11 ms·

Everything you have listed above could be solved with money. Only 10% of applicants are physically and mentally qualified? Sounds like you need more applicant

by tw04 2y ago

Everything you have listed above could be solved with money. Only 10% of applicants are physically and mentally qualified? Sounds like you need more applicants? Want to attract more applicants? Offer more compensation. The training and onboarding is incredibly long? Sounds like a doctor? Do you know why people go through the pain of becoming a doctor? Because they make a lot of money when they get through the other side. Technology hasn't changed is a political problem due to lack of... money. There isn't an issue with new technology, there's an issue with the government refusing to invest in upgrading the technology. Canada doesn't have this issue and they're far smaller than the US. Too much stress? I bet if you paid people so much money that they could work for 10 years and then either retire to a lower paying job, or retire entirely, people would deal with it. I do absolutely, 100% think that this is a problem that can easily be solved with money. I also think our politicians will flounder around making excuses about how the problem is unsolvable because it doesn't directly help their chances of re-election. The first time a plane goes down carrying a dozen congress critters and their families, you can bet there will magically be money in the banana stand.

crmd 2y ago
I respectfully disagree - there's always money in the banana stand.
d0gsg0w00f 2y ago
> Do you know why people go through the pain of becoming a doctor? Because they make a lot of money when they get through the other side. I think the guaranteed respect and admiration that comes from the title is actually a more powerful draw. Don't get me wrong, the money is good, but on par with senior manager in any large tech firm. Doctor is a primal respect that technical roles do not carry. You're not getting instant respect from mother in laws and pastors as an ATC.
- Tatar_grade 2y ago
  there's something about the guaranteed aspect, whereas a senior manager is at the behest of office politics and the business cycle
- FpUser 2y ago
  >"Doctor is a primal respect that technical roles do not carry." Used to be. Not anymore. Nowadays many doctors act as a smartass business people.
  - datavirtue 2y ago
    In my city it's an underpaid work-a-day job that half of them hate. There is something about being trapped that can make any job sick the life out of you. I remember a former CEO who would come into work each day and let out a heavy sigh before unlocking his office door. I learned that he was trapped in the job until he retired for various reasons...most of his own making.
    - somenameforme 2y ago
      It's the paperwork. Most people have no idea the amount of paperwork doctors have to fill out - it adds up to 20-30 hours of it per week. It's getting close to a full time job by itself. Think about how pleasant the experience is of filling out bureaucratic/government paperwork, and now imagine doing that as a full time job.
      - hattmall 2y ago
        What? This doesn't sound right at all. I've worked very closely with Doctors during the implementation of EHR systems and they don't spend nearly that much time on paperwork. They spend a couple minutes charting things for each patient. Then about 30 minutes at the end of the day going over anything that's been flagged by admin. Then about 1-3 hours every two weeks adjusting rejected claims. There's certainly a lot of paperwork that has to be done, but doctors aren't doing it.
        somenameforme 2y ago
        Part of being a good doctor is good bedside manner. They're not going to bitch about it to a stranger, but it's a huge and well known problem that is almost certainly the single biggest cause for doctor burnout (which is extremely widespread). Some random source (though my experience comes from family) : "What they learned was that during office hours, half the time — a huge chunk — was allocated to desk work, like documentation in the electronic medical record (EMR), reviewing test results, handling medication requests, and filling out forms. What was remarkable was that even during office visits, doctors interacted with their patients for only half of the time; the rest was EMR and paperwork. As a matter of fact, for every hour of face-to-face patient time, another two hours were spent on desk work." [1] The paper mentions that was the amount of time spent for doctors with "documentation support" (various forms of automation/streamlining) that would generally be absent in something like a primary care physician's office, meaning he'll be spending substantially more time on paperwork. The paper also (at a quick skim) did not mention out-of-office work, where doctors often spend even more time filling out paperwork. And there are also regulations meaning doctors themselves have to be the ones filling out much of this paperwork. [1] - https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/physicians-paperwork-and-paying-attention-to-patients-2016103110558 https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/physicians-paperwork-and...
- adamanonymous 2y ago
  > You're not getting instant respect from mother in laws and pastors as an ATC You would if it was known to pay $500k/yr+
  - nicoburns 2y ago
    Earning highly does not universally command respect the way being a doctor does. Some would even see earning that much as being immoral (i.e. actually negative)
    - portaouflop 2y ago
      Which very highly paid job does not command respect in society? I can’t think of any (Outside of anti-capitalist circles ofc)
      - nicoburns 2y ago
        > Which very highly paid job does not command respect in society? Banking? Sales? > Outside of anti-capitalist circles ofc Well that's quite the point. Maybe those circles are small in the US, but they aren't in most of the rest of the world. Let me just say that if I called my parents and told them that I had gotten a well-paid job at, say, a hedge fund, they would not be impressed and would likely think less of me for it.
        somenameforme 2y ago
        One doesn't need to be anti-capitalist to dislike bankers, salespeople, or many other similar careers. They, in many cases at least, rely on information inequalities to deceive and rip off people. I love capitalism, but I loathe sketchy behavior done in the pursuit of money. They are two very different things.
