Posted on 08/28/2018 3:44:31 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The Trump economy has delivered strong growth and low unemployment — now the challenge is to keep it all going.
Cutting taxes and clearing out burdensome regulations offer businesses better incentives to invest but as in Tinkerbell’s admonitions to Wendy, Americans have to believe for it to happen.
Despite relentless criticism from Democrats on the Hill, the liberal-dominated media and barnstorming socialists like Bernie Sanders, the president has persuaded businesses and ordinary folks that good old fashioned capitalism and enlightened self-interest still works.
It’s in the numbers. The pace of hiring is up, and Mr. Trump’s economy coming off a big second quarter is averaging 2.7 percent growth — that’s about 40 percent better than the disappointing performances of Messrs. Bush and Obama.
Mr. Trump did inherit a lot of excess capacity from his predecessors. Although the unemployment rate was already at 4.7 percent when he took office, many young people were underemployed — liberal arts majors working as baristas or in professional looking jobs like assistant manager at a bank or retailer that hardly require the skills of a college graduate.
Now employers are getting more realistic — and practical — by abandoning for new hires requirements for college degrees and highly specific experience and skill sets. That’s helping self-taught software engineers get placed at Intel and high school graduates land entry level professional positions at Bank of America.
To keep growth in high gear, businesses have to follow through by adding to training budgets and the many private apprenticeship programs that the Department of Labor certifies and helps young folks identify. The latter are not just in traditional building trades but also in technology, manufacturing and service industries. Many pay about $15 an hour during training and average starting salaries of $60,000 for those who successfully complete programs.
Beyond these, President Trump is establishing an advisory council comprised of corporate, nonprofit, state government and educational leaders that will work to implement results-oriented job training programs in classrooms and workplaces.
Too many high schools dropped traditional vocational programs in recent decades under pressures from tight budgets and to channel students to college. Mostly that resulted in lots of young people who dropped out after a year or two or graduated from a degree program that did not adequately prepare them for the jobs market. The resulting burden of debt, especially for minorities, too often is overwhelming.
Job one for the president’s council has to be getting more young people steered from college track and into vo-tech and apprenticeships, and incentivizing states to redirect funds now going to useless university programs back into those areas.
Finally, regulation has to make sense — not just for America but for the broader world.
Suspending disbelief about the missions of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and the World Trade Organization, the bottom line is that American compliance doesn’t mean much if other nations are permitted to violate the rules or intent of those agreements.
Handcuffing American industry does little good if Chinese emissions are growing in leaps and bounds, and India and other developing nations are simply not adhering to the same standards as Western economies. Until they are, more sensible regulations for U.S. auto efficiency and overall emissions standards are in order.
President Obama rushed through higher gas-mileage standards after to his horrors Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 election to Mr. Trump. Consequently, freezing CAFE standards at their target for 2020 — fleet averages at about 37 MPG — instead of going all the way to 50 MPG in 2025 would be prudent, and Mr. Trump has initiated the necessary public comment processes.
While big tariffs on trade with China should not be our end goal, we simply can’t go on destroying millions of jobs and permitting Beijing’s bureaucrats to coerce American companies to transfer valuable technology in frontier areas like artificial intelligence and robotics.
If China can’t play by the rules of civilized nations — something even the more statist Europeans are now recognizing as a threat — then trade with China must be managed outside the WTO so that we may preserve the global body for trade among Western nations.
These are radical changes in policy that will reach deeply into our schools and affect relations with partners abroad but are necessary to keep the locomotive of American growth on track.
I ran track in college.
I went through a small college, it was on both sides of the highway.
Yes! I would add to that - return of shop class and similar classes at the high school level.
bmp
Several Industrial business owners I know of can not find any skilled welders or machinists below 50 years old.
They make a good bit of money hourly.
College is not for everybody.
“College is not for everybody.”
In the near future, I would not be surprised if a degree becomes a liability. Not only do most software shops do not care if you have a degree, it can be considered as evidence that you are not a natural and had to go to college and be spoon fed the material.
Definitely a good move. This is how workers in Switzerland are so competent. Each and every one was trained educationally for it, even your salesmen and ladies, produce guys, florists, etc. Only people in the few professions you need a university degree for go there. Everyone else picks a profession direction and goes to an internship after high school.
Typically they go to school in the morning for gen ed subjects that affect that career, and specific industry courses once they know those, and in the afternoon they will work for an employer for a small stipend. The employer in turn has promised the state they will be training this intern and preparing them to pass industry specific exams. At that point each new trainee is a diplomaed florist or whatever.
My wife made a good living as an optician which is not a profession that immediately springs to mind as a career. I was a career counselor to veterans and welfare recipients.
I am 100% behind this. The idea that, “if you don’t go to college you’ll never get a good paying job,” is over.
I was recently talking with an electrician and a plumber both of whom got their education and commercial licenses through a local vocational school. Both said they had more business than they could handle and were making really good money.
The trades will always be needed: good times, bad times, what ever, you’ll always need a good plumber or mechanic.
return of shop and firearms training classes to junior and senior high schools!
my Lord, we’ve allowed most of our public schools to degenerate so badly!
the above would be a good beginning towards raising a far more competent next generation (and helping our economy, too!)
A side benefit of this is taking average students who otherwise flunk out of college (and demand loan forgiveness) or earn grievance studies degrees (women’s studies, black studies) will do something PRODUCTIVE.
We’ll remove a large share of those who become social justice warriors.
A lot of truth in what you just posted.
The company I work for is a fortune 500 company and we do not give a financial reward for getting advanced degrees.
100% agree!
Yep! People will always need to eat, poop, wash, and have transportation!
Natural programmer my rear ...
any NON-formally trained computer programmer creates poor quality software. JUNK-ware. Almost universal. Shops care less because mangers empire build and a college degree is a threat to their own job.
One step above junk software is what companies aim for.
What is Microsoft’s software reputation?? Junk.
The issue of making a good living is often traded away for the opportunity to hit a management track or rise to executive income. That later is extremely difficult to manage if one has no college degree.
The reason is that HR people, management people and others doing the interviews cull the number of applicants and those without a basic degrees are among those cut away. A non-traditional hire that does not work out reflects on those that did the hiring and taking non-conventional applicant leaves the decision maker exposed to criticism. Of course I will point out the obvious that how skilled and trained someone is will only partially be determined by their pre-career education.
I started a career in the late 1960s with that limitation and was saved due to an established family reputation in my particular field. It allowed me to almost always be interviewed and my track record carried me after I was in the door. Most people with the exact same qualifications would not fare as well I am afraid.
My father was proud that I was in the same industry and further proud when I achieved some heights that he never hurdled.
This giant mountain of debt that some are saddled with in the last 20 years is an absurd thing for modest income fields. That should provide a caution to all.
Far too many college graduates leave school without the ability to actually DO anything. So they become ACADEMICS.
ACADEMIC: An individual educated beyond his intelligence, who is unwilling to or incapable of creating or providing goods or services of value to others, who pontificates and expects to be paid for it, usually from public funds.
Out of curiosity, how many of the welfare recipients actually WANTED to work instead of collect?
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