You fool yourself thinking there isn't any capitalism involved, even 
socialist Countries are capitalist, because the monetary system they run 
under it is based in profit making, but in the end that pulls harder 
than anything unless people actually get what they expect from a living 
they will go with the profit making and whatever practice they need to 
get into to get the money the want, unless you don't want to go to 
prison or get dirty, the latter not common.

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On 24/09/2014 12:24, Thomas de Groot wrote:
> On 24-9-2014 10:43, andrel wrote:

>> I am 50+. Which indeed means that I have to become a freelancer or have
>> to find a job in management and not be productive myself anymore.
>>
>

Being a freelancer is not too bad if you can find the work and don't 
mind travelling. Having the language skills you do opens lots of doors.

I really sympathise if you have to go into management. I miss working 
with my hands and for years I travelled with a small toolkit in case I 
had to fix something. :-)

> Yes, I believe that sums up the situation indeed. Americans would
> probably call this a new opportunities situation (and they are not
> wrong) but in Europe we have a different approach to this, especially
> the older generations. We always believed more in stable job continuity
> and job protection.
>

That is mainland Europe. In Britain it has been like that for decades. 
And we are worse off for it.
No wonder the Iraqis called America and Britain, Satan and little Satan 
one follows the other.

-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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I am not fooling myself and I never said there was no capitalism 
involved. I said that the issue was how a government can spend tax 
money. That has some intervention by market forces (here probably less 
than in your country) but that is irrelevant. The point simply is that 
no matter for what reason the amount of money is still finite.
I am a victim of mismanagement and lack of foresight by politicians not 
of a capitalist intervention. Believe me, I do know my country much 
better than you do.
Please stop trying to force a complex situation in your limited 
framework, it really is annoying.


On 24-9-2014 14:34, Saul Luizaga wrote:
> You fool yourself thinking there isn't any capitalism involved, even
> socialist Countries are capitalist, because the monetary system they run
> under it is based in profit making, but in the end that pulls harder
> than anything unless people actually get what they expect from a living
> they will go with the profit making and whatever practice they need to
> get into to get the money the want, unless you don't want to go to
> prison or get dirty, the latter not common.


-- 
Everytime the IT department forbids something that a researcher deems
necessary for her work there will be another hole in the firewall.

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On 24-9-2014 14:39, Stephen wrote:
> On 24/09/2014 12:24, Thomas de Groot wrote:
>> On 24-9-2014 10:43, andrel wrote:
>
>>> I am 50+. Which indeed means that I have to become a freelancer or have
>>> to find a job in management and not be productive myself anymore.
>>>
>>
>
> Being a freelancer is not too bad if you can find the work and don't
> mind travelling.

I am trying to find jobs as freelancer indeed. I do hate travelling, but 
if I have to I do not complain.

> Having the language skills you do opens lots of doors.

I do speak Dutch and English, I understand German but always get the 
genders wrong. French is not so good, my Spanish worse, but improving. 
Then I do speak C, Matlab, and a bit of Java, Python, Javascript and I 
used to be able program in e.g. Fortran and Prolog. Then there are the 
classical languages Latin and various assembly languages.
Of course I know a bit about functional languages, although I never used 
them. And I can explain why the guarded commands language of Dijkstra 
has a fundamental design flaw and why my version is better ;)

> I really sympathise if you have to go into management. I miss working
> with my hands and for years I travelled with a small toolkit in case I
> had to fix something. :-)

yes, that is what I fear most. I got into this business originally 
because I wanted to make things. Such a pity that one might have to give 
that up. Incidentally my desire to keep building things was one of the 
reasons why I accepted these temporary positions, otherwise I would have 
gone the way of the devil much earlier.

>
>> Yes, I believe that sums up the situation indeed. Americans would
>> probably call this a new opportunities situation (and they are not
>> wrong) but in Europe we have a different approach to this, especially
>> the older generations. We always believed more in stable job continuity
>> and job protection.
>>
>
> That is mainland Europe. In Britain it has been like that for decades.
> And we are worse off for it.
> No wonder the Iraqis called America and Britain, Satan and little Satan
> one follows the other.





-- 
Everytime the IT department forbids something that a researcher deems
necessary for her work there will be another hole in the firewall.

