#Financial Sector Recruitment

[alliance00]

6 Easy Steps to Choose the Right Banking Recruitment Agency

Selecting the right banking recruitment agency can be a distinct advantage for both work searchers and banking foundations. The correct office can smooth out the employing system, guaranteeing that competitors with the right abilities and capabilities are coordinated with the right jobs. The following are six simple tasks to assist you with picking the best financial enlistment organization to address your issues.

1. Define Your Requirements

Before you start your advantage, it's squeezing to have a reasonable comprehension of what you really want from a banking recruitment agency. For work searchers, this recommends perceiving the sort of financial positions you're amped up for, for example, retail banking, experience banking, or cash related appraisal. For banks and monetary foundations, this integrates finishing up the particular positions you really want to fill, for example, credit specialists, consistence arranged specialists, or branch supervisors.

By framing your necessities, you can limit your rundown of expected organizations to those that have practical experience in your specific area of interest. For example, on the off chance that you're searching for significant level leaders, you could zero in on organizations with a solid history in chief hunt inside the financial area.

2. Check Their Industry Expertise

Banking is a specific field, so picking an enlistment office with profound industry knowledge is significant. Search for organizations that have a demonstrated history in banking recruitment and figure out the subtleties of different financial jobs. You can survey their aptitude by exploring their site, perusing client tributes, and requesting contextual investigations or examples of overcoming adversity.

A recruitment agency with a solid spotlight on financial will have laid out associations with industry experts and a superior handle of the abilities and capabilities expected for various jobs. This ability will be important in tracking down the right applicants or open positions.

3. Evaluate Their Recruitment Process

Understanding how an enlistment office leads its hunt and determination cycle can give you knowledge into their viability. Get some information about their way to deal with obtaining competitors, screening cycles, and how they guarantee that up-and-comers are ideal for the jobs they're filling.

For job seekers, ask about how the office coordinates your abilities and vocation objectives with accessible open doors. For bosses, it's crucial for know how the office surveys possibility to guarantee they meet your particular necessities and organizational culture.

An agency that uses a rigorous and transparent recruitment process is more likely to deliver high-quality candidates or job matches.

4. Consider Their Reputation and Reviews

Reputation speaks volumes about the effectiveness of a recruitment agency. Research online reviews, request references, and look for suggestions from associates or industry contacts. A respectable organization will have positive input from the two clients and competitors and a past filled with effective situations.

Pay attention to reviews that notice the office's correspondence, impressive skill, and capacity to comprehend client needs. These elements are significant in guaranteeing a smooth and fruitful enrollment process.

5. Assess Their Communication and Support

Effective communication is key to a successful partnership with a recruitment agency.  Assess how well the organization speaks with you during the underlying phases of commitment. Is it true that they are receptive to your requests? Do they give clear and opportune updates?

For job seekers, great help from the office remembers standard updates for requests for employment and useful criticism. For businesses, it includes straightforward correspondence about the advancement of the enrollment interaction and any difficulties experienced.

An agency that focuses on correspondence and backing is bound to give a positive and useful experience.

Conclusion

Choosing the right banking recruitment agency involves careful consideration and due diligence. By characterizing your necessities, assessing industry ability, understanding the enlistment interaction, really taking a look at notoriety and surveys, evaluating correspondence and backing, and exploring expenses and terms, you can go with an educated choice. The right agency like Alliance Recruitment Agency will assist with smoothing out your pursuit of employment or enlistment process, prompting effective results for the two up-and-comers and businesses. Carve out opportunity to follow these means, and you’ll be well on your way to finding a recruitment partner that meets your needs effectively.  Contact us now.

[hemaris]

soooooo annoying how a year ago i was like hahaaaa leaving the legal sector FOREVER & now i'm like being a public prosecutor would pay really well though 🥺🥺🥺

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Ad-tech targeting is an existential threat

I'm on a 20+ city book tour for my new novel PICKS AND SHOVELS. Catch me TORONTO on SUNDAY (Feb 23) at Another Story Books, and in NYC on WEDNESDAY (26 Feb) with JOHN HODGMAN. More tour dates here.

The commercial surveillance industry is almost totally unregulated. Data brokers, ad-tech, and everyone in between – they harvest, store, analyze, sell and rent every intimate, sensitive, potentially compromising fact about your life.

Late last year, I testified at a Consumer Finance Protection Bureau hearing about a proposed new rule to kill off data brokers, who are the lynchpin of the industry:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/16/the-second-best-time-is-now/#the-point-of-a-system-is-what-it-does

The other witnesses were fascinating – and chilling, There was a lawyer from the AARP who explained how data-brokers would let you target ads to categories like "seniors with dementia." Then there was someone from the Pentagon, discussing how anyone could do an ad-buy targeting "people enlisted in the armed forces who have gambling problems." Sure, I thought, and you don't even need these explicit categories: if you served an ad to "people 25-40 with Ivy League/Big Ten law or political science degrees within 5 miles of Congress," you could serve an ad with a malicious payload to every Congressional staffer.

Now, that's just the data brokers. The real action is in ad-tech, a sector dominated by two giant companies, Meta and Google. These companies claim that they are better than the unregulated data-broker cowboys at the bottom of the food-chain. They say they're responsible wielders of unregulated monopoly surveillance power. Reader, they are not.

Meta has been repeatedly caught offering ad-targeting like "depressed teenagers" (great for your next incel recruiting drive):

https://www.technologyreview.com/2017/05/01/105987/is-facebook-targeting-ads-at-sad-teens/

And Google? They just keep on getting caught with both hands in the creepy commercial surveillance cookie-jar. Today, Wired's Dell Cameron and Dhruv Mehrotra report on a way to use Google to target people with chronic illnesses, people in financial distress, and national security "decision makers":

https://www.wired.com/story/google-dv360-banned-audience-segments-national-security/

Google doesn't offer these categories itself, they just allow data-brokers to assemble them and offer them for sale via Google. Just as it's possible to generate a target of "Congressional staffers" by using location and education data, it's possible to target people with chronic illnesses based on things like whether they regularly travel to clinics that treat HIV, asthma, chronic pain, etc.

Google claims that this violates their policies, and that they have best-of-breed technical measures to prevent this from happening, but when Wired asked how this data-broker was able to sell these audiences – including people in menopause, or with "chronic pain, fibromyalgia, psoriasis, arthritis, high cholesterol, and hypertension" – Google did not reply.

The data broker in the report also sold access to people based on which medications they took (including Ambien), people who abuse opioids or are recovering from opioid addiction, people with endocrine disorders, and "contractors with access to restricted US defense-related technologies."

It's easy to see how these categories could enable blackmail, spear-phishing, scams, malvertising, and many other crimes that threaten individuals, groups, and the nation as a whole. The US Office of Naval Intelligence has already published details of how "anonymous" people targeted by ads can be identified:

https://www.odni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/ODNI-Declassified-Report-on-CAI-January2022.pdf

The most amazing part is how the 33,000 targeting segments came to public light: an activist just pretended to be an ad buyer, and the data-broker sent him the whole package, no questions asked. Johnny Ryan is a brilliant Irish privacy activist with the Irish Council for Civil Liberties. He created a fake data analytics website for a company that wasn't registered anywhere, then sent out a sales query to a brokerage (the brokerage isn't identified in the piece, to prevent bad actors from using it to attack targeted categories of people).

Foreign states, including China – a favorite boogeyman of the US national security establishment – can buy Google's data and target users based on Google ad-tech stack. In the past, Chinese spies have used malvertising – serving targeted ads loaded with malware – to attack their adversaries. Chinese firms spend billions every year to target ads to Americans:

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/06/business/google-meta-temu-shein.html

Google and Meta have no meaningful checks to prevent anyone from establishing a shell company that buys and targets ads with their services, and the data-brokers that feed into those services are even less well-protected against fraud and other malicious act.

All of this is only possible because Congress has failed to act on privacy since 1988. That's the year that Congress passed the Video Privacy Protection Act, which bans video store clerks from telling the newspapers which VHS cassettes you have at home. That's also the last time Congress passed a federal consumer privacy law:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_Privacy_Protection_Act

The legislative history of the VPPA is telling: it was passed after a newspaper published the leaked video-rental history of a far-right judge named Robert Bork, whom Reagan hoped to elevate to the Supreme Court. Bork failed his Senate confirmation hearings, but not because of his video rentals (he actually had pretty good taste in movies). Rather, it was because he was a Nixonite criminal and virulent loudmouth racist whose record was strewn with the most disgusting nonsense imaginable).

