Permanently Underpaid

The populist movement that elected Donald Trump was heavily focused on bringing solid-paying blue-collar jobs back to the United States. Disenfranchised coal miners and assembly line workers ignored the decade-after-decade decline in the demand for their services, the serial bankruptcies of their traditional employers, the change in environmental requirements and the fact that labor was now a global commodity. Even as automation leveled the production cost playing field between developed and developing nations, even as international outsourcing faded as the most relevant cause of job displacement, blue-collar workers believed that they could push the clock back and recapture a labor system long since rendered obsolete. Economists knew that this could never happen… progress seldom unwinds to return to costly and inefficient processes.

Even as many white-collar jobs, some even at the top of the food chain (investment advisors, financial analysts, lawyers and even surgeons), vaporized as complex robotics meet-ever-more-sophisticated artificial intelligence, there was (still is) this pervasive assumption that a college education is a panacea, regardless of degree, an unwavering path to a better job and a lifetime of solid earning power. Not exactly. Certainly not always.

Forgetting about the eventual impact of growing artificial intelligence in the workplace, there are a couple of axioms from the old job market that continue to apply to contemporary employment, as a number college-educated young adults first entered the job market during the last Great Recession, and  this one in particular: the lower the pay of your first real post-college job, regardless of the reasons, the lower you can expect your earnings to be for the rest of your life.

Work as a barista pending another degree? That “between years” job won’t be enough to satisfy a top law or business school admissions office; that low-pay journey will of necessity delay your entry into that ultimate professional job (assuming you stick with it), which will cascade into the rest of your earning life… all the while those who started earlier at that better earning power work will be years ahead in raises and promotions by the time you get to market.

But wait, it gets worse if that is a “take a little less to get your foot in the door” job or if an economic downturn has momentarily dropped entry-level pay for that career. Raises and promotions, with some serious exceptions, usually evolve from those entry-level pay scales. Start low, a 10% raise is against that lower pay level… and so on, and so on.

Another feature of the current job market is the severe polarization between what jobs get the fabulous pay… and the rest. College grads often have to take what they can find, dive into the gig market of contract work or Uber/Lyft or take second jobs. We call that underemployment, and since job figures are based on “averages” – where very high pay at the top makes everyone look rich but the median workers are hardly well-compensated – seeing how much underemployment there is in the United States takes some of digging. Politicians love averages and falling unemployment numbers… even if those numbers fall apart in deeper analysis. Here’s how important it is to make that first real job after college count:

“Although making lattes or staffing a cash register is often considered a youthful rite of passage during that bumpy transition from campus to the workforce, new research suggests that settling for a subpar job out of the gate can harm career prospects for years to come.

“Two-thirds of people who were underemployed in their first job after college were still underemployed five years later, while only 13% of new grads who landed college-graduate-level jobs right away were underemployed after five years, according to a study released in May by Burning Glass Technologies, a labor market analytics company, and the nonprofit Strada Institute for the Future of Work.

“Underemployment gets harder to escape as time goes on. Three-quarters of those who were underemployed five years after college continued to be so at the 10-year mark, according to the report.

“The skills and professional connections gained in the first job help lead to the next and then the next, and those who missed out early have a hard time catching up. Their earnings fall behind. Recent college graduates who are underemployed earn, on average, $10,000 less a year than their counterparts doing college-graduate-level work, the report found.

“Women are disproportionately affected — 47% of women were underemployed in their first post-college job, versus 37% of men, the report found. The researchers didn’t examine the reasons for the gender divide, but it could be linked to the growing specificity of job descriptions, as research has shown that women are less likely than men to apply for a job if they don’t believe they meet all the listed requirements, Burning Glass Chief Executive Matt Sigelman said.

“‘That first job is so critical because so many who do start out behind stay behind, and the financial implications are substantial as well,’ said Michelle Weise, chief innovation officer for the Strada Institute. The research was based on 4 million resumes of people who graduated after 2000. To account for rising employer standards, it defined college-graduate-level jobs as those for which more than half of current job postings require a college degree.

“In decades past, wandering aimlessly for a while after college was an accepted part of the transition to adulthood. Today’s new grads face a very different labor landscape that favors the focused, the researchers said… For one, ballooning student debt — approaching $1.5 trillion nationally, with California’s new graduates on average facing nearly $23,000 each as of 2016 — makes it unwise to cut short earning potential.

“In addition, employers no longer expect new hires to stay with the company for the long haul and so many don’t invest in entry-level training, yet they have high expectations that people come in with a specific skill set, Sigelman said.

“Meanwhile, the population of college graduates has risen markedly — more than one-third of people over 25 have at least a bachelor’s degree, compared with about one-fifth 20 years ago — which has made it harder to stand out and has enabled employers to make college a prerequisite for jobs that traditionally didn’t require it. And new graduates face competition from older peers still recovering from the misfortune of graduating during the Great Recession.” Los Angeles Times, July 9^th.

Young adults don’t have the same leeway to spend time “discovering themselves” anymore. They need to get on a job track early, in the earliest years of college, or their fellow students will leave them in the underemployment earnings dust… forever. Employers also prefer focused and directed students who know what they want… and whose education is fresher and more relevant.

