📘 Part 3: Employment and job-related issues

This episode's vocabulary

Specialist knowledge (noun phrase) – advanced or specific understanding of a subject, usually gained through training or education.

Coursework (noun) – work (such as assignments or projects) done by students as part of a course.

Manual labour (noun) – physical work done by people, especially with their hands.

Poorly paid (adjective phrase) – not earning much money for the work done.

Mental labour (noun) – work that involves thinking and decision-making rather than physical effort.

Dexterous (adjective) – able to do tasks skillfully, especially with your hands.

Fall back on (something) (phrasal verb) – to use something when the main plan fails or is not available.

Strenuous (adjective) – requiring a lot of effort or energy.

Be-all and end-all (idiom) – the most important thing, or the only thing that matters.

Put (someone) out of a job (phrase) – to cause someone to lose their job, often due to technology or company changes.

Grasp the basics (verb phrase) – to understand the fundamental or essential parts of something.

Relative to (prepositional phrase) – compared with something else.

Progression (noun) – gradual development or advancement over time.

Logistical (adjective) – related to planning and managing how things are done or moved.

Union dues (noun) – money that workers pay regularly to be members of a labor union.

Training requirements (noun phrase) – the skills or knowledge needed to be learned for a specific job or task.

Desperate (adjective) – having an urgent need or desire for something, often because of difficult circumstances.

Socio-economic status (noun phrase) – a person’s social and financial position in society.

Responsibilities (noun) – tasks or duties that someone is expected or required to do.

Breakthrough (noun) – a sudden, important discovery or development that helps solve a problem or improve a situation.

Questions and Answers

Maria: What jobs are hard to do?

Rory: Well, that could be almost any job if you don't understand what you need to do. I suppose the most difficult would be those requiring some sort of specialist knowledge or training, like being a scuba diving instructor or a data analyst. Those require years of training to master. And I suppose at least some sort of coursework to help you grasp the basics.

Maria: Who should be paid more?

Rory: Well, I imagine everybody thinks they should be paid more. But ideally, the people who are paid the least, even though they do a great deal of work. So people like classroom assistants or manual labourers, I don't think they get a lot relative to other people. And I don't think they're particularly easy professions either. So why they're so poorly paid escapes me.

Maria: And what's the difference between payment for mental work and that for physical work?

Rory: Well, on the surface of it, it seems like the wages for mental labour are higher. And of course, by contrast, manual labour would not be rewarded as much. But I don't think that's actually true when you think about it, to be honest, because in my country, for example, people that have a trade, like a plumber or a joiner, make a lot more money, or the equivalent amount as a teacher, provided they're suitably skilled. So I don't think there's actually a difference, to be honest. I know the question is about what the difference is, but I don't think it exists.

Maria: And do you think that physical workers can receive higher salaries in the future?

Rory: Well, that's a very good question. If the progression in robotics technology is not as fast as we would like it to be, then they will probably be paid more because human beings will be more capable of doing things than machines. So the fine motor skills that we have are extremely difficult to replicate in machines at the moment. However, if we have some sort of scientific breakthrough that allows this to happen and machines become more dexterous, then I don't think they will. I think they'll be paid a lot less because their labour will no longer be required. So they will need to have some other skill to fall back on.

Maria: How important is giving training to employees?

Rory: Well that will probably depend on the sector of the economy they work in and what they need to do for their job. So if it's something like just picking fruit, then I can't imagine the training requirements are too strenuous. But if it's organising the entire crop harvest, that probably takes a great deal of skill and training or a great deal more than just picking the stuff up.

Maria: Is salary the most important factor when choosing a job?

Rory: Well that depends on how desperate you are for money. For people in lower economically developed countries or of low socio-economic status, then I can certainly see it being a priority. But that's not the be-all and end-all. Some people already live comfortably and can do what they like, so choice might be more important. Freedom of action might play a bigger role in their decision-making.

Maria: Do you think machines could replace human workers in the future?

Rory: Well, yes, because they already do. And that trend shows no sign of reversal, short of some sort of huge environmental catastrophe which I can't even imagine right now. It seems like that's going to continue into the future as machines take on more and more responsibilities because they're more capable and they don't require things like workers' rights or a union to protect them, which requires union dues. So why would you pay for those things if you don't have to from the perspective of a company?