But the leak of Bork's video-rental history gave Congress the cold grue. His video rental history wasn't embarrassing, but it sure seemed like Congress had some stuff in its video-rental records that they didn't want voters finding out about. They beat all land-speed records in making it a crime to tell anyone what kind of movies they (and we) were watching.

And that was it. For 37 years, Congress has completely failed to pass another consumer privacy law. Which is how we got here – to this moment where you can target ads to suicidal teens, gambling addicted soldiers in Minuteman silos, grannies with Alzheimer's, and every Congressional staffer on the Hill.

Some people think the problem with mass surveillance is a kind of machine-driven, automated mind-control ray. They believe the self-aggrandizing claims of tech bros to have finally perfected the elusive mind-control ray, using big data and machine learning.

But you don't need to accept these outlandish claims – which come from Big Tech's sales literature, wherein they boast to potential advertisers that surveillance ads are devastatingly effective – to understand how and why this is harmful. If you're struggling with opioid addiction and I target an ad to you for a fake cure or rehab center, I haven't brainwashed you – I've just tricked you. We don't have to believe in mind-control to believe that targeted lies can cause unlimited harms.

And those harms are indeed grave. Stein's Law predicts that "anything that can't go on forever eventually stops." Congress's failure on privacy has put us all at risk – including Congress. It's only a matter of time until the commercial surveillance industry is responsible for a massive leak, targeted phishing campaign, or a ghastly national security incident involving Congress. Perhaps then we will get action.

In the meantime, the coalition of people whose problems can be blamed on the failure to update privacy law continues to grow. That coalition includes protesters whose identities were served up to cops, teenagers who were tracked to out-of-state abortion clinics, people of color who were discriminated against in hiring and lending, and anyone who's been harassed with deepfake porn:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/06/privacy-first/#but-not-just-privacy

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/02/20/privacy-first-second-third/#malvertising

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[zvaigzdelasas]

[USA Today is US Private Media]

Lebanon has been attacked by something the world has never seen before ‒ a mass sabotage of electronic devices remotely detonated. Tiny bombs inside pagers and walkie-talkies went off as the devices' users were in homes, supermarkets, buses and on the streets. At least 37 people, including two children, were killed and thousands wounded in two waves of attacks this week. Lebanon's government and Hezbollah, an Iran-backed group that uses the nation as a base for its militants, both blamed Israel. Israel has not claimed responsibility for the attacks directly, but anyone who pays attention to the Middle East understands that this operation almost certainly originated in Tel Aviv.[...]

On Friday, Israel launched an airstrike that reportedly killed senior Hezbollah commander Ibrahim Aqil in Beirut. Israeli officials said Hezbollah later fired dozens of rockets into northern Israel.[...]

When you turn pagers into bombs, you have to know that there will be a high risk of collateral damage. The pagers belonged not just to military members of Hezbollah, but also medical staff and others.[...]

[Now,] an entire nation, Lebanon, has been terrorized. Its medical facilities are straining to handle all the bomb victims. Some in Lebanon are comparing the feeling of insecurity to the awful aftermath of the 2020 Beirut dock explosion.[...]

As an American, I financially support Israel with my tax dollars. If they are murdering Lebanese children, then to some extent, I did that.

Sure, Hezbollah’s ability to communicate internally has been gravely damaged, at least momentarily. But this tactic is spurring anger at Israel across all sectors of Lebanese society, and indeed, the Arab world. Iraq is sending medical supplies to Lebanon; Egypt is expressing solidarity.

Will it be harder or easier for Hezbollah to get recruits? The pager and walkie-talkie explosions killed and wounded a few fighters, but there will be three or four replacements for each one who fell.

[E]ven Hezbollah’s fiercest opponents are now rallying to their support.

It also will inevitably cause more and more Americans to wonder if we should be such strong supporters of a nation that uses tactics that terrorize an entire country and inevitably leave behind dead and wounded children.

20 Sep 24

[reasonsforhope]

"Seven federal agencies are partnering to implement President Biden’s American Climate Corps, announcing this week they would work together to recruit 20,000 young Americans and fulfill the administration's vision for the new program. 

The goals spelled out in the memorandum of understanding include comprehensively tackling climate change, creating partnerships throughout various levels of government and the private sector, building a diverse corps and serving all American communities.

The agencies—which included the departments of Commerce, Interior, Agriculture, Labor and Energy, as well the Environmental Protection Agency and AmeriCorps—also vowed to ensure a “range of compensation and benefits” that open the positions up to a wider array of individuals and to create pathways to “high-quality employment.”  

Leaders from each of the seven agencies will form an executive committee for the Climate Corps, which Biden established in September, that will coordinate efforts with an accompanying working group. They will create the standards for ACC programs, set compensation guidelines and minimum terms of service, develop recruitment strategies, launch a centralized website and establish performance goals and objectives. The ACC groups will, beginning in January, hold listening sessions with potential applicants, labor unions, state and local governments, educational institutions and other stakeholders. 

The working group will also review all federal statutes and hiring authorities to remove any barriers to onboarding for the corps and standardize the practices across all participating agencies. Benefits for corps members will include housing, transportation, health care, child care, educational credit, scholarships and student loan forgiveness, stipends and non-financial services.

As part of the goal of the ACC, agencies will develop the corps so they can transition to “high-quality, family-sustaining careers with mobility potential” in the federal or other sectors. AmeriCorps CEO Michael Smith said the initiative would prepare young people for “good-paying union jobs.” 

Within three weeks of rolling out the ACC, EPA said more than 40,000 people—mostly in the 18-35 age range—expressed interest in joining the corps. The administration set an ambitious goal for getting the program underway, aiming to establish the corps’ first cohort in the summer of 2024. 

The corps members will work in roles related to ecosystem restoration and conservation, reforestation, waterway protection, recycling, energy conservation, clean energy deployment, disaster preparedness and recovery, fire resilience, resilient recreation infrastructure, research and outreach. The administration will look to ensure 40% of the climate-related investments flow to disadvantaged communities as part of its Justice40 initiative.  

EPA Administrator Michael Regan said the MOU would allow the ACC to “work across the federal family” to push public projects focused on environmental justice and clean energy. 

“The Climate Corps represents a significant step forward in engaging and nurturing young leaders who are passionate about climate action, furthering our journey towards a sustainable and equitable future,” Regan said. 

The ACC’s executive committee will hold its first meeting within the next 30 days. It will draw support from a new climate hub within AmeriCorps, as well as any staffing the agency heads designate."

-via Government Executive, December 20, 2023

-

This news comes with your regularly scheduled reminder that WE GOT THE AMERICAN CLIMATE CORPS ESTABLISHED LAST YEAR and basically no one know about/remembers it!!! Also if you want more info about the Climate Corps, inc. how to join, you can sign up to get updates here.

[hyperlexichypatia]

I think the way nonprofits and public agencies are funded leads us to adopt some of the worst aspects of a capitalist mindset towards our service users.

In a business, the goal is clear: Generate profit. Sell more product, to generate more profit. Recruit more customers, to generate more profit. Upsell customers to a more expensive product, to generate more profit. Convince customers to keep coming back and buying more things, to generate more profit.

Manipulation is built into the process, and it's understood by all parties. When a business does something "for you," it's in the hopes that you'll buy (or keep buying, or buy more of, or persuade other people to buy) their product. When a company offers free ice cream with your insurance quote, it's not because they like you and and want you to have ice cream; it's because they want you to come for the ice cream, stay for the insurance quote, and buy their insurance policy before you leave, so they can get your money. Everybody knows this.

Nonprofits and public agencies theoretically don't have this motive. Theoretically, the services we offer are for you, the service user. Theoretically, there is no profit motive, and thus no motive for manipulation. Theoretically, whether or not people choose to use the services we offer has no effect on us, so our only goal in promoting or raising awareness of our services is so that potential users can know about them and decide whether or not to use them.

Theoretically.

But in reality, public agencies and nonprofits are funded by governments, foundations, and donors. They demand "data" to justify their funding, and a major source of "data" is the number of service users. Markers of success have to be measurable and numerical, even if that metric doesn't really make sense. So even if there's not directly a profit motive for recruiting service users as "paying customers," there can still be a financial incentive for recruiting as many service users as possible, including using "sales" techniques like giveaways and gimmicks.

