It's almost an axiom, in many foreign work forces, that J'cans have a reputation, with their extended families, to seem to be working all the time in a flux of activities. Who knows if conservative, religious values have something to do with these habits of wanting to get ahead despite adversities.

So when the 2013-2014 Global Competitive Report comes out stating that besides corruption, tax rates & access to financing, "the poor work ethic of the national labour force are also affecting the country’s competitiveness", do we need to scratch our heads and wonder why?

Is there something in the nature of many of J'cans, blithely looking to prove themselves in more competitive labour markets abroad, as spoofed in the now defunct show In Living Colour:

The Headley Family: Hey Mon Airlines
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jpu5_3qk4KM&feature=related

Gleaner Link: Jamaica's Competitive Rankings
http://jamaica-gleaner.com/latest/article.php?id=47775

Hilarious!

The Jamaicans who migrate have the drive to get ahead, and are willing to work hard for what they want. Most of the ones who remain are not willing to put out much effort but expect to be paid for doing little, and expect hand-outs from their migrant relatives. Another factor is that the money abroad has value, while ours has very little purchasing power, so maybe we shouldn't blame them.

Looking at the world as a whole it would seem that countries that have hot weather year round tend not to have much in the way of thriving economies. With the exception of a few as in the case of India or Israel.The constant heat seems to slow people down while the winter seems to have the opposite effect,plus when you have four seasons as we do here in new England you have a four seasons economy instead of just a one season economy and that really expand your economy over time which have a positive impact on every aspect your life from your financial well being to the kind of life style you can live and that will affect every level of the economy.

Archie & distraction...Local Laziness Quotients (Lack of "Productivity": manual & technologically advanced) & Climate Rationale as factors in Jamaican's work ethic?...Hmmm!

Let's, for the sake of humanity, abstract out some of the mythology and profiling about work habits in a neutrally examined zone:
Europe-the so-called industrious Northern (more Teutonic counties like Germany) and the more laid-back, "lazier", hotter South (notably Greece).

The truth, as likely for the Jamaican work force, local & migrant, is a bit fuzzier:

Europe is a mess because Germans work hard and Greeks are shiftless. False!
Certainly it’s difficult to visit Germany without being impressed by the efficiency and orderliness of German society. And any visit to Spain or Italy or Greece suggests there is something frustratingly lackadaisical about the Mediterranean work ethic.

But stereotypes are tricky. Human beings are primed to see evidence that confirms our pre-existing patterns of belief. Germany is richer than Italy, and German politicians currently hold the whip hand in internal political deliberations. Blaming the whole mess on the comparative torpor of Latins places a convenient moral framework around complicated economic questions, and affirms prior beliefs about who does and doesn’t work hard.

But the data don’t support it.
It’s true that Germans and Greeks work very different amounts, but not in the way you expect. According to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, the average German worker put in 1,429 hours on the job in 2008. The average Greek worker put in 2,120 hours. In Spain, the average worker puts in 1,647 hours. In Italy, 1,802. The Dutch, by contrast, outdo even their Teutonic brethren in laziness, working a staggeringly low 1,389 hours per year.

The truth is that countries aren’t rich because their people work hard.
When people are poor, that’s when they work hard.
Platitudes aside, it takes considerably more “effort” to be a rice farmer or to move sofas for a living than to be a New York Times columnist. It’s true that all else being equal a person can often raise his income by raising his work rate, but it’s completely backward to suggest that extraordinary feats of effort are the way individuals or countries get to the top of the ladder.
On the national level the reverse happens—the richer Germans get, the less they work.

Closer to the mark is the observation that Germans (like the Dutch and the Austrians) are thrifty, net savers who consume less than they produce and therefore export more than they import.

Read More in Slate:
www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2011/12/european_financial_crisis_is_eu rope_a_mess_because_germans_work_hard_and_greeks_are_lazy_.html

Are Greeks the hardest workers in Europe?
"The Greek labour market is composed of a large number of people who are self-employed, meaning farmers and - on the other hand - shop-keepers who are working long hours."

Self-employed workers tend to work more than those who have specified hours in an employment contract.
The second reason...is the different number of part-time workers in each country.
"In Germany, the share of employees working part-time is quite high. This represents something like one in four"...

