7 ms·

> But corporate America has become so parsimonious about paying workers outside the executive suite that meaningful wage increases may seem an unacceptable affr

by polarix 12y ago

> But corporate America has become so parsimonious about paying workers outside the executive suite that meaningful wage increases may seem an unacceptable affront. In this environment, it may be easier to say “There is a shortage of skilled workers” than “We aren’t paying our workers enough,” even if, in economic terms, those come down to the same thing.

rayiner 12y ago
The "worker shortage" concept is seriously one of the dumbest memes of corporate America. There's a ton of people out of work, and it doesn't take much in the way of skill to be a truck driver. Companies simply aren't paying enough for what can be a very demanding job.
- fiatmoney 12y ago
  "it doesn't take much in the way of skill to be a truck driver" It's harder than you'd think to do a perfect 90 degree backup of a full-size semi into a loading dock without jackknifing, or to develop the temperament to pay attention to a boring stretch of highway for 8 hours at a time. You're being trusted with a lot of valuable equipment and cargo, to say nothing of the insurance risk should you flatten someone's Mercedes.
  - purringmeow 12y ago
    And that's why truck driving is the perfect job to automate.
    - TeMPOraL 12y ago
      All driving is, for more-less the same reasons.
      - eru 12y ago
        Apart from driving for fun.
        TeMPOraL 12y ago
        Not on public roads, please.
        lotsofmangos 12y ago
        Driving for fun doesn't have to mean racing or otherwise driving dangerously. I know loads of people who will go out for a drive as recreation.
  - makomk 12y ago
    Also, the working conditions in the industry are apparently not great - lots of management incompetence, unrealistic expectations, and pressure to break safety laws, and it's never the people pressuring the drivers into breaking the rules that get into trouble.
    - twothamendment 12y ago
      Yes, like incompetent management who tells a driver in freezing temperatures that they will not reimburse him for fuel additive to keep the truck from gelling up. Management was in Florida. The truck was in Montana. Eventually a call to a mechanic with a clue got the expense approved. If there is a way for management to push a driver to cook the log book, they will. The best thing for drivers is the electronic log book that can't lie.
      - sokoloff 12y ago
        > The best thing for drivers is the electronic log book that can't lie. Not while they're getting paid by the mile... They aren't called comic books for nothing.
  - thrownaway2424 12y ago
    That doesn't sound "harder than you'd think", it sounds about as hard as you'd think. I'm sure that particular maneuver could be taught to the most apt students over a weekend, and as the article points out anyone can learn this skill in 6 weeks. If the people they get in trucker school have a hard time learning these things, that's just another indicator that they need to put more money on the table to attract better students.
    - the_ancient 12y ago
      No the article says they can get the required government CDL in 6 weeks, Passing a CDL test is not much harder than a Reg Test, and many states have had people convicted of working with the schools in a Cash for Licence scams, the larges was in IL a few years back where a good % of all CDL's issued by the state of IL were simply paid for. It take a hell of alot longer to become a proficient trucker. Long time truckers have nothing but disdain for these 6 week course drivers that are on the road. I know when my father (who is a trucker) first become a driver I believe it was a 6mo or year long course with longer period as a "driver in training" with the company he was placed in, we was part of a driver team pair with an experienced driver. This was after being a driver for the US Army for 6 years driving a Deuce and half. Today a Driver take a 6 weeks intro course and then it entrusted with 80,000 pounds going 65mph.... with no additional training.
      - smm2000 12y ago
        The fact that insurance companies are fine with entrusting 80000 pounds truck to somebody who got CDL after six weeks tells me that it's adequate training and accident rate of new drivers is not much higher than accident rate of experienced drivers.
        the_ancient 12y ago
        lol suurrrreeeeeee What that should really tell you is Trucking companies is that paying a 6 week driver peanuts + the extra insurance is still less than paying an experienced driver an acceptable wage. With the Raise of "No Fault" States many trucking companies are also Self Insuring, since they only ever have to pay for the damages of their own equipment, which if it does not effect the operation of the the truck they will not fix anyway. But sure continue believing that a 6 week driver is just as good as a 15+ year driver