Now, this isn't inherently a bad thing -- after all, people in the nonprofit sector want people to use our services, so we want to get the word out about what we have to offer. I'm not saying it's inherently wrong for a nonprofit to use a raffle or a giveaway or a pizza party or whatever to get the word out and recruit new service users.

But since the services we offer are supposed to be for the service users' own benefit, sometimes the attitude around promoting them slips into the idea that the people we're ostensibly trying to serve have to be manipulated or bribed or tricked into accepting services for their own good, because they don't know or care what's good for them.

This can get into some really unfortunate implications territory in the context of the demographics of people who tend to work at nonprofits and public agencies, compared to the demographics of people those agencies tend to serve.

Attitudes can quickly morph into "Those People don't care about their children's health/education/etc., so we have to trick and manipulate and bribe them with food and prizes."

There's a difference between "Giveaways are a fun way to get the word out about our services" and "Those People don't care about their children's diabetes risk unless we make them sit through a lecture before we give them food." And way too many public agency and nonprofit workers, in private, in what they think is a sympathetic audience, are way too open about saying the latter.

[letteredlettered]

What an interesting topic. I’ve heard that a large percentage of employees cite their bosses as the reason they leave their jobs. What are some ways companies try to mitigate this?

They don't.

I can really only answer for my company, which cared about retention (of employees) a lot. Many companies do, because it costs much less to recruit/onboard/train as little as possible, and because it can be hard to get the work done without adequate staffing. I'd add that my company had one area in which staffing was a nation-wide crisis; also my company was in the public sector and was in the press a lot, which mean they cared about their image.

They still didn't do that much to ensure that people had good bosses. That has less to do with this company and more to do with the structure of business in capitalist society. This is a big reason HR is never going to be that helpful unless you've got a tiny company that, completely by luck, has mostly good folks.

A company isn't going to take a generalized point about folks leaving their job because they don't like their bosses as fact. Companies feel they are too diverse and the financial risk is too great to pour money into something if they don't have hard data, so the first step to retention is getting data. You would think exit interviews would be really informative, but those require a lot of time which equals staff which equals money. Some employers do them but mine would only do one if you asked, and then they did nothing with the info. This is because the company's mentality was "well, if you're leaving you're probably really dissatisfied and we don't want to hear about that." I know this makes no sense. But in general, not just in the business but in this society (formed by capitalism), the idea seems to be if you're dissatisfied it's your fault. Meanwhile the company is interested in data about why people stay; they figure if folks are satisfied, that's the company's fault and they want to keep doing the same so they can retain employees.

Our company had a huge employee satisfaction survey they did every year that included questions about employee opinions about the company, their colleagues, and their bosses. You get emails to remind you to take it and if you can't get time in the workday, bosses are supposed to allow time for it. Some problems with that are you still have to remember to take it; if you don't have time you have to ask a boss you might not like to get that time; some folks at my company literally had jobs that literally are life or death so it can be hard to take time to take a survey; the survey is only in English; the survey is only in the computer; the reminders are only in email. So you have to be a moderately good English speaker who regularly checks email and knows how to use a computer and gets regular access to a computer for the company to get your data about your satisfaction. As you can imagine, our most vulnerable employees often get missed.

If the survey showed that folks were really dissatisfied with a particular boss, that boss got put into a series of trainings. Training is good, but US businesses (and plenty of employees themselves) seemed to have latched onto the idea that training is the be-all, end-all of improvement. Many of us saw this in response to the discussions about EDI (equity, diversity, and inclusion) that came about in 2020; business promised to be anti-racist and had some EDI seminars to prove it, and that was all. Why is it like this? What is really needed to make bosses better bosses? And why isn't that being done?

When it comes to "why is it like this": recruiting and retaining good leaders is hard. The way someone becomes a boss in almost any organization is a) management likes them, and/or b) they were good at a job in a lower level or different department, or c) they come from the outside with a good resume and what sounds like good experience. But a lot of time, management likes people who aren't disruptive, and sometimes folks who aren't disruptive are the folks who are not thinking for themselves and not asking questions and doing everything the way they're told even when it doesn't make sense. That doesn't make a good leader. As for folks who are good at the lower level job in the hierarchy or in another department, they aren't always good at managing. It's a different skill set, but I've seen a lot of leaders and employees make this mistake. They think that that the folks who are great at the job should be promoted, and honestly that really doesn't make sense. And last but not least, folks who get hired from the outside are a complete crapshoot, because experience with leadership does not necessarily a good leader make.

As for what is needed to make bosses better bosses, imo what you would really need is someone embedded within the department who is managed by the boss and is doing the same work as the other employees, but also has the training and experience to evaluate what the boss is doing well and isn't doing well, and then also has the authority and buy-in to work with the boss so that the boss can shadow and learn the leadership skills they need. Then, if the boss can't improve, there would need to be the will within the org to fire or demote that boss, and often that will doesn't exist because recruiting bosses is so hard and the training is usually monumental.

Side note, what I'm describing is what consultants should do and normally don't. Consultants come in and ask a lot of questions and do focus groups and maybe some observations, but they are not in there doing the work understanding what it is like to live in this world, and without that I frankly find a lot of the work they do useless. That said, consultants are almost always hired to identify inefficiencies; they're not really there to make it a more satisfying job. Imo, the greatest efficiency is a satisfied worker, but it is hard to get the data to point that way, and again, companies only want data, and again, your dissatisfaction is your own fault.

Another side note, this is why unions are so great. Union stewards are folks who work for the company but can act as a union representative. This means they're embedded in the department and doing the work everyone does, but they can also at times step outside that role and carry the authority of an outside entity that does have some power to use against the employer. This is why all employees should have a union.

So, why aren't companies doing this? As you can imagine, hiring the ambassador to embed within a department, training them, paying them for their time--all of these are just too cost prohibitive to justify when they only thing you're getting out of it is employee satisfaction. It is also possible to improve employee satisfaction by paying employees more, which is in fact why I stayed in this job I hated as long as I did. I was getting paid so much that it just did not make sense to walk away without a firm plan in place. In the end, paying employees more costs less than ensuring they have a good boss.

I have lots more to say about this, but I've said a lot already, so if anyone has follow up questions, feel free to send more asks.

[kowai-kabuki-tanuki]

Annecy: A Lake of Broken Promises

Fantastic article by Matt Jones from Medium:

How Annecy 2025 exposed the widening chasm between graduate hopes and industry reality – and what must change before an entire generation of creative talent is lost forever

The picturesque lakeside town of Annecy should have been the place where dreams came true. Instead, it became the scene of a devastating awakening. As thousands of animation students clutched their sketchbooks and business cards with QR codes linking to online portfolios at the 2025 festival, the world’s premier animation celebration, they encountered a sobering truth: just 3 recruitment booths operated alongside 23 educational providers – a stark 3:23 ratio that perfectly encapsulated the industry’s fundamental supply-and-demand crisis.

The recruitment reality was brutal. Cartoon Saloon from Northern Ireland told hopeful graduates they weren’t currently hiring. Doghead from Italy maintained a booth that remained largely unstaffed throughout the festival. Dwarf offered opportunities, but only for those willing to work in France. A small recruitment room on Mifa Campus ran sessions for merely 2 days, yet was oversubscribed, leaving countless students without access.

This disconnect between aspiration and opportunity represents far more than a scheduling mishap or economic blip. It reveals a fundamental crisis brewing at the heart of the animation industry – one that threatens to squander a generation of creative talent whilst simultaneously undermining the very foundations upon which animated storytelling is built.

Key takeaways

Only a fraction of animation graduates – as few as 3 to 5 out of every 100 – secure employment in their chosen field, despite an industry valued at $400 billion globally

Major studios including Pixar have reduced their workforces by 14% whilst simultaneously increasing their reliance on artificial intelligence and sequel-based content

Animation festivals like Annecy, which should serve as crucial bridges between education and employment, are failing to provide meaningful recruitment opportunities despite charging premium attendance fees

Universities continue expanding animation programmes whilst knowing full well that industry absorption rates cannot support graduate numbers

A new model of industry collaboration, educational transparency, and creative risk-taking is urgently needed to prevent the collapse of animation’s talent pipeline

Where are the Jobs When Animation is Booming?

