BoomerD
No Lifer
- Feb 26, 2006
- 62,899
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I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
This is about the same way I feel about the subject.
FUCK the rest of the world. '
I only care about the American economy, because it's the one I live in.
Let the rest of the world take care of their own.
:thumbsup:
These countries that are taking US jobs via outsourcing need to develop their own industries and economies, instead of leaching off the US economy.
As for the H1B workers, it's fine to bring them in for jobs that we can't fill here, but sadly, the corporations are bringing them in, then getting rid of US workers because the H1B folks are cheaper labor. THAT should be a crime.
Might some of the folks here on H1B visas become citizens? Sure, but they should NOT be here if there are Americans who could do the job, or be trained to do the job.
America has gone from being a country "Of the people, by the people, and for the people,"
to a country "Of the corporations, by the corporations, and FOR the corporations."
Maybe it's time for the PEOPLE to take their country back.
You may live in the US but most of the goods you buy are not made there, so you should care.
A point could be made that the USA needs to develop its own manufacturing base instead of leaching off low cost developing nations.
I'm in favour of communism too....only I prefer the true communism that has no governing body. Just think of it, no politicians....my oh my what a dream.
I'm gonna head out too, I'll prob check out this thread tomorrow sometime and it'll have some interesting arguments, and hopefully someone takes up my point of view.
Engineer
Elite Member
- Oct 9, 1999
- 39,234
- 701
- 126
Your point was once a reality, until the investor class discovered cheap, foreign labor and the fact that they could make a quick buck off of it. They then proceeded to persuade the US consumer that they could save money by having basic goods and services made by that cheap, foreign (sometimes slave) labor.
I would love for the US to develop it's own manufacturing base on basic goods again. 98% of shoes and 96% of clothing that we wear are now made outside the US. If we were to collapse or piss off enough outside countries, we would go naked. Maybe with the high cost of fuel (and going higher) and rising labor rates in other countries PLUS the weakening dollar (making it much cheaper relatively speaking to manufacturer goods here), maybe some of the US manufacturing of old will return.
I saw a chart once that gave the seven steps of decline of EVERY empire in history that has fallen (they all eventually fell)...Step #6 was using the conquered and slave labor of other lands to provide you with goods and services. Well, by that definition, the US is at step #6 ......
History may not repeat itself, but I wouldn't bet against it. Sitting around beating your chest and saying "America, fuck yea!!!" isn't going to get it done. We all can't just sell stuff to each other....we need to be producers, not consumers. We're quickly becoming consumers and I guess that works as long as the rest of the world takes our toilet paper dollars.....
One big point was completely forgotten about in this thread is the trade deficit. We are importing nearly 1 trillion dollars worth of items/barbies/junk more than we are selling to the rest of the world. Those dollars need to find their way home at some point and they surely are. The rest of the world are buying our capital assets while we buy Barbie from them. Middle Eastern countries are buying our corporations and "real" assets at a fast pace and China is doing the same. According to CNBC, the rest of the world is buying our assets at a pace of 1% faster than we are buying theirs so US ownership of hard assets is shrinking by 1% per year. Sure, others will say "Japan was doing this also but they failed". Well, China and the REST of the world isn't a small Japan. China and India have vast amounts of DIRT CHEAP labor and could continue buying the US on trade deficit alone for decades if not more all the while adding to their income from their newly purchased hard assets. One example is that China was looking to buy US steel companies to ship the steel to China for it's own use.
All of the above is one result of outsourching/offshoring our jobs and bringing in the resulting goods from other countries. Pretty damn sad really....
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
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- 91
I'm not sure that most Americans hate it but those who do view it (rightfully) as a threat to their economic well being and to the quality of their life.
Have you ever studied basic microeconomics? Do you remember what happens when the supply of a good increases dramatically relative to the demand for that good? The price point decreases. Now try to imagine what would happen if 2.4 billion people (India + China) willing to work for far lower wages were added to the U.S. labor market (about 306 million) while maintaining a relatively constant demand for labor (business capital, overall economic activity, etc.). You get a huge increase in the supply + static demand = what for wages (the price point)? Drop in wages and working conditions, etc. (Duh.)