  - JoeAltmaier 12y ago
    Standard truck-driver meme: how can you tell a teamster from and owner-operator? The operator can back it up. Why? Because in a corporate yard (where all teamsters terminate) its somebody else's job to drive it in the yard.
- ewams 12y ago
  They pay $1.10 per mile in my area plus gas.
  - the_ancient 12y ago
    That sounds like Owner Operator wages to me, which mean the $1.10 per mile must pay for the Payment on the Truck (which costs anywhere from 50K to 100K+), Maintenance on the Truck, Normal Business expenses as a Owner Operator is a small business, Government Fees, Road Expenses, Health Insurance, Self Employment Taxes, and the list goes on and on.
winestock 12y ago
As far as I know, that equivalence betwixt "shortage of workers" and "not paying workers enough" holds for economists as far apart as Milton Friedman and John Maynard Keynes. That makes management's policy especially inexcusable.
- Havvy 12y ago
  Even as far apart as Mises and Keynes.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
- icelancer 12y ago
  Right. It's not an economics problem, even! Just math!
- afafsd 12y ago
  Well, there can't be all that big a shortage anyway. Last time I went to the US I found that supermarkets were stocked with food, gas stations with fuel, and lumber yards with lumber, so it seems that stuff is still getting from where it is to where it needs to be quite effectively.
scarmig 12y ago
They are slightly different, though I agree that most of the time it's a matter of greedy or shortsighted executives being cheap or expecting workers to bear the cost of training. How they're different: you may well have a situation where the short term supply of workers is highly inelastic. In that situation, paying more won't help any shortage. And some jobs that you would think are elastic in the long term aren't as much as you might think: the majority of people may simply be unable to perform the job, or uncertainties about the job's existence in four years might mean the expected return of training is very low or negative. If people are not sanguine about the existence of trucking jobs 10 years from now, it's no surprise that the actual supply of labor is very low and not looking to expand soon. If you're an employer, you're probably best off using your monopsonist position to drive down wages of the current supply instead of paying handsome sums to coax people into taking big risks in preparing and dedicating themselves to your jobs. Especially if you're an executive rewarded on the timescales of a year or two, and not on timescales of a decade.
- thrownaway2424 12y ago
  For any individual trucking firm in a liquid market served by several such firms, the driver market is in fact highly elastic. If this Swift Transportation company which is featured in the article wanted to avoid a 20% decline in their share price, they merely had to walk into the break room at the competing trucking company and offer $10,000 spot bonuses to switch companies. Boom. Elastic. Anyway, Swift's annual report says that driver wages as a fraction of revenue have fallen in each of the last two years, so it's their own fault if they came up short on drivers.
  - scarmig 12y ago
    According to the article, the shortage is industry wide. The result of what you suggest would be a bidding war for the existing truckers, until the point the bidding has devoured all economic profit. We don't see that happening, clearly. My hypothesis of implicit or explicit collusion among the dwindling number of trucking firms to drive down wages instead of drawing on supposedly elastic supply manages to explain that, on the other hand. The only other possibility would be an industry wide miscalculation that just happens to look the same as widespread collusion.
x0x0 12y ago
And it's not like trucking is a good job. For that princely (!!!) $41k / year, you are often away from home. I'd bet you don't get comped for all the meals you eat on the road either, so there goes a bunch of money spent eating out, even if it is just at truck stop diners. If you have a family, and and your partner has a job -- as he or she must, given that shit salary -- knock $4-$10k/year off for daycare as well. I mean, I'm just stunned people aren't begging for these jobs. Not to mention that from some reading, and I unfortunately forgot the link, it appears that truckers have to choose between keeping their jobs or obeying safety regulations. But never you worry, if they get caught violating sleep requirements only they get in trouble, not the companies. It's funny; this story is a perfect