The question that haunts every animation graduate clutching their sketchbooks and business cards with QR codes to online portfolios seems almost absurd when set against the industry’s financial success. These students, many shy and anxious, scribble copious notes and desperately seek opportunities to showcase their work, lacking the confidence of seasoned professionals yet carrying the same creative passion. The global animation market reached $400 billion by 2024, with North America alone anticipated to grow from $23.2 billion in 2023 to $36.7 billion by 2031. Yet this prosperity hasn’t translated into opportunity for the very people who dream of creating these blockbuster films and series.

Behind the impressive box-office numbers, however, the animation industry has been experiencing seriously choppy waters. Major animation players have implemented cutbacks over the past year, with Pixar’s recent cuts affecting 14% of its workforce. The studio justified these layoffs as part of a move away from creating streaming content for Disney+ to refocus on features, but industry insiders recognise this as symptomatic of broader cost-cutting measures across the sector.

The cruel irony becomes apparent when examining what’s actually being produced. Studios are making unprecedented profits from animated content whilst simultaneously reducing the workforce needed to create it. 3 animated releases in 2024, all sequels, dominated the worldwide box-office: Disney/Pixar’s Inside Out 2 topped with nearly $1.7 billion, followed by Universal/Illumination’s Despicable Me 4 and Universal/DreamWorks Animation’s Kung Fu Panda 4.

The Academic Industrial Complex

Universities have become unwitting accomplices in this crisis, continuing to expand animation programmes despite knowing that industry absorption cannot support graduate numbers. The business model is too attractive to resist: animation courses command premium fees – often reaching $50,000 annually in prestigious institutions – whilst requiring relatively modest infrastructure compared to other disciplines.

Gobelins’ 3D Character Animator certificate boasts that graduates have a 100% employment rate within 6 months of completing the program, but this represents an elite programme admitting perhaps 20 students annually. Meanwhile, hundreds of other institutions worldwide graduate thousands more students into a market that simply cannot accommodate them.

The disconnect between educational marketing and employment reality has created what industry observers describe as an “academic industrial complex.” Universities promote animation programmes using imagery of Pixar campuses and DreamWorks success stories, whilst carefully avoiding discussions of actual employment statistics. Students accumulate debt pursuing dreams that statistical analysis suggests are increasingly unlikely to materialise.

Michelle Connolly of Educational Voice observed that “Schools must stop selling 1990s-era career dreams. Our 2024 survey shows 68% of graduates need hybrid tech/art roles to survive”, yet this message hasn’t reached prospective students who continue enrolling in traditional animation programmes expecting traditional career paths.

The Festival Paradox

Annecy 2025 perfectly embodied the industry’s contradictions. The festival featured phenomenal lineups with major studios like Disney Animation, DreamWorks, and Pixar presenting new work, drawing a record 18,000 accredited guests. Yet for the students who travelled from across the globe, often spending their last savings on accommodation and festival passes, meaningful employment opportunities were virtually non-existent.

Beyond the supply-demand imbalance lay deeper structural problems. The exhibition hall for students was even reduced in size this year, with 1/3 blocked off for Mifa (aimed at buyers), along with the traditional ground floor. This physical reduction of student space in favour of commercial activities perfectly symbolised the festival’s shifting priorities.

Even established schools like MoPA admitted the exhibition costs were incredibly expensive, yet they gambled on the opportunity to promote that year’s graduates – with very few actually getting the chance to meet with recruiters. This expensive gamble proves indicative of how educational institutions are forced to compete in an increasingly desperate marketplace, whilst being particularly unfair to students from institutions that couldn’t afford booth space.

This represents the festival’s core contradiction: it markets itself as an industry gateway whilst the economics tell a different story. Students invest hundreds of pounds in passes, travel, and accommodation, often funded by family savings or student loans, based on promotional materials suggesting attendance will improve career prospects. Meanwhile, the festival charges educational institutions premium rates to compete for attention from virtually non-existent recruiters.

The Artificial Intelligence Acceleration

Perhaps no factor threatens animation employment prospects more dramatically than the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence. 75% of survey respondents indicated GenAI tools, software and/or models had supported the elimination, reduction or consolidation of jobs in their business division, according to a comprehensive study of entertainment industry executives.

The impact extends beyond simple job displacement. About 33% of industry executives predicted that AI would displace 3D modellers by as early as 2026, with 25% expecting graphic designers to be affected as well. These entry-level positions traditionally served as stepping stones for animation graduates, providing essential industry experience whilst developing professional portfolios.

About 21.4% of Film, Television, and Animation jobs (or approximately 118,500 jobs) are likely to have sufficient tasks affected to be either consolidated, replaced, or eliminated by GenAI in the U.S. by 2026. California, home to major animation studios, will be impacted the most, affecting 39,500 jobs.

The technology���s advancement was evident at Annecy itself, where AI companies maintained booths that were all but empty, targeting studios rather than students. Chat3D, offering text-to-3D model generation, charged between $500–1,000 per user per month – pricing that made clear their focus on corporate clients rather than emerging artists. The sparse attendance at these AI booths suggested either industry wariness or that deals were being struck behind closed doors, away from the festival’s public spaces.

The Sequel Trap

Studios’ increasing reliance on sequels and franchise content represents another threat to emerging talent. The 2025/26 slate demonstrates an unprecedented commitment to reboots and spinoffs: Stranger Things is being animated, whilst beloved series including Gumball, Regular Show, Adventure Time, Foster’s Home, and Steven Universe are all receiving reboots or spinoffs. Even these familiar properties face production delays, further restricting opportunities for new talent.

Original content traditionally provided opportunities for newcomers to prove themselves on smaller projects before advancing to major productions. However, this shift reflects risk-averse corporate strategies prioritising proven intellectual property over creative innovation. Tom Sito, a Hollywood animation veteran now teaching at USC, suggests that the widespread cutting of jobs “bespeaks the lack of vision in a lot of the corporate strategy”.

The sequel dominance creates a vicious cycle: fewer original productions mean fewer opportunities for new talent, which reduces the industry’s creative diversity, ultimately leading to even greater reliance on proven properties. Young animators find themselves competing for positions on projects led by established teams with decades of experience, making entry-level opportunities even scarcer.

What Must Change: A 3-Pillar Solution

Festival Reform: Creating Real Opportunity

Annecy and other major festivals must evolve beyond their current model of celebration without substance. Festival organisers should implement tiered exhibition fees, charging premium rates to companies without active recruitment whilst subsidising booths for studios offering genuine employment opportunities. This would incentivise meaningful job creation whilst reducing the financial burden on organisations actually hiring.

Festivals should establish year-round digital portfolio platforms rather than relying on brief, expensive physical events. These platforms could operate continuously, providing far better return on investment for both students and employers than current festival models. Having Annecy support the thousands of students who pay dearly to attend each year feels just, and recruiters should be incentivised to use such platforms or disincentivised to ignore them.

Most importantly, festivals must abandon romanticised career presentations in favour of honest industry discussions. Panel sessions should include employment statistics, salary realities, and alternative career paths rather than perpetuating unrealistic expectations about traditional animation careers.

Educational Transparency: Truth in Advertising

Universities must implement mandatory employment outcome reporting, similar to medical schools’ residency placement rates. Prospective students deserve accurate information about career prospects before committing to expensive programmes. Accreditation bodies should require institutions to demonstrate minimum employment rates – perhaps 25% within 6 months of graduation – to maintain programme approval.

Curricula need fundamental restructuring to prepare students for hybrid careers combining animation skills with business, technology, and entrepreneurship. Rather than training students exclusively for studio employment that may not materialise, programmes should develop versatile creative professionals capable of adapting to changing industry conditions.

Industry Innovation: Breaking the Sequel Cycle

Studios should establish “original content quotas,” dedicating specific percentages of budgets to new intellectual property development. This could follow models already implemented in some territories, ensuring continued creative innovation whilst maintaining profitable franchise production.

Governments that offer tax incentives and provide funding for large employers in the creative industry to operate in their countries should mandate original content quotas and student hiring/development programmes as conditions for receiving these benefits. Public investment in studios should yield public benefit through job creation and creative diversity.

Companies should develop apprenticeship programmes providing paid training rather than relying solely on traditional hiring from oversaturated graduate pools. These programmes could identify promising talent early whilst providing practical industry experience currently lacking in 3–4 year degree programmes.

Emerging Opportunities: Beyond Traditional Animation

Despite the challenges, new opportunities are emerging for creative professionals willing to adapt. The animation industry employs more than 220,000 professionals in the United States and is expected to grow by 5% annually, though these roles increasingly require hybrid skills combining animation with technology, business, or education.

