Diversity, Globalization And Workforce In America
Research Paper
Diversity, Globalization and Workforce in America
Submitted by: Prashant Sharma
Subject: ITKM–505
Professor: Michael Lohle
Date: November 21, 2014
Introduction
Our age has seen the great recession that began in 2007 December, still after 7 years its devastating effects can be seen in the labor market of workers in the USA. It has changed the beliefs, aspirations, experiences, and concerns of the working force in the America. These changes are the result of the changing nature of work in a knowledge-driven, volatile and global economy. Due to recession companies faced shortage of cash, because at that duration there was very big liquidity crunch. This made companies to change their tactics, in order to save money …show more content…
they started identifying less productive workers, and let them go. Cowen talked about this particular situation in his book and even mentioned that this phenomena gave rise to the one of the biggest unemployment ratio in the history of economy (Cowen, 2013).
There was one time when jobs were stable or we can also say that jobs were permanent; now they are not, most of jobs today are temporary or contingent. There were many factors which affected and lead towards the labor market transformation but basically there were four broad forces which made the big difference; (Horn, 2013).
Globalization and offshoring
Mergers, acquisitions and restructuring
Transition from industrialization to a knowledge and service based economy
Deunionization
Global, competitive forces and business and public policy decisions made once-secure jobs vulnerable. Competitive pressures of the global economy frayed the implicit mutually beneficial contract workers and employers (Horn, What Workers Really Want and Need, 2013).
We all know that US is home to a large variety of various cultures and national origins. According to the Census Bureau data projection America’s population will become more racially and ethnically diverse by 2060. This will undoubtedly impact how people will live and work together (Dauber, n.d.).
According to the author of “Average is over”, I totally agree the fact that if United States take in more immigrants, the field in which those immigrants work are less likely to see work outsourced abroad. This means that immigration makes it possible to keep those jobs in the United States (Tyler, 2013).
Findings
In the introduction of this paper, I mentioned few reasons which broadly effected the most in the US labor market transformation, let’s discuss further on those points.
In “The World is Flat” Thomas Friedman mentioned that the things brought about by the flow of capital, workflow software and the internet have increased the global workforce and created a flat world for competition and collaborations.
The practice of offshoring which was unimaginable in the 1980s, was now desirable and possible. Though researchers still argue on the quantity of impact on US jobs from offshoring, but it is clear that it had impacted on main industries and jobs, specifically low wages work (Thomas, 2007).
The frequent change in the leadership of an organization due to mergers and acquisitions is also a one of the main transformations of US workers jobs. According to the data almost 6% jobs were reduced due to mergers between 2001 and 2006. Adding into that automated technologies like internet or phone based customer care systems are further contributing in shrinking down the workforces. Employers are looking for more automated solutions in various domains to reduce their expense, which leading into less jobs because machine technologies are taking their place (Horn, What Workers Really Want and Need, …show more content…
2013).
If we go little back in the time around 1980s, third of US workforce was in manufacturing. By 2009 only tenth of it was accounted, because since 1997 those jobs disappeared. As per historical data those jobs were considered full of opportunities and good wages especially for the less educated worker. This happened because those industries and jobs were relocated to other countries because of the cheap, affordable, and abundance labor workforce. This was actually a very good example of capital been more mobile than workers because it leads towards deindustrialization (Snyder, 2010).
During good time, unions were formed to safe guard the interest of workers – 40hours work in a week, healthcare insurance, retirement plan, paid leave, medical leave, equal employment opportunity, social security and workplace safety. These set of rules also benefited wages and policies in nonunion workplaces and workers less educated. But dilution of unions, especially in private sectors weakened the workers power and lower their benefits (The De-unionization of America, 2011).
Declination of Job Satisfaction:
As the great recession has passed and the US including rest of the world are on their path to recovery, but effects of that harsh period can still be measured in the way US labor works, and think of their jobs.
