Slashdot Log In
The Jobs Crunch
Posted by
michael
on Sat Sep 25, 2004 02:05 AM
from the not-steve-jobs dept.
from the not-steve-jobs dept.
randall_burns writes "Neither major party is accurately describing or combatting the Jobs Crunch that Americans are facing. Bad immigration policy-and bad trade deals are combining to decimate the middle class in America."
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
All I know is... (Score:5, Interesting)
These are NOT good times...although Bush would have us believe otherwise.
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Funny)
A recession is when someone you know is out of work.
A depression is when you are out of work.
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Then do it. Every two days, set up a profitable business employing others. You will be incredibly wealthy and give many people who want jobs a place to work. Or was that just more right-wing bullshit -- the kind of unsubstantiated thing that Rush Limbaugh or Bill O'Reilly says because it sounds good but isn't really true at all?
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh wait. First I need money to pay for an office to hold my new employees. Plus, I'll need money to pay for the employees. And I'll need money for whatever supplies are needed for these employees to do their jobs (computers, products, etc).
Oh, and then I'll need time finding the place to rent, supplies and employees. In addition, I'll need time to plan out what business I'm going into, as well as strategy to make it profitable.
Hm. Yeah, that ain't happening in 2 business days even given my full weekend head start. I might be able to muster up enough grocery money in 2 days, not enough money to start a business.
Did you really think about this comment before you posted it? I think you meant it takes two days for a rich person to set up a profitable business, with the previous months spent in planning.
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Funny)
Step 2: Wait 2 days.
Step 3: ????
Step 4: Profit!!
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Informative)
A depression is when you lose yours.
Yeah, good saying.
Let me add what Reagan said in 1980: "A recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his." (sorry, I'm really a Democrat.)
But just so you know, there is actually a big difference. In a recession, the value of the dollar in your pocket goes DOWN. In a depression, the value of the dollar in your pocket goes UP. It's astounding how few [people|economists] know this.
You think inflation is bad? Try deflation, the oppostite, when prices go down.
Loans are defaulted, because people suddenly owe more, and can't pay. Interest rates go up, since cash itself is more likely to increase in value than an investment. You're used to getting raises, to keep up with inflation... how would you like it if your boss gave you a timely drop in salary, to keep up with the drop in the cost of living? That's deflation, and it happened during the last US depression in the 30s. There has not been a depressed economy since then (possibly excepting New Zealand and Finland.)
A recession is not a small depression.
yo.
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Informative)
Japan was depressed economy just a few years ago. Here is a brief of Japan's economy from the economist:
Japan's economic slump began with a stockmarket crash in 1989; persistent deflation then lowered wages and discouraged investment. For years the Bank of Japan took a passive approach before aggressively boosting the money supply to keep the yen weak in February 2003. That, combined with cost-cutting by Japanese exporters, has led to a rise in business profits and in the stockmarket. The government now believes it can halt deflation by 2006 (the OECD disagrees). Some companies have been able to clean up their debt, banks are looking healthier, and there are even signs that consumer spending, low during the slump, might rise again.
In the long run, however, Japan needs reforms: an ageing population will shrink productivity, raise health-care costs and further burden the costly public pension system (though some economists have argued that Japan's public debt--161% of GDP in 2003--is not as crippling as it looks). Junichiro Koizumi, the prime minister, promised painful economic reforms in 2001, but his efforts have been half-hearted. Reformed and galvanised, Japan's unproductive service industries could take up the slack of future economic slowdowns and lessen the burden on export-led manufacturing.
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Interesting)
Being jobless is rough though, and very unfortunate if it hits both wage earners in a household.
Personally, I think Kerry needs to give out specifics on how he expects to fix things. It just seems to me that he's hedging, he still hasn't offered real solutions during his campaign. I do seriously want to vote Kerry, but it seems that the best argument for doing so is that he's "not Bush".
If someone does have a clear statement on Kerry's proposed economic policy, I'd like to read it. Seriously.
Parent
All you know is nothing... (Score:5, Informative)
In 1933...
