The Jobs Americans Won’t Do? Try: the
Skills Young Americans Weren’t Taught

The "future of America" will have difficulty in putting together a sentence YET.......they know that it's a hop-and-skip to the birth control/condoms "department". Maybe color their hair(green) and get fitted for various sized nose rings while they wait. They'll contemplate whether to become a professional protestor and protest anything. Online or appearance.

There's no such thing as a job Americans won't do. We built this country. My great grandfather had a huge farm and lots of kids. My grandmother went to school til 6th grade then had to go to work on the farm. My ex grew up on a farm and believe me there wasn't anything they didn't do.

Took my celeron-based Toshiba dinasour to a small computer repair shop a few years back where a young, Mexican-American girl did some remarkable things to it and got it spinning like a top again. I asked where she learned her skill and she replied that her high school in Mexico required a year of technical trade study. Impressive.

While students in the US are unable to read, write, or do math; they all seem to be very proficient at posting YouTube and Tic Toc videos of themselves dancing or doing stupid stunts. "Internet Influencer" seems to be the most popular career goals of younger generations. Internet Influencers will surely add to the US GDP by replacing lost tech and manufacturing jobs.

I nominate this for must read. I learned to work and persistence on the farm. It is intimidating to pull into a 1/2 section hay field filled with bales and know you have to load them all onto a truck, haul them to a barn, and stack them in there. My brothers and I could haul 1000 bales a day, but it took a long time to feel like you've made a dent in the field of hay.

There are a LOT of different groups that we can 'thank' for the situation that we find ourselves in. I think we can 'thank' the 'Academic education' industry "You HAVE to go to College and get a Degree to make a decent living" (and then charge the Hades for a worthless degree in 'Gender Studies' or 'Film Studies'.... useless as far a doing anything productive, but the Academia organizations made a TON of money off each student. We can thank the 'Academics' and the Media 'Chattering Class' for years telling us that "We are in the Information Age, the Post-Industrial Economy".... Manufacturing does not matter. We can thank the Entertainment 'industry' for demonizing manufacturing and years of heaping scorn on people who work for a living, and people in engineering. The Entertainment 'industry' always pushes itself,,,, TV and Movies... and of course now all the online 'Influencers'. The Chattering Class have no respect for the Producing Class.... the people who actually WORK to make things. ("Eeeww, those people actually SWEAT while doing their job!" The Chattering Class only pushes 'Being Cool' and Entertainment... and they have the Media Megaphone. We can also thank the Labor Cartels - also known as Unions- for driving labor prices and work regulations to where it is too expensive for an American manufacturer to be competitive. Well, Talk is Cheap. But if we do not manufacture products here, then we have to buy them from foreigners. If the labor, tax, and regulatory situation makes manufacturing here too expensive, it WILL be moved overseas, made with 'slave labor' and NO safety or environmental regulation. I think we can also thank the various Big Box Stores for driving manufacturing overseas, as they are so big they can, by demanding lower and lower prices at the producer level, force entire manufacturing companies to bend to their will or go out of business.

I would point out that, not only are kids not getting job skills, but the schools they are going to are not educating them to a work culture or even a respect for the culture of this country that made it great, many of the things that the article mentions. If you go to school and the focus is on how horrible we are treating the climate and that the cause of it is our industrialized society, the kids coming out of that miasma are not going to be interested in contributing to a society that they think is killing us. The liberals have been using environmentalism as a stepstone to power, with NO concern about the damage their lies are doing to our society. Our kids are the victims of their lies and attempts at clinging to power.

One significant factor of the decline of american Competence and work ethic is the advent of the factory farms in America. The loss of Millions of family farms predicates the loss of millions upon millions of workers in that field. Farmers have so very many different skills that are useful in the city as well. i. e. Planning, Carpentry, Plumbing, Refrigeration, Electrical, Mechanical both Automotive and Machinery, Construction, etc, etc. All of these are necessary skills on the farm or ranch. I'm sure thata similar situation is evident in many other industries as well. Gigantic businesses are almost as bad as Government Businesses!

The first time I heard the phrase “jobs Americans won’t do” was George W. Bush. That man did more damage to this country than most democrats. And to think he was the lesser of the two evils when we voted… More importantly, the public education system has to go back to what it once was. What we have now is guarantee failure for future generations. Teaching should be a vocational certification not a degree from a four year college.

Bring back shop classes in school. Wood shop, mechanics. Teach children how to change a tire and balance a checkbook. Teach kids how to get along in the real world.

Americans will work if you pay a decent salary... IF you limit welfare to the old and disabled, and IF parents will stop supporting their adult children.

#10, cooking classes too. . .

IMHO, this should be not only a 'must read' but kept permanently in front of the public's awareness. It is rare these days to read a column that, in a clear and detailed manner, not only lays out a pervasive and debilitating problem...but actually describes what is needed to fix said problem. Save and share!

I am often upset when I see my daipughter and/or her husband doing chores while the teen aged grand ones are sitting around. Put 'em to work! My son-in-law is a jack of all trades and I constantly tell him to involve the grandson in his building and repair activities - teach him to turn a wrench! My daughter excels in the cooking/baking area - teach them to cook! I was much easier on my kids than my parents were on me but they seem intimidated by theirs. Alas. I am an advocate of mandatory 2 year military service after high school. Get them away from mom and dad and teach them discipline, responsibilty and badic skills.

#14 replying to myself - I regret that I never learned to type, and I didn't proof read before I posted! Discipline!!

#10, I was certified to teach Home Economics in NJ over 50 years ago. The 4 food groups changed. The new food groups are canned, boxed, frozen and ready-to-eat.

On a side note, people who worked in the trades or a factory often belonged to a bowling league, softball team, or some fraternal organization. They didn't have time to rob a liquor store or shoplift as a hobby.

The author missed a major cause. Super, insane, ultra high minimum wage laws sawed off the first three rungs on the employment ladder. No untrained teen doing some simple, menial job is worth $20 to $25 per hour....which is the LAW in much of the country, sadly.

One of the first things we need to do is stop telling kids that doing manual labor is beneath them and if you get a college degree you can get a job. This may be true with STEM degrees, but BAs in art and basket weaving are another story. And, with STEM jobs you are expected to produce, not sit back and drink coffee. And, doing manual labor can give you insights into directing and coordinating work activities that will be useful. In other words, we need to teach them the right attitudes