A recent research was conducted on the random 25,000 United States citizens. They were employed, unemployed and underemployed between 1998 – 2012, one of the most volatile duration in American history. The study showed that there is a decline in job satisfaction among labor, workers doubt that their loyalty to employers is reciprocated, losing hope in their government and policy makers, and are frustrated about inadequate training and educational programs for unskilled or unemployed labors (Horn, What Workers Really Want and Need, 2013). The data was put together for the declining of job satisfaction among the US workers based on the various factors. The charts below summarizes
it; Source: What a difference a decade makes: The declining job satisfaction of the American workforce, Heldrich center for workforce development, September 2009.
The charts clearly showed the percentage of respondents who were satisfied with the various workplace factors, in the year 1999 which declined in all the factors by 2009.
Cowen specifically mentioned in his book, that workers are really bother about low wages, unemployment and people are afraid of seeing the erosion of their economic futures (Tyler, 2013). Along with these one of the most important facts which was gathered in the research was that the people are in doubt about their loyalty towards employers. To support this comment have a look to the below statistics table.
Total
Men
Women
White
Non-White
High school
College
Bachelor Degree or higher
Under $35k
$35k to $70k
$70k to $100k
$100k and over
I feel a sense of loyalty to the company that I work for
85%
84%
85%
86%
81%
84%
86%
85%
86%
82%
85%
86%
The company I work for feels a sense of loyalty towards me
63%
63%
63%
65%
56%
70%
55%
63%
72%
64%
59%
56%
How much do you trust your employer to tell the truth about the economic health of company?
56%
60%
52%
58%
49%
60%
47%
60%
55%
54%
54%
61%
How much do you trust your employer to tell the truth about the security of your job?
50%
51%
51%
53%
44%
54%
44%
53%
57%
48%
44%
54%
Source: What a difference a decade makes: The declining job satisfaction of the American workforce, Heldrich center for workforce development, September 2009.
Carl Van Hom, co-director of the study, said workers this year showed dramatic loss of confidence about their job security, their prospects for retirement, and what lies ahead for the next generation (Horn, Working Scared, 2013).
Though all the data shared is not so encouraging, it is very important that these factors and problems should be addressed and need to be treated with concrete solution, which is sad to say that still unknown to us.
Conclusion & Recommendation
Attention is required to alter this economic landscape, the American economy is still struggling to recover from the great recession in 50 years history. A special thought is required to address the challenge like how to educate, train and retrain workers so that they could be utilized by employers at their full potential. The entire society which includes workers, political leaders, business representatives, and educational leaders must rally around central goals. It is necessary to strive for equity and opportunity by creating a better educated and competitive workforce. The United States is getting tough competition from developing and already developed nations for economic growth. Developed nations are investing more in compare to US in the preparation and education of their workforce, same is the scenario with the developing nations like China, India and Brazil. U.S. people and political, business, and education leaders face fundamentally new challenges in a global, competitive, technology-driven environment where economies, entire industries and companies are transformed with lightning speed. Tectonic shifts of this magnitude require responses for which policymakers, businesses and citizens are truly “all in” (Horn, What Workers Really Want and Need, 2013).
References
Dauber, D. A. (n.d.). How Will the Issue of Cultural Diversity Increase in Importance and Affect the Workplace? Retrieved from Chron: http://work.chron.com/issue-cultural-diversity-increase-importance-affect-workplace-22959.html
Economic Trends. (n.d.). What workers really want and need, p. 2013.
Horn, C. E. (2013, October 1). What Workers Really Want and Need. Retrieved from SHRM:http://www.shrm.org/publications/hrmagazine/editorialcontent/2013/1013/pages/0913-working-scared.aspx
Horn, C. E. (2013). Working Scared. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc.
Snyder, M. (2010, September 24). Facts About The Deindustrialization Of America That Will Blow Your Mind. Retrieved from The Economic Collapse : http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/19-facts-about-the-deindustrialization-of-america-that-will-blow-your-mind
The De-unionization of America. (2011, March 23). Retrieved from Viable Opposition: http://viableopposition.blogspot.com/2011/03/de-unionization-of-america.html
Thomas, F. (2007). The World is Flat.
Tyler, C. (2013). Average is over. New York: Penguin Group.
