Must-Read: Caroline Freund and Christine McDaniel: The U.S. Needs to Invest in Minds, Not Miners

Must-Read: Not “hands” vs. “minds”, IMHO, but rather: “hands” vs. “minds and smiles”…

Caroline Freund and Christine McDaniel: The U.S. Needs to Invest in Minds, Not Miners: “Otherwise the job market will leave a lot of men behind… https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-07-06/the-u-s-needs-to-invest-in-minds-not-miners

…The U.S. economy has long been moving away from “hands” industries such as mining and manufacturing toward “minds” sectors such as finance, health and education. From 1970 to 2016, the share of workers in the former declined from 38 percent to 16 percent, while the share in the latter increased from 26 to 44 percent….”Hands” sectors include mining and logging, manufacturing, and construction. “Minds” sectors include information, financial activities, professional and business activities, and education and health services. Excluded sectors: trade, transport and utilities; leisure and hospitality; other services. Less-educated men, who occupy more than three-quarters of “hands” jobs, have felt the sharp swing away from physical labor most acutely. By contrast, women comprised half of the “minds” as far back as 1970, and their share grew in subsequent decades as they increasingly joined the work force. The steadiness of the shift from hands to minds suggests that technology is the main driving force…. Increasing trade with China might have contributed… [but] it clearly wasn’t the primary force….

New technologies… have been better at replacing men’s work. Employment in some predominantly male occupations that require a high-school diploma or less—such as metalworkers, printing press operators and carpenters—has declined by more than a quarter since 2005. By contrast, employment in some female occupations with similar requirements—bakers, manicurists, personal care aides—has grown by more than a quarter…”