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[Trekkin]

I think you mean it's something a politician cannot give without being called a socialist. You seem to imply that it's an impossible thing to do, but it's not. I don't proclaim to know the ultimate solution, but there are certainly ways and ideas out there to improve and fix things for the "coal" demographic, some of which are going to trigger hair-trigger cries of 'AAAA! COMMUNIST!!!11!!1! *FALLS OFF CLIFF*', some of which aren't but may be politically difficult, and others which aren't neccesarily politically difficult and just require political will and effort.

There is that. Leaving aside that systemic fixes can solve the root problems that gave rise to Trumpism but not Trumpism itself, there's still the frankly immutable reality that our economy is shifting and there's no more use for coal miners. That's not something you can fix by having them spend a week learning Python in the middle of West Virginia so they can all get modern jobs, and it's insulting to everyone involved to try. Now, they'll also call you a Communist for suggesting that you help them, but that does ameliorate a lot of the more pressing problems to some degree, and I suspect that eventually even UBI would come to be like Medicare, where all the red-blooded pinko-hating Real Americans scream in rage at the thought of government getting its filthy paws anywhere near their none-dare-call-it-welfare.

[nenjin]

That's not something you can fix by having them spend a week learning Python in the middle of West Virginia so they can all get modern jobs, and it's insulting to everyone involved to try.

Well they certainly can't get paid being smug.

[SalmonGod]

Yeah, as someone who's been involved in making hiring decisions, the type of transparency you're looking for wouldn't work.  "Not a good fit" is an excellent reason in many cases to make a decision, which comes down to what you're able to glean about someone's personality from a half hour of asking them questions. 

To substantiate, I will take personality over experience or other hard qualifications any fucking day.  I've hired two people that were 100% my decision, and both of them became central pillars of the office - a couple of the most dependable and pleasant to work with individuals we have.  In both cases, the decision came down to my impression of what their work ethic was like, based on the thought processes I could see through their stories about past work experience, and my impression of what their personality would contribute to the office atmosphere.  On the other hand, I've had people report to me who were hired by other managers and had excellent qualifications on paper, but were bitter, hateful human beings who knew how to play shitty games to make everyone around them miserable and unproductive in ways that couldn't easily be measured and pinned on them directly.  I've also seen, recently even, people who have worked with a candidate in the past tell managers "don't hire them they're bad news" and managers go ahead and hire them anyway because they're the most qualified... and then 2 months later, fire them and start over again because they really did turn out to be shitty people who had managed to build up a good resume.

But if these decisions were being scrutinized by 3rd parties, I probably couldn't have made them.  It's hard enough already.  Everybody hates making hiring decisions.  I felt for every applicant I didn't choose to hire.  If I knew I could face potential interrogation by someone other than my co-management about "Why did you pass up this qualified applicant for this inexperienced person", it would seriously damage my resolve to pick the candidate who I honestly thought was the best choice based on anything but hard criteria.  And if the basis of my decisions was made to everybody I didn't hire, it could have awful consequences for my career later on.  Especially when based on soft criteria and unsubstantiated suspicions about personality issues someone would bring into the office, if I was forced to pass that back to them as cause for rejection, that would unavoidably be taken personally and I would expect vengeful behavior if I ever became their co-worker or was interviewed by them later on.  My wife recently became friendly co-workers with someone I interviewed in the past and didn't hire, and I had to hang out with him for a bit at her office Christmas party.  Because all he got was a flat answer, it was an amiable interaction.  He learned some things after the rejection that made him thankful he didn't get the position anyway, and there were no hard feelings.  Wouldn't have been so if he was told that I didn't hire him because I couldn't tell if his personality was really that bland and he really had so little to say about his past experiences in office environments, or if he was hiding that he was secretly a conniving team wrecker.

[nenjin]

*gets deeply introspective about job behavior*

[wierd]

The problem with "Unsubstantiated suspicions", is that this is 100% identical to bigotry.

You know, "Unsubstantiated suspicions" that black people are all drugged out gang bangers, or that gay people are pedophiles.


