Writing Project 3

Zach Davis

Dr. Wielgos

College Writing II

16 April 2015

Evolution of “Work” in the 21st Century

Like scientific evolution, the workplace and economy evolve over time as well. This is extremely evident today in regards to how jobs are being outsourced, the advances in technology which eliminate some manual labor jobs, and the need for people who possess different skills and are able to do many tasks. It’s appears that it will get much harder to get a job, let alone a good paying job, as time goes on. Even with all these uncertainties, there is still a way for young Americans to succeed in an ever changing world economy. It will take every college age American to do very well in school and the think about whether or not their college courses and intended major would affect and help grow a global economy, know a lot about knowledge current technology, and allow themselves to be very adaptability for many types of jobs and positions. 

One of the many new practices in the workplace is the idea of offshoring, or what some call outsourcing jobs all around the world. Alan S. Blinder, an Economics Professor at Princeton University and who once served as vice chairman to President Bill Clinton’s Federal Reserve Board, discusses the realization that more and more jobs are being shipped overseas. In a recent article in the magazine Foreign Affairs, he writes “the greatest problem for the next generation of American workers may not be lack of education, but rather offshoring…especially to countries with lower wages, such as India and China” (9). Blinder is trying to tell the public that offshoring is a becoming a more typically business practice. It is cheaper for employers and company owners to pay employees and factory workers who are accustomed to lower wages and will do anything to make some sort of money. Blinder implies that offshoring could also lead to higher profits for business owners because their employee or factory workers’ pay and expenses are exponentially lower then what they would be in America.  A way to combat outsourcing is by thinking globally. Thomas L. Friedman, an investigative reporter and a regular columnist for the New York Times, believes that markets evolve and one of the evolving parts in the ideas of a global economy. In his article titled “The Untouchables”, he plainly makes the claim “every young American today would be wise to think of himself or herself as competing against every young Chinese, Indian, and Brazilian” (169). Friedman expresses the thought that outsourcing can be a motivator for young Americans to want to do well in school and work, particularly during their time in college. He believes Americans can be successful in a world economy, but it is not going to be as easy to earn and hold a job like it was in the mid 1900s. Outsourcing is becoming a problem for the average worker, but on top of that, these everyday workers need to know how to keep up with the extraordinary advances in technology the 21st century has to offer. 

21st century technology is also another reason why employers want to cut expenses on workers. Richard W. Judy and Carol D’Amico, who both wrote Work and Workers of the Twenty-First Century, emphasize that technology will eventually take over or “displace low-skilled and unskilled workers” (165). Judy and D’Amico back up their claim by stating that a software called “CASE Tools”. They convey this by saying ““CASE Tools” now assist in writing routine computer code” (165). This vc a small smile size of technology doing work that humans would normally do, but knowing how technology has evolved in the last decade or so, anything is possible. Not all hope is lost though. Judy and D’Amico realize that for some technology there will be need for people who work, manage, and be take care of the new technological advances. They write, “The best jobs created in the Innovation Age will be filled by Americans (and workers in the other advanced countries) to the extent that workers possess the skills required to complete for them and carry them out” (165).  Basically what they are saying, is that the new technology will not complete whip out all jobs in the future. People who can handle the new technology of the future will be able to survive and be successful in a 21st century world economy. Being able to comprehend new technology is a great way of being adaptable, which is also another key component young people need to know in order to be successful during the 21st century.

Being adaptable, or possess the ability to do many different jobs is going to be very important for a person to be successful in a 21st century economy. Richard Sennett, who is a Professor of Sociology at the London School of Economics and a Professor of Humanities at New York University, conveys the idea that their are going to be no long term jobs due to the ever changing and fast growing markets around the world. He writes, ““People are hungry for change,” the management guru James Champy argues, because “the market may be ‘consumer-driven’ as never before in history” (155). Following that statement, he backs up that claim by saying, “the market, in this view, is too dynamic to permit doing things the same way year after year, or doing the same thing” (155).  Basically what he is trying to say, is that in order to be successful in today’s economy you need to adaptable to jobs that suit the when world’s wants and needs. In order to accommodate this reality, Tom Peters, who is a well-known management consultant, writes “To thrive in tomorrow’s transparent team environment, the typical white-collar worker will have to be noticeably good at something the world values” (161). Tom believes being well round is vital to being able to get goods jobs, particularly when college aged people are young and are trying to settle on a career that they want to spend the rest of their life on. Being able to do several skills will make it much easier for a young person in the 21st century to be successful and possibly be able to do something they truly enjoy to do.

Work in the 21st century is becoming vastly different compared to work in the 1900s. With new advances in technology and the idea of outsourcing, they make the competition for jobs much more intense then it was in earlier times. For someone to distance themselves from other job applicants, they most have many different skills and being able to keep up with the current times, trends, and wants of the 21st century. 

Works Cited 

Blinder, Alan. “Will Your Job Be Exported?” Writing in the Disciplines.  Eds. Laurence Behrens 

and Arthur Rosen, Boston. 2011. 8-13. Print. 

Friedman, Thomas. “The Untouchables.” Writing in the Disciplines.  Eds. Laurence Behrens and Arthur Rosen, Boston. 2011. 169-172. Print. 

Judy, Richard & Carol D’Amico. “Work and Workers in the Twenty-First Century.” Writing in the Disciplines.  Eds. Laurence Behrens and Arthur Rosen, Boston. 2011. 163-168. Print. 

Peters, Tom. “I Feel So Damn Lucky.” Writing in the Disciplines.  Eds. Laurence Behrens and 

Arthur Rosen, Boston. 2011. 160-163. Print. 

Sennett, Richard. “No Long Term: New Work and the Corrosion of Character.” Writing in the Disciplines.  Eds. Laurence Behrens and Arthur Rosen, Boston. 2011. 150-159. Print.