Keep your unemployment between 6% and 12%

[casssnider]

I am working on my second city and I am attempting to build an industrial powerhouse. I have got it up to 75,000 population with almost no offices and the bare necessity of commercial zoning. Almost everybody works in industry, in jobs that they are over qualified for. The key to accomplishing this has been maintaining a high unemployment rate. I wait until my unemployment rate hits 12%, then I zone industrial. It takes a little while to fill the new jobs and I get messages that there are not enough workers but the jobs do get filled before the factories are abandoned. Once my unemployment hits 6% I stop zoning and wait for my population to grow. When unemployment hits 12% I start zoning again.

Even if you are not trying to build an industrial city this is still a good method to ensure that the farms on the outskirts of your town don't get abandoned. I have seen many people complain that their low level industry gets abandoned because they don't have any uneducated workers. Cims will take jobs that they are over qualified for but they will leave them at the drop of a hat for a better opportunity. And when your population drops, farms, forestry and level one industry are the first things to get abandoned. But if you maintain at least 6% unemployment you can sustain a drop in your population level with out any abandoned industry.

 

[JimmiG]

Yep, this is pretty much how it works in the real world too. Unemployment needs to be kept at a certain level, so that people will take (and keep) jobs they don't actually want, or are over-qualified for.

A worker shortage (more jobs than workers available) would mean that employees could pick and choose what job they wanted, and start to demand more benefits and higher wages. Good for 99.9% of the people, but terrible for the economy and global competitiveness of the country.

 

[Freedon]

What about not providing any education (especially no universities) in your city at all? Should help to avoid the abandoning. Never tried it though, cuz it feels too silly for me ^^

 

[IVIaarten]

I normally try to keep my supply of education a bit under the demand. This makes it so that not everyone gets educated (or at least they get educated slower), and it seems to favor the cims who live close to the school. With this I can keep my farms and forestry industry filled with lower unemployment levels. It also gives some nice difference in looks between the neighborhoods (education being one of the requirements for higher levels).

My regular industry I just level up to lvl 3 to get them to employ higher educated cims (and generate more jobs to begin with). Ore and Oil already require higher educated people, so it's only really an issue for farming/forestry.

 

[DCT1080]

Why not also make sure that your industrial zones are really well provided for with all the services and transport, even parks, so that your industrial levels up and there are less jobs requiring uneducated workers and thus less waiting time for cims to take a job they are over qualified for?

 

[ReginaRC]

I prefer leveling my generic industry so they need more educated Cims but I also have timber and farming that are fully stocked with over-qualified Cims and I didn't need to keep a horribly high unemployment rate to do that. Yes, it takes longer for the jobs to get filled but ultimately they do. Most of the time my unemployment is between 0% and 3%. High unemployment also has the side effect of causing Cims to leave town because they can't find jobs. If jobs are available, no matter what level, they will usually take those instead of leaving.

 

[Kingman]

Personally i prefer to keep Cims at 3-6% unemployment, with university students serving as "transition"

 

[EvilTom]

I am working on my second city and I am attempting to build an industrial powerhouse. I have got it up to 75,000 population with almost no offices and the bare necessity of commercial zoning. Almost everybody works in industry, in jobs that they are over qualified for. The key to accomplishing this has been maintaining a high unemployment rate. I wait until my unemployment rate hits 12%, then I zone industrial. It takes a little while to fill the new jobs and I get messages that there are not enough workers but the jobs do get filled before the factories are abandoned. Once my unemployment hits 6% I stop zoning and wait for my population to grow. When unemployment hits 12% I start zoning again.

Even if you are not trying to build an industrial city this is still a good method to ensure that the farms on the outskirts of your town don't get abandoned. I have seen many people complain that their low level industry gets abandoned because they don't have any uneducated workers. Cims will take jobs that they are over qualified for but they will leave them at the drop of a hat for a better opportunity. And when your population drops, farms, forestry and level one industry are the first things to get abandoned. But if you maintain at least 6% unemployment you can sustain a drop in your population level with out any abandoned industry.

I completely agree. This has been my strategy for a while. I try to aim for 10%. Glad to see other people are doing the same.

0% unemployment or empty jobs would be destructive to a real life economy and in game. I can still maintain residential demand even with 10% unemployment, so I don't have a problem. To be honest as well the statistics aren't detailed enough and need the different education level's employment stats, or the show you the number of over educated workers. That would be helpful, not some kind of overarching unemployment stat.

 

[Kingman]

I would prefer if the the stats showed students as a separate jobs and showed stats in a more "economically realistic way"


Something like (example in brackets)

Working age adults (1100)
Total jobs (1000)
Jobs fulfilled (900)
Working age students such as university students (100)
Truly Unemployed, people who are not studying(but could) and are working age (100)

And then Unemployment as a 10%

 

[ReginaRC]

I would prefer if the the stats showed students as a separate jobs and showed stats in a more "economically realistic way"


Something like (example in brackets)

Working age adults (1100)
Total jobs (1000)
Jobs fulfilled (900)
Working age students such as university students (100)
Truly Unemployed, people who are not studying(but could) and are working age (100)

And then Unemployment as a 10%

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're saying here but students don't show up as unemployed since they're in school and not available for work. How many students are currently in Uni is on the education tab.

 

[Kingman]

Yes i know that information is there


But you have that population tab that says "jobs avaliable" "jobs fulffilled" and "population"


I would like to have that information i mentioned in that post in there aswell. It would make management of the economy, particulary of the job market, much easier.

I would even add a small counter for the jobs fulfilled where after that number, the number of overqualified and underquilified jobs are also mentioned.

It would make everything much clearer and would also clear a lot of the problems people seem to be "having" with underemployed industrys, when it´s just a consequence of poor information


Basically show the information in that tab in a "economic" kind of way which would make things much clearer

 

[ReginaRC]

Thanks for explaining! Yes, I could see that as being helpful. I've been pining for unemployment numbers to be broken down by education level. It'd be extremely helpful to know exactly how many Cims are uneducated, etc.