Job workers needed thread

[dlague]

I know of many that have taken early retirement because getting good a job in the tech sector is hard at 60 or even 55..

 

[yeggous]

I know of many that have taken early retirement because getting good a job in the tech sector is hard at 60 or even 55..

In the tech sector you have to essentially reinvent yourself every five years. That is one of the things I like about it. As technology changes you have to be continuously adopting new skill sets.

What type of tech employees are you talking about?

When interviewing older workers, I see a lot who seem to have missed the transition to cloud computing and virtualization. We get a lot of older IT applicants that focus on their experience managing and deploying servers. Unfortunately for them we don't have physical servers any more than we have landline phones or travel agents. It is a similar story with desktop computer support which we have all but eliminated as Macs have become the dominant personal computing platform.

 

[Jully]

I know of many that have taken early retirement because getting good a job in the tech sector is hard at 60 or even 55..

Marketing too. Tech is even beyond reinventing yourself, though many people do not do that piece either. It's almost about appearance for some employers, especially if the average age is under 33 they will just feel weird hiring a 54 year old.

 

[steamboat1]

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-bl...y-disability-insurances-effect-on-labor-force

 

[Not Sure]

There are very good reasons while the labor participation rate is biased and unusable a indicator of economic health.

The most obvious is that controlling for economic changes, we should expect to see a continued drop in the labor participation rate due to demographic shifts. As the Boomers age out of the workforce they are naturally going to lower the rate. Likewise an influx of young people would also lower the rate as young people are more likely to be full time students. For the same reason an increase in the rate of people going to college will lower the participation rate.

Note the bulges in population in Boomers entering in retirement and in their college / grad school years. The chart below is from the year 2015:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demog.../media/File:USA_by_Sex_and_Age_2015-07-01.svg
I know the Baby Boom bulge can be hard to pick out given the mortality trend at those ages. Notice the sharp jump at age 69 (would be now age 70 since the data is a year old). That corresponds to babies born in 1946 -- a year (call it 9 months) after the end of World War II. That huge demographic bulge entering retirement is driving down the labor participation rate in profound ways.

Even pretending that those demographic trends are not forcing a change in the participation rate, a drop in the participation rate can also be interpreted as a healthy sign of economic strength. Namely it can be an indicator of new family formation where one parent chooses to stay home. This would be amplified if perhaps there was a demographic bulge at child bearing years. (See the above chart.)

How would you control for such effects? You could calculate the rate of people who are seeking employment but are unable to find it. I think would call it the unemployment rate.

I'm suspicious of miraculous numbers a month before an election! Full employment used to be 5% .Discouraged workers should be included in the rate ! Lots of boomers are working at McDonalds . I do agree with you about the rate rising but not in a healthy way . Tech is replacing workers ...In the next 20 yrs I can see caravans of driverless big rigs and driverless Uber cars. Truckers make 50-80 K plus benefits ,potential savings to companies will be huge! Tech people will be under pressure as well if the current H1B visa progam is expanded.

I know a number of people that have returned for Masters degrees because they were unable to find jobs. So I guess in that sense the rate would be affected .

I have two friends that retired in their 50's both were manufacturing . One got fed up with the lower margins and sold out the other had a great plan . Both are still active with other investments and technically not retired.

It's a bogus number IMHO.

Lets start a go fund me for Scotty . He can be the "Offical AZ snow critic", travel around to Ski areas under cover and do a column.

 

[steamboat1]

Discouraged workers should be included in the rate !

For September U-6 was 9.3% (BLS) & 12.8% (Gallup)

 

[Not Sure]

Keeping things lite

 

[Jully]

I'm suspicious of miraculous numbers a month before an election! Full employment used to be 5% .Discouraged workers should be included in the rate ! Lots of boomers are working at McDonalds . I do agree with you about the rate rising but not in a healthy way . Tech is replacing workers ...In the next 20 yrs I can see caravans of driverless big rigs and driverless Uber cars. Truckers make 50-80 K plus benefits ,potential savings to companies will be huge! Tech people will be under pressure as well if the current H1B visa progam is expanded.

I know a number of people that have returned for Masters degrees because they were unable to find jobs. So I guess in that sense the rate would be affected .

I have two friends that retired in their 50's both were manufacturing . One got fed up with the lower margins and sold out the other had a great plan . Both are still active with other investments and technically not retired.

It's a bogus number IMHO.

Lets start a go fund me for Scotty . He can be the "Offical AZ snow critic", travel around to Ski areas under cover and do a column.

There's always going to be problems, especially with the loss of jobs due to driverless cars or automated manufacturing, but these changes have always been happening and will continue to change the way the economy and workforce operate. See the decline of the small family farm in the 1800s and the decline of the Texas oil industry (until its recent partial resurgence).

