Help Wanted: Why That Sign's Bad

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IBM (IBM) is feeling the skills mismatch problem as it changes its focus to services and data analysis. On Apr. 28, Big Blue announced that it plans to add 4,000 specialists in what it calls "analytics." It hopes to get as many as possible by retraining, using some of its $1 billion-a-year training budget. Consultants who install software might learn to help companies spot patterns in their data to improve efficiency. But IBM is still laying off thousands of people who have no place in the new company. "It's really easy to find people that are 50% of what you are looking for," says Jim Spohrer, director of university programs at IBM. "It's really hard to find people that are 90% of what you are looking for. This is a real dilemma."

DESCENDING THE ECONOMIC LADDER

Good help can be hard to find at the bottom of the pay scale, too. In Maryland's Dorchester County, where the jobless rate is 11.5%, crab processors are trying to fill 300 jobs that pay $6.71 to $14 an hour depending on how quickly people can pick meat from crab shells. Most of the work is done by Mexican women on temporary work visas. Crab companies held a job fair in early April, but only two locals applied. "People don't want to go back down the economic ladder," says Bill Sieling, executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Seafood Industries Assn.

Does the persistence of job openings coupled with high unemployment mean that the U.S. is at risk of becoming like the Europe of the recent past, with its rigid labor markets? Could be. Obama's stimulus package improves U.S. jobless benefits, which while justifiable on humanitarian grounds do make workers less eager to jump at the first job offer. The housing crash has increased immobility. And the sheer length of this recession is making jobless Americans rustier and less employable, says economist Laurence M. Ball of Johns Hopkins University. To fight this sclerosis, the White House is using $3.5 billion of the stimulus for training, while boosting support for community colleges. Classes for factory workers seeking entry-level health-care careers have shown some success.

The truth is, displaced workers may have to move down a few rungs as they switch careers because their skills are irrelevant in their new roles, says David H. Autor, a labor economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Many laid-off Wall Street financial engineers still haven't absorbed that, says Fred Wilson, a partner in Union Square Ventures, a New York venture capital firm. "For them to take a job that pays a lot less, they have to make a meaningful change in their lifestyle. And that is an issue."

Employers need to bend as well, recognizing that the candidates they're seeking may not exist. Mark Mehler, co-founder of CareerXRoads, a staffing strategy consulting firm in Kendall Park, N.J., tells employers: "You're hiring potential....You've got to train them."

A mismatch of work and workers is never a good thing. But smart policy—combined with realism on the part of employers and job seekers—can minimize the disruption.

With Moira Herbst, Spencer E. Ante, Nanette Byrnes, Michelle Conlin, and Jena McGregor

Coy is BusinessWeek's Economics editor.

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