[Closed] Can there ever be full employment

Wouldn't full employment mean that demand for employees would outstrip supply, causing escalation of wages and thus inflation spiralling out of control? Though your idea is nice...

IIRC socialist germany came close, but there may have been bigger problems there...

Communism?

Obviously not, as some people don't want to work. oh - and before anyone explodes at that, I actually have some friends who are very much of that opinion and do a pretty good job of it...

Rachel

Of course it is possible. Certainly close to full employment.

What would the folk in the job centre do? They are all ****less eejits - would you let them loose anywhere important?

Surely the dole office would have to made redundant? 😕

EDIT. Doh! 15 seconds too slow.

TandemJeremy - Member

Of course it is possible. Certainly close to full employment.

No such thing unless you want to be my slave. 😆

What would the folk in the job centre do? They are all ****less eejits - would you let them loose anyewhere important?

A troll is supposed to be a bit more subtle SbZ, not written to make the poster sound like a bit of a ****less eejit

How are the tractor production statistics, comrade?

We could, but we would have to move along way from our current social structures and economic model to achieve it.

Firstly there is work to be done, if society will pay for it, I am sure we would all love to see more doctors and nurses providing first rate care for everyone. More teachers and smaller class sizes, greater research of future technology, better roads, better transport, cleaner streets etc etc etc.

Paying for it is the hard part, but the world is rich enough to do it, or at least the western world is, and to be honest it would probably bring the rest of the world up to our living standards quicker than continuing down the current path.

Try and get a dutch man to work over time .....

Out side their contracted hours they arw taxed very heavy

Thus employers employ more staff ...

This country gives away far too much free time ..... Clock in at 8 out at 4.30 ill only work longer for more money or time in leiu - i work for you you are not my friend

Surely having competent, intelligent, motivated people is part of it too? Not everyone can train to be a doctor, teacher, nurse, low-temperature fusion researcher, barman, zumba teacher.

Still, I'd imagine that the streets would be very clean.

trail_rat for PM.

Obviously not, as some people don't want to work.

That is very easily resolved - once you have enough jobs for everyone, ie no unemployment, then there is no longer any need for "unemployment benefit" and it is scrapped. Of course they can't be forced to work, but they might go hungry.

I like your ideas btw project, except for staying at school until 20. And it would still need imo for jobs to be "created". But we haven't reached a stage in society where everything that needs to be done, has, or is, being done, so that really isn't a problem.

Surely having competent, intelligent, motivated people is part of it too? Not everyone can train to be a doctor, teacher, nurse, low-temperature fusion researcher, barman, zumba teacher.

Well those that succeed like to perpetuate the myth that its all down to hard work, and that they are the creators of their own success (or at least the ones that are given a platform to talk about success, which tends to be wealthy businessmen and entertainers) the reality is in most cases its opportunity that makes the difference, create greater opportunity and more people can become those things.

But it needs a shift in ideology, not communism, but placing greater importance on education, health, science and society rather than just a world where greed wins.

Of course we could have full employment

However I'm afraid some of us would not be in a job we really wanted to do, with little or no career prospects, and an unfulfilling job with no prospect of escape

or do you think those shelves at Tesco's are going to stack themselves ?

25% of the population jobless. average week 48 hrs. share the work around - bingo - 36 hr weeks for everyone.

[i]IIRC socialist germany came close, but there may have been bigger problems there...[/i]

Yep, they turned up but had nothing to do.

Only based on experience of the company I worked for buying an ex-GDR cement plant.

Full employment though usually doesn't mean 100%, but 95%-ish.

or do you think those shelves at Tesco's are going to stack themselves

Thing is, if shelf stacking at Tesco's paid a decent wage, enough to buy a house raise a couple of kids, go to the Alps once a year and buy a mountain bike or two, plenty of people would be happy for a stress free job that allows them to concentrate on their own life and their family instead of being sucked into the rat race.

The presumption seems to be that people who are unemployed are usually unemployed. A minority of people unemployed at any time have been unemployed for a year or more, only 2% ( less than 0.1% of the working age population) have been unemployed continuously for 2 years. And while long term unemployment keeps being described as a growing problem the number of long-termers is half what it was 10 years ago.