        bobthepanda 2y ago
        Also, a nonzero amount of people remember events like the Great Recession that were caused by the hubris of bankers.
jerlam 2y ago
> Sounds like a doctor? Not disagreeing, but the US also has a doctor shortage for at least a decade that it is seemingly unable to fix.
- jyounker 2y ago
  The USA restricts the number of positions for medical schools and residencies. It's a problem that money could solve.
  - nradov 2y ago
    There is no restriction on medical school admissions. It's really just residencies.
    - taeric 2y ago
      My understanding is that this is a distinction that doesn't make a difference? Without a residency, can you become a doctor?
      - nradov 2y ago
        That's mostly correct, but there are a few students who enroll in medical school with no intention of becoming practicing physicians. They want to go into some other career like research or technology or hospital administration.
      - OJFord 2y ago
        Yes, because you have to be (or be about to be and in time to start) a doctor in order to be apply for residency. Resident doctors are doctors, exactly as junior SWEs are software engineers. (UK doctors have for some reason long objected to 'junior' and recently become 'resident doctors' over exactly this. All the more confusing - throughout and still there's been 'Senior House Officers', because 'house' used to be what it was called, like US residency, doing house, there were junior and senior house officers, so why not just revert to that? Who knows, but now they're all resident doctors - and some of which are senior house officers - until they're registrars/consultants, and they're happier with that than junior doctors.)
janalsncm 2y ago
> Too much stress? Not just that, but having a shortage means each ATC does more work which is inherently stressful.
- HPsquared 2y ago
  This is the same problem doctors have, which pushes a lot of people away from the profession. It's a self-reinforcing problem.
natnat 2y ago
I don't honestly think that technology is meaningfully downstream of money. A startup or hobbyist can build something that costs Google several million dollars in a weekend. Most of these systems are complex, but not as complex as e.g. an operating system. But upgrading technology requires government administrative capacity. That's generally cheaper than outsourcing technology development to third parties, but does require a commitment to try to understand the thing you're managing. Politicians don't hire competent administrators because they believe that building a solution yourself and buying a solution from a contractor are basically equivalent, which anyone on this website can tell you is not true. This is an easier problem to solve than most think, but it's not trivial. And it's really hard when you have clowns like Elon Musk purposefully destroying institutional knowledge for no good reason.
- watwut 2y ago
  > A startup or hobbyist can build something that costs Google several million dollars in a weekend. They genuinely cant. They can make a sorta kinda prototype of something that costs Google several million dollars.
  - natnat 2y ago
    You're right that a hobbyist couldn't build something like search or maps or docs in a weekend, but a lot of what Google ships is boring webapps. And I promise that they are really hard to ship: approvals are annoying and time-consuming, and the infrastructure is designed for scalability and performance, not flexibility or iteration speed. There's a joke inside Google that Google infra makes easy things hard and impossible things possible.
imoverclocked 2y ago
> Technology hasn't changed is a political problem due to lack of... money. Tell me you haven’t worked in aerospace without telling me you haven’t worked in aerospace. There is plenty of money sunk into all corners of the field but progress is slow because the risk of change is lives lost. At some point, the risk of not changing means more lives lost… and that’s when things will change.
- portaouflop 2y ago
  Maybe the technology part can’t be fixed easily with money but sounds to me like all the other aspects of the money argument are still valid.
  - imoverclocked 2y ago
    Like “too much stress?” Money only does so much to improve your life. Stress is a way to shorten your life. Long term chronic stress literally makes you ill in ways that medicine can’t fix.
    - swores 2y ago
      Paying more money can make a huge difference to stress. Obviously it can't make an hour of doing the work less stressful in itself, but more money could do one or more of the following: - Allow people to retire after a decade rather than several decades of work - Allow (or require) people to only work part-time (eg 2 days a week, or 5 days of 2 hours a day, or...) while still earning a full time equivalent salary - Allow a work day to be 10mins on, 50mins resting for every hour (requiring 6x as many staff), while paying as if the full hour was work - Pay for therapy, stress-management lessons, etc. - Pay for a professional cleaner at home, a part-time chef or lots of restaurant/takeaway meals, or whatever else helps to minimise the amount of work you need to do outside the job - Probably other ideas that haven't come into my mind in the two minutes I've spent on the subject of how more money can help fight issues caused by stress
- fn-mote 2y ago
  > There is plenty of money sunk into all corners of the field but progress is slow … because of mismanagement, just like other large software rewrites that you are probably familiar with. It’s the same problem - updating a complex system - except there’s no other vendor you can switch to.
jltsiren 2y ago
Paying too much can be counterproductive, if the job is demanding, people don't find it inherently rewarding, and most people are not qualified for it. If you earn enough to retire after 10 years, you also earn enough to feel financially secure after 3 years, quit, and find a better job.
isodev 2y ago
> Only 10% of applicants are physically and mentally qualified? Another way would be investing in education (instead of dismantling it, or mixing it with religion and politics), making it more accessible so more people come out who are better equipped to take on "complex jobs"
