Impending Labor Shortage

[goldstar]

I have often heard employers say "It's so hard to find competent help." I ask, in return: What are you doing to train tomorrows' workers?

All too often, I have them reply "Oh, NO! I am not about to train someone, just so they can go work somewhere else!" Yet, these same folks are all too ready to hire someone trained by another.

I've seen companies go to absurd lengths to prevent employees from using what they learn to further their own careers. For example, the employer will provide the required OSHA 10-hr. training, but will see that no credential is ever received by the employee.

Indeed, lest I speak the unspeakable ... one of the "advantages" employers see in hiring illegals is that Mexican immigrants differ from every other immigrant group in one major way: they do not seek upward mobility, being content to linger in their entry-level positions for a lifetime. Don't take my word for it: James Michener documented this decades ago when he was writing his novel "Centennial."

Since I entered the workforce (in the early 70's), I have seen the steady closing of opportunities for advancement. "Back then," several of my supervisors had moved up - often to senior positions - thought they had not gone to college. Ironically, they often found themselves implementing policies that closed the doors to future ambitions souls.

The electrical trade used to be a great launching point into other areas. Not any more; "journeyman" is as far as you're going. Good luck moving out of physically demanding construction work as you age. No degree, no future. Who, I ask, would want to enter such a field?

Meanwhile, our schools teach from the 1st grade that "the trades" are for the losers, misfits, and others "not good enough" to go to college. By the time these kids graduate, they firmly believe that skilled tradesmen are little more than slightly retarded chimpanzees with tool belts.

Small wonder it's "so hard to find good help."

Well stated. I can't speak to being an employee because I haven't been one for some time now. But, take a look at all the comments that have been made in this thread from an employer's point of view, then turn yourself around and you can make similar opposing arguments from an employee's point of view.

As has been previously stated, those quality people that currently have jobs (what few are available) are not going to be leaving those jobs to work for companies with less to offer than the one they currently work for. If you don't have the ability to make an exceptional offer to attract them then the best you can hope for is to find people with a good work ethics, willing to work for what you have to offer. Don't worry about training them and then losing them to another company. That's been going on since the beginning of time. Get the best hired help you can afford but don't expect them to work at the same level as you. Your compensation package you have, I'm sure, is going to be lot higher than that of the person you want to employ.

If you are skillful enough and have the foresight to find a specialized niche for your business (like the enterprise that Mike Holt built for himself) then your company will grow and you can develop your own quality personnel who will stay with you for a long time. On the other hand, if you're one EC among 100's in your area who is just installing lights, switches and receptacles you have the same misfortune of drafting from an under-educated work force as everyone else does.

Keep the faith. You're probably not going to find that EXACT person you want for the job but there are still quality people out there who can do a great job for you.

 

[ptonsparky]

Right on the money, There is no labor shortage, many people are looking for work.

The jobs just may not be where they are looking.

 

[kwired]

Right on the money, There is no labor shortage, many people are looking for work.

There are people looking for a paycheck, many of the don't really want to have to work, and if they are employed bring that attitude with them.

 

[stevenje]

All too often, I have them reply "Oh, NO! I am not about to train someone, just so they can go work somewhere else!" Yet, these same folks are all too ready to hire someone trained by another.

"

Right on the money! This short sighted mentality helps no one. Things sure have change over the 40 plus years I have been in this industry. My mentors took great pride in passing on the knowledge of our trade to the next generation of sparkies. They were proud to see you become the best you could be and that they had a part in it.

 

[kwired]

Right on the money! This short sighted mentality helps no one. Things sure have change over the 40 plus years I have been in this industry. My mentors took great pride in passing on the knowledge of our trade to the next generation of sparkies. They were proud to see you become the best you could be and that they had a part in it.

The almighty dollar is who runs the show in all business these days, owners/investors only see dollars, they don't see that satisfied employees are more productive and that ultimately may allow for making even more dollars. There is also a large number of people going to retire soon, the almighty dollar again wants to find ways to pinch its own pennies and force them into leaving so they can find ways out of paying them retirement benefits or at least lessening those benefits that were once promised.

You don't go into a job as a career anymore you take what you can get for as long as it lasts, and often the next job is nothing even closely related, no matter what skills you may have gained.

 

[don_resqcapt19]

The jobs just may not be where they are looking.

That can be an issue...my son is an electrical engineer looking for a new job, but he only wants to live in certain cities and has limited his search to those cities. He currently has a job so he can wait until he finds a job that matches his "wants". He is also running up against the experience requirements as he has only two years and many employers looking for engineering talent are looking for 5 or more years of experience.

However in general, I agree with iwire, that there is no real technical talent shortage in this country...just a shortage of employers willing to pay the wages that the available talent wants.

 

[hbiss]

Don't know that I agree that there is no talent shortage but I do agree that employers are unwilling to pay the wages that would make the trade attractive. Like renosteinke points out about the stigma attached to manual trades, the only thing that will remove that and encourage young people to enter the trades is pay comparable to that promised to people with college degrees. We complain about the influx of illegal and other immigrants who get hired to do this work. What young person want's to work alongside them making the same pay?