When FDR entered office the unemployment rate was 25%, with an underemployment rate of 50%. He had to close the banks to stop from them from failing. Germany that year would appoint an austrian named Adolf Hitler as their leader. Veterans the previous year had rioted in washington. If you want to make the argument that FDR had prolonged the depression through bad policies...you can make that argument but calling the economy of 1933 "a routine recession" is idiocy.
Second of all the relocation camps didnt happen until TEN YEARS LATER in the middle of a little conflict called "world war II".
Other than not knowing anything about history, economics, or politics the author of this comment seems relatively well informed.
Parent
Re:All you know is nothing... (Score:5, Insightful)
When FDR entered office the unemployment rate was 25%, with an underemployment rate of 50%. [...] calling the economy of 1933 "a routine recession" is idiocy.
No it's NOT! I heard it on Rush Limbaugh and again on Fox News so it MUST be true!
Parent
Nice flamebait re: FDR (Score:5, Insightful)
the depression's very high unemployment rate by
instituting SS, and work programs like CCC and WPA
that provided a public benefit. He did not make
lies, half-truths, and political doublespeak
an Executive Branch SOP. He did not slash
corporate taxes, and the tax rate of the very
wealthiest Americans, and then shift the tax
burdeon onto the backs of the shrinking
middle class. FDR did not encourage the flight
of American jobs overseas because "what's good
for General Motors is good for America". FDR
did not open the floodgates of illegal
immigration into this country to force wages
lower.
George W. Bush has done all these things, and
more. It is pretty sad when the only decent
paying jobs available to unemployed Americans
is to drive a truck through Iraqi free fire
zones. The high point of Bush's "job creation"
record was 135,000 new jobs in a month -- which
unfortunately doesn't even cover students from
high school or college entering the job market,
let alone those unemployed. Bush has embraced
"corporate national socialism", and abandoned
the working class. From all reliable accounts,
one of the Bush administration's top policy
goals was the invasion of Iraq, from before his
inauguration. All the lies and doublespeak that
was employed (WMD, terror links, and "imminent
threat" were cobbled together and used after
9/11/2001 as cover for this war. Each have
proved to be false. The Bush "war plank" was
an agenda hidden from the voters in 2000 by
such promises as "no foreign wars", "no nation-
building", etcetera, all while planning for
Saddam's ouster. Bush mismanagement of the
war in Iraq, and of domestic policy decisions,
have been equally disasterous to this country,
with the sole exception of the GOP-aligned
multinational corporations. George W. Bush
spoke the truth (finally) at a Washington,DC
fundraiser when he said "the HAVE's and the
HAVE MORE's are my base (constituency)".
If this country should be cursed with yet another
George W. Bush term of office, do not expect that
there will be any improvements in job growth,
health care, international relations, or the
war in Iraq. Do expect more tax cuts for the
corporations and wealthiest 2% of taxpayers.
Do expect SS and Medicare to be gutted, as Bush
finds new ways to drive the country deeper into
debt. Do expect greater loss of personal freedom
in this country, as "Patriot Act" extensions
are subverted to crush political opposition.
Do expect Bush to continue promoting religious
organizations as the only source of welfare
and social assistance. Do expect America's
open borders to continue to encourage illegal
immigration, because America's businesses
want ever cheaper labor.
Parent
All I know is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Wake up, people.
Don't blame "bad immigration", or "globalization", blame YOURSELVES for being COMPLACENT !
This world we live in is increasingly interconnected. Whatever we'd seen playing in the halls of UN 20 or 30 years ago today is playing right at our doorsteps - and that is, we aren't compete against other Americans for our own survival, but against THE WORLD !
Yes, globalization goes both ways. While the third world countries are whinning about "Developing world conspire to re-colonize us", we, who live in FIRST WORLD COUNTRIES, must realize that while those sons-of-bitches are whinning, their cheaper labor is taking away our jobs.
Usually, we single-minded Americans will yell and shout and demand our "representatives" to "DO SOMETHING" - which, more than always, mean "closing our borders", "stop outsourcing" etc, which in itself WILL NOT WORK ANYMORE IN THIS WORLD WE ARE LIVING.
