Marty Nemko

You May Need Not Baby Steps but Micro Steps

2009-11-08T23:40:00.001-08:00

I suggested to one of my career counseling clients that she call 20 potential employers. She exclaimed, "I can't even say hello to a store clerk and you want me to cold contact 20 employers?"

That reminded me of how fear-filled many people are. So if even a baby step feels too big, ask yourself what is the microstep you could take: the step that is so easy, you wouldn't be tempted to procrastinate it.

For example, if you're too scared to cold contact even one employer, try writing a script for a 10-second pitch. Then read it aloud, perhaps into a recorder. Listen to the recording and keep trying it until you like it. Then give your 10-second pitch to a best friend. Next, call one prospective employer--one you don't mind at all screwing up with.

How to Outsource, Offshore to India

2009-11-08T23:30:00.000-08:00

Silicon Valley insider and India specialist, Sramana Mitra says you can get your low-level work, such as data entry done in India for $2 an hour, basic programming for $5 an hour, and webmaster-level work for $10 an hour.

And it's easy to find such workers: elance.com , odesk.com , and guru.com.

She does recommend you interview them (Skype video and audio calls are free worldwide) and ask for references. Be sure they can communicate effectively verbally and in writing--You want to be sure they understand what you want done.

Also, try them out on a $50 or $100 project before hiring them for a biggie.

I'd imagine that reading this is scary to Americans who have invested a fortune in college and expect $30-100 an hour, plus benefits, 12 weeks a year of Family and Marriage Leave, rights to sue for wrongful termination, etc.

Hot Tech Fields

2009-11-08T23:24:00.000-08:00

I interviewed Silicon Valley insider Sramana Mitra on my NPR-San Francisco show today. She said most of the action is in:

Search engine optimization
Health care information technology
Online training and education
Gaming
Marketing using social media (e.g. Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter)
CleanTech
iPhone and to a lesser extent, Blackberry and Droid apps.

How to Make Peace with Working in a Bureaucracy

2009-11-02T16:13:00.000-08:00

Whether working in a company, nonprofit, or government agency, many employees are frustrated with the politics, lack of autonomy, and slow pace of getting things done.

But most employees are too scared--often understandably--to quit and become self-employed or to work for a tiny company, where job security is an oxymoron and resources are what one seeks rather than has.

So what's a wage slave to do? Of course, there's no perfect answer but I had a client today who now feels more willing to stay in his corporate job because of a suggestion I made: When experiencing your bureaucracy's inefficiency, if you can't reasonably change it, be not angry but amused.

That's not as difficult as it may seem. It mainly requires keeping the big picture in mind: For example, if your customer buys your competitor's product, will the world be that much worse? If it takes another month for your initiative to be implemented, is it that big a deal? If your co-worker's idea gets adopted, not yours, will your career really be much affected? Actually, you may be more likely to be perceived well if, after unsuccessfully making the case for your idea, you congratulate the other person and move on to the next issue.

Ironically, being less invested in an outcome while still working diligently will usually result in your organization turning out at least as good work, and your co-workers and bosses having better lives because you're not unduly forceful or passive-aggressive.

Relentlessness: The Key to Success

2009-10-29T18:50:00.000-07:00

I keep finding that successful people have, in addition to intelligence, one key quality: relentlessness. They latch on a goal and then persist in a comprehensive attack on it.

For example, if I aspired to the long-shot career of sportswriter, I'd:

identify the 20 sportswriters I most admire. For each, I'd read five or ten of their most recent articles, taking notes on what I most wanted to emulate.
then write to each of them, explaining how much I admired them, and would include the aforementioned examples. I'd ask if they would offer me career advice and/or feedback on articles I've written.
send profuse thanks and a new article of mine to any sportswriters that responded. Eventually, I'd ask for leads and a letter of recommendation for a job or internship.
read the useful articles on the websites of the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association, Baseball Writers Association of America, Football Writers Association of America, and U.S. Basketball Writers Association. I'd network and get advice at their national conferences and local chapter meetings. And I'd keep writing a lot, ever incorporating the useful feedback I was getting.

Despite sportswriting being a long-shot career, if I had at least moderate talent, I'd bet I'd achieve my goal of becoming a professional sportswriter.

Even in mundane fields, relentlessness is the most potent way to ensure your success. If you wait for good things to happen, or you tackle things in drips and drabs, unless you're brilliant or lucky, you'll likely be waiting for Godot.

Holiday Presents, Bah, Humbug! (There's a Better Alternative)

2009-10-26T23:43:00.000-07:00

Exchanging presents at Christmas (oops, also Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Ramadan, and Winter Solstice) is a practice that is ripe for replacement, at least for those of us who already have too much stuff.

Instead of giving more stuff to clutter your recipients' lives or for them to have to shlep back because it doesn't fit or they hate it, why not, in the recipient's name, give a donation to the charity of your choice?

The charity I'm currently hot on is SmileTrain. Millions of kids in developing nations have cleft palates. That makes them not only very unattractive, shunned by children and later by adults, but often unable to speak comprehensibly. Yet a simple one-hour surgery can render the child completely normal and able to live up to his or her potential. SmileTrain, which focuses on rural India, has already performed 500,000 such surgeries but millions more kids need it.

I must admit to a particular appreciation of Indians, indeed all Asians, because they are an impressive people: Despite being as visibly different from white Americans as any minority and other immigrants, they, even as new immigrants, have low crime rates and instead, in greater proportions than the general population, become top contributors to society, for example, as physicians, successful businesspeople, and innovators in Silicon Valley's high-tech and biotech worlds. So when we cure an Asian child's cleft palate, it strikes me that we are likely to be unleashing especially good potential that otherwise would go for naught.

Of course, you may have another charity that you're more inclined to donate to but there is one charity I believe is a poor choice: a college scholarship fund. Such donations are likely to provide little help per charitable dollar invested.

Let me explain why. Donating to a scholarship rarely does what most donors think it does: enable a student to attend college who otherwise couldn't. Instead, what usually happens is that your donation is used to tweak an already admitted student's financial aid package.

If the student is lucky, your donation is used to convert some portion of the student's government-paid student loan into grant. In that case, you are essentially opting to pay additional tax--you've chosen to pay the loan subsidy that the government otherwise would have paid. Thanks to you, the government keeps the money. That's very different from what scholarship fund solicitors imply: that you're enabling a student to attend college who otherwise couldn't.

If the student "recipient" is not lucky, your donation is used to replace the scholarship the college would otherwise have given the student to induce him or her to choose that college. The college figures, "Good! S/he got the money from someone else, so we can keep the dough in our coffers!" The student doesn't get an additional dime.

Even if your donation is given to a student before choosing a college, funding a scholarship is a poor use of your charity dollars. The student, knowing s/he has a chunk of other people's money to use to pay college tuition, is thus disincented to look for a cost-effective college. If it was his own money, s/he might, for example, wisely conclude that a good public university is a prudent choice, perhaps even a very-low-cost community college for the first two years. But if the student has your money to spend on tuition, s/he's likely to give less weight to cost-effectiveness in choosing a college.

Of course, the most important argument against funding a scholarship as your charity of choice is that, for example, a $250 donation to pay for a child to have a cleft palate fixed will likely do far greater good.