As these annual hours figures are for all workers, the large proportion who work part-time in Germany is bringing down the overall average. In Greece, far fewer people work part-time.
So, because the two labour markets are structured differently, it is actually hard to compare like with like.
If you account for these factors by stripping away part-time and self-employed people and look only at full-time salaried workers, the Greeks are still working almost 10% more hours than the Germans.
This is because the Germans take more holiday, sickness leave and maternity leave - on average four weeks more than the Greeks.

On the basis...of Gross Domestic Product, i.e., a country's entire production, divided by the number of workers...the average German worker is more productive than the average Greek.

Germany ranks as the eighth most productive country by worker out of the OECD countries - or the seventh out of the European countries - while Greece comes in at 24th...this is mainly because Germany has a very efficient manufacturing sector.
And while a smaller proportion of Germans work in agriculture, here too they are more efficient - partly because "technology is more widespread..."

BBC Link:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17155304?print=true

When it comes to work it is all about working "smarter" not "harder" and that is what the Germans do as good as any nation that has ever existed.Of course each country on each continent tells it,s own story.There is usually a multitude of reasons not just a single one when dealing with issues as complex as this,not the least of which is the size of the population,but that is usually a big one.Just from casual observation the cold whether "seems" to drive people or nations closer whereas the heat seems to have the opposite effect.As the saying goes "necessity is the mother of invention" or something to that effect.In the winter for the most part people stay inside somewhere and study,when the whether is hot people tend to be more casual about everything especially work!

The number of hours worked obviously is not the point, but rather the quality of the output, i.e. the productivity of the worker. Tools of course are important and impact productivity, which would explain the fewer number of hours worked by the Germans with higher productivity than their European brethren. Many Jamaicans view their employers as slave masters and tend not to give of their best, and actually think nothing of robbing them.

distraction...With all the structural changes rapidly occurring in modernizing economies, how long will the cliché, working "smarter" not "harder", be an effective strategy for those prepared workers seeking employment? Do you not believe the trend of corporate human intelligence creating artificial intelligence to replace workers in many jobs, which were considered "skilled" and specific, is presently operative?

IBM's Watson computer beating the best human competitors at chess & the Jeopardy game show are not anomalies in predicting the capabilities of smart robots. Even in "white collar" law offices, millions of boxes of "discovery" data are being pored over by robotic devices substituting for untold number of worker-hours. The nursing and medical fields have also been similarly revolutionized in the delivery of services. Manufacturing has been so "smartly" roboticized (physical & software) that, in many sectors, high wage economies have been able to downsize their work forces to be competitive with lower-wage "assembling" countries.

CBS: Are Robots Hurting Job Growth?
www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2lDmF8ZShI

Here in Jamaica, "experts" are predicting that "nearly half of the more than 40,000 young people who graduate high schools and universities this year may not find employment in the private sector".

The gloomy outlook comes weeks after the Statistical Institute of Jamaica (STATIN) reported that the country's unemployment rate rose to 16.3 per cent in April this year, a two percentage-point climb when compared to the corresponding period last year.
..equating to over 200,000 people unemployed. It is estimated that of the 1.1 million with jobs, nearly half are "underemployed or marginally so, lots frustrated, having given up in ever finding jobs to match their talents & stamina.

STATIN's figures also showed that unemployment among young people between the ages of 14 and 24 years old rose to 38.5 per cent in April this year, a 4.1 percentage-point increase from last April.

Gleaner: No Jobs For Grads... 20,000 Youths Leaving School Won't Find Employment
http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20130903/lead/lead1.html

ONLY TWO per cent of persons who signed up to the Jamaica Employ programme has landed interviews, and it is unclear how many have landed jobs.

"As it stands presently, people need to look globally. We are no longer an insulated country. We are part of a global village in a global market place. We need to look everywhere on the globe. What is not available in Jamaica may be available somewhere else..."--Labour Minister Derrick Kellier

Are we not to assume that the majority of those Jamaicans, who studied diligently & prepared themselves in high school and university, for a life of meaningful employment were expecting, in a future competitive environment, to work both hard and smart to retain those few precious jobs?

Gleaner: Job Letdown - Jamaica Employ Fails To Deliver
http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20130905/lead/lead1.html


Once a Classical Ideal of Education, but less so in an Anxious Age, when "monetizing" one's activities/niches are so prime:

I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain.
John Adams (US diplomat & politician & 2nd US President (1735 - 1826)

Distraction
You have got to be joking !!
ONE LOVE !!
Mike

One love MikeyMike,"keeping it real" 'cause that is just how I feel!