, but being a male millenial in 2018 is anything but that. The media says you're a sexual predator. They say you're toxically masculine. That is, the very hormones imbued within you are to blame for a host of problems. If you're white they say you are constantly oppressing people of color. If you're in tech, then you're worst kind of man possible - a tech bro. Couple the prevailing sentiment with a change in the type of available jobs. Physically demanding work is less common now, and manufacturing, long a mainstay of male occupation, was moved overseas. Office work is more about people relationships, which generally favors women. Our education system is similarly biased against men these days. I'm at the old end of the millenial generation, but if I was 25, I don't think I'd be too motivated either. I'm not surprised when these young men favor sitting in a basement playing video games over getting a job. Or watching porn instead of going after a girlfriend. The culture has shifted. For some people it's a huge win and there are a wealth of new opportunities - but it is a zero sum game, and now we're seeing the losers.
peterburkimsher 8y ago
I'm a 29 year old male. I've been trying to get a new job since March, and I've been unemployed since August. I have an MEng in Electronic Systems Engineering, and over 3 years continuous relevant work experience. I have tried applying through Seek and TradeMe, and got no response. I tried writing custom cover letters and applying on company websites. I've rewritten my résumé several times based on contradictory advice. I updated my LinkedIn, and made a second LinkedIn profile to add strangers. I asked recruiters for help. I put side projects on the web, especially Show HN, to try to get attention. I asked friends who I worked with at Fisher & Paykel Healthcare when I was there before. I found random people on Github and offered to work for free on open-source projects just to get an introduction. I contacted computer repair shops and asked them to put up posters advertising data migration services that I could do with my old Apple II. I've contacted every Apple-certified repair person in NZ/Aus/Can to ask them for help. I've tried praying about it. I've tried spamming the companies that have emails readily available, from the accredited employers list. I posted a desperate plea on Facebook, and followed up on advice (+1 introduction) from friends. None of these methods are working. I've had only two interviews. Most companies don't even send rejections. I've lowered my standards so now I'll accept any kind of job, anywhere. This is a cry for help. I know I'm doing something totally wrong. I just don't know how to contact companies. Please tell me what to do. Please tell me email addresses of people who care.
- lordnacho 8y ago
  What do you want to do as a job? What do the people who have this job have on their CVs? Have you found people on LinkedIn who hire for what you want to do? Also recruiters are a dead end for everyone who isn't already a very close match for a job that's going. It's incredibly frustrating for everyone, but that's their incentive structure. And what do you mean Apple II? Isn't that ancient?
  - peterburkimsher 8y ago
    I'll take anything as a job now. I can get my own Working Holiday visa. But I've been turned down by farms and construction companies, not only tech companies. I don't know how to find people on LinkedIn, but I created a new account just to spam that way. I'll keep trying to add lots of strangers and hope I find a friendly one. Yes, I used an Apple II with ADTPro to migrate data off lots of old 5.25" floppies for archiving purposes. I thought that I could start a business to do that, if I could get computer repair shops to advertise for me. So I asked the repair shops, but most didn't even reply, and the only one that did told me that I should set up the business first and then they'll ask their manager whether they'd be willing to put up a poster. My logic is that older people are rich and powerful, and fondly remember their old computers. So the data migration would put me in contact with people who could give me a real job later.
thrower123 8y ago
Is there a good explanation for the bar chart that shows labor force participation being down or flat for just about everyone other than young women and old men?
shagie 8y ago
The part that made me wonder about the millennials in their job search is: > Butcher has a high-school diploma and a resume filled with low-wage jobs from Target and Walmart to a local grocery store. He’s being selective as he searches for new work because he doesn’t want to grind out unhappy hours for unsatisfying compensation. I believe that having a job that you love is a luxury. It is something to look at once basic needs are met. There are jobs out there, and even jobs that train entry level in a trade. No, it may not be the job you love... but as Stephen Stills said: > If you're down and confused And you don't remember who you're talking to Concentration slip away Because your baby is so far away > Well, there's a rose in a fisted glove And the eagle flies with the dove And if you can't be with the one you love, honey Love the one you're with ... That doesn’t mean one should love that unsatisfying job, but recognize that not everyone will have that dream job.
- fatnoah 8y ago
  >He’s being selective as he searches for new work because he doesn’t want to grind out unhappy hours for unsatisfying compensation. I think this is a large part of the issue here. I only have my experience employing millenials to go by, but they're a group that seems to be less focused on compensation and career advancement than generations before them. They're version of the American Dream is also different than generations before them. It's not get job, make money, get a house, have kids, etc. There's nothing wrong with any of that. Society has changed, and the economics have changed. I graduated college in 1997 with $30k in debt, which was a lot at the time. Now, that'd be below average. I was the only one of my large group of friends that didn't own a house within 5 years of graduation. Contrast that with the cohort of millenials I've managed, and I don't think a single one out of several dozen have owned their own home. It's either not a high priority or seems so out of reach when student loans and the high cost of ownership in this area (Boston) come into play. Sure, they could maybe buy a place in suburbia, but again that's a smaller priority than in was before them. My tl:dr; for the article is that they're less willing to work "just because" and have different goals than generations before them, and that's hard for people to grok.
  - shagie 8y ago
deleted 8y ago
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56 points by flormmm 8y ago

