<Rita Old Comment Thread 2 The Oil Drum The MMS numbers illustrate the problem [UPDATED 9/23]>

36 comments on The solutions to the problem are not always simple

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dex3703 on September 23, 2005 - 12:55am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Hold on a minute, poppa. Yes there are lots of fools who get into college with their marginal grades and SATs and graduate with a marketing or mass communications degree. There are also plenty of people who went into the sciences and got real degrees and are working at Target just like the mass communications types.

I got a degree in English, which is hard to use, since in my jobs the  people I've had to please have had English so bad they can't see what the problem is with how whatever incomprehensible copy is written. I currently work at a temporary contractor job for a Large Software Company (yes, that one), where hundreds of people with those ostensibly advanced degrees from India have put the project months and millions behind schedule, and made it a fucked up ugly mess.

Computer science departments have been contracting at almost 20% a year for several years now, because students figure what's the point of working hard to lose out in future work to some unwashed visa holder who'll work 20 hours a day for peanuts. Might as well do something more fun and work at Target.

I didn't know how well I really was doing in math and science. If I'd known how competent most people with those degrees are now I would've squeaked through college calculus with confidence.

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step back on September 23, 2005 - 1:22am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
You can still pass calculus now, through at-home, on net education.

There are 6 BILLION people on this planet. 5.9 billion of them work for either Target or Wal-Mac. Therfore you are an infinitessmely small element in the overall squeeze of things. As we grow to a population of 9 BILLION by year 2050, the planet will be pushed to new "limits" and it will "converge" toward its ultimate solution.

Cheers.

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PaulS on September 23, 2005 - 7:59am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
"If I'd known how competent..."

Absolutely: the social attitudes and dodgy degrees are not necessarily exclusive to particular subjects. It's a fairly safe bet that some of those responsible - at each and every level of government - for the hurricane-related failures held very expensive MBA or Finance degrees. And even "hard" degrees like Computer Science don't necessarily guarantee competence these days.

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ericy on September 23, 2005 - 9:56am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

There is a huge difference between a person who is "book smart" and a person who will be productive in the real world.  In my current field (CS), lots of people come out of school with horrible problem solving skills, and couldn't think outside of the box if their lives depended upon it.  They apparently managed to pass their classes simply by rote memorization, and have trouble stepping back and getting the big picture.

I have had many discussions with people about whether problem solving is an inate ability, or whether it is something that can be learned.  We have never really come up with a satisfactory answer, but tend to lead towards the "inate ability".

I imagine it to be the same in many other fields.  People who can merely learn by rote, and parrot stuff back are always going to be at the bottom rungs.  Some recognize their limitations and become managers (the pointy-haired boss) :-).

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step back on September 23, 2005 - 1:22pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
It is much worse than that ericy.

I was a working stiff engineer (hardware/software interfaces) for many years. Then I "defected" and went into a field where adherence to the laws of Mother Nature is not required. All you have to do is "persuade" other humans in order to consider yourself as being "successful".

Most of our "modern" society (Adam Smith society) is based on one human being B.S.ing another human being.

Many of us negotiate "fair" prices for stuff. Very few human beings do "real" stuff anymore in the USA. We are all virtual. Your plumber deals with the real stuff, and your other craftsmen do too. However, very often you will run across massive populations of people where no one knows how to pick up a screwdriver and turn it in the right direction or what makes the car "go".

In the computer field, I am astounded by how many practitioners do not understand that their "code" is usless unless there is physical hardware to execute it. We have each become so "specialized" as Adam Smith suggested we do, to the point that we are clueless as to how the world comes together into an operative whole. It all seems to happen by "magic". After a while, we and the bozzos we put in the White House start believing in "magic" and "intelligent design". We/They have no clue. How sad.

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tom deplume on September 23, 2005 - 5:36pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
My baby brother went to all the trouble and expense of getting a computer science degree. He worked for a local furniture manufacturer for 15 years. New management figured out a way to eliminate his position. He's now assistant manager of a McDonalds.
Schools don't and shouldn't teach for jobs that no longer exist.
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step back on September 24, 2005 - 3:09am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
At some point there will be no jobs for anybody, even at McDonalds.

We let "They who are in power" dump their psycho-babble on us about what a great job "they" are doing managing the Gulf Coast and others of "their" assets in this "ownership society". Alan Greenspin keeps crowing about improvements in "productivity" and big gains in GDP. But all those "productivity" gains mean that McDee can run a store with fewer and fewer people, thereby increasing "profits" for the corporation and screwing the little people out of yet more jobs. Soon, no more jobs for any of the people, no matter what your skills set is.

Remember when the government advised your little brother to go get the education for that "high tech" job by studying computer science? He followed their advice didn't he? They gave him a loan to do it, right? Then someone grabbed the money in the "education" sector and ran away. Now where are all those noble folk who value "values" and evade evaluation of themselves for all their screw-ups? Oops, they are in the White House.

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36 comments on The solutions to the problem are not always simple

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