[CLUE-Talk] Job web sites to visit

[Jeffery Cann]

On Thursday 05 December 2002 09:03 pm, mgushee at havenrock.com wrote:
> Hmm, ok. To the extent that the question is, "What can you do for yourself
> here and now?" I think the guy's right on. But I also think he's missing
> the big picture: what's happening now to IT jobs has already happened to
> manufacturing jobs,

I agree totally.

> and if current trends continue (why wouldn't they?),
> pretty soon if you're not a doctor, a lawyer, a C-level executive at a
> major corporation, or a star entertainer, you can forget about aspiring to
> even a middle-class lifestyle.

Here, I disagree.  Although we (the technologists) as educated and 'skilled' 
labor believe or assume that we are insolated from the perils of those 
laborers (formerly) working in the 'manufacturing' sector.  The fact is they 
were skilled and trained and now are replaced (for example in the automotive 
industry) largely by automation and robots.

Here's another example -- Sun's goal of putting all sysadmins out of work (N1 
technology).  Read the first paragraph of this article and you'll get Sun's 
point of view:
 + http://www.serverworldmagazine.com/monthly/2002/11/roadmap.shtml

According to Business Week (Nov 25 issue), all of the other big firms (HP, 
MSFT, Oracle, etc.) have similar goals.  Why are these firms proposing such 
plans which will obviously hurt all our future career aspects?  

The main reason is that the majority of the cost of running a business is 
labor.  In my 400-person business unit at Standard & Poor's, over 80% of our 
operating costs are labor.  So:

	fewer laborers --> lower operating cost = higher profit

Note that only about 100 of our 400 employees actually work in technical 
fields (DBA, Development, QA, QC, SA).  

Believe me, if my company could live without us, they would whack our jobs in 
an instant.  Right now, they cannot and our benefits to the company outweigh 
the costs.  30 years ago, we used to distribute our data in books, published 
twice a year.  If my company could get away with still publishing books, they 
would do it, simply to save the never-ending costs of technology.  But, their 
customers demanded monthly, then weekly, then daily, and now real-time access 
to our financial data.  So, the company puts up with all of the computers and 
geeks like us because they _have_ to -- either use computers or go out of 
business.

Unfortunately, those of us who thought that 'getting a college education' or 
'getting a technical job' would protect us from the cold facts of capitalism 
are fooling ourselves.  We are no different than dedicated factory worker of 
the 1960s who was laid off in the 1980s because his job was automated out of 
existence.  It will happen to us too, so be prepared for it.  The fact that 
most of us have college degrees does not matter.  To a business, we are all 
labor -- or to use the latest assine term - we are all 'human capital'.

> At the root of much of this is so-called "free trade", which really means
> free movement of capital. And in signing up for NAFTA, the WTO, and the
> upcoming GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services), our government is
> taking most of our economic policy entirely out of the democratic arena
> (what's left of it) and placing it in the hands of unelected and
> unaccountable bureaucrats. So until the citizens of this country wake up
> and take back their rights (I'm not holding my breath), we're all going to
> be spending the rest of our lives defending our meager little pieces of the
> pie.

I think the 'free trade' argument is too much of a conspiracy theory.  It 
would be nice to blame NAFTA or WTO for the problems of the elimination of 
technology workers.  But, I think the answer is simply capitalism.  Profit 
drives everything.  The trade agreements are just another vehicle to drive 
profit.  So, I think your blame / anger is better placed on capitalism.

Ironically, I think that technology has enabled things like 'free trade' to 
come to fruition.  Were it not for a global communications network and 
sophisticated software to track and ship orders, what use is world-wide 
trade?  We (the technologists) are victims of our own success.  We have 
enabled our business leaders to consider the elimination our jobs because we 
have became too good at improving / automating business processes.

<sarcasm>
I look forward to the day when we can all live a simpler lifestyle after the  
robots take over.  Unfortunately, I'm afraid that at 31 years old, I won't 
live to see the utopia I see portrayed in Star Trek movies.
</sarcasm>

Jeff

-- 
    planet earth (tm)
http://jefferycann.com/