Future Population Lower Than U.N. Estimates, Perhaps by Billions

(p. A15) Is a dangerous population explosion imminent? For decades we’ve been told so by scientific elites, starting with the Club of Rome reports in the 1970s. But in their compelling book “Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline,” Canadian social scientist Darrell Bricker and journalist John Ibbitson lay out the opposite case: “The great defining event of the twenty-first century,” they say, “will occur in three decades, give or take, when the global population starts to decline. Once that decline begins, it will never end.”
. . .
So why exactly is everyone still worried about the opposite problem? The authors pin the blame on faulty assumptions by the population establishment, as represented by the U.N. Population Division. They don’t use the United States as an example, but I will: The U.N.’s most recent population forecasts suggest that the average U.S. total fertility rate from 2015 to 2020 should be 1.9 children per woman. In reality, CDC data shows U.S. fertility has averaged about 1.8 children per woman from 2015 to 2018. In 2019, early indications are that fertility will probably be nearer 1.7 children per woman.
. . .
As Messrs. Bricker and Ibbitson point out, U.N. forecasts are substantially out-of-step with existing data from many countries, including China, India and Brazil. As a result of these mistakes, the most widely used population benchmarks in the world are probably wrong. The future will have far fewer people than the U.N. suggests; perhaps billions fewer.

For the full review, see:
Lyman Stone. “BOOKSHELF; A Drop In Numbers.” The Wall Street Journal (Thursday, February 7, 2019): A15.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date February 6, 2019, and has the title “BOOKSHELF; ‘Empty Planet’ Review: A Drop in Numbers; Governments stoke fears about overpopulation, but the reality is that fertility rates are falling faster than most experts can readily explain.”)

The book under review, is:
Bricker, Darrell, and John Ibbitson. Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline. New York: Crown, 2019.

Universal Basic Income Increases Taxes and Does Not Increase Work Among Unemployed

(p. 13) HELSINKI, Finland — A basic income made recipients happier than they were on unemployment benefits, a two-year government experiment in Finland has found. But it did not, as proponents had hoped, make them more likely to work.
. . .
The basic income has been controversial, however, with leaders of the main Finnish political parties keen to streamline the benefits system but wary of offering “money for nothing,” especially ahead of parliamentary elections due in April [2019].
. . .
The higher taxes that the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development says would be needed to pay for basic income schemes might also be off-putting for voters.
In a review of the Finnish scheme last year, the organization warned that implementing it nationally and cost-neutrally for the state would imply significant income redistribution, especially toward couples from single people, and increase poverty.
The researchers have acknowledged that the Finnish pilot was less than realistic because it did not include any tax clawback once participants found work and reached a certain income level.
Swiss voters rejected a similar scheme in 2016.

For the full story, see:
Reuters. “Experiment Explores Income, Jobs and Happiness.” The New York Times, First Section (Sunday, Feb. 10, 2019): 13.
(Note: ellipses, and bracketed year, added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date Feb. 9, 2019, and has the title “Finland’s Basic Income Trial Boosts Happiness, but Not Employment.”)

