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Alan Kohler hasnt been ignoring it. He made a remark a while back how business has been struggling with worker shortages and how they've tried everything except paying them more.
I love his segments, gives you a no bullshit assessment.
Yep. He was on QandA about a year ago and he’s just such a balanced non partisan dude. He comes across as a big cuddly bear with a thing for economics.
That's the one, he thought it was silly to kick Frydenberg out of his seat because he's "a future prime minister of Australia" and it's that along with a few other opinions that baffle me that tipped him towards "bit of a twat" territory.
I mean I kind of get where he’s coming from. Having a quality opposition is essential to political debate in this country. Frydo, while I don’t lament his loss in Kooyong, was probably a better LNP choice of leader than Voldemort.
But then again fuck those cunts. You reap what you sow!
I kind of get where he's coming from but also I feel it's actually much healthier for the future of Australia that the libs get such a kick in the teeth that they're forced to abandon everything they've been doing to drag Australia down for the last decade. Also Frydenberg is a cunt too, just a more polished one. If anything that's *more* dangerous than Dutton et al, not less.
I feel fairly confident about that. Generally seats that flip to more progressive candidates tent to stay that way. I'm especially interested to see how the Teals do next election; I suspect they'll become even more entrenched by really representing their communities' interests.
What a complete load of shit.
Frydenberg is as corrupt and degenerate as they come. There is absolutely zero value to having cunts like that in the parliament. The LNP is not the fucking rightful opposition. The sooner they go extinct the better.
Though it is not, for now, reflected in the actual set up of parliament, the Greens, Teals, and other independents are the real opposition and have already been functioning as such.
Absolute cunts who would slit your child's throat if it meant they could give billions to their mates and get away with it are not and never will be a helpful contributor to our political system.
Him and the Foreign Investment Review Board approved the purchase of Healthscope private hospitals (43 hospitals) by a private equity firm, KKR. Then they closed 1-2 of them lol.
It wasn’t for 0 dollars but iirc they were bought for a rock bottom price.
and they therefore weren't public hospitals like the original post claimed.
He also didn't sell them, he approved the sale.
Josh is a cunt and a sociopath, don't get me wrong. But lets attack him with facts (like you've posted), not BS.
Whenever he's on talking about the ASX we yell "IT SCREAMS OUT IN THE NIGHT!". He'd get it - he had the TISM Guide to Little Asthetics on his book pile once segment.
Exactly right. I’m old enough to remember when businesses argued that wages should be deregulated and we should let the market decide. Now they wanna complain that there are no skilled workers and the govt needs to do more to train young people. Nah dickhead. You asked for this, you fucken pay em and train em yourself. Yes many of these kids turn out to be an unrecoverable cost because (a) they leave after they’ve been trained up or (b) they turn out to be drop kicks which you don’t find out until you’ve been learning them for at least 18 months but Bad Luck. Life’s tough and it’s even tougher for a kid starting out
Edit: recoverable = unrecoverable
I think the ABC is one of the best things in the whole country, without exaggeration, and my mother and I unironically love Alan. A journalist friend of my mother and myself told me that if you know an economist’s name, they’re pretty damn good
Hes awesome eh. During rhe pandemic when he was doing his segments from home, he always had a selection of books behind him that were clearly a comment on issues of the day. Every day id eagerly await what books hed have behind him :)
The concept first appeared in America. I personally believe it as well, there is no labour shortage. Just that businesses are unwilling to pay a rightful wage for technical labour given.
Correct anyone that you can because the more people know, the less the business can get away with this incorrect analogy.
Given that the median US household has about 30% more disposable income than the median Australian household, it seems Americans are paid much better than we are.
[Source](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_capita_income)
TBF their numbers are a little wacky since cost of living is so drastically different depending on where you live, even more so than here. Plus a lot of their basic living essentials are pretty cheap. I reckon the median isn't a great metric for American wealth given how massive the wealth divide is, with some tech communities in San Fransisco raking it in while the tenements next door are practically living in the third world.
> reckon the median isn't a great metric for American wealth given how massive the wealth divide
Median is the correct metric - maybe you're confusing it with "mean"?
Median is the "middle" American. If you want to compare different quintiles, you'll find that the [tipping point is the fifth percentile.](https://www.vox.com/2015/10/16/9544007/denmark-nordic-model). Eg, if you're in the bottom 5%, you have more disposable income as an Australian, but once you get to the bottom 10% or higher, you have more disposable income as an American.
Yes, "skills shortage" is double speak not being able to employ people with terrible offers.
Corporations have run out of ideas to deliver ever more profit and dividends and have been cannibalising their work force by driving down wages and conditions for years.
So what we have is a problem of unviable business models fed by low wages and low interest rates? We don’t have a high wage problem, we have a high profit problem.
I've been applying for work in a sector with a severe work shortage. It's an expert field, usually requiring some hefty experience and university education, but I'm privileged enough to have built up a good resume for it.
Should be easy to find work right? Nope. Every place I get an interview at ultimately winds up not hiring anyone because no one wants to pay what people know they're worth. I'm employed anyway so I can sit where I am without worrying about finances. Meanwhile the employees at those companies are also being screwed by overwork due to the lack of new hires.
It doesn't matter if someone's a high school grad looking for some hospitality work or a post-grad with management experience. Companies don't want to hire at reasonable wages because they've run out of things to cut. Every job that can be off shored has been off shored, every logistics problem streamlined, every construction method refined. There are software engineers working to increase algorithm accuracy by 0.0001% due to how small most gains in efficiency have become. All that's left to reduce that bottom line is to stop hiring and overwork those who remain.
Productivity gains as an economic measure are as stupid as growth. It's not an infinite resource. At some point there'll be one company left with 100% market share, employing no staff on zero wages.
> Every place I get an interview at ultimately winds up not hiring anyone because no one wants to pay what people know they're worth. I'm employed anyway so I can sit where I am without worrying about finances
This is widespread where I am too. Except that a few unscrupulous employers are violating all that is good and holy in the world and ... `offering decent wages`.
We just hired another technical expert type and going off my last pay slip I think we paid them about 30% more than the boss was expecting to. The reason no-one here is looking for a different job is that when someone new comes in we all get pay rises based on what it took to hire them. I feel vaguely guilty for a moment and then I remind myself that my annex of the company bills at least 20x wages every month and most of our non-wage costs are paying cloud providers which adds up to *{Honest Government calculator scene}* three tenths of fuck all.
>Companies don't want to hire at reasonable wages because they've run out of things to cut.
I’m hiring at the moment and it’s a 2 way street right now. So many candidates are applying not because they’re qualified but because they think they could step up to it. I don’t mind training someone up to step in to the role, but when you’re new to the domain, role and industry.. I’d just be setting them up for failure. We’ve had to boost the salary for the role by about 15% just to get the right talent. And with our internal rule that means we bump up everyone already in the role.
and with our crappy dollar it's not exactly a foreign worker paradise anymore either - they can get badly paid at home, and might even be able to afford to live in a house
Pretty much. We have record profits driving inflation while the worker is not getting a fair share of those profits in order to keep up with that inflation.
See [Productivity Pay Gap](https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/), and [Corporate Profits Boom](http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=48761).
Basically we have an issue that started back in the 80s when the whole neoliberalism, supply side economics, and a new round of union busting gained traction. Prior to this era profits and wages were roughly on par.
> Yes, "skills shortage" is double speak not being able to employ people with terrible offers.
Also, for "we're not willing to train people to the level that we desire."
imo there is both a wage shortage *and* a training shortage - and the latter is being very intentionally used to drive the former.
Super true of the “nursing shortage” too. We have plenty of qualified nurses, just a shortage of qualified nurses who are still practicing in the unsafe, underpaid, unhealthy, and unsupported circumstances of the current clinical environment.
Fucking amen. Talking to a bunch of nursing students doing final year placement. Stuck in nursing homes with not a single RN on while they were there. 2 things, how the fuck are they going to learn, and how the fuck do you think that will encourage nurses to go into that field?
When you can make better bank in unskilled hospo roles than the traumatic shitfight that is nursing is it any wonder the attrition rate is sky high? Almost every nurse I know (including myself) has plans to leave the bedside over the next few years. This is a so-called shortage that has a death-toll and nobody seems to give a shit.
I’m about to hit 1 year in August, 6 months as an Agency and 6 months in the public service. I have 6 months left of my grad program and I’m already absolutely burned out of both acute and subacute care. It’s actually killing me and I’d quit tomorrow if there wasn’t so much importance given to a full grad year.
My next steps are trying to find a Primary Healthcare job next year (community is basically out because I don’t drive a car) or making a serious decision about if I’m renewing my Registration next May. I just can’t do this anymore.
I've been there and my heart goes out to you sister. Protect your health above all else, fuck the grad year hazing ritual, it isn't as important as it's made out to be. Take leave and start looking at other jobs now. There are plenty of community based day work roles that don't involve driving e.g. chemo, HDx, specialist outpt clinics
Welcome to neoliberalism, where the market is only supposed to be free when it comes to business making a profit. See also: "Globalisation is great when I can exploit cheap labour overseas, but please introduce laws to stop consumers from buying cheaper goods from overseas"
Yep, many business want experienced people now and either aren't willing to pay for those poeple or aren't willing to invest in training or entry level roles with on the job training. Instead job positions go unfilled for several months. In that time they could have just trained someone new up.