America's Forced March to the Left

2009-10-21T22:42:00.000-07:00

The drug-induced anti-authority, anti-discipline, hippie era of the '60s combined with America's drubbing in Vietnam and the spectacular birth of the Black Power and feminist movements led America to become ever more contemptuous of right-of-center thought.

Because that is more a movement of passion than of reason, it has--outside the hard sciences--rapidly accelerated in zeal, power, and influence, which has led to leftist thinking dominating society's mind molders: the colleges and the media: including most of the major newspapers, book and magazine publishers, and TV news networks, led by CNN.

That, of course, is bringing about, not withstanding occasional pauses, an ever more leftward-leaning electorate, which has resulted in the election of the most radical president in American history. And the leftward trend is accelerating yet further. He's only been in office for nine months and already, he has taken over the nation's largest car company and all college lending from banks, mortgaged our children's future by forcing through a wildly cavalier "stimulus," plan, filled with leftist policies--for example, transportation spending designed to force us out of our cars and into wildly time-wasting mass transit. Most dangerous, ObamaCare will ensure that taxpayers will die earlier by providing health insurance to everyone, without regard to their ability to pay, including, after he gives them amnesty, the 12-to-20 million illegals. You can't provide health care for 43 million more people with the same numbers of doctors, nurses, MRI machines, operating rooms, etc., without killing more people--Already, over 100,000 people die of medical errors every year. And to ensure that his dragging of America leftward accelerates, he's skirted Congress by naming 37 czars to move America ever leftward.

The only remaining major mass-media sources of conservative thought are the admittedly sometimes overwrought (e.g., Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck) Fox News and some conservative radio talk show hosts, notably Rush Limbaugh. And now, the White House and its complicit media, is trying to eliminate even their relatively small influence. For example, the media ridicules Limbaugh while promoting such equally biased and frothing leftists as former sportscaster, now Obaman pit bull Keith Olbermann. Limbaugh's drug problem was exploited viciously by the media, and now, with frighteningly little evidence, the media is tarring Limbaugh as a racist, the worst epithet that, today, can be bestowed. It's McCarthyism from the Left.

And to assault the last bastion of right-of-center thought, the White House is refusing to provide access to Fox News, the only major news organization to seriously question Obama policies: the many hard leftists on the Obama campaign team (not to mention his white-hating pastor of 20 years Jeremiah Wright,) ObamaCare, his massive expansion of government, the Acorn scandals, skirting Congress by creating more than 30 leftist czarships, etc. Ironically, the Pew Charitable Trusts found that Fox provided the presidential campaign's most fair and balanced coverage.

Let me be clear, I do not like many of Fox News's rightwing lightweights. But listen, for example, to the regular Fox News debates among the likes of Charles Krauthammer and Bill Kristol on the right and Juan Williams and Mara Liasson on the left and I think you'd be hard-pressed to broad-brush dismiss Fox News.

Compare those with CNN "debates," in which CNN regularly pits a brilliant leftist such as Paul Begala or Julian Epstein against a lightweight conservative such as Bay Buchanan or Alex Castellanos. That's like the president of the American League pitting his best home-run hitter against a minor leaguer from the National League in a home-run hitting contest. That hardly proves that the American League has better hitters.

Do you truly believe America will be better now that we are significantly exposed only to left-of-center ideas? If the country veers ever more leftward? Are the following ideas so apriori wrong that they should be given short shrift and in many cases, outright censored: individual responsibility, discipline, order, fiscal restraint, meritocracy rather than reverse discrimination, free-market versus big government solutions, a clear-eyed look at the pros and cons of providing another amnesty for illegals, the science behind global warming, the risk-reward ratios of "environment-saving" restrictions on our lives, a fair-minded risk/reward analysis of nuclear energy and of ObamaCare, and more careful stewardship of our tax dollars?

As readers of this blog know, I hold some liberal views, many libertarian and a few conservative ones, but perhaps most important, I believe society is, by far, best when we are exposed to the full range of benevolently derived ideas. Alas, America has raced toward ensuring that we are exposed overwhelmingly to leftist views. That trend has rapidly accelerated under President Obama and his complicit media.

Lord Acton said that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Obama is verging on absolute power and is using it to stifle all dissent. That worries me.

Making a Living at Garage Sales, Yard Sales, Moving Sales, and Estate Sales

2009-10-18T23:06:00.000-07:00

I predict that you could make a living from garage sales, yard sales, moving sales, and estate sales, as follows:

Every week, consult local newspapers and websites to find the upcoming garage, yard, moving, and estate sales. Especially note those in middle- to upper-class older neighborhoods. Why older? Because their residents are more likely to have been there for years and thus have more good stuff to sell. Use maps.google.com to print out a map of the area, and put an X on the locations of all the sales you plan to visit.

On the first morning of the sale, plan to arrive at your first stop at least 15 minutes before its scheduled start time. Bring your iPhone or other wireless internet device with you so you can check ebay.com to see what similar items sold for.

Generally, the professionally run sales are the worst for you because they charge high prices. If you see a professional sign, skip it or come back 1/2 hour before the sale ends--at that point, they may be willing to give you a real bargain. In any event, you must be a tough negotiator or you probably won't make enough money to make this endeavor worth your while.

To take advantage of auction fever, sell your lightweight items (jewelry, collectables, etc) on ebay. Sell heavier items, for example, furniture, at a consignment store, on craigslist.com, or a publication read by people likely to buy the product you're selling.

Keep track of what sort of products are yielding you the highest net profit and focus subsequent treasure hunts on those items.

The Latest Clean-Tech Career Information

2009-10-16T00:21:00.001-07:00

Clean Edge, a consulting firm that focuses on the Clean Tech Industry, just issued a Job Trends report.

Here are highlights:

There’s no mistaking the types of jobs we’re talking about – they include solar system installers, wind-turbine technicians, energy-efficiency software developers, green building designers, and clean-energy marketers.

The top five sectors for clean-tech job activity in the U.S. are solar; biofuels and biomaterials; conservation and efficiency; smart grid; and wind

Here's a more detailed list:
Energy
Renewable Energy (e.g., Solar, Wind)

Energy Storage

Energy Conservation and Efficiency

Smart Grid Devices and Networks

Electric Transmission and Grid Infrastructure

Biomass and Sustainable Biofuels

Transportation

Hybrid-Electric Vehicles

All-Electric Vehicles

Electric Rail

Hydrogen Fuel Cells for Transport

Advanced Transportation Infrastructure

Advanced Batteries for Vehicles

Water

Energy-Efficient Desalination

UV Filtration

Reverse Osmosis Filtration

Membranes

Automated Metering and Controls

Water Recovery and Capture

Materials

Biommicry

Bio-Based Materials

Reuse and Recycling

Green Building Materials

Cradle-to-Cradle Systems

Clean-Tech Job Compensation Survey

Boiler Operator Biofuels / Biomaterials $61,100 Mid-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Refuse, Garbage, and Recyclable Material

Collector

Biofuels / Biomaterials $38,100 Mid-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Research Associate, Molecular Biology Biofuels / Biomaterials $46,600 Entry-Level Bachelor's Degree

