COLUMN LEFT/ GEORGE McGOVERN : ‘Good’ Jobs Start at the Entry Level : In improving workers’ skills for better jobs, don’t ignore the people who lack basic skills.

“Jobs, jobs, jobs, McJobs, good-paying jobs, dead-end jobs, job training, job retraining.” Over the next few weeks and well into 1993, the public will be inundated with recommendations on how to get more Americans working and for good wages in the bargain.

Implicit in many of the current news stories is a concern that the quality of America’s work force is declining. Reviving the economy has been inextricably linked with competing ideas on how to create “good jobs” and how to fill them with qualified employees.

Unfortunately, there is no agreement on the basics. How do we fund better training for better employees for better jobs? Should business pay a tax to finance the cost of post-high school training? Should government pick up the slack left by parents who fail to keep their kids in school or by schools that fail to teach? Too often, the debate about job training is focused on what the government should do or require to provide job training.

All these discussions overlook an important question: How do those who are the least likely to be employed ever become part of the American work force?

Over the years, I’ve provided “entry-level” work to a variety of people, many of whom were overqualified for their positions. Answering telephones and sorting mail at little more than the minimum wage may not be what people envision as a first job after graduating from college. Yet congressional offices are flooded with degreed applicants because they recognize that the experience of working “on the Hill”--no matter what they do there--can be invaluable as a stepping stone to other opportunities where their college degrees may be required, but where work experience separates them from everyone else.

Similarly, when I was in the restaurant-hotel business, I knew that serving food, tending bar and changing linens were not considered long-term careers by many of my employees. Yet these jobs are great ways to get started in the industry or, in fact, in any industry. (In a recent national survey of waiters and waitresses, most agreed that their work as tipped employees in the hospitality industry was helpful in teaching skills that could be used in other types of employment.)

The current debate over a work force trained for better jobs is focused on improving skills for careers that demand improved talents, such as computer programming. Far less attention is paid to increasing the availability of jobs that many unskilled people need simply as a port of entry into the world of work. We forget too often that a job--any job--is often the best training for a “better” or more specialized job.

Historically, our country has had an abundance of entry-level positions that gave people the chance to learn more important (and more universal) skills than hammering a nail straight or booting a computer. Workplace social skills that many of us take for granted, such as taking direction, being a self-starter and decision-making, are desperately needed in our work force. Too many young people do not seem to learn these basic skills in school and have no role models at home to teach them. If you think this is exaggeration, ask someone who hires young people.

For many employees, an entry-level job is the only opportunity to learn about the workplace. Poor language skills, illiteracy and the inability to show up for work regularly keep many people from advancing beyond a basic wage. Yet, some of these entry-level jobs may be the only work that is available to keep someone from total welfare dependency.

Unfortunately, many entry-level jobs are being phased out as employment costs grow faster than productivity. In that situation, employers are pressured to replace marginal employees with self-service or automation or to eliminate the service altogether. When these jobs disappear, where will young people and those with minimal skills get a start in learning the “invisible curriculum” we all learn on the job? The inexperienced applicant cannot learn about work without a job. This is the worst Catch-22 there is.

As we debate the definition of “good jobs” and how to train people to fill them, we cannot afford to ignore the bottom of the ladder and the need to preserve the first rungs for people to climb. Without a sufficient focus on the creation of entry-level work, employment-based learning opportunities will become an endangered species in the marketplace.

When we look at entry-level work, too often we view it only in terms of a paycheck. We should not fall into the trap of valuing only what we can count.