• lieuwestra
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    848 months ago

    Skilled labor is economists jargon, so the meaning of it does not match the dictionary definition.

    No one is saying there is literally no skill involved in unskilled labor.

    • @Asafum@feddit.nl
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      8 months ago

      Skilled labor = real human deserving of a fair wage.

      Unskilled labor = meat machine that we need to pay by law, but we gladly wouldn’t pay them a dime if we could get away with it because they aren’t real people.

      -Asshat Owners

      • lieuwestra
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        338 months ago

        Technically skilled as in requiring education (financed by the state), unskilled can learn on the job within days.

        But politics has a way with twisting those words into a us/them dichotomy.

          • @kautau@lemmy.world
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            158 months ago

            I’m a software engineer. There’s people on my team that went to Yale for computer science. There’s also people on my team that took a six month coding boot camp. They’re both great at their jobs.

        • @Asafum@feddit.nl
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          88 months ago

          For me it’s not really an us/them opposition, my disgust is with how unskilled laborers are viewed/treated because of our lack of education. That somehow makes us subhuman and undeserving of a living wage. That we should be thankful for a minimum wage.

          I have no issue with skilled laborers, I have an issue with owners/CEO/etc… us laborers of all skills are in the same boat. Best friend works for Intel, Intel makes tons of money, friend gets pay cut and added responsibility. ¿Que?

          • lieuwestra
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            38 months ago

            The problem lies in the fact that we need to categorise these subjects to write more effective policy. And it doesn’t matter what words you use, they always get these connotations as familiarity grows.

          • @Incandemon@lemmy.ca
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            18 months ago

            To add to this, the whole education level dictates importance thing never made sense to me anyways. I may see a doctor once or twice a year, but I need garbage collected every week. On the level of social importance it strike me then that the garbage person is therefor more important than a doctor.

        • @Incandemon@lemmy.ca
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          18 months ago

          I think its unintended but by that definition then carpentry or other trades which used to be learned by apprenticeship on the job aren’t skilled?

        • @unfreeradical@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          Is it made less difficult to achieve a living wage for everyone by affirming, or by challenging, the practice of characterizing some labor as “unskilled”?

          • @helenslunch@feddit.nl
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            8 months ago

            What it does it make you sound like a dunce for pretending like there aren’t many many jobs that require special skills.

            What you’re doing is applying manipulative tactics and blatantly lying to further an agenda rather than just applying simple logic and reason. When you do that, you inhibit the cause you claim to support.

    • @unfreeradical@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      Sure. To the economist the terms are jargon, but to the bootlicker they are sacred words. Your heresy is unwelcome.