The microeconomic
picture of the U.S. has changed immensely since
1973, and the
trends are proving to be consistently downward for
the nation's high
school graduates and high school drop-outs.
"Of all
the reasons given
for the wage squeeze - international competition,
technology,
deregulation, the decline of unions and defense cuts -
technology is
probably the most critical. It has
favored the
educated and the
skilled," says M. B. Zuckerman, editor-in-chief of
U.S. News &
World Report (7/31/95). Since 1973,
wages adjusted
for inflation
have declined by about a quarter for high school
dropouts, by a
sixth for high school graduates, and by about 7% for
those with some
college education. Only the wages of
college
graduates are up.
Of the fastest growing technical jobs, software
engineering
tops the list.
Carnegie Mellon University reports, "recruitment of it's
software
engineering students is up this year by over 20%." All
engineering jobs
are paying well, proving that highly skilled labor is
what employers
want! "There is clear evidence that
the supply of
workers in the
[unskilled labor] categories already exceeds the
demand for their
services," says L. Mishel, Research Director of
Welfare Reform
Network. In view of these facts, I wonder if these
trends are good
or bad for society. "The danger of
the information
age is that while
in the short run it may be cheaper to replace
workers with
technology, in the long run it is potentially self-
destructive
because there will not be enough purchasing power to
grow the
economy," M. B. Zuckerman. My
feeling is that the trend
from unskilled
labor to highly technical, skilled labor is a good one!
But, political
action must be taken to ensure that this societal
evolution is
beneficial to all of us. "Back in
1970, a high school
diploma could
still be a ticket to the middle income bracket, a nice
car in the
driveway and a house in the suburbs.
Today all it gets is a
clunker parked on
the street, and a dingy apartment in a low rent
building,"
says Time Magazine (Jan 30, 1995 issue).
However, in 1970, our government provided our
children with a
free education,
allowing the vast majority of our population to earn
a high school
diploma. This means that anyone,
regardless of family
income, could be
educated to a level that would allow them a
comfortable place
in the middle class. Even restrictions
upon child
labor hours kept
children in school, since they are not allowed to work
full time while
under the age of 18. This government policy was
conducive to our
economic markets, and allowed our country to
prosper from 1950
through 1970. Now, our own prosperity
has
moved us into a
highly technical world, that requires highly skilled
labor. The natural answer to this problem, is that
the U.S.
Government's
education policy must keep pace with the demands of
the highly
technical job market. If a middle class
income of 1970
required a high
school diploma, and the middle class income of 1990
requires a
college diploma, then it should be as easy for the children
of the 90's to
get a college diploma, as it was for the children of
the 70's to get a
high school diploma. This brings me to
the issue
of our country's
political process, in a technologically advanced world.
The
advance of mass communication is natural in a
technologically
advanced society. In our country's short
history, we
have seen the
development of the printing press, the radio, the
television, and
now the Internet; all of these, able to reach millions
of people. Equally natural, is the poisoning and
corruption of these
medias, to
benefit a few.
From the 1950's
until today, television has been the preferred
media. Because it captures the minds of most
Americans, it is the
preferred method
of persuasion by political figures, multinational
corporate
advertising, and the upper 2% of the elite, who have an
interest in
controlling public opinion. Newspapers
and radio
experienced this
same history, but are now somewhat obsolete in the
science of
changing public opinion. Though I do not
suspect television
to become
completely obsolete within the next 20 years, I do see
the Internet
being used by the same political figures, multinational
corporations, and
upper 2% elite, for the same purposes.
At this
time, in the
Internet's young history, it is largely unregulated, and
can be accessed
and changed by any person with a computer and a
modem; no license
required, and no need for millions of dollars of
equipment. But, in reviewing our history, we find that
newspaper,
radio and
television were once unregulated
too. It is easy to see why government has such an
interest in
regulating the
Internet these days. Though public
opinion supports
regulating sexual
material on the Internet, it is just the first step
in total
regulation, as experienced by every other popular mass
media in our
history. This iswhy it is imperative to
educate people
about the
Internet, and make it be known that any regulation of it is
destructive to
us, not constructive! I have been a
daily user of the
Internet for 5
years (and a daily user of BBS communications for 9
years), which
makes me a senior among us. I have seen
the moves to
regulate this
type of communication, and have always openly opposed
it.
My feelings about
technology, the Internet, and political process are
simple. In light of the history of mass
communication, there is
nothing we can do
to protect any media from the "sound byte" or
any other form of
commercial poisoning. But, our country's
public
opinion doesn't
have to fall into a nose-dive of lies and corruption,
because of
it! The first experience I had in a
course on Critical
Thinking came
when I entered college. As many good
things as I have
learned in
college, I found this course to be most valuable to my
basic
education. I was angry that I hadn't had
access to the power
of critical
thought over my twelve years of basic education. Simple
forms of critical
thinking can be taught as early as kindergarten. It
isn't hard to
teach a young person to understand the patterns of
persuasion, and
be able to defend themselves against them.
Television
doesn't have to be a weapon against us, used to sway our
opinions to
conform to people who care about their own prosperity,
not ours. With the power of a critical thinking
education, we can
stop being
motivated by the sound byte and, instead we can laugh
at it as a cheap
attempt to persuade us.
In conclusion, I
feel that the advance of technology is a good trend
for our society;
however, it must be in conjunction with advance in
education so that
society is able to master and understand
technology. We can be the masters of technology, and not
let it be
the masters of
us.
Bibliography
Where have the
good jobs gone?, By: Mortimer B. Zuckerman
U.S. News & World Report, volume
119, pg 68
Wealth: Static
Wages, Except for the Rich, By: John Rothchild
Time Magazine, volume 145, pg 60
Welfare Reform,
By: Lawrence Mishel
http://epn.org/epi/epwelf.html
20 Hot Job
Tracks, By: K.T. Beddingfield, R. M. Bennefield, J.
Chetwynd,
T. M. Ito, K.
Pollack & A. R. Wright
U.S. News & World Report, volume 119,
pg 98
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