Instead of closing up, we SHOULD be OPENING UP EVEN MORE, and yes, that means, we should roll up our sleeves and COMPETE AGAINST THE CHEAPEST LABOR IN BANGLADESH, by using OUR BRAIN.
Our plush lifestyle is at threat. If we don't do something, our high cost of living ain't gonna last. We gotta figure out ways to be BOTH the CHEAPEST COUNTRY IN THE WORLD TO DO SOMETHING, and THE COUNTRY WHERE WE CAN LIVE In WHATEVER LIFESTYLE WE WANT.
I am saying this base on my experience of a guy who have traveled and worked in all over the world. I am not that type of "Americans" who coccoon himself in the "protection of Uncle Sam". Rather, I go out into the WORLD and see what's going on, and btw, making money at it.
Yep, there are people in the third world countries who will accuse me of "exploitation", but I don't mind. If they won't let me exploit them, then they won't get jobs. It's that simple.
And then, there are Americans who accuse me of "exporting jobs to other countries". Again, I don't mind.
You see, if I can't make a toaster oven in America under U$ 2.25, then I won't make money selling them not only in America, but also all over the world. I gotta find the CHEAPEST PLACE IN THE WORLD to do what I need to do, and if that means doing it OUTSIDE AMERICA, I'll do it in a jiffy.
In the same token, the money I earned, I sent back to my good ol' U. S. of A. for safekeeping. No matter how I like the world outside America, America is still my country.
To to those who want to close our borders - please don't buy any clothing, any furniture, any electrical appliances, any thing, in fact, because 90% of them are MADE OUTSIDE America !
You can close the border to "immigrant, but you can't stop those things from coming in. It's us, the Americans, who demand CHEAP but QUALITY goods, so something gotta give.
Until the day you realize you can't live the way you did, you wouldn't understand which world we are living in, my friend.
Parent
Tariffs make things BETTER, not worse (Score:5, Insightful)
This economic treason by the elites all started decades ago when they shipped out our advanced manufacturing jobs to Japan. Advanced manufacturing jobs are not assembly jobs, but more like fabrication jobs. See this article for more info. [pushhamburger.com]
Now they are doing the same thing to office work (like software, financial etc) that they did to advanced manufacturing. But we office workers are more able to stop them this time, mainly because we have some access to the media via the internet and boards like Slashdot.
Tariffs do make things worse, but only for the upper income group. For the average working person, tariffs are good.
Let me ask you something: if free trade is so good for lowering prices, then why is an average car costing more of the average salary now than it did 25 years ago? For more details on this check out Marshall Brain's Concentration of Wealth blog [blogspot.com].
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Informative)
The economy is strong, it's getting stronger [miami.com]
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Interesting)
I can guarantee you if a Democrat gets in again you'll be sliding deeper and deeper.
You know, your post would be much more impressive if it showed a single policy of Clinton's which Bush changed in the name of fiscal responsibility. I have not heard about any, myself.
On that note, where were the Republican votes stopping Clinton's policies? Looking back, I remember the Republicans in congress being pretty quiet those 8 years, except when the whole Monica thing came out.
I'm not going to debate beliefs, just throwing in my 2 cents. I don't like either party. I especially don't like paying over $200 Billion dollars to invade Iraq and make everyone hate us at the same time.
Being hated globally is not condusive to future peace and prosperity at home.
Parent
Holy crap (Score:5, Informative)
I can guarantee you if a Democrat gets in again you'll be sliding deeper and deeper.
Almost four years later you're still trying to blame Clinton? And what are we sliding deeper into? When Clinton was president the economy was booming, people had jobs, we had a budget surplus. America was a lot stronger under Clinton than it is under Bush. If Clinton was running against Bush then dubya wouldn't have a chance.
I will say this, though. This time around we can blame the supreme court. But if Americans actually elect that idiot, then we deserve what we get the next four years.
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Informative)
That's not correct. From http://www.snopes.com/science/stats/unemploy.htm [snopes.com]
Although this belief is widespread and has at times been reported as factual in the mainstream media, the truth of the matter is that unemployment statistics are gathered through a process of sampling a representative number of households; they are not arrived by counting the number of unemployment insurance claims made during a particular month. Data collected in the Current Population Survey (CPS), a monthly survey of over 60,000 households, is used for this purpose. From this data, an extrapolation is made about the unemployment status of the country as a whole.