Geothermal Power Engineer Geothermal $71,799 Entry-Level Engineering Bachelor's

Degree

Architect (LEED Certified) Green Building $58,700 Mid-Level Bachelor's Degree

Building Maintenance Engineer Green Building $43,300 Mid-Level High School/Associate’s

Degree

Energy Field Auditor Green Building $48,500 Entry-Level Bachelor's Degree

HVAC Service Technician Green Building $49,500 Mid-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Instrumentation & Controls Technician Green Building $72,900 Mid-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Insulation Worker Green Building $36,100 Mid-Level High School/Associate’s

Degree

Project Manager, Construction (LEED Certified) Green Building $80,000 Senior-Level Bachelor's Degree

Manufacturing Engineer PHEV / EV $60,300 Entry-Level Engineering Bachelor's

Degree

Mechanical Engineer PHEV / EV $63,600 Entry-Level Engineering Bachelor's

Degree

Accountant Renewable Energy,

General

$46,400 Mid-Level Bachelor's Degree

Business Analyst Renewable Energy,

General

$61,500 Entry-Level Bachelor's Degree

Financial Analyst Renewable Energy,

General

$60,200 Entry-Level Bachelor's Degree

Marketing Coordinator Renewable Energy,

General

$39,300 Entry-Level Bachelor's Degree

Project Developer Renewable Energy,

General

$106,000 Mid-Level Master's Degree

Embedded Systems Engineer Smart Grid $77,100 Mid-Level Engineering Bachelor's

Degree

Hardware Design Engineer Smart Grid $87,700 Mid-Level Engineering Bachelor's

Degree

Journeyman Lineman Smart Grid $67,900 Mid-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Network Operations Center Technician Smart Grid $46,400 Mid-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Software Engineer Smart Grid $65,500 Entry-Level Bachelor's Degree

Construction Foreman Solar PV $53,500 Senior-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Electrical Design Engineer Solar PV $65,000 Mid-Level Engineering Bachelor's

Degree

Maintenance Technician Solar PV $44,100 Mid-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Research and Development (R&D) Lab Technician

Solar PV $41,400 Mid-Level Bachelor's Degree

Solar Energy System Installer Solar PV $40,000 Entry-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Solar Energy Systems Designer Solar PV $42,600 Entry-Level Bachelor's Degree

Solar Fabrication Technician Solar PV $43,800 Entry-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

System Integration Engineer Solar PV $75,100 Mid-Level Engineering Bachelor's

Degree

Construction Superintendent Wind Power $74,000 Senior-Level Bachelor's Degree

Field Service Engineer Wind Power $62,400 Mid-Level Engineering Bachelor's

Degree

Sheet Metal Worker Wind Power $50,300 Mid-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Welder, Cutter, Solderer, or Brazer Wind Power $50,300 Mid-Level High School/Associate's

Degree

Wind Turbine Technician Wind Power $52,600 Entry-Level Bachelor's Degree

Source: PayScale and Clean Edge, Inc., 2009

Clean-Tech Job Activity – Top 15 U.S. Metro Areas*

1 San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose, CA

2 Los Angeles-Riverside-Orange County, CA

3 New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island, NY-NJ-CT-PA

4 Boston-Worcester-Lawrence-Lowell-Brockton, MA-NH

5 Washington-Baltimore, D.C.-MD-VA-WV

6 Denver-Boulder-Greeley, CO

7 Seattle-Tacoma-Bremerton, WA

8 Portland-Salem, OR

9 Chicago-Gary-Kenosha, IL-IN-WI

10 Sacramento-Yolo County, CA

11 San Diego, CA

12 Austin-San Marcos, TX

13 Phoenix, AZ

14 Detroit-Ann Arbor, MI

15 Houston-Galveston-Brazoria, TX

In addition to pure plays, diversified multinational corporations are also adding to the ranks of emerging clean-tech jobs. Siemens currently has 5,500 employees working for its wind business, BP has more than 2,200 solar employees, and GE Energy, with a diverse portfolio of both conventional and rapidly expanding clean-energy activities, employs 40,000. Other multinationals with significant clean-tech workforces, among a growing list, include Sharp, Toyota, and ABB. And, as we point out later in the report, major entities such as utilities are hiring more clean-tech workers as they transform their businesses.

Next Big Thing in IT Jobs: Networking the Grid

The smart grid has become one of the hottest areas of clean

tech. What is it? Well, it’s a lot of things, ranging from enhanced

grid monitoring and renewable energy integration to

smart meter networking and consumer energy management.

Deployment of these upgrades to the world’s electrical grids

will require an enormous amount of manpower – and this

means jobs.

There will be plenty of opportunities for traditional grid workers:

installing smart meters, building transmission and distribution

networks, and integrating new generation capacity.

But the heart of the smart grid is in the digital management

of data, not unlike the Internet. With even more potential

nodes than the Internet, however, the smart grid will be the

mother of all networks, placing the work of creating smart

grids largely on the shoulders of the IT community.

Blogs

Blogs are a great way to keep up with the latest news and gather insight from some of the brightest minds following the industry. Below is a sampling of what we feel are some of the best clean-tech blogs. To track these and other industry blogs,

visit www.cleanedge.com/blogs.

Apollo Alliance Blog Green Tech Pastures – ZDNet

earth2tech R-Squared Energy Blog

Green Collar Blog Clean Techies

Green Tech – CNET Environmental Capital - WSJ

Green Light – Greentech Media Gunther Portfolio

Clean Technica Green Inc – NYT

EcoGeek.org Venture Beat – Green Beat

Green for All Blog

JOB RESOURCE GUIDE

Conferences/Career Fairs

Here are a few of the best events at which to explore clean-tech opportunities and support the clean energy economy.

Good Jobs, Green Jobs Green Career Conference (SD, SF, LA) Green Professionals’ Conference

Networking Organizations & Nonprofits

Eco Tuesday Apollo Alliance

Green Drinks Green America

Net Impact Green For All

Renewable Energy Business Network Repower America

Best Careers in 2010

2009-10-15T22:50:00.000-07:00

I just wrote an article on choosing a career that will appear in American Mensa's magazine. Part of the article consists of these descriptions of 16 careers I believe are particularly worthy of consideration by Mensans and other intelligent people. Perhaps you'll find one or more that you might want to check-out:

Researcher with expertise in two or more of these: physics, math, molecular biology, engineering, and/or computer science. Key specializations:

energy: e.g., developing space-based solar power, in-vehicle hydrogen fuel generator, algae that's genetically engineered for maximum net energy yield, efficient insulators such as nanolevel-designed coatings, long-cruising-range batteries for electric vehicles.

genomics : e.g., determining what gene clusters affect what phenotypes, developing safe, effective methods of gene knockouts and transfers.

neurophysics: e.g., understanding the physics of depression, ADD, schizophrenia, retardation, etc.

diagnostic imaging: e.g., developing molecular-level medical imaging.

pollution control: e.g., nuclear waste neutralizers, nanolevel pollution filters.