- least 2y ago
  I generally agree with your sentiment for improving education, but I don't think the limiting factor for ATCs has to do with it, but with innate qualities in individuals. You can see the list of criteria here: https://www.faa.gov/air-traffic-controller-qualifications https://www.faa.gov/air-traffic-controller-qualifications
  - ajuc 2y ago
    - Be a United States citizen - Be under the age of 31 Well, they restrict the pool pretty harshly right from the start.
  - swores 2y ago
    I think most people underestimate the amount of "innate qualities" from patience to creativity etc. that actually are influenced by education, parenting, etc. rather than being defined at birth by genetics. Education isn't just about changing the quantity of knowledge people have learned - a country with good free education, along with other things like mental health support, good parenting resources/education/support, etc. will lead to more people having the qualities needed to be ATCs despite not having learned them by going to specific "managing stress 101" classes. (Edit: It's possible I misunderstood you and by innate qualities you literally just meant the things in their explicit requirements list like being under 31 and being a US citizen, if so apologies but I'll leave my comment here anyway.)
    - jvvw 2y ago
      A quick google suggests that only 35% of US adults have 20/20 vision (although I guess it might be higher if you restrict to the population of the age required) which is one of the requirements so that by itself limits the pool of applicants significantly regardless of education, parenting etc?
kshahkshah 2y ago
mid 100k salary... not worth it for that level of stress
8note 2y ago
i dont think offering more compensation solves the problem. the people you might want mignt 1. always have a better option elsewhere and if your raise the offer, competitors will offer something even higher instead, beyond the pittances the government is willing to spend 2. never be willing to take on the job as specified - huge responsibility and risk of killing people, with long hours and no recognition 3. never finds out that the pay is high - nobody talks about it, or sells its existence as an option. 4. doesnt have a parent in the business to teach them what to do raising the payment seems to fail a lot, even though its suggested naively all the time as the solution to all labour problems. alternatives might be to increase outreach, immigration, enslaved prison workers, stronger unions to make the job more like what people are willing to work, etc
- sooheon 2y ago
  Money talks. No amount of outreach makes a mispriced offer attractive.
- Panzer04 2y ago
  Of course it solves the problem. People will prevaricate and blow a ton of money in so many ways before they acknowledge the easiest fix. The extra expenses will also encourage actual fixes to the system like better automation or whatever to reduce costs.
callc 2y ago
> Offer more compensation. > Too much stress? I bet if you paid people so much money that they could work for 10 years and then either retire to a lower paying job, or retire entirely, people would deal with it. I highly doubt that solving the problem with just money will get the right people. A high salary becomes the goal in an of itself, and everything else falls to the wayside. Do you really care about safety? Applicants may say they do, but only want to retire after 10 years and will lie through their teeth. Money is a corrupting factor. I don’t like to take this side of the argument, since I want people to be paid fairly, but there’s something fundamental to seeing unpaid volunteers having the best intentions and most love for their craft
- baq 2y ago
  Corrupting or motivating? Thin line I’d say. The other side of the coin is you won’t get the candidates you want if they can get the same money for less taxing jobs. Game theory 101.
RobotToaster 2y ago
> Too much stress? I bet if you paid people so much money that they could work for 10 years and then either retire to a lower paying job, or retire entirely, people would deal with it. Or pay people enough they can afford to work part time. A stressful job is less stressful if you only have to work 2 days a week.
- HPsquared 2y ago
  This also applies to doctors and any stressful job really. Long hours compound the stress problems, making the job really unattractive.
- zoky 2y ago
  I suspect this would probably be counterproductive, for a couple reasons. First, you’d be encouraging people to take on a second job with all of their free time, which would lead to more overall stress. But I think you’d also see a reduction in efficiency and overall quality of work when you’re only “practicing” two days a week, especially after five days off. I mean, when I come in to work after a long weekend, I can hardly remember what the hell it is I even do!
trod1234 2y ago
> Everything you have listed could be solved with money. No that's actually not true. Government jobs are soul crushing. The way the bureaucracy works, its all about social standing, politics, and seniority. In these jobs you trade your sanity for money, and they have a long reputation for being just like this which is why few ever apply. No reasonably average intelligence person is going to do that unless they are absolutely desperate. Its a dead end job.
skirge 2y ago
with more money you will attract greedy people and greedy is contradictory with being responsible
robertlagrant 2y ago
> Want to attract more applicants? Offer more compensation. This was already addressed in the original post. Why write in this "spelling it out for you" style when they already addressed it? > Do you know why people go through the pain of becoming a doctor? Because they make a lot of money when they get through the other side. This is really reductive. There are multiple reasons: - very stable employment - very prestigious job, and has been for centuries. Conveys authority. Your family can boast that you're a doctor. - very interesting tales come out of employment, and your family probably - very easy to feel good about being a doctor - directly helping people etc Not all of those for everyone, and they no doubt don't all turn out to be the case, but doctors apply for multiple reasons, and many of them aren't in high-paying areas at all. Doctors (in America, which I assume is what you're focusing in on) are paid well partly because they have high expenses in terms of liability insurance.
