this post was submitted on 15 Oct 2023
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I mean in general, this isn't a serious post. However, the best way to get more doctors and teachers is to lower the financial barriers to education and making the jobs more appealing. Every job has different needs on how to improve working conditions so I won't get into the weeds too much, but in general a socialist economy would help substantially.
I'm in Quebec. Half of our teaching graduates last 5 years or less before changing careers. Working conditions are atrocious. They're integrating special needs students with regular classes, and barely have half the resources they would need to do this successfully without slowing down the whole class. At my second internship, we had 5 students on intervention plans - in preschool.
My 6yo son needs OT for slight motor skill delays, and a neuropsych eval for ADHD. In the private sector, we can hopefully expect an appointment in 6mo for the former, and still no news as to when we'll have an appointment at all after a couple months on the waitlist. Both have a 2-3 year waitlist in the public sector. The school's (part-time, split with 2 other schools in the area) OT is on leave until February, with no replacement, and most other in-house support services are part-time too, and need an official diagnosis before they can really dedicate more time than punctual interventions for him.
All of these reasons, as well as many personal disagreements with the education program, is why I left the field before graduating. Not cause I wouldn't have liked teaching, but because I would have 100% been part of that aforementioned statistic. It's sad it came to this - I'm convinced young boys need more male teachers. But 7 years out of school, working as a programmer, I already make more and have better work-life balance than I'd ever have had as a teacher.
Tangentially related, but despite making a solid 6 figures, I still can't buy a house in a 1h+ radius around town (where most jobs in my field are located), as I've been priced out by the last 5 years' home values and interest rate hikes.
And as the other guy from Europe mentioned, we're in a similar situation: 25% of our population is 65 and up, so tons of people are leaving for retirement. COVID didn't help either, tons left a little earlier to avoid the crisis.
It's fucked.
I agree.
But here in Europe the problem isn't that education is too expensive or jobs suck, it's simply that we have a huge retired population and a small workforce.
The obvious solution to me is either completely opening the borders of the EU or greatly expanding immigration. The refugee crisis could be solved quite easily by accepting refugees and integrating them into the workforce. Please note that I'm not advocating for them to assimilate. Again, this would be easier to do in a socialist economy.
Immigration of course is a force that allows the states of Europe to shape their workforces however they wish.
However, the broader issue, within the context, is why it is claimed that the share of the population working versus not, or needing care versus not, are conditions generating an unbearable strain against total societal capacity.
The reason, of course, is simply the austerity narrative. Elites wish to hoard instead of to share, and so they misdirect toward some other issue as the reason everyone else must be deprived.
I feel you are representing the scarcity narrative that is commonly propagated by elites.
Workers are four times more productive than their grandparents. Europe has a near unbounded capacity to shape its own workforce through immigration.
Most of the wealth in society is being claimed as profit by the immensely wealthy, who are contributing no labor for generating the wealth.
Many jobs add very little value to society overall, and many who would wish to work are disenfranchised for various reasons.
If society were organized such that those who wished to work could contribute directly to activities that were meaningful and substantial for the entire public, rather than being framed around the private interests of the wealthy few, we could begin to achieve conditions of shared affluence and abundant leisure.
Really?
Teachers and nurses are four times more productive than two generations ago?!
So they can have four times as many students and patients?
That's a recipe for neglect of kids and patients, and burn-out of teachers and nurses.
GDP has risen, yes. And the wealth should be more equally distributed, also yes.
But let's not lose track of common sense.
Total productivity has expanded fourfold in proportion to the size of the workforce.
The measure includes all workers in all sectors.
If you think such an advance is possible only by teachers and nurses having four times the case load, then it is you who is not applying common sense.
Indeed, farm workers in the US are ten times as productive as during the Second World War.
You are also being disingenuous to antagonize the claim of productivity rising, while yet acknowledging the rise in GDP.
GDP is simply the common measure of worker productivity, when adjusted per capita, and at times by purchasing power.
You are focusing on GDP instead of reality.
Reality is that we really need more people working jobs that are scarce. US GDP is double than that of the EU, but American living standards were better when we were at GDP parity.
So, as the Economist recently pointed out, Americans aren't getting much for their high GDP.
Americans of course are realizing all of the value corresponding to the high GDP. There is no one else to take it. American workers, however, are realizing vastly less. Most of the value generated by the labor of workers in the US, and of workers in every nation, is claimed as profit by the very tiny section of society that owns most of the business, and who are not providing labor that generated the wealth.
Perhaps it is the distinction between workers' wages and owners' profit, as the division of the entirety of wealth generated within society, that you are describing as "reality".
Based on your response, it appears you misunderstood my comments, as may be expected if you form your analysis from the Economist. The Economist supports the interests of business owners, which are mutually antagonistic with the interests of workers.
If workers realized a greater share of the value generated by their labor, then they would have more control over the conditions of their labor, and more freedom in their lives, as well as simply more enjoyment from higher wages. As such, in higher numbers they would seek to fill positions that are meaningful and substantive in terms of social value, including teaching and nursing, and more of such positions would be available.
Again, the shortcoming in your analysis is due to your believing the scarcity narrative, that because business owners insist on taking far too much, workers should be condemned to fight for scraps.