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Check the date on that one. IIRC Bush changed how the government collects it's data by purposefully underfunding and cutting certain unemployment tracking programs.
Let's face it - the gang in power is just a bunch of "Cheap Labor Republicans." They are gunning for your job because it can be done cheaper somewhere else. These guys make money by keeping labor costs down, not by a a booming economy that benefits you or yours. Catch a clue.
Political Reality Redacted
Several months ago I watched Joe Hough, President of the Faculty and William E. Dodge Professor of Social Ethics at the Union Theological Seminary, speak on Bill Moyers "Now" and I was immediately impressed by both his passion as well as the following statement that he made:
HOUGH: The growing gap between the rich and the poor which has become almost obscene by anybody's standards, and the stated intentional policy of bankrupting the government so that in the future there'll be no money for anything the federal government would decide to do. http://www.pbs.org/now/printable/transc...print.ht ml [pbs.org]
Now some of you may be thinking that the above statement is somewhat extreme, and I used to wonder about that myself. But the statement haunted me. The reality is that some of what our current government is doing only makes sense if you consider "bankrupting the government" their actual goal. Have they not reduced taxes for the top 1%? Have they not also run a record deficit? When is a tax cut not a tax cut? When you run a deficit.
The bottom line is that it seems to be okay to run a deficit paying off federal war contracts to Halliburton, but god forbid they should run a deficit supporting job creation programs. And you'll forgive me if I don't consider the expansion of our military "true" job creation.
So what are they really doing? Why are they doing it? You have to ask those questions because it would be a mistake to assume that anyone, esp. an apparent imbecile like Bush, acts without purpose. The appearance of the dolt just might be the mask of a sly con man.
So who has the answers? There's this one guy that has it completely nailed. His stuff is so savvy, so on point that it is frankly scary in it's simplicity and clarity. So don't hesitate - go read it. If you can't handle it all at once, pace yourself - but read it, all of it. It's just four pages: two long, two short. And the rest of the site is excellent too if you still need more.
"CHEAP-LABOR CONSERVATIVE" ISSUES GUIDE
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/blurbs.htm [conceptualguerilla.com]
CATALOGUE OF BOGUS CONSERVATIVE IDEAS
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/bogusideas.htm [conceptualguerilla.com]
"PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY" AND WAGES
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/wages...bility.h tm [conceptualguerilla.com]
THE WRATH OF THE MILLIONAIRE WANNABE'S
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/milli...nnabes.h tm [conceptualguerilla.com]
What's all this about in a few short sentences?
Labor is the true engine of any economy, wealth is not (it is the mere distribution of the results of labor). A boom economy benefits anyone that works for a living because labor is then scarce and labor is valued more highly. Those at the top require cheap labor to maximize their profits - so they hate boom economies. Everything our government is doing right now is intended to devalue labor. The unequal distribution of vast amounts of wealth into the hands of non-laborers makes democracy almost impossible (which is why the founders favored limits on almost everything that concentrated wealth into too few hands).
Let it sit with you a while and you will begin to realize that it explains everything from bad schools, pri
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Insightful)
http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_faq.htm#Ques5 [bls.gov]
Now, if you look at the qualifications [state.wy.us] for collecting unemployment, you'll see that unemployment eligible people are a proper subset of "unemployed" people. If you're unemployment benefits ineligible, you're not considered "unemployed." So the poster you were disagreeing with was exactly right in saying that the figures "don't count people who're no longer collecting unemployment and have simply given up.."
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Please do not be a tool. The "given up" remark is something getting said a lot in the media regarding some people who are married and have a spouse who gets laid off and can't find work. The household then learns to get by on a single income, then the pressure to find work is much less. This works and has been popular for the families who will sacrifice that Lexus and drive a Honda instead. This means nothing for the masses across middle america who's factory jobs are gone. So are all the Walmart and McDonalds jobs in many areas.
