there isn't a shortage of skilled labor.

what there is, is a lot of business owners who want 30 years of experience for the low low price of $6.50 per hour. And they want it with mandantory overtime and unpaid overtime.

No doubt there are employees who are underqualified and doing a crappy job in theiry job. But what I see are highly talkented people doing difficult jobs extremely well for $9 per hour. So, which is true?

True, 10 years ago saw a job posting of a well known Swedish telecom that wanted people under 25 with a masters in computer engineering and at least five to ten years of experience in the industry.
To this date i still wonder if they ever managed to find one with those qualifications.
>> ^marinara:

what there is, is a lot of business owners who want 30 years of experience for the low low price of $6.50 per hour. And they want it with mandantory overtime and unpaid overtime.

I find myself unable to process the job advertisements in a way that actually translates into tasks you would actually be performing. I don't know how many times I've heard of people talking about they applied for a job that read like they wanted an entry level person, and come to find out they ended up hiring people who were 10 and 15 years above the experience level it sounded like they were asking for.

My dad just recently got a job, the position he applied for was road maintenance.....fixing pot holes basically and then in the winter plowing snow. They sent him an offer letter, no details of actual job activities. He needed a job and he had been looked over for stuff in other jobs for not repeating himself in each category, one applicant assessor told him he should put "Asphalt" in front of "Paver Operator" because they don't know if a paver is the same as an asphalt paver...and that he should have repeated that in every section that left room for entering your own info. So after dealing with that for over a year, he took this job....thinking he's finally got something that is at least in his ballpark and they have some sort of reasonable job description where the guy isn't performing the job duties of six people. After he went through his orientation and got the gear they required him to have for safety.....he was put on a weed eater. That's all he does all day is run a weed eater.....which was never mentioned in the job description he applied for. Never mentioned in the orientation, never mentioned in the offer packet......basically just never mentioned.

So......all I have to say to that is. Employers are their own worst enemy. You get people into jobs through networking or lieing, as the process that is in place is pure deception based on both fronts. If you answer questions honestly and try not to exaggerate or guess what they want, you look like you are unqualified by a large margin. So you get people who have drastically less experience and do things that are very dangerous because they don't know know any better....because they exaggerated/lied on their applications.

It's like when I read the resumes of my highest paid friends. I know they can't do what's on their resume, I even ask them if they can. And they pretty much preface anything by saying "I could learn how to do it.".....which to me, if it's a core job task you're looking at it's an unacceptable answer. Because you don't know if you could learn it to the level you would need for that job. And that's on top of the crazy list of skills they ask for when most of them are not even slightly used by their company.

Basically they need to figure out what they actually need/want so they can find a fair market price to ballpark on their job ads.

There's still a company in my area that advertisers for a specific job all year round, and has done so for 3 years. I find it impossible that they have not filled an entry level job position adequately in 3 years with 2 universities located in the same town and a even larger universities located just an hour away. I believe they want to marginalize their staff, so they can plug anyone in at any time for as close to minimum wage as they can manage....or they are using it as a tool to say "Look we've interviewed countless individuals and we have no filled that position."

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Part of the problem is due to the fact that many skilled trades-workers are not interested in mentoring an apprentice. They just don't want to or, don't have the time, whatever. So, tradesmen get older and no one replaces them when they leave. And, the apprentices that do get hired get treated like shit.

The problem for wanting to apprentice is especially bad if you are no longer a teenager. If you are in your late twenties and want to be an apprentice, the foremen, etc.. just scoff at you for being "too old"....

An excellent plumber is infinitely more admirable than an incompetent philosopher. The society which scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity, and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity, will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water. — John W. Gardner (1912-2002)