The job market should be considered as interaction between supply and demand, and not from the perspective of new and emerging occupations. Three recent major post-World War II changes in the human resources posture have tended to create labor surpluses: shift from rural South to urban North, increased number of working women, and the postwar baby boom, whose high school dropout led to a youth unemployment problem and whose college graduates created an even greater labor surplus. Several theories attempt to explain the tightening job market and overeducation of Americans and elimination of jobs by automation and technology. A decrease in the country's birthrate pattern will lead to a shortage of human resources in the eighties. A principle of the job market is that two of three job openings are replacing someone leaving an existing position. The third job opens up due to growth, and only a small proportion are in new and emerging occupations. The fastest growing jobs will not require a four-year college education. An examination of the spring 1980 "Occupational Outlook Quarterly" shows that new occupations will account for only a small part of the job openings in the next decade. Most jobs will be in the replacment market. (YLB)