- watwut 2y ago
  Doctors dont have interesting tales to tell, nor should have due to things being private by law. Stability of employment is something that traffic controllers could have, this is just a question of "working conditions" and solvable by money. I really do not see why traffic controller could not feel good about being traffic controller. They do more "life saving" jobs then any of us on hacker news.
  - robertlagrant 2y ago
    > Doctors dont have interesting tales to tell, nor should have due to things being private by law. Identifiable tales are illegal, yes. That's not all tales. Surely you know a doctor and they've told you stories before? I'm listing other reasons doctors like being doctors over just money. I don't know what the rest of your comment has to do with this.
  - Shinolove 2y ago
    Jokes on you I am working on ATC software solutions (safety modules exactly aiming to predict and warn about this kind of events)
mihaaly 2y ago
You must be an economist. :D - Can you swim now? - No. - What if I give you money?
DannyBee 2y ago
There are plenty of jobs that you can't pay people enough money to want to do. The notion that if you just pay enough, people who are otherwise qualified will do anything, is amazingly reductive. It's a super US-centric view, and not surprisingly, it does not have an amazing history of working out (especially compared to other mechanisms). Given the people in question have good other options, why would they do this, even if you paid more? In fact - plenty of smart people will take pay cuts for better qualify of life. Example: Plenty of folks take pay cuts to work remotely from places they like more, and because they find it a better quality of life. Not everyone is money driven, and the assumption that here is that the intersection of "money driven, capable of doing this job, etc" is large enough that increasing the amount of money will make the result larger. It's totally non-obvious this is true.
- pif 2y ago
  > Plenty of folks take pay cuts to work remotely Pay cuts are not important; profit is! If I get paid 100 less, and spend 90 less because of no commuting, I'm gaining more than before.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - bill_joy_fanboy 2y ago
    This is completely true. I make less working remotely in a LCOL area than I would in the HCOL area where my office resides. The differential in COL, though, is so high that I'm saving a lot more. In other words, I'm making less but I'm building more wealth. Most of the money that goes into living in a HCOL area and commuting to office is just pure waste to satisfy the egos of upper managers who want to preside over a big floor of workers.
    - sesky 2y ago
      That seem like a reductive take on why people live in HCOL areas. Those areas cost a lot because most people believe the quality of life is better, which raises the cost of living due to competition for real estate. If every part of the US became equally expensive and convenient for work, VHCOL areas like the Bay Area would still be immediately oversubscribed for reasons unrelated to work. The Bay Area has arguably the best climate (cool Mediterranean) of any major city, unique proximity to a diverse set of outdoor recreation (Big Sur, Napa, Yosemite, Tahoe just to name a few), and all the desirable amenities of a major metro area. That’s not to say you can’t have a perfectly happy life in other areas if you have different preferences, but the cost of living is ultimately a market, driven by the aggregate preferences of all people.
joakleaf 2y ago
Sorry. But people in general do not choose to study medicine because they can make a lot of money after the study. I have had some experience with family, girl friends, friends and med-students. And it was definitely not the primary reason any one of them chose that path. I don’t think money is a strong enough single motivator for med-school or any other long term hard study/job.
michielderhaeg 2y ago
> Too much stress? I bet if you paid people so much money that they could work for 10 years and then either retire to a lower paying job, or retire entirely, people would deal with it. Don't underestimate just how high-stress these jobs are and what it does to you. People quit these kinds of jobs for 2 reasons 1) They can't deal with the stress mentally, or don't want to. 2) They were not smart enough to choose option 1 and their body just physically gives up and they are no longer capable of performing their job as an ATC. I know someone who is now legally handicapped because her lungs don't function properly anymore due to the stress and was forced to retire early.
egberts1 2y ago
Sure, let's have FAA reject qualified ATC applicants because they answered "science" as their worst subject in high school and/or "history" in college. (The core crux of Brigida vs FAA 2015 lawsuit) Or the passive visual skin color test (Brigida vs Buttigieg 2021 lawsuit). That'll be about 4,120 qualified ATC applicants that won't be coming back: would you come back if a sizable class-action award is forthcoming? If that was the plan (to lock up and away FAA ATCs, to inflate supply-demand, that's a shrewd economic move, but I don't think so).
SkiFire13 2y ago
> Too much stress? I bet if you paid people so much money that they could work for 10 years and then either retire to a lower paying job, or retire entirely, people would deal with it. I feel like this could be counterproductive. If people retire after 10 years instead of after 30 years, you now have to hire 3x the amount of people over time.
asdefghyk 2y ago
RE "...The first time a plane goes down carrying a dozen congress critters and ...." Is it realized it almost happened in the recent helicopter / aeroplane crash. As it was said the helicopter was used for moving VIPS ....
cranky908canuck 2y ago
> Everything you have listed above could be solved with money. Except that when money was on the table, Reagan fired them. ATC is remote from most people's day-to-day awareness unless planes hit each other, but medical help that's held back is really in-your-face. Granted, that's decades in the past. No way anyone would jump in and try to gut the public service like that today [1]. [1] sarky.