The men and women who are trying to support families who have had their unemployement benefits dry up do not just "give up" on getting a job. They do anything and everything they can to keep their kids and spouse fed. The only thing they don't do is count towards the damn numbers our government is trying to pass off on us as "getting better". If nobody noticed, more people matured to legal working age than jobs created this year.
Parent
Re:All I know is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Stop feeling sorry for yourself - get over it, AND do something different until you are employed.
Ah, the vague tripe of the right-wing. Chest-pounding patriotism backed up with hollow, unspecific recommendations, based on the false premise that changing careers has zero cost and can be done overnight.
Some guy who's worked on an assembly line for 26 years or some woman who's been employed as a customer service rep at a phone bank for 12 probably can't afford to start their own business or even go to school to learn some new skill. Perhaps you think that their families should live in refrigerator boxes under bridges while the ex-breadwinners get the training to change careers. Even if they did change careers, they'd be back that the bottom rung of the ladder in their new field, probably making very little money and facing tuition loans on top of that.
Then you ignore the fact that most people don't have the intelligence to quickly change careers, start their own businesses, and learn a whole new set of skills. Any economic plan that requires that everyone be of above average intelligense is destined to fail.
Parent
Outsourcing (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Outsourcing (Score:5, Interesting)
Believe it or not, he's actually got a plan for this. Unlike so many of his other proposals, this one doesn't revolve around ludicrously jacked revenue projections or unfunded mandates. Kerry's plan is to get Congress to pass a tax penalty on companies that send jobs overseas.
Might sound good to some, but the net result will be increased labor costs (or increased tax and tax-compliance costs) for business, which will have the net effect of putting the breaks on an economy which right now is growing at a nice, sustainable rate. Since Kerry's spending plan already calls for nothing less than a wildly unsustainable 12.5% GDP growth per year for 10 years, the additional labor and compliance costs will make little difference in terms of tax revenues and a balanced budget. But it will mean that those businesses are generating less overall economic activity, which will have a net negative effect on domestic job growth.
"Backfire," I think is the word I'm looking for here.
Parent
We WANT high labor costs! It's a Good Thing! (Score:5, Insightful)
Look, the highest standards of living in the world are in the social demcracies of Europe, and they have HIGH labor costs--they have minimum wages levels of like $12/hour. High lahor costs are a GOOD THING...IF, and ONLY if you are a WORKER. Now, if you are an investor or business owner, that is a Bad Thing.
Fortunately, over 90% of Americans are WORKERS. Your problem is that you have been tricked by investor/corporate propaganda into thinking that YOU are an INVESTOR. Well, you AIN'T an investor. YOu are a WORKER. Deal with it. Accept it, and then help organize your country to HELP THE WORKER, like they do in Scandanavia.
The reason the 3rd world IS the 3rd world is that they have LOW LABOR COSTS. That is the DEFINTION of being 3rd world.
The reason many of the countries in NW Europe have the highest quality of life is because they have the HIGHEST COST OF LABOR. And it aint no accident. The two concepts are DIRECTLY RELATED.
Parent
Re:Outsourcing (Score:5, Insightful)
I take serious issue with anyone who wants to try and suppress outsourcing or "globalization" in any way. Not because I think it's good for me personally - it's bad for me personally, as a software engineer in the Silicon Valley... at least in the short term. But this attitude is similar to the attitude of the RIAA who wants to fight the inevitable. The world is changing, national economies are becoming one global economy. You can try and fight it, but we will just be damaging our position in this new global economy. It's going to happen, whether we like it or not. The ubiquity of the Internet that gave us such prosperity in the late 90's has also helped to ensure the inexorable approach of globalization.
The question we has to ask ourselves is not "How do we stop outsourcing/globalization?" The question is "How do we make sure we have a strong position in the new global economy?"
Unfortunately, I don't have any firm answer I can beat people around the head with. It's a hard problem. I have some ideas, though (of course). I think what will keep us fiscally healthy as certain types of jobs become more efficient to export is innovation, pure and simple. We need to encourage innovation and entrepreneurialism, which will not only create new jobs, but new TYPES of jobs, new fields, and new skills that we will have a distinct advantage in possessing.
