Jousting for jobs is still a bloody process, hence, the acquisition of skills and information is critical to both entrants and retirees. What’s new, what’s old? Stick to the tried and tested? Or go for creative careers? What do we do with Jessica Santina’s "10 Great Careers You’ve Probably Never Heard Of?"

1. People who want jobs must value information, education, socialization. "The working class, at each step in its struggle, is brought face to face with the necessity of possessing information concerning society." [Nikolai Bukharin, "The Practical Importance of the Social Sciences"]

2. Mainstream and unconventional jobs. The Department of Labor and Employment Job Index lists anesthesiologist, cardiovascular telemetry nurse and industrial pharmacist along with faith healer, drugless treatment healer, and herbal healer.

3. Archaic jobs. In Imperial China, there were "barbarian-handlers" like Li Hongzhang of the Qing Dynasty.

4. Deadend jobs. "Sonderkom-mando means special detail. At Auschwitz it meant a very special detail indeed – one composed of prisoners whose duties were to shepherd condemned persons into gas chambers, and then to lug their bodies out. When the job was done, the members of the Sonderkom-mando were themselves killed." [Kurt Vonnegut. Mother Night. NY: Delta Trade Paperbacks, 1999, p. 7]

5. Background of heroes and heroines. The Katipuneros, their families and friends were workingmen. Nicolas De Jesus (Andres Bonifacio’s father-in-law) was a master mason and carpenter, Gregoria De Jesus did some sewing and weaving, and the Great Plebeian himself was a warehouse supervisor.

6. Definition of a profession. What do economists do? They collect indicators, maintain databases, analyze historical trends, develop models, and forecast growth, inflation, unemployment and interest rates. [Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2004-05 Edition]

7. Who makes good money? Engineers and software specialists. In India, "the average starting salary for an engineer is about US$60,000 a year. It’s ten times that in the US and Europe, where demand for software specialists far outstrips supply." [Sethuraman Dinakar, "The Star Of India, Version 2.0, CFO Asia (The Magazine For Financial Directors And Treasurers), January 2000]

8. Example of a new labor sub-stratum. In Japan, there exists the "furita, people who work part-time and without job security, either because they choose to remain independent or because companies aren’t hiring permanent staff workers." [Rebecca Mead, "Shopping Rebellion: What the kids want," The New Yorker magazine, 2002-03-18]

9. Examples of high corporate positions in a New Economy Asian firm (HiTech, a publicly listed, Singapore-based manufacturer of computer peripherals): vice-president for network maintenance and security, chief outsourcing officer, director of e-commerce. [Steven Crane, "21st Century CFO," CFO Asia, February 2000]

10. Bias in labor regulations. "Whenever the legislature attempts to regulate the differences between masters and their workmen, its counselors are always the masters. When the regulation, therefore, is in favor of the workmen, it is always just and equitable; but it is sometimes otherwise when in favor of the masters." [Adam Smith. Wealth of Nations. Volume 1, Book 2. 1776]

11. The true cause of the OFW phenomenon? "One of the special features of imperialism, connected with the facts I am describing, is the decline in emigration from imperialist countries and the increase in immigration into these countries from the more backward countries where lower wages are paid." [Lenin, "Parasitism And Decay Of Capitalism," 1916]

12. The fasting-feasting cycle is vicious. ""One thing stood out clearly before my eyes: It was the sudden changes from work to idleness and vice versa; so that the constant fluctuations thus caused by earnings and expenditure finally destroyed the ‘sense of thrift’ for many people and also the habit of regulating expenditure in an intelligent way." [Adolf Hitler. Mein Kampf. 1934. Translated into English by James Murphy. 1939]

13. Are Filipinos bad workers? Lazy? No, said Rizal. In fact, indolence was an "effect of misgovernment" and "a corollary derived from the lack of stimulus and of vitality."

14. Government is responsible for labor. "In a dynamic economy, if jobs are lost in one sector, new jobs are being created in another. Government’s role is to facilitate the movement of labor from one to the other. It is a primary responsibility of government to maintain full employment." [Joseph E. Stiglitz, Nobel laureate in economics, Professor of Economics at Columbia University and ex-Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to President Clinton and Chief Economist and Senior Vice President at the World Bank, "Protectionism Made in the USA," April 2002, Project Syndicate 1995-2006]

15. No substitute for self-help. "The people are led to expect or demand that the government do more for them, without showing much readiness to change their own ways. This does not help the cause of development, as planning in a stagnant and poor society must aim at getting people to rationalize their attitudes and, in particular, to work harder to improve their lot." [Gunnar Myrdal. Asian Drama: An Inquiry into the Poverty of Nations. An Abridgement by Seth S. King of the Twentieth Century Fund Study. New York: The Twentieth Century Fund Study, 1971, p. 140]

16. Labor as the true source of value. "Labor must be directed towards the external, natural world in order to create food, clothing and shelter, along with other things...This means that human beings, in order to live, have no choice but to create things through labor." [Hajime Kawakami, 1928]

17. Everybody should work. "As Gandhi said, the poor of the world cannot be helped by mass production, only production by the masses." [E.F. Schumacher. Small is Beautiful: A Study of Economics as if People Mattered. London: Vintage Books, 1993]

In today’s world, it may not be enough to say that "those who do not work shall not eat." Competition is keen among the 200-plus economies straddling both sides of the Equator. Filipinos are not only racing with one billion Indians and 1.6 billion Chinese, they are also confronted with non-renewable resources like space and time.