How the Poor, Hungry, and Determined Can Persevere and Succeed

(p. B1) “I believe tech can be a road to the middle class for large numbers of Americans,” said Mr. Hsu, a co-founder and the chief executive of Pursuit, a nonprofit social venture. “But there’s real skepticism about that among people who see the winners in technology as a small network of the privileged.”
He is using Pursuit, housed in a former zipper factory in Long Island City, the Queens neighborhood where Amazon had intended to locate, to try to prove those skeptics wrong.
The venture is a small yet innovative player in a growing number of nonprofits developing new models for work force training.
(p. B5) Their overarching goal is upward mobility for low-income Americans and the two-thirds of workers without four-year college degrees.
Pursuit, according to its donors and to work force experts, stands out for the size of the income gains of its graduates and its experiment with a kind of bond to finance growth. It is a program worth watching, they say, and beginning to attract attention nationally.
About 85 percent of Pursuit’s 300 graduates have landed well-paying tech jobs within a year. They work as software engineers both at major corporations like JPMorgan Chase and at start-ups like Oscar Health. They earn $85,000 a year on average, compared with $18,000 before the Pursuit program.
. . .
Max Rosado heard about the Pursuit program from a friend. Intrigued, he filled out an online form, and made it through a written test in math and logic, interviews and a weekend workshop with simple coding drills, joining the 10-month program in 2016.
At Pursuit, Mr. Rosado, who has a two-year community college degree in liberal arts, got an intensive immersion in programming languages, concepts and projects. But the curriculum also covered so-called soft skills like making presentations, working in teams and writing résumés and thank-you notes.
Today, Mr. Rosado, 30, is an engineer at GrubHub, the meal delivery service, working on its smartphone software. In his previous jobs, in back office and sales associate roles in stores, he earned $15,000 to $20,000 a year. He makes nearly $100,000 now, he said.
. . .
Pursuit screens applicants for many characteristics, but those mainly fall into two categories: problem-solving skills and perseverance. The program, Mr. Hsu said, looks for people who are hungry and determined, willing to put in the time and effort to become a software developer, but also able to adapt to new and unfamiliar environments.

For the full story, see:
Lohr, Steve. “A Way Out of Poverty and Into an $85,000 Tech Job.” The New York Times (Saturday, March 16, 2019): B1 & B5.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date March 15, 2019, and has the title “Income Before: $18,000. After: $85,000. Does Tiny Nonprofit Hold a Key to the Middle Class?”)

Firms Moving from Silicon Valley to Texas

(p. A3) SAN FRANCISCO–California’s economy is adding jobs far faster than affordable places to live, forcing some employers to leave the state as they expand.
. . .
Karen Holian, 44 years old, joined the startup Lottery.com when it was founded here in 2015. Though a San Francisco native, Ms. Holian, a marketing manager, was excited when the company last year moved to Austin, Texas, because she could finally plan to buy a home.
“In San Francisco, that never seemed like a possibility,” she said. A mother of two, she is for now renting a four-bedroom house for $2,000 a month, a third of what a comparable place costs in her hometown.
Lottery.com CEO Tony DiMatteo said that as the company grew, he found it difficult to persuade current and prospective employees to move to the area. “We can give them a much better bang for their buck if we’re not in San Francisco,” he said.
. . .
Carl Guardino, chief executive of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group, said CEOs tell him “that any new job that doesn’t absolutely need to be in the Bay Area is located outside of the Bay Area.” The public-policy advisory group counts some 360 companies, including Silicon Valley’s largest, as members.
. . .
Texas has drawn more companies leaving California over the past decade than any other state, according to research by Joe Vranich, a relocation consultant who encourages businesses to leave California.
Housing costs are “a major selling point for us,” said Mike Rosa, senior vice president of economic development for the Dallas Regional Chamber. “It’s a factor in just about every [relocation] search we see.”

For the full story, see:
Nour Malas. “Firms Quit California Over Costs.” The Wall Street Journal (Tuesday, March 20, 2019): A3.
(Note: ellipses, and bracketed year, added; bracketed word, in original.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date March 19, 2019, and has the title “California Has the Jobs but Not Enough Homes.” The sentence quoting Karen Holian appeared in the online, but not the print, version.)

Tight Labor Market Gives a Chance to Outsiders

(p. 7) Traditionally male industries have made a comeback. The three fastest-growing sectors since December 2016 have been the three that are most male-dominated: mining, construction, and transportation and utilities. Yet in the same period women’s employment has increased more. It turns out that women are moving into these male-dominated fields, as well as a few others.
. . .
The faster employment growth for women was concentrated in sectors that are at least two-thirds male. In these sectors, women’s employment rose 5.0 percent, versus 3.0 percent for men. Women’s employment grew more than 10 percent in construction, mining, and transportation and utilities.
. . .
“In a tight labor market, firms give workers a chance they would not otherwise consider,” said Lawrence Katz, a labor economist at Harvard. “But the tight labor market could facilitate longer-term change if it demonstrates to firms that they should be more open to women in previously male-dominated areas.”
This growth in women’s employment in male-dominated industries is not just about desk jobs. Within male-dominated industries, the fastest growth for women has been at the building site and on the factory floor, rather than in the accounting office.

