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I'm in industrial controls/automation and also electrical maintenance, currently in-house. We do have experienced manufacturing staff in this country, most of

I'm in industrial controls/automation and also electrical maintenance, currently in-house. We do have experienced manufacturing staff in this country, most of them are immigrants. Technical jobs such as mine are paid pretty well, but especially with our aging manufacturing infrastructure (old, decaying plants) - which China et al are decades away from - there's not enough skill to go around and so we tend to be very overworked, causing further attrition. I guess my question is why can't we just import more talent/skill from places like China, just as we've done in science and medicine? People still want to come here. The article isn't clear on exactly where the shortages are eg technicians, QA, forklift drivers, operators. The un-/low-skilled positions are again largely filled with immigrants as it is. These jobs, like agriculture (where I worked in a past life), are not for the faint of heart. As for job security, we Millenials giggle dejectedly to even imagine that to be a thing. Your point on the college-educated bias against blue-collar work is apt; even if it's better money many simply don't want to accept that we paid through the nose for something that doesn't pan out economically. Not clear on the meaning of your last sentence ie 'movement is measured in a country'. Do you mean PRC being totalitarian?

sanxiyn 4y ago
I agree immigration is a solution. US immigration is literally a trillion dollar bill lying on the sidewalk. For some mysterious reasons US doesn't want to pick it up.
- curious_cat_163 4y ago
  It is likely because about 25% of the country would not like a more liberal immigration policy. There are merits to immigration but the politics around this has become toxic. I do not know how the US gets back on this horse without having bipartisan legislation. Such legislation looks pretty hard to be supported by a majority of the republic party’s primary voters. So, the question is what gives. Any one sided policy moves on this by the Democratic Party would likely face risk to be reversed.
  - KerrAvon 4y ago
    This is the case for essentially all US federal governance at this point. Something’s going to have to give; we will either plummet into fascism as 45% of the country seems to want or we will somehow back down from the precipice through some yet unforeseen series of events.
    - issa 4y ago
      Totally off topic, but I don't think the events will be "unforeseen". There are so many plausible predictions of what the future will hold, it's unlikely we will be surprised. At least, science fiction readers won't be surprised. My personal bet is that Star Trek has the closest thing to accurate future-history. We go through some really bad times, then master fusion technology and suddenly there is enough of everything to go around. Clearly we have a lot of growing to do before being in a post-scarcity world means that everyone is well cared for. Fingers crossed.
  - nyokodo 4y ago
    > It is likely because about 25% of the country would not like a more liberal immigration policy. The blame isn’t just with the “build the wall” crowd, the majority of the other 75% of Americans do not place fixing immigration as a top priority, and immigrants are not voters in the short to medium term so they‘re not benefiting anyone in the next election.
    - astrange 4y ago
      Also, immigrants aren't particularly likely to vote for you just because you let them in, nor do they even like other immigrants themselves so they're not going to vote for them either. That's how powerful American cultural imperialism is; we make them American as soon as they get here.
  - mickdeek86 4y ago
    The politics of immigration have always been toxic, see the quota system, or Archie Bunker, or 'Irish need not apply'. I think that reframing immigration as probably our biggest strategic asset historically might have some potential. If Jewish physicists had stayed in Europe, would we have nuclear supremacy? If Chinese laborers hadn't gone to California, would we have the Transcontinental railroad? Where would NASA be without the stolen German engineers? The Democrats talk about it like it's charity and the humane thing to do, and the Republicans come back with 'first we have to take care of our own'. HN seems to understand this, but it isn't what makes the news.
YeBanKo 4y ago
How long does it take to train an apprentice in your field? Let’s say for electrical maintenance?
- mickdeek86 4y ago
  Electrical maintenance? We could start someone today and the rest depends on learning ability. You don't need a license to work in-house. In any case, it's rare to work alone, there's always someone older than you in the shop, at least until you become the aged master. Controls/Automation engineer? I apprenticed for 4 years and still learn something every day.
  - YeBanKo 4y ago
    Not sure what state you are in, but in California community colleges are fairly good. They can provide trade education together with apprenticeship programs. This system can close the gap for many tradesman jobs. It is not gonna happen in a year, but over next 10 years. In 2012 Jobs told Obama that those jobs aren’t coming back, around the time Tesla was able to pull off Models S. Iirc 52% of it was US made, which seems impressive. It’s been almost two years since the dependency on import from very few country for critical things was widely exposed due to pandemic. This would be enough time to train someone junior or have them be half way through their apprenticeship. Now we want to move to alternative energy source, which most likely means that solar and lithium batteries alone aren’t gonna suffice. At the same time, EU is learning the hard way why it’s not ideal for the energy sector to rely to heavily on a foreign irrational actor. I think there is enough momentum to push the needle and see results in 5-10 years.
fny 4y ago
Thanks for the comment. > most of them are immigrants This proves my point: America has lost is manufacturing capacity. These people are not "Made in America". Of course you can import more of these people, but I'm not sure the half the population is into that given who we had as our last president. > "working a skilled manufacturing job where your every movement is measured in a country." Typo. I meant to say "company." If you work in a factory where you make motors or fencing, your output can be directly seen and measured. With desk jobs, the outputs are at times a little more unmeasurable.
- carom 4y ago
  >I'm not sure the half the population is into that given who we had as our last president. Their issue is with illegal immigration and drug trafficking across the border. The dream would be to let American jobs stabilize after addressing undocumented labor. Get everyone protected under the law and paying into the system. Then import people as needed. The other half of the country seems to support a system of exploitative labor because not doing so sounds racist.
yterdy 4y ago
There are plenty of people from generationally-marginalized families and communities who would love to be hired for positions where they'd be well-compensated while developing valuable skillsets. They're fine with the work being difficult or non-"sit-on-your-ass" oriented. But when People of Influence jump to the solution of, "Import skilled workers that will not only compete for these jobs we need filled, but likely shut out existing residents who've never had access to the requisite training or networks, forever," it speaks to how well PoI truly intend to take care of, say, PoC. If you sense that your abilities won't be appreciated in the future, why spend the time and energy developing them? At the end of the day, we pursue economic affluence for the promise of social stability it's supposed to bring. Selling out existing Americans, rather than investing in them, in order to save money and hit the ground running short-term, is likely a long-term demographic nightmare. I say this as a progressive, not because I'm anti-immigration, but because the solution suggested seems less about keeping the country open and more about maintaining the wealth of a few at the expense of their marginalized neighbors across the train tracks. Remember how the auto industry brought a bunch of Japanese trainers over years ago and then threw their recommendations for developing the local workforce in the trash? Let's do the right thing this time.
- mickdeek86 4y ago
  On the off chance that this isn't just an academic exercise in moral posturing, and you in fact do progressivism or labor advocacy rather than just identify with it, and happen to actually know any of these "people of color", please do encourage them to apply for any of the numerous job postings which have hitherto rotted on the vine for a year or more. Even the People of Influence - to a man Trumpian troglodytes though they are - seem to me generally willing to take a shot at this point. By the way, these postings most always include the hourly pay, which everyone earns, including the Ukrainian refugees and guest workers we have at our plant atm.