by tw04 2y ago

crmd 2y ago

I respectfully disagree - there's always money in the banana stand.

d0gsg0w00f 2y ago

> Do you know why people go through the pain of becoming a doctor? Because they make a lot of money when they get through the other side. I think the guaranteed respect and admiration that comes from the title is actually a more powerful draw. Don't get me wrong, the money is good, but on par with senior manager in any large tech firm. Doctor is a primal respect that technical roles do not carry. You're not getting instant respect from mother in laws and pastors as an ATC.

Tatar_grade 2y ago
there's something about the guaranteed aspect, whereas a senior manager is at the behest of office politics and the business cycle
FpUser 2y ago
>"Doctor is a primal respect that technical roles do not carry." Used to be. Not anymore. Nowadays many doctors act as a smartass business people.
- datavirtue 2y ago
  In my city it's an underpaid work-a-day job that half of them hate. There is something about being trapped that can make any job sick the life out of you. I remember a former CEO who would come into work each day and let out a heavy sigh before unlocking his office door. I learned that he was trapped in the job until he retired for various reasons...most of his own making.
  - somenameforme 2y ago
    It's the paperwork. Most people have no idea the amount of paperwork doctors have to fill out - it adds up to 20-30 hours of it per week. It's getting close to a full time job by itself. Think about how pleasant the experience is of filling out bureaucratic/government paperwork, and now imagine doing that as a full time job.
    - hattmall 2y ago
      What? This doesn't sound right at all. I've worked very closely with Doctors during the implementation of EHR systems and they don't spend nearly that much time on paperwork. They spend a couple minutes charting things for each patient. Then about 30 minutes at the end of the day going over anything that's been flagged by admin. Then about 1-3 hours every two weeks adjusting rejected claims. There's certainly a lot of paperwork that has to be done, but doctors aren't doing it.
      - somenameforme 2y ago
        Part of being a good doctor is good bedside manner. They're not going to bitch about it to a stranger, but it's a huge and well known problem that is almost certainly the single biggest cause for doctor burnout (which is extremely widespread). Some random source (though my experience comes from family) : "What they learned was that during office hours, half the time — a huge chunk — was allocated to desk work, like documentation in the electronic medical record (EMR), reviewing test results, handling medication requests, and filling out forms. What was remarkable was that even during office visits, doctors interacted with their patients for only half of the time; the rest was EMR and paperwork. As a matter of fact, for every hour of face-to-face patient time, another two hours were spent on desk work." [1] The paper mentions that was the amount of time spent for doctors with "documentation support" (various forms of automation/streamlining) that would generally be absent in something like a primary care physician's office, meaning he'll be spending substantially more time on paperwork. The paper also (at a quick skim) did not mention out-of-office work, where doctors often spend even more time filling out paperwork. And there are also regulations meaning doctors themselves have to be the ones filling out much of this paperwork. [1] - https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/physicians-paperwork-and-paying-attention-to-patients-2016103110558 https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/physicians-paperwork-and...
adamanonymous 2y ago
> You're not getting instant respect from mother in laws and pastors as an ATC You would if it was known to pay $500k/yr+
- nicoburns 2y ago
  Earning highly does not universally command respect the way being a doctor does. Some would even see earning that much as being immoral (i.e. actually negative)
  - portaouflop 2y ago
    Which very highly paid job does not command respect in society? I can’t think of any (Outside of anti-capitalist circles ofc)
    - nicoburns 2y ago
      > Which very highly paid job does not command respect in society? Banking? Sales? > Outside of anti-capitalist circles ofc Well that's quite the point. Maybe those circles are small in the US, but they aren't in most of the rest of the world. Let me just say that if I called my parents and told them that I had gotten a well-paid job at, say, a hedge fund, they would not be impressed and would likely think less of me for it.
      - somenameforme 2y ago
        One doesn't need to be anti-capitalist to dislike bankers, salespeople, or many other similar careers. They, in many cases at least, rely on information inequalities to deceive and rip off people. I love capitalism, but I loathe sketchy behavior done in the pursuit of money. They are two very different things.
        bobthepanda 2y ago
        Also, a nonzero amount of people remember events like the Great Recession that were caused by the hubris of bankers.

jerlam 2y ago

> Sounds like a doctor? Not disagreeing, but the US also has a doctor shortage for at least a decade that it is seemingly unable to fix.