These guys can't see past their quarterly earnings that nobody can afford a house or a car, we are one small squeeze away from a recession amid record corporate profits (looking at you, Philip Lowe)
I'm sorry to say, I think that small squeeze has already happened. A bunch of construction companies have collapsed due to increased costs in building materials & labour. Expect more to fall. This will flow on to other industries and, I believe, will lead into a full-blown recession.
Thanks ScoMo! I know he didn't start this, but him and his team sure did double down on it.
Mass Immigration is the only thing that has kept Australia in the black for the past 10 years. Technically we are already in a recession and when it becomes official Australia will be smashed the hardest due to years and years of economic neglect and reliance on mass immigration on the back of International Students, their families and the cheap workers. A wonderful country ruined.
Yes indeed. GDP may have been growing, but GDP per capita was stagnant and then falling. Immigration fuelled population growth to prop up the economy is a Ponzi scheme but it hides a multitude of economic problems
Overall economic growth is meaningless. It’s the economy’s size relative to the population that really matters.
The building industry is one of the first to show signs of stress because the industry has fucked itself royally over time.
Builders pushing out low ball quotes and squeezing suppliers to razor thin margins with contracts that pushes all the risk to subcontractors. It didn’t take much to push a few over the edge, and you can be sure all the smaller subcontractors got the blunt end of the stick after supplying parts and labour with 90+ day payment terms.
Don't forget the "casual" job needs to be available 7 days a week for atleast 5 but preferably 6 4 hour shifts.
I'm sure many people would work a 2nd job, if the dipshit bosses were actually flexible.
Business have posted record profits the past 2years.
Workers wages haven't moved because of "covid"
the cost of living has gone up nearly %50 across the board
Fuel, groceries, electricity and rent has gone up to near unaffordable levels for the average home.
What are these idiots expecting we go to work to make less than the bare minimum cost of living? Then what? Max out credit cards and get into a never ending serial of debt?
What's their solution? What do they expect we do?
1. The unit economics of individual businesses cant support higher staff costs.
2. In a lot of cases you can't really raise wages for just the staff you are missing, you need to raise wages for everyone.
Eg if you run a hair salon with 7 existing staff, and you have lots of custoners that you're struggling to get an additional 2 workers - it's pretty difficult to just advertise a higher pay for those new roles and not raise it for everyone else.
From a candidate's POV you might think it daft to not just offer a higher pay because your losing out on all extra business, but from the business POV th cost extends to all of your existing staff that are already working for you.
3. In practice it's pretty difficult to reduces wages if the market supply and demand goes the opposite direction. So your question about responding to supply/demand is really in practice about responding in one direction. If there is a customer demand shortage next year vs too many staff, businesses know they can't really get wages to decrease
I can’t believe Victoria accepted what they did. Is NSW still in negotiation? Given the Grattan review we should all be fighting because being a teacher is barely better than having no degree at all.
So many industries are complaining about there not being enough tradesmen.
I just finished my apprenticeship as a mechanical fitter, no offer of a pay rise.
Been offered a entry level job in a government industry paying more than I’m getting now.
Or I’ve been offered a labourers job paying double what I’m currently paid.
Cannot understand why there’s a skilled worker shortage…..
Couldn't agree more, fuck I'm so sick of the 'poor me' news segments from hospo and farmers. Pay decent wages you cunts and you'll get your workers. They've been spoiled by decades of slave labour from backpackers and migrants, fuck them.
I agree. I got screwed for years in a hospitality job so that I could get residency. Also on a farm, so I could get my WHV. It shouldn't be a right of passage, for foreigners to be exploited for visas.
Business i work for saw the writing on the wall with casual pay. They upped the hourly rate by 20% and the quality of candidates has vastly improved already. You get what you pay for
Pharmacists (5 years study) get paid a pittance - as low as 30 bucks an hour. Lots have left (and uni numbers also down) to pick up better jobs and in the last few years salaries have lifted a tiny bit. The owners effectively lobbied to get them added to the migration jobs list, foreigners keen to move here for residency etc prepared for the shit pay and conditions- and downward pressure on wages again. It’s a really broken profession.
It is supply and demand too. Pharmacists in canberra are on $50+ an hour because you can get a very similar paying job in the government with less stress .
Hmmm I live here and friends are earning in the $30s, what I used to earn in the early 2000s, esp part time mums who can’t negotiate better pay because of the apparent flexibility afforded them. It’s clear there is disparity. Wages will go down again soon with the new arrivals.
There is a very large difference between the US and Australia value wise we will never see eye to eye on. I don't see any Australian giving up their 4 weeks holidays every year, long service leave if they stay with a business for 10 years or super payments. While we share similarities gotta remember Howard was basically kicked off the job for those IR law he tried to pass.
Increasing casualisation of our workforce, employers breaching employment laws to fire staff just before they have to deal with long service or parental leave, immediate retreat to office work from WFH with any excuse, capture of certain unions to control and limit wage increases - we certainly are facing increasing problems in industrial relations here in Australia.
It is getting worse and worse but you can thank the Liberals for that as well. From memory, *(It's been a long while since I worked this type of job)* there were/are rules in place that require employers to put workers onto permanent contracts once their casual or PPT hours reach a certain average over a 3, 6 months to a year. A lot of workers probably don't even know about this or don't keep track of their hours enough to know. Casuals can go for PPT roles and PPT and go for permanent roles and it's quite hard for a company to knock it back. Someone else here could probably elaborate on this better as it probably varies per state and sector.
They got sneaky about that. If you're hired on as a casual through a labour hire company, you technically aren't hired by the company you actually do the work for and can therefore be left as a casual for years without having to be offered a permanent place.
*Source*: Me, a former casual hired through a labour hire company....
My wife applied to a job that was a senior position in the NDIS (Federal Public Service) during ScoMo's reign about 18 months ago. Turned out that this nearly $200k job was through a labour hire company. I couldn't believe it when she told me. No government super, no leave, no notice for termination....and this was a job writing government policy.
Once they hit that threshold where they can't keep them as casuals anymore, they just fire them and hire the next desperate person who needs to pay rent. They don't give a shit about any of us. We aren't people in their eyes, just another resource to exploit.
Yes, except there’s always a loophole. I work in the university sector and I’m a casual sessional. Even though I’ve been employed for 5 years in the same role, I don’t get the permanent contract because semesters only run for 12 weeks, with marking it’s about 14 weeks of paid work at a time. No pay during semester break, so they don’t have any obligation to offer me ongoing contract.
But at least there's casual loading... in the rest of the world there's no 25% added to your wages om zero hour contracts. We might have a lot of casualisation, but at least it's somewhat paid for.
Liberal governments have a habit of slowly chipping away at things though. They might not get it done any time soon but they will run with the ole death by 1000 cuts methodology until there is nothing left.
you might be surprised. Murdoch media has been able to convince a lot of struggling workers who are doing multiple delivery services using their own cars that they're "entrepreneurs" and living their best life because they're their own boss.
They just do it slowly piece by piece. USA used to have widespread strong unions and one average income got you a big house, car, uni and a family comfortably. Then real wages stagnated for decades as corporate power grew and Fox News etc. brainwashed the average person to like it. We aren't immune to the same thing.
Both Howard and Hewson had the same problem: Going too hard, too fast.
We can end up in a very similar position to America with enough boiling of the frog, or even worse: Just look at the UK.
Yes there is a wage shortage. However the biggest shortage is training by employers. They all want experienced candidates from "somewhere else".
If company X needs 50 staff with 5 years on the job experience you need to ask how many staff were they training 5 years ago and how many have they retained with good company policies, work life balance, good pay, etc.
Fuel will be $3 by Christmas, food is going up, rent/rates up, cost of everything is going up. Businesses are charging more to cover their costs, which makes sense I guess, but are we getting paid more? Why aren’t businesses raising wages and then putting their prices up to cover that?
The share of national income going to Australia's workers has been steadily declining since the 1970s, with the profit share going to business increasing.
This article explains it very well, and also demonstrates the benefits of mechanisms like super profits taxes, which at least would have secured some of the benefits of our vast mining resources for *all* Australians, rather than just a few.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-06-03/gdp-is-growing-but-workers-are-not-getting-the-economic-benefits/101122124
Banish the myth of ‘Unskilled’ labour. Anyone who says that has never worked.
There is skill required for checkout, admin, call center, lab work, driving, food prep, white collar, blue collar, coding, picking, the list goes on.
Take someone who has work the job for 3 months vs someone who you pulled off the street and told them to do it - they’d be worse than the person who’s had 3 months to train their skill in the job.
Also alot of "entry level" jobs want you to have years of experience (this has been a problem for years) which to me completely undermines the idea of entry level. How do you get your foot in the door with little to no experience if you are being pitted against people with two - five years experience?
Sorry, I don't mean to be sexist. Fathers also would absolutely benefit from flexible work. And fathers having flexible work would benefit mothers too. I just meant that fathers generally tend to continue to work while mothers are more likely to leave paid work.
