America RIP -- great article

[Dulanic]

My wife worked at a bank and Bank of America (BAC) hired people in india to review all the checks with some kind of a system on their network. I think this is going too far. To think someone in another country has access to your financial records is a bit much. At every turn we are outsourcing jobs. Solar panels made in China? Electric Car Charging stations made in India. This is what we got from the Green Industry. Everything is made in another country.

We need to do something to bring back jobs to America. Other countries are doing this!

Most fortune 500 companies outsource to India. Specifically to Gurgaon India. Even fucking HR is outsourced a lot of the time now... how fucking sad is that.

People say we are becoming a "service" company, but that is what is being outsourced now. First they got our manufacturing to China now our services are going to India.

 

[rudder]

Surely this was obvious to everyone and their grandmother. Replacing low-tech manufacturing jobs with high-tech jobs only works if you actually plan for them and work to make it happen. They don't just materialise out of thin air. And while everyone was very keen to move their jobs offshore, nobody wanted to consider the other side of the coin - that those jobs needed to be replaced with their high-tech counterparts.

The U.S. still manufacturers more in dollar value every year than any other nation... even way more than China. It is just that you don't need 50,000 people to build a $200 million jet, or other expensive heavy equipment. There is plenty of high tech manufacturing in the U.S.... you just don't need a lot of people to create a lot of value.

When someone in China is making $1/day to sew t-shirts... you can't really compete with that in our economy. A natural progression is to see those jobs move to a more underdeveloped nation.

There are still industries investing in American labor. There is a new Volkswagen plant that opened up in Tennessee.

The problem I see is the U.S. government is allowing China to kill that middle tier manufacturing. Things like solar panels for instance. Solyndra went out of business because the Chinese are dumping uber cheap products on the market. And you can see by the actions of the Chinese who they want in office... Obama. as long as China keeps their currency low and products cheap... it will be tough.

 

[hal2kilo]

Part of the problem is pushing young people to go to college, the other problem is working conditions and lack of benefits in the blue collar industry.

If the welding field offered better benefits, I would consider going back. But why should I have to work 50 - 70 hours a week? Its good money, but what about time with my family and time to do what I want?

4 days off a month is no way to live. Sometimes I did not get a day off in 6 weeks. Screw that.

The lack of respect i.e. real wages, for physical labor is a disgrace. God, forbid that we rebuild the absolutely crumbling infrastructure in this country. But, we can't have people of average intelligence earning a living wage. Got to keep them below me cause I'm such a smarty pants technical professional.

My ego just can't handle it.

 

[Auric]

Yeah, it is a sadly common misconception that U.S. manufacturing has been in decline. Rather, production value has doubled in the last thirty years while reducing labour by a third. It is generally safer, cleaner, and more technical -particularly managing machines, while producing higher quality.

Olde timey physically intensive labour is not particularly desirable by any criteria. As an extreme illustration: rocks can be broken down with sledgehammers (a la classic prison labour) and doing so would certainly employ many people but it does not make any sense. That is particularly true when everyone shares a common interest in each others' health.