When agrarian society faded in favor of the more profitable industrial era, no matter how hard you worked as a farmer or how hard the farming industry tried to preserve itself the tide of change could not be turned. By the same logic, no matter how hard we try to reestablish a middle class based on industrial-era jobs, the internet, and cheap offshore labor has created a tide no amount of hope and legislation can hold back.
Just as the farmer had to accept the change and adapt, so too does the middle class. The mindset of middle-class workers who are employed in laborer-oriented professions and only think about working for others need to adapt, just like the farmers had to. Rather than work harder at their job and hope their contributions are recognized and rewarded with higher wages, the middle-class worker of the future needs to rethink the game as the rules are changing. My dad worked nearly his entire adult life for one company.
Today, according to the 2014 Bureau of Labor Statistics report, the median number of years a worker spends with one employer is just 4.6 years and going down. The idea of career and wage growth over time within a company is no longer valid. The idea of climbing the corporate ladder rung by rung has been rewritten.
Furthermore, more companies are reducing the number of hours workers can work to keep employees under mandated benefit thresholds. Jim Clifton, the CEO of Gallup, said recently that the percent of full-time jobs in this country as a percent of the adult population “is the worst it’s been in 30 years.” The methods of earning an income are changing and workers need to adapt by embracing a more entrepreneurial way of thinking if they want to survive financially.
Rather than derive all their income from a single job, middle-class workers need to consider earning income from additional sources. They need to look for everyday problems they can solve. That is what it will take to transform the middle class. While labor is limited by available time, earnings from innovation are not limited.
This is our “Sputnik moment”. Firms like flooring giant Shaw Industries pared down their workforce from 28,000 to 23,000 during the recent recession. Since then, with heavy investments in robotics and mechanization, they have rebuilt their revenue to near pre-recession levels. While the company has boosted wages for some of its master mechanics, it feels no pressure to increase wages for the unskilled positions it still retains.
It is time to choose: either derive more income from multiple sources or wait in vain for someone to rescue you. With more labor-saving innovations being introduced into the market every day there is less and less need for jobs that simply provide labor. More laborers chasing fewer and fewer jobs means companies can get away with paying lower wages.
Do you think like an entrepreneur and pursue multiple sources of income?
