The revolving door from political operative to opinion writer is a disservice to journalism. Even after assuming private sector status on the op-ed page, it's hard to take former Clinton adviser Dick Morris or former Bush speech writer William McGurn seriously as independent voices about ideas. When I see an editorial column by someone who was either recently or currently is a government employee, I usually skip it and look for the news coverage on the same subject.
That said, Mr. McGurn's Wall Street Journal column today on how young workers can reach the middle class without college was a timely and interesting look at the diversity of the U.S. economy and its ladders to success.
The column is mostly a nice plug for the economic research of American University's Robert Lerman and Georgetown's Harry Holzer, who crunched the numbers and found jobs that pay substantially more than the national average and don't require a four-year college degree.
Pointing out how skilled tradesmen such as power plant operators and physical therapists can still make decent wages in the U.S. was a novel way of looking at the bright side on a holiday that often brings gloom and doom formulations about economic divides, outsourcing, dreams dying and so on.
Quasi-journalists like McGurn are among the most difficult to get ideas in front of - but also the most high value once you've done it.
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