Slowly it is dawning on people that the current economic slump is several crises intertwined: a financial crisis, a fiscal crisis, a housing crisis and simultaneously a restructuring of the economy due to technological change and global competition.
Labor unions, especially in the public sector, don't seem to understand that some government functions are going to go the way to typesetting at newspapers, door to door milk delivery and floppy disk manufacturing. One reason there is so little sympathy for demonstrating public employee unions in places like Wisconsin is that they seem to think they should have retirement and other benefits that are better than those of other workers.
What is happening in the private sector, meanwhile, is not just historic, but history speeding up. Recently I had dinner with four young men in their 30s. Each had a job, but not one had a job that existed ten years ago. Meanwhile, one sees the local video shop close and the live bank tellers and even grocery clerks diminish in number.
Many of us have gotten used to employment obsolescence. I operated an elevator as a college student once upon a time. Remember elevator operators?
Then there are, or were, telephone operators. If you want to talk to a live telephone operator these days, call the U.S. Capitol. Congress will be among the last to let such folk go. (For your Contact List, the Capitol switchboard is 202 224-3121. It's been that number since at least the early 60s, though then there were no area codes and the number was called "CApitol 43121".) Whether run by Republicans or Democrats, Congress still has telephone operators because Members cannot afford to treat voters the way the rest of the government does. Just try getting through to a live voice at the IRS. Some companies (e.g., Netflix) think that their customers are important enough that they should be able to get a real person the line in less than a few minutes. So, even telephone operators--and domestically operated call centers--may yet have a future.
But only the free market can decide. Liberals (aka, Progressives) believe that government can anticipate structural changes and go about creating jobs. It can--but only in Washington, DC and state capitals. But it is really poor at imagining, let alone stimulating, the private sector where productive jobs are found. If it were otherwise, Cuba would be a workers paradise after all.
Regardless of party or current job, one's age or income, we all have a huge stake in the current restructuring. Therefore, give the private sector the freedom to create the jobs of the future--or there won't be many, at all.
http://www.entrepreneur.com/startingabusiness/article184288.html
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