Gaming represents a significant growth area, with the gaming and animation industry reaching a massive $268.8 billion by 2025. These positions often offer more creative freedom and better employment prospects than traditional film animation, whilst still utilising core animation skills.

Virtual and augmented reality applications continue expanding, creating demand for animators in educational technology, healthcare simulation, and interactive media. These emerging sectors often welcome candidates with animation backgrounds, even if they lack specific industry experience.

Independent production has become increasingly viable through crowdfunding and digital distribution platforms. Software publishers lead the animation industry’s pay scale with a $110,000 average annual salary, whilst tools like Blender and affordable rendering services enable small teams to produce professional-quality content.

An Industry’s Reckoning

The numbers from Annecy 2025 tell a story that the animation industry can no longer ignore. With 23 educational providers competing for the attention of just 3 recruitment booths, the festival became an inadvertent expose of systemic dysfunction. Thousands of students, armed with portfolios and dreams, encountered a marketplace that had no genuine intention of hiring them.

This revelation demands urgent examination of how the animation industry markets itself versus how it actually operates. The disconnect between promotional promises and employment reality threatens not just individual careers but the creative future of animation itself. If the industry continues excluding new voices whilst relying on artificial intelligence and franchise content, it risks cultural stagnation that could undermine the very creativity that built studios like Pixar and DreamWorks.

The current trajectory requires acknowledgement from all stakeholders – festivals, universities, and studios – that existing practices are unsustainable. Students deserve honest information about career prospects, meaningful opportunities to demonstrate their abilities, and alternative pathways when traditional employment proves elusive.

The animation industry stands at a crossroads. It can continue celebrating past achievements whilst failing future creators, or it can restructure itself to nurture the talent pipeline essential for continued innovation. The stark reality exposed at Annecy 2025 – 3 recruitment opportunities amid 23 educational providers – demands immediate action.

The next Annecy festival could feature genuine employment opportunities rather than empty promises, honest career discussions rather than promotional presentations, and sustainable pathways for emerging talent rather than exclusive access for established professionals. Whether this transformation occurs depends on industry leaders’ willingness to prioritise long-term creative health over short-term financial convenience.

The alternative – continued exclusion of new talent whilst relying on artificial intelligence and franchise content – threatens the very creativity that made animation beloved worldwide. For an industry built on imagination and wonder, such an outcome would represent the ultimate broken promise beside the pristine waters of Lake Annecy.

Students hoping to be noticed – by Matt Jones

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved in our archive

No mention of covid or long covid, but lots of mention of "cost to taxpayers" and "learning losses." I wonder what *specific* actions should be taken besides forcing sick people to stay in the classroom? Hmmst...

By Poppy Wood

Concerns that absence crisis provoked by the pandemic continues to disrupt learning

About 14,000 teachers in England called in sick every day last year, analysis has found.

Department for Education (DfE) data show that about 2.5 million school days were lost in 2022-23 as more than 326,000 teachers missed class owing to sickness.

Each teacher who took sick leave reported an average of eight days off work last year. It equates to almost 13,700 teachers calling in sick on any given day during the 190-day school year.

About 66.2 per cent of England’s teaching workforce were off school because of illness last year, according to the DfE’s school workforce statistics.

It marks a slight decrease on the 67.5 per cent of teachers who called in sick in 2021-22, but is still far above the pre-pandemic rate of 54.1 per cent.

The figures will raise concerns that an absence crisis provoked by the pandemic continues to disrupt learning, with the number of pupils missing school also significantly higher post-Covid.

In total, 7.8 million school days have been lost to sickness since in-person teaching resumed following the pandemic, according to analysis of DfE data by the TaxPayers’ Alliance.

Compared with the 2018-19 academic year – the year before the pandemic – an extra 461,500 teaching days were lost last year because of staff illness.

Joanna Marchong, investigations campaign manager of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: “Taxpayers will be shocked by the sheer number of sick days taken by teaching staff.

“Alongside their generous holiday entitlements, hundreds of thousands of teachers are frequently absent, leaving classrooms in disarray and forcing taxpayers to bear the significant costs of finding covers.

“Schools must tackle this issue if they want to deliver a consistent quality of education that is value for money for taxpayers.”

‘Deteriorating mental health’ While the Government does not collect statistics centrally on the reasons for teacher absence, experts have pointed to increased stress and deteriorating mental health.

In some secondary schools, as many as 166 teachers took sick leave at some point during the 2022-23 academic year, compounding financial pressures on already stretched school budgets.

Most teachers in England receive full sick pay for 25 working days off work in their first year in the profession, rising to 100 working days in their fourth and successive years of teaching.

The Telegraph revealed last week that teacher absences are forcing schools to spend billions on supply staff each year as headteachers scramble to plug gaps in the workforce.

In 2022-23, schools gave £1.2 billion of taxpayers’ cash towards expensive teacher supply agencies to fill vacancies and cover long-term sickness. It is almost double the £738 million spent on supply teachers in the year before the pandemic.

Labour has promised to allow teachers to complete more tasks from home in an attempt to make the profession more attractive. The Government is also exploring how to use artificial intelligence to reduce staff workloads, after almost one in 10 teachers quit the profession last year.

It is hoped the measures will help tackle the recruitment and retention crisis and stem the tide of staff calling in sick each day.

Daniel Kebede, the general secretary of the National Education Union (NEU), called on the Government to improve teacher pay to prevent a growing exodus from the sector.

“We need to see a concerted effort by the Government to retain teachers in the profession. This will need changes to accountability so we have a collaborative and supportive system,” he said.

“This will also require action on closing the pay gap between teachers and other graduate professions, reducing workload and more flexible working in education”.

Mr Kebede blamed the rise in the teacher absence rate since the pandemic on “excessive teacher workload driven by a high-stakes assessment and accountability system”.

He warned this would continue to “leave many teachers burnt out, leading to stress, sickness and people leaving the profession” without urgent government action.

Labour has come under fire for bowing to pressure from education unions on above-inflation public sector pay deals and demands.

Last month, the NEU voted to accept the Government’s pay offer of a 5.5 per cent uplift for most teachers this year, but warned that it will push for a bigger hike next year.

It suggests the UK’s largest teaching union will continue to wield the threat of further strike action as it seeks long-term funding to address the retention crisis.

‘Severely absent’ pupils Bridget Phillipson, the Education Secretary, has warned of a “dire” inheritance from the previous government as she faces calls for further funding from across the sector.

Schools are also struggling with dwindling pupil attendance levels since the pandemic, with Ms Phillipson warning recently that it was quickly becoming an “absence epidemic”.

More than one in 50 pupils in England are now missing at least half the school year, official figures show.

The proportion of children classed as “severely absent” – meaning they failed to show up for 50 per cent or more of classes – rose to 2.1 per cent in the autumn and spring terms of 2023-24.

It means that about 158,000 pupils were severely absent from school during those teaching periods, according to DfE data.

The DfE was approached for comment.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Gloria Oladipo at The Guardian:

In recent weeks, the fate of the United States Postal Service (USPS), a revered and vital public institution, has been uncertain. Since the start of his second presidency, Donald Trump has launched major changes to the federal government. Along with billionaire Elon Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge), the president has carried out widespread layoffs at agencies such as the Small Business Administration and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, with the purported goal of cutting costs and boosting efficiency. Now, Trump is turning his focus to the post office, an agency he has long been critical of and one that he may be privatizing. In addition to delivering upwards of 343.5m pieces of mail and packages a day, the post office is responsible for administering official government forms such as passport applications, and providing banking services, such as money orders. As of 2025, it employs 640,000 people. Black people, in particular, make up 29% of its staff, while making up just 12% of the national workforce overall. The Washington Post first reported that Trump is expected to take control of the USPS, likely signing an executive order in the coming weeks to place the independent agency under the Commerce department. With privatization, Trump would probably curtail postal services, said Arrion Brown, the national support services director for the American Postal Workers Union. “The privatization definitely would require less employees,” he said. “That would cut down on the number of postal jobs.” Trump’s potential plans for the USPS could threaten the agency’s rich legacy of Black employment, from which generations of Black families have secured wealth and benefits through service. “The postal service workforce is more diverse racially [and] ethnically than the labor force in this country as a whole,” said Brian Renfroe, the national president of the National Association of Letter Carriers. The gains in the post office with regards to diversity aren’t accidental. One reason for the high rate of Black employment at the postal office is because the USPS recruits veterans, a large percentage of whom are Black, said Monique Morrissey, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute. “They’re vetted and they’re trustworthy,” said Morrissey of veterans. “You don’t want somebody messing with mail. The consequences are harsh if somebody does that.” Because of federal protections, the post office, like other federal agencies, also has less discrimination in hiring compared to private sector employment. Anti-discrimination language in USPS’s collective bargaining agreements promotes employee diversity, said Renfroe. “Hundreds of thousands of good middle-class jobs have been offered to people all over the country, without regard to race or any other demographic [information]”.