analogy [1] for [2] something [3] but [4] I [5] just [6] can't [7] think [8] of [9] what [10]. Meanwhile, true story: a former employer not only completely lied to me about what I'd be doing, but then threw a fit when I quit two months in. And sent potential engineering recruits a python puzzle with a naked woman in it. It's a shock why employers have trouble hiring is all I'm saying... [1] http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB113210508287498432 http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB113210508287498432 [2] http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/04/11/1201127/-Facebook-CEO-Wants-More-H-1B-Visas http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/04/11/1201127/-Facebook-C... [3] http://www.forbes.com/sites/ayoomojola/2013/07/15/the-shortage-of-developer-talent-is-crushing-mobile/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/ayoomojola/2013/07/15/the-shorta... [4] http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/11/technology/zuckerberg-tech-pac/index.html http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/11/technology/zuckerberg-tech-p... [5] http://www.crn.com/news/channel-programs/240163468/nice-work-if-you-can-get-it-the-it-talent-shortage-is-more-serious-than-you-think.htm http://www.crn.com/news/channel-programs/240163468/nice-work... [6] http://www.infoworld.com/t/h-1b/silicon-valley-leaders-unite-fwdus-in-push-more-h-1b-visas-216359 http://www.infoworld.com/t/h-1b/silicon-valley-leaders-unite... [7] http://thehill.com/policy/technology/258985-microsoft-lack-of-tech-workers-approaching-genuine-crisis http://thehill.com/policy/technology/258985-microsoft-lack-o... [8] http://www.sfgate.com/business/networth/article/Real-estate-taxes-soar-along-with-home-prices-5673040.php http://www.sfgate.com/business/networth/article/Real-estate-... [9] http://sf.curbed.com/archives/2014/08/07/gasp_sfs_housing_market_is_not_that_overvalued_after_all.php http://sf.curbed.com/archives/2014/08/07/gasp_sfs_housing_ma... [10] http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/blog/real-estate/2014/06/bay-area-home-prices-san-francisco-case-shiller.html?page=all http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/blog/real-estate/201...
crassus2 12y ago
If a business owner raises wages, he solves his labor problem but spends more money and reduces profit. If instead he complains about a labor shortage, then maybe politicians will pass a law allowing more immigration and he will be able to lower his wages and increase his profit. It's beneficial for business owners for there to be a general belief in a labor shortage but it is not beneficial for people to believe they are stingy.
- eru 12y ago
  We wouldn't have this conversation, if immigration was sane in the first place. Ie let anyone in. It's such a waste of human labour.
  - zo1 12y ago
    Would never happen. People in certain countries get way too many free things and benefits, and are used to much higher standards of living. They'd be up in arms every time they saw an "immigrant" using it, or if an immigrant reduces the value of labor. It's really unfortunate because the only reason most people are against immigration, deep down, is that they fear they will be usurped by cheap labor. And that is only a problem because we haven't allowed free-trade and free-flow of migrants around the world from the start. Instead, we built up barriers, and we've created dams. Of course people are now going to complain when the flood gates open and a valley gets washed out. It has to get worse, before it gets better.
    - crdoconnor 12y ago
      >It's really unfortunate because the only reason most people are against immigration, deep down, is that they fear they will be usurped by cheap labor. There's many good reasons to be against immigration apart from that: 1) It lets companies play third world workers off against first world workers. We know that they tell the first world workers to shape up (i.e. work overtime; accept abuse & wage theft) or have their job shipped to China, but they actually do the same to the 3rd world workers too with the threat of insourcing. After all, there are MANY times when it's a trade-off between more expensive but higher productivity 1st world workers and lower productivity, lower paid 3rd world workers. BOTH wages are driven down (often to unbearable levels) by tearing down trade barriers, because they can simply pick the workforce that is more desperate. 2) 3rd world countries often spend outrageous amounts of money to educate their workforce, only to have the cream of the cream high tail it to a high income country which gets all of the benefits of that education. This is a direct subsidy from poorer countries to richer countries that goes largely unacknowledged.

