Ivanka Trump, who has coasted through life largely on the coattails of her tarnished family name, has some advice for struggling workers in the U.S. right now—just “find something new!”
On Tuesday, she launched a White House-sponsored ad campaign, which as the Associated Press wrote, “aims to encourage people who are unemployed or unhappy in their jobs or careers to go out and ‘find something new.’” The campaign’s splashy new website encourages people to get trained on new skills, look for an apprenticeship, or go to a vocational school or get an associate’s degree, all of which takes time, a certain level of financial resources, or both, which is hardly any help to people who are currently unemployed and panicking about finding work. (Good luck, btw, doing any of that while the coronavirus has disrupted almost all aspects of our lives.)
On Tuesday, during a livestreamed roundtable with IBM chairwoman Ginni Rometty, Apple CEO Tim Cook, and others, Ivanka proclaimed that people just “lack sufficient awareness” of the jobs available to those without college degrees. “We have to stop telling students and workers that this is the only option,” she said, without acknowledging that even pre-pandemic, most new jobs were going to those with bachelor’s degrees or higher.
It’s certainly interesting timing to announce an initiative like this in the midst of a pandemic that has led to alarmingly high levels of unemployment, one in which her father’s administration is actively opposing the continuation of one of the few federal programs—expanded unemployment benefits—that has actually helped American workers get by.
Which is not to say that the idea of training people for jobs that are in demand is a bad idea—but in practice, it’s much, much more complicated than just slapping together a pretty new website and rolling out a PR campaign. And the Trump administration, while touting job training and giving out a measly $100 million for apprenticeship programs, has at the same time pushed for massive cuts to the Department of Labor’s existing training programs.
But for Ivanka, the solution isn’t a more robust federal response, or turning the jobs that are available but currently extremely shitty into good jobs with decent benefits and wages—it’s for all of us to take the reins and improve our circumstances through our own pluck and initiative. “There has never been a more critical time for Americans of all ages and backgrounds to be aware of the multiple pathways to career success and gain the vocational training and skills they need to fill jobs in a changing economy,” Ivanka told the Associated Press.
During the virtual roundtable, Ivanka also touted her daddy’s utter mismanagement of the pandemic. “The Trump administration continues to put Americans first in everything we do,” she said.
Ivanka, attuned as always to people’s economic pain and suffering!