Basically, the wealthy who own the capital are able to pay their workers lower wages, keeping a larger share of workers' contribution to the act of wealth production for themselves. The rich get richer, the middle class gets poorer.
To sum it up for a bumper sticker:
Foreign Outsourcing: Exporting American prosperity. Importing third world poverty. One lost job at a time.
To learn more about foreign outsourcing and also the very closely related issues of foreign work visas (import labor to displace Americans and lower wages) and mass immigration (import labor to displace Americans and lower wages while causing a population explosion that increases the strain on the environment and real estate prices) you should read up on Global Labor Arbitrage
Value and importance are relative. Of value to whom? Important for whom? In an American context the proper question is, "What makes an American more important than someone from another country?"
Answer: The well being of other Americans affects your well-being and if you are an American you could potentially be directly affected by these issues.
If a psychopathic murderer sets up shop in your town and starts hacking up other people in your town, why should you care? Because he could hack up someone you care about and potentially you. Likewise, if you are an American and American jobs are being sent offshore (or filled by foreigners on work visas or being taken by immigrants) it could be your job or career that is next. Even if you think your job is safe, you could still be affected by increased competition as displaced and unemployed and underemployed Americans rush to obtain the qualifications needed to work in your field, perhaps offering to do your job for less money.
Also, you have an interest in having a healthy American economy and society because you live in it. Did it ever occur to you that there might be a relationship between crime, unemployment, and the state of the economy? Might more people resort to crime if more people become desperate? Do you have an interest in your own personal safety?
Have you paid your taxes lately? Did it occur to you that if we had fewer poor people that perhaps the government would need less of your tax money to provide health care, public education, housing, and criminal justice (prisons, etc.)?
It's easy to brush off the welfare of other Americans until your own welfare is affected. Will your job and career be next?
The issue is, as an American, is it in your rational selfish interest for other Americans to have jobs generated by the American economy? Should you be concerned about your own interests or would you be willing to sacrifice yourself for the sake of the poor in other countries?
My position is that people in other countries need to structure their governments, economies, social policies, and societies so that they generate their own jobs and build their own internal economy (what a concept) instead of having to beg and hope for jobs generated by the economies of other countries.
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
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Please...please tell the American masses what this magical field is! A field where a nearly limitless amount of people can work (and presumably be able to afford a middle class or at least lower middle class lifestyle)?
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
- 91
Because when that person takes your job, he removes himself from the market of people looking for jobs that you might also want to take. Also, possibly, when he quits his old job that job opens up for another American (potentially you or one of your competitors).
In contrast, when the job is sent to China it means that the number of people seeking jobs in the U.S. has increased by one (you) whereas the number of jobs available for people in the U.S. has decreased by one (your job that was sent to China).
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
- 91
You also have to wonder just how many oil jobs there are in Texas. Are there enough to absorb all of the displaced Americans? I doubt it.
That is hilarious.
Engineer, I hope that you aren't putting yourself at risk by posting potentially outable information (such as that info about the number of defects per million) that could put you in jeopardy.
It almost sounds like something out of Atlas Shrugged. They'll probably be able to blame the company's failures on other people or the general state of the economy and then use their connections to wealthy people to get new jobs when in reality their own performance lacks merit.
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
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Starved for "good" employees in pretty much every industry? Could you please provide a source for that wild claim?
How do you reconcile that claim with the knowledge that the United States lost about 212,000 jobs in June. (The 62,000 that were reported plus the unreported about 150,000 new jobs needed every month to keep pace with the nation's explosive population growth.)?
Right now our colleges and universities are pumping out far more graduates than the economy needs. We're producing about double the number of lawyers we need (seven years of college education) and are far more Ph.D. scientists than we need (many of whom end up working low-paid gypsy scientist positions called postdoctorates). I can't speak from personal knowledge about other fields, but presumably this is also true for MBAs as well as a great many other fields (computer programming, etc.).