jyounker 2y ago
The USA restricts the number of positions for medical schools and residencies. It's a problem that money could solve.
- nradov 2y ago
  There is no restriction on medical school admissions. It's really just residencies.
  - taeric 2y ago
    My understanding is that this is a distinction that doesn't make a difference? Without a residency, can you become a doctor?
    - nradov 2y ago
      That's mostly correct, but there are a few students who enroll in medical school with no intention of becoming practicing physicians. They want to go into some other career like research or technology or hospital administration.
    - OJFord 2y ago
      Yes, because you have to be (or be about to be and in time to start) a doctor in order to be apply for residency. Resident doctors are doctors, exactly as junior SWEs are software engineers. (UK doctors have for some reason long objected to 'junior' and recently become 'resident doctors' over exactly this. All the more confusing - throughout and still there's been 'Senior House Officers', because 'house' used to be what it was called, like US residency, doing house, there were junior and senior house officers, so why not just revert to that? Who knows, but now they're all resident doctors - and some of which are senior house officers - until they're registrars/consultants, and they're happier with that than junior doctors.)

janalsncm 2y ago

> Too much stress? Not just that, but having a shortage means each ATC does more work which is inherently stressful.

HPsquared 2y ago
This is the same problem doctors have, which pushes a lot of people away from the profession. It's a self-reinforcing problem.

natnat 2y ago

I don't honestly think that technology is meaningfully downstream of money. A startup or hobbyist can build something that costs Google several million dollars in a weekend. Most of these systems are complex, but not as complex as e.g. an operating system. But upgrading technology requires government administrative capacity. That's generally cheaper than outsourcing technology development to third parties, but does require a commitment to try to understand the thing you're managing. Politicians don't hire competent administrators because they believe that building a solution yourself and buying a solution from a contractor are basically equivalent, which anyone on this website can tell you is not true. This is an easier problem to solve than most think, but it's not trivial. And it's really hard when you have clowns like Elon Musk purposefully destroying institutional knowledge for no good reason.

watwut 2y ago
> A startup or hobbyist can build something that costs Google several million dollars in a weekend. They genuinely cant. They can make a sorta kinda prototype of something that costs Google several million dollars.
- natnat 2y ago
  You're right that a hobbyist couldn't build something like search or maps or docs in a weekend, but a lot of what Google ships is boring webapps. And I promise that they are really hard to ship: approvals are annoying and time-consuming, and the infrastructure is designed for scalability and performance, not flexibility or iteration speed. There's a joke inside Google that Google infra makes easy things hard and impossible things possible.

imoverclocked 2y ago

> Technology hasn't changed is a political problem due to lack of... money. Tell me you haven’t worked in aerospace without telling me you haven’t worked in aerospace. There is plenty of money sunk into all corners of the field but progress is slow because the risk of change is lives lost. At some point, the risk of not changing means more lives lost… and that’s when things will change.

portaouflop 2y ago
Maybe the technology part can’t be fixed easily with money but sounds to me like all the other aspects of the money argument are still valid.
- imoverclocked 2y ago
  Like “too much stress?” Money only does so much to improve your life. Stress is a way to shorten your life. Long term chronic stress literally makes you ill in ways that medicine can’t fix.
  - swores 2y ago
    Paying more money can make a huge difference to stress. Obviously it can't make an hour of doing the work less stressful in itself, but more money could do one or more of the following: - Allow people to retire after a decade rather than several decades of work - Allow (or require) people to only work part-time (eg 2 days a week, or 5 days of 2 hours a day, or...) while still earning a full time equivalent salary - Allow a work day to be 10mins on, 50mins resting for every hour (requiring 6x as many staff), while paying as if the full hour was work - Pay for therapy, stress-management lessons, etc. - Pay for a professional cleaner at home, a part-time chef or lots of restaurant/takeaway meals, or whatever else helps to minimise the amount of work you need to do outside the job - Probably other ideas that haven't come into my mind in the two minutes I've spent on the subject of how more money can help fight issues caused by stress
fn-mote 2y ago
> There is plenty of money sunk into all corners of the field but progress is slow … because of mismanagement, just like other large software rewrites that you are probably familiar with. It’s the same problem - updating a complex system - except there’s no other vendor you can switch to.

jltsiren 2y ago

Paying too much can be counterproductive, if the job is demanding, people don't find it inherently rewarding, and most people are not qualified for it. If you earn enough to retire after 10 years, you also earn enough to feel financially secure after 3 years, quit, and find a better job.