There's also the systemic bias involved in self-evaluation of these kinds of decisions.  People tend to over-value when they make the right call, over when they make the wrong one.  AND-- when you dont' have to give the people you shrift a second thought after you deep six their application, it makes it much easier.

(See also, how police officers go VERY VERY wrong when they get to "go with their gut" about people being guilty or innocent.)

No, we are getting to the point where we really and honestly DO need this level of transparency.

What I am getting at, is that applicants are at your mercy, but you are not even slightly responsible for when you get it wrong-- more, you never know when you are wrong, because you are protected from those consequences by the lack of transparency.

[Trekkin]

That's not something you can fix by having them spend a week learning Python in the middle of West Virginia so they can all get modern jobs, and it's insulting to everyone involved to try.

Well they certainly can't get paid being smug.

It's hardly smugness to acknowledge that the jobs aren't there, the jobs that do exist have talent with more relevant experience to draw from, and some of the initiatives I've seen described for this sort of thing have almost literally the scale I described. This is not a problem limousine liberalism can solve before it decides to find a new cause for which to raise awareness.

[wierd]

That's not something you can fix by having them spend a week learning Python in the middle of West Virginia so they can all get modern jobs, and it's insulting to everyone involved to try.

Well they certainly can't get paid being smug.

It's hardly smugness to acknowledge that the jobs aren't there, the jobs that do exist have talent with more relevant experience to draw from, and some of the initiatives I've seen described for this sort of thing have almost literally the scale I described. This is not a problem limousine liberalism can solve before it decides to find a new cause for which to raise awareness.

Quite right.

You can instruct for a trade, but you cannot instruct skill.  Skill comes in 2 forms:  Natural talent, and honed through practice.  Neither of those things comes from a weekend course in introductory programming.

The jobs that are out there in the programming world, want people that have firm, good grasps on the requisite subjects, and can perform those tasks with high quality skill and precision.  Bob McCoalminer is not going to find the same level of applicability there.  He's better off trying to be a police officer. (no, i'm dead serious.)

The problem is that Bob is a human being, and not an obsolete bit of tech. Throwing him to the wolves, financially speaking, is inhuman and inhumane.  However, that is exactly what makes the most financial sense, which is all you can expect from "Fiduciary responsibility" driven corporate structures.

[SalmonGod]

The problem with "Unsubstantiated suspicions", is that this is 100% identical to bigotry.

You know, "Unsubstantiated suspicions" that black people are all drugged out gang bangers, or that gay people are pedophiles.


There's also the systemic bias involved in self-evaluation of these kinds of decisions.  People tend to over-value when they make the right call, over when they make the wrong one.  AND-- when you dont' have to give the people you shrift a second thought after you deep six their application, it makes it much easier.


No, we are getting to the point where we really and honestly DO need this level of transparency.

What I am getting at, is that applicants are at your mercy, but you are not even slightly responsible for when you get it wrong-- more, you never know when you are wrong, because you are protected from those consequences by the lack of transparency.

Dude I've been on this forum for nearly 10 years espousing leftist anarchy, hatred of corporations and the rich, and getting on people for downplaying bigotry.  But I also just left 3 years of working as a low level manager.  And I could not have operated under the type of thing you describe.

What you really want is to get rid of interviews as part of the hiring process.  Because an interview is an imperfect tool.  You spend a little bit of time with someone.  Maybe you spend a little bit of time with them twice.  And you try to learn about what kind of person they are, when they're trying to convince you that they're the ideal employee.  You're not going to get much more than unsubstantiated suspicions out of that!  It's literally impossible.  Something like 3/4 of applicants I've ever interviewed answer questions as if they're reading from a script, and I feel like I've learned nothing about them that I can trust.  And based on that, you're supposed to figure out the two most important things: who is going to contribute to a drama-free team dynamic, and approach their work in an honest, creative fashion.  Yeah, when bigoted people are the ones making hiring decisions, that's going to flavor their perceptions.  But how else are hiring decisions supposed to be made?  All you're suggesting is punishing interviewers for doing the work of interviewing.  If you want everything based on hard qualifications, then get rid of interviews.  And I'm sure as hell not going to try and operate a team in a work environment through that fucking mess.  Some of the people I've had to work with who were hired on the basis of qualifications alone made me want to kill myself for having to cope with their hateful bullshit every day.

