I take part in hiring decisions in our company all the time - all white collar jobs. We’ve probably hired 50 people in the last two years, and I can’t think of a single one of them that didn’t come from an off-the-street resume or a hiring service. Not a single one was related to anyone associated with the company or knew anyone in the company. Of course many of them had previous jobs and therefore had decent references to check, but so far as I can recall none of them were related to the employee in any way, and none were people like ‘a friend of my dad who’s very powerful’. It was all teachers and profs if the applicant was fresh out of school, or last manager if the applicant was coming from another job.
I’m curious as to why the huge difference in personal experience around this.
Whoa. Did I just read you right that all your jobs come from referrals? Could you elaborate on that? Are these referrals from people you’ve done work for and liked your work? Or from people who have heard of your reputation? Or are they strings being pulled by powerful people on your behalf because you are connected to them some way?
If the former, then that’s hardly what we’re talking about. That’s like saying that nepotism exists because people with good references have a better chance at a job.
What we’re talking about is whether you need to ‘know someone’ to get a job, which implies that someone who isn’t connected to the powerful is shut out of the job market.
No kidding. From 1980 to 2010 wages for my kind of job went up 2 dollars an hour. And that was “not really” because in 2010 I had to pay forty dollars a week toward the health insurance I used to get for free for any crappy full time job back in the 80s. I not only didn’t go up - in reality I went backwards. And that was with keeping up with all of the increasing computer skills my industry required over the years. How interesting that instead of wanting to see everyone raised up so many people want to see folks that are doing okay dragged down. If it wasn’t so sad it would be funny.
The former - people that I’ve worked with that reco me for a job opening. I freelance, and have many jobs each year, so it’s the nature of the business (i’ve got more than 15 W-2’s for last year).
As far as ne
Well, that was embarrassing…
As far as nepotism is concerned, do you have any data or cites to back up your claim of its abuse in the public sector? I’m quite sure that it exists, but remember that it cuts both ways - some folks were able to avoid active war duty so that they could get placed in a branch of the military, like a domestic air guard, that didn’t require the benefactor of the string pulling to show up all the time.
Where did I claim that the public sector is especially bad for nepotism? I think you have me confused with someone else. I was merely refuting the claim that it’s hard to get ahead in the private sector without ‘connections’.
A Koch brother, a union worker, and a tea party activist are sitting at the same table. They’re given a plate of twelve cookies. The Kock brother takes eleven, gives the last to the tea partier, and whispers: “keep your eye on that other guy. He wants part of your cookie.”
Yeah, it’s not exactly surprising that someone who gets charge for the use of public infrastructure turns a profit. It’d be pretty much impossible not to.
Let’s examine an extreme hypothetical to show why this logic is flawed. Let’s say that the tollbooth workers made $200k a year, which ate almost all of the operating revenue of the toll booth company, but not all of it. Let’s say after all those expenses, the company still made a profit of $1. You could still say “the tollbooth operators aren’t costing the state one dime, the toll operation pays for itself” and it would still be silly. And it would certainly not be a defense of them being paid appropriately.
Whatever money they’re overpaid is money that could’ve otherwise gone to the state to do anything with - including paying public workers who actually have valuable skills like teachers or cops or research scientists at state universities or many other public sector jobs. This is indeed an indirect cost to the taxpayer, and that’s not even examining the fact that it’s not really logical to conclude that a toll-taking operation that didn’t need to build the road or repair somehow is doing the state a favor by turning a profit.