While the article did a lot of pointing at men not working, it did little to show what the Hole in the "Hot U.S. Market" was. Maybe the people they were talking about would benefit from that information.

ghostly_s 8y ago
Right. What exactly are all those "hot" jobs these men are supposedly refusing? Very frustrating framing.
- Jtsummers 8y ago
  It's not the jobs themselves that are hot, it's the job market that is. We have low unemployment, but for some reason this demographic remains at a higher rate of unemployment than their age-wise peers from a decade ago, while other demographics have recovered or surpassed their prior numbers.
bargl 8y ago
There are a TON of Blue collar jobs that are only getting higher pay in the Seattle area right now. Entry level Electrician, 25/hr. After the Apprenticeship 50/hr (2 years I think). I believe plumbing, construction, etc are in the same boom right now. That's a really awesome job for someone who is struggling to make ends meet at a pizza joint (example from article). This is 100% anecdotal and regional. So take it with a grain of salt.
- rootusrootus 8y ago
  My brother-in-law is a journeyman electrician in Seattle and the going rate is around 40-45/hour. Not a bad wage at all. But it does require about four years to get to that point.
- barrow-rider 8y ago
  Similar prices to be had around NoVA / DC. Data center electricians with 2 years experience were at 35/hr, and the Master electricians with experience were roughly double. No shit, I was a data center manager then and contemplated switching jobs. Source: I hired both union and non-union (union guys on the side) for electrical work in DC area data centers.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
LitFan 8y ago
> Weary of long days earning minimum wage, he quit his job in a pizzeria in June. Given these are the types of jobs these men are leaving, and assuming these are the types of jobs still available, it's these jobs. The market is hot because jobs are available. It's not hot because good jobs are available.
Jtsummers 8y ago
The hole is the 500k or so men who aren't working now (in the 25-34 year old demographic) who were working before the recession (well, the calculated amount based on percentage of that demographic who were working pre-recession versus who are working now). While other demographics (35-44 yo men and women, 25-34 yo women) have recovered (or done better) than pre-recession rates. And given the overall low unemployment figures, the question is why does this demographic seem to be missing out on the recovery?
- Nasrudith 8y ago
  I wonder about the distribution within. Men are known to have a higher standard deviation in IQ. Perhaps it is a sign of hidden if not disabilities relative appitude disadvantages or relative socialization maladjustment - no judgement as to who is wrong if any. I personally had one hell of a time going through the hiring process despite my credentials.

sol_remmy 8y ago

I know a bunch of beautiful, accomplished women with great jobs who can't find good men to start a family with. Young mens' failure-to-launch is becoming a big problem....

aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago
Define “good men”.
- dpeck 8y ago
  Same definition as it's always had. Either bring in money, do a good job caring for the home & family, or some combination those two. No one wants a partner, regardless of gender, that doesn't contribute.
  - RankingMember 8y ago
    By this definition, the example millennial male who is studying to become an EMT is on track to contribute but doesn't qualify as a "good man". Seems a little short-sighted.
    - dpeck 8y ago
      if he's not contributing to family life while he's studying then you're right, he's not. He may be aspiring to be a "good partner", but if he's _only_ working on bettering himself that is exactly what most people do not want in a partner.
- DiabloD3 8y ago
  Also define "failure to launch". From what I can tell, women who consistently complain they can't find a good man wants a self-made man who's already succeeded, instead of one in the process of acquiring that success. This is identical to a guy who quits on the third day because he's not the CEO yet, even though his job is in the mail room and no one even knows his name yet. Want something in life? Work for it. There are no participation prizes in life: this goes for both the traditional male and traditional female roles. Success only sees success, no matter what you choose to do in life.