Before getting too excited, remember that after getting that hard-science/math Ph.D, you may need a one-to-two-year postdoc. Learn more: Career Guide for Scientists: www.phds.org/career-guide/. Science Careers: http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/

Federal government manager, especially in homeland security, energy, health care, veterans' affairs, defense, and the environment. Common federal job titles for degree holders: program analyst, program manager, director. Also needed are country experts, especially on China, India, and Middle Eastern countries. The Federal government will be the largest source of new jobs, with 300,000 hires expected within the next two years. Learn more: Partnership for Public Service: www.ourpublicservice.org/OPS/

Corporate executive specializing in global business development or managing global workforces. Being bilingual/bicultural in Mandarin, Hindi, Bengali, Russian, Portuguese, Arabic, or Farsi is a plus. Learn more: Thunderbird School of Global Management Blogs: http://knowledgenetwork.thunderbird.edu/research/knowledge-network-blogs

Finance specialist, especially with skills in raising funds globally. Learn more: Global Finance Magazine: www.gfmag.com

Terrorism expert, especially on bioterrorism and nuclear/radiologic weapons of mass destruction. Learn more Careers in the Age of Terrorism: www.martynemko.com/articles/careers-in-age-terrorism_id1285

Cognitive-Behavioral Therapist. The Mental Health Parity Act now requires mental health to be covered as fully as physical health, but many insurers will cover only cognitive-behavioral therapy because it 's shorter-term and has generally shown greater efficacy than traditional therapy, which explores the impact of past experiences on your psychology. Among my thousands of career coaching clients, I've found that those who have undergone long-term traditional psychotherapy often suffer side effects from the therapy: excessive self-absorption, preoccupation with their past, and/or externalization of responsibility. Learn more: Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies: www.abct.org.

Immigration expert. President Obama has promised a path to citizenship for America's 12 to 20 million illegal immigrants. After ObamaCare is passed, that will likely rise on his agenda. Experts will be needed to figure out how to successfully integrate such a large population of largely minimally educated, limited-English-speaking, and high-health-care need people. Learn more: Department of Homeland Security: www.dhs.gov. National Council of La Raza: www.nclr.org.

Optometrist. This career offers high success rate with patients, good income, status, and shorter-than-MD training: four years after a bachelors, seven years in a combined BS/OD program. Learn more: Bureau of Labor Statistics profile: www.bls.gov/oco/ocos073.htm

Genetic counselor. With personal DNA sequencing becoming ever more informative and affordable, people face many more gene-related decisions, for example, if your genome doubles your risk of breast cancer, should you have a preventive mastectomy? Or you're pregnant and a test reveals your baby has the gene for a genetic disease that may or may not be serious. Should you abort? Genetic counselors help people figure out what to do. A master's is the terminal degree. Learn more: National Society of Genetic Counselors: www.nsgc.org/career.

Health informatics specialist. Hospitals, insurers, and regional collaboratives are switching to electronic medical records. Nurses and doctors, urged to do more evidence-based medicine, are using computerized expert systems to guide diagnoses and treatment recommendations. Healthcare providers also are collecting more data to evaluate quality of care. Learn more: American Medical Informatics Organization: www.amia.org, American Health Information Management Association: www.ahima.org.

Patient Advocate. Even Christopher Columbus would have had a tough time navigating the tricky waters of the U.S. healthcare system, and most people, especially when ill, aren't the best navigators. Enter patient advocates. They help ensure that the patient gets to see the right specialist. They do Internet research so the patient is informed when talking to the doctor. They educate family members on how to support the patient during a hospital stay. And they sort through the mountains of bills and, if necessary, negotiate fees with the healthcare provider, insurance company, or other payer. ("Medicare, how dare you refuse to pay for that surgery?!") Learn more: Becoming a Patient Advocate: http://patients.about.com/od/caringforotherpatients/ss/becomeadvocate.htm.

Program Evaluator. Not withstanding politicians' rhetoric, is Head Start really worth the taxpayer dollars? What are the benefits and liabilities of online versus in-person training of lab techs? How might a teen-pregnancy prevention program further reduce teen pregnancy? Program evaluators address such questions. Learn more: Basic Guide to Program Evaluation: www.managementhelp.org/evaluatn/fnl_eval.htm.

Higher Education Administrator. Even in tough times and despite annual more-than-inflation price increases and low freshman-to-senior achievement growth, many people continue to view higher education as worth the money. So manager types may find the job market better in higher education than in corporate America. Also, colleges are among the more felicitous work environments for bright people. Plus you get lots of vacation: Neat niche: Student affairs administrator. (No, I'm not talk about assignations.) Learn more: the book, The College Administrator's Survival Guide.

Physical Therapist. Job satisfaction surveys rate this career near the top. One-on-one interaction, with progress usual, reasonable work hours, and you get to spend more than the physician's 12 minutes per patient. In addition, the job market will be decent as aging boomers are ever more likely to sustain weekend-warrior injuries and worse. A three-year Doctor of Physical Therapy has become the standard terminal degree. Learn more: Dept of Labor profile: Department of Labor profile. American Physical Therapy Association: www.apta.org.

Veterinarian. For many people, this career is more desirable than physician: shorter training, you get to do a wider range of procedures, less insurance paperwork, and you avoid the uncertainties of health care reform. Of course, your patients can't describe what's wrong with them. Learn more: About.com's veterinary career portal: http://careerplanning.about.com/od/occupations/p/veterinarian.htm.

Media coach. I include this self-employment opportunity because it has near-zero start-up costs, demand is strong and likely to grow, and many people would find it fun. Media coaches prepare executives, job seekers and others, to do well in front of a camera or microphone: YouTube, intranet, video-resume, as well as traditional TV and radio. Learn more: the book Media Training, A-Z.

The World's Fastest Way to Find a Career?

2009-10-13T23:31:00.000-07:00

This has to be the world's fastest way to find a career that matches your abilities.

Here's how it works. At this federally created site, just click on all the skills/abilities you'd like to use in your next career, click "Go" and up pops a list of best-fitting careers.

Scan all the careers on the the list and use your intuition to pick one or more that's worthy of investigation. Just click on that career and you'll get useful info on it.

Still interested, Google the name of the career and the word "career." (For example: "Accountant career"). Want still more, read a book(s) on the career. You can find on-target ones by searching amazon.com--Again, search on the name of the career and the word "career."

Finally, speak with or, better, visit one or more people on-site in that career. If it still feels right, you probably have found a well-suited career.

"The Sexiest Man Alive:" An outline for a play on low sex drive (new version)

2009-10-12T23:22:00.001-07:00

Dear Reader,

I'd appreciate your honest appraisal of whether you think it's worth my taking the time to turn this outline into a full script, and any suggestions you might have.

"The Sexiest Man Alive"
An outline for a play about a couple's mismatched sex drive

by Marty Nemko
10.17.09 version

Rick, a George Clooney-type 48 year-old, whom People Magazine named "The Sexiest Man Alive," in fact has low sex drive.

A year ago, Rick married Sandy, a hottie, in hopes of revving-up his sex drive.

Rick has been nominated again for "Sexiest Man Alive" and the play opens with he and Sandy arriving in their hotel room the night before the Award ceremony. As usual, she is amorous and he is indifferent. She begs him to take Viagra and he refuses, mainly because he doesn't want to take drugs merely so it can service her--It does little to increase his sex drive; it just gives him an erection. In fury, she threatens to, at the Awards night, expose him, "The Sexiest Man Alive," as having little sex drive.

