h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Who else would like to see a survey of those in and out of jobs; how many are home grown, how many are from outside and who are the ones struggling trying to find something? should we be looking after our own countries people first? or should homegrown people be looking for jobs in other countries?

So you would like to know if "THEY" are taking our jobs, homes and women then? Right?

"should homegrown people be looking for jobs in other countries?"

Why not?

Should there be a minimum wage throughout the EU?

I benefit from the EU "free movement of goods & services" by living and working, without extra permits that Germans don't have - so I'm obviously not going to say "we should give jobs to 'homegrown' applicants only"

Minimum wage throughout the EU? what? a set number of Euros per hour or percentage of average wages? Weighted for the local cost of living?

Obviously I'm no economist, but isn't this something the EU is working towards?

If we raise the minimum wage in Poland (for example) to the equivalent of £6 an hour, businesses will instantly scream they can't afford it. But prices would rise as well. Everything would level out fairly quickly wouldn't they?

but do we want that? Companies who are relocating to (or building factories in) Poland will just go further east.

We're currently building a factory in Poland. I am 100% convinced that when it's up and running my job will be moved. Without me as I can't just grab the Gruesomes out of primary school here and expect them to cope.

Which means yep one Polish person employed. But I'll be out of a job forever (probably)

Do we want that repeated on a huge scale?

My worry (and in principle, I should add, I believe firmly in a minimum wage) is that eventually all the jobs in manufacturing etc will go away from Western Europe. But who will buy what's being produced in these far off factories?

Added to that: I still meet Germans (we have high unemployment here) who will not (mostly fairly recent graduates) or can not (with family commitments) take certain jobs because they have to work inconveniet hours for fairly low wages. Who does these jobs? Mostly immigrants who have been working elsewhere for much less money.

There's no simple answer.

I don't believe that there is a simple answer. I have Greek friends in Limassol. They took us to a restaurant. They spoke Greek to the waiters who did not understand them. The waiters came from the Ukraine as cheap labour as it was more costly to hire Greek staff.
I am 56, I have been looking for a job since March. I am either too old, or they look at my uni education and I'm too qualified, or not the right qualifications. I don't know have answer to the job market, I just keep on applying for work.

I would be surprised it Poland has the economy to cope with a UK-level minimum wage yet. I don't think it'd just be a case of prices adapting.

I wouldn't be too worried about outsourcing from the point of view of western economies - its not a zero-sum game where there's only a certain amount of economic growth to go around between countries.

Consider Japan: started as an outsourcing ground producing volume cheap goods. They almost certainly took our jobs. Now its probably the world leader for electronics technology, and has an excellent reputation for high quality and efficient engineering. They probably took a few more of our jobs there too. Has this cycle in Japan been bad for western economies?

And when people talk about solving third world poverty by investment, they mean outsourcing and building their factories there because of cheap labour.

but what is good for the economy as a whole isn't necessarily best for the man on the street.

I see in my company that we can sell whatever we produce and still the customers want more - but we have to keep costs down so each of us is working more and more for relatively less & less. Zero pay rises mean that we realistically get less now than last year.

And at some point, as yet unspecified the jobs will move east. But the product sell in the west. Who can afford it, though?

When I speak about third world investment I don't mean outsourcing necessarily - I would prefer that for those countries their biggest export wasn't their people (as I'm seeng now from Estonia, for example) and that their natural resources are sold for a realistic price - and not pushed down just so the people in the west who still have jobs can afford to buy ever more products.

But I have no idea what the answer is.

to answer the original question, I have a job.

oh yeah. me too.

I am currently without a job, but that's by my own choice. I am not from the UK, I live in scotland.

My new job is starting in october, I will have been without a job then for almost 2 months. No benefit, just saved money to bridge the gap to give myself some time to get a number of things done and look for a place to live in my new place of work.

Yes I think people should be mobile to move from one country to another.

No I don't think a europe-wide minimum wage is a good idea. Not now anyway, the difference between one country and the next is too big. Or maybe I was unlucky in choosing the UK and is that the only odd one out. I earn the same here as I would in my home country, but *everything* is much more expensive here. And that's probably one of the countries with a relatively small difference.

If the economies of the various country get more aligned, ie if prices become comparable, then yes we could move to a uniform minimum wage. But to do it earlier than that is cheating out on people.

...
or have a missed a crucial point and would such a wage be expressed in terms of the local standard of living or something similar? (directly related to the price of bread?)

Lizard King

So what about the Peugeot plant in Coventry ? Its being closed and the jobs relocated to a new plant in Poland - built with EU grants.

Its all very well to talk about a global economy, but until there is a global cost base, and similar legislation throughout the world, jobs will continue to follow the cheapest/most flexible labour pool.

Can you imagine being told - "sorry I'm making you redundant there's a chap in the next town will do the job cheaper." There would be uproar. Change town to country and off we go.

that's exactly what is happening. The companies move, and earn more money for the shareholders, the wage-slaves get shafted. And all the while the politicians are bleating about how the economy is growing.

For the upper echelons, maybe.

But the point of the economy growing, is 1) possibility of better wellfare provision for those out of work, and 2) more new jobs, and better paid, than those lost tend to be created.

Whereas trying to keep the jobs in the country with the highly priced workforce through protectionism or subsidies is just delaying the inevitable and throwing good money after bad.

but there isn't better welfare is there? there are cuts cuts cuts and more cuts.

As long as the gap is widening, and most of us are on the bottom of the heap (and we know how difficult it is to get out of that for the kids) then I don't give a stuff how fat the cats are getting. I care about all those drudge filled lives of those people whose existence can be thrown into complete mind-numblingly horrible chaos by the arrival of one unexpectedly huge bill.

Where are the better jobs ?

In call centres ?

What exactly are the 50% of the population who aren't graduates going to do in future ?

They won't be on the production lines, or in the componant factories, or down the pits, or in the shipyards.

play the role of extras in music videos, movies, shows, etc. about dystopian futuristic societies in which a large percentage of the uneducated population are un-employable?