I was absently scrolling through the interweb when I happened upon a review of a book called The Political Economy of Work in the 21st Century by Martin Slick.
That caught my eye. Before I knew it I was reading an excerpt from said book concerning the divesture of Avondale Shipbuilding from the Northrop Grumman war-profiteering combine.
Northrop always had an awful time finding qualified workers to build its ships. I found that hard to believe, but even I, pro labor as I am, was starting to believe that maybe it's true; maybe Northrop and all the other contractors involved in heavy manufacture simply can't find the skilled workers they need in America.
I put it down to the sorry state of America's education system. America's education system is so fucked that you can't even train a high-school graduate to be a welder.
No offence to my brother welders, but we don't exactly need the creme de la creme of the education world to train as welders. At some of your more intricate fitting assignments you'd want guys who have a reasonable facility with math in general and geometry in particular, but generally speaking, welding is the trade that makes the least demands on the intellect.
So imagine my surprise when I make my way through Slick's book and discover this tidbit:
There is no convincing evidence of a shortage of welders. Avondales efforts (to bring in foreign workers on HB-2 visas) are a transparent effort to utilize immigration laws to pay substandard wages.
NO SHIT!!!
So it wasn't the education system after all!
It was about screwing the workers.
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