sanxiyn 4y ago

I agree immigration is a solution. US immigration is literally a trillion dollar bill lying on the sidewalk. For some mysterious reasons US doesn't want to pick it up.

curious_cat_163 4y ago
It is likely because about 25% of the country would not like a more liberal immigration policy. There are merits to immigration but the politics around this has become toxic. I do not know how the US gets back on this horse without having bipartisan legislation. Such legislation looks pretty hard to be supported by a majority of the republic party’s primary voters. So, the question is what gives. Any one sided policy moves on this by the Democratic Party would likely face risk to be reversed.
- KerrAvon 4y ago
  This is the case for essentially all US federal governance at this point. Something’s going to have to give; we will either plummet into fascism as 45% of the country seems to want or we will somehow back down from the precipice through some yet unforeseen series of events.
  - issa 4y ago
    Totally off topic, but I don't think the events will be "unforeseen". There are so many plausible predictions of what the future will hold, it's unlikely we will be surprised. At least, science fiction readers won't be surprised. My personal bet is that Star Trek has the closest thing to accurate future-history. We go through some really bad times, then master fusion technology and suddenly there is enough of everything to go around. Clearly we have a lot of growing to do before being in a post-scarcity world means that everyone is well cared for. Fingers crossed.
- nyokodo 4y ago
  > It is likely because about 25% of the country would not like a more liberal immigration policy. The blame isn’t just with the “build the wall” crowd, the majority of the other 75% of Americans do not place fixing immigration as a top priority, and immigrants are not voters in the short to medium term so they‘re not benefiting anyone in the next election.
  - astrange 4y ago
    Also, immigrants aren't particularly likely to vote for you just because you let them in, nor do they even like other immigrants themselves so they're not going to vote for them either. That's how powerful American cultural imperialism is; we make them American as soon as they get here.
- mickdeek86 4y ago
  The politics of immigration have always been toxic, see the quota system, or Archie Bunker, or 'Irish need not apply'. I think that reframing immigration as probably our biggest strategic asset historically might have some potential. If Jewish physicists had stayed in Europe, would we have nuclear supremacy? If Chinese laborers hadn't gone to California, would we have the Transcontinental railroad? Where would NASA be without the stolen German engineers? The Democrats talk about it like it's charity and the humane thing to do, and the Republicans come back with 'first we have to take care of our own'. HN seems to understand this, but it isn't what makes the news.