Increased access to postal service employment means that Black families can access solid benefits, especially as generations have been “blocked from other ways of creating wealth”, said Morrissey. “The benefits matter a lot to African American communities because of historical barriers to wealth creation and access to financial security through health benefits,” she said. USPS also pays relatively well compared to other jobs that do not require a college degree, Morrissey added, given training and trust required for the job. USPS also has union-protected pay increases based on how long a person has been employed with the post office, Renfroe noted. “It’s a place to really make a solid middle class career,” he said. “When we talk about collective bargaining rights being attacked, we’re talking about people’s ability to have a middle class career.”

Diversity in the postal service is also a direct result of “geographic diversity”, said Renfroe. Many of the more than 33,000 post offices in the US are “heavily concentrated in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and other urban areas”, regions where Black people are more likely to live and be employed from. The wealth building relationship between Black Americans and the postal service dates back to the 19th century, says Phillip Rubio, a history professor at North Carolina A&T State University. In 1865, Congress passed a law allowing Black people to be employed as postal workers, reversing an 1802 bill that previously declared that mail carriers could only be “free white persons”. Formerly enslaved people then started “taking advantage of what was a patronage job”, said Rubio, who’s an expert on Black postal workers. “The way the postal service opens up to African Americans is [that] they open the door,” he said, adding: “The post office [was] attractive when so many private sector jobs were closed to [Black people].” [...]

In the 1940s, 14% of middle-class Black people were employed by the post office, according to research by the economists Leah Boustan and Robert Margo. Even still, Black employees were largely denied workplace advancement, including for clerk positions and other higher-ranking roles. Black postal workers, particularly in the south, fought to get into local unions and keep local branches from being segregated. The civil rights movement of the 1960s contributed to improved conditions for Black people in the postal service. President John F Kennedy’s Executive Order 10925 prohibited discrimination in the hiring of federal employees, with USPS offices across the country posting Equal Employment Opportunity posters and notices where employees could submit complaints. Black postal employees were also promoted to higher ranking jobs and elected to local and national leadership positions. From 1960 to 1966, USPS was the largest employer of Black people in the US, and by 1970, Black people were 2.5 times more likely to work for the post office than white people (the rate is higher in especially segregated cities). By the year 2000, Black postal employees workers were also in the top 25% of earners of Black workers in the US.

The Guardian wrote a solid piece on how the USPS helped build a solid middle class foundation for Black Americans, and how Racist-in-Chief Trump could upend that legacy.

[rdiasrohini]

Unlock Your Career Potential: Find the Best MBA Colleges in Delhi Under GGSIPU

Enrolling in an MBA program is a powerful move if you plan to take your career to the next level. Among the many options available, the best MBA colleges in Delhi affiliated with Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University (GGSIPU) stand out for their academic excellence, affordability, and career opportunities. These Delhi MBA colleges offer industry-aligned programs, world-class faculty, and strong placement records, making them a top choice for ambitious business leaders.

Why Choose GGSIPU for Your MBA? GGSIPU is a prestigious public university that offers quality higher education in various disciplines. The top MBA colleges in Delhi under GGSIPU are known for their balanced approach combining theory and practical learning. Students benefit from modern infrastructure, industry internships, and regular interactions with corporate leaders.

These Delhi MBA colleges are strategically located, giving students access to networking opportunities, internships, and real-world business experience. Also, their fees are much cheaper than many private institutes, making them a value-packed option.

MBA Admission Process in GGSIPU Colleges

To apply to MBA programs in GGSIPU, candidates must qualify through national-level entrance exams like CAT, CMAT, or IPU CET conducted by the university. The entrance exam evaluates your skills in areas like quantitative aptitude, logical reasoning, English, and general awareness.

Once you qualify, the university conducts centralized counseling. Here, candidates go through document verification, preference selection, and final seat allocation based on merit. This structured admission process ensures that only deserving candidates are offered seats in the best MBA colleges in Delhi.

Specialisations Offered by Delhi MBA Colleges The colleges under GGSIPU offer a wide range of MBA specializations to suit today’s job market:

MBA in Finance: Build a strong foundation in investment banking, financial planning, and corporate finance.

MBA in Marketing: Learn digital marketing, branding, and market strategy.

MBA in Human Resource Management: Master the art of talent acquisition, employee engagement, and performance management.

MBA in Operations Management: Focus on supply chain efficiency, production planning, and quality management.

MBA in International Business: Understand the dynamics of global business and cross-border management.

MBA in IT Management: Integrate business strategies with emerging technological trends and systems.

These specialisations provide subject matter expertise and open doors to multiple career paths.

Strong Placement Record with Top Recruiters The strength of GGSIPU's top MBA colleges in Delhi is their excellent placement support. Career guidance, resume building, interview preparation, and mock sessions are integral to the training. Students are placed in prestigious organisations such as Amazon, Deloitte, EY, Infosys, ICICI Bank, and others.

The colleges maintain a strong alumni network and corporate relationships, helping students find exclusive internships and job roles in sectors such as consulting, IT, banking, and FMCG.

Bonus: Start your journey with a BBA Before an MBA, many students start by pursuing a BBA degree from a reputed BBA college in Delhi. A BBA builds a solid foundation in business principles and makes the transition to an MBA seamless. If you are beginning your academic journey, consider starting with a top-rated BBA college in Delhi.

Conclusion Whether you are beginning your journey with a BBA college in Delhi or aiming to pursue postgraduate studies from the best MBA colleges in Delhi, GGSIPU offers unmatched academic value and career opportunities. With high placement rates, industry-focused specialisations, and affordable fees, these colleges are ideal destinations for ambitious students seeking success in the business world.

[isaacsapphire]

Is there a proper term for the issue of keyword overlap or abbreviation overlap and other naming convention issues resulting in confusion, miscommunication, SEO issues, and the like?

One particularly notable case is the abbreviation CBT being used for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Computer Based Training (workplace training term used at eg Walmart), and Cock and Ball Torture (kink category).

IRA could be Irish Republican Army (recent history terrorist/freedom fighter organization), an Individual Retirement Arrangement (financial investment type thing), or the Internet Research Agency (Russian misinformation organization).

There was a dustup on tumblr years ago about the “poly” tag and if polyamorists or Polynesians would get ownership of the poly tag.

In job searching/hiring, the shared industry term “security” results in physical security and it security and government security clearance jobs stepping on each other’s toes and wasted time. Multiple similar issues exit across job searching/recruiting job titles and industry terms, which probably has economic implications in wasted time at minimum, and definitely doesn’t help economists get good data, as out of work it security specialists don’t want security guard jobs and neither may have security clearances so openings or low pay or whatever in one sector might be difficult to see in data collection.

Oh and CSA is the abbreviation for the Confederate States of America (breakaway Southern States that wanted to keep slavery in the American Civil War) or Child Sexual Abuse.

[jobyoda-philippines]

Exploring Career and Job Opportunities in Davao City Philippines

Davao City, recognized as one of the Philippines' most progressive cities, continues to experience remarkable economic growth, creating a vibrant job market that attracts professionals from across the country. The city's diverse economy offers numerous employment opportunities, from entry-level positions to executive roles, making it an attractive destination for job seekers at all career stages.

The Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) sector stands as one of the largest employers in Davao City, providing thousands of jobs across various specializations. Companies in this sector actively recruit customer service representatives, technical support specialists, and quality assurance analysts, offering competitive salaries and comprehensive benefits packages. The industry's continued expansion has created numerous opportunities for career advancement, with many organizations promoting from within and providing extensive training programs.

Part-time employment opportunities have also flourished in Davao City, catering to students, professionals seeking additional income, and individuals preferring flexible work arrangements. The retail sector, food service industry, and education field offer numerous part-time positions with varying schedules and responsibilities. These roles often provide valuable work experience and can serve as stepping stones to full-time careers.

