3 ms·

"the only place where traditional economic intuitions still apply" Which economy? In the US, healthcare, public schools in some states, and B2B sales come to m

"the only place where traditional economic intuitions still apply" Which economy? In the US, healthcare, public schools in some states, and B2B sales come to mind as decent jobs. But I agree with the general sentiment - there do not seem to be great choices that support a nice life. Quite a few of my friend have to work multiple jobs or double shifts to make it work.

Retric 2y ago
Most healthcare jobs don’t pay particularly well. The inefficiency is going to pay the salaries of medical transcriptionists, people handling billing inside insurance and in healthcare facilities etc. Things that aren’t improving outcomes are ultimately why healthcare is expensive in the US. Just for comparison the minimum wage nationwide in Feb 1, 1968 was 1.60$/hour that’s ~14.61$/hour when adjusted for inflation. Median household income in 1968 was 8,600$ or ~$78,504.90 inflation adjusted and that was mostly single income. https://www.census.gov/library/publications/1969/demo/p60-66.html https://www.census.gov/library/publications/1969/demo/p60-66... https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/ https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/
- giantg2 2y ago
  I wasn't really talking about the billing, but more about doctors, nurses, medical manufacturing, etc.
  - Retric 2y ago
    That’s the higher end of medicine, orderlies are making 16$/h. People on ambulances are often making 17$/h. Some nurses make ok money, but starting salary for a school nurse is 20$/h and median school nurse is making 30$/h... Granted I understand what you mean, but it’s kind of like saying managers make good money while ignoring all the shift managers at fast food joints.
    - numba888 2y ago
      Can we summarize it that 'easy' or 'low skilled' jobs aren't payed better today comparing with the past? Not surprising taking into account demand and population. More worrying is that high-skilled jobs aren't rewording. As for equality.. welcome to USSR, you see how it ended. Now only a few Arabs states have greater inequality.
      - Retric 2y ago
        I wouldn’t call working an ambulance as easy by any metric. As to inequality, we’ve made this much worse intentionally via things like a tax code that massively favors high income earners. It’s not even that this tradeoff has increased GDP growth or anything the country was growing faster with higher tax rates on corporations and dividends. Even just theoretically it’s suboptimal because jobs catering to or trying to extract money from high income people don’t lend themselves to automation. Long term everyone rich or poor has been worse off.
      - vasco 2y ago
        Why wouldn't the required skill level increase though? I think it's expected that as a society specializes it becomes more and more difficult to get ahead if you're producing goods or services at the lowest level of specialization. With education getting better and technology improving, it's impossible to make rote jobs be economically feasible for anything other than robots.
      - loglog 2y ago
        You have no clue about the collapse of the USSR. Its economy was crippled by monopolies and absurd subsidies, not by equality.
        numba888 2y ago
        > You have no clue about the collapse of the USSR. I lived through it. We can talk a lot about, but the fact is equality doesn't work. Maximum it gets to is everyone equally poor. And as a result of it there are no startups. You need middle class for this and motivation. Government controlled and own monopolies is also the result of equality. Nobody else has the resources. So commies had to create the economy, few bigger things are easier to manage. Managers aren't interested in risk taking, it's not worth it. Finally everything stalled and fell far behind the rest of the world. There were bright spots, but that's it. Like North Korea today can build missiles and not much else. Just look around. Probably only Cuba and North Korea are still in true socialism. In both there is a small super-rich class and the rest is, yes, equally poor. Super-rich are pretending to be poor too and invent theories to keep the rest under control. BTW, I'm not sure Cuba still has strong ideology today.

Retric 2y ago

Most healthcare jobs don’t pay particularly well. The inefficiency is going to pay the salaries of medical transcriptionists, people handling billing inside insurance and in healthcare facilities etc. Things that aren’t improving outcomes are ultimately why healthcare is expensive in the US. Just for comparison the minimum wage nationwide in Feb 1, 1968 was 1.60$/hour that’s ~14.61$/hour when adjusted for inflation. Median household income in 1968 was 8,600$ or ~$78,504.90 inflation adjusted and that was mostly single income. https://www.census.gov/library/publications/1969/demo/p60-66.html https://www.census.gov/library/publications/1969/demo/p60-66... https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/ https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

giantg2 2y ago
I wasn't really talking about the billing, but more about doctors, nurses, medical manufacturing, etc.
- Retric 2y ago
  That’s the higher end of medicine, orderlies are making 16$/h. People on ambulances are often making 17$/h. Some nurses make ok money, but starting salary for a school nurse is 20$/h and median school nurse is making 30$/h... Granted I understand what you mean, but it’s kind of like saying managers make good money while ignoring all the shift managers at fast food joints.
  - numba888 2y ago
    Can we summarize it that 'easy' or 'low skilled' jobs aren't payed better today comparing with the past? Not surprising taking into account demand and population. More worrying is that high-skilled jobs aren't rewording. As for equality.. welcome to USSR, you see how it ended. Now only a few Arabs states have greater inequality.
    - Retric 2y ago
      I wouldn’t call working an ambulance as easy by any metric. As to inequality, we’ve made this much worse intentionally via things like a tax code that massively favors high income earners. It’s not even that this tradeoff has increased GDP growth or anything the country was growing faster with higher tax rates on corporations and dividends. Even just theoretically it’s suboptimal because jobs catering to or trying to extract money from high income people don’t lend themselves to automation. Long term everyone rich or poor has been worse off.
    - vasco 2y ago
      Why wouldn't the required skill level increase though? I think it's expected that as a society specializes it becomes more and more difficult to get ahead if you're producing goods or services at the lowest level of specialization. With education getting better and technology improving, it's impossible to make rote jobs be economically feasible for anything other than robots.
    - loglog 2y ago
      You have no clue about the collapse of the USSR. Its economy was crippled by monopolies and absurd subsidies, not by equality.
      - numba888 2y ago
        > You have no clue about the collapse of the USSR. I lived through it. We can talk a lot about, but the fact is equality doesn't work. Maximum it gets to is everyone equally poor. And as a result of it there are no startups. You need middle class for this and motivation. Government controlled and own monopolies is also the result of equality. Nobody else has the resources. So commies had to create the economy, few bigger things are easier to manage. Managers aren't interested in risk taking, it's not worth it. Finally everything stalled and fell far behind the rest of the world. There were bright spots, but that's it. Like North Korea today can build missiles and not much else. Just look around. Probably only Cuba and North Korea are still in true socialism. In both there is a small super-rich class and the rest is, yes, equally poor. Super-rich are pretending to be poor too and invent theories to keep the rest under control. BTW, I'm not sure Cuba still has strong ideology today.