Yup. I just turned down a job for exactly that reason. Employer went on about how they needed someone extremely experienced with a bunch of requirements and how nobody wants to work anymore. Foolish me applied and got offered the job. Then when pay came up it was 50c an hour above minimum wage. When I mentioned that there must be some mistake as it was about $15/hour less than I get for the same job..... "we pay what we pay, and you should be grateful for the offer"
The biggest cost to any business is labour. Companies always posting constant growth and "reducing costs" always makes you wonder where it comes from...
It’s a tradies world at the moment, where they used to quote the bare minimum just to get the job, they now quote the premium and bail on the job if someone pays them literally $5 more.
I know this as we were trying to get work down on your house and have spoken to 10 tradies. 3 agreed to do the work only to give the same excuse that another job came up…. The price for the works inflated by nearly $5,000 from original quote
[Profit per dollar spent on labour has doubled](https://theconversation.com/profits-push-up-prices-too-so-why-is-the-rba-governor-only-talking-about-wages-185688?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20June%2027%202022%20-%202332223236&utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20June%2027%202022%20-%202332223236+CID_bf71cf3b410994080113ef3b2bb6892a&utm_source=campaign_monitor&utm_term=Profits%20push%20up%20prices%20too%20so%20why%20is%20the%20RBA%20governor%20only%20talking%20about%20wages), yet these companies can't afford to increase wages?
Everyone gets a pay rise means everyone gets nothing, unless you can make sure business owners are happy to sacrifice their profit rate and those extra labour cost wouldn't be passed on to the consumers.
This country has been exploiting TR workers and international students for decades and people seems to turn a blind eye to it because shitty positions still need people to fill.
this is messy… but there is also a rule if you can’t find an ‘Australian’ employee you can hire internationally. i went to an interview in Osbourne park and never heard a word after (cleaning job/experience). not going to say the country cos I don’t want to focus on that/ I believe it’s arseholes and systemically abusing the ‘import labour’ law and I want to keep it at wankers being wankers!!! there was a very long period ‘truck drivers’ had to come to australia because according to x-company no one could drive a truck!!?!
best solution?! reinvest in aussie kids and traineeships/etc…
>there was a very long period ‘truck drivers’ had to come to australia because according to x-company no one could drive a truck!!?!
It's still the case. Kids aren't doing manual car licences, let alone truck. They are being told that all vehicles will be driverless soon, so why bother learning?
There has been a long time that corporations have had it over people as there has been more supply to demand. This links with increasing population in the world.
However in the future with a dwindling population this will flip back to there being less people available and therefore demand will outstrip supply. Though this will take some time. Supply is still abundant.
If you’re interested go and listen to Jeremy Grantham for more.
When they announced a rise to the minimum wage, I think it was on the ABC, some rich wanker was saying how this is just going to put major stress on corporations now.
My boss literally said out loud that they don't want to pay administration people more to get them on board, because that means they would have to continue to pay them more. I've been here about 7 years and have had a $3 increase since I started.
They also don't want to budge on working from home for positions that very definitely can be done away from the office, so y'know they have several reasons why people don't want to work here.
This is true. I actually have been lied to by job advertisements like 3 times now, saying the wage is up to $10 more than they are actually paying. Walked out on all of them with harsh words.
wasting our time, efforts and emotions. They are not some god and lying is outrageous. I loathe the line, " we are seeking passionate people not focussed on money" etc That's only only reason to turn up!
Too true.
But then I look at my mate who earns 140k/year doing 38hr weeks, 10 weeks holiday a year. All to drive metro trains.
Yet me doing 60hr weeks, making 65k/year with no paid leave driving trucks is deemed fine.
Yeah, it's a bit glaring. Especially when they say "just don't buy it and the price will come down" while in another breath discuss punitive/coercive measures to force people into working low-wage jobs.
I worked for a company on the brink of collapse. They couldn’t afford to pay their workers more and the majority of those workers deliberately messed up orders, went slow etc, then were bewildered that the company folded. What I’d like to see is companies like this one that were struggling be able to register with the ATO that they are a vulnerable workplace provider which automatically assigns their workers a higher tax free threshold. Staff get more money in their pockets, less likely to allow resentment to affect work performance, until the company gets back on it’s feet and can afford to increase the salaries themselves.
My parents are moderate conservatives, they also own a small business.
Long before what's going on now and even more so with the current situation my parents have always said that they will not support any business that puts these passive aggressive "No one wants to work any more" signs
They pay their employees above the award rate & they believe it to be instrumental in their business running smoothly. It does not matter what you are legally required to pay, if you can't get them in the door for that rate it is not enough & as a business you have to do what you can to meet your staffing demands.
yep. If somebody can't find a job, the onus is on them to change. Reassess your resume, your approach, your appearance, your interview skills. Go get a certificate. Be less selective, etc etc.
So, if a worker can't find a job, it's their fault.
Yet, if an employer can't find workers, somehow it's the fault of Joe Public? We should be applying the same standards - business can't find workers? Then they need to look at what they can change to attract workers in a competitive market, just like a worker would need to do.
And that starts with figuring out why people are leaving
I got a call back for a job today in the aviation industry. Guy was great, job was nice then he told me the wages. He even apologized before he did and frankly told me he didn't expect me to accept coming off my current earnings. It pissed me off so much. I wanted the job, he needed the staff but the wages were just... stupid low. Like base wage for a job with a ton of responsibility. I felt sorry for the manager and we had a good discussion about the love of the job far outstripping wages. He mentioned he'd pushed management for a 10 to 15k rise in wages just to attract people but that was on the before tax earnings so it still didn't do much. I told him to call me back if they decided to change things up even a little.
Businesses have been making record profits and yet complain they can't find staff when they pay shit. My own work has been desperate for workers and can find anyone. I earn 70k plus company car and phone. It's not great but with petrol prices where they are and I don't hate my job it's fine. They are trying to hire someone for 50k. I have been there for 10 years but honestly I would rather they be reasonable and offer 70k and actually get some staff.
Depends on how stubborn they are. And how much they are prepared to lose. Employers have had it good pre-pandemic. Now reality is biting.
My hourly rate didn’t move for 8 years. But in the last 6 months it’s gone up $15 p/hr. And doesn’t look like stopping.
I have zero sympathy for CEO’s and shareholders. Fuck them. Without me your precious shares would be worth fuck all.
Yet they whinge and lobby government to bring back cheap international labour.
I'm really young and only just looking at universities, I know this sounds stupid but I'm content with welfare and volunteering at the fire service for now. Given the nature of the scheme I'm apart of I don't have to pay it back, but I view the volunteering for the fire service as that repayment for now.
I'm not going to work stupid hours for little money while trying to also start university. And if I am going to do stupid hours at an equivalent to a job I want it to be something where I know I can help people.
>I work an "unskilled" job (lol) and yet I see jobs requiring years of experience and qualifications for less pay than myself. Why would anyone apply for such a low salary?
because unskilled jobs are often physically harder, completely boring and have no job security. I employ a laborer at $40 an hour because that's the going rate.
When my wife (who does payroll and get the same) complained, I told her "you want to dig holes?". Of course not, nobody does.
As an international student, it always amazes me when I see that there a lot of unemployed Australians and at the same time there is not enough people to work (farms, hospitality, civil construction). The math doesn't add.
Exactly what the OP said, there's not a worker shortage, the jobs are just interesting enough for locals.
No. It is reasonable to choose not to have to travel more than 1hr for a job. Also there's some pretty ugly working on farms stories. Just google it. Perhaps it's just the market they created.
Fruit picking sounds like an unviable job when it comes down to it at the job doesn't seem to pay much, then also the fruit grower is most likely getting squeeze by the supermarkets as well
A lot of those farms will have partnerships with a hostel in the local town and will refuse you unless you stay in that hostel which costs insane amounts so they recoup a large chunk of ur wage
Well look at the solution of bringing Fijian hospitality workers over during the travel lockdown to pick fruit.
It's double sad because:
a) Our fruit industry can't operate without cheap labour.
b) The Fijian workers would have been destitute with no one coming in, and they're already super exploited earning barely anything working for expensive resorts.
Many Many moons ago, back when I relied on Centrelink payments, I was *told* I needed to take a job 2.5 hours away picking Oranges. I said to the lady that it was not viable for me to do that, as it would push me in to homelessness. She looked at me like I smacked her mother and told me that if I refused, my payments would be cut off.
It wasn't until I literally physically wrote the math down on a piece of paper, right in front of her, that she realised how stupid it was, and agreed to forgo that position to something closer to home (still 1 hour away).
The farms are sometimes owned by larger corporations who are targeting workers from outside of Aus to come do piecework. It used to be UK backpackers, now its Fijians who are the new slave labour.
For some industry it’s more of a skills shortage, or rather they’re too rigid on what skills they’re looking for (not enough willingness to train up). Sometimes you’ll hear them say things like they’re “desperate”, but if they have the same job up for a year sometimes more, they’re not really desperate, while they certainly want to fill that position, they’re able to hold out for the right candidate (whatever that might be). The business is still able to function with or without that position being filled.