by polarix 12y ago

rayiner 12y ago

The "worker shortage" concept is seriously one of the dumbest memes of corporate America. There's a ton of people out of work, and it doesn't take much in the way of skill to be a truck driver. Companies simply aren't paying enough for what can be a very demanding job.

fiatmoney 12y ago
"it doesn't take much in the way of skill to be a truck driver" It's harder than you'd think to do a perfect 90 degree backup of a full-size semi into a loading dock without jackknifing, or to develop the temperament to pay attention to a boring stretch of highway for 8 hours at a time. You're being trusted with a lot of valuable equipment and cargo, to say nothing of the insurance risk should you flatten someone's Mercedes.
- purringmeow 12y ago
  And that's why truck driving is the perfect job to automate.
  - TeMPOraL 12y ago
    All driving is, for more-less the same reasons.
    - eru 12y ago
      Apart from driving for fun.
      - TeMPOraL 12y ago
        Not on public roads, please.
        lotsofmangos 12y ago
        Driving for fun doesn't have to mean racing or otherwise driving dangerously. I know loads of people who will go out for a drive as recreation.
- makomk 12y ago
  Also, the working conditions in the industry are apparently not great - lots of management incompetence, unrealistic expectations, and pressure to break safety laws, and it's never the people pressuring the drivers into breaking the rules that get into trouble.
  - twothamendment 12y ago
    Yes, like incompetent management who tells a driver in freezing temperatures that they will not reimburse him for fuel additive to keep the truck from gelling up. Management was in Florida. The truck was in Montana. Eventually a call to a mechanic with a clue got the expense approved. If there is a way for management to push a driver to cook the log book, they will. The best thing for drivers is the electronic log book that can't lie.
    - sokoloff 12y ago
      > The best thing for drivers is the electronic log book that can't lie. Not while they're getting paid by the mile... They aren't called comic books for nothing.
- thrownaway2424 12y ago
  That doesn't sound "harder than you'd think", it sounds about as hard as you'd think. I'm sure that particular maneuver could be taught to the most apt students over a weekend, and as the article points out anyone can learn this skill in 6 weeks. If the people they get in trucker school have a hard time learning these things, that's just another indicator that they need to put more money on the table to attract better students.
  - the_ancient 12y ago
    No the article says they can get the required government CDL in 6 weeks, Passing a CDL test is not much harder than a Reg Test, and many states have had people convicted of working with the schools in a Cash for Licence scams, the larges was in IL a few years back where a good % of all CDL's issued by the state of IL were simply paid for. It take a hell of alot longer to become a proficient trucker. Long time truckers have nothing but disdain for these 6 week course drivers that are on the road. I know when my father (who is a trucker) first become a driver I believe it was a 6mo or year long course with longer period as a "driver in training" with the company he was placed in, we was part of a driver team pair with an experienced driver. This was after being a driver for the US Army for 6 years driving a Deuce and half. Today a Driver take a 6 weeks intro course and then it entrusted with 80,000 pounds going 65mph.... with no additional training.
    - smm2000 12y ago
      The fact that insurance companies are fine with entrusting 80000 pounds truck to somebody who got CDL after six weeks tells me that it's adequate training and accident rate of new drivers is not much higher than accident rate of experienced drivers.
      - the_ancient 12y ago
        lol suurrrreeeeeee What that should really tell you is Trucking companies is that paying a 6 week driver peanuts + the extra insurance is still less than paying an experienced driver an acceptable wage. With the Raise of "No Fault" States many trucking companies are also Self Insuring, since they only ever have to pay for the damages of their own equipment, which if it does not effect the operation of the the truck they will not fix anyway. But sure continue believing that a 6 week driver is just as good as a 15+ year driver
- JoeAltmaier 12y ago
  Standard truck-driver meme: how can you tell a teamster from and owner-operator? The operator can back it up. Why? Because in a corporate yard (where all teamsters terminate) its somebody else's job to drive it in the yard.
ewams 12y ago
They pay $1.10 per mile in my area plus gas.
- the_ancient 12y ago
  That sounds like Owner Operator wages to me, which mean the $1.10 per mile must pay for the Payment on the Truck (which costs anywhere from 50K to 100K+), Maintenance on the Truck, Normal Business expenses as a Owner Operator is a small business, Government Fees, Road Expenses, Health Insurance, Self Employment Taxes, and the list goes on and on.