The play chronicles the next 24 hours. Although he's furious at her for trying to force him into sex-- "You want a sex machine, use your vibrator!," -- to avoid the embarrassment of being exposed, losing his leading-man movie-star career, and simply because he loves her, he tries ever bolder efforts that night to arouse his interest. But she is so angry at their year of his rejecting her sexually, that she unconsciously sabotages his efforts and they fail.

Next, they're in the audience at the Awards ceremony. (This can be accomplished within a Black Box set, no set change required: They would sit in the audience. The voice of an emcee, sound of audience clapping, and props would complete the effect.) The beginning of the scene lampoons the puerility of such events: the speeches, the canned jokes, the political correctness. In between, Rick and Sandy's fight devolves further, although all in a whisper. Rick wins "Sexiest Man Alive." He starts his acceptance speech whereupon she stands up, clearing her throat to speak. Then, in a powerful speech, he admits he has low sex drive--maybe part physical, maybe part psychological, maybe part his fundamentalist upbringing, but if there's hope, it's Sandy. He calls her up to the stage and professes his love for her. The orchestra music starts to play, cuing him that his allotted two minutes is up, whereupon he embraces her and they walk, hand in hand, off the stage.

They are in bed. Finally realizing how sexually intimidating she is, she is dressed subtly rather than bawdily. Her demeanor matches: subtly sexy, not raucous. In trepidation, summoning all his courage (I'll extend this, trying to make it funny and touching--making us really root for him) he takes half a Viagra. They read the NY Times, which calls him a hero for "bringing the last sex taboo out of the closet." They make gentle love, during which she is moaning in ecstasy but he is silent, yes, experiencing some pleasure, but largely he looks like he's fulfilling an obligation.

After they orgasm, she makes afterglow comments and he moves the conversation to an asexual but pleasant topic that reveals their being quite compatible in the non-sexual domain--the play ends with them laughing.

At the end of the curtain call, the audience is invited to remain for a conversation with the playwright, director, and/or actors.

Why Funding a Scholarship is the Worst Charity You Could Donate To

2009-10-09T00:42:00.001-07:00

When you fund a scholarship (usually by donating to your college or to a charity) you are making terrible use of your charity dollars. Here's why:

You're probably NOT enabling a kid to attend college who otherwise wouldn't. Contrary to the sales pitches that many fundraisers use or imply, very few students would be unable to attend an appropriate college in the absence of your money. You're merely substituting your money for the government's or college's. (The college's money heavily comes from such sources as tax dollars and government- or corporate-paid overhead payments.) The kid would have attended college, probably the same college, and almost certainly an equally appropriate college without your money.

Usually, your donation makes college only minimally more affordable to a student. The amount of your scholarship dollars is usually deducted dollar-for-dollar(!) from the financial aid the student would otherwise get from the government or the college.

Usually, the best a student can hope for is that the college will convert his taxpayer- or college-subsidized low-interest loan into a grant. So, for every dollar you donate, only a few cents actually gets to the student. We'd never donate to a charity that had even 30% overhead, yet here, you're donating to a charity that is almost all overhead!

A student's receiving your scholarship reduces his or her motivation to select the most cost-effective college.

You incur a huge opportunity cost. There are so many uses of charity dollars more likely to lead to greater societal good. For example, I have given money to a blue-collar school district that provides little or no special programming for its high-ability elementary school kids. (The funding and attention in most schools has been diverted to low achievers, to meet the government's No Child Left Behind mandates.) That donation enables those kids, with so much potential to make a difference in the world, to get appropriate education and co-curricular experiences they otherwise would not get. I've also donated money to the Population Council, which makes birth control and reproductive education available to third-world women, and to The National Organization for Rare Diseases, which funds research on diseases too rare for the drug companies to invest in.

Think three times before saying yes to your college's or charity's highly sophisticated pitches for your money to fund scholarships. Your charity dollars will do much more good elsewhere. Besides, you've already paid your college a fortune for an education that many thoughtful people conclude does not yield sufficient benefit for all the money and time.

How to Get Promoted...But is the Effort Worth It?

2009-10-08T20:29:00.001-07:00

Dan Schwabel, a biggie in the personal branding arena sent me these questions for an article he's writing for Details magazine. Here were my answers. At the end, I wrote something that surprised me and may be worthy of your reading.

What does it take to get a promotion at work right now?
One or more of these, the more the merrier: a better job offer, demonstrated greater value added compared with peers, promise of doing a better job than the person currently in the desired position, an industry award, a bold proposal, sleeping with the boss.

What is the most unique strategy you would recommend for current workers who are looking to get ahead in this economy?
Write a proposal for an initiative that, while consistent with the culture and mission of the organization, would be an exciting yet realistic quantum leap ahead for the organization. Send it, in advance, to the attendees of an important meeting. Get their input. Get permission to present the revised version at the meeting. Make that presentation with CEO-like crispness.(Watch C-Span, CNBC, and YouTube to see CEO types in action.)

What is your take on going the extra mile at work and helping out other teams if you have those skills?
Working s generally more rewarding, both financially and in accomplishment, than going home, watching TV, playing golf, and/or drinking or doing drugs.

What do you think about transparency at work? Should all workers be that honest?
It's not realistic. Especially in tough times, inside knowledge can be very helpful. It's all well and good to say "Share for the common good," but in the end, most people act in their self-interest--they want to get ahead or at least don't want to be a victim of the next round of layoffs.

How important is it to be connected to your colleagues through social networks? I know you think it's key. I think it's usually overrated---Most people spend more time at it than the benefits they derive (e.g., participating in the discussions on LinkedIn.) I do like Guy Kawasaki's YouTube video 10 Ways to Use LinkedIn and his article Ten Twitter Tips.

Do you believe that growing your brand outside of your company can help you inside?
Yes. Give speeches at conferences, get articles written about you in trade publications.

But Dan, frankly, having had a zillion clients play these games to "get ahead," it feels a little sickening, kind of like the movie, They Shoot Horses Don't They, in which everyone's pitted against each other to see who can dance the longest. All but the winner collapse and even the winner is exhausted. Trouble is, I don't know what the answer is. Socialism is probably, net, worse.

Another Letter from a Victim of Prejudice Against White Males

2009-10-05T17:13:00.000-07:00

Here is the latest of the many letters I've received from white males who feel the pendulum has swung so far that it's slamming them in the chest:

Hello Mr. Nemko,

I have spent most of my life priding myself on my open-mindedness while living in a state where that commodity can be in short supply.

Unfortunately, over the last 10 years, my open attitude is being returned less and less often.

At first, I thought I was at fault, but with time and awareness, I have come to realize that the white middle-aged male is now the low person on the totem pole and everyone, including many white men, seem determined to keep it that way.

I have experienced racism and sexism. I have been ignored, berated, and ridiculed. I have been passed over for jobs and promotions that have been given to people with less experience and fewer abilities. Unfortunately, when I bring up these realities, people seem to look at me as if I were speaking a different language.

For a while, I was angry. At this point, I simply feel resigned. I’ve been around long enough to understand that a pendulum always swings and now, white males are the victims of that swing. I sure do feel sorry though for the young white men out there.

Sincerely,

David Dickson

whynotnow@mail.com

Finding the Willpower

2009-10-03T09:57:00.000-07:00

The cure for your lack of willpower depends on what causes it:

Many previous failures. If you too often fail, eventually you understandably figure it's not worth trying. In other words, you lose willpower.