The Information Technology sector in Davao has seen significant growth, with many companies seeking software developers, web designers, and IT support specialists. This growth has been fueled by the city's improving technological infrastructure and the increasing number of tech-focused businesses establishing operations in the region. Tech professionals can find opportunities in both established companies and startups, with many positions offering competitive compensation and the possibility of remote work arrangements.

Davao's hospitality and tourism industry continues to expand, creating jobs in hotels, restaurants, travel agencies, and tour operations. The sector offers positions ranging from entry-level service roles to management positions, with many employers providing training and development opportunities. The industry's growth has also sparked demand for professionals in events management and tourism marketing.

The education sector presents numerous opportunities for both full-time and part-time employment. Educational institutions regularly seek teachers, tutors, and administrative staff. The rise of online learning has created additional opportunities for English language teachers and academic consultants who can work flexible hours from home or teaching centers.

Job hiring  in Davao, the digital economy has opened new avenues for employment. E-commerce specialists, digital content creators, and social media managers are in high demand as businesses increasingly establish their online presence. These positions often offer the flexibility of remote work while providing competitive compensation packages.

Professional development resources are readily available in Davao City, with numerous institutions offering skills training programs and industry certifications. Job seekers can access career counseling services, resume writing assistance, and interview coaching through various employment support organizations. These resources prove invaluable in helping candidates prepare for and secure desired positions.

The financial services sector in Davao has also experienced substantial growth, creating opportunities for banking professionals, insurance specialists, and investment consultants. These positions typically offer attractive compensation packages, including performance bonuses and health benefits, making them highly sought after by experienced professionals.

Davao's agricultural sector continues to evolve, combining traditional farming with modern agribusiness practices. This has created opportunities for agricultural technologists, food processing specialists, and supply chain professionals. The sector offers both technical and management positions, with many companies providing specialized training and development programs.

For those entering Davao's job market, proper preparation is essential. Successful job seekers typically maintain updated resumes, prepare comprehensive portfolios, and stay informed about industry developments. Professional networking, both online and offline, plays a crucial role in discovering opportunities and advancing careers in the city.

The future of Davao's job market looks promising, with emerging industries creating new employment opportunities. The city's commitment to economic development, coupled with its strategic location and robust infrastructure, continues to attract businesses and investors, ensuring a steady stream of job opportunities for qualified candidates.

Whether seeking full-time employment or part-time job in Davao City offers a diverse range of opportunities across multiple industries. Success in this dynamic job market often comes to those who combine proper preparation with continuous skill development and effective networking. As the city continues to grow and evolve, its job market remains a beacon of opportunity for professionals seeking to build meaningful careers in Mindanao's premier business hub.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Intuit: “Our fraud fights racism”

Tonight (September 27), I'll be at Chevalier's Books in Los Angeles with Brian Merchant for a joint launch for my new book The Internet Con and his new book, Blood in the Machine. On October 2, I'll be in Boise to host an event with VE Schwab.

Today's key concept is "predatory inclusion": "a process wherein lenders and financial actors offer needed services to Black households but on exploitative terms that limit or eliminate their long-term benefits":

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2329496516686620

Perhaps you recall predatory inclusion from the Great Financial Crisis, when predatory subprime mortgages with deceptive teaser rates were foisted on Black homeowners (who were eligible for better mortgages), resulting in a wave of Black home theft in the foreclosure crisis:

https://prospect.org/justice/staggering-loss-black-wealth-due-subprime-scandal-continues-unabated/

Before these loans blew up, they were styled as a means of creating Black intergenerational wealth through housing speculation. They turned out to be a way to suck up Black families' savings before rendering them homeless and forcing them into houses owned by the Wall Street slumlords who bought all the housing stock the Great Financial Crisis put on the market:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/08/wall-street-landlords/#the-new-slumlords

That was just an update on an old con: the "home sale contract," invented by loan-sharks who capitalized on redlining to rip off Black families. Back when banks and the US government colluded to deny mortgages to Black households, sleazy lenders created the "contract loan," which worked like a mortgage, but if you were late on a single payment, the lender could seize and sell your home and not pay you a dime – even if the house was 99% paid for:

https://socialequity.duke.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Plunder-of-Black-Wealth-in-Chicago.pdf

Usurers and con-artists love to style themselves as anti-racists, seeking to "close the racial wealth gap." The payday lending industry – whose triple-digit interest rates trap poor people in revolving debt that they can never pay off – styles itself as a force for racial justice:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/01/29/planned-obsolescence/#academic-fraud

Payday lenders prey on poor people, and in America, "poor" is often a euphemism for "Black." Payday lenders disproportionately harm Black families:

https://ung.edu/student-money-management-center/money-minute/racial-wealth-gap-payday-loans.php

Payday lenders are just unlicensed banks, who deploy a layer of bullshit to claim that they don't have to play by the rules that bind the rest of the finance sector. This scam is so juicy that it spawned the fintech industry, in which a bunch of unregulated banks sprung up to claim that they were too "innovative" to be regulated:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/01/usury/#tech-exceptionalism

When you hear "Fintech," think "unlicensed bank." Fintech turned predatory inclusion into a booming business, recruiting Black spokespeople to claim that being the sucker at the table in the cryptocurrency casino was actually a form of racial justice:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/07/business/media/cryptocurrency-seeks-the-spotlight-with-spike-lees-help.html

But not all predatory inclusion is financial. Take Facebook Basics, Meta's "poor internet for poor people" program. Facebook partnered with telcos in the Global South to rig their internet access. These "zero rating" programs charged subscribers by the byte to reach any service except Facebook and its partners. Facebook claimed that this would "bridge the digital divide," by corralling "the next billion internet users" into using its services.

The fact that this would make "Facebook" synonymous with "the internet" was just an accidental, regrettable side-effect. Naturally, this was bullshit from top to bottom, and the countries where zero-rating was permitted ended up having more expensive wireless broadband than the countries that banned it:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/02/countries-zero-rating-have-more-expensive-wireless-broadband-countries-without-it

The predatory inclusion gambit is insultingly transparent, but that doesn't stop desperate scammers from trying it. The latest chancer is Intuit, who claim that the end of its decade-long, wildly profitable "free tax prep" scam is bad for Black people:

https://www.propublica.org/article/turbotax-intuit-black-taxpayers-irs-free-file-marketing

Some background. In nearly every rich country on Earth, the tax authorities send every taxpayer a pre-filled tax return, based on the information submitted by employers, banks, financial planners, etc. If that looks good to you, you just sign it and send it back. Otherwise, you can amend it, or just toss it in the trash and pay a tax-prep specialist to produce your own return.

But in America, taxpayers spend billions every year to send forms to the IRS that tell it things it already knows. To make this ripoff seem fair, the hyper-concentrated tax-prep industry, led by the Intuit, creators of Turbotax, pretended to create a program to provide free tax-prep to working people.

This program was called Free File, and it was a scam. The tax-prep cartel each took a different segment of Americans who were eligible for Freefile and then created an online house of mirrors that would trick those people into spending hours working on their tax-returns until they were hit with an error message falsely claiming they were ineligible for the free service and demanding hundreds of dollars to file their returns.

Intuit were world champions at this scam. They blocked their Freefile offering from search-engine crawlers and then bought ads that showed up when searchers typed "freefile" into the query box that led them to deceptively named programs that had "free" in their names but cost a fortune to use – more than you'd pay for a local CPA to file on your behalf.

The Attorneys General of nearly every US state and territory eventually sued Intuit over this, settling for $141m:

https://www.agturbotaxsettlement.com/Home/portalid/0

The FTC is still suing them over it:

https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/cases-proceedings/192-3119-intuit-inc-matter-turbotax

We have to rely on state AGs and the FTC to bring Intuit to justice because every Intuit user clicks through an agreement in which we permanently surrender our right to sue the company, no matter how many laws it breaks. For corporate criminals, binding arbitration waivers are the gift that keeps on giving:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/24/uber-for-arbitration/#nibbled-to-death-by-ducks

Even as the scam was running out, Intuit spent millions lobby-blitzing Congress, desperate for action that would let it continue to privately tax the nation for filling in forms that – once again – told the IRS things it already knew. They really love the idea of paying taxes on paying your taxes:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/20/turbotaxed/#counter-intuit

But they failed. The IRS has taken Freefile in-house, will send you a pre-completed tax return if you want it. This should be the end of the line for Intuit and other tax-prep profiteers:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/17/free-as-in-freefile/#tell-me-something-i-dont-know

Now we're at the end of the line for the scam, Intuit is playing the predatory inclusion card. They're conning Black newspapers like the Chicago Defender into running headlines like "IRS Free Tax Service Could Further Harm Blacks,"

https://defendernetwork.com/news/opinion/irs-free-tax-service-could-further-harm-blacks/

The only named source in that article? Intuit spokesperson Derrick Plummer. The article went out on the country's Black newswire Trice Edney, whose editor-in-chief did not respond to Propublica's Paul Kiel's questions.