If you think workplaces are hell to endure right now, just wait until they're random lotteries of people thrown into proximity with each other on the basis of what impressive sounding things they could think of to write on a piece of paper.

[wierd]

This problem you cite--- People act like robots--- Is BECAUSE of the screening process, SG.

When you have to play buzzword bingo to even TALK to the hiring manager, you defacto SELECT for that behavior.  Don't cry to me about how you cant find humans when you do that, and predispose your talent pool to robotic answerers.  (The humans dont want to play that stupid assed game, and will just give up on your industry. I sure the fuck did, and for that very reason.)

AGAIN-- See how police officers ROUTINELY "Get it wrong" when they go with their gut about people's guilt or innocence.  For the same reasons that police officers need to be held accountable, managers and HR people do also.  end of story.  (Most of the people a police officer interviews, are there because they are involved in some way, in a police investigation-- naturally.  This leads to the mistaken conclusion that most people are criminal malactors, which then translates into the kinds of abuses the criminal justice system perpetrates. As far as the police are concerned, they are just doing their job. Same as you.)

[Starver]

I'd rather just straight up tell them I have no interest in propping up the coal industry, and that my attention would be focused instead on constructing a safety net strong enough for them to get educated for and land a different, more modernized job.

So, instead of saying "We’re going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business", perhaps she should have qualified that. Let's see, how about..?

So for example, I’m the only candidate which has a policy about how to bring economic opportunity using clean renewable energy as the key into coal country.  Because we’re going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business, right?  And we’re going to make it clear that we don’t want to forget those people.  Those people labored in those mines for generations, losing their health, often losing their lives to turn on our lights and power our factories.
Now we’ve got to move away from coal and all the other fossil fuels, but I don’t want to move away from the people who did the best they could to produce the energy that we relied on.
(...)
So I am passionate about this, which is why I have put forward specific plans about how we incentivize more jobs, more investment in poor communities, and put people to work.

Amazingly(?), she did. But it doesn't get quoted, by the people who liked to quote the first snip.


(Oh, and I'd just like to mention that Karnewarrior said "I have no interest in propping up the coal industry". Those are the exact words uzed, ladies and gentlemen of Coal Country. The heartless bastard!)


I have no idea how bad it could have been for people under H Clinton.  But I'm betting it wouldn't have been a petulant, disorganised and idiotic dystopia, even for those of the opposing political hue. Even without any particular optimism, what we've seen already trumps (NPI) much of the run-of-the-mill pessimism quoted, short of actual hot war breaking out. And I gladly merit H the ability to not have stumbled into conflict so easily, whereas it seems that Trump's main tactic has been somehow (maybe by being manipulated, or dragged around on a leash) stumbling out of conflicts with no obvious methodology behind the brinkmanship.

[smjjames]

If you think workplaces are hell to endure right now, just wait until they're random lotteries of people thrown into proximity with each other on the basis of what impressive sounding things they could think of to write on a piece of paper.

Sounds like a heck of a social experiment, also perfect for Reality TV.

This problem you cite--- People act like robots--- Is BECAUSE of the screening process, SG.

When you have to play buzzword bingo to even TALK to the hiring manager, you defacto SELECT for that behavior.  Don't cry to me about how you cant find humans when you do that, and predispose your talent pool to robotic answerers.  (The humans dont want to play that stupid assed game, and will just give up on your industry. I sure the fuck did, and for that very reason.)

AGAIN-- See how police officers ROUTINELY "Get it wrong" when they go with their gut about people's guilt or innocence.  For the same reasons that police officers need to be held accountable, managers and HR people do also.  end of story.

Theres even an entire subgenre of guidance books about how to write cover letters, resumes, do interviews, etc.

More seriously though, Salmongod has a point here, even if you're qualified, being a piece of shit asshole completely negates that. So, what's a better solution to replace interviews that doesn't involve 'robotic data input'?