Could you please name some of these industries where people are needed at middle class wages?
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
- 91
Why will those "new employment opportunities" in hot fields like biochemistry, nanotechnology, computers, or "Next Big Thing" technology go to Americans when the same work can be done for lower wages in other countries?
Saying what you said sounds good and gives people the warm 'n' fuzzies when looked at on the surface, but if you dig deeper and start asking questions about that premise it doesn't hold water.
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
- 91
Having people take the jobs on work visas and do them in the U.S. is probably preferable to foreign outsourcing since they will be spending money in the U.S. but it's still not as good as having Americans do those jobs. Also, to an extent it results in population explosion which places a higher burden on the environment and also increases the prices for real estate and natural resources (more people on the same amount of land means less land and fewer resources per person).
Furthermore, the types of jobs that people do on the work visas are often college-education-requiring knowledge-based jobs--the ones that displaced Americans are supposed to retrain for. Why should Americans invest time and money on college education for certain fields when jobs in those fields are either not available to them or suffer from now artificially depressed wages? Retrain, reeducate--for what?
Engineer
Elite Member
- Oct 9, 1999
- 39,234
- 701
- 126
I'm not worried about it in the least. It might just be time for me to find a new job anyway. They have lost 3 of the 7 people that work in my department during the last 6 months and now, with the new hiring freeze, those people can't be replaced any time soon. Currently, I'm in a position of relative power. Can I be replaced? Sure thing (Kroger taught me that one lifelong lesson). Will there be short term pain while they are replacing me? 100% without a doubt.
Thanks WhipperSnapper for the concern though. At least a few are looking out for the remaining US worker in the manufacturing sector!
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
- 91
And you're saying that there's an unlimited number of jobs available in securities trading? That almost seems equivalent to saying that there's an unlimited number of jobs available for playing the stock market or for people who can win at the casinos.
I'll confess ignorance about securities trading, but I wonder, what would happen if a huge amount of intelligent and wise people entered the field and began making only good trades? Is it possible that everyone could earn money on their trades and never lose money or do some people have to lose money on the trades so that others can make money off of them? Is the nature of securities trading win-loss or is it possible for everyone to win? If the later, then isn't that akin to having some sort of a cuckoo-cloud undertaking where wealth magically materializes out of thin air? Also, would the amount of arbitrage increase? That is to say, would the prices at which people were willing to make the good buys end up increasing as a result of a higher demand for those good buys, bringing the prices closer to their actual net present value and leaving less room for profit margins?
I find it rather incredulous that you work in this field yet would seem to have little understanding of basic economic concepts (such as the relationship between the supply of labor, the demand for labor, and wages (the price point)) and the concept of conflicts of interest among rational men. That's all you really need to understand the concept of global labor arbitrage.
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
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I wouldn't be so certain that it's really in his selfish interest or any American's selfish interest if the United States became an impoverished third world country or a South American-styled third world country. Perhaps some people and some securities traders would be wealthier since they could keep a larger fraction of a worker's contribution to the production of wealth as profit, but at what cost?
What if the end result were being wealthier but ending up as a prisoner in your own country fearing that you and/or your family will be kidnapped and held for ransom by unscrupulous members of the desperately poor masses? What if it meant having to live behind barbed wire., walls, and gates and always being accompanied by security guards while hoping that your helicopter never needs to make an emergency landing in the impoverished districts?
Also, what happens if you end up losing all of your wealth for some reason and have to join the masses (who are now impoverished)?
I think it's in the wealthy's interest to be wealthy in a safe first world America and to not be wealthier in an impoverished third world America where danger lurks behind every desperate face.
The only dilemma seen here is the task at hand to rid the U.S. of people like you and restore America to it's greatness.
As you can see there are many people working on precisely that.
Ya know it is interesting and it almost belongs in that oxymoron thread (like the pro-life pro-death penalty people being hypocrites and such).
Left leaning people are in general more worried about how the world thinks, wants more world involvement, and preaches how important everyone else is not just Americans.
