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Women are getting most of the new jobs. What's going on with men? – OPB (opb.org)
10 points by bilsbie 6 days ago
8 comments

man this article sucks. the NPR article inside of it that they reference does a far better job explaining

https://www.npr.org/2022/11/04/1133586707/boys-men-labor-for...

> The big shift in the labor market has been away from the kinds of jobs which could be done largely through physical strength, and/or with relatively low levels of education. Stereotypically, the guy with maybe a high school diploma could come out and get a pretty good union job in a factory. And those jobs are just becoming scarcer and scarcer because of these changes in the economy.

Manufacturing has been dwindling for decades as a result of deliberate policy choices to offshore. So it's not as if this is a new thing.

Without factory work, non-professional men have been shunted into precarious low-quality driving and general logistics - Uber, Deliveroo, other parcel couriers, warehouse logistics.

Most of those don't require physical strength, so the premise that Diploma Man wants a job with heavy lifting to feel manly is bizarre.

Manufacturing is not dwindling; manufacturing employment has been, but it was that way everywhere in the world. It's productivity. There's nothing that could be done about it.
So basically increased degree requirements for jobs?
YMMV based on the role, but some healthcare roles are highly stressful plus you're exposed to all sorts of infectious diseases. A more charitable interpretation is that these new new role openings are in response to high turnover.
Looking forward to the follow up article on why the majority of jobs lost to AI were held by women.
Indeed, "identity tied to a particular occupation" is evil. You are not same thing as the way you manipulate the world into wiring money to you.

And some people still ask kids "who do you want to become when you grow up?"

Given the level of social and institutional focus on girls in STEM, this is only getting worse in the future for boys as they grow. They are not given the same level of motivation and support.
Because capitalism:

Over the past 12 months, health care alone added 390,000 jobs, more than in the economy overall, making up for job losses elsewhere.

Health care is what the market demands, so that's where the jobs get created. If those are framed as women's work, then women will get trained for them and women will get the jobs.

TFA doesn't break down how much of that is nursing and how much is administrative. Both are coded as "women's work", for different reasons.

Even aside from the employment benefits, it would be very helpful to stop thinking that men are doctors and women are nurses. But I've also never seen a male receptionist at a doctor's office.

[delayed]
It is clear evidence of discrimination.