For the full commentary, see:
Jed Kolko and Claire Cain Miller. “As Labor Market Tightens, Gender Lines Blur.” The New York Times, SundayBusiness Section (Sunday, Dec. 16, 2018): 7.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date Dec. 14, 2018, and has the title “As Labor Market Tightens, Women Are Moving Into Male-Dominated Jobs.”)

Innovative Entrepreneurs Improve Life for All

(p. A19) In a free-market system, society’s most productive members tend to facilitate upward mobility for all of us, not just for themselves. And not only through their philanthropy.
Oil refining made the Rockefellers rich, but in the process, they made oil products much cheaper and thus more widely available to the poor. Prior to Standard Oil, whale oil and candles were a luxury that only the wealthy could afford. The rest had to go to bed early to save money, explains Burton Folsom, a professor of history at Hillsdale College. “By the 1870s, with the drop in the price of kerosene, middle- and working-class people all over the nation could afford the one cent an hour that it cost to light their homes at night. Working and reading became after-dark activities new to most Americans.”
Rockefeller got rich and America got more productive. Henry Ford did something similar in auto manufacturing, as did Sam Walton of Walmart fame with respect to big-box discount stores. Bill Gates has done more for humanity creating his computer-software fortune than he will ever do giving it away through his foundation. Wealth creation plays a far bigger role than philanthropy or government transfer programs in improving our standard of living, something that those forever trying to “stick it to the rich” either don’t understand or choose to ignore out of political expedience.

For the full commentary, see:
Jason L. Riley. “UPWARD MOBILITY; How a Billionaire Spends His Money Is His Own Business; Progressives are more interested in scapegoating the wealthy than they are in relieving poverty.” The Wall Street Journal (Wednesday, Jan. 30, 2019): A19.
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date Jan. 29, 2019.)

Small Spanish Firms Less Likely to Hire with Higher Minimum Wage

(p. B1) MADRID — As Spain grapples with a turbulent political crisis, one of Europe’s last Socialist governments may soon fall amid the rise of a new nationalism in the country. But whatever the outcome, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez is leaving behind a signature legacy: a record increase in the minimum wage.
The 22 percent rise that took effect in January, to 1,050 euros (about $1,200) a month, is the largest in Spain in 40 years. Yet the move has ignited a debate over whether requiring employers to pay more of a living wage is a social watershed, or a risky attempt at economic engineering.
. . .
(p. B4) Over 95 percent of businesses in Spain are small and medium-size firms, many of which operate with thin margins, according to Celia Ferrero, the vice president of the National Federation of Self-Employed Workers.
“You won’t find people disputing that higher wages are needed,” said Ms. Ferrero, whose organization represents many smaller businesses. “The question is whether firms can afford it. Higher wages and social security taxes simply make it more expensive for employers to hire or maintain staffers.”
“It’s not that they don’t want to pay; they literally can’t,” she added.
Lucio Montero, the owner of General Events, which makes booths and backdrops for firms displaying wares at big conventions, employs eight workers on the outskirts of Madrid. He pays each €1,400 a month.
The higher minimum wage and increased social security charges will put upward pressure on his labor bill and already thin margins, he said. It is a cost that he can ill afford.
“I would need to think twice about hiring more people,” said Mr. Montero, walking around his tiny, sawdust-covered factory floor.

For the full story, see:
Liz Alderman. “Spain’s Minimum Wage Has Surged. So Has Debate.” The New York Times (Friday, March 8, 2019): B1 & B4.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date March 7, 2019, and has the title “Spain’s Minimum Wage Just Jumped. The Debate Is Continuing.”)