isodev 2y ago

> Only 10% of applicants are physically and mentally qualified? Another way would be investing in education (instead of dismantling it, or mixing it with religion and politics), making it more accessible so more people come out who are better equipped to take on "complex jobs"

least 2y ago
I generally agree with your sentiment for improving education, but I don't think the limiting factor for ATCs has to do with it, but with innate qualities in individuals. You can see the list of criteria here: https://www.faa.gov/air-traffic-controller-qualifications https://www.faa.gov/air-traffic-controller-qualifications
- ajuc 2y ago
  - Be a United States citizen - Be under the age of 31 Well, they restrict the pool pretty harshly right from the start.
- swores 2y ago
  I think most people underestimate the amount of "innate qualities" from patience to creativity etc. that actually are influenced by education, parenting, etc. rather than being defined at birth by genetics. Education isn't just about changing the quantity of knowledge people have learned - a country with good free education, along with other things like mental health support, good parenting resources/education/support, etc. will lead to more people having the qualities needed to be ATCs despite not having learned them by going to specific "managing stress 101" classes. (Edit: It's possible I misunderstood you and by innate qualities you literally just meant the things in their explicit requirements list like being under 31 and being a US citizen, if so apologies but I'll leave my comment here anyway.)
  - jvvw 2y ago
    A quick google suggests that only 35% of US adults have 20/20 vision (although I guess it might be higher if you restrict to the population of the age required) which is one of the requirements so that by itself limits the pool of applicants significantly regardless of education, parenting etc?

kshahkshah 2y ago

mid 100k salary... not worth it for that level of stress

8note 2y ago

i dont think offering more compensation solves the problem. the people you might want mignt 1. always have a better option elsewhere and if your raise the offer, competitors will offer something even higher instead, beyond the pittances the government is willing to spend 2. never be willing to take on the job as specified - huge responsibility and risk of killing people, with long hours and no recognition 3. never finds out that the pay is high - nobody talks about it, or sells its existence as an option. 4. doesnt have a parent in the business to teach them what to do raising the payment seems to fail a lot, even though its suggested naively all the time as the solution to all labour problems. alternatives might be to increase outreach, immigration, enslaved prison workers, stronger unions to make the job more like what people are willing to work, etc

sooheon 2y ago
Money talks. No amount of outreach makes a mispriced offer attractive.
Panzer04 2y ago
Of course it solves the problem. People will prevaricate and blow a ton of money in so many ways before they acknowledge the easiest fix. The extra expenses will also encourage actual fixes to the system like better automation or whatever to reduce costs.

callc 2y ago

> Offer more compensation. > Too much stress? I bet if you paid people so much money that they could work for 10 years and then either retire to a lower paying job, or retire entirely, people would deal with it. I highly doubt that solving the problem with just money will get the right people. A high salary becomes the goal in an of itself, and everything else falls to the wayside. Do you really care about safety? Applicants may say they do, but only want to retire after 10 years and will lie through their teeth. Money is a corrupting factor. I don’t like to take this side of the argument, since I want people to be paid fairly, but there’s something fundamental to seeing unpaid volunteers having the best intentions and most love for their craft

baq 2y ago
Corrupting or motivating? Thin line I’d say. The other side of the coin is you won’t get the candidates you want if they can get the same money for less taxing jobs. Game theory 101.

RobotToaster 2y ago

> Too much stress? I bet if you paid people so much money that they could work for 10 years and then either retire to a lower paying job, or retire entirely, people would deal with it. Or pay people enough they can afford to work part time. A stressful job is less stressful if you only have to work 2 days a week.

HPsquared 2y ago
This also applies to doctors and any stressful job really. Long hours compound the stress problems, making the job really unattractive.
zoky 2y ago
I suspect this would probably be counterproductive, for a couple reasons. First, you’d be encouraging people to take on a second job with all of their free time, which would lead to more overall stress. But I think you’d also see a reduction in efficiency and overall quality of work when you’re only “practicing” two days a week, especially after five days off. I mean, when I come in to work after a long weekend, I can hardly remember what the hell it is I even do!

trod1234 2y ago

> Everything you have listed could be solved with money. No that's actually not true. Government jobs are soul crushing. The way the bureaucracy works, its all about social standing, politics, and seniority. In these jobs you trade your sanity for money, and they have a long reputation for being just like this which is why few ever apply. No reasonably average intelligence person is going to do that unless they are absolutely desperate. Its a dead end job.

skirge 2y ago

with more money you will attract greedy people and greedy is contradictory with being responsible

robertlagrant 2y ago

> Want to attract more applicants? Offer more compensation. This was already addressed in the original post. Why write in this "spelling it out for you" style when they already addressed it? > Do you know why people go through the pain of becoming a doctor? Because they make a lot of money when they get through the other side. This is really reductive. There are multiple reasons: - very stable employment - very prestigious job, and has been for centuries. Conveys authority. Your family can boast that you're a doctor. - very interesting tales come out of employment, and your family probably - very easy to feel good about being a doctor - directly helping people etc Not all of those for everyone, and they no doubt don't all turn out to be the case, but doctors apply for multiple reasons, and many of them aren't in high-paying areas at all. Doctors (in America, which I assume is what you're focusing in on) are paid well partly because they have high expenses in terms of liability insurance.

watwut 2y ago
Doctors dont have interesting tales to tell, nor should have due to things being private by law. Stability of employment is something that traffic controllers could have, this is just a question of "working conditions" and solvable by money. I really do not see why traffic controller could not feel good about being traffic controller. They do more "life saving" jobs then any of us on hacker news.
- robertlagrant 2y ago
  > Doctors dont have interesting tales to tell, nor should have due to things being private by law. Identifiable tales are illegal, yes. That's not all tales. Surely you know a doctor and they've told you stories before? I'm listing other reasons doctors like being doctors over just money. I don't know what the rest of your comment has to do with this.
- Shinolove 2y ago
  Jokes on you I am working on ATC software solutions (safety modules exactly aiming to predict and warn about this kind of events)

mihaaly 2y ago

You must be an economist. :D - Can you swim now? - No. - What if I give you money?