YeBanKo 4y ago

How long does it take to train an apprentice in your field? Let’s say for electrical maintenance?

mickdeek86 4y ago
Electrical maintenance? We could start someone today and the rest depends on learning ability. You don't need a license to work in-house. In any case, it's rare to work alone, there's always someone older than you in the shop, at least until you become the aged master. Controls/Automation engineer? I apprenticed for 4 years and still learn something every day.
- YeBanKo 4y ago
  Not sure what state you are in, but in California community colleges are fairly good. They can provide trade education together with apprenticeship programs. This system can close the gap for many tradesman jobs. It is not gonna happen in a year, but over next 10 years. In 2012 Jobs told Obama that those jobs aren’t coming back, around the time Tesla was able to pull off Models S. Iirc 52% of it was US made, which seems impressive. It’s been almost two years since the dependency on import from very few country for critical things was widely exposed due to pandemic. This would be enough time to train someone junior or have them be half way through their apprenticeship. Now we want to move to alternative energy source, which most likely means that solar and lithium batteries alone aren’t gonna suffice. At the same time, EU is learning the hard way why it’s not ideal for the energy sector to rely to heavily on a foreign irrational actor. I think there is enough momentum to push the needle and see results in 5-10 years.

fny 4y ago

Thanks for the comment. > most of them are immigrants This proves my point: America has lost is manufacturing capacity. These people are not "Made in America". Of course you can import more of these people, but I'm not sure the half the population is into that given who we had as our last president. > "working a skilled manufacturing job where your every movement is measured in a country." Typo. I meant to say "company." If you work in a factory where you make motors or fencing, your output can be directly seen and measured. With desk jobs, the outputs are at times a little more unmeasurable.

carom 4y ago
>I'm not sure the half the population is into that given who we had as our last president. Their issue is with illegal immigration and drug trafficking across the border. The dream would be to let American jobs stabilize after addressing undocumented labor. Get everyone protected under the law and paying into the system. Then import people as needed. The other half of the country seems to support a system of exploitative labor because not doing so sounds racist.

yterdy 4y ago

There are plenty of people from generationally-marginalized families and communities who would love to be hired for positions where they'd be well-compensated while developing valuable skillsets. They're fine with the work being difficult or non-"sit-on-your-ass" oriented. But when People of Influence jump to the solution of, "Import skilled workers that will not only compete for these jobs we need filled, but likely shut out existing residents who've never had access to the requisite training or networks, forever," it speaks to how well PoI truly intend to take care of, say, PoC. If you sense that your abilities won't be appreciated in the future, why spend the time and energy developing them? At the end of the day, we pursue economic affluence for the promise of social stability it's supposed to bring. Selling out existing Americans, rather than investing in them, in order to save money and hit the ground running short-term, is likely a long-term demographic nightmare. I say this as a progressive, not because I'm anti-immigration, but because the solution suggested seems less about keeping the country open and more about maintaining the wealth of a few at the expense of their marginalized neighbors across the train tracks. Remember how the auto industry brought a bunch of Japanese trainers over years ago and then threw their recommendations for developing the local workforce in the trash? Let's do the right thing this time.

mickdeek86 4y ago
On the off chance that this isn't just an academic exercise in moral posturing, and you in fact do progressivism or labor advocacy rather than just identify with it, and happen to actually know any of these "people of color", please do encourage them to apply for any of the numerous job postings which have hitherto rotted on the vine for a year or more. Even the People of Influence - to a man Trumpian troglodytes though they are - seem to me generally willing to take a shot at this point. By the way, these postings most always include the hourly pay, which everyone earns, including the Ukrainian refugees and guest workers we have at our plant atm.