The Big Jobs Myth: American Workers Aren't Ready for American Jobs

[TwilightGardener]

5. When I hear "job training", I assume one is speaking of taking a high school grad and putting him

though some sort of six-week or six-month job-specific training program (and then the company hires him, hopefully). But those already exist, they're called community colleges and for-profit schools, and there are millions of people out there footing the bill for their OWN training in the hopes of getting an edge on their competitors for that elusive job. So why would the government or companies want to pay for this, when there are enough people WITH the desired education or certification already who can't find work?

I offer my husband as an example--he is seeking an IT security job (having done this in the military), everyone he worked with in IT a couple years ago told him that CISSP was the hot new thing, and he should get a CISSP certification. So he studied for six months, spent hundreds of dollars, and got certified. And...nothing. No one is interested in THIS particular certification anymore, apparently. And now employers want a shitload of other stuff ALONG with security certification: ITIL, PMP, CCNA--the fucking certifications never end, and he simply has to pay the money, spend the time chasing them, hoping they're still "hot" when he finally finishes them. Still no guarantee that anyone will hire him, of course, and the jobs that ARE out there are offering him what they used to pay new grads 10 years ago ($42,000 for a network administrator??). He is having an impossible time trying to figure out WHAT these people want. Yesterday he lost out on a job because he didn't have enough experience with their particular VOIP phone system. He could learn that shit in weeks. It's fucking ridiculous.