Assuming you buy that idea at all, the question then becomes, how do we promote that? We already have a culture that encourages individualism, creativity, and risk-taking. I think that's a good start. But we need to focus more heavily on education. We should be more aggressive about the expectations of our children. Perhaps have some government subsidy of pre-schooling. More education about education - make sure kids know what their options are. Anyone that can finish high school can go to a university or a vocational school and get some basic knowledge about a field where there is a chance they will innovate. There's all sorts of loans or scholarships available for people who don't have the money. There are some exceptional people that will be revolutionary no matter what schooling or environment they come from, but innovation will be more common given more rigorous and effective education. I think the government should aggressively fund and incentivize education at all levels.
The other thing that's REALLY important is making it EASY to start and run a small company. Small business is extremely important in innovation, and local job creation. Joe (or Jane) Upper-Middle-Class-with-a-Bachelor's-degree-and-a
I think the US government, in order to protect its country's position of economic dominance over the next 20 years, must take an active role in shaping America into as Educated and Creative a country as it can. Big business leads to monopolies leads to a lack of innovation, competition, and freedom leads to mediocrity and the death of Capitalism. Why does our government encourage big business over small business, other than simply corruption?
Ok, I've started ranting. I'll stop now.
-If
Parent
Re:Outsourcing (Score:5, Insightful)
If you're going to have a global system, then you must adjust the relative value of human labor, so that the quality of life is elevated for the poorest, and the whole world isn't reduced to a huge slave shop. Just as we balance monetary worth between nations and currencies, we need to set up a fair trade balance in wage differential across nations to insure that the quick and the greedy don't just use this as an opportunity to make a cash grab (in the form of human value), and cause an economic implosion. This needs to be a slow process, allowing for global equalization to occur, at the same time we need to insure that trade and the flow of wealth is balanced so that the nations economy remains robust and flexible.
The current outflow of 'Dollars' is unsustainable. The current rate of increasing unemployment for American workers is unsustainable. What happens when every, job blue and white, collar is taken by either an illegal immigrant, or a foreign national working outside the country? What happens when the only jobs available in this country pay minimum wage? What happens when tens of millions of people have no way of finding work at all, no way of contributing to the economy, and are a drain on the national infrastructure? As the tax base erodes, how are government services provided? How do we prevent lawlessness, crime, ignorance, when government infrastructure begins to collapse? That's not a moot question. A small town on the California central cost just closed it's city government, Salinas has let go of over half it's city employees, and the kindergartens in Monterey have gone from an average of 20 students 4 years ago, to over 40 per classroom now, and teachers are terrified, because there have recently been a number of cases of 5 year olds wandering off of school property because there is no way for one person to watch that many young children.
Your idea about education is a good one, sadly, money for education is being cut across the board all over the country. A recent report describing the increased cost of education and the quickly dwindling money available for supporting education, is forcing student with resources to settle for less, and students without resources to settle for nothing at all. Add to that, a general educational system more intent on making people docile and obedient, than actually giving them anything that vaguely resembles knowledge, and you have one more critical ingredient for what is quickly becoming a global disaster.
As for small business... how do you start a small business if the middle class is gone and you have no local customers? Are you going to start off with a global business from the get go? If so, how will you compete against a third world country providing the same service as you for 10% of your cost? Your ideas are good, they just can't happen in the world that is getting made, they are literally impossible, if the current trends follow to their conclusion. The worst part, is that the European and Asian economies are intimately linked to ours. If we go down, we're taking the entire first and second world down with us. We'll be faced with an economic disaster that makes the great depression look like misplaced chump change. The current Libertarian Presidential candidate had some brilliant ideas, returning the country to a strict adherence of the constitution, fixing the big mistakes we made with corporations and bringing back a high level of personal responsibility to both business and society. Separating business from state, just as we separate church from state. Making government service the thing it was originally intended to be, a means to serve, not a means to get rich or empower lawyers/business/the highest bidder.
I am of the mind that all people everywhere need to be free, safe from harm, safe from violence, safe from slavery. I am of the mind that every person on earth should have a nom
Parent
low unemployment compared to europe (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:low unemployment compared to europe (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:low unemployment compared to europe (Score:5, Interesting)
And this is a good thing.