Maria: And how have robots and computers changed the way people work?

Rory: Well, in some ways they've made life easier because, for example, rather than having a whole department to animate a film, you now get one computer to do it or one person with a computer to organise that. And so from a logistical and organisational perspective, then it's become much easier. But of course, that's from the company's perspective. From the perspective of the workers, it's made life more difficult because they now have to get jobs that are different from the ones they prepared for, or they've been put out of a job by these changes in technology or these developments in technology.

Discussion

Maria: So, Rory, what's the difference between the words work and a job? And what are typical mistakes?

Rory: If we talk about employment, then work is uncountable, but jobs are countable. So work is like the action that you do, but the job is the profession that you have.

Maria: So you say that people have a lot of work and physical jobs are more difficult. So you can't say people have works.

Rory: Well, people do have works, but not in that sense. A work, in the countable sense, is something that you create. So we talk about a work of art or public works, like public infrastructure. This is why it's important to get this right, because there's a difference in meaning between these two things, and you can confuse people if you're not talking about the right thing. And Maria's looking confused now. So this is why it's important.

Maria: Yeah, but usually we say kind of like people do a lot of work. So like, not people do a work, people do a job, people do work.

Rory: You can do good works. That's a religious thing though, or it's a very formal way of describing charity work.

Maria: Yeah, but Rory, like usually, come on, usually, usually…

Rory: I know, but I'm explaining why this is important because there are other meanings attached to this idea of work. It's not just about employment. It's also about a whole load of other things. So this is why we need to get this right for our higher scores.

Maria: So you can say that the most difficult jobs would be the ones which require a lot of specialist knowledge and training. So jobs which require specialist knowledge, specific knowledge, and jobs which require specific training. And then you can give an example. For example, a scuba diver instructor or a psychotherapist, a data analyst.

Rory: Don't ask me where those examples came from. I think it's because I used to do scuba diving.

Maria: And these jobs require years of training to master this. So we master skills. We master a profession. And those people who teach other people to do something also are quite hard to do, right? So like coaches, instructors, trainers. So they help people grasp the basics of a skill. So when people understand the basic knowledge of diving, for example. Some jobs should be paid more. So again, we use jobs. Or I can say some work should be paid more. And you can say that lawyers should be paid more, doctors. And some people are paid the least. So they are paid the smallest amount of money. And people who do a great deal of work, so a lot of work, should be paid more. And then you can give an example, right? So like a classroom assistant, teachers, manual labourers. So manual is something you do by hand. And labourers, we mean workers. So people who work with their hands, manual workers or manual labourers. A person who does unskilled work. So physical work, for example, a farm labourer. Okay, so we're talking about unskilled work. And also you can talk about trades. People have a trade. So a trade is something like plumbing. A trade is like an unskilled thing.

Rory: Oh no, a trade is a very skilled thing. You have to be trained to be a plumber or a good one anyway. I think the requirements for it are different for being in university though.

Maria: Yeah, do you need a degree to be a plumber? That's what I mean.

Rory: Well, that's a good point. You might not need a degree, but you may need some sort of qualification or certification. That will depend on the country.

Maria: Yeah, sure. So a trade is a job, especially one that needs a special skill and involves working with your hands. So usually like a carpenter who works with wood or a plumber who fixes your toilet. But usually, they don't have to go to university. Normally…

Rory: I'm not so sure about that. I think you can be a master plumber as well. I'm not sure how these things work though. I am very unfamiliar with tradespeople and what they do. Thank you to anyone who is a plumber out there listening to us.

Maria: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you can say that people with trades, like plumbers, carpenters, and who else?

Rory: Joiners, which is what carpenters are called now, at least in my opinion.

Maria: Okay, so a joiner is a carpenter. Woodworker, joiner.

Rory: Yeah. Plasterers, they plaster your walls. Oh my. There are so many different kinds. I think plumbers and electricians are the most commonly used ones.

Maria: Rory, you said something about the machines, like machines and robots have become more. And then you said something destructors, dextrous?

Rory: Oh, dextrous.

Maria: Dextrous. Yeah. D-E-X-T-E-R-O-U-S, dextrous. So having the ability to perform a difficult action quickly and skillfully with the hands.

Rory: Usually with the hands.

