Re: Mexicans striking
depends on what the job is.<br /> I have a lot of friends with 4-6 yer degrees in various fields, most cant make over 38K a year with it.<br />and most would not frame a house,pour concrete nor pump septic tanks for a living.<br /> however all can be very good paying jobs if you learn the trade and always do the job better than the last time.<br /> its amazing how much technical programs in schools have been watered down or eliminated some get canned in favor of a new football stadium.<br /> a well trained tech takes 10 years or so, a machinist that I could walk out and hand a blue print to and tell him the saw shed code for the materiel and walk away from takes about 10 years to train, that means ya only get about 10 years at the top.<br /> a general carpenter/framer and concrete tech takes about the same. we wont even get into plumbing and electrical or HVAC. seems to many of our college grads come out without any actual skills to create things.<br />so now we have a large unskilled workforce competeing for jobs in the 17-25K range which is starting range for many fields and folks are mad.<br />however the illegals have as slight edge sometimes due to hunger.<br />they sometimes understand the value of training and the ability to catch on and catch on quick.<br /> I have trained a few, most would show up early or stay late with me to learn,even if it was on their time not company time.<br /> I got most my knowledge the hard way, I spend and spent hours and hours teaching myself my trade with various manuals and tech writings at libraries all over the US. I spent 6 years in the US navy's advanced electronics field, graduated top of my class in BE/E,FC(A)and FC (C) schools as well as a host of shorter schools I managed to grab.watched a lot of others fail, not because it was hard but because it required self motivation to learn. in the 80's I taught myself how to program and set up CNC lathes and mills. not because its cool but because programmers made more than operators.<br />and that was my edge, I was hungrier than most the rest.<br />navy said to get more money I had to advance paygrades. to advance paygrades ya had to pass tests. to pass tests you had to learn.<br /> in the navy when you take an advancement test you and every other sailor going for that paygrade in that job skill takes the same test on the same day,<br /> if 4 slots are open for advancement the top 4 get advanced the rest get passed not advanced points for the next cycle.<br /> thats how I went from E-1 to E-5 in 3 years,<br /> I studied.<br /> right now there is a kid I am trying to train, I am giving up.<br /> he refuses to read.<br /> he wants the answers handed to him and I am not gonna do it.<br /> he asks a question and gets mad when I reply with a question.<br />yet he refuses to get the manual out and answer my question.<br /> sorry about the long rant but a job is just that. its a job.<br /> if someone can do it as well as you for less money who is gonna get that job? the key is to improve your skill making you more valuable than the next guy.<br /> and only one way to improve is to make a point to learn at least 1 new thing everyday.
