pearlpro
Expert Expediter
The Mississippians just disappeared. We don’t know why. In the early 13th century, their city — what we know as Cahokia Mounds — was more populous than London. We think it was, anyway. We really don’t know. We don’t even know what they called it. For that matter, we don’t know what they called themselves.
If our society collapses, future historians will have the benefit of old newspapers to peruse. Maybe they will have a chance to see the Wall Street Journal from last Wednesday.
Dennis Berman wrote a column about the future of truck-driving. Rather, the nonfuture of truck-driving. “Over the next two decades, the driving will slowly be taken on by the machines themselves,” he wrote.
He quoted Ted Scott, director of engineering and safety policy for the American Trucking Associations. Scott said driverless trucks were “close to inevitable.”
In fact, everybody he quoted agreed. Trucking company executives seemed enthused about a world with no more drivers. No more health care costs. No more overtime. No more employee problems.
The article was generally upbeat, but not entirely so. “Economic theory holds that such basic changes will, over time, improve standards of living by making us more productive and less wasteful. An idle truck with a sleeping driver is, after all, just a depreciating asset. But watching a half decade of lagging U.S. employment, it’s hard not to feel a swell of fear for those 5.7 million people, a last bastion of decent blue-collar pay.”
He was referring to the 5.7 million Americans who drive trucks for a living.
More people out of work. Mostly men. Breadwinners, we used to call them.
This is happening all around us, of course. All sorts of jobs are becoming obsolete. We’ve certainly seen it here at the buggy whip factory. Entire trades have been wiped out.
Sportswriter Dan O’Neill had a story in Saturday’s Post-Dispatch about the last Union Printers International Baseball League Tournament. It has been going on since 1908. Printers from a dozen cities competed. For the first 60 years of the tournament, only card-carrying union printers could play. As the number of printers dwindled, rules were relaxed. Sons of printers could play. Then nephews. Finally, eligibility rules were dropped altogether.
Even when jobs don’t become obsolete, companies are getting by with fewer workers. I was recently talking with a man in the vending-machine business. He told me times are tough. There are fewer and fewer people in the buildings, he said.
Everybody is downsizing.
Even industries that ought to be immune are not. We have an aging population. That ought to be great news for the health care industry. But what’s happening? BJC Healthcare announced last month that it was cutting 160 employees. For the first time, employees were being laid off. These employees included nurses. Nurses! As the Baby Boomers hit their sixties, hospitals are laying off nurses?
St. Anthony’s Medical Center laid off people in June, too.
One reason cited was reduced consumer spending. That makes sense. Unemployed people try to put off medical spending.
Brick-and-mortar stores are losing business to the Internet. Real estate people complain that consumers can go online and look at a property. Travel agents are fighting a losing battle against the Internet. The list of endangered jobs grows.
Politicians don’t seem to get it. The president was in Missouri and Illinois last week talking about the economy. He spoke to college students. He said we need to keep the interest rates low on school loans.
That would be good, but that’s not the big problem. The big problem is a lot of the kids will be unemployed after graduation. A college diploma used to be a ticket to the middle class. It was like an unwritten contract. That contract is no longer in force. Of course, it helps to have an education, but an education no longer guarantees much.
Think about the kids coming out of law school. Many of them are heavily in debt. There aren’t enough legal jobs for them.
What are they going to do? Drive a truck?
Meanwhile, a couple of pages inside from the story in the Wall Street Journal about the coming demise of the truck drivers, there was a photo of a new SUV from Bentley Motors. The vehicle is expected to sell for between $140,000 and $180,000.
If our society goes down, future historians will have a good idea what happened.
Bill McClellan is a columnist for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Read his columns here.
If our society collapses, future historians will have the benefit of old newspapers to peruse. Maybe they will have a chance to see the Wall Street Journal from last Wednesday.
Dennis Berman wrote a column about the future of truck-driving. Rather, the nonfuture of truck-driving. “Over the next two decades, the driving will slowly be taken on by the machines themselves,” he wrote.
He quoted Ted Scott, director of engineering and safety policy for the American Trucking Associations. Scott said driverless trucks were “close to inevitable.”
In fact, everybody he quoted agreed. Trucking company executives seemed enthused about a world with no more drivers. No more health care costs. No more overtime. No more employee problems.
The article was generally upbeat, but not entirely so. “Economic theory holds that such basic changes will, over time, improve standards of living by making us more productive and less wasteful. An idle truck with a sleeping driver is, after all, just a depreciating asset. But watching a half decade of lagging U.S. employment, it’s hard not to feel a swell of fear for those 5.7 million people, a last bastion of decent blue-collar pay.”
He was referring to the 5.7 million Americans who drive trucks for a living.
More people out of work. Mostly men. Breadwinners, we used to call them.
This is happening all around us, of course. All sorts of jobs are becoming obsolete. We’ve certainly seen it here at the buggy whip factory. Entire trades have been wiped out.
Sportswriter Dan O’Neill had a story in Saturday’s Post-Dispatch about the last Union Printers International Baseball League Tournament. It has been going on since 1908. Printers from a dozen cities competed. For the first 60 years of the tournament, only card-carrying union printers could play. As the number of printers dwindled, rules were relaxed. Sons of printers could play. Then nephews. Finally, eligibility rules were dropped altogether.
Even when jobs don’t become obsolete, companies are getting by with fewer workers. I was recently talking with a man in the vending-machine business. He told me times are tough. There are fewer and fewer people in the buildings, he said.
Everybody is downsizing.
Even industries that ought to be immune are not. We have an aging population. That ought to be great news for the health care industry. But what’s happening? BJC Healthcare announced last month that it was cutting 160 employees. For the first time, employees were being laid off. These employees included nurses. Nurses! As the Baby Boomers hit their sixties, hospitals are laying off nurses?
St. Anthony’s Medical Center laid off people in June, too.
One reason cited was reduced consumer spending. That makes sense. Unemployed people try to put off medical spending.
Brick-and-mortar stores are losing business to the Internet. Real estate people complain that consumers can go online and look at a property. Travel agents are fighting a losing battle against the Internet. The list of endangered jobs grows.
Politicians don’t seem to get it. The president was in Missouri and Illinois last week talking about the economy. He spoke to college students. He said we need to keep the interest rates low on school loans.
That would be good, but that’s not the big problem. The big problem is a lot of the kids will be unemployed after graduation. A college diploma used to be a ticket to the middle class. It was like an unwritten contract. That contract is no longer in force. Of course, it helps to have an education, but an education no longer guarantees much.
Think about the kids coming out of law school. Many of them are heavily in debt. There aren’t enough legal jobs for them.
What are they going to do? Drive a truck?
Meanwhile, a couple of pages inside from the story in the Wall Street Journal about the coming demise of the truck drivers, there was a photo of a new SUV from Bentley Motors. The vehicle is expected to sell for between $140,000 and $180,000.
If our society goes down, future historians will have a good idea what happened.
Bill McClellan is a columnist for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Read his columns here.
