The TUC has explained why we're in recession despite the unemployment not being as bad as expected:
A new TUC reports shows that seventy-nine percent of net job creation since June 2010 has taken place in industries where the average wage is less than £7.95 an hour. Just over one in five new employee jobs created since June 2010 have been in the highly paid computer programming, consultancy and related services industries, where the average hourly wage is £18.40. In the middle paid industries, which account for nearly three quarters of the UK workforce and where the average is between £7.95 and £17.40 per hour, there has been no net job creation since June 2010.
If the vast majority of new private sector jobs have been low paid unsurprisingly the net impact has been a reduced household capacity to spend and an increase in inequality between a small leite and the rest in the country - both being massively destructive to well being, whilst fuelling demand for many beenfits that are paid to those in work because the private sector does not pay enough to ensure people can afford l to live on what they are paid.
Let's not then pretend there is any private sector cure to our current ills if this is the direction of travel - unless increasing poverty is the desired policy goal, because there isn't on the basis of this evidence.
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Interesting yet unsurprising result from research by the TUC. Why wasn’t it the result of research by the Labour party? You would think it would be a fine hammer to beat the coalition with, when they crow about all the jobs that have been created on their watch.
Labour In Name Only indeed…
Labour? Thank heavens Bob Crow has the full measure of them! It is well overdue for the Unions to drop Labour like the proverbial Pork Pie at a barmitzvah!
Computer Programming is the “new clerical” .
It used to be highly paid but the packages for most software developers are way behind for instance police constables and police sergeants .
There will likely be long periods out of work and ageism curtailing your career by the age of 55 – it’s a mugs game .
The UK no longer has much of a software development industry . Software Houses have for as long as I can remember been categorised as a service industry when in reality it is manufacturing .
University Bursars have pointed out that the employment prospects for computer science graduates are especially bad .
Things are about to get even worse for UK Computer Science and Software Engineering graduates looking for their first job .
The current and previous govt and E.U. have agreed to issue massive numbers of I.C.T. visas to Indian outsourcing giants in exchange for giving UK Banks access to Indian markets .
This cheap labour from overseas won’t pay any UK N.I. so everyone will be subsidising the companies which engage them .
I couldn’t recommend anyone to pursue a career in software . It’s a mugs game .
Am left shaking my head when politicians are talking about it as if it’s one of the jobs of the future .
The jobs for the future must surely be ones that create social and economic improvement: Sustainable housing,transport and locally sourced food supplies not to mention a banking system that keeps money in communities. The high-tech junk world will always be outsourced to parts of the world that need to focus on their own sustainability issues.
Plenty of I.T. is absolutely essential and socially useful .
Government bodies have implemented some very successful I.T. systems . It’s a pity that the failures get all the attention .
Of course there are good developers in India but they aren’t the ones that most Western companies end up with working on their projects – because their number one criteria is price .
The misapprehension that I.T. systems are a commodity has lead to a lowering of quality .
My field is representation of data and database management systems and in my opinion the field stopped developing in about 1995 .
The so called “progress” in that area since has been investment to maintain the status quo – to protect previous investments in technological dead ends like SQL and XML when it could have gone into a new true relational data sub-language .
A lot of what passes for education is actually training in specific vendors tools . Consequently the market is not discerning enough to know that there could be something better and is happy to be spoon fed by big vendors like Oracle and Microsoft .
The last chance of innovation in the field died when Ingres was bought by Computer Associates .
I acknowledge that “what goes around comes around” and that computer systems have over the years put a lot of people out of work .
On the other hand there is also a case to be made that mechanisation has been a force for good . Some would claim it helped end slavery – machines becoming more cost effective than bonded labour .
I would second that, as a retired software engineer. I was made redundant from the local branch of a well-known firm in 2005 and many others followed me out of the door. The last time I worked, as a contractor at a software house the majority of the workforce had been shipped in from Bangalore. The super-rich Sikh owner provided them with all necessities and was paying them minimal rates. That was the trend then – it’s almost universal now.
I recently advised a friend’s son not to take a computing degree because that is most definitely not the future.
Carol ,
I think you were right to discourage him from taking such a subject .
If it’s right for him and he’s among the minority who are equipped to make a success of it against all the odds then what you said won’t have deterred him .
My friends other half is a teacher and she spends a lot of out of school time marking and preparing lessons but for those with a calling it looks like a good choice .
I’ve not met anyone who chose the teaching profession for the money but I reckon the long term trend will be that the remuneration for teachers will increase – as parents become ever more desperate to believe that education is the ticket to a better life .
(which is only partially true of course because fundamentally the game is rigged so you can’t win !)
Were you able to offer him any alternatives ?
carol – where are the job futures? Without a green agenda and a revolution in housing I think many young people will flock to banking which shows no sign of reform as yet. I’m attracted to the idea of a zero growth economy that ticks over in a sustainable way. Work would be worthwhile because you could witness it adding to social well-being. At present most people can’t.
hear Duncam Smith in an atrocious interview on the dumbeddown beeb this morning; he bleated on about the private sector creating all these supposed jobs. When reminded of the recent misuse of statistics debacle he substituted the verb ‘belief’ for ‘know’ which at least reveals that ideology is the true psychological force – no reference, of course, to the housing speculation disaster that is at the root of wrecked lives. At least he know says ‘I believe’….thought he was about to burst into song!
I think this is evidence that the Unions could spend the money they raise far more effectively than simply contributing to the coffers of the LINO party.
Recovery ?
http://touchstoneblog.org.uk/2013/07/britains-unbalanced-recovery-a-round-up
There is surely a limit to the quantity of industries and companies which are profitable enough to pay significantly higher wages .
Outside this group there is another group , maybe even larger , of industries and companies including most SME’s which just aren’t that profitable – they are what they are and you can’t get blood out of a stone .
What could be done for those other than to lower premises costs and ensure large competitors are not getting an advantage by not paying their tax ?
There seems to be much greater scope for improving matters by lowering the cost of living than for most companies to increase wages .
What about the state paying a living wage to everyone ?
See http://classonline.org.uk/docs/2013_Policy_Paper_-_Richard_Murphy__Howard_Reed_(Social_State_-_Idleness.pdf
Bill Mitchell has written an interesting post on this topic: “The British agenda to bring workers to their knees is well advanced” (
http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=24671 )