The usually most successful solution: Choose more attainable goals: an job better suited to your strengths, a more attainable romantic partner, etc.

Hedonism. Here, you fail to realize that to the extent you prioritize pleasure over productivity, you are a drain on your family and on society. The wise person realizes that productivity is key to the life well-led, and that requires frequent impulse control and sacrificing of pleasure for the greater good of accomplishing something.

Genetically low energy. Some people emerge from the womb driven while others are laid back. That is very difficult to compensate for. It may help to pair up for work and avocationally with someone with moderately higher energy. It may rub off.

If you have long been depressed (not just because of a specific situation you're facing,) drugs such as Prozac or Wellbutrin may help, especially if combined with regular exercise and short-term cognitive therapy.

Drug or alcohol problems. The stereotype of the lazy pot smoker is true. To find willpower you must find the--well--willpower to stop doing drugs and alcohol. You are fooling yourself if you think it isn't hurting your work and personal life, not to mention your health.

People of faith are often best helped with a 12-step program such as Alcoholics Anonymous. More purely rational people are often helped with cognitive therapy. Some people are helped by a physician-prescribed drug that reduces cravings or makes you feel nauseous if you drink or do drugs. For some people, a combination works best. Here is a review of alcoholism treatments.

You're pampered or have been. For example, you were too often indulged by your parents, you're a trust fund baby, welfare recipient, or have a spouse or parent who pays your bills. Unless you're an intrinsically motivated person, if you're taken care of, you lose much willpower. The following may be unrealistic but it may be wise: Cut the purse strings and try to make it on your own. Much easier said than done, I'm sure.

Unearned high self-esteem. Many people have been led to believe they deserve high self-esteem merely because all people are worthy or because they're "The Chosen People," "Black is beautiful," etc. That mindset is likely to reduce your willpower. True self-esteem comes only from accomplishment. If you think otherwise, you're deluding yourself.

Misinterpreted theology. Some religious and otherwise spiritually oriented people believe canards like, "The world is abundant. It will provide" or "If it's meant to happen, it will," Many people misinterpret the Christian precept "Do not be willful" as "God will provide," rather than "Make all reasonable effort but at some point realize it's out of your control."

Along with intelligence and ethics, nothing is more key to the life well-led than willpower. I hope you might find at least one of the above suggestions helpful in improving yours.

Reactions to this article, including other suggestions on how to build willpower are, of course, welcome.

What I've Learned in Six Decades

2009-09-29T23:00:00.000-07:00

In his play, Broadway Bound, Neil Simon wisely said, "Wisdom doesn't come with age. Wisdom comes with wisdom."

With that caveat, as I approach my seventh decade, here is the wisest advice I can muster:

On career: If I haven't acquired wisdom in this area, I'm in trouble. I've been a career coach for 25 years. Here are some things I've learned:

¨ For most people, there is no one best-suited career. They could be equally happy and successful in many careers as long as it met their non-negotiables, for example: using your head vs. your hands, people-centric vs. isolated, employed vs. entrepreneurial, artistic vs. scientific, plus a decent boss, pay, commute, learning opportunities, and workplace ethics.

¨ It's wise to hire an inexperienced smart hard worker over an experienced person of average intelligence and drive.

¨ Procrastination is a career killer. Avoid those psychotherapist-concocted excuses for inaction, for example, "fear of failure," and "fear of rejection." Feel the fear and do it anyway; the fear will dissipate. And if you're lazy, recognize that you pay a price far greater than any benefits you derive--not only lack of success but ultimately feeling like a parasite on others, or at least having made far less of a difference to your family, community, and world than you could have or your peers have.

On money: Only fools chase money beyond a moderate income. After taxes, your quality of life's improvement is too small to justify what it often takes to get big bucks: a career you enjoy far less than a less remunerative one, inordinate stress, ethical compromises.

On friends: They're more important than family. Other than your spouse, you don't choose your family. You do choose your friends, so you're more likely to be compatible. I have seen so many family members cause each other misery. Compatible, close friends are a treasure. If you have such friendships, nurture them. If you don't, prioritize making one.

On marriage: A good marriage should get a passing grade on all these characteristics:

¨ enjoying each other in bed

¨ enjoying each other out of bed

¨ respecting each other deeply

¨ no fatal flaw in either of you (for example, chronic addiction or violence)

¨ that ineffable thing called love--in which you feel warm whenever you see the person, and you care as much about the other person's wellbeing as your own.

Of course, no marriage scores a permanent A on all those factors but if, for an extended time, your or your partner rate the marriage as a C or lower on two or more of those, you may be better off single or with another partner.

Few people fundamentally change and even fewer change because of another person's attempt to make them change. Sure, encourage tweaks but key to a good relationship is accepting each other for who they essentially are. If you can't, consider separating.

On sex: The key is to find a partner with a compatible sexual appetite and to communicate your desires to your partner, verbally if necessary.

On politics: Liberal ideals appeal to the hearts of all good people but fail to adequately consider how most humans behave: that handouts and other compensatory programs reward incompetence and laziness and thus encourage more of it while punishing the more worthy. Liberals, who ever expand government, fail to accept that the security of government jobs causes government services to be of low quality and to cost the taxpayer vastly more than they should. Also, liberals seem to care about everyone but the taxpayer, who usually gets terrible value received for the amount paid. Government must take much more seriously their responsibility to steward taxpayer money as though it was their own.

Conservatives fail to realize that people's failures are often beyond their control: the genes and environment bestowed by their parents. It is government's (as well as individuals') responsibility to help compensate those who lost in the genetic and environmental lottery. Conservatives also fail to acknowledge that unbridled capitalism does lead to excesses requiring regulation, although only a non-onerous and realistically enforceable level of regulation.

On faith: There is no God worth praying to. If there were, s/he wouldn't have allowed billions of people, including infants, to suffer weeks or months of horrific pain only to die of diseases such as cancer or AIDS, leaving bereft family members. "A loving God," hmmph.

The potential for holiness resides within each of us: the impulse to do good. We should keep that impulse top-of-mind.

"A Nation of Cowards?" Toward an Honest Conversation About Race and the Achievement Gap

2009-09-28T17:31:00.001-07:00

In June, I posted a teacher's sobering, indeed stunning account of his experiences teaching in a heavily African-American urban high school. It generated an unprecedented 473 comments.

I have just finished writing an article that includes the most interesting quotes from those comments, spanning the ideological and political spectrum. I conclude the article by proposing what I believe is a bold yet realistic blueprint for reducing the achievement gap.

The article is too long to post here, but if you're interested, here is the link to it.

Feel free to post your comments on that article here.

Is Watch-and-Wait A Wiser Strategy Re Global Warming?

2009-09-25T11:29:00.000-07:00

With so many compelling problems facing the world--from cancer to world poverty--I cannot understand why liberal leaders such as President Obama are so eager to immediately start spending so massively in perpetuity in an attempt to cool the planet when average global temperature has gone up just 1/2 of one degree since 1880 and flat or declining for the past decade, even if we don't count the aberrantly warm year of 1998. Here's another chart, this one from MIT, reporting that there's been essentially no increase since 1995!