athenot 8y ago

> Weary of long days earning minimum wage, he quit his job in a pizzeria in June. He wants new employment but won’t take a gig he’ll hate. So for now, the Pittsburgh native and father to young children is living with his mother and training to become an emergency medical technician, hoping to get on the ladder toward a better life. Perplexing? The opening of this article gives a pretty straightforward answer: people in that demographic aren't buying the narrative that a minimum-wage job will necessarily come with growth opportunities. So instead of getting pigeon-holed, they are trying to jump into a career with better growth opportunities. Sometimes that requires leaving immediate money on the table.

dleslie 8y ago
The angle here is that minimum wage does not offer sufficient flexibility and access to satisfactory growth opportunities. That's a _feature_ for employers, who do not desire turn-over and training costs, and an _anti-feature_ for employees, who desire a better life.
- supertrope 8y ago
  I don’t think employers cackle at the thought of employees being wage slaves. They are unwilling or think its impossible to offer a living wage so high turnover (e.g. 140% per annum) is just a cost they accept.
  - dleslie 8y ago
    They aren't cackling like saturday morning cartoon villains; they're applying a rational choice to minimize operation costs. This is less true the closer their personal connection to their employees is, I suspect; but many minimum wage employers have a bureaucratic buffer/barrier between the minimum wage employees and those making the decisions about operational costs.
    - barrow-rider 8y ago
      This is called Middle Management, and exists entirely to buffer high level decision makers from day-to-day workers.

patient_zero 8y ago

This article was pretty bad. "Hot" labor market huh? isn't it mostly low income service jobs and degree required jobs that are "hot"? I wouldn't know from this article, because it chooses to ask questions rather than provide info. I weep for the one young man who is studying to be an EMT. I learned recently that that job, which is tasked often with saving lives, pays ~12 bucks an hour. The "hot" labor market is a farce.

rootusrootus 8y ago
EMT is entry level, though, and you are basically competing against a workforce where most people have gone past that to become paramedics. Not to say that a paramedic salary is all that lucrative itself, but it's about 10K higher than EMT.

frgtpsswrdlame 8y ago

Purely my perspective but... There is a psychic toll to doing a job that really feels beneath you. If you're raised in a culture where all the men in your class didn't have to get an education after high school and were able to support a family on manual or trade work and then you try to follow in their footsteps and fall flat on your face straight into minimum wage service work that's a burden those men carry. And then they apply for 100 jobs through indeed or linkedin and maybe get no calls back or only called back from similarly shitty jobs. They have low prospects so dating is harder. They have a lot of pain so it's easier to justify doing drugs. It's a classic downward cycle but worse it's something we, as professionals, have created. The utilitarian logic backing open trade and frenzied automation widely spread their marginal benefits but closely concentrate their heavy costs. These are those costs come to light.

MIKarlsen 8y ago

"If you get to the point where you’re turning 30, you’ve never held a real job and you don’t have a college education, then it is very hard to recover at that point." I've raised this point to a fair few of my friends and colleagues recently. I think it is becoming increasingly hard to contribute to society, because everything is so gosh-darn technical. Companies _scream_ for developers - but not junior developers, or people who they can teach to program - but developers with 5+ years worth of experience. I think this will only get WAY worse in the future. Unfortunately, I also think it will mean that people who fail to get a job after taking their degree will be worse off than people with little or no education, who has always had a job (no matter the type of job). So if you're done with college/university (which is when you're around 25-30 y/o in Europe), and you can't get a job, and you can't put your education to use. You're pretty much shit out of luck in most cases. Of course you can always dig yourself out, but doing so would most likely mean working a min-wage job for 8-10 hours a day, and then spending all your free-time and weekends learning a useful skill, which doesn't leave much time for friends or family (or making a family).

k__ 8y ago
On the other hand, how many people can you train to become programmers?
- MIKarlsen 8y ago
  Are you asking if it would be feasible for companies to take in well-educated people, and teaching them the programming/dev-craft? I don't know. But right now, companies are trying to solve the problem in other ways, which is ultimately not addressing their core need. I just feel like some sort of educational system (bootcamp'ish) would be able to make a good business case for most companies.
  - ams6110 8y ago
    When I finished my undergrad education, my first job was with a big consulting firm. Early 1990s. They did have a 6 or 8 week "boot camp" and they taught new hires how to program. Many of them had had no significant prior background in programming.

