Conversation with Fareed Zakaria
05.04.2008 at 09:12pm
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This comment is in response to “Restoring the American Dream”
I taught math for thirty-seven years. In all that time I never had a parent say that the course work was too easy. Just the opposite–they complained that the course was too hard or the pace was too fast. Parents and students are happy as long as the grades are high, homework doesn’t interfere with after-school jos or family affairs and the students are eligible for extra-curricular activities.
Yes, I would like for the American educational system to be upgraded.It’s true that we need more technical training for our students instead of expecting them to all take the college-prep route. We could learn a lot from the educational systems of other countries.
One last comment: The CEOs said that our workers were not educated well enough for the jobs. Does that include all the assembly-line jobs that our “under-educated” citizens once did so well that we had the best economy in the world? The corporations use this lie as a rationalization for out-sourcing these jobs to cheaper labor.
“The CEOs said that our workers were not educated well enough for the jobs. Does that include all the assembly-line jobs that our “under-educated” citizens once did so well that we had the best economy in the world? The corporations use this lie as a rationalization for out-sourcing these jobs to cheaper labor.” by Kay Hood
I saw and heard the CEO’s say a lot of things. One was the CEO of Google talk about the 7 year cycle of recovery! Marx had a lot to say about the 7 year business cycles (we call it the Bubble Economy these days) and I bet that CEO didn’t even realize he was agreeing with him!
I also heard Fareed say the government cain’t create jobs. Somebody needs to tell him that Atomic Energy,NASA,TVA,the Interstaet highway system were all government jobs programs.
[rant]
There’s no way that low-skill assembly line work could be kept in the US, except at wages nobody but an illegal immigrant would accept. How many Americans would be willing to pay 3-4x the current price for basic, simple manufactured goods? If we don’t allow other countries to sell goods here, they won’t let us sell goods there. Then we lose jobs in the well-paid high skill sectors where we are paid, torpedoing domestic demand and putting the low skill workers out of work too. It just won’t work. Don’t blame the CEOs, that kind of work is just not viable here anymore.
America, and Americans, need to wake up, forget the entitlements, stop pretending that simply being American should be a ticket to the middle class, and compete. As individuals, we have to seek out economically relevant education and training, be creative, be aggressive, and work… like everybody else out there is doing. Dropping out of school or getting an economically irrelevant degree then whinging about guvvermint ain’t gonna cut it.
The problem isn’t just undereducation, it’s miseducation. Why are we drowning in unemployed liberal arts graduates and dropouts when American industry – even at close to 10% unemployment – has a shortage of machinists, precision welders, and many other skilled trades? The average American heavy equipment operator is well over 50… how do we plan to build infrastructure when those guys retire? Young Americans don’t want to work in a factory or drive a front-end loader, even at quite decent pay. They want cushy office jobs, and if they can’t get what they want they’d rather go on the dole than train for a job that’s actually useful and in demand.
Forget the high-pay low-skill assembly line job. Gone away, not coming back, ever. Ancient history. Times they have a’changed, it’s a new world. Evolve, adapt, think, work, compete. This is how societies survive. Whiners go extinct, and they deserve it.
{/rant]
dayuhan I agree with parts of your rant, and tire of the hype that promotes the myth that you can’t make it without a degree, and then push liberal arts degrees! Of course I feel for that and now many years later I realize that its value is very limited compared to real knowledge that contributes to society such as engineering, medicine, and many technical skills. I would have been better off, and more importantly better equipped to contribute to society, if I went to school to learn a real trade.
Parents need to wake up, and stop working two jobs to send their kids to private schools and then a high end liberal arts university just because the Jones next door are pursuing this imaginary path to success. In all likelyhood their kids may very well be better suited to go to a tech school that costs much less and where they’ll learn a valuable trade that will return more on the dollar invested in the education than the liberal art’s degree. Wow, imagine going to a school where you actually learn skills instead of listening to far left leaning professor share his/her naive views of the world?
Our current paradigm for success is broken, and since we seem to be incapable of innovating on our own, we should take a close look at how Germany is educating their folks. It is continuous throughout their lifetimes (and the government plays a role), and it is focused on providing skills for current and emergent requirements in the work force. They have the lowest low employment of any modern nation.
When I look over the political debate school prayers, gay marriage, abortion rights, etc. I see a country divided over personal issues (emotional touch button issues), and very little intellectual debate and discussion on what it will take to get our country back on track. Perhaps our inability to solve complex problems as a nation, and instead resort to name calling, deflamation, and unhelpful talks shows that promote this crap is a sign that our education system as failed completely? We may be too dumb collectively to fix ourselves?
Bill,
Mostly agreed, but I think our economic paradigm is less broken than obsolete. It’s not about fixing it up so it can be what it was before, because it can’t be what it was before. the world has changed and we can neither wall it out not force it back to what it was. In many ways global integration has been a very good thing, creating an incentive for peace and creating opportunities around the world. On the other hand, it means more competition for us.
Nations, like species, must adapt to changing circumstances or go extinct. The world will not stop changing and it won’t go back to being what it was. We have to look forward, not back; choose a direction and pursue it.
I didn’t mean to suggest that government has no place in the process; there are things government can and should do. Trying to keep low-skill assembly line jobs in the US isn’t one of them.
Well, I will certain agree that it is time for the US to stop attempting to “contain” every problem (be it military, ideological or economic) and buckle down and compete. To be competitive in the emerging world we need more young people educated in hard sciences.
Pretty simple fix, instead of pouring the bulk of our resouces into the bottom 20% of the student body, we need to pour it into the top 20%; and then ensure that any of those kids who wants to earn a degree in a hard science gets to do it for free. The nation will earn every penny of that back 100 fold.
We also need to stop bailing out old industries and build new ones instead where we have the ability to compete. I was at a conference on futures and one presenter made the case that when new technological break throughs occur they are initially applied to doing old thing better. This ultimately leads to fewer jobs and causes a major hit on the economy. Then, at some point, those new technologies are applied to doing new things, which then leads to the creation of whole new industries, new jobs and an overall elevation of the economy. We are on the cusp. The question for America is do we want to be the nation that makes that break through, or do we want to work for the nation that makes that break through?
Using new tech to do old things is well exemplified by latest crop of American Billionaires via Google and Facebook. Faster research and easier social connections are the fortunes of today, but both of those are job destroying companies. The billionairs of the coming decades will be standing on the backs of efforts such as this to build job producing companies. Robots can replace unskilled labor; but educated, thinking labor will surge.
I’m optimistic, but we do need to change our perspective, and unleash the power of the American people to best prepare for and win this competition.
Bob,
Great post, and if possible could you please send a couple of examples that demonstrate:
“when new technological break throughs occur they are initially applied to doing old thing better. This ultimately leads to fewer jobs and causes a major hit on the economy. Then, at some point, those new technologies are applied to doing new things, which then leads to the creation of whole new industries, new jobs and an overall elevation of the economy.”
At risk of sounding like a socialist, I think the government should assist with education across the spectrum. Focusing on the top 20% or bottom 20% is already a model that is leading to a degradation in our standing. I want to read more on Germany’s system, they seemed to have cracked the code for their nation.
I think the human race is on the cusp of developing many new industries, but most will be knowledge based industries and we’ll need more than 20% of our population qualified to participate in them.
The Speaker was David Pearce Snyder, probably best to go to his site at http://www.the-futurist.com/