I’m Peter Dekom, and in the world of harsh competition and too many people wanting the same goal, he or she who hesitates… is quickly left behind.

In a War between the U.S. and Iran, Who Fires the First Shot?

To Iranian President Rouhani: 

NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED STATES AGAIN OR YOU WILL SUFFER CONSEQUENCES THE LIKES OF WHICH FEW THROUGHOUT HISTORY HAVE EVER SUFFERED BEFORE. WE ARE NO LONGER A COUNTRY THAT WILL STAND FOR YOUR DEMENTED WORDS OF VIOLENCE & DEATH. BE CAUTIOUS!

8:24 PM - 22 Jul 2018  Donald Trump Tweet.

There’s little doubt that Iran is a regional rogue state and troublemaker. Their government is not particularly popular with their own people. Their censorship and religious dress requirements along with a deep mismanagement of the local economy leave their people socially repressed and economically depressed. But protestors are severely punished, some even perish. The Revolutionary Guards are harsh. The Ayatollah is unbending and the ultimate power in the nation, trumping elected representatives at every turn. But please do not assume for a second that the locals’ hatred of their leadership remotely means the people have any real affinity for the U.S. For the most part, they hate us only slightly less than the hate their own leaders.

They covet becoming the regional power, a Shiite nation (Shiites represent only about 20% of Islam) with connections and foot soldiers all over the Middle East. Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Gaza and Yemen are just a partial list. In a war, they would instantly mine the Strait of Hormuz (see the map above), effectively cutting off most Middle Eastern oil from reaching Europe. Their sleeper cells all over the West, including the United States, would begin to take action. They have the potential of reigniting their nuclear weapons program at the drop of a hat, particularly if the United States forces Europe to stop buying their oil effective on September 1^st. Do we attack their mainland? With what? From where? What’s the trigger?

Donald Trump has now authorized a U.S.-controlled media campaign against local Iranian politicians and officials and other anti-Iranian policies (like the new sanctions). “In Washington, U.S. officials familiar with the matter told Reuters that the Trump administration had launched an offensive of speeches and online communications meant to foment unrest and help pressure Iran to end its nuclear program and its support of militant groups.” The Cipher Brief, July 23^rd.

The goal is to turn the country against the leadership, perhaps fomenting rebellion or at least influencing local elections. Hmmmm. Where have we seen this before? But it’s ok, because The Donald is ordering it. Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani told Trump was begging for trouble if he made good on that threat, saying, “war with Iran is the mother of all wars.” Trump’s response is above. Sabre-rattling… again. And the probably answer to the title question just might be Israel, acting as our surrogate.

Russia has sidled up to Iran with military aid and a mutual agreement on oil production. So once again, the United States and its newly anointed best-friend Russia might duke it out through surrogates. Last time, the U.S. supported the rebels in Syria against the Assad government. Russia supported Assad with vastly more money, arms, and even fighting men than did the U.S. for the rebels. The Assad regime is almost finished obliterating the rebels, content to have used Russian-supplied barrel bombs, planes and poison gas on its own people. We lost, by the way.

This time, it will be Israel for the U.S., and Iran for Russia. We might get involved, but probably not. If bluster turns to violent military confrontation. Trump does very little in the way of real warfare, however, if you haven’t noticed. Lots of bluffing and posturing. Very little real military action, which turns out to be what should happen. Nothing.

Only July 22^nd, a cadre of very successful and very patriotic U.S.-citizen-escapees from Iran – professors, lawyers, doctors, business owners, etc. – took out a full-page ad in the Los Angeles Times admonishing the ill-informed Trump administration that if it mounted its threatened anti-leadership media campaign in Iran, that leadership would use that fact to rally the people to their support. It would give Rouhani, the Ayatollah and the Revolutionary Guards even greater justification to clamp down. In short, such a Trump effort would produce exactly the opposite effect.

The July 23^rd The Cipher Brief (citing Reuters) explains the background of this latest dispute: “Iran faces increased U.S. pressure and looming sanctions after Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States from a 2015 international deal over Iran’s nuclear program.

“Addressing a gathering of Iranian diplomats, Rouhani said: ‘Mr Trump, don’t play with the lion’s tail, this would only lead to regret,’ the state news agency IRNA reported… ‘America should know that peace with Iran is the mother of all peace, and war with Iran is the mother of all wars,’ Rouhani said, leaving open the possibility of peace between the two countries, at odds since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

“‘You are not in a position to incite the Iranian nation against Iran’s security and interests,” Rouhani said, in an apparent reference to reported efforts by Washington to destabilize Iran’s Islamic government…

“Current and former U.S. officials said the campaign painted Iranian leaders in a harsh light, at times using information that is exaggerated or contradicts other official pronouncements, including comments by previous administrations… Rouhani scoffed at Trump’s threat to halt Iranian oil exports and said Iran has a dominant position in the Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, a major oil shipping waterway.