winestock 12y ago

As far as I know, that equivalence betwixt "shortage of workers" and "not paying workers enough" holds for economists as far apart as Milton Friedman and John Maynard Keynes. That makes management's policy especially inexcusable.

Havvy 12y ago
Even as far apart as Mises and Keynes.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
icelancer 12y ago
Right. It's not an economics problem, even! Just math!
afafsd 12y ago
Well, there can't be all that big a shortage anyway. Last time I went to the US I found that supermarkets were stocked with food, gas stations with fuel, and lumber yards with lumber, so it seems that stuff is still getting from where it is to where it needs to be quite effectively.

scarmig 12y ago

They are slightly different, though I agree that most of the time it's a matter of greedy or shortsighted executives being cheap or expecting workers to bear the cost of training. How they're different: you may well have a situation where the short term supply of workers is highly inelastic. In that situation, paying more won't help any shortage. And some jobs that you would think are elastic in the long term aren't as much as you might think: the majority of people may simply be unable to perform the job, or uncertainties about the job's existence in four years might mean the expected return of training is very low or negative. If people are not sanguine about the existence of trucking jobs 10 years from now, it's no surprise that the actual supply of labor is very low and not looking to expand soon. If you're an employer, you're probably best off using your monopsonist position to drive down wages of the current supply instead of paying handsome sums to coax people into taking big risks in preparing and dedicating themselves to your jobs. Especially if you're an executive rewarded on the timescales of a year or two, and not on timescales of a decade.

thrownaway2424 12y ago
For any individual trucking firm in a liquid market served by several such firms, the driver market is in fact highly elastic. If this Swift Transportation company which is featured in the article wanted to avoid a 20% decline in their share price, they merely had to walk into the break room at the competing trucking company and offer $10,000 spot bonuses to switch companies. Boom. Elastic. Anyway, Swift's annual report says that driver wages as a fraction of revenue have fallen in each of the last two years, so it's their own fault if they came up short on drivers.
- scarmig 12y ago
  According to the article, the shortage is industry wide. The result of what you suggest would be a bidding war for the existing truckers, until the point the bidding has devoured all economic profit. We don't see that happening, clearly. My hypothesis of implicit or explicit collusion among the dwindling number of trucking firms to drive down wages instead of drawing on supposedly elastic supply manages to explain that, on the other hand. The only other possibility would be an industry wide miscalculation that just happens to look the same as widespread collusion.

