Half Sigma reflects on the fact that only about 8% of all working Americans are in the manufacturing sector and the majority is employed in health care, education and public service. So few people works in agriculture that he doesnt even mention them.
It follows that the loss of manufacturing jobs in America does not add much to unemployment and vice versa, the revival of manufacturing will not bust employment. Simply, manufacturing is so efficient and automatic that needs ever fewer workers. America is the number one agricultural and manufacturing country in the world, but its productivity is so high that employ few people.
I imagine that the future will be like farming in Israel, where more people are employed by the Ministry of Agriculture and the Faculty of Agriculture than there are actual commercial farmers.
At the personal level, work opportunities for water engineers are mostly in the public sector, where salaries are withing the range of 2500 to 3500 dollars a month. Independent consulting engineers rarely earn more. The best salaries are in sectors where the workers are unionized, like health, public employees, education, banking. The strongest unions are in Mekorot the Water Company, the Electric Company and the Ports Authority, where engineers earn about 5,000 - 6,000 dollars a month. In fragmented sectors like the food industry, salaries are very low.
11 comments:
The problem is that it's fundamentally impossible to sustain an economy where no one makes anything and everyone is just a bureaucrat or a medical professional or makes hamburgers. There's an old joke where someone asks an immigrant about how they made a living in the Old Country and he replies "we all took in each other's laundry". This is not really the basis for a strong economy.
K
So what is the optimal manufacturing base to retain in the USA?
Anon.
"So what is the optimal manufacturing base to retain in the USA?"
Looking at the successful example of Germany, I'd say we'd be better off with closer to 20% of Americans working in manufacturing.
Germany exports maybe 2/3 of it auto production. I don't think that's in the cars for the US.
K
K
It is a vast (and malicious) exaggeration that America manufactures nothing. It is still the largest manufacturing country in the world. Much more than Germany or China. It is productivity that has grown so much that its relative importance has diminished. Like agriculture.
While only a small number of people in the agricultural sector describe themselves as farmers, the farming sector and its ancillary industries employs perhaps ten times as that number. This includes the John Deeres, Cargills, Monsantos and government scientists. All in the US agricultural sector generates employment for close to twenty million people. It is not by any means a small sector.
Would classify John Deere as agriculture?
While the US is still a manufacturing country, entire industries have almost completely disappeared - garment and shoe manufacturing, television and other consumer electronics, small appliances, telephones, watches, housewares , etc. Other industries are either bankrupt or foreign controlled - e.g. the auto industry. Others are fading fast - furniture. It's not a promising picture - you have to look at the direction and momentum, not just the static picture.
K
The garment, shoe and furniture industries are all low tech and should be allowed to go overseas.
Israel has a positive balance of trade and as far as I know Israel exports almost none of the items that you listed. America has an Ashkenazi upper class the way Israel does, but even if we didn't we could maintain a positive balance of trade with some adjustments. In fairness if we did not have an Ashkenazi upper class our ability to export high-tech would be much smaller than it is now, but we could at least maintain a positive balance of trade, since both Scandinavia and Brazil are able to do so.
North Carolina, which used to be a center of the American automobile industry has made great efforts to become a high tech center to the extent it can.
John Deere is both agri and lawnmowers, and utility vehicles used by farmers and landscapers and others alike, etc.
Mark said...
North Carolina, which used to be a center of the American automobile industry has made great efforts to become a high tech center to the extent it can.
I'm sorry, that was an extremely stupid comment of me. I meant to say cabinetmaking and textile industries and instead I had Detroit on the brain when we were talking about the loss of industries.
Nonetheless, North Carolina is the home of Research Triangle Park.
Post a Comment