WHY JOBS EXIST

Highlighted lately by the National Labor Relations Board's fight against Boeing setting up a new plant in South Carolina is the fact that many people don't realize the reason jobs exist in the first place. There seems to be the misunderstanding that jobs exist for the employees. Nothing of course could be further from the truth. Jobs exist to produce profit for the business owner. Be that owner the shareholders of a Fortune 100 company or Mom & Pop's grocery on the corner. That is the sole reason that jobs exist.


You see to employers labor, or the cost of providing jobs is a necessary expense not the purpose of the exercise. As a business owner you don't hire someone so you can watch them sit in a chair and make widgets all day. You hire someone to obtain widgets so that you can sell them at a profit. That profit of course being to you what the pay check is to that widget maker.



Since by definition EVERYTHING in a business is done with the intent of creating profit, hiring someone is scrutinized the exact same way. For example these are the thoughts that run through the owner's head before he places an ad to hire a new employee: Right now we can make 100 widgets per week with 2 employees. That's 50 per employee per week. I think I can sell 150 widgets per week since the widget market is picking up and my competitor just retired. So considering that AND the facilities costs I can hire another person and give myself a raise.

You will note nowhere in there was the thought: I really should provide a job for some stranger just because it would be a nice thing to do. That is because providing jobs is not what companies are about. Providing profit is what companies are about. Now that same business owner may very well stop off at 3 charities and 2 churches after work to donate his time and profit, but when he's at work making widgets he's not thinking altruistic thoughts.  He's thinking how to maximize profit.



So the next time you hear someone whining that people aren't hiring, think about why it is people get hired in the first place, and remember that they need to find someway to make themselves profitable to an employer and they'll have no problem getting a job. But, if they try to force an employer to pay so much for their widget making labor or only make widgets in non competitive areas labor costs wise then they'll send our fictitious widget maker out of business, or out of the country. So be careful what you try to get out of your job. You don't want to price yourself such that it's cheaper to let you stay home. Because there is no good business reason not to let you do so, and considerable reason to not only allow it, but force it.