x0x0 12y ago

And it's not like trucking is a good job. For that princely (!!!) $41k / year, you are often away from home. I'd bet you don't get comped for all the meals you eat on the road either, so there goes a bunch of money spent eating out, even if it is just at truck stop diners. If you have a family, and and your partner has a job -- as he or she must, given that shit salary -- knock $4-$10k/year off for daycare as well. I mean, I'm just stunned people aren't begging for these jobs. Not to mention that from some reading, and I unfortunately forgot the link, it appears that truckers have to choose between keeping their jobs or obeying safety regulations. But never you worry, if they get caught violating sleep requirements only they get in trouble, not the companies. It's funny; this story is a perfect analogy [1] for [2] something [3] but [4] I [5] just [6] can't [7] think [8] of [9] what [10]. Meanwhile, true story: a former employer not only completely lied to me about what I'd be doing, but then threw a fit when I quit two months in. And sent potential engineering recruits a python puzzle with a naked woman in it. It's a shock why employers have trouble hiring is all I'm saying... [1] http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB113210508287498432 http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB113210508287498432 [2] http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/04/11/1201127/-Facebook-CEO-Wants-More-H-1B-Visas http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/04/11/1201127/-Facebook-C... [3] http://www.forbes.com/sites/ayoomojola/2013/07/15/the-shortage-of-developer-talent-is-crushing-mobile/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/ayoomojola/2013/07/15/the-shorta... [4] http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/11/technology/zuckerberg-tech-pac/index.html http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/11/technology/zuckerberg-tech-p... [5] http://www.crn.com/news/channel-programs/240163468/nice-work-if-you-can-get-it-the-it-talent-shortage-is-more-serious-than-you-think.htm http://www.crn.com/news/channel-programs/240163468/nice-work... [6] http://www.infoworld.com/t/h-1b/silicon-valley-leaders-unite-fwdus-in-push-more-h-1b-visas-216359 http://www.infoworld.com/t/h-1b/silicon-valley-leaders-unite... [7] http://thehill.com/policy/technology/258985-microsoft-lack-of-tech-workers-approaching-genuine-crisis http://thehill.com/policy/technology/258985-microsoft-lack-o... [8] http://www.sfgate.com/business/networth/article/Real-estate-taxes-soar-along-with-home-prices-5673040.php http://www.sfgate.com/business/networth/article/Real-estate-... [9] http://sf.curbed.com/archives/2014/08/07/gasp_sfs_housing_market_is_not_that_overvalued_after_all.php http://sf.curbed.com/archives/2014/08/07/gasp_sfs_housing_ma... [10] http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/blog/real-estate/2014/06/bay-area-home-prices-san-francisco-case-shiller.html?page=all http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/blog/real-estate/201...

crassus2 12y ago

If a business owner raises wages, he solves his labor problem but spends more money and reduces profit. If instead he complains about a labor shortage, then maybe politicians will pass a law allowing more immigration and he will be able to lower his wages and increase his profit. It's beneficial for business owners for there to be a general belief in a labor shortage but it is not beneficial for people to believe they are stingy.

eru 12y ago
We wouldn't have this conversation, if immigration was sane in the first place. Ie let anyone in. It's such a waste of human labour.
- zo1 12y ago
  Would never happen. People in certain countries get way too many free things and benefits, and are used to much higher standards of living. They'd be up in arms every time they saw an "immigrant" using it, or if an immigrant reduces the value of labor. It's really unfortunate because the only reason most people are against immigration, deep down, is that they fear they will be usurped by cheap labor. And that is only a problem because we haven't allowed free-trade and free-flow of migrants around the world from the start. Instead, we built up barriers, and we've created dams. Of course people are now going to complain when the flood gates open and a valley gets washed out. It has to get worse, before it gets better.
  - crdoconnor 12y ago
    >It's really unfortunate because the only reason most people are against immigration, deep down, is that they fear they will be usurped by cheap labor. There's many good reasons to be against immigration apart from that: 1) It lets companies play third world workers off against first world workers. We know that they tell the first world workers to shape up (i.e. work overtime; accept abuse & wage theft) or have their job shipped to China, but they actually do the same to the 3rd world workers too with the threat of insourcing. After all, there are MANY times when it's a trade-off between more expensive but higher productivity 1st world workers and lower productivity, lower paid 3rd world workers. BOTH wages are driven down (often to unbearable levels) by tearing down trade barriers, because they can simply pick the workforce that is more desperate. 2) 3rd world countries often spend outrageous amounts of money to educate their workforce, only to have the cream of the cream high tail it to a high income country which gets all of the benefits of that education. This is a direct subsidy from poorer countries to richer countries that goes largely unacknowledged.