But how do you report an accurate state of the economy then? There are issues with both numbers. Yeggous cited the issues with labor force participation rate, and you've laid out issues with unemployment rate and they're both valid. If you look at both numbers, you see that labor force participation is just now beginning to maybe rise again very slowly (though very slowly as seen in the participation rate you posted on the previous page) and you see unemployment rate doing much better. So there's some success but still many problems, especially with the boomer population - see issues with tech, marketing, and manufacturing all discussed already.

For every boomer you know working at Mcdonalds I know a young father laid off between 2007-2009 who has now found a good job in healthcare, education, etc and is responsible for bringing the unemployment rate down as well. I don't think its bogus, I think its flawed just like any other number is. You can't describe the world's largest economy with one number, that's insanity.

 

[dlague]

I'm suspicious of miraculous numbers a month before an election! Full employment used to be 5% .Discouraged workers should be included in the rate ! Lots of boomers are working at McDonalds . I do agree with you about the rate rising but not in a healthy way . Tech is replacing workers ...In the next 20 yrs I can see caravans of driverless big rigs and driverless Uber cars. Truckers make 50-80 K plus benefits ,potential savings to companies will be huge! Tech people will be under pressure as well if the current H1B visa progam is expanded.

I know a number of people that have returned for Masters degrees because they were unable to find jobs. So I guess in that sense the rate would be affected .

I have two friends that retired in their 50's both were manufacturing . One got fed up with the lower margins and sold out the other had a great plan . Both are still active with other investments and technically not retired.

It's a bogus number IMHO.

Lets start a go fund me for Scotty . He can be the "Offical AZ snow critic", travel around to Ski areas under cover and do a column.

This puts what you are saying into perspective!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

 

[Not Sure]

This puts what you are saying into perspective!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

Well done and a bit scary, Bots may decide one day humans are obsolete. Although Horses may have the last laugh,one good solar flare or EMP and it's back to the stone age for us. To the Amish down the road it will be business as usual .

 

[yeggous]

Well done and a bit scary, Bots may decide one day humans are obsolete. Although Horses may have the last laugh,one good solar flare or EMP and it's back to the stone age for us. To the Amish down the road it will be business as usual .

That was well produced. I have to admit I am doing my part to put professional drivers out of business. These are exciting times.


Sent from my iPhone using AlpineZone mobile app

 

[Not Sure]

That was well produced. I have to admit I am doing my part to put professional drivers out of business. These are exciting times.


Sent from my iPhone using AlpineZone mobile app

Skynet goes self aware in 3,2,1

Very curious how navigation is accomplished ? GPS plus optical? infrared? How is rain/snow squalls dealt with ?

 

[yeggous]

Skynet goes self aware in 3,2,1

Very curious how navigation is accomplished ? GPS plus optical? infrared? How is rain/snow squalls dealt with ?

Short answer is that it is achieved by combining several sensors.

In rural areas maps are less accurate, but you don't need as much accuracy with single lane roads with intersections spread out. In these areas, GPS navigation with cameras works fine. Using stereo cameras allows you to detect the range of objects. Infrared vs visible cameras is just a matter of wavelength so the distinction is trivial. I'm not sure what wavelengths they use. Many systems also use radar to help supplement when sun glare becomes a problem, but radar can't resolve obstacles as well.

In urban areas things become more complicated. GPS signals bounce of buildings creating what we call "the urban canyon effect." Currently we're reliant on lidar in urban areas, which also means that roads must have a detailed survey before cars can safely operate there. Lidar has historically been very expensive, but prices are coming down fast. This is one of several reasons why the first fully autonomous cars will likely serve ride sharing companies in urban areas. When we first started working on the systems, Lidars cost $100k each. Today they are down to $8k, and we expect them to come down significantly more.

Right now snow and rain are not a problem -- to a point. The guidance stops working at about the same point where you should probably stop driving too. Optical visibility is the limiting factor, so fog is the more serious concern.

 

[Jully]

In urban areas things become more complicated. GPS signals bounce of buildings creating what we call "the urban canyon effect." Currently we're reliant on lidar in urban areas, which also means that roads must have a detailed survey before cars can safely operate there. Lidar has historically been very expensive, but prices are coming down fast. This is one of several reasons why the first fully autonomous cars will likely serve ride sharing companies in urban areas. When we first started working on the systems, Lidars cost $100k each. Today they are down to $8k, and we expect them to come down significantly more.

Right now snow and rain are not a problem -- to a point. The guidance stops working at about the same point where you should probably stop driving too. Optical visibility is the limiting factor, so fog is the more serious concern.

Lidar coming down has been a wonderful thing in many research areas! GIS and remote sensing has become much more possible due to cheaper lidar. Unfortunately this also lead to FEMA being able to do more in depth analysis of flood zones leading to many people having their homes or businesses being designated as a flood zone causing some anger...