Diversity, Globalization and Workforce in America
Submitted by: Prashant Sharma
Subject: ITKM–505
Professor: Michael Lohle
Date: November 21, 2014
Introduction
Our age has seen the great recession that began in 2007 December, still after 7 years its devastating effects can be seen in the labor market of workers in the USA. It has changed the beliefs, aspirations, experiences, and concerns of the working force in the America. These changes are the result of the changing nature of work in a knowledge-driven, volatile and global economy. Due to recession companies faced shortage of cash, because at that duration there was very big liquidity crunch. This made companies to change their tactics, in order to save money …show more content…
they started identifying less productive workers, and let them go. Cowen talked about this particular situation in his book and even mentioned that this phenomena gave rise to the one of the biggest unemployment ratio in the history of economy (Cowen, 2013).
There was one time when jobs were stable or we can also say that jobs were permanent; now they are not, most of jobs today are temporary or contingent. There were many factors which affected and lead towards the labor market transformation but basically there were four broad forces which made the big difference; (Horn, 2013).
Globalization and offshoring
Mergers, acquisitions and restructuring
Transition from industrialization to a knowledge and service based economy
Deunionization
Global, competitive forces and business and public policy decisions made once-secure jobs vulnerable. Competitive pressures of the global economy frayed the implicit mutually beneficial contract workers and employers (Horn, What Workers Really Want and Need, 2013).
We all know that US is home to a large variety of various cultures and national origins. According to the Census Bureau data projection America’s population will become more racially and ethnically diverse by 2060. This will undoubtedly impact how people will live and work together (Dauber, n.d.).
According to the author of “Average is over”, I totally agree the fact that if United States take in more immigrants, the field in which those immigrants work are less likely to see work outsourced abroad. This means that immigration makes it possible to keep those jobs in the United States (Tyler, 2013).
Findings
In the introduction of this paper, I mentioned few reasons which broadly effected the most in the US labor market transformation, let’s discuss further on those points.
In “The World is Flat” Thomas Friedman mentioned that the things brought about by the flow of capital, workflow software and the internet have increased the global workforce and created a flat world for competition and collaborations.
The practice of offshoring which was unimaginable in the 1980s, was now desirable and possible. Though researchers still argue on the quantity of impact on US jobs from offshoring, but it is clear that it had impacted on main industries and jobs, specifically low wages work (Thomas, 2007).
The frequent change in the leadership of an organization due to mergers and acquisitions is also a one of the main transformations of US workers jobs. According to the data almost 6% jobs were reduced due to mergers between 2001 and 2006. Adding into that automated technologies like internet or phone based customer care systems are further contributing in shrinking down the workforces. Employers are looking for more automated solutions in various domains to reduce their expense, which leading into less jobs because machine technologies are taking their place (Horn, What Workers Really Want and Need, …show more content…
2013).
If we go little back in the time around 1980s, third of US workforce was in manufacturing. By 2009 only tenth of it was accounted, because since 1997 those jobs disappeared. As per historical data those jobs were considered full of opportunities and good wages especially for the less educated worker. This happened because those industries and jobs were relocated to other countries because of the cheap, affordable, and abundance labor workforce. This was actually a very good example of capital been more mobile than workers because it leads towards deindustrialization (Snyder, 2010).
During good time, unions were formed to safe guard the interest of workers – 40hours work in a week, healthcare insurance, retirement plan, paid leave, medical leave, equal employment opportunity, social security and workplace safety. These set of rules also benefited wages and policies in nonunion workplaces and workers less educated. But dilution of unions, especially in private sectors weakened the workers power and lower their benefits (The De-unionization of America, 2011).
Declination of Job Satisfaction:
As the great recession has passed and the US including rest of the world are on their path to recovery, but effects of that harsh period can still be measured in the way US labor works, and think of their jobs.