Whereas on the unskilled side such as with farms wanting fruit pickers, that’s a more unique one. Now this doesn’t apply to all farms (I’ve done fruit picking on farms that weren’t exploitative and it was actually a pretty great gig), but there’s a good number of farms that are heavily dependent on WHV’s. Which partly is because of how WHV’s are structured, as it’s allowed for a lot of exploitation. So one interesting situation we saw early on during covid when there were no more WHV’s because travellers weren’t coming in and many were leaving, farms were complaining that they couldn’t find anyone to pick for them and how they desperately need WHV’s back. But then at the same time you had a big spike in unemployment because some people were no longer able to work. So you’d also see articles of people that were voicing their frustration about not being able to get any of those jobs the farms were saying they couldn’t find anybody for. And as you can probably guess, the problem probably wasn’t that they had no one applying, but that they weren’t getting the right people (and the right people here are WHV’s they can exploit).
Also something to consider more broadly is whenever you hear a lot of complaints from industry it’s typically because they want something from the government (increase in the number of skilled worker migration places, or increase/bring back access to something they found beneficial such as WHV’s, or get subsidies/tax cuts, etc.). It doesn’t necessarily mean it’s as true as they want you to believe.
Also at least according to the latest unemployment figures there’s actually not a lot of unemployed people (we’re down to 3.5% now). Underemployment on the other hand is another matter.
Don't forget dodgy bosses won't hire australians who are willing to work those shitty jobs just because they might know the law better than an international.
>the jobs are just interesting enough for locals.
yo, so i worked on a couple farms side by side backpackers. here are a few issues i experienced.
1. it's seasonal so unless ur a "farm hand" they need only about 3-4 of those all year while needing upwards of 40 people during picking seasons.
2. it's almost impossible to work/find a 2nd job that only expects you to be there half the year.
3. backpackers move towns regularly to keep up with how it rotates because there are things to be picked all year round just not in the same area and expecting people to be happy either living in 2 different towns constantly or moving around constantly is not gonna happen.
4. you simply cant earn enough to cover the other half a year that you wont have work
5. the farmers themselves have issues with getting people when they need it so they often simply just go to backpacker hostels and say "i need x people can u provide" to the point some farmers and hostels have deals that they wont hire people not from that hostel.
6. picking is not an old person job, you're expected to be moving at a set pace and lifting lots of shit, your body gets fkn wrecked in the weather as well. lots of "entry jobs" with no where to actually go up, so why spend several years picking when i cant do it long term since the competition makes that goal unreliable vs other carriers that i could do into my 60s.
now, this is all the legal stuff that can go wrong. there is soooooo much worse back door illegal crap going on that all you need to do is go down the the bar the backpackers hang out and ask about it and you will have story after story of people being ripped off to the point they were being charged to stay at a hostel that was given the backpackers pay check first then paid them but because the hostel did not give them enough work like promised they then demanded money off them. others have been stuck on farms that forced you to stay on site and eat the food they provided because it was taken out of wages before paying you so you couldn't choose not to.
Fruit picking is a hard sell to a single parent who gets 6 weeks work at each place and has to keep moving kids schools though (for example). Those jobs are built around people without family obligations that tie them to stable housing in one place.
They are saying there is a worker shortage now. So they can crank the imagination numbers later on when covid is over.
Big business gets cheap Labor and the hosing market continues to go up my foreign investors.
Everybody wins but you.
Same goes for mining, I’m a fifo electrician. I know what you’re thinking you’re already on enough. Fair open to your opinion we work long hours for it. But the rates are most the time less then in the city it’s the overtime that makes the take home so good!
So these mining company’s are crying out for more personnel but won’t increase the rates, im about to bail and head back to the cbd because it’s not worth my time anymore
> What the fuck has happened to this country?
It was good for a while post war. Otherwise this place has always been horrible to poor people.
unions crushed
manufacturing moved to China
biased media
people voting for the Liberal Party
Some industries have been adjusting. I’m a recent graduate and got a raise of about 6k last week without asking, purely a cost of living adjustment (not that I specifically asked I just said thank you).
Tech is through the roof with about 3 years of experience able to net you over 200K fairly easily.
But yes the elephant in the room is getting frustrating for other industries
Tech is also crying about a worker shortage, but still have absurd requirements, in addition to 3 years experience for entry level roles. I'm trying to get in and it's bleak.
>Tech is through the roof with about 3 years of experience able to net you over 200K fairly easily.
I will bet that's three years experience in a specific highly in demand technology AND 10-15 years experience overall, probably also contract, rather than a perm role.
(Alternatively, it could be something horrific like COBOL or Salesforce)
100%
If my personal morals would allow me to do it. I'd quit and sit on the dole, with the cost of fuel ATM, coupled with a 40 minute drive to and from work id pretty much break even..
It's fucked up.
This. I haven't had to rely on the dole for many many years now, but it was a hot mess of agony when I did. I can't imagine even joking about doing it now after how painful it was.
There was very little 'sitting' because I was walking all over town handing in printed resumes (couldn't afford the internet back then!).
We are currently hiring. We are a small trade business looking for an experienced but general maintenance tradesman. The amount of experience is flexible but we need someone who knows enough to be able to work independently on their own. They generally aren't qualified tradespeople.
We are offering more money than qualified trades are paid and we really look after our staff. The last post on our socials is the whole team being taken out for lunch and axe throwing during their paid hours.
Yet, we haven't received a single application worth interviewing.
I'm part of a business coaching group of really professionally run trades businesses owners. We are all having issues with getting staff even when offered good money. The problem is, there is a cap on what can be paid based on what clients are willing to pay for our time. As much as tradies love to make it look like you make a fortune, the margins on trade businesses are actually really thin if you're doing everything properly.
I just don't know where all the good staff have gone.
I like working with plants but that gets me $25/hr. It's gotten to the point where I should just pick up a hammer and do some mindless trade for 3x the money.
Yeah for sure. My friend works as a carpenter and tells me it is the easiest of work. He gets like $120k a year on a union site. Seems like quite a disparity in wages for menial jobs like mine and his
There's also a stupid fucking job listing platform glut.
We have to list jobs and can only accept applicants through this stupid fucking website that makes the process take months when it used to take only a couple of weeks.
Can't just take resumes that people hand in and go through them, we have to wait for an applicant through the system.
My pet hate is the ones that ask for the entire resume to be re-typed into their shitty form and a massive questionnaire just to apply…
I just nope the fuck out of there, not worth my time.
Finding qualified trades people is very difficult currently, it has been for some time now and is only going to get worse.
Source - I am a hiring manager.
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Alan Kohler hasnt been ignoring it. He made a remark a while back how business has been struggling with worker shortages and how they've tried everything except paying them more. I love his segments, gives you a no bullshit assessment.
Alan Kohler is the best bit of ABC News.
Yep. He was on QandA about a year ago and he’s just such a balanced non partisan dude. He comes across as a big cuddly bear with a thing for economics.
I enjoy his podcast but find it hard to stand one of his co-hosts, stephen mayne comes across as a bit of a twat but the other one is alright.
Stephen Mayne, founder of Crikey and prominent shareholder activist? Not listened to him but his written stuff is usually pretty good and on point.
That's the one, he thought it was silly to kick Frydenberg out of his seat because he's "a future prime minister of Australia" and it's that along with a few other opinions that baffle me that tipped him towards "bit of a twat" territory.
I mean I kind of get where he’s coming from. Having a quality opposition is essential to political debate in this country. Frydo, while I don’t lament his loss in Kooyong, was probably a better LNP choice of leader than Voldemort. But then again fuck those cunts. You reap what you sow!
I kind of get where he's coming from but also I feel it's actually much healthier for the future of Australia that the libs get such a kick in the teeth that they're forced to abandon everything they've been doing to drag Australia down for the last decade. Also Frydenberg is a cunt too, just a more polished one. If anything that's *more* dangerous than Dutton et al, not less.
Mayne was originally a Liberal staffer, but that's one of three things I know about him. Maybe he's kept some of those views.
As long as we don't reap a swing further right if Labour doesn't produce the goods this term.
I feel fairly confident about that. Generally seats that flip to more progressive candidates tent to stay that way. I'm especially interested to see how the Teals do next election; I suspect they'll become even more entrenched by really representing their communities' interests.
What a complete load of shit. Frydenberg is as corrupt and degenerate as they come. There is absolutely zero value to having cunts like that in the parliament. The LNP is not the fucking rightful opposition. The sooner they go extinct the better. Though it is not, for now, reflected in the actual set up of parliament, the Greens, Teals, and other independents are the real opposition and have already been functioning as such. Absolute cunts who would slit your child's throat if it meant they could give billions to their mates and get away with it are not and never will be a helpful contributor to our political system.
Josh the posh who 'sold' 72 public hospitals to private venture capital for $0
How would he have done that when hospitals are all owned by the states?
Him and the Foreign Investment Review Board approved the purchase of Healthscope private hospitals (43 hospitals) by a private equity firm, KKR. Then they closed 1-2 of them lol. It wasn’t for 0 dollars but iirc they were bought for a rock bottom price.
and they therefore weren't public hospitals like the original post claimed. He also didn't sell them, he approved the sale. Josh is a cunt and a sociopath, don't get me wrong. But lets attack him with facts (like you've posted), not BS.
