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Plenty of jobs, lazy Americans just don't want them
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Fox's John Stossel.
Some people look at our 8.1 percent unemployment rate and say, there aren't enough jobs out there. But others say there are plenty, Americans just aren't willing to do them. One of those people is John Stossel, host of "Stossel" on the Fox Business Network.
Stossel did a Fox News special called "Out of Work," where he argues that there are plenty of jobs in the United States, Americans aren't willing to take them. He points the blame on a more-than-generous government safety net.
"We've taught people that in some cases it's easier to be dependent, and you're a sucker if you pound the pavement and work at one of those tough minimum wage jobs," he told host Jeremy Hobson.
Listen to the interview above to hear from Stossel about why he thinks both the "help wanted index" and the unemployment numbers are higher than ever now.
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Re: Marketplace segment in which John Stossel implied a moral failure on the part of unemployed New Yorkers who refused to take minimum wage jobs (in a city with one of the highest cost of living in the world!) He further laid blame at the feet of our society for making it possible for people to make this choice!
http://www.kiplinger.com/slideshow/cities-with-most-expensive-cost-of-li... retrieved 8/1/02 (most expensive in US);
http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/top-50-highest-cost-of-living-cities-in-the... retrieved 8/1/02 (15th in world)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/27/cities-high-cost-of-living_n_12... retrieved 8/1/12 most expensive in US)
Why should the unemployed cooperate with an economic system that denies them any meaningful choices (and thereby deprives them of the free-marketer’s beloved “freedom”?) They are citizens, not grist for an uncaring economic mill.
Their refusal to settle for poverty and powerlessness is a right of citizenship. They are entitled to exercise their franchise every day, not just on Election Day.
If they choose to pursue a course counter to that desired by the power structure that would prefer an underclass of supplicants, and to reinforce the political implications of their choice by imposing an economic cost on the society that denies them real opportunity, they are entitled to do so. It is a version of “voting with their feet”.
It is similar to civil disobedience, but more subtle. No laws are broken, only expectations – expectations exploited by interests promoting the status quo. This is realpolitik. Citizens are entitled to say, “This sucks. Change it.”
Carrying FOX News’ Stossell’s moralisms without an opposing view is a disservice to your listeners who deserve the full story.
Hats off to those New Yorkers who refuse to work at exhausting dead end jobs that provide them nothing but the bare minimum needed for survival and leave them with nothing to show for their work but paychecks that don’t begin to cover the bills. No advancement, no benefits, no savings, no new skills – just a future of more of the same – settling for scratching for survival.
Cui Bono? Whom does this scenario benefit? Employers – plain and simple. NPR’s listeners include the other side of that particular equation. Speak for them too.
David J. Cullen
941-323-2404
cullenasea@aol.com
It was great to hear someone finally say what needed to be said, even if it isn't exactly P.C. to say it. The economy is restructuring, and people need to be open to any and all job opportunities wherever they may happen to be. It's only the social safety net, which allows people to be so picky and say they don't want to do this or that, or don't want to live here or there. This kind of pickyness is a luxury belonging to people with skills in demand. It doesn't help that the government has basically outlawed the jobs that many of these people qualify for with the skills they bring. When you mandate a minimum wage, and particular benefits and liabilities to employers, you make the price too high to hire people with low skills and productivity. You deny them the opportunity to learn a trade. Those jobs are instead replaced by automation, or are sent to other locations with labor costs that enable those economic activities to be viable. People are rational beings, and when they are given the choice of sponging off the social saftey net, or working a low paid job, many to most will chose leasure and handouts.
What a load of sanctimoniousness bull. When my husband was laid off and out of work for 8 months he applied for jobs on a daily basis. He applied for anything and everything that he could. However, due to his 15 years of career experience in the automotive field he was either NOT called in for an interview or passed over because no one could understand why a mechanic who made $20/hr would "settle" for a $9/hr labor job. He was passed over time and again. This was not his being "lazy" this was the companies not wanting to risk their time on a hard working man who needed a job. Crap.
If your husband was a good mechanic he should have been able to offer his skills to repair people's cars irrespective of his former employer. Around where I live the shop's are charging customers $100/hr. With prices so high, their obviously isn't a surplus of people that know how to fix cars.
Some of the comments here are true. There are a lot of minimum wage jobs available. These service sector jobs are essentialy what has replaced the outsourced middle-class jobs. Had Hobson & Stossel dug a little deeper, they would have discovered that most of those jobs do not offer benefits and only hire for less than 30 hrs, 20 hours on average. Many demand flexible schedules as well, making it difficult to hold more than one of these part-time gems at a time or attend school. That means you'll be earning a whopping $170 per/wk gross. They of course do this to avoid the cost of health care benefits as well as any penalties that may be incurred for dodging benefits. Additionally, many employers of the low wage, as mentioned in "lazy Americans," demand experience and others discriminate against age, though they would never admit it, and in some cases, even discriminate against non-Hispanic ethnicities ( never thought I would see that, this is truly a new age).
Others post jobs, but don't seem too ambitious in filling the position. I know of several retail jobs that have gone unfilled for more than a year, despite, multiple qualified, if not over-qualified candidates applying.
As for those still pouring in from south of the border, the large influx of the past twenty years is largely the result of NAFTA, which gutted American manufacturing and Mexican agriculture.
Outsourcing has now done to "white collar" employment, what NAFTA did to "blue collar" employment in the US. Until there are global labor laws & unions, this will be an ongoing issue. It's too easy for US employers to wrap themselves in the flag on Veteran's Day or Independence day, espousing the virtues of liberty, capitalism and democracy, while sending jobs to communist countries that allow no such virtues.
It's easy to stand on the outside of the pain of others and criticize. It takes real courage to attempt to feel the struggle and suffering.
I don't mind hearing from self-righteous, condescending right-wing jerks. but as others have said, John Stossel's arguments were pure pseudoscience and anecdote. and it was pure laziness not to find someone who is at least smart enough to cover that up.
Furthermore, EVEN if his arguments are right, this trend of empty minimum wage jobs that people are not willing to do are a good old economic phenomenon: A FAILURE of the market. yo, if people aren't willing to do your job for what you're paying, you have to PAY MORE.
All these capitalists just love the market when it works to their benefit, but when the people get fed up and start looking out for themselves, it's because they're "lazy", not because they're unwilling to be exploited.suuuuure.
I agree to some extent with this article. My mother (yes, dear mom) was out of work for 9 months, 3 of which was disability, but she wouldn't even get a job at Walmart to earn some money. She literally lived off of my brother and me for those 6 months without an income and didn't move from the couch. We tried to be compassionate because we know she's worked hard in her life, but she literally has nothing but debt to show for it. No retirement savings, no nothing. We begged her to get an hourly job (because that's how she raised us--to seek out any job), one that didn't require a brain, to get herself out of the house but she didn't and was almost content living off of us. She's a nurse, so she has a great paying job now but is still behind on everything. In those 6-9 months without a job, she still had the best cable package, ate out frequently, and went on a bender with QVC shopping. To prove my point: When I was laid off in 1997, I cried for about a day and licked my wounds for about a week, then found the strength and courage to open my own business with only $500 in the bank and no idea where the car insurance payment was coming from. It was hella hard, but I'm still making a living 15 years later.
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