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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   25227 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 30, 2023

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There are 58,500 “news analysts, reporters and journalists” vs. 520,700 plumbers and pipe fitters. It sure doesn’t seem like plumbing is that unpopular, to say nothing about the millions of other blue-collar jobs.

If you fire all 826,200 “media and communications workers,” you might be getting somewhere. How many of them do you think are working for the government?

Source

Tough to find data at my fingertips, but I've heard that the non-profit sector, which is largely unproductive, has grown from approximately 0% to 10% of the workforce in the last 50 years.

The noisy bit of the non-profit sector is unproductive. But the big numbers in non-profit employment are in service provision in fee-charging or government-contracted non-profits - the most visible examples are church and university-owned hospitals; private, parochial and charter schools; and private universities.

Government-contracted non-profits have essentially the same problems as government-contracted for-profits. Fee-charging non-profits like university-owned hospitals are notoriously run in exactly the same way as for-profits, including the "sometimes making huge profits" bit. In general, I would say that service-providing non-profits are only unproductive in a Sturgeon's law kind of way which also applies to the for-profit and government sectors.

But the big numbers in non-profit employment are in service provision in fee-charging or government-contracted non-profits - the most visible examples are church and university-owned hospitals; private, parochial and charter schools; and private universities.

I guess we'll have to see the numbers. I agree that those institutions are productive, or at least no worse than private or government alternatives.

I do wonder how many people are in the activism and awareness space. I seem to come across a lot of them in my personal life. I try not to wince when they tell me what they do.

Top 10 registered UK charities based on paid employee headcount - not sure how I would find the equivalent for the US. Registration is optional for universities which is why they don't dominate the list.

  • SAVE THE CHILDREN INTERNATIONAL 18409 - Fundraises from the public, mostly doing foreign aid stuff. Some advocacy work, but not as much as, say, Oxfam, so most of the staff are on direct work.
  • NUFFIELD HEALTH 17165 - Fee-charging non-profit which operates a chain of private hospitals and a chain of gyms.
  • THE BRITISH COUNCIL 9861 - About 1/2 of the budget is language schools (fee-charging with some UK government subsidy) and 1/4 is handing out scholarships for overseas students at UK universities (ultimately UK government funded). The other 1/4 is annoying nonprofit stuff.
  • THE HALO TRUST 9741 - Removes landmines on UK and foreign government contracts
  • United Learning LTD 9144 - Runs charter schools, mostly on UK government contracts
  • MSI REPRODUCTIVE CHOICES 8993 - Runs sexual health clinics in 37 countries - funding is a mix of UK and foreign government contracts and fee charging.
  • ROYAL MENCAP SOCIETY 8009 - Does some fundraising and advocacy, but about 80% of the budget is providing mental health services under UK government contracts
  • BARNARDO'S 7317 - About 1/2 of what it does is running childrens' homes under UK government contracts, the other 1/2 is advocacy.
  • THE NATIONAL TRUST FOR PLACES OF HISTORIC INTEREST OR NATURAL BEAUTY 6651 - Operates a range of heritage attractions (particularly famous for the stately homes and the trailhead carparks in the UK national parks), mostly funded by admission fees. Has an advocacy arm which makes a lot of noise on a tiny budget because it has become a kind of clearinghouse for wealthy retired NIMBY Karens.
  • CARDIFF UNIVERSITY 6032 - Does what it says on the tin.

So I would say across these 10 names 20% of the activity is annoying nonprofit stuff and 80% is providing services on a commercial or government-contract basis. My guess is that the US figures would be even more skewed because of the large number of nonprofit-owned hospitals in the US.

There is a lot more creativity in job titles when it comes to various low productivity office jobs. Tradesmen tend to have short and to the point titles. The people who should be in the trades tend to have vague titles.

Umm, have you run this thesis by actual tradesmen?

From my vantage point most bs office jobs are going to people who would have been housewives or secretaries in an era when the trades were fully staffed, and the trade shortage is as much about having to compete with IT and relatively earlier retirements making the fertility crunch apparent earlier, and that while there’s a minority of men who should be working trades jobs in offices, they mostly have actual jobs that either would have existed in 1960 or exist now because of an actual function. Most young men who should go into a trade seem like they’re playing video games and smoking weed instead, funded by some combination of parents/neetbux/McDonald’s. Likewise trades job titles are increasingly unwieldy; everyone is a ‘technician’ these days.

I don’t believe titles came into this.

How many communications majors do you think are in government jobs?

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