-Hal
[h=1][/h]

 

[__dan]

There is an aggregate surplus of productive capacity relative to demand, beginning about the turn of the century in 1900 due to mechanization, technology, tools, and large capital organization. Demand that was formerly met with manual, horse, and slave labor is now performed by machines and technology.

When demand exceeds productive capacity, there is a shortage and pricing power for producers. When capacity exceeds demand, it has a negative impact on pricing power, profitability, and causes liquidation of the excess capacity.

Now with computers replacing people at manual tasks and outsourcing to foreign countries expanding the labor supply, we are basically in a perpetual surplus of labor for the foreseeable future. It has existed since 1900 and is a foreseeable surplus of labor for the next 100 years. There is a long term structural deflationary impact on labor pricing power.

Labor falls into two groups, the great mass of man, which are the unskilled idiots and clueless fakers of which there is a surplus relative to jobs available to them, and the technically skilled elite producers, of which there are more technically demanding jobs than there are competent technicians to fill them. This is why you see clueless fakers in demanding technical jobs, faking it (making big bucks). Jobs in general, for the unskilled, clueless, and uneducated warm bodies, there is a surplus of unskilled labor relative to demand and lack of pricing power. There is and will always be aggregate structural long term unemployment. Technical jobs in high demand specialties, there is a shortage of skilled educated technicians and pricing power, job mobility, for producers.

This is well understood, well documented, and only partially mitigated by government deficit spending and the complementary institutionalized government waste.

Absent government deficit spending, the deflationary effects of the productive capacity surplus would shrink the economy to the liquidating level, forcing debt defaults and productive capacity off the market in the process, which is why the government is organized around creating inflation. Investing in additional productive capacity would only result in a larger surplus relative to demand and additional deflationary impacts on pricing, which is why waste, and investing in goods not offered for sale (wars) are necessary.

Quigley is the best teacher of this, and even Keynes predicted the 15 hour work week. The employers and temp agencies are simply able to exploit a force that is already present, the excess of labor relative to demand. But they are paying the rate for warm bodies and not technically skilled producers. There are plenty of warm bodies but few technical producers.

 

[iwire]

I am just not buying into the labor shortage excuse.

If you are looking for good help and are only offering what you perceive to be the 'going rate' for new hires there is no incentive for good help to come your way.

Most of the good, talented help is already working and is likely making more than that new hire 'going rate' already. What would be the incentive to leave that job to work for less?

Even for the good help that is for some reason out of a job at this time they were accustomed to a certain rate of pay and the know their own value so they will not rush to take a job for a lower rate than they had been making unless they are very hungry.

Now I understand paying high rates is problematic when you have to bid work against contractors paying less. The customer is usually not going to care or believe that your help is more talented and can do a better job. But that is a different issue than a labor shortage.

It seems to me most companies want to hire people for a low rate with promises of raises down the line if they prove themselves.

Maybe a better way to go is to hire at a higher rate with the condition that if they do not live up to that rate they will be terminated.

It always comes down to money, we are all the same. We all want as much as we can get and for business owners that are used to saving money anyplace they can that results in less than stellar employees.

 

[petersonra]

I am just not buying into the labor shortage excuse.

If you are looking for good help and are only offering what you perceive to be the 'going rate' for new hires there is no incentive for good help to come your way.

Most of the good, talented help is already working and is likely making more than that new hire 'going rate' already. What would be the incentive to leave that job to work for less?

Even for the good help that is for some reason out of a job at this time they were accustomed to a certain rate of pay and the know their own value so they will not rush to take a job for a lower rate than they had been making unless they are very hungry.

Now I understand paying high rates is problematic when you have to bid work against contractors paying less. The customer is usually not going to care or believe that your help is more talented and can do a better job. But that is a different issue than a labor shortage.

It seems to me most companies want to hire people for a low rate with promises of raises down the line if they prove themselves.

Maybe a better way to go is to hire at a higher rate with the condition that if they do not live up to that rate they will be terminated.

It always comes down to money, we are all the same. We all want as much as we can get and for business owners that are used to saving money anyplace they can that results in less than stellar employees.

There are other issues in the trades though. despite there being a wide range of skill, experience, and production, tradesmen are often paid much the same because they are considered to be interchangeable. unions encourage this thinking and as long as unions have a lot of the pricing power via various mechanisms, this won't change.

It is all but impossible to find a way to pay a superior wage to a superior employee these days. It is not just a union problem. Employers of all types have bought into the idea that an employee of type X and grade Y is worth $Z. Even in non-union companies there is often no more than 20% difference in pay between the worst and the best employee in a particular position.

 

[iwire]

There are other issues in the trades though. despite there being a wide range of skill, experience, and production, tradesmen are often paid much the same because they are considered to be interchangeable. unions encourage this thinking and as long as unions have a lot of the pricing power via various mechanisms, this won't change.
.

True to some extent but I also know some union members that are paid higher than their contract requires. Why? Because their employees feel they are worth it.