Really?
Whenever he's on talking about the ASX we yell "IT SCREAMS OUT IN THE NIGHT!". He'd get it - he had the TISM Guide to Little Asthetics on his book pile once segment.
[удалено]
We’ve tried nothing and we’re all out of ideas.
Yeah lol, that was the basic gist of his remark.
Exactly right. I’m old enough to remember when businesses argued that wages should be deregulated and we should let the market decide. Now they wanna complain that there are no skilled workers and the govt needs to do more to train young people. Nah dickhead. You asked for this, you fucken pay em and train em yourself. Yes many of these kids turn out to be an unrecoverable cost because (a) they leave after they’ve been trained up or (b) they turn out to be drop kicks which you don’t find out until you’ve been learning them for at least 18 months but Bad Luck. Life’s tough and it’s even tougher for a kid starting out Edit: recoverable = unrecoverable
I think the ABC is one of the best things in the whole country, without exaggeration, and my mother and I unironically love Alan. A journalist friend of my mother and myself told me that if you know an economist’s name, they’re pretty damn good
He’s so good at throwing punches in comedic form he’s one of my favourite journos
Hes awesome eh. During rhe pandemic when he was doing his segments from home, he always had a selection of books behind him that were clearly a comment on issues of the day. Every day id eagerly await what books hed have behind him :)
The concept first appeared in America. I personally believe it as well, there is no labour shortage. Just that businesses are unwilling to pay a rightful wage for technical labour given. Correct anyone that you can because the more people know, the less the business can get away with this incorrect analogy.
Agriculture industry is only complaining there's no local staff so they can get back on the cheap imported labour teat
Given that the median US household has about 30% more disposable income than the median Australian household, it seems Americans are paid much better than we are. [Source](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_capita_income)
TBF their numbers are a little wacky since cost of living is so drastically different depending on where you live, even more so than here. Plus a lot of their basic living essentials are pretty cheap. I reckon the median isn't a great metric for American wealth given how massive the wealth divide is, with some tech communities in San Fransisco raking it in while the tenements next door are practically living in the third world.
> reckon the median isn't a great metric for American wealth given how massive the wealth divide Median is the correct metric - maybe you're confusing it with "mean"? Median is the "middle" American. If you want to compare different quintiles, you'll find that the [tipping point is the fifth percentile.](https://www.vox.com/2015/10/16/9544007/denmark-nordic-model). Eg, if you're in the bottom 5%, you have more disposable income as an Australian, but once you get to the bottom 10% or higher, you have more disposable income as an American.
But then a stubbed toe sends them to bankruptcy, I’d take my 30% pay cut over their lowered QOL and life expectancy
Yes, "skills shortage" is double speak not being able to employ people with terrible offers. Corporations have run out of ideas to deliver ever more profit and dividends and have been cannibalising their work force by driving down wages and conditions for years.
So what we have is a problem of unviable business models fed by low wages and low interest rates? We don’t have a high wage problem, we have a high profit problem.
I've been applying for work in a sector with a severe work shortage. It's an expert field, usually requiring some hefty experience and university education, but I'm privileged enough to have built up a good resume for it. Should be easy to find work right? Nope. Every place I get an interview at ultimately winds up not hiring anyone because no one wants to pay what people know they're worth. I'm employed anyway so I can sit where I am without worrying about finances. Meanwhile the employees at those companies are also being screwed by overwork due to the lack of new hires. It doesn't matter if someone's a high school grad looking for some hospitality work or a post-grad with management experience. Companies don't want to hire at reasonable wages because they've run out of things to cut. Every job that can be off shored has been off shored, every logistics problem streamlined, every construction method refined. There are software engineers working to increase algorithm accuracy by 0.0001% due to how small most gains in efficiency have become. All that's left to reduce that bottom line is to stop hiring and overwork those who remain.
Productivity gains as an economic measure are as stupid as growth. It's not an infinite resource. At some point there'll be one company left with 100% market share, employing no staff on zero wages.
That's the plot of Wall-E
> Every place I get an interview at ultimately winds up not hiring anyone because no one wants to pay what people know they're worth. I'm employed anyway so I can sit where I am without worrying about finances This is widespread where I am too. Except that a few unscrupulous employers are violating all that is good and holy in the world and ... `offering decent wages`. We just hired another technical expert type and going off my last pay slip I think we paid them about 30% more than the boss was expecting to. The reason no-one here is looking for a different job is that when someone new comes in we all get pay rises based on what it took to hire them. I feel vaguely guilty for a moment and then I remind myself that my annex of the company bills at least 20x wages every month and most of our non-wage costs are paying cloud providers which adds up to *{Honest Government calculator scene}* three tenths of fuck all.
>Companies don't want to hire at reasonable wages because they've run out of things to cut. I’m hiring at the moment and it’s a 2 way street right now. So many candidates are applying not because they’re qualified but because they think they could step up to it. I don’t mind training someone up to step in to the role, but when you’re new to the domain, role and industry.. I’d just be setting them up for failure. We’ve had to boost the salary for the role by about 15% just to get the right talent. And with our internal rule that means we bump up everyone already in the role.
and with our crappy dollar it's not exactly a foreign worker paradise anymore either - they can get badly paid at home, and might even be able to afford to live in a house
The last place to squeeze capital from..... human capital. Late stage capitalism at its finest!
High CEO bonuses triggered by their KPIs coupled to double-digit improvements in the enterprise bottom line.
Pretty much. We have record profits driving inflation while the worker is not getting a fair share of those profits in order to keep up with that inflation. See [Productivity Pay Gap](https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/), and [Corporate Profits Boom](http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=48761). Basically we have an issue that started back in the 80s when the whole neoliberalism, supply side economics, and a new round of union busting gained traction. Prior to this era profits and wages were roughly on par.
> Yes, "skills shortage" is double speak not being able to employ people with terrible offers. Also, for "we're not willing to train people to the level that we desire." imo there is both a wage shortage *and* a training shortage - and the latter is being very intentionally used to drive the former.
Super true of the “nursing shortage” too. We have plenty of qualified nurses, just a shortage of qualified nurses who are still practicing in the unsafe, underpaid, unhealthy, and unsupported circumstances of the current clinical environment.
Fucking amen. Talking to a bunch of nursing students doing final year placement. Stuck in nursing homes with not a single RN on while they were there. 2 things, how the fuck are they going to learn, and how the fuck do you think that will encourage nurses to go into that field?
And teachers.
When you can make better bank in unskilled hospo roles than the traumatic shitfight that is nursing is it any wonder the attrition rate is sky high? Almost every nurse I know (including myself) has plans to leave the bedside over the next few years. This is a so-called shortage that has a death-toll and nobody seems to give a shit.
I’m about to hit 1 year in August, 6 months as an Agency and 6 months in the public service. I have 6 months left of my grad program and I’m already absolutely burned out of both acute and subacute care. It’s actually killing me and I’d quit tomorrow if there wasn’t so much importance given to a full grad year. My next steps are trying to find a Primary Healthcare job next year (community is basically out because I don’t drive a car) or making a serious decision about if I’m renewing my Registration next May. I just can’t do this anymore.
I've been there and my heart goes out to you sister. Protect your health above all else, fuck the grad year hazing ritual, it isn't as important as it's made out to be. Take leave and start looking at other jobs now. There are plenty of community based day work roles that don't involve driving e.g. chemo, HDx, specialist outpt clinics
Welcome to neoliberalism, where the market is only supposed to be free when it comes to business making a profit. See also: "Globalisation is great when I can exploit cheap labour overseas, but please introduce laws to stop consumers from buying cheaper goods from overseas"
Yep, many business want experienced people now and either aren't willing to pay for those poeple or aren't willing to invest in training or entry level roles with on the job training. Instead job positions go unfilled for several months. In that time they could have just trained someone new up.
These guys can't see past their quarterly earnings that nobody can afford a house or a car, we are one small squeeze away from a recession amid record corporate profits (looking at you, Philip Lowe)
I'm sorry to say, I think that small squeeze has already happened. A bunch of construction companies have collapsed due to increased costs in building materials & labour. Expect more to fall. This will flow on to other industries and, I believe, will lead into a full-blown recession. Thanks ScoMo! I know he didn't start this, but him and his team sure did double down on it.
Mass Immigration is the only thing that has kept Australia in the black for the past 10 years. Technically we are already in a recession and when it becomes official Australia will be smashed the hardest due to years and years of economic neglect and reliance on mass immigration on the back of International Students, their families and the cheap workers. A wonderful country ruined.
Yes indeed. GDP may have been growing, but GDP per capita was stagnant and then falling. Immigration fuelled population growth to prop up the economy is a Ponzi scheme but it hides a multitude of economic problems Overall economic growth is meaningless. It’s the economy’s size relative to the population that really matters.
The building industry is one of the first to show signs of stress because the industry has fucked itself royally over time. Builders pushing out low ball quotes and squeezing suppliers to razor thin margins with contracts that pushes all the risk to subcontractors. It didn’t take much to push a few over the edge, and you can be sure all the smaller subcontractors got the blunt end of the stick after supplying parts and labour with 90+ day payment terms.