Insisting on immediately and massively spending to try to cool the planet seems particularly foolish because key evidence suggests that even that 0.5 degree warming since 1880 is at least partly natural variation, not man-made. For example, there has been a major CO2 increase during most recent decade, a period in which temperatures have been flat or declining. Atmospheric CO2 is a proxy for man-made hydrocarbon emissions. If man-made behaviors were causing global warming serious enough to justify the world making massive efforts to cool the earth, global temperatures should not be declining. Even if other factors are masking the man-made contribution to global warming, the amount and rate of global warming is small, far less than predicted by Al Gore and his anti-corporation-motivated allies. And remember the climate change alarmists' data is based heavily on highly conjectural computer models: garbage in-garbage out.

Another untested assumption: Even if, over the next 50 years, average global temperature were to reverse trend and rise, would the net effect be so negative as to justify an immediate and massive indeed quixotic effort to slow it? For example, many areas, for example in Canada and Russia, previously too cold to grow crops, would become farmable. An article in Germany's leading magazine, Der Spiegel makes the case that it's impossible to predict whether global warming, if any, will yield a net positive or negative effect on the earth.

Perhaps the most dispositive reason to watch-and-wait instead of, right now, spending massively to try to cool the planet, is the extraordinary difficulty, indeed unrealism, of trying to get the worldwide spending of incomprehensibly large amounts of money, curtailment of development and of travel in perpetuity that would be required to possibly achieve even a one- or two-degree decline in average global temperature.

Charles Siegel of preservenet.com commented on today's New York Times editorial that said:
"The hope is these [Copenhagen] talks will produce commitments from each nation that, collectively, would keep temperatures from rising 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels. That will require deep cuts in emissions — as much as 80 percent among industrialized nations — by midcentury." Siegel commented, "In reality, it requires at least an 80% cut in emissions in the entire world by 2050, not just from the industrialized nations." Is it realistic to do that?

There are only so many fiscal and human resources to go around. If we immediately and forever spend so massively on trying to cool the globe, we will have to shortchange initiatives with a higher probability of improving humankind--such as a true war against cancer or world poverty.

Of course, some efforts to cool the planet also facilitate energy independence, for example, nuclear energy and conservation efforts that minimally impinge on our freedom such as higher CAFE standards. I support both of those measures. But the sorts of permanent massive spending and incursions on our freedoms (for example, restricting road building thereby encouraging gridlock, and eliminating already scarce city parking spots, forcing us into inevitably time-wasting mass transit) being proposed by President Obama and other liberal world leaders is incomprehensible to me.

It seems to me that in light of the 15-year flat global temperature and below-average extreme weather such as hurricanes despite the CO2 increase (the opposite of what Al Gore and the IPCC's politically stacked panel predicted,) and that the money and effort could be diverted to better address the world's enormous pressing needs, a few years of watch-and-wait, accompanied by continuing, non-politically-motivated research on the above questions, along with private-sector research into improved alternative energy sources is a wiser path than immediate massive spending to try to cool the planet. What am I not understanding?

Two Ideas for Career Websites

2009-09-23T18:38:00.000-07:00

Despite the plethora of career-related websites, I believe that creating these could enable someone to do well by doing good:

APlayer.com.
Many sites attempt to match employee with employer but none use the most potent predictor of how well an employee will do on the job: simulation.

APlayer.com would make it easy for an employer to upload a simulation of a task(s) the employee must do well on that job.

Candidates whose resume and application match the job description would be invited to participate in that online simulation.

High-scoring candidates would be invited to in-person interviews.

InterviewFinder.com.
Nearly every job seeker hates looking for a job: networking, cold-calling prospective employers, creating resumes, filling out applications, getting letters of recommendation, etc.

Career counselors looking for more clients would, on interviewfinder.com, offer to handle the entire job search except for the interview, of course.

A Blueprint for Long-Term Prosperity

2009-09-23T13:30:00.001-07:00

This wonderfully centrist article in The Economist perfectly defines what I believe to be the ideal roles of business and government. The article's major contentions are:

Entrepreneurship is the key because only new products and services can keep quality of life improving.
Non-entrepreneurial businesspeople, such as corporate raiders, arbitragers, financial instrument brokers (e.g., those exotic CDOs and CMOs that helped trigger the financial crisis) are the bad guys.
A modest amount of government regulation is needed to control the aforementioned bad guys.

An Idea for a Conservative Play

2009-09-13T23:46:00.000-07:00

In a recent post, I noted that all influential political plays are leftist. A commenter mentioned that Alison Carey, Director at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, was looking for non-leftist playwrights.

So I wrote to her, she encouraged me to send her something, and I've drafted this plot outline for a play. Your comments are welcome.

For example, I'd welcome an obstetrician's or medical malpractice attorney's opinion on whether the scenario is realistic.

Affirmative Actions
(NOTE: This is merely a plot summary. It does NOT present the characterizations, which, of course, are crucial.)

Characters
Jennifer: Diversity consultant, white, 35, 7 months pregnant.

Daniel, her son, a high school senior, white.

Melissa, an employment lawyer who represents a cancer-research biotech company, 40, white, 8 months pregnant.

Bob: Melissa's husband, a social worker, African-American.

Cedric: Jennifer's obstetrician, 30, African-American.

Lily: The operating room nurse. Asian.

Act I
Jennifer ends her conference keynote address, "Affirmative Action Benefits Everyone" and asks for questions. Melissa splutters, "If affirmative action is so beneficial, why, in every one of the world's 195 countries, majority Black or minority Black, colonized or not, in which Blacks were enslaved and not, is there not one country, at any point in history, in which Blacks don't have the lowest achievement rate and the highest crime rate?" Melissa goes into premature labor. Being from out of town, Melissa doesn't have a local obstetrician. Jennifer, who lives locally, recommends hers: Cedric.

During the cesarean birth, Cedric nicks an artery, the baby's (Leah) heart rate skyrockets and blood pressure drops. Cedric manages to stabilize Leah but her Apgar score is 4 (very unhealthy.)

Cedric tells Melissa and Bob that Leah appears to have suffered profound brain damage but claims it occurred naturally, the result of Melissa having a child at age 40. After a painful debate, Melissa and Bob decide to institutionalize Leah.

Cedric's guilt-and self-doubt-filled monologue is interrupted by a thought, "It seems odd that such short oxygen deprivation could have caused such profound damage." He convinces Melissa and Bob to have Leah undergo a more thorough set of scans.

Act II
The scans reveal a neck tumor that is blocking blood flow to a key part of Leah's brain. That and not Cedric's error caused the low Apgar score and projected profound brain damage.

If the tumor is malignant, Leah will likely die. If it's benign, she could grow up to be normal. A surgeon, with Cedric watching, removes the tumor. Leah immediately shows tiny but very hopeful signs of improvement. And the tumor is benign.

Lily reveals to Melissa and Bob that Cedric nicked Leah's artery. "He made another serious error six months ago. We all wanted Cedric to succeed because there are so few Black obstetricians, so we covered for him but I can' stand the thought that he could hurt more babies."

Under Melissa's withering questioning, Cedric admits he was admitted to medical school because of affirmative action and was kicked out and then reinstated only because he threatened to sue for racial discrimination. Bob and Melissa express rage and accusations not only to Cedric but to each other.