Restructuring, as the current neo-con governments in Europe call it, is nothing more than:
Are you starting to see a pattern here? The so-called restructuring is nothing but a naked grab for power by the corporations and their toadies. The proof is in the pudding: all European politicians who participated in such 'restructurings' end up with cushy jobs at their friends' megacorps (do you hear me, Wim Kok?).
MartParent
Labour Force Survey (Score:5, Informative)
There is a common measure of unemployment across Europe, the Labour Force Survey. The survey seeks information on respondents' personal circumstances and their labour market status during a specific reference period, normally a period of one week or four weeks (depending on the topic) immediately prior to the interview.
The LFS is carried out under a European Union Directive and uses internationally agreed concepts and definitions. It is the source of the internationally comparable (International Labour Organisation) measure known as 'ILO unemployment'.
On this measure the UK jobless rate is just under 5%, with France, Germany and Italy all at around the 9% mark.
Parent
Re:low unemployment compared to europe (Score:5, Insightful)
Which unfortunately contributes to joblessness. Good arguments can be made to have unemployment programs, but the more you increase the coverage period and the better the benefits, the higher jobless rates will go.
And the comparison isn't being made by most people as a "well other people have it worse argument," rather it's meant to show that you need to be careful of the policies you institute because sometimes they make the problem worse, not better, despite your good intentions. Europe is an example, so before we charge ahead with policies that have been shown to fail, we should think twice.
It's usually a lot easier to focus on the short term, but we really need to take a long term view of things. Opening trade and eliminating barriers to the free flow of labor is where the larger rewards are in the long term.
Just as people have self-destructive tendencies with diet because we didn't evolve in an environment filled with calorie rich and easily obtained food, we also end up shooting ourselves in the foot when we decide to circle the wagons and protect members of the "tribe." It's not the world we live in anymore, and it requires a leap of rationality to recognize what is best for everyone in the long term.
Parent
Can you guys drop the Socialist moniker please? (Score:5, Insightful)
People in the US have no idea what they are talking about when they say EU countries are socialist.
They may be more socially responsible than the US goverments perhaps, but private property and free enterprise has never been stopped.
If you want examples of Socialist countries look at Cuba or North Korea, where everything is Socialized by means of state control and ownership.
Parent
Where is American Society going (Score:5, Insightful)
At the top end you have the rich and super-rich, with limited call on their wealth in terms of taxes.
At the bottom end you seem to have people who have to hold down more than one job to make ends meet, have limited access to medical care and whose children receive only a poor quality education.
This leaves your middle classes, who are being squeezed. If they don't work in a service that requires personal contact then they are in danger of being outsourced to cheaper locations elswhere on the globe.
Barons, serfs and guilds is the way it appears to be. It isn't quite as extreme here in Britain, but we are going the same way.
Re:Where is American Society going (Score:5, Insightful)
When all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. When all you want to talk about is classism, every society appears stratified.
Parent
I'm a micro-view of the job situation (Score:5, Insightful)
All the layoffs of recent times have flooded the teaching ranks with people getting alternative certification. Add to that a recent flood of people who spent years in other roles in education just now finishing their degrees, and the new teachers are getting pushed out. That whole ETS scoring fiasco [theadvertiser.com] didn't help either.
Read again to understand this: there are too many teachers. People in other countries may not understand the gravity of this, but for people who are used to teachers being the most pissed on of American professionals, this should be the ultimate sign of how bad things are right now.
Immigration policy (Score:5, Insightful)
Racismdot (Score:5, Insightful)
Sad Day For /. (Score:5, Insightful)
Indeed So... (Score:5, Interesting)
Xenophobic Bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, we've got a job crunch in this country, and we had a severe job crunch in the dot-bomb technology industry, with an estimated 49% of San Francisco's high-tech jobs disappearing, so my friends were affected much more strongly than the average American, and there's a non-trivial chance I'll get laid off next week.