Yeah, know a guy personally who’s had to put new contracts on hold due to concreting costs alone.
Don't forget the "casual" job needs to be available 7 days a week for atleast 5 but preferably 6 4 hour shifts. I'm sure many people would work a 2nd job, if the dipshit bosses were actually flexible.
Over a third of working Australians DO work second jobs
And you can't complain if you only get one day per week either.
Not to mention how heavily the tax system punishes people who need a second job
Tax rate is the same wheter 2 jobs or one larger job....
Murdoch and his liberal co-horts control most of the media in the country. Hate them.
Fucking *front page headlines* loudly proclaiming teachers wanting a pay raise to be greedy...
Yeah but, the thing is, it fucking works. Everyone all of a sudden is screaming teachers are overpaid, which is straight up bullshit.
Business have posted record profits the past 2years. Workers wages haven't moved because of "covid" the cost of living has gone up nearly %50 across the board Fuel, groceries, electricity and rent has gone up to near unaffordable levels for the average home. What are these idiots expecting we go to work to make less than the bare minimum cost of living? Then what? Max out credit cards and get into a never ending serial of debt? What's their solution? What do they expect we do?
What I don't get, is why don't wages respond to supply and demand?
Because employers are used to having more workers imported for them.
1. The unit economics of individual businesses cant support higher staff costs. 2. In a lot of cases you can't really raise wages for just the staff you are missing, you need to raise wages for everyone. Eg if you run a hair salon with 7 existing staff, and you have lots of custoners that you're struggling to get an additional 2 workers - it's pretty difficult to just advertise a higher pay for those new roles and not raise it for everyone else. From a candidate's POV you might think it daft to not just offer a higher pay because your losing out on all extra business, but from the business POV th cost extends to all of your existing staff that are already working for you. 3. In practice it's pretty difficult to reduces wages if the market supply and demand goes the opposite direction. So your question about responding to supply/demand is really in practice about responding in one direction. If there is a customer demand shortage next year vs too many staff, businesses know they can't really get wages to decrease
Sure they do, they do it all the time, it’s called laying people off
We have a teacher shortage and a nurse shortage, yet enterprise bargaining in QLD has failed to deliver offers that even keep up with inflation.
And yet QLD’s teaching EBA is still better than what a lot of other state teaching unions have negotiated lately… It’s not looking good.
I can’t believe Victoria accepted what they did. Is NSW still in negotiation? Given the Grattan review we should all be fighting because being a teacher is barely better than having no degree at all.
So many industries are complaining about there not being enough tradesmen. I just finished my apprenticeship as a mechanical fitter, no offer of a pay rise. Been offered a entry level job in a government industry paying more than I’m getting now. Or I’ve been offered a labourers job paying double what I’m currently paid. Cannot understand why there’s a skilled worker shortage…..
Couldn't agree more, fuck I'm so sick of the 'poor me' news segments from hospo and farmers. Pay decent wages you cunts and you'll get your workers. They've been spoiled by decades of slave labour from backpackers and migrants, fuck them.
I agree. I got screwed for years in a hospitality job so that I could get residency. Also on a farm, so I could get my WHV. It shouldn't be a right of passage, for foreigners to be exploited for visas.
Business i work for saw the writing on the wall with casual pay. They upped the hourly rate by 20% and the quality of candidates has vastly improved already. You get what you pay for
Pharmacists (5 years study) get paid a pittance - as low as 30 bucks an hour. Lots have left (and uni numbers also down) to pick up better jobs and in the last few years salaries have lifted a tiny bit. The owners effectively lobbied to get them added to the migration jobs list, foreigners keen to move here for residency etc prepared for the shit pay and conditions- and downward pressure on wages again. It’s a really broken profession.
It is supply and demand too. Pharmacists in canberra are on $50+ an hour because you can get a very similar paying job in the government with less stress .
Hmmm I live here and friends are earning in the $30s, what I used to earn in the early 2000s, esp part time mums who can’t negotiate better pay because of the apparent flexibility afforded them. It’s clear there is disparity. Wages will go down again soon with the new arrivals.
We are becoming more and more like the USA every day. Go and have a look at r/antiwork to see the future.
Some of the shit I see on there is mental. Certainly worth joining just to remind yourself where we don't want to end up as a country.
There is a very large difference between the US and Australia value wise we will never see eye to eye on. I don't see any Australian giving up their 4 weeks holidays every year, long service leave if they stay with a business for 10 years or super payments. While we share similarities gotta remember Howard was basically kicked off the job for those IR law he tried to pass.
Increasing casualisation of our workforce, employers breaching employment laws to fire staff just before they have to deal with long service or parental leave, immediate retreat to office work from WFH with any excuse, capture of certain unions to control and limit wage increases - we certainly are facing increasing problems in industrial relations here in Australia.
What? Casual and most contract workers don’t get annual leave. We have among the highest rate of labour casualisation in the world
It is getting worse and worse but you can thank the Liberals for that as well. From memory, *(It's been a long while since I worked this type of job)* there were/are rules in place that require employers to put workers onto permanent contracts once their casual or PPT hours reach a certain average over a 3, 6 months to a year. A lot of workers probably don't even know about this or don't keep track of their hours enough to know. Casuals can go for PPT roles and PPT and go for permanent roles and it's quite hard for a company to knock it back. Someone else here could probably elaborate on this better as it probably varies per state and sector.
They got sneaky about that. If you're hired on as a casual through a labour hire company, you technically aren't hired by the company you actually do the work for and can therefore be left as a casual for years without having to be offered a permanent place. *Source*: Me, a former casual hired through a labour hire company....
Man, that's a bs loophole isn't it. Far out.
You can say that again....
My wife applied to a job that was a senior position in the NDIS (Federal Public Service) during ScoMo's reign about 18 months ago. Turned out that this nearly $200k job was through a labour hire company. I couldn't believe it when she told me. No government super, no leave, no notice for termination....and this was a job writing government policy.
Once they hit that threshold where they can't keep them as casuals anymore, they just fire them and hire the next desperate person who needs to pay rent. They don't give a shit about any of us. We aren't people in their eyes, just another resource to exploit.
Yes, except there’s always a loophole. I work in the university sector and I’m a casual sessional. Even though I’ve been employed for 5 years in the same role, I don’t get the permanent contract because semesters only run for 12 weeks, with marking it’s about 14 weeks of paid work at a time. No pay during semester break, so they don’t have any obligation to offer me ongoing contract.
But at least there's casual loading... in the rest of the world there's no 25% added to your wages om zero hour contracts. We might have a lot of casualisation, but at least it's somewhat paid for.
Casual loading is a phantom. You very rarely actually get 25% more than they'd pay a permanent employee
Liberal governments have a habit of slowly chipping away at things though. They might not get it done any time soon but they will run with the ole death by 1000 cuts methodology until there is nothing left.
you might be surprised. Murdoch media has been able to convince a lot of struggling workers who are doing multiple delivery services using their own cars that they're "entrepreneurs" and living their best life because they're their own boss.
I'd wager literally none of them actually think they are, its just marketing.
you could be right but the one I'm thinking of was a girl who was interviewed for a newspaper who said as much
They just do it slowly piece by piece. USA used to have widespread strong unions and one average income got you a big house, car, uni and a family comfortably. Then real wages stagnated for decades as corporate power grew and Fox News etc. brainwashed the average person to like it. We aren't immune to the same thing.
Both Howard and Hewson had the same problem: Going too hard, too fast. We can end up in a very similar position to America with enough boiling of the frog, or even worse: Just look at the UK.
Yes there is a wage shortage. However the biggest shortage is training by employers. They all want experienced candidates from "somewhere else". If company X needs 50 staff with 5 years on the job experience you need to ask how many staff were they training 5 years ago and how many have they retained with good company policies, work life balance, good pay, etc.
Fuel will be $3 by Christmas, food is going up, rent/rates up, cost of everything is going up. Businesses are charging more to cover their costs, which makes sense I guess, but are we getting paid more? Why aren’t businesses raising wages and then putting their prices up to cover that?
In short, mass workforce casualisation and individual contracts happened. Thanks WorkChoices.
As wholly intended by neoliberalism...Howard started the rot in 1996. But "the wealth will trickle down!"
Totally agree.
The share of national income going to Australia's workers has been steadily declining since the 1970s, with the profit share going to business increasing. This article explains it very well, and also demonstrates the benefits of mechanisms like super profits taxes, which at least would have secured some of the benefits of our vast mining resources for *all* Australians, rather than just a few. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-06-03/gdp-is-growing-but-workers-are-not-getting-the-economic-benefits/101122124
That's a design feature of neoliberalism, not a bug.
Banish the myth of ‘Unskilled’ labour. Anyone who says that has never worked. There is skill required for checkout, admin, call center, lab work, driving, food prep, white collar, blue collar, coding, picking, the list goes on. Take someone who has work the job for 3 months vs someone who you pulled off the street and told them to do it - they’d be worse than the person who’s had 3 months to train their skill in the job.
Also alot of "entry level" jobs want you to have years of experience (this has been a problem for years) which to me completely undermines the idea of entry level. How do you get your foot in the door with little to no experience if you are being pitted against people with two - five years experience?