Its more common that people are in and out of work, some of the big employers seem to insist of certain jobs, particularly their more poorly paid ones being temporary, even though those temporary roles seem to exist permanently.

The presumption seems to be that people who are unemployed are usually unemployed.

No, the assumption is that there aren't enough jobs for everyone so as a result there is a constant pool of labour looking for work. Very handy if you want to keep wages down. But not very handy if you want consumers with money in their pockets.

Has it occurred to anyone the importance of open borders in this discussion?

How come there are millions of people who have come here and have been able to find work, while the people already here, seemingly cannot find a job?

How come there are millions

millions?

Is that millions of skilled workers that come here and millions of school leavers who can't find work ?

Macruisikeen - Wiki stats for 2010 as follows:

UK population - 62,008 k
Foreign born - 7,012 K (11.3 %)
Of Which - EU: 2,245k (3.6%)
Non EU: 4,767k (7.7 %)

So, yeah, Millions.

Ernie - I've seen plenty of skilled people move into the UK, loads in fact, scientists, nurses, plumbers, carpenters, all sorts.

A quick trip to my local garage/tesco/pret a manger would also [i]suggest[/i] that there's a fair number of unskilled migrants in the mix as well.

How many of them are the result of recent movements though?

The non eu figures suggest to me that the majority are the result of the recruitment drives from commonwealth countries in the 50's 60's and 70's, which is different than suggesting that current unemployment is affected in any significant way by open borders.

we could have a really big army...

A quick trip to my local garage/tesco/pret a manger would also suggest that there's a fair number of unskilled migrants in the mix as well.

You want to take a quick trip to all the building sites I've been working on recently, most of the general labourers appear to be British born kids.

Zulu, are they unskilled migrants or are they skilled/professional but unable to get a position that suits their level of education and training?

I've seen plenty of skilled people move into the UK

and how many leave? theres no shortage of uk citizens working abroad who post on this forum

Zulu, are they unskilled migrants or are they skilled/professional [s]but unable to get a position that suits their level of education and training?[/s] who are willing to knuckle down and work hard, regardless?

Good question IDave, I dunno

But you wonder why someone who's a skilled professional from another country would choose to come here and work at Tesco's stacking shelves for minimum wage, when we can't even get our own unemployed to do it...

Makes you think eh?

because they can take that money home and put it towards a house or local business, i.e a future but the uk worker will not beable to do this as easily, hence less motivation of a future.

Zulu, are they unskilled migrants or are they skilled/professional but unable to get a position that suits their level of education and training?

To be fair that happens to British born people too. The young general labourer on my present site has a university degree (computers) but works sweeping up. He takes a train and three buses to get to work which costs him £10 a day and takes 2 hours each way. He is just above the minimum wage. He's self-employed and works through an agency so doesn't get paid any extras such as holidays, including bank holidays. He regularly gets laid off for a day or two every week because they "don't need him" so he just sits at home when that happens. He was getting paid until 5 o'clock but they have now knocked an hour off, although they expect him to work for free until about 4.30 which he does because he doesn't want to lose his job. The tiler (ceramic) on the site has a degree in astronomy.

What we need is a war. A bloody big one! And none of this nonsense with remote controlled drones and smart weapons. We need some good old-fashioned trench warfare with forced conscription, bayonet charges and hacking off your own gangreneous limbs and stuff. That'll soon stop the lazy sods moaning about having to do a few weeks in Tesco.

Invading Iran would get my vote!

[b]TandemJeremy - Member

Of course it is possible. Certainly close to full employment. [/b]

But only through state interference.

State benevolence always leads to state malevolence.

[i]But only through state interference.

State benevolence always leads to state malevolence.

[/i]

And fraud and bad practice, in fact based upon current events...

But only through state interference.

The state interferes at every level of the economy. Or did you think that George Osborne didn't have a job?