Hot Job Market Helps the Least Well-Off

(p. A15) This past weekend [Sat., March 2, 2019], The Wall Street Journal published a series of stories titled “Inside the Hottest Job Market in Half a Century.” As far as I’m concerned, this jobs record is the story of the year. The Journal’s articles transformed a year of economic data into the new daily reality of getting paid to work in America.
“All sorts of people who have previously had trouble landing a job are now finding work,” the Journal reported. “Racial minorities, those with less education and people working in the lowest-paying jobs are getting bigger pay raises and, in many cases, experiencing the lowest unemployment rate ever recorded for their groups. They are joining manufacturing workers, women in their prime working years, Americans with disabilities and those with criminal records, among others, in finding improved job prospects after years of disappointment.”
Example: A 23-year-old woman, Cassandra Eaton, a high-school graduate and single mother who was working for about $8 an hour at a day-care center in Biloxi, Miss., is doing now what previously would have been unimaginable. She’s an apprentice welder making $20 an hour at a shipyard in Pascagoula.
The unemployment rate for high-school dropouts, a status many depressing books and studies show puts one close to the bottom of the barrel for getting ahead in America, is 5%. Their median wages the past year rose 6%.

For the full commentary, see:
Daniel Henninger. “WONDER LAND; Story of the Year; You have to be obtuse to stare at this jobs record and pretend it isn’t happening.” The Wall Street Journal (Thursday, March 7, 2019): A15.
(Note: bracketed date added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date March 6, 2019.)

Farsighted Engelbart Saw That Computers “Would Aid Humans, Not Replace Them”

(p. A15) On Dec. 9, 1968, Doug Engelbart of the Stanford Research Institute presented what’s now known as “The Mother of All Demos.” Using a homemade modem, a video feed from Menlo Park, and a quirky hand-operated device, Engelbart gave a 90-minute demonstration of hypertext, videoconferencing, teleconferencing and a networked operating system. Oh, and graphical user interface, display editing, multiple windows, shared documents, context-sensitive help and a digital library. Mother of all demos is right. That quirky device later became known as the computer mouse. The audience felt as if it had stepped into Oz, watching the world transform from black-and-white to color. But it was no hallucination.
. . .
The coolest thing about this story is that, starting 20 years ago, Doug Engelbart was my next-door neighbor.
. . .
One of Engelbart’s biggest influences was Vannevar Bush’s 1945 essay, “As We May Think,” which envisioned a “memex” machine–a portmanteau of “memory” and “index”–that would enhance human cognition. While I chased my kids’ errant basketballs in his backyard, Doug would tell me about this sort of “human augmentation,” arguing that computer science was developing in ways that would aid humans, not replace them.

For the full commentary, see:
Andy Kessler. “Life as We Know It Turns 50; The 1968 ‘Mother of All Demos’ showed the world a vision for modern computing.” The Wall Street Journal (Monrday, Dec. 3, 2018): A15.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date Dec. 2, 2018.)

Hybrid Jobs Are Less Likely to Become Obsolete

(p. R14) Jobs that tap both technical and creative thinking include mobile-app developers and bioinformaticians, and represent some of the fastest-growing and highest-paying occupations, according to a new report from Burning Glass Technologies, a labor-market analytics firm in Boston.
The company analyzed millions of job postings to better understand the skills employers are seeking. What they discovered was that many employers want workers with experience in such new capabilities as big-data gathering and analytics, or design using digital technology. Such roles often require not only familiarity with advanced computer programs but also creative minds to make use of all the data.
. . .
People who fail to update their skills will qualify for fewer jobs. In 2013, Burning Glass found, one in 20 ads for design, media and writing jobs requested analysis skills. In 2018, one in 13 postings did. In 2013, one in 500 ads for marketing and public-relations pros asked for data-visualization skills. By 2018, the ratio had increased to one in 59.
People in hybrid jobs are also less likely to become professionally obsolete. Highly hybridized jobs have only 12% risk of being automated, compared with a 42% risk for jobs overall, says Burning Glass.

For the full story, see:
Lauren Weber. “The ‘Hybrid’ Skills That Tomorrow’s Jobs Will Require.” The Wall Street Journal (Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2019): R14.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online and print versions have the same dates and titles.)

The Burning Glass Technologies report mentioned in the passages above, is:

Sigelman, Matthew, Scott Bittle, Will Markow, and Benjamin Francis. “The Hybrid Job Economy: How New Skills Are Rewriting the DNA of the Job Market.” Boston, MA: Burning Glass Technologies, Jan. 2019.