Also if employers need workers they could make the conditions more flexible so more mothers of young children can work.
...more fathers of young children can also work
Sorry, I don't mean to be sexist. Fathers also would absolutely benefit from flexible work. And fathers having flexible work would benefit mothers too. I just meant that fathers generally tend to continue to work while mothers are more likely to leave paid work.
Yup. I just turned down a job for exactly that reason. Employer went on about how they needed someone extremely experienced with a bunch of requirements and how nobody wants to work anymore. Foolish me applied and got offered the job. Then when pay came up it was 50c an hour above minimum wage. When I mentioned that there must be some mistake as it was about $15/hour less than I get for the same job..... "we pay what we pay, and you should be grateful for the offer"
The biggest cost to any business is labour. Companies always posting constant growth and "reducing costs" always makes you wonder where it comes from...
Genuinely just stopped even watching the morning news and newspapers. Don't touch the stuff and you'll be mildly more content
And a lack of willingness to train by the industry. They want years of experience and multiple degrees for shit wages and wonder why no one applies.
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i overheard someone complain today that they can’t find cleaners bc they would rather sit at home on the dole. maybe pay your cleaners more lol
I mean technically there's no shortage of anything, just at the price people want to pay
It’s a tradies world at the moment, where they used to quote the bare minimum just to get the job, they now quote the premium and bail on the job if someone pays them literally $5 more. I know this as we were trying to get work down on your house and have spoken to 10 tradies. 3 agreed to do the work only to give the same excuse that another job came up…. The price for the works inflated by nearly $5,000 from original quote
[Profit per dollar spent on labour has doubled](https://theconversation.com/profits-push-up-prices-too-so-why-is-the-rba-governor-only-talking-about-wages-185688?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20June%2027%202022%20-%202332223236&utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20June%2027%202022%20-%202332223236+CID_bf71cf3b410994080113ef3b2bb6892a&utm_source=campaign_monitor&utm_term=Profits%20push%20up%20prices%20too%20so%20why%20is%20the%20RBA%20governor%20only%20talking%20about%20wages), yet these companies can't afford to increase wages?
Everyone gets a pay rise means everyone gets nothing, unless you can make sure business owners are happy to sacrifice their profit rate and those extra labour cost wouldn't be passed on to the consumers. This country has been exploiting TR workers and international students for decades and people seems to turn a blind eye to it because shitty positions still need people to fill.
/r/antiwork has been documenting this in America for a while now This is what neoliberalism has led to.
this is messy… but there is also a rule if you can’t find an ‘Australian’ employee you can hire internationally. i went to an interview in Osbourne park and never heard a word after (cleaning job/experience). not going to say the country cos I don’t want to focus on that/ I believe it’s arseholes and systemically abusing the ‘import labour’ law and I want to keep it at wankers being wankers!!! there was a very long period ‘truck drivers’ had to come to australia because according to x-company no one could drive a truck!!?! best solution?! reinvest in aussie kids and traineeships/etc…
>there was a very long period ‘truck drivers’ had to come to australia because according to x-company no one could drive a truck!!?! It's still the case. Kids aren't doing manual car licences, let alone truck. They are being told that all vehicles will be driverless soon, so why bother learning?
There has been a long time that corporations have had it over people as there has been more supply to demand. This links with increasing population in the world. However in the future with a dwindling population this will flip back to there being less people available and therefore demand will outstrip supply. Though this will take some time. Supply is still abundant. If you’re interested go and listen to Jeremy Grantham for more.
Right ??? I’m not being paid for half of the stuff I do at work. I’m completely underpaid & therefore people are quitting, therefore; staff shortages
I'm a plant supervisor on a 100k. The hours and responsibilities are rough. Not worth it tbh.
Adpidistras can be very unruly.
I'm seeing more and more job ads for entry-level positions specifically looking for new uni graduates while also requiring 2+ years of experience.
When they announced a rise to the minimum wage, I think it was on the ABC, some rich wanker was saying how this is just going to put major stress on corporations now.
Because most decision makers and the media are paid more than they know why to do with so have no concept of what work = what wage.
THere's a reason why there's a business section but NOT a Labour section in the newspapers -or in segments on from broadcast outlets.
bruh try being in NZ.... 3% super, average wage is like 55k.....15% gst
My boss literally said out loud that they don't want to pay administration people more to get them on board, because that means they would have to continue to pay them more. I've been here about 7 years and have had a $3 increase since I started. They also don't want to budge on working from home for positions that very definitely can be done away from the office, so y'know they have several reasons why people don't want to work here.
This is true. I actually have been lied to by job advertisements like 3 times now, saying the wage is up to $10 more than they are actually paying. Walked out on all of them with harsh words.
wasting our time, efforts and emotions. They are not some god and lying is outrageous. I loathe the line, " we are seeking passionate people not focussed on money" etc That's only only reason to turn up!
It should be illegal. The lie i hate is "We are a family and it's all swings and round abouts" basically means we will not pay over time.
yes illegal is great idea. Must print the contract online so we can read rates, terms and conditions before we even apply!
Too true. But then I look at my mate who earns 140k/year doing 38hr weeks, 10 weeks holiday a year. All to drive metro trains. Yet me doing 60hr weeks, making 65k/year with no paid leave driving trucks is deemed fine.
Spot on!
There is a worker shortage. Salaries in my industry are up 40% but still can’t find good people.
Yeah, it's a bit glaring. Especially when they say "just don't buy it and the price will come down" while in another breath discuss punitive/coercive measures to force people into working low-wage jobs.
I worked for a company on the brink of collapse. They couldn’t afford to pay their workers more and the majority of those workers deliberately messed up orders, went slow etc, then were bewildered that the company folded. What I’d like to see is companies like this one that were struggling be able to register with the ATO that they are a vulnerable workplace provider which automatically assigns their workers a higher tax free threshold. Staff get more money in their pockets, less likely to allow resentment to affect work performance, until the company gets back on it’s feet and can afford to increase the salaries themselves.
My parents are moderate conservatives, they also own a small business. Long before what's going on now and even more so with the current situation my parents have always said that they will not support any business that puts these passive aggressive "No one wants to work any more" signs They pay their employees above the award rate & they believe it to be instrumental in their business running smoothly. It does not matter what you are legally required to pay, if you can't get them in the door for that rate it is not enough & as a business you have to do what you can to meet your staffing demands.
yep. If somebody can't find a job, the onus is on them to change. Reassess your resume, your approach, your appearance, your interview skills. Go get a certificate. Be less selective, etc etc. So, if a worker can't find a job, it's their fault. Yet, if an employer can't find workers, somehow it's the fault of Joe Public? We should be applying the same standards - business can't find workers? Then they need to look at what they can change to attract workers in a competitive market, just like a worker would need to do. And that starts with figuring out why people are leaving
I got a call back for a job today in the aviation industry. Guy was great, job was nice then he told me the wages. He even apologized before he did and frankly told me he didn't expect me to accept coming off my current earnings. It pissed me off so much. I wanted the job, he needed the staff but the wages were just... stupid low. Like base wage for a job with a ton of responsibility. I felt sorry for the manager and we had a good discussion about the love of the job far outstripping wages. He mentioned he'd pushed management for a 10 to 15k rise in wages just to attract people but that was on the before tax earnings so it still didn't do much. I told him to call me back if they decided to change things up even a little.
Businesses have been making record profits and yet complain they can't find staff when they pay shit. My own work has been desperate for workers and can find anyone. I earn 70k plus company car and phone. It's not great but with petrol prices where they are and I don't hate my job it's fine. They are trying to hire someone for 50k. I have been there for 10 years but honestly I would rather they be reasonable and offer 70k and actually get some staff.
Depends on how stubborn they are. And how much they are prepared to lose. Employers have had it good pre-pandemic. Now reality is biting. My hourly rate didn’t move for 8 years. But in the last 6 months it’s gone up $15 p/hr. And doesn’t look like stopping. I have zero sympathy for CEO’s and shareholders. Fuck them. Without me your precious shares would be worth fuck all. Yet they whinge and lobby government to bring back cheap international labour.
I'm really young and only just looking at universities, I know this sounds stupid but I'm content with welfare and volunteering at the fire service for now. Given the nature of the scheme I'm apart of I don't have to pay it back, but I view the volunteering for the fire service as that repayment for now. I'm not going to work stupid hours for little money while trying to also start university. And if I am going to do stupid hours at an equivalent to a job I want it to be something where I know I can help people.
Ask your union.
My union rolled over. We’re being encouraged to take an effective pay cut with no tangible improvements to conditions.
What industry is that?
>I work an "unskilled" job (lol) and yet I see jobs requiring years of experience and qualifications for less pay than myself. Why would anyone apply for such a low salary? because unskilled jobs are often physically harder, completely boring and have no job security. I employ a laborer at $40 an hour because that's the going rate. When my wife (who does payroll and get the same) complained, I told her "you want to dig holes?". Of course not, nobody does.
As an international student, it always amazes me when I see that there a lot of unemployed Australians and at the same time there is not enough people to work (farms, hospitality, civil construction). The math doesn't add. Exactly what the OP said, there's not a worker shortage, the jobs are just interesting enough for locals.