A thought came to me a bit ago but dismissed it as probably not working in todays economy/climate, what about something akin to apprenticeships? Like a transition period to see how things work out. Sure, theres going to be pros and cons of that and it might not work for every industry, but it's an idea.

[SalmonGod]

This problem you cite--- People act like robots--- Is BECAUSE of the screening process, SG.

When you have to play buzzword bingo to even TALK to the hiring manager, you defacto SELECT for that behavior.  Don't cry to me about how you cant find humans when you do that, and predispose your talent pool to robotic answerers.

AGAIN-- See how police officers ROUTINELY "Get it wrong" when they go with their gut about people's guilt or innocence.  For the same reasons that police officers need to be held accountable, managers and HR people do also.  end of story.

This is systemic problems with the pressures of capitalism to conform to a workplace... or at least, conform to the selection process of gaining access to a workplace, and then you can freely dance in between the lines of plausible deniability and HR policy. 

But in a world of capitalist pressures, you're not describing anything that will help with the process of giving people fair chances while also allowing organizations to at least TRY to select people that will be good for them.  You pretty blatantly ignored most of what I said, in fact.

What do you actually expect of someone who is doing the work of interviewing someone?  For the most part, it's not their fault that the societal context that the interview takes place in is a shitty one.  So please tell me.  How do you expect them to evaluate the person they're interviewing.  If you can't, then I conclude that you don't actually have any answer, and are just projecting feelings at the problem.

And police work is not a good analogy, because guilt for a crime is not comparable to suitability for a position.  Plus, police are not supposed to determine guilt or innocence.  They're supposed to capture suspects for a court to decide guilt or innocence, and treat those suspects as if they're innocent until that determination is made.  If they invest themselves into making that determination at all, then they are doing their job wrong.  It is literally the job of someone interviewing candidates, on the other hand, to gauge the character of the person they're interviewing.

A thought came to me a bit ago but dismissed it as probably not working in todays economy/climate, what about something akin to apprenticeships? Like a transition period to see how things work out. Sure, theres going to be pros and cons of that and it might not work for every industry, but it's an idea.

In today's jargon, those are called interns and temps... and tend to be just another avenue for abusive employer behavior.

[Trekkin]

This problem you cite--- People act like robots--- Is BECAUSE of the screening process, SG.

When you have to play buzzword bingo to even TALK to the hiring manager, you defacto SELECT for that behavior.  Don't cry to me about how you cant find humans when you do that, and predispose your talent pool to robotic answerers.  (The humans dont want to play that stupid assed game, and will just give up on your industry. I sure the fuck did, and for that very reason.)

We screen out people who play buzzword bingo where I work, as distinct from just knowing what they're talking about. Two things invariably turn out to be true about them: they're nowhere near as smart as they think they are and they have a gigantic chip on their shoulder about it. I can do without incompetence masked by toxicity.

Have you ever been involved in the hiring process from the inside, wierd? We're not all as robotic as you think.

[PTTG??]

To be fair, President Hillary would have to deal with two years of insane Republican dysfunction. McConnell would be just as bad regardless of the president...

[Lord Shonus]

I have no idea how bad it could have been for people under H Clinton.  But I'm betting it wouldn't have been a petulant, disorganised and idiotic dystopia, even for those of the opposing political hue. Even without any particular optimism, what we've seen already trumps (NPI) much of the run-of-the-mill pessimism quoted, short of actual hot war breaking out. And I gladly merit H the ability to not have stumbled into conflict so easily, whereas it seems that Trump's main tactic has been somehow (maybe by being manipulated, or dragged around on a leash) stumbling out of conflicts with no obvious methodology behind the brinkmanship.

Hillary would almost certainly have been a competent president. That's not the issue. The issue is that she was a terrible candidate. She had too much baggage (enough that it didn't matter how much was fabricated), was too tone-deaf (That speech you quoted was generally recieved as "We are going to put you all out of work, but here's some nebulous promises about replacement jobs that I have no intention of keeping" - which most candidates would have recognized), and too easy to paint as corrupt. She made Trump look better by comparison to a lot of people, entirely because he was (allegedly) outside the system and she embodied it.