I was watching Chris Matthews yesterday (I don’t really like him or his show, but I keep watching it. Do you have a show like that, one you don’t even like yet you still keep going back to it, maybe in hopes that it will get better, but it never does? Anyway….) and he said something that needs to be said more:

‘Why can’t we get Americans to do these jobs?’

No, he was not referring to the manufacturing jobs that are being exported to other lands. No, he is not referring to menial labor gigs that immigrants are sucking up at a rate extremely dramatized by the current regime.

He is referring to engineering and tech jobs that are being filled by people from China, India, Japan, etc.

This comment was more of an aside, the main issue was about the travel ban and how it has affected the tech industry. But I think this is a more interesting, and deeper, issue to discuss.

When politicians keep promising job growth and bringing back jobs that have been shipped out or phased out due to technology, there is this idea that there are literally no ‘good’ jobs in America.

Well, there are. And they all involve math and science.

So why aren’t Americans filling those jobs? Well, it is NOT because the Chinese, Indians, etc are taking lower wages. Oh no, these gigs are 6 digits plus. It is NOT because the establishment wants to hire people of an international flavor. Quite the opposite in fact; employers crave for native speakers. So….why?

Because we in this country think this person is a reasonable head of education:

Oops, sorry. I mean her:

Now I don’t have time to outline all the issues with Skeletor….errrr… Ms Devos. But here are but a few:

• During her lobbying in Michigan for more charter schools, 38% of said charter schools tested ‘well below average’ nationally and over 50% were ‘below average. And Michigan (much like Arizona) set up these charters to do better! They did not have to let in non-native speakers, or mentally handicapped kids, or even kids they don’t want. Yet still these schools are failing, except for the few elite schools that are testing through the roof. But guess what? Not every gets to go there.

• She has publicly said she wants to privatize schools to ‘advance God’s kingdom’. I assume she is not referring to Allah or Buddha. Regardless of the whole separation between church and state thing, this drifts farther from the advancement of science and reason and closer to religious dogma that will retard the scientific progress of this country

• She knows ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about education and government laws that bind it. NOTHING! So even if you are a pro-privatization person, is she really the one to artfully advance your cause?

There are more…..far more…and I can talk a blue streak about it. But I’ll cut if off here.

The reality is that there are plenty of jobs in our country, it is just we do not value the content or methods needed to be qualified for said job. How many times have you heard people joke about not being good at math? Now, how many times have you heard people joke about not being good at reading? One is socially acceptable (maybe even desired) and the other makes you look like an idiot. Until our societal outlook on math, science, and education as a whole are extremely vetted, we will still have mouth-breathers complaining about the lack of jobs that don’t require them to use their brain.