Then Black Enterprise got in on the game, publishing "Critics Claim The IRS Free Tax Prep Service Could Hurt Black Americans." Once again, the only named source for the article was Plummer, who was "quoted at length." Black Enterprise declined to tell Kiel where that article came from:

https://www.blackenterprise.com/critics-claim-the-irs-free-tax-prep-service-could-hurt-black-americans/

For Intuit, placing op-eds is a tried-and-true tactic for laundering its ripoffs into respectability. Leaked internal Intuit memos detail the company's strategy of "pushing back through op-eds" to neutralize critics:

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6483061-Intuit-TurboTax-2014-15-Encroachment-Strategy.html

Intuit spox Derrick Plummer did respond to Kiel's queries, denying that Intuit was paying for these op-eds, saying "with an idea as bad as the Direct File scheme we don’t have to pay anyone to talk about how terrible it is."

Meanwhile, ex-NAACP director (and No Labels co-chair) Benjamin Chavis has used his position atop the National Newspaper Publishers Association to publish op-eds against the IRS Direct File program, citing the Progressive Policy Institute, a pro-business thinktank that Intuit's internal documents describe as part of its "coalition":

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6483061-Intuit-TurboTax-2014-15-Encroachment-Strategy.html

Chavis's Chicago Tribune editorial claimed that Direct File could cause Black filers to miss out on tax-credits they are entitled to. This is a particularly ironic claim given Intuit's prominent role in sabotaging the Child Tax Credit, a program that lifted more Americans out of poverty than any other in history:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/29/three-times-is-enemy-action/#ctc

It's also an argument that can be found in Intuit's own anti-Direct File blog posts:

https://www.intuit.com/blog/innovative-thinking/taxpayer-empowerment/intuit-reinforces-its-commitment-to-fighting-for-taxpayers-rights/

The claim is that because the IRS disproportionately audits Black filers (this is true), they will screw them over in other ways. But Evelyn Smith, co-author of the study that documented the bias in auditing says this is bullshit:

https://siepr.stanford.edu/publications/working-paper/measuring-and-mitigating-racial-disparities-tax-audits

That's because these audits of Black households are triggered by the IRS's focus on Earned Income Tax Credits, a needlessly complicated program available to low-income (and hence disproportionately Black) workers. The paperwork burden that the IRS heaps on EITC recipients means that their returns contain errors that trigger audits.

As Smith told Propublica, "With free, assisted filing, we might expect EITC claimants to make fewer mistakes and face less intense audit scrutiny, which could help reduce disparities in audit rates between Black and non-Black taxpayers."

Meanwhile, the predatory inclusion talking points continue to proliferate. Nevada accountants and the state's former controller somehow coincidentally managed to publish op-eds with nearly identical wording. Phillip Austin, vice-chair of Arizon's East Valley Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, claims that free IRS tax prep "would disproportionately hurt the Hispanic community." Austin declined to tell Propublica how he came to that conclusion.

Right-wing think-tanks are pumping out a torrent of anti-Direct File disinfo. This surely has nothing to do with the fact that, for example, Center Forward has HR Block's chief lobbyist on its board:

https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/4125481-direct-e-file-wont-make-filing-taxes-any-easier-but-it-could-make-things-worse/

The whole thing reeks of bullshit and desperation. That doesn't mean that it won't succeed in killing Direct File. If there's one thing America loves, it's letting businesses charge us a tax just for dealing with our own government, from paying our taxes to camping in our national parks:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/30/military-industrial-park-service/#booz-allen

Interestingly, there's a MAGA version of predatory inclusion, in which corporations convince low-information right-wingers that efforts to protect them from ripoffs are "woke." These campaigns are, incredibly, even stupider than the predatory inclusion tale.

For example, there's a well-coordianted campaign to block the junk fees that the credit card cartel extracts from merchants, who then pass those charges onto us. This campaign claims that killing junk fees is woke:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/04/owning-the-libs/#swiper-no-swiping

How does that work? Here's the logic: Target sells Pride merch. That makes them woke. Target processes a lot of credit-card transactions, so anything that reduces card-processing fees will help Target. Therefore, paying junk fees is a way to own the libs.

No, seriously.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/27/predatory-inclusion/#equal-opportunity-scammers

[eaglesnick]

“Hypocrisy is the audacity to preach integrity from a den of corruption" - Wes Fester

Yesterday I highlighted the hypocrisy of Reform UK and Nigel Farage regarding public sector pensions.

The average public sector pension varies according to the particular scheme, length of service, and pension contributions. The Local Government Pension Scheme (more of this later) pays out between £5000 and £6000 per year while teachers receive between "£11,000-£12,000 per annum. Retired NHS staff typically receive "£7000 -£12,000 per year.

These figures are paltry compared to Nigel Farage's annual pension from the EU of £73,000.

Reform UK has describes public sector "gold plated" pension schemes as bankrupting the country and they are determined to bring these schemes to an end.

Richard Tice, former Tory donor and now Deputy Leader of Reform UK, has proposed moving all public sector workers onto defined contribution schemes, which shift investment risk from the employer to the employee. He’s also targeted council pensions specifically, suggesting that new recruits should not be enrolled in defined benefit plans and that existing staff might receive lower pay rises to offset pension costs.

Cue the "resignation" of Zia Yusuf, former Chairman of Reform UK. Yusuf's resignation lasted 2 days after which he rejoined the party as leader of Reform UK's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)

Yusuf cited "exhaustion" as his reason for resigning, but after a glass of lucozade and two days with his feet up, he was fully recovered and full of renewed political zeal. If not exactly wielding a chainsaw, he is determined to cut local authority waste just like his much admired role model, Elon Musk. Like Musk, Yusuf believes in "disruptive efficiency", an aggressive streamlining of local authority services, departments and personnel.

In the USA Musk’s purge of government personnel saw some federal government departments suffer a 10% reduction in their workforce. If Yusuf follows the same pattern then one in ten council workers can expect to lose their jobs.

In the UK the broader public sector workforce is just over 6 million. If the newly invigorated Yusuf follows Musk, then Reform UK is hoping to make over half a million workers unemployed in the name of "disruptive efficiency". 60-70% of those workers have dependent families, so the cost of making half a million public sector workers redundant may well exceed any savings the sackings are meant to facilitate, in increased welfare payments, unless of course they wish to slash these also.

If this wasn’t bad enough, it has been suggested that the REAL reason Reform UK are so interested in public sector pension pots is it gives Reform UK access to tens of billions of pounds.

According to the Financial Times, Reform UK by

 "…controlling some councils pretty much translates into control of their pension funds." (Gauging Reform UK's pension power": 19/05/25)

The FT goes on to estimate that Reform UK will have majority control of 4 pension committees, overseeing £29.2bn, and a controlling plurality on a further 5 pension committees, over seeing £25bm.  In total, the FT calculates that Reform UK will have an influential vote on 18 public employee pension schemes, collectively worth more than £100bn.

Is the real reason Zia Yusuf "resigned" so he could rejoined as DODGE Czar in charge of how the money in these employee pension schemes could be diverted Reform UK's way? After all, Zia Yusuf is a successful businessman and by all accounts a whiz-kid organiser. When Yusuf resigned, so did Nathaniel Fried who was heading up Reform UK’s DOGE programme. . With Fried out of the way, Yusuf was free to become the new head of DOGE.

Obviously we will have to wait and see what Yusuf and DOGE do concerning their newfound access to billions worth of pension funds, but we have some clues.

Tice has complained that "woke net-zero-obsessed" pension investments deliver "woeful returns". He suggests worker pension funds should be managed more aggressively and investing in ventures with higher returns ( but also higher risk of failure.)

What Tice is advocating has striking echoes with the kind of arguments made by parts of the financial sector before the crash of 2008, pushing for higher returns through aggressive investment strategies while downplaying the risks. What could possibly go wrong?