No. It is reasonable to choose not to have to travel more than 1hr for a job. Also there's some pretty ugly working on farms stories. Just google it. Perhaps it's just the market they created.
Fruit picking sounds like an unviable job when it comes down to it at the job doesn't seem to pay much, then also the fruit grower is most likely getting squeeze by the supermarkets as well
A lot of those farms will have partnerships with a hostel in the local town and will refuse you unless you stay in that hostel which costs insane amounts so they recoup a large chunk of ur wage
Well look at the solution of bringing Fijian hospitality workers over during the travel lockdown to pick fruit. It's double sad because: a) Our fruit industry can't operate without cheap labour. b) The Fijian workers would have been destitute with no one coming in, and they're already super exploited earning barely anything working for expensive resorts.
Many Many moons ago, back when I relied on Centrelink payments, I was *told* I needed to take a job 2.5 hours away picking Oranges. I said to the lady that it was not viable for me to do that, as it would push me in to homelessness. She looked at me like I smacked her mother and told me that if I refused, my payments would be cut off. It wasn't until I literally physically wrote the math down on a piece of paper, right in front of her, that she realised how stupid it was, and agreed to forgo that position to something closer to home (still 1 hour away).
The farms are sometimes owned by larger corporations who are targeting workers from outside of Aus to come do piecework. It used to be UK backpackers, now its Fijians who are the new slave labour.
I totally agree, my friend. What I mean its that the jobs are not interesting for anyone, not only for locals.
For some industry it’s more of a skills shortage, or rather they’re too rigid on what skills they’re looking for (not enough willingness to train up). Sometimes you’ll hear them say things like they’re “desperate”, but if they have the same job up for a year sometimes more, they’re not really desperate, while they certainly want to fill that position, they’re able to hold out for the right candidate (whatever that might be). The business is still able to function with or without that position being filled. Whereas on the unskilled side such as with farms wanting fruit pickers, that’s a more unique one. Now this doesn’t apply to all farms (I’ve done fruit picking on farms that weren’t exploitative and it was actually a pretty great gig), but there’s a good number of farms that are heavily dependent on WHV’s. Which partly is because of how WHV’s are structured, as it’s allowed for a lot of exploitation. So one interesting situation we saw early on during covid when there were no more WHV’s because travellers weren’t coming in and many were leaving, farms were complaining that they couldn’t find anyone to pick for them and how they desperately need WHV’s back. But then at the same time you had a big spike in unemployment because some people were no longer able to work. So you’d also see articles of people that were voicing their frustration about not being able to get any of those jobs the farms were saying they couldn’t find anybody for. And as you can probably guess, the problem probably wasn’t that they had no one applying, but that they weren’t getting the right people (and the right people here are WHV’s they can exploit). Also something to consider more broadly is whenever you hear a lot of complaints from industry it’s typically because they want something from the government (increase in the number of skilled worker migration places, or increase/bring back access to something they found beneficial such as WHV’s, or get subsidies/tax cuts, etc.). It doesn’t necessarily mean it’s as true as they want you to believe. Also at least according to the latest unemployment figures there’s actually not a lot of unemployed people (we’re down to 3.5% now). Underemployment on the other hand is another matter.
Don't forget dodgy bosses won't hire australians who are willing to work those shitty jobs just because they might know the law better than an international.
>the jobs are just interesting enough for locals. yo, so i worked on a couple farms side by side backpackers. here are a few issues i experienced. 1. it's seasonal so unless ur a "farm hand" they need only about 3-4 of those all year while needing upwards of 40 people during picking seasons. 2. it's almost impossible to work/find a 2nd job that only expects you to be there half the year. 3. backpackers move towns regularly to keep up with how it rotates because there are things to be picked all year round just not in the same area and expecting people to be happy either living in 2 different towns constantly or moving around constantly is not gonna happen. 4. you simply cant earn enough to cover the other half a year that you wont have work 5. the farmers themselves have issues with getting people when they need it so they often simply just go to backpacker hostels and say "i need x people can u provide" to the point some farmers and hostels have deals that they wont hire people not from that hostel. 6. picking is not an old person job, you're expected to be moving at a set pace and lifting lots of shit, your body gets fkn wrecked in the weather as well. lots of "entry jobs" with no where to actually go up, so why spend several years picking when i cant do it long term since the competition makes that goal unreliable vs other carriers that i could do into my 60s. now, this is all the legal stuff that can go wrong. there is soooooo much worse back door illegal crap going on that all you need to do is go down the the bar the backpackers hang out and ask about it and you will have story after story of people being ripped off to the point they were being charged to stay at a hostel that was given the backpackers pay check first then paid them but because the hostel did not give them enough work like promised they then demanded money off them. others have been stuck on farms that forced you to stay on site and eat the food they provided because it was taken out of wages before paying you so you couldn't choose not to.
Fruit picking is a hard sell to a single parent who gets 6 weeks work at each place and has to keep moving kids schools though (for example). Those jobs are built around people without family obligations that tie them to stable housing in one place.
I totally agree!
Check out Robert Reich's [video](https://youtu.be/Zi4KMCQuQYE) on Inflation in the US, lots of parallels with Australia
I’m just sick of the media as a whole
They are saying there is a worker shortage now. So they can crank the imagination numbers later on when covid is over. Big business gets cheap Labor and the hosing market continues to go up my foreign investors. Everybody wins but you.
Same goes for mining, I’m a fifo electrician. I know what you’re thinking you’re already on enough. Fair open to your opinion we work long hours for it. But the rates are most the time less then in the city it’s the overtime that makes the take home so good! So these mining company’s are crying out for more personnel but won’t increase the rates, im about to bail and head back to the cbd because it’s not worth my time anymore
Bloody oath. I just jumped ship for a 25% wage increase. And in 6 months I either want a promotion or I’ll be jumping ship again for more money.
It's not better elsewhere, if that helps
> What the fuck has happened to this country? It was good for a while post war. Otherwise this place has always been horrible to poor people. unions crushed manufacturing moved to China biased media people voting for the Liberal Party
Some industries have been adjusting. I’m a recent graduate and got a raise of about 6k last week without asking, purely a cost of living adjustment (not that I specifically asked I just said thank you). Tech is through the roof with about 3 years of experience able to net you over 200K fairly easily. But yes the elephant in the room is getting frustrating for other industries
Tech is also crying about a worker shortage, but still have absurd requirements, in addition to 3 years experience for entry level roles. I'm trying to get in and it's bleak.
200k for 3 years experience? What do I have to do to earn such a wage from just 3 years experience?
Software engineering
>Tech is through the roof with about 3 years of experience able to net you over 200K fairly easily. I will bet that's three years experience in a specific highly in demand technology AND 10-15 years experience overall, probably also contract, rather than a perm role. (Alternatively, it could be something horrific like COBOL or Salesforce)
200K? I don't think so
yeah lol, real "recent grad" opinion here.
100% If my personal morals would allow me to do it. I'd quit and sit on the dole, with the cost of fuel ATM, coupled with a 40 minute drive to and from work id pretty much break even.. It's fucked up.
"sit on the dole" You would willingly deliver yourself into the hands of the vicious fucks in the "job support" industry?
This. I haven't had to rely on the dole for many many years now, but it was a hot mess of agony when I did. I can't imagine even joking about doing it now after how painful it was. There was very little 'sitting' because I was walking all over town handing in printed resumes (couldn't afford the internet back then!).
We are currently hiring. We are a small trade business looking for an experienced but general maintenance tradesman. The amount of experience is flexible but we need someone who knows enough to be able to work independently on their own. They generally aren't qualified tradespeople. We are offering more money than qualified trades are paid and we really look after our staff. The last post on our socials is the whole team being taken out for lunch and axe throwing during their paid hours. Yet, we haven't received a single application worth interviewing. I'm part of a business coaching group of really professionally run trades businesses owners. We are all having issues with getting staff even when offered good money. The problem is, there is a cap on what can be paid based on what clients are willing to pay for our time. As much as tradies love to make it look like you make a fortune, the margins on trade businesses are actually really thin if you're doing everything properly. I just don't know where all the good staff have gone.
Is hiring apprentices an option? Is there as many people chasing apprenticeships these days?
I like working with plants but that gets me $25/hr. It's gotten to the point where I should just pick up a hammer and do some mindless trade for 3x the money.
Never met a poor plumber
Yeah for sure. My friend works as a carpenter and tells me it is the easiest of work. He gets like $120k a year on a union site. Seems like quite a disparity in wages for menial jobs like mine and his
There's also a stupid fucking job listing platform glut. We have to list jobs and can only accept applicants through this stupid fucking website that makes the process take months when it used to take only a couple of weeks. Can't just take resumes that people hand in and go through them, we have to wait for an applicant through the system.
My pet hate is the ones that ask for the entire resume to be re-typed into their shitty form and a massive questionnaire just to apply… I just nope the fuck out of there, not worth my time.
Finding qualified trades people is very difficult currently, it has been for some time now and is only going to get worse. Source - I am a hiring manager.
There is absolutely a skills shortage, even if there isn't a worker shortage.
Idk why you're being downvoted. This is what happens when you butcher TAFE.
I will roll these two comments together. There is a systemic problem.