Americans Are No Longer on the Move... Michael Barone

[mystery-ak]

Americans Are No Longer on the Move
Michael Barone
12/30/2016 12:01:00 AM - Michael Barone

Americans see themselves as people on the move. When the going gets tough or when opportunity beckons, we get up and go. We move around a lot.

Actually, we don't -- or don't nearly so much as we used to. The percentage of Americans moving every year is less than half that of a half-century ago and down significantly since the early 1990s.

Some of that decline is a response to the economic cycle. Contrary to widespread impression, mobility tends to decline in bad economic times. The Okies moving from the Dust Bowl to the Central Valley of California made a big impression in the 1930s because they were the exception, not the rule. Most Americans stayed put and ate vegetables raised in their gardens or window boxes, making do as best they could.

more
http://townhall.com/columnists/michaelbarone/2016/12/30/americans-are-no-longer-on-the-move-n2264638

[jmyrlefuller]

They often can't obtain jobs in growth areas because of occupational licensing laws

This explains more of it than anything. Pretty much any job that pays a decent wage these days has prerequisites that no common person can expect to have, and even if they go back to get them, by the time they do, the job's long gone to someone else, and in its place is another job with totally incompatible requirements.

This is the problem facing America: a manufactured "skills gap" that keeps most common Americans out of good careers.

[skeeter]

In keeping with his dogma on immigration, Barone totally ignores the effect on the salaries and work opportunities for average Americans of virtually unrestricted immigration, including the estimated 750,000 H1bs currently living and working here.