Alex63 8y ago

Some interesting things in this article. Given what appear to be changing attitudes to men ("long America’s economically privileged gender"), is this situation really surprising? When one considers diversity and inclusion goals, hiring more men seems like a lower priority. I was also amused by the comment, “I’m very quick to get frustrated when people refuse to pay me what I’m worth.” This seems like a conversation I have at least once a quarter with someone. You're worth what the market is willing to offer you, not what you think you are worth.

ehrtt 8y ago
> You're worth what the market is willing to offer you, not what you think you are worth. This is an absurd statement, the market is not a god. It does not have a value system.
- divs1210 8y ago
  In a capitalistic society, The Market = God. Ever heard people claiming that The Market will fix things? Where have I heard that before?
  - geezerjay 8y ago
    > In a capitalistic society, The Market = God. Enough with the puerile poetry. In a capitalist society, the market is people like you and me who like to decide for themselves what's in their own best interests. The market fixes problems because people likeyou and me always find a balance between what they supply and demand, and what trade-offs they are willing to accept. There is no magic or witchcraft.
    - divs1210 8y ago
      i look around and see a world struggling with pollution and inequality. Do you have any data/studies backing your claim, or am I supposed to take it all on faith?

michaelbuckbee 8y ago

Anytime the issue of millenials and jobs comes up, I think you have to talk about what the structural differences in the economy and business world are now: "Thirty years ago, she says, you could walk into any hotel in America and everyone in the building, from the cleaners to the security guards to the bartenders, was a direct hire, each worker on the same pay scale and enjoying the same benefits as everyone else. Today, they’re almost all indirect hires, employees of random, anonymous contracting companies: Laundry Inc., Rent-A-Guard Inc., Watery Margarita Inc. In 2015, the Government Accountability Office estimated that 40 percent of American workers were employed under some sort of “contingent” arrangement like this—from barbers to midwives to nuclear waste inspectors to symphony cellists. Since the downturn, the industry that has added the most jobs is not tech or retail or nursing. It is “temporary help services”—all the small, no-brand contractors who recruit workers and rent them out to bigger companies." From the fantastic https://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/poor-millennials/ https://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/poor-millenn...

mdo123 8y ago
Ugh I hate Watery Margarita Inc!
- forgottenpass 8y ago
  They're as bad as Heady Pours LLC
uep 8y ago
Doesn't this mean that middle-men are just being inserted who are absorbing some of the productivity (earnings) of the worker? It seems like this would only make economic sense if the end company isn't using them on a regular basis, so overall efficiency goes up by multiplexing an employee out to multiple companies as needed. It seems implied by "Rent-A-Guard", but I'm musing out-loud. I haven't had a chance to read your article yet.
- barrow-rider 8y ago
  > Doesn't this mean that middle-men are just being inserted who are absorbing some of the productivity (earnings) of the worker? Essentially, yes.

lyonsntl 8y ago

Press F for the neets

tamaharbor 8y ago

Losers.

ravenstine 8y ago

> Men -- long America’s economically privileged gender It depends on how you look at it. Don't get me wrong, men have had lots of privileges, but they have long been expected to work. Those social expectations are rapidly disappearing, and somewhat shifting to women, and we're seeing rates of depression and suicide rise for women in roughly the same time frame. Calling it privileged is a very one-sided way of looking at it, as the "privilege" comes with lot of responsibility that quickly becomes burdensome. With affordable home appliances, online services through your phone, video games, Netflix, and PornHub, the house wife/husband is obsolete. Why take on the same burdens your fathers did when little to none of that existed? With wages being stagnant since the 1970s, the ridiculous housing market, the materialist debt-slave culture, the decline of marriage, and the decrease in sustainable jobs, why exactly should millennial(and increasingly Gen Z) men bother working as much as their fathers? I come from a very wealthy area and only one of the dozens of men my age, with whom I grew up with, own what their fathers did when they were their age. Millennial men are rife with disenfranchisement that flies under the radar because the economy has enough shit jobs to allow them to scrape by, and the media is generally not compassionate to the issues of men. I mean, just look at this article which is clearly written as an underhanded criticism of young men. Let me repeat the question in the last paragraph: Why exactly should millennial men work as much as their fathers?

ben_jones 8y ago
I'm looking at a $400 bill after insurance for a 15 minute doctor's visit. Nothing fancy he took my blood pressure and listened to my lungs and sent me on my way. I'm fortunate that I can easily pay this, but what if I was living paycheck to paycheck? It would crush me. When wealth is so fleeting as to be taken away by such a minuscule stroke of bad luck, why would people bother chasing it? I'm literally going to have to "shop around" for my next appointment should I need one.
- lawn 8y ago
  There surely is a middle ground here between living paycheck to paycheck and not making work the most important thing in your life.

justfor1comment 8y ago

The millennial generation is also the first one in history to have mass exposure to the success of others due to social media websites. This could be a reason they want to seek better opportunities than the minimum wage jobs available to them. Retraining in schools does seem like a reasonable approach to pursue such better opportunities. Don't feel like millennials are in the wrong here.