DannyBee 2y ago

There are plenty of jobs that you can't pay people enough money to want to do. The notion that if you just pay enough, people who are otherwise qualified will do anything, is amazingly reductive. It's a super US-centric view, and not surprisingly, it does not have an amazing history of working out (especially compared to other mechanisms). Given the people in question have good other options, why would they do this, even if you paid more? In fact - plenty of smart people will take pay cuts for better qualify of life. Example: Plenty of folks take pay cuts to work remotely from places they like more, and because they find it a better quality of life. Not everyone is money driven, and the assumption that here is that the intersection of "money driven, capable of doing this job, etc" is large enough that increasing the amount of money will make the result larger. It's totally non-obvious this is true.

pif 2y ago
> Plenty of folks take pay cuts to work remotely Pay cuts are not important; profit is! If I get paid 100 less, and spend 90 less because of no commuting, I'm gaining more than before.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- bill_joy_fanboy 2y ago
  This is completely true. I make less working remotely in a LCOL area than I would in the HCOL area where my office resides. The differential in COL, though, is so high that I'm saving a lot more. In other words, I'm making less but I'm building more wealth. Most of the money that goes into living in a HCOL area and commuting to office is just pure waste to satisfy the egos of upper managers who want to preside over a big floor of workers.
  - sesky 2y ago
    That seem like a reductive take on why people live in HCOL areas. Those areas cost a lot because most people believe the quality of life is better, which raises the cost of living due to competition for real estate. If every part of the US became equally expensive and convenient for work, VHCOL areas like the Bay Area would still be immediately oversubscribed for reasons unrelated to work. The Bay Area has arguably the best climate (cool Mediterranean) of any major city, unique proximity to a diverse set of outdoor recreation (Big Sur, Napa, Yosemite, Tahoe just to name a few), and all the desirable amenities of a major metro area. That’s not to say you can’t have a perfectly happy life in other areas if you have different preferences, but the cost of living is ultimately a market, driven by the aggregate preferences of all people.

joakleaf 2y ago

Sorry. But people in general do not choose to study medicine because they can make a lot of money after the study. I have had some experience with family, girl friends, friends and med-students. And it was definitely not the primary reason any one of them chose that path. I don’t think money is a strong enough single motivator for med-school or any other long term hard study/job.

michielderhaeg 2y ago

> Too much stress? I bet if you paid people so much money that they could work for 10 years and then either retire to a lower paying job, or retire entirely, people would deal with it. Don't underestimate just how high-stress these jobs are and what it does to you. People quit these kinds of jobs for 2 reasons 1) They can't deal with the stress mentally, or don't want to. 2) They were not smart enough to choose option 1 and their body just physically gives up and they are no longer capable of performing their job as an ATC. I know someone who is now legally handicapped because her lungs don't function properly anymore due to the stress and was forced to retire early.

egberts1 2y ago

Sure, let's have FAA reject qualified ATC applicants because they answered "science" as their worst subject in high school and/or "history" in college. (The core crux of Brigida vs FAA 2015 lawsuit) Or the passive visual skin color test (Brigida vs Buttigieg 2021 lawsuit). That'll be about 4,120 qualified ATC applicants that won't be coming back: would you come back if a sizable class-action award is forthcoming? If that was the plan (to lock up and away FAA ATCs, to inflate supply-demand, that's a shrewd economic move, but I don't think so).

SkiFire13 2y ago

> Too much stress? I bet if you paid people so much money that they could work for 10 years and then either retire to a lower paying job, or retire entirely, people would deal with it. I feel like this could be counterproductive. If people retire after 10 years instead of after 30 years, you now have to hire 3x the amount of people over time.

asdefghyk 2y ago

RE "...The first time a plane goes down carrying a dozen congress critters and ...." Is it realized it almost happened in the recent helicopter / aeroplane crash. As it was said the helicopter was used for moving VIPS ....

cranky908canuck 2y ago

> Everything you have listed above could be solved with money. Except that when money was on the table, Reagan fired them. ATC is remote from most people's day-to-day awareness unless planes hit each other, but medical help that's held back is really in-your-face. Granted, that's decades in the past. No way anyone would jump in and try to gut the public service like that today [1]. [1] sarky.