[stouset]

The job being monotonous is clearly enough of a downside that significantly higher pay and benefits are needed to attract talent.

Paying higher wages might help retain employees (or not! there are jobs people just won’t keep doing no matter the pay) but doing so could easily increase costs to the point where your product is uncompetitive in the market. It also might just be worth having higher turnover in order to keep prices low.

[Pulcinella]

We need actual data to decide how significant is "significant." Otherwise you will just have businesses complaining no one wants to work for "significantly" higher pay (a whole $0.05/hour more).

[stouset]

I’m sorry but this is a ridiculous take. $0.05/hr is $104 a year for a full-time job. Zero people are going to have that be the tipping point for them to take on a monotonous, often physically draining job that they’d otherwise turn down.

[Spooky23]

You underestimate the low end of the labor market. People may not jump for a nickel, but they absolutely will for $0.25-0.30.

[Pulcinella]

Yes that is my point. What business owners consider "significant" and what sane people consider significant are often quite different.

[stouset]

I apologize, I misread this and thought you were suggesting that $0.05 was significant.

[snozolli]

there are jobs people just won’t keep doing no matter the pay

I do not believe this common claim.

[stouset]

Obviously there is some ludicrous threshold of pay where more people will decide to do some job. But for practical purposes the pay needs to be in line with still being able to price your products competitively in a global marketplace.

Even $10,000/yr more might not be enough to move the needle all that much on a job that’s backbreaking, monotonous, and with little prospects for career growth. Especially if you have a limited pool of applicants due to your location.

[snozolli]

Obviously there is some ludicrous threshold of pay where more people will decide to do some job

Ludicrous only from the perspective of the employer. Everyone wants something for nothing.

The fact is that regular Americans (i.e. not exploited, immigrant labor, or oppressed out-groups) used to do manual labor and manufacturing in the United States. They took pride in their labor. People haven't changed, the economics have.

As for your last paragraph, the oil fields have been able to meet their need for employees for the most part, and that ticks every one of your undesirable factors. So what gets workers there? Pay.

[chongli]

You used to be able to buy a nice house in the suburbs with car in the garage and a white picket fence, support a stay-at-home wife with three kids, put them all through college, and take annual vacations to Disneyland or the Caribbean, and cover the healthcare needs of the whole family, all on the salary of a high school educated factory worker. Now all that sounds impossible. You’d have to pay factory workers well into six figures for a lifestyle like that.

What happened? Cost disease [1]. All of the big ticket things in that lifestyle (except for the car) skyrocketed in price relative to inflation.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baumol_effect

[nradov]

That was never the reality for most factory workers. Usually the car was cramped with a single bathroom, the wife picked up some part-time work, most vacations were road trips to go camping, and not all the kids went to college. Inflation and growing income inequality are legitimate problems but let's not paint an unrealistic picture of "the good old days".

[selimthegrim]

Not a sprinter van clearly if it was cramped with a single bathroom.

[ponector]

Obviously it was only for white people. And for sure not a regular factory worker who is doing simple tasks. Maybe floor manager...

[nradov]

Pay, plus a willingness to hire workers who might not be tolerated in other jobs due to background check issues or HR policy violations. (I am not claiming this is necessarily a bad thing.)

[carlosjobim]

Theoretically, an utterly horrible job with great pay would attract a lot of workers who do it for some time to get a financial boost before moving on.

[greedo]

When I was young, it was popular to go up to Alaska for the season and either work the fishing boats or the canning factories.

[lenkite]

A lot of folks like repeatable, monotonous jobs. They can loose themselves in a trance doing the same thing for hours.

The problem is that American bosses will never hire these kind of people. They can never pass the interview game.

[ASalazarMX]

Except you can't just zone away in a factory job. Workers need to pay attention if they don't like injuries. It the job doesn't need much skill, it doesn't necessarily mean it's easy or safe.