Melissa tells Jennifer and Daniel what has occurred. Melissa is surprisingly consoling. Jennifer debates whether to cancel her upcoming appointment with Cedric, and picks up the phone.

Daniel is completing his online application to Harvard. (The application is projected on an on-stage wall.) He has reached the ethnicity question. He is 1/8 Spanish. What box does he check? He and Jennifer debate it. His cursor hovers over the choices: White, Latino, Multiracial.

At the end of the curtain call, the cast steps aside to reveal, on the projected computer screen, a scrolling series of statistics on affirmative action.

Why Double-Digit Unemployment will be Permanent

2009-09-12T10:30:00.001-07:00

This week's Time magazine cover story asserts that double-digit employment is here to stay but, true to its ever more liberal bias, the article avoids the most potent reasons why:

Government, advocacy groups, and the media pressure employers to hire candidates based not purely on merit but also on race, ethnicity, gender, and age. For example, courts are increasingly using the "disparate impact" standard to judge racial discrimination. If, for example, a smaller percentage of African-Americans pass an employee-selection test, even if no test items were evaluated to be biased against African-Americans, the test's disparate impact on African-Americans would be legally admissible evidence that the employer was discriminatory. Being pressured to hire on non-merit-based criteria, of course, reduces employers' desire to hire at all.

Government has vastly increased the dollar and human costs of hiring people. Of course, there are the employer-paid payroll taxes: unemployment tax, Medicare, Medicaid and half of Social Security plus all the associated paperwork. But mandates such as the Family Leave Act, which allows workers to take up to 12 weeks of leave every year(!) with guaranteeed rights of return, imposes onerous demands on employers. And President Obama has proposed making that leave paid! And for the coup de gras, health care cost, already a huge employer expenditure will grow far larger under ObamaCare, under which employer taxes will be used to subsidize the poor's health care.

Living-wage laws, for example, those in San Francisco, require employers to pay all workers $11.54 an hour (usually plus benefits). Employers who could use an employee that would add any less value than $11.54 an hour plus benefits won't hire anyone at all--few employers want to take a loss in hiring an employee.
The hassle factor. Many American employees, especially in liberal cities, and especially young employees, feel a sense of entitlement and litigiousness. They view employers as necessary evils. Many employers find the hassles of dealing with such employees outweigh the profit they would generate.
Increased government worker protections create yet more disincentives to hire. For example, California law requires that even if a non-exempt worker works only four days a week, if an employer wants an employee to work a 9th hour on even one day, the worker must be paid 50% more for that one hour. Another example: sexual harassment laws have been so liberalized that, for example, if a person merely perceives a coworker to be making unwanted advances or is offended by a photo of a sexily-dressed person in an employee's cubicle, s/he could have grounds to build a case against the employer for condoning a "hostile environment," even if the employer was unaware of the photo!
It is very difficult to fire an unsatisfactory employee, especially if the employee is in a "protected class:" woman, minority, person over 40, person with a disability (everything from cancer to depression.) Many such employees file wrongful termination actions and the rate is growing. Those suits are not only costly and can take many years, they take a great psychological toll on employees being accused of or deposed about alleged racism, sexism, ageism, or a hostile environment.
The overall cost of regulation is enormous. A study by California State University economists reported today by Governor Schwarzennegar finds that the regulations cost the average small business and $134,000 every year, a total cost of $493 billion and 3.8 million jobs. And, of course, President Obama is calling for yet more regulation.
Those are potent reasons why employers are ever more likely to not hire U.S. employees but rather to offshore or automate jobs, or simply to calculate that there's too little profit to justify the disadvantages of hiring. And to the extent hiring is necessary, employers are ever more often hiring workers on short-term contracts to reduce payroll costs and the risks of lawsuits.

Time magazine proposes the typical liberal solutions that have already been tried and failed: funding colleges more and job retraining. We already have the highest percentage of college graduates in American history and as discussed earlier, employers are yawning at them because all we've done is taken weak high school students, lowered standards in college, but radicalized them to demand the moon from employers. So employers offshore, automate, or temp as many positions as possible. Regarding job retraining, it's been tried and tried, and those federal training programs fail: cost a fortune per trainee and most trainees don't land a job in their new career or don't last.

In my view, two changes would have the biggest long-term impact on decreasing the unemployment rate:

Training more entrepreneurs, starting in elementary school. That would yield more successfully self-employed people, more new ideas for products and services, which would create the need for more employees.

Freeing business from most government regulation.

Fat chance.

The ObamaCare Questions I'd Ask at a Town Hall Meeting

2009-09-11T14:27:00.000-07:00

President Obama, you've said, again and again, that ObamaCare would not cover illegals. Yet ObamaCare has no money allocated to verifying that a patient is a legal resident of the U.S.

And to the extent illegals wouldn't be covered under ObamaCare, you have repeatedly said you plan to make all illegals legal: the so-called "path to citizenship." So won't all these 13 to 20 million illegals become legal and thus covered under ObamaCare?

And is that fair? Today, every year(!), medical errors result in more than 100,000 deaths and hundreds of thousands of additional people who stay sicker or get sick because of those errors.

Indeed, two months ago, a dear friend, a healthy 54-year-old woman, went in for routine surgery and came out a near-vegetable--the surgeon nicked a critical blood vessel.

With the same number of doctors, nurses, MRI machines, and operating rooms, ObamaCare will attempt to provide health care for 47,000,000 additional people--a group with high health care needs and low ability to pay. Thus, many more medical errors will occur and so, many legal residents who took care of their health and paid into the system will die, get sicker, or stay sicker because you, Mr. President, are forcing us to share our health care with a cohort of 47,000,000 high-use people, whether they are legal or not, whether they pay or not.

I ask you, Mr. President, what would you say to those countless people who unnecessarily will get sick, or to the family members of those who die because you decided to provide health care without regard to people's legality or whether they paid their fair share?

Isn't it fairer to have a basic public plan for the poor and a much higher-quality plan for those who pay into the system? Isn't it unfair to make legal residents pay for illegals, thereby endangering those legal residents' lives?

And a final question: Do you really think that ultimately, we will have a more just country, a better life for our residents, when you force the responsible taxpayer to reward the lawbreakers (the illegals) the wild-risk-takers (people who borrowed beyond their means and the banks that lent to them) and the incompetent (the US car makers)?

Battery Stations Instead of Gas Stations?

2009-09-03T11:21:00.000-07:00

Imagine if instead of pulling into a gas station, you pulled into a battery station that quickly swapped out your nearly empty battery for a fully charged one?

Those stations are being created now in Israel, with plans in place for Denmark, Australia, California, Hawaii and Ontario, Canada. The initial demonstration proof-of-concept took place in Japan.

With the already available lithium-ion batteries, fully electric cars (or perhaps with a range-boosting generator added a la the Chevy Volt) would be practical, affordable, and much less polluting than a traditional car powered by an endless series of little gas explosions.

I love that solution. Cars give people freedom impossible to match using mass transit, even at mammoth cost. And even though it's unclear how manmade and controllable global warming is, certainly air quality would be improved and the world would be freed from having its behavior dictated by oil-producing countries such as Iran, Venezuela, and Saudi Arabia.

For more on this, see the report in today's Economist. And here's a link to a video that explains how the Israeli company, A Better Place, is planning to implement the idea.