Quote:
Originally Posted by aka123
How it is impossible to draw conclusions from employment ratio? It is self-explanatory: the amount of work age folks who are employed. It describes just what it is meant to.
|
yea, it's a random statistic, but what does that statistic mean? why is it going up or down?
Look at 60s to 2000s in the US:
57.4 59.2 62.8 64.4
What does that mean? Did economy improve? or did our society become more materialistic so work became more desirable? Maybe fewer people became married in that time range, leading to more people seeking work? etc
Quote:
Originally Posted by aka123
Better for who? Maybe the wife wants to work? How about the work hours in the society in general? Also this model relies for traditional family cohesion, that isn't the case in modern societies. There is huge amount of singles and divorced folks. If there is just one job per family; either one is fucked before marriage or after divorce. Although USA is famous for the big after divorce payments for either one; usually for the wife. But still, considering the requirement that people can (if wanting) independently support themselves economically; it requires jobs for everyone.
Also not everyone like the old model: "woman gets sold" to a man, so that the selling (and still paying) family gets someone to support her. In the model you presented; women aren't very independent.
|
Isn't it safe to say that work is generally undesirable (from that person's perspective)? So when someone works he does so because he is forced to... Do you honestly think that wife would rather work at some meaningless job whole day, or spend time with her kids? or would 60 year old guy rather retire at 60 or put in few more years of work in? There are of course exceptions, but generally you want less work, not more...
So like I said, it's debatable whether low or high "employment-population ratio" is "good"...
p.s.
it's not about "traditional family", that example was just used to illustrate a point... same point can be made about 60 year old guy that chooses between continuing to work or retiring...