2017: Whither Democrats?

And what makes it worse is I know at least 3 people who do the same work I do without the degree… this is one of the positions to do that. If you don’t do the degree route and do the mythical entry level path and work your way up, this was one of the positions that allowed you to get your foot in the door. If you were pretty good at this position you had a good chance to stay in the position or be able to apply for other positions within the hospital once you’ve established yourself as a capable worker.

Management and HR are causing this train-wreck. They’ve got it in their head that the only good employees out there are the ones with degrees… except they won’t pay enough for these positions for someone with a degree to really want it.

That’s positively ridiculous to require a four year degree for positions like that. My sons are going to have a hell of a time in this climate. Two of them are struggling to figure out what to do with their lives and hearing you guys talk about that kind of educational spend for 12/hr is sickening.

The IT shop I work in has a number of folks who came in with no degree and simply worked their way from things like card puller or computer room operator into much more dynamic roles as IT specialists in a specific area. Some are now coders, systems administrators, etc. These are all smart people who used entry level positions and in-house education to climb the ladder. Management here seems to continue doing that where appropriate too.

Agreed, 100%. My son will be getting his Masters, which will probably qualify him for $15 an hour, lol.

Do they have any interest in trades? Because around here electricians, plumbers, etc seen like they can pretty much name their price. There’s just not enough to go around, and they’re not jobs that are going to be outsourced to China or India.

There are places that will look at work and life experience, though I can’t say how much that exists anymore. But when I was at Microsoft, they were totally open to talking to a friend of mine who had no college degree. He didn’t get the job, and I imagine that all else being equal you probably suffer in comparison to someone with a degree, but if you have something to show them or some valuable experience, it can be done.

The middle one has batted around the possibility of being a plumber. He’s working at Hersheypark this summer in “sanitation” so he’s getting to see a lot of things in the workforce that will help shape his future goals I think. He’s got an interest in Accounting now too and you’ll always need those as well.

My youngest seems to be set on the Coast Guard, but he’s got two more years of high school yet and is a top athlete. He may have other options available to him. Marine biology interests him the most. The oldest has kind of lost his way so I really don’t know what he’s going to do now.

As long as management has all the power this is how it will be.

Why settle for anything less when you can demand the impossible and get it?

I hope he’s looking at this with his eyes wide open, Marine Bio is a passion occupation, there really isn’t any money in it. Also realize that most positions have you living in areas that other people consider vacation destinations (near the water just about anywhere) so you’re not only making little money, but they also have you living in high cost areas. I speak from two decade of experience here.

Neither here nor there really but I’ve had a lifelong love of the ocean and it’s inhabitants, on a number of occasions I’ve volunteered for my local aquarium and beach naturalist programs. I’ve also harbored fantasies of giving up my day-to-day struggles and going back to school to study oceanography or marine biology. What’s funny though is that apparently so many IT/programmer types harbor such fantasies that it’s considered cliche, and schools get tired of hearing from folks like me. I can’t do anything original, apparently.

Yeah, thanks. I will probably have him read your post. Not that it will matter too much because he’s a teenager and well, they are teenagers. :) I think he sees the Coast Guard as a way to get into it without having to pay for the education part of it. We’ll see. I’m skeptical of that working out. Thanks again, though.

Karen Handel’s ads linking Ossoff somehow to the shooting at the GOP baseball practice last week seem to be working. Ossoff winning was probably the last chance for stopping the Senate’s healthcare bill.

Sure looks like Handel has the momentum. She wins and it’s going to be a long, grim summer trudge to the Virginia elections in the fall.

I expect Handel to win, the shitcare law passing, the MSM lauding Republicans for “getting things done” and to widely pan Democrats as “unelectable”, i.e., “If they can’t win this district in this political environment, where can they win?”

The amount of money being spent on this election is obscene; more than a $100 per voter. Either way the outcome is not going to be representative of a real election.

But money is speech and corporations are people, so actually this is the most representative election in modern American democracy.

As a bellwether, it’s pretty overrated. It isn’t representative at all. And we have 2005 and 2009 special elections as examples where the Republicans and Democrats respectively won special elections and then got their clocks cleaned a year later in the midterms.

Still important though…GA-06 is maybe the last chance to send a concrete message to Senate Republicans on the AHCA.

I’m pretty sure that Ossoff is going to lose, and because of the hype and money that’s gone into this, they’re going to use it as a validation of their bullshit.

This right here.

Well yeah. Already has been noted.

Democrats helped create the hype on this special election. When the runoff happened, people came out of the woodwork to declare it a referendum on the GOP and the start of a turning tide, which was foolish. As @triggercut points out, even if the Democrats won the seat, it isn’t really useful as a predictive tool for the 2018 elections.

Democrats obviously want the win here, hence the pouring of money into it, but they really overplayed their hand.

I just couldn’t disagree more with this.

It’ll suck to lose this race, but the biggest effect of Handel’s win is likely to be on the R side–Senate goes full speed ahead on AHCA, and it may marginally improve the roster of willing candidates in 2018. Both of those things would have happened if Democrats had done nothing here. Again, probably best not to read tons into this for 2018.

And really, that’s the Catch-22 of being involved as an official with the Democratic party. Fight really hard for a seat, and someone tsk-tsks you for overplaying your hand. Don’t fight really hard for a seat, and someone tsk-tsks you for not putting in enough effort.

Until that asshole shot up a baseball practice last week, this was trending Ossoff’s way. It sucks.