But then outsource some jobs and those same people who are just as valuable as we are are all the sudden not quite so important as we are.
Left leaning people are in general more worried about how the world thinks, wants more world involvement, and preaches how important everyone else is not just Americans.
But then outsource some jobs and those same people who are just as valuable as we are are all the sudden not quite so important as we are.
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
- 91
You're committing a very common error of logic that often occurs in this debate. You're equating two very different kinds of economic phenomena--(1) global labor arbitrage and (2) technological advances and their associated productivity increases.
In the case of global labor arbitrage, wealth leaves the pockets of middle class Americans and goes to the poor in third world countries and to the wealthy who own the capital. Capital investments are made, not in the U.S., but overseas. Also, the U.S. labor force is essentially merged with the global labor force which means that wages and standard of living must decrease (applying basic principles of supply and demand).
In the case of technological advance (aka bona fide productivity increase) the money stays in the U.S. The technological advance might result in fewer jobs in a couple fields but new jobs will open up to implement the new technology (people to program and maintain the robots) and money saved in the form of lower prices and higher profits will flow into other areas of the economy to replace the jobs lost. Thus, perhaps when the candlestick makers were replaced by light bulbs and electricity new jobs became available to make light bulbs and power lines.
A technological advance might shift where jobs and capital are allocated in an insular economy but the wealth will remain internalized and the amount of labor relative to the demand for labor (or the overall amount of capital) will remain about the same. In contrast, foreign outsourcing increases the amount of labor relative to capital, decreasing the price point (wages) and standard of living for Americans.
Do you see the difference? Technological Advance and Global Labor Arbitrage are two entirely different types of economic phenomena.
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
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Germany and Japan are first world countries that pay their employees first world wages and thus they can afford to also purchase American products made with first world labor. If competition from Japan and Germany (real competition and not wage competition) were the "problem" then this entire thread wouldn't have come up as an issue.
American + Japanese + German labor market divided by American + Japanese + German capital (or demand for labor) = American labor / American capital (or demand for labor), more or less.
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
- 91
I don't know what if any newsletter Engineer subscribes to, but you might find the Zazona.com Job Destruction Newsletter to be of interest. It's pretty good though I don't take the time to read through it as much as a I should. You can find it here:
http://www.zazona.com/
For those who are interested in discussing global labor arbitrage, population explosion, and the state of the U.S. economy, I'd be interested in getting a separate discussion forum going since, as far as I know, there really isn't one for this topic. You can find it here:
http://outsourcing.yuku.com/
Well, do you want to pay $10,000 to an out-sourced call-center person or $45,000 to an AMerican call-center person? As a CEO of a company, the answer is quite clear.
Of course, if you want to pay $45,000 to an American call-center person, then to make up the increase in salary, you have to increase the price of the product, which will effect YOU, the consumer.
Of course, if you want to pay $45,000 to an American call-center person, then to make up the increase in salary, you have to increase the price of the product, which will effect YOU, the consumer.
Engineer
Elite Member
- Oct 9, 1999
- 39,234
- 701
- 126
And you've seen some large lowering of prices since the huge offshoring craze started taking place? No, the only things that you have witnessed is millions of manufacturing jobs lost to cheap, overseas labor and accumulation of wealth like no other period of time by the investor class. They aren't lowering prices, their increasing their wealth at the expense of the US worker. Maybe your job will be next to go. See if it matters how much things cost while you're looking for a job.
Engineer
Elite Member
- Oct 9, 1999
- 39,234
- 701
- 126
I say fuck them all regardless. I'm not worried about what they think and I'm sure now worried about giving American jobs away just so they can have one. It's not about giving them jobs and everyone knows it...it's about building more wealth at the expense of US jobs and exploiting cheap, slavelike labor.
And for the record, do you think the right is any better then what you say the left does? They tend to say fuck the world and what they think but tend to think that outsourcing is great and always cite the need for those people to work. Hypocracy works both ways.