It is all but impossible to find a way to pay a superior wage to a superior employee these days. It is not just a union problem. Employers of all types have bought into the idea that an employee of type X and grade Y is worth $Z. Even in non-union companies there is often no more than 20% difference in pay between the worst and the best employee in a particular position

And it is these same type of companies that say there is a labor shortage.


Skilled workers are found to fill jobs in the most uninhabitable and violent corners of the world. From oil rigs, to the oil sands of Alberta, to the Middle East. Etc. All it takes is money.

 

[kwired]

Maybe a better way to go is to hire at a higher rate with the condition that if they do not live up to that rate they will be terminated.

Employers would love that, labor laws don't see it that way though. How many employees would complain if you gave them a raise, even if they didn't necessarily deserve it?

Skilled workers are found to fill jobs in the most uninhabitable and violent corners of the world. From oil rigs, to the oil sands of Alberta, to the Middle East. Etc. All it takes is money.

And most of those jobs do pay fairly well, but you usually have to give up something to have those jobs, or are not located in a place where people maybe would like to raise their family. Some of those jobs are high pressure jobs as well, meaning you can only do so much time and then you must move on or the stress will get to you.

 

[don_resqcapt19]

Employers would love that, labor laws don't see it that way though. How many employees would complain if you gave them a raise, even if they didn't necessarily deserve it? ...

Most states are "employment at will". In the absence of a labor contract, they don't need a reason to terminate you.

 

[kwired]

Most states are "employment at will". In the absence of a labor contract, they don't need a reason to terminate you.

Maybe labor laws are not as much of an impact as I initially thought, but I was referring to a pay cut and not termination.

 

[Besoeker]

Skilled workers are found to fill jobs in the most uninhabitable and violent corners of the world. From oil rigs, to the oil sands of Alberta, to the Middle East. Etc. All it takes is money.

I've read through this thread and there are some interesting perspectives.

I'll offer mine which, being from across the pond, might be expected to be different.
But actually gel quite well with some of the points raised here.

I agree with your point that, if you offer sufficient reward, you will get the applicants.
But a couple of other raised by others.
The skill sets required and the number of people, new blood, coming into the field.
People perhaps shunning the field because they don't want to get their hands dirty as mentioned in an earlier post or, if they have a technical bent, wanting to get into IT rather than the electrical field.
Or that a trade skill is somehow not considered "sexy".

I suspect it's a bit worse here in UK because the term "engineer" is so misused. If I tell someone I'm an electrical engineer it is quite likely to be blanked out. Or they think I fix washing machines.
Whatever, we don't seem to have enough young people entering the electrical trades and professions.

A sad and somewhat morbid tale that I've probably related previously.
I, my chief project engineer, and the project consultant were sitting around having a coffee and chewing the fat during one of the hurry up and wait phases common during the commissioning phases of a fairly big project. My guy, the youngest, was approaching fifty at the time. I and the consultant had more than a decade on that.

We got to chatting about mutual acquaintances. Moved, retired or deceased.
It makes me a little introspective at times. Should I now be checking my emails and working on new tenders at nearly 23:00 hours?
We need new young people to be attracted to the profession.

 

[kwired]

I suspect it's a bit worse here in UK because the term "engineer" is so misused. If I tell someone I'm an electrical engineer it is quite likely to be blanked out. Or they think I fix washing machines.

What they don't realize is that you maybe do fix washing machines, but maybe not the kind of washing machines they have an image of in their mind.

I run into a lot of people that have no idea of some of the things I do work on, and I consider to be somewhat routine things to work on, many seem to think electricians just wire houses and that is about it, reality is I could care less if I ever did any electrical work in a house.

 

[iwire]

And most of those jobs do pay fairly well, but you usually have to give up something to have those jobs, or are not located in a place where people maybe would like to raise their family. Some of those jobs are high pressure jobs as well, meaning you can only do so much time and then you must move on or the stress will get to you.

Wouldn't you say that was exactly my point?

The fact these jobs that are very tough to fill can be filled anyway by raising the rewards.

 

[iwire]

Maybe labor laws are not as much of an impact as I initially thought, but I was referring to a pay cut and not termination.

But I did not mention a pay cut, I said termination.

 

[don_resqcapt19]

But I did not mention a pay cut, I said termination.

But the same applies to a pay cut...in the absence of either a union or personal services contract, the employer can change your rate of pay at will, in most states.

 

[PetrosA]

The bottom dollar is a huge part of the problem on both the employer and employee sides of the issue. One business owner I spoke with recently who owns a large florist shop with about 15-20 full time employees told me that he's having a huge problem finding help locally because the bottom dollar needed to live locally is very high. His bottom dollar is such that he can't afford to pay his employees enough to live in the area his business is based out of, so more and more often he's forced to hire people who live up to an hour away. The same phenomenon is happening to trades in the Philly suburbs with more and more people having to live farther away from where they work because they can't afford to live in even the cheapest neighborhoods that they work in. I did the same thing. I live in Lancaster and drive between 90-150 miles per day to get back and forth to work. It's crazy. I'd hire a driver if I could, but he'd probably have to live an hour further west from me