Post a reply to this message

On 24-9-2014 13:24, Thomas de Groot wrote:
> On 24-9-2014 10:43, andrel wrote:
>> On 24-9-2014 9:31, Thomas de Groot wrote:

>>> What makes me angry is that nowadays getting a job is more a question of
>>> age than of skills. +40? I am sorry my dear sir. You are an expert but
>>> your age, you know, your age...
>>
>> I am 50+. Which indeed means that I have to become a freelancer or have
>> to find a job in management and not be productive myself anymore.
>>
>
> Yes, I believe that sums up the situation indeed. Americans would
> probably call this a new opportunities situation (and they are not
> wrong) but in Europe we have a different approach to this, especially
> the older generations. We always believed more in stable job continuity
> and job protection.

My Dutch article is sort of about the Americanization of Dutch research. 
We are also getting more and more opportunistic short term research here.
For me an important factor is that I believe in good research in a 
stable group with a long experience. Stable jobs are just what makes 
long term cooperation possible.



-- 
Everytime the IT department forbids something that a researcher deems
necessary for her work there will be another hole in the firewall.

Post a reply to this message

On 24/09/2014 13:59, andrel wrote:
> On 24-9-2014 14:39, Stephen wrote:

>>
>> Being a freelancer is not too bad if you can find the work and don't
>> mind travelling.
>
> I am trying to find jobs as freelancer indeed. I do hate travelling, but
> if I have to I do not complain.
>

Best of luck with it. Getting the first one is the hardest.

>> Having the language skills you do opens lots of doors.
>
> I do speak Dutch and English, I understand German but always get the
> genders wrong.

I keep forgetting which words are Scottish and not used by the English, 
myself.

> French is not so good, my Spanish worse, but improving.
> Then I do speak C, Matlab, and a bit of Java, Python, Javascript and I
> used to be able program in e.g. Fortran and Prolog. Then there are the
> classical languages Latin and various assembly languages.

LOL



>> I really sympathise if you have to go into management. I miss working
>> with my hands and for years I travelled with a small toolkit in case I
>> had to fix something. :-)
>
> yes, that is what I fear most. I got into this business originally
> because I wanted to make things. Such a pity that one might have to give
> that up. Incidentally my desire to keep building things was one of the
> reasons why I accepted these temporary positions, otherwise I would have
> gone the way of the devil much earlier.
>

Nothing I can say here except I hope you get your hearts desire and it 
all works out for you.


-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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On 24-9-2014 15:17, andrel wrote:
> My Dutch article is sort of about the Americanization of Dutch research.
> We are also getting more and more opportunistic short term research here.
> For me an important factor is that I believe in good research in a
> stable group with a long experience. Stable jobs are just what makes
> long term cooperation possible.

Exactly my thoughts.

Thomas

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I disagree that you know your economy better than I do, I'm not writing 
about your Country. And here is why: Who benefits from the 
"mismanagement and lack of foresight by politicians"? that's probably 
done on purpose to suck up money for some rich guy as it usually 
happens, you haven't at the seems investigated that far. My frame work 
is limited but probably I'm thinking ahead of you on this.

Post a reply to this message

On 25/09/2014 09:47, Saul Luizaga wrote:
> I disagree that you know your economy better than I do, I'm not writing
> about your Country. And here is why: Who benefits from the
> "mismanagement and lack of foresight by politicians"? that's probably
> done on purpose to suck up money for some rich guy as it usually
> happens, you haven't at the seems investigated that far. My frame work
> is limited but probably I'm thinking ahead of you on this.

In principle if what I think you mean is right. I agree with you.
Are you talking about the class war/struggle?

-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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> But of course many companies have found a way around both problems.
> You see, rather than making permanent employment contracts, they make
> extremely short temporary contracts that they just renew over and over
> again for as long as the employee is hired. These temporary contracts
> are typically for periods of three to even just one month.

In the UK retail industry having contracts that are for a low or even 
zero number of hours are very common. The employer is then legally 
allowed to give you 40 hours of work every week for 6 months and then 
nothing (or only 4 hours or something).

> You see, you can't fire somebody without good reason.

The problem is (in the UK at least) that "they are not very good at 
their job and we want to replace them with someone better" is not a 
"good reason" in the eyes of the law.

> (At least these employees get all the same legal benefits as those who
> have a permanent contract, eg. in terms of holydays and legal protection.
> However, they have to live in constant fear that their employer one day
> decides not to renew.)

Typically here though for professional temporary workers they get paid 
significantly more (sometimes even double) than permanent staff. So if 
you can get yourself a "temporary" contract that an employer repeatedly 
renews you are on to a real winner. The fact that you might then be 
unemployed for 6 months after a few years work is more than offset by 
the increased salary you got during that time.

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