A recent research was conducted on the random 25,000 United States citizens. They were employed, unemployed and underemployed between 1998 – 2012, one of the most volatile duration in American history. The study showed that there is a decline in job satisfaction among labor, workers doubt that their loyalty to employers is reciprocated, losing hope in their government and policy makers, and are frustrated about inadequate training and educational programs for unskilled or unemployed labors (Horn, What Workers Really Want and Need, 2013). The data was put together for the declining of job satisfaction among the US workers based on the various factors. The charts below summarizes
it; Source: What a difference a decade makes: The declining job satisfaction of the American workforce, Heldrich center for workforce development, September 2009.
The charts clearly showed the percentage of respondents who were satisfied with the various workplace factors, in the year 1999 which declined in all the factors by 2009.
Cowen specifically mentioned in his book, that workers are really bother about low wages, unemployment and people are afraid of seeing the erosion of their economic futures (Tyler, 2013). Along with these one of the most important facts which was gathered in the research was that the people are in doubt about their loyalty towards employers. To support this comment have a look to the below statistics table.
Total
Men
Women
White
Non-White
High school
College
Bachelor Degree or higher
Under $35k
$35k to $70k
$70k to $100k
$100k and over
I feel a sense of loyalty to the company that I work for
85%
84%
85%
86%
81%
84%
86%
85%
86%
82%
85%
86%
The company I work for feels a sense of loyalty towards me
63%
63%
63%
65%
56%
70%
55%
63%
72%
64%
59%
56%
How much do you trust your employer to tell the truth about the economic health of company?
56%
60%
52%
58%
49%
60%
47%
60%
55%
54%
54%
61%
How much do you trust your employer to tell the truth about the security of your job?
50%
51%
51%
53%
44%
54%
44%
53%
57%
48%
44%
54%
Source: What a difference a decade makes: The declining job satisfaction of the American workforce, Heldrich center for workforce development, September 2009.
Carl Van Hom, co-director of the study, said workers this year showed dramatic loss of confidence about their job security, their prospects for retirement, and what lies ahead for the next generation (Horn, Working Scared, 2013).
Though all the data shared is not so encouraging, it is very important that these factors and problems should be addressed and need to be treated with concrete solution, which is sad to say that still unknown to us.
Conclusion & Recommendation
Attention is required to alter this economic landscape, the American economy is still struggling to recover from the great recession in 50 years history. A special thought is required to address the challenge like how to educate, train and retrain workers so that they could be utilized by employers at their full potential. The entire society which includes workers, political leaders, business representatives, and educational leaders must rally around central goals. It is necessary to strive for equity and opportunity by creating a better educated and competitive workforce. The United States is getting tough competition from developing and already developed nations for economic growth. Developed nations are investing more in compare to US in the preparation and education of their workforce, same is the scenario with the developing nations like China, India and Brazil. U.S. people and political, business, and education leaders face fundamentally new challenges in a global, competitive, technology-driven environment where economies, entire industries and companies are transformed with lightning speed. Tectonic shifts of this magnitude require responses for which policymakers, businesses and citizens are truly “all in” (Horn, What Workers Really Want and Need, 2013).
References
Dauber, D. A. (n.d.). How Will the Issue of Cultural Diversity Increase in Importance and Affect the Workplace? Retrieved from Chron: http://work.chron.com/issue-cultural-diversity-increase-importance-affect-workplace-22959.html
Economic Trends. (n.d.). What workers really want and need, p. 2013.
Horn, C. E. (2013, October 1). What Workers Really Want and Need. Retrieved from SHRM:http://www.shrm.org/publications/hrmagazine/editorialcontent/2013/1013/pages/0913-working-scared.aspx
Horn, C. E. (2013). Working Scared. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc.
Snyder, M. (2010, September 24). Facts About The Deindustrialization Of America That Will Blow Your Mind. Retrieved from The Economic Collapse : http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/19-facts-about-the-deindustrialization-of-america-that-will-blow-your-mind
The De-unionization of America. (2011, March 23). Retrieved from Viable Opposition: http://viableopposition.blogspot.com/2011/03/de-unionization-of-america.html
Thomas, F. (2007). The World is Flat.
Tyler, C. (2013). Average is over. New York: Penguin Group.