Well those that succeed like to perpetuate the myth that its all down to hard work, and that they are the creators of their own success (or at least the ones that are given a platform to talk about success, which tends to be wealthy businessmen and entertainers) the reality is in most cases its opportunity that makes the difference, create greater opportunity and more people can become those things.

Doctors, teachers, nurses, low-temperature fusion researchers? Are you sure? Isn't it the people who've made lots of money without any particular qualifications who push the line about hard work, rather than the average paid highly skilled who do jobs most people couldn't actually do. You're confusing level of remuneration with difficulty of doing the job there - something there's not necessarily that good a correlation between.

How come there are millions of people who have come here and have been able to find work, while the people already here, seemingly cannot find a job?

This has been touched on in another thread. Companies would rather take skilled/experienced personnel from other countries, rather than train someone who has the qualifications, but not the track record.

Well those that succeed like to perpetuate the myth that its all down to hard work, and that they are the creators of their own success

People don't solely create their own success.

Doctors, teachers, nurses, low-temperature fusion researchers? Are you sure? Isn't it the people who've made lots of money without any particular qualifications who push the line about hard work, rather than the average paid highly skilled who do jobs most people couldn't actually do. You're confusing level of remuneration with difficulty of doing the job there - something there's not necessarily that good a correlation between.

Nope, I know lots of intelligent people who never had the opportunity to go into higher education, people who could have easily got degrees. Its about building an education system that expects success, smaller classes, nurturing talent and intelligence andd an expectancy of higher education for all, give everyone the opportunity not just the middle classes.

Low unemployment = good
No unemployment = bad

Imagine full employment. Companies are unable to recruit. Or expand. Or employ people with new skills. Wages rise, public spending increases, inflation rises, growth is stunted. Imagine your wages doubling, but then finding the shops empty as there are not enough employees to design/assemble/transport the products, and anything you can buy, you have to queue for ages to pay as they are short on staff.

Extreme example, I admit, but Crawley did have a period years back where there were not enough people available to work, and it was a problem for businesses.

If you class 16 hours a week on minimum wage as a job - maybe. Of course this leave you with less money in your pocket than being on the dole... Especially if you're under 23 and get less working tax credits.

I was luck enough to have an ace apprenticeship but looking around my workplace at the number of guys 10 or less years from retirement (lots) 27 to 40 year olds in the middle of their career (a few) and Apprentices / Trainees (1 or 2). I think we're gonna have a problems really quite soon...

or do you think those shelves at Tesco's are going to stack themselves ?

I'm sure they're working on it.

I'm afraid the main issue is there isn't enough real work to keep everybody gainfully employed 38 hours a week (that should be 4 days not 5 btw) from 21 to 65. And that driving to the office every day to sit on the internet isn't really efficient in terms of resources and productivity.

I know lots of intelligent people who never had the opportunity to go into higher education

Really? I thought the universities accepted people from any background nowadays. What exactly was it that stopped them going and becoming a doctor?

Really? I thought the universities accepted people from any background nowadays. What exactly was it that stopped them going and becoming a doctor?

Yes, they probably would have been easily accepted into university if that's the direction they had been channelled in by parents and education. If the influences and advice isn't there to direct a person in that path, then its much less likely to happen.

So the opportunity was there then, they just didn't take it.

Real opportunity is more than arbitrary rules.

Can there ever be full employment ?

Has the idea ever formed part of the election promises of any party ?

Be pretty difficult to achieve if the govt. of the day doesn't want to achieve it.

Occupational and geographical immobility of labour means we will never have 0% unemployment.

Japan has pretty much full employment. A lot of jobs are non-jobs, like having old fellas standing at traffic lights doing hand signals that duplicate what the traffic lights are telling you, and guards stationed at 5m intervals round building sites. Still, everyone seems to have a role, and everyone seems content.

TJ - 25% of the population jobless. average week 48 hrs. share the work around - bingo - 36 hr weeks for everyone.

1. Do you know many people who would be willing to reduce their income by 25% so someone else can have a job too?

2. Do you know many people who could afford to continue spending at current rates (and therefore "supporting the economy") if their income fell by 25%? (Yes the unemployed would also be working but on average they would be earning 25% less than todays average earners so not affluent).