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specialp 8y ago

"So for now, the Pittsburgh native and father to young children is living with his mother" In the past that wasn't so much of an option. You had to survive. I grew up with parents working jobs like the one he eschewed. They wouldn't dare try to live with my comparatively much more wealthy grandma. So now living with your parents into your 30s is like taking basic income. This is all fine if someone is truly doing this to invest in more education to get out of the unskilled labor market, but bad when it is just an excuse to be lazy. I too worked low wage jobs when I was a teen and in college to pay my way, I find that when people leave the upward trajectory by leaving school or their job for "something better" they end up becoming lazy and end up worse.

hindsightbias 8y ago
And your parents get to raise your kids. And probably pay for their care and schooling. I can grok 'lazy' or non-participation, but adding kids to the mix?
ams6110 8y ago
Don't know why you're downvoted. It's very easy for a person to rationalize sitting at home by telling himself he is holding out for a job that will "pay what I'm worth" but not doing anything concrete to make that happen. When I was in my late teens/20s I never thought moving back home was an acceptable option. Working at McDonalds or delivering pizza and living with roomates felt more honorable than moving back in with my parents.
- fatnoah 8y ago
  IMHO (and I emphasize that), the main difference is that when I was that age, getting a job, making money, and being independent were my goals. For the younger generation, they came into the world at a time of economic turmoil and skyrocketing student loan costs. By the time things recovered, housing markets in many areas were back to the races before they could catch up. Throw in more of an emphasis on doing, making, and experiencing things, and hustling for a buck is less of a priority.

panarky 8y ago

It's not perplexing at all. People forget that the market for labor is just like other markets. If you're selling a thing and the market price is lower than the thing is worth, then you don't sell it. If the minimum wage kept up with the increase in worker productivity over the last 50 years, today's minimum wage would be about $19.50. So workers who refuse to take dead-end jobs are simply rational economic actors refusing to sell a large fraction of their existence for a pittance. If employers have job openings they can't fill, while workers are idle because they won't work so cheap, then shouldn't the market-clearing wage increase? If not, what's preventing it?

supertrope 8y ago
Cue those who want to cut minimum wage and public assistance so unemployment is even more dire.
- gwright 8y ago
  From a public policy standpoint, I think it would be better to have people at even a very low rate with public assistance as appropriate than to have people not working at all and dependent 100% on public assistance. Increasing the minimum wage results in some people getting a higher wage and other people getting $0.
ams6110 8y ago
> If employers have job openings they can't fill, while workers are idle because they won't work so cheap, then shouldn't the market-clearing wage increase? If not, what's preventing it? Other workers will work cheap. See, it doesn't matter what you think your time is worth. The supply of people willing to work is what determines what it is worth. Minimum wage jobs can literally be done by almost anyone who is not mentally or physically handicapped. You can "refuse to sell" your labor at that price, but when you have nothing in the way of skills or experience to offer, you really are just choosing to be unemployed.
- irrational 8y ago
  But, what happens where there are no workers? Everywhere I go there are signs saying help wanted. But, unemployment is practically non-existent where I live. Everyone who wants a job, has a job.

throw_millenial 8y ago

People love to talk about privilege, but being a male millenial in 2018 is anything but that. The media says you're a sexual predator. They say you're toxically masculine. That is, the very hormones imbued within you are to blame for a host of problems. If you're white they say you are constantly oppressing people of color. If you're in tech, then you're worst kind of man possible - a tech bro. Couple the prevailing sentiment with a change in the type of available jobs. Physically demanding work is less common now, and manufacturing, long a mainstay of male occupation, was moved overseas. Office work is more about people relationships, which generally favors women. Our education system is similarly biased against men these days. I'm at the old end of the millenial generation, but if I was 25, I don't think I'd be too motivated either. I'm not surprised when these young men favor sitting in a basement playing video games over getting a job. Or watching porn instead of going after a girlfriend. The culture has shifted. For some people it's a huge win and there are a wealth of new opportunities - but it is a zero sum game, and now we're seeing the losers.

