Help wanted

S ome technological changes affect our lives directly while others do not. Make two lists: firstly, of inventions and new products from the last few years which have saved time in your household, and, secondly, of technological inventions which have led to people losing their jobs. The following article from the Time magazine looks at some of the technological developments that have affected the general organization of our economy.

As Winston Churchill once said, the news from France is very bad. So is the news from Germany, Italy, Britain, Spain and North America. Almost everywhere in the industrialized world, unemployment is rising or is stuck at levels – an average 9.5% in Western Europe - that would have been considered intolerable a generation ago. Even in Japan the iron rice bowl of lifetime employment shows signs of corrosion.

The problem is not just stagnant econo­mies. Whole industries, such as European coal mining, appear headed for extinc­tion. The end of the cold war has resulted in defense plants winding down: by 1995 the U.S. alone will lose half a million jobs in the armed forces and twice as many in defense industries. But above all, the deve­loped countries are undergoing a period of change as traumatic as the Industrial Re­volution itself. New production and infor­mation technologies are transforming factories and offices - and in both cases it means doing more with fewer people. The cruel world of global competition forces companies everywhere to seek ways to chop their head counts.

The old-fashioned mass-production line is disappearing, and with it the kind of factory jobs that have existed for a hun­dred years. In the U.S. the 500 biggest in­dustrial companies shed 3.4 million em­ployees during the '80s; West European companies like Philips and Daimler-Benz are also slashing tens of thousands of jobs. White collars are following blue ones out the gate. Companies are at last waking up to what computers can do, thanks to a new generation of top managers who can actually operate them. Clerical paperwork is going; so are middle-management jobs supervising lower echelons and reporting to higher ones.

So is the employment outlook utterly bleak? Not at all. Never mind that even today, newspapers bulge with job offers. Partly this reflects the mismatch always found in labour markets, but even sluggish economies constantly create jobs. While big U.S. industrial companies were cutting all those jobs, small firms were adding 13 million new ones. For example, at growth rates of only 2% a year, the U.S. economy should generate 2 million additional jobs an­nually through the '90s. Service jobs will dominate, but industry will need a new kind of worker, able to think for him - or her - self and be part of a team handling tasks on its own initiative.

An American study that is probably valid for other advanced countries suggests that the people most in demand will be tech­nicians, engineers, computer scientists, systems analysts, nurses, physiotherapists and radiologists, most of whom will require computer fluency and competence in math. Sales and service employment will also grow in large numbers, along with more menial jobs like janitor and waiter.

What is striking about this list is that it splits into a top group of relatively skilled jobs and a bottom layer of low-skilled ones. Welcome to the new two-tier world of employment, in which high pay for low skills is a thing of the past and there is not much middle ground between reprogramming robots and flipping hamburgers. With most advanced countries needing to integrate immigrants, the availability of low-skilled service jobs may be welcome, but for those job seekers who hope to earn good money, the advice must be: Get on your bike, but get a solid education and salable skills first.

By Robert Ball

Task 5. Answer the questions on the text “Help wanted”.

1. What does Robert Ball see as being the main problem facing modern western economies, and what development does he believe is responsible for this?

2. Provide examples of industries that are winding down.

3. Explain the following metaphor used by the author: ‘the cruel world of global competition’.

4. Is the employment outlook utterly bleak?

5. What outlook is offered by the author of the article? How might it affect you?

6. What skills should a new type of worker possess?

Task 6. Turn back to the chart in Task 1. Is it worth interchanging some of your ideas with the ideas from the texts?

Task 7. Comment on the quotation using the ideas from the two texts:

People who work sitting down get paid more than people who work standing up. ~Ogden Nash

Task 8. Flick through the texts “Recent changes in the world of work” and “Help wanted” and find as many English equivalents for the Russian expressions as you can:

• застойная экономика;

• развитые страны;

• увольнять/сокращать штат.

Task 9. Complete the sentences with a word or a phrase from active vocabulary units of the texts “Recent changes in the world of work” and “Help wanted”.

1. Sheila works in a chemical factory. She has to wear a special uniform and a mask to avoid chemical poisoning. Her job is quite ............................... .

2. ............................... changes are needed if environmental catastrophe is to be avoided.

3. The company is fortunate to have such highly ............................... workers.

4. Prices have rocketed! There has been a ............................... increase in prices.

5. If you want to master your profession, you need to learn something new every day. This can be called ............................... .

6. My grandma will never learn how to use a computer because she finds it rather hard to do. She says modern technology is very ............................... .

7. An employee who can be on-line with his or her employer, eliminating the need to work in an office, can be called a ............................... .

8. Wearing short skirts was considered ............................... a century ago.

9. Jack is always snowed under at work because he can never decide the order in which to perform tasks. He should ............................... hours.

10. The belugas of the St Lawrence may now number only 400, and their population is shrinking year by year. They are certainly heading ............................... .

11. In this cruel world of ............................... one has to try hard to earn their bread in the marketplace.

12. In times of an economic crisis it’s almost impossible to find a lucrative job. So, the employment outlook is ............................... .

13. There are dozens of classified ads printed in the evening edition of this newspaper. The newspaper ............................... with advertisements.

Task 10. Insert the right preposition.

1. The Second Industrial Revolution was sparked ___ ___ the invention of electricity.

2. Modern technology is increasingly used ___ the workplace.

3. If you choose the career of a designer, it will let you make use ___ your creativity.

4. Poor ecology usually results ___ people losing their health.

5. Students will gain competence ___ a wide range of skills.

6. I shouldn’t have followed my friends’ advice. Next time I’ll think ___ myself.

Task 11. Paraphrase the underlined items in the texts “Recent changes in the world of work” and “Help wanted” and make up 7 fresh context sentences with the ones you like most.

Task 12. With the texts closed, recall the relevant ideas and continue the sentences:

1. Fundamental changes … .

2. With the spread of information technology … .

3. This revolution was sparked off by … .

4. This revolution made it possible to … .

5. All this resulted in (the fact that) … .

6. To land a job, a person now has to possess certain skills and qualities such as … .

7. A new type of worker will also require … .

8. So, in the cruel world of global competition … .

9. That’s why before getting on your bike, … .

10. Another important idea mentioned in the texts is that with information technology getting more sophisticated and widespread, … .

11. Due to this fact, a new type of worker is becoming very popular now: he is a long-distance worker, who … .

12. The advantage of this work is the ability to … , while the disadvantage is that … .

13. Finally, the author highlights another fact that heavy industry and a lot of manufacturing … .

14. This division of labour has resulted in … .

Task 13. Complete the charts below.

In the first chart, you are to collect similar ideas from both texts. Copy the chart into your copybook and fill it in by writing sentences containing similar ideas.

Similar ideas
Recent Changes in the World of Work	Help Wanted
1. …	1. …
2. …	2. …

In the second chart, list all other ideas introduced in the articles.

Other ideas
Recent Changes in the World of Work	Help Wanted
1. …	1. …
2. …	2. …

Task 14. Write a summary of the texts “Recent changes in the world of work” and “Help wanted”.

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