3. Many of those people working 48h weeks are only contracted to do 35h weeks, and not paid any overtime. So they would really not want to cut their salary to work their contracted ours. Employers would need to find 25% more money to pay for the extra staff. Tax would need to increase to cover that in the public sector whilst the cost of goods in shops would go up in the real world. At a time when salaries would be falling!

4. Tax revenue would fall. Whilst people coming off benefits would start paying tax; income taxes are biased towards higher earnings. Reducing everyones earnings by 25% has a disproportionate effect on tax.

5. You don't have enough skilled people to take up the slack in the skilled area of the market. Do you really want the long term unskilled unemployed (unemployable?) filling the gap in the services you want to receive? We'd end up increasing migration to get vaguely competent people to fill the roles.

Now we don't actually have 25% unemployment (its about 8% - and only just over 1/2 of those claim benefit).

Finally - why do people seem to think stacking shelves at Tesco is badly paid. If you worked TJ's 48 hr week stacking shelves you'd earn about £17k a year (possibly more for Sundays etc!).

Full employment can only be achieved if I put everyone to hard labour ... in fact there will be world wide labour shortage if I become the Uber Living God Dearest of the Dear Dictator. 😈

poly - Member

TJ - 25% of the population jobless. average week 48 hrs. share the work around - bingo - 36 hr weeks for everyone.

thats far too simplistic an approach though.

1. Do you know many people who would be willing to reduce their income by 25% so someone else can have a job too?

2. Do you know many people who could afford to continue spending at current rates (and therefore "supporting the economy") if their income fell by 25%? (Yes the unemployed would also be working but on average they would be earning 25% less than todays average earners so not affluent).

3. Many of those people working 48h weeks are only contracted to do 35h weeks, and not paid any overtime. So they would really not want to cut their salary to work their contracted ours. Employers would need to find 25% more money to pay for the extra staff. Tax would need to increase to cover that in the public sector whilst the cost of goods in shops would go up in the real world. At a time when salaries would be falling!

4. Tax revenue would fall. Whilst people coming off benefits would start paying tax; income taxes are biased towards higher earnings. Reducing everyones earnings by 25% has a disproportionate effect on tax.

5. You don't have enough skilled people to take up the slack in the skilled area of the market. Do you really want the long term unskilled unemployed (unemployable?) filling the gap in the services you want to receive? We'd end up increasing migration to get vaguely competent people to fill the roles.

Now we don't actually have 25% unemployment (its about 8% - and only just over 1/2 of those claim benefit).

Finally - why do people seem to think stacking shelves at Tesco is badly paid. If you worked TJ's 48 hr week stacking shelves you'd earn about £17k a year (possibly more for Sundays etc!).
Posted 14 minutes ago

Economies throughout the Western World are in a mess precisely because of economic inequality, and the ridiculous attempt to deal with that issue by providing easy credit.

And no single thing contributes more to economic inequality than mass unemployment.

[url= http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/roubini43/English ]The Instability of Inequality[/url]

[i]"Firms in advanced economies are now cutting jobs, owing to inadequate final demand, which has led to excess capacity, and to uncertainty about future demand. But cutting jobs weakens final demand further, because it reduces labor income and increases inequality. Because a firm’s labor costs are someone else’s labor income and demand, what is individually rational for one firm is destructive in the aggregate.

The result is that free markets don’t generate enough final demand. In the US, for example, slashing labor costs has sharply reduced the share of labor income in GDP. With credit exhausted, the effects on aggregate demand of decades of redistribution of income and wealth – from labor to capital, from wages to profits, from poor to rich, and from households to corporate firms – have become severe, owing to the lower marginal propensity of firms/capital owners/rich households to spend."[/i]

ernie_lynch - Member

But only through state interference.

The state interferes at every level of the economy. Or did you think that George Osborne didn't have a job?

I did not mention anything about George Osborne.
In fact I have not really thought about George Osborne for a while until you mentioned him, personally I find him an abhorrent little toff.

theres no shortage of uk citizens working abroad who post on this forum