Maria: So we mean with hands. Yeah, so a dextrous movement is a movement with your hands.

Rory: Well, if you're very dextrous, you could use your feet or your toes.

Maria: Feet as well? Okay!

Rory: Well, it says especially with the hands. Now I'm looking at it in the dictionary and it occurs to me that there are people that learn to do things with their feet when they lose their hands too.

Maria: So, for example, he's a dextrous surgeon. So he performs operations. He works with his hands and people who work with cars, who fix cars. So they do different repairs. So they are practical and dextrous.

Rory: Well, if you're good at typing, you could be quite dextrous.

Maria: Robots, machines have become more dextrous.

Rory: Yes! Well, they have. They're more capable of doing these fine, small movements accurately. Not as well as a human being, though. I don't think you can get… Well, no, can you get a robot to do good handwriting? I don't know.

Maria: ChatGPT is your robot. No, handwriting, though. Interesting.

Rory: There was an invention in the 18th century. It was very complex. And this guy designed it so that it would write a letter. And that's quite cool. But I don't know what possible use that would have had at the time. I think it was just to show that it could be done.

Rory: We talk about employees or workers. They should be trained. So the company usually provides special training to their employees. So they train them up. And this depends on a job. You can give an example. If it's about picking fruit, we pick fruit, we collect fruit. There are apple trees, and you go about collecting apples. Yum, yum, yum. So perhaps this doesn't require special training, right? But organising a crop harvest, so organising all this event of collecting apples from all apple trees, could take a great deal of training and skill. Yeah? So you should be trained to organise lots of people, to organise all the processes, where to put the apples. So that requires a lot of training and skill. Salary could be the most important factor in choosing a job. Or may not be the most important factor. Rory, tell us, what synonyms could we say? Salary or...

Rory: Oh, God. Wages, perhaps? Although wages tend to be paid more regularly than the salary. A salary is monthly or yearly. Wages tend to be daily or weekly. But that's not always the case. They're used to discuss things in different ways. We can also talk about remuneration, even though I don't like that word at all.

Maria: Yeah, listen. So a salary is a salary, okay? So money or salary. So you can say that for people in lower economically developed countries, salary is a priority. So the most important factor is a priority. So, number one.

Rory: It might be. I said I could see why or I can see why. I don't like to say it's the only thing, because, of course, that implies that poor people only care about money. And I don't think that's true. I think they care about other things too.

Maria: And poorer countries could be called economically... lower economically developed countries. So countries which are not economically developed.

Rory: So that's important to point out. People might be tempted to say poor countries, but that implies that they don't have anything. But they might have a great culture, for example, and they might contribute in that way instead. So this idea of being poor is usually connected with the idea of being worthless, which I think we can agree we shouldn't say about entire countries.

Maria: If I say there is no sign of reversal, what does it mean?

Rory: It just means things aren't likely to return to how they were or to go backwards to a different previous state. So if something returns to how it was, that would be it going back to, well, the state of affairs before. So let's think about this. Sometimes parts of towns and cities are abandoned. So it returns to wilderness, which means the trees and plants come back and take over.

Maria: Reversal, dear listener, is C2 level. Proficiency, Band-9 word!

Rory: Yaaaaas!

Maria: So reversal is the act of changing or making something change to its opposite. For example, I want a reversal of this decision. So I want the decision to be opposite. For example, a decision was made so that all the employees go back to the office. They should work offline. No, I want a reversal of the decision. I want everybody to stay at home, to work from home. So I want a reversal. And with robots, with chatGPT, so now robots do some work instead of people, there is no reversal. We can't go back to our life without the internet and chatGPT.

Rory: Well, we could. I mean, there could be some disaster that destroys the internet, but I don't think that that's very likely.

Maria: No, yeah, unlikely. Machines or robots take on more responsibilities. So take on. So machines, robots could take on a lot of work, could take on, could do, complete, deal with a lot of responsibilities. Rory, I think the episode is long enough, so we can skip the vocabulary show.

Rory: Absolutely. I think we've talked a lot about a lot of great vocabulary for work, and you'll get a chance to use it later. I think after we release this episode, I'll put something out on Telegram asking people to use this vocabulary to describe their ideal job.

Maria: Thank you very much for listening, and we'll get back to you in our next episode. Bye!

Rory: Bye!

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