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
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Fallen Angel--you're only considering the front-end of the equation. What about the conveniently ignored and less-visible back-end costs? Think of it this way. Would you rather pay current prices and keep your current wage or pay prices that are 25% lower (the front end prices that you see) while having a 40% wage decrease?
Now let's think about it on a broader scale in terms of American society. Basically, Americans can only really consume the wealth that they themselves produce because wealth doesn't grow on trees and first has to be produced before it can be consumed (unless we become pirates and pillage other people who are doing the producing).
Does it make more sense to pay the American in the call center $45,000/year and have him pay taxes or does it make more sense for him to earn $15,000/year (so his wage is competitive with those in India) and to then have the taxpayers pay for his health care and his children's public education while they also help out their relatives who have also now been reduced to $15,000/year from $45,000/year?
The issue is--are we better off having abundant middle class jobs and their corresponding insular American Free Market prices and equitable distribution of wealth between the rich, the middle class, and the poor, or would we be better off having a small percentage of the population that would be very rich while having a small middle class and a large underclass and lower prices (and social problems and a lower quality of life for most Americans and higher taxes to pay for public education and health care and more prisons, etc.)?
Would we be better off having a relatively insular American economy and a strong middle class and higher prices like the nation had in previous decades or would we be better off if we integrated ourselves with the global labor market and lived the way most people live in India, China, and Mexico (impoverished but with lower prices)?
The wealth has to be produced somewhere. Right now our nation is suffering from a massive trade deficit and we are basically purchasing goods from other countries by selling off our hard wealth--our real estate and our business capital for short term ephemeral goods and services.
A lower price is nice--but at what cost? Wealth doesn't grow on trees so ask yourself what caused the prices to decrease, who wins and who loses, and what the invisible back-end costs are. You might discover that the front-end price savings isn't worth the massive back-end costs and that at the end of the day you can't get something for nothing. The issue is whether we'll join people in other countries in living in poverty while supporting a wealthy elite or whether we'll internalize our wealth and continue to maintain an equitable distribution of wealth between the classes.
Give some thought to this while you're in the shower. What do we need to maintain a middle class standard of living in this country? Where does our wealth come from? What is the source of wealth? Is it really possible to obtain a "lower price" and to get something for nothing or do we have to produce our wealth? Should we produce wealth for ourselves or should we trade our land and our capital assets to purchase wealth other people have produced?
IMHO, Engineer is largely correct. He leaves out the part about exploiting the purchasing power and accumulated wealth of the american middle class through the instrument of debt, however.
There's a lag between the profits of outsourcing and the inevitable reduction of purchasing power among the target population. When we're all reduced to chinese working conditions and wages, then we'll have their purchasing power, too...
Meanwhile, huge federal deficits mask those effects, extend the looting spree... making the inevitable denouement even more profound and painful. Trickle-down won't sell w/o deficits, and deficits can't continue forever...
Deficits also enable the illusion on another level entirely, by soaking up excess overseas dollars, providing foreign investors with a false sense of security wrt dollar value...
Which as already gone the way of the Dodo bird- explosive oil prices haven't had the same effect on other nations, at all, because the value of their currencies adjust upward in relation to the dollar almost as fast as the price of oil (in dollars) goes up. It's really an attack on the dollar, yet is being sold as something else entirely by those who have something to lose from the truth being told...
There's a lag between the profits of outsourcing and the inevitable reduction of purchasing power among the target population. When we're all reduced to chinese working conditions and wages, then we'll have their purchasing power, too...
Meanwhile, huge federal deficits mask those effects, extend the looting spree... making the inevitable denouement even more profound and painful. Trickle-down won't sell w/o deficits, and deficits can't continue forever...
Deficits also enable the illusion on another level entirely, by soaking up excess overseas dollars, providing foreign investors with a false sense of security wrt dollar value...
Which as already gone the way of the Dodo bird- explosive oil prices haven't had the same effect on other nations, at all, because the value of their currencies adjust upward in relation to the dollar almost as fast as the price of oil (in dollars) goes up. It's really an attack on the dollar, yet is being sold as something else entirely by those who have something to lose from the truth being told...
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