YouSaid · the spoken record

Byron Auguste

lines on the record: 62
first: 2022-09-21
most recent: 2022-09-21
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Kept from moving into jobs that they have the skills for, we mostly learn on the job. That's where most of our human capital is developed. So I think we've got it backwards when we think about a skills gap being driven by education. The skills gap is a result of the opportunity gap that we've imposed, not entirely, but the implications for the college wage premium is that there's three things. There's signaling, there's learning in college, but there's also what are you allowed to learn on the job as a result?”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But who has basically the same kind of characteristics? The first one, the one coming out of college, is likely going to go into entry-level sales, entry-level management, entry-level technology. And from then on, their employers will invest in developing their human capital as part of their employer's business model and competitive strategy. Whereas the second person, who starts with the same skill set, same attributes, will probably be put into entry-level retail warehouse factory floor, and for the most part, they will be trained for safety, compliance, and efficiency, and not for career development and so forth. So after 10 years of that, well, then you're going to have a massive difference in wage outcomes in the particular scenario I'm talking about really don't have to do with what they learn. And they have to do with the initial signaling. But we've got to recognize that the fact that people are placed in jobs and”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah. Well, I've thought about this a lot because the college wage premium has been pretty stable, right? People who have college degrees do make more than those without. But I think there's something else besides learning in college and the signaling, which is if you look at how these studies work, you're typically measuring an income gap, let's say 10 years later. And we've got it two-tiered labor market in this country. So you started this question with like a typical bachelor's degree, but there's no typical bachelor's degree, as you know, by topic, but also by school. I mean, a college degree isn't one thing. It's like 18,000 different things. So that's the first point. And so as we talked about before, there's a huge overlap in the distribution of actual skill, actual competency, IQ, everything you want conscientiousness, all the rest of it. So picture someone coming out of, let's say, a flagship state university versus somebody coming out with most community college degrees or who didn't finish college.”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“How much do you think is signaling and how much do you think is learning? Are you saying the alternative is learning at college, or are you saying something different?”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“25 and over. I think IQ is overrated and conscientiousness is underrated for the most part because people can learn new things, but learning, as you know, learning can be uncomfortable. First of all, it requires realizing you don't really know a thing, paying attention to where I sort of know this, but looking at the finer points. So yeah, I think conscientiousness probably matters more on the whole”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, it's not an area where I'm an expert, but it does seem like a lot of it has to do with culture, like, you know, organizational culture. And while I'm not an expert on police, I think I have had a lot of experience with the culture of different organizations. And one thing that's so striking is how much cultures, organizational cultures tend to replicate themselves, how much you can come in with a very different kind of attitude and aspiration. And you end up norming to the norms of the organization. And I think that probably is applicable in police departments.”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's a great question because we need a lot more nursing, a lot more elder care. I would say in elder care, I think paying people more would be a good start. I mean, that typically pays very poorly. And so I think that should not be overlooked because, you know, it's still a market both ways. I think secondly, though, having more pathways and ways to kind of engage. I mean, most people move through the job market based on the skills they have, the experiences they have. And so similar to If there's not a lot of men in the early stages of care work, it actually is harder for them to move in. Just like if there's not a lot of women in the early stages of construction work, it's harder for them to move in, even though there should be a lot more women in construction and a lot more men in care.”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, labor markets look like statistical discrimination when you look at them at them at the market level, but at the level of the point of hiring, the question is, you have to typically, particularly when you're hiring on a digital platform where you might have hundreds of jobs, you know, hundreds of people apply for your jobs, you do have to shortlist people. So there is some form of screening based on some sort of signal that is required just from a transaction cost standpoint. But these days, there's so many better ways to do it than a bachelor's degree. 25 years ago, when you needed to just have like a keyword search, fine. But now, I mean, you could post the training that you do for your own people once they have the job and see who could do the first three modules of the training and give them an interview. There's so many different ways, but the point is you should screen in based on skills, not screen out based on pedigree. That's the fundamental issue.”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, I think what you're describing there is you're describing two distributions, and you're saying that on average, someone with a bachelor's degree is more likely to have that skill set or learn it than someone without a bachelor's degree. But I heard average is over. Somebody said that. And so, if you look at the overlap of the distributions, if you've got millions of people that you're excluding just because your arbitrary definition of them means that on average that's kind of dumb, isn't it? I mean, it's prejudice, right? It's prejudging somebody based on a statistical distribution, even though they quite likely could have those skills.”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I think the word require is doing a lot of work there, Tyler. I mean, by that definition, 75% of admin assistant jobs require a bachelor's degree, even though two-thirds of admin assistants don't have a bachelor's degree. So when you have a couple million people doing a job without a degree and that job requires them doing a degree, maybe we should reevaluate what requires means. I don't talk about those jobs requiring a degree. I think companies often screen out people. They preemptively pre-screen people who don't have a degree, but that's not the same as saying it requires it.”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But I don't see why that would be because a new piece of software is designed typically for people to use. It might be a little bit complicated, but if it's Salesforce or whatever kind of software you're using, it's designed for humans to use. And it could be better for humans to use. But I don't think there's a fundamental distinction between learning digital tools and learning physical tools. And learning digital tools, you're much more likely to be able to learn them anywhere. I mean, with physical tools, like let's say in textiles or design things, you need to kind of be in a center where there's a lot of other artisans and with digital tools, you know, you can be more of anywhere.”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I don't think technology makes training harder. I mean, it should make it easier. I mean, there's so many more ways to deliver information, to engage with information. And it's funny because a lot of times I hear people talk about, oh, in a digital economy, things are going to be so much harder. But I actually think in many ways it's easier. I mean, think about someone who's a janitor even, or can become sort of a building manager with digital technology, working it on an iPad is easier than all the physical tools you need. So I think it makes training easier.”
2022-09-21 · Conversations with Tyler · Byron Auguste On Rewiring the U.S. Labor Market · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source