peterburkimsher 8y ago

I'm a 29 year old male. I've been trying to get a new job since March, and I've been unemployed since August. I have an MEng in Electronic Systems Engineering, and over 3 years continuous relevant work experience. I have tried applying through Seek and TradeMe, and got no response. I tried writing custom cover letters and applying on company websites. I've rewritten my résumé several times based on contradictory advice. I updated my LinkedIn, and made a second LinkedIn profile to add strangers. I asked recruiters for help. I put side projects on the web, especially Show HN, to try to get attention. I asked friends who I worked with at Fisher & Paykel Healthcare when I was there before. I found random people on Github and offered to work for free on open-source projects just to get an introduction. I contacted computer repair shops and asked them to put up posters advertising data migration services that I could do with my old Apple II. I've contacted every Apple-certified repair person in NZ/Aus/Can to ask them for help. I've tried praying about it. I've tried spamming the companies that have emails readily available, from the accredited employers list. I posted a desperate plea on Facebook, and followed up on advice (+1 introduction) from friends. None of these methods are working. I've had only two interviews. Most companies don't even send rejections. I've lowered my standards so now I'll accept any kind of job, anywhere. This is a cry for help. I know I'm doing something totally wrong. I just don't know how to contact companies. Please tell me what to do. Please tell me email addresses of people who care.

lordnacho 8y ago
What do you want to do as a job? What do the people who have this job have on their CVs? Have you found people on LinkedIn who hire for what you want to do? Also recruiters are a dead end for everyone who isn't already a very close match for a job that's going. It's incredibly frustrating for everyone, but that's their incentive structure. And what do you mean Apple II? Isn't that ancient?
- peterburkimsher 8y ago
  I'll take anything as a job now. I can get my own Working Holiday visa. But I've been turned down by farms and construction companies, not only tech companies. I don't know how to find people on LinkedIn, but I created a new account just to spam that way. I'll keep trying to add lots of strangers and hope I find a friendly one. Yes, I used an Apple II with ADTPro to migrate data off lots of old 5.25" floppies for archiving purposes. I thought that I could start a business to do that, if I could get computer repair shops to advertise for me. So I asked the repair shops, but most didn't even reply, and the only one that did told me that I should set up the business first and then they'll ask their manager whether they'd be willing to put up a poster. My logic is that older people are rich and powerful, and fondly remember their old computers. So the data migration would put me in contact with people who could give me a real job later.

thrower123 8y ago

Is there a good explanation for the bar chart that shows labor force participation being down or flat for just about everyone other than young women and old men?

shagie 8y ago

The part that made me wonder about the millennials in their job search is: > Butcher has a high-school diploma and a resume filled with low-wage jobs from Target and Walmart to a local grocery store. He’s being selective as he searches for new work because he doesn’t want to grind out unhappy hours for unsatisfying compensation. I believe that having a job that you love is a luxury. It is something to look at once basic needs are met. There are jobs out there, and even jobs that train entry level in a trade. No, it may not be the job you love... but as Stephen Stills said: > If you're down and confused And you don't remember who you're talking to Concentration slip away Because your baby is so far away > Well, there's a rose in a fisted glove And the eagle flies with the dove And if you can't be with the one you love, honey Love the one you're with ... That doesn’t mean one should love that unsatisfying job, but recognize that not everyone will have that dream job.

fatnoah 8y ago
>He’s being selective as he searches for new work because he doesn’t want to grind out unhappy hours for unsatisfying compensation. I think this is a large part of the issue here. I only have my experience employing millenials to go by, but they're a group that seems to be less focused on compensation and career advancement than generations before them. They're version of the American Dream is also different than generations before them. It's not get job, make money, get a house, have kids, etc. There's nothing wrong with any of that. Society has changed, and the economics have changed. I graduated college in 1997 with $30k in debt, which was a lot at the time. Now, that'd be below average. I was the only one of my large group of friends that didn't own a house within 5 years of graduation. Contrast that with the cohort of millenials I've managed, and I don't think a single one out of several dozen have owned their own home. It's either not a high priority or seems so out of reach when student loans and the high cost of ownership in this area (Boston) come into play. Sure, they could maybe buy a place in suburbia, but again that's a smaller priority than in was before them. My tl:dr; for the article is that they're less willing to work "just because" and have different goals than generations before them, and that's hard for people to grok.
- shagie 8y ago

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