“‘Anyone who understands the rudiments of politics doesn’t say ‘we will stop Iran’s oil exports’...we have been the guarantor of the regional waterway’s security throughout history,’ Rouhani said, cited by the semi-official ISNA news agency… Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday backed Rouhani’s suggestion that Iran may block Gulf oil exports if its own exports are halted.

“Rouhani’s apparent threat earlier this month to disrupt oil shipments from neighboring countries came in reaction to efforts by Washington to force all countries to stop buying Iranian oil… Iranian officials have in the past threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation for any hostile U.S. action.” Hmmm. The “mother of all peace”? Now that’s an interesting backdoor invitation if I have ever heard one. Hint! Does Donald Trump get hints? It’s hard to imagine a more ineffective and arrogant campaign than that promised by Donald Trump. How do bullies respond to being bullied? Precisely.

I’m Peter Dekom, and a complete ignorance of history, regional culture and statistical facts are not exactly the best foundation upon which to base a diplomatic strategy.

When Too Much Creates No Choice at Law

The worldwide web was supposed to open minds to new experiences, learning, exploration and discovering new truths. It was a marvel, able to access books, expertise, data and hordes of information, taking people to knowledge sources in democratic freedom. As you watch Facebook shares plummet by almost 20% because of that company’s utter failure to control its role in the dissemination of “fake news” (not the Trumpian-labeled kind… but that which truly false and misleading, which often emanates from Trump himself), bots customizing fake news to cater to the gullible searching for confirmation of inane conspiracies, and Twitter that foments mass followings of mendacity – the modern versions of the golden calf (Bible: Exodus 32:4), a fake religious vector demanded by the masses – something has gone terribly wrong.

Russians have mastered using the Web to decimate our democratic basics and filter disinformation (based on data-scraping personal information on millions of Americans) to influence our election process. Polarized Americans now routinely refuse to consume any content that contracts their calcified view of what they believe is supposed to be. Fox News is a very strong example of a once-independent news services that has morphed into the propaganda arm of the Republican Party, a problem only exacerbated by the President’s castigating the rest of the free press and the “enemy of the American people.” Fox New followers treat its “report only what the government wants people to hear” as their news gospel, despite a tsunami of false and biased reporting.

Too much information has resulted in Americans’ reducing and narrowing their focus. Instead of using the Web to generate information to help them make better decisions, so many Americans have simply pushed anything that contradicts their expectations out the window, never to be seen, read or understood. In short, we are dumbing down based solely on bias and opinion.

But the ability to track and filter out “objectionable material” is now being aided by software originally created to allow parents to protect their children from porn and predators. The July 28^th FastCompany.com provides this real-world example: “Netsweeper, a company in Ontario, Canada, has touted its internet filtering software as a way for institutions like schools and hospitals to block pornographic, exploitative, or illicit websites, or help governments collect taxes on e-commerce sales. It says that its artificial intelligence software can filter the web in real time while receiving requests for ‘approximately 22 million new URLs each and every day’ from over 500 million end users.

“Increasingly, many of those users are living in countries where authoritarian and otherwise troubled political regimes are using Netsweeper and similar tools to block a range of ‘controversial’ content, including political campaigns, media websites, and even search terms like ‘LGBTQ,’ ‘gay,’ and ‘lesbian.’

“An April report by researchers at the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto identified 10 countries where the company’s tools ‘appear to be filtering content for national-level, consumer-facing ISPs’ [Internet Service Providers] amid acute human rights or security concerns: Afghanistan, Bahrain, India, Kuwait, Pakistan, Qatar, Somalia, Sudan, UAE, and Yemen. Except for India and Pakistan, all of the countries are ranked ‘authoritarian’ by the Economist Democracy Index.

“‘It does appear that Netsweeper has no aversion to selling to clients in authoritarian regime contexts, within which there is a growing appetite to censor the internet,’ says Ron Deibert, the director of Citizen Lab, the internet watchdog group behind the report, ‘Planet Netsweeper.’

“Filtering the web like this ‘appears inconsistent with core corporate responsibilities to respect human rights such as freedom of opinion and expression and non-discrimination,’ the researchers wrote…

“Netsweeper is far from the only company that sells internet-filtering technology to governments. As with systems sold by companies like Blue Coat Systems, SmartFilter, and Sandvine—which also has its headquarters in Ontario—Netsweeper’s products are marketed at a wide range of clients, like libraries, schools, hospitals, and businesses, meant to keep users ‘safe’ from malware and objectionable content, like pornography or violent imagery. In recent years the firm has also marketed its filtering technology as a way to help governments collect taxes on cross-border e-commerce sales. ‘Netsweeper is here to enforce the internet laws of your country,’ the firm said in a 2016 promotional video… But the same tools are also used by governments and ISPs to monitor and filter political, social, and LGBTQ content across whole countries.”

Individuals will soon be able to guarantee that they don’t even get any information from any source that contradicts their world-view. They can censor their family, and a U.S. government with authoritarian leanings can apply some of their filters against MSM (mainstream media) that they so violently oppose. The Western notion of democracy is struggling to survive, but the very technology intended to enable maximum free expression is producing very much the opposite result.

I’m Peter Dekom, and exactly what are the values, the very form of government, that we are passing down to the next generation of Americans?