Thank god for that article (Score:5, Insightful)
A Lousy Article (Score:5, Insightful)
All he did was state data, interpret, and generalize. He indicts rebuplicans and the current administration for corporate decisions; democrats for their failure to understand their constituents. He is assuming the Kerry-Edwards campaign will succeed in November by advising them in what they should be doing, manage the trade defecit and immigration. By doing so will magically grow the middle class and their disposable income.
For being an economist, why doesn't he understand that and unemployment rate of 5.4% is very good and one of the lowest in the world. Its certainly better than the double-digit numbers in most of the world and certainly this [rupe-india.org] overall number from India.
As for the shifting of capital and the growing divide of the classes, name one successful society, where the controlling power had a monetary policy will divide the currency exactly among its citizens. Just one... Nope? I didn't think so. The closest example I can think of is the USSR, and they still had the rich elite controlling the working class; and it only lasted 70 years.
Last time I checked, my blue-collar, low-wage friends and I all have the same opportunity of wealth as the rich kids we tend to resent. Notice, I did NOT say that it would be easier because often capital is more difficult to obtain, but we have the same basic opportunity to start a business as the next person. We have the greatest entrepreneurial environment in the world and its ours to take advantage of. People from other countries see this and other advantages our country offers and immigrate. Is the global playing field level? No, it never has been and it never will be. Life is not fair. Life is hard. Get over the idea of being employeed in one place for your entire life in a job that a trained monkey or robots can do.
Will the election in November help? No. Its just a corporate sponsored figurehead with a puppet administration. Either one. What about a third party? Well, we effectively shut them out a generation ago and now, they're just a talking point.--Amigori
Immigration in and of itself is NOT the problem (Score:5, Interesting)
Let me ask you this? Why must we have immigration?
The answer is that you want you society to resemble a pyramid with the youngest at the base of the pyramid, the middle aged in the middle, and the eldest at the top of the pyramid. If your society is not shaped like a pyramid, social programs and the system of collecting taxes completely fall apart.
In order for society to maintain a balance, every woman needs to have on average about three kids. How many kids did your parents have?
How many kids are you going to have?
Because citizens don't have enough kids to fill in the bottom of the pyramid we must have immigration or, we have to re-engineer our social systems and methods of tax collection. Take your pick.
This is why France has the largest muslim population in Europe. Native France citizens didn't have enough kids to support the country. SOo to supplement they had to allow immigration.
This is why Japan is doomed without immigration. Women there are now refusing to marry and having kids later and later (post 35). Pretty soon the population pyramid of Japan will be inverted with the oldest at the top. I predict they will allow immigration soon.
Africa's population has no middle. Only the very young and very old. The middle was wiped out by AIDS.
So that's the long and short of immigration. If you want something different, you have three choices:
1. Have more kids.
2. Change your system of collecting taxes (shift the tax burden higher up the pyramid).
3. Change your system of social programs. Maybe public education is no longer free. Maybe social security vanishes. Lot's of cuts will have to be made since there are fewer older people to pay taxes and usually they pay less.
The sad thing is that our politicians don't explain the social engineering of our country and let everyone jump to their own conclusions. The Repulicans know that if they do not capture the Hispanic/Latino/Mexican vote that they will NEVER win an election again. That is why Bush speaks spanish and was going to open the immigration flood gates to Mexio prior to 9-11. Right now, it's a giant mess and we really need some good social planners to figure out how best to manage our society in the direction that we want it to go.
Taking Self-Employed Into Account? and my thoughts (Score:5, Interesting)
From what I have read from the federal government's figures, once you take the self-employed into account, Bush is creating jobs, not losing them. Since the self-employed are not being taken into account by the "left", I can not trust anything they have to say about avarage salary since they are not taking millions of workers into account.
Now don't take this to mean that I support Bush either. The whole Homeland Security continues to rub me the wrong way. And the federalizing of the airport screeners?!?
As far as outsourcing goes, every company I have personally been involved with that has outsourced to India (5 in the IT arena) have all seen it as a huge failure and pulled it back in-house. 2 where development and 3 were tech support.
I do agree with their take on worker visas. If you want to work and live in America, become a citizen.
The lowering "disposible income" figure is very misleading. This has been torn apart by the "Right" because you look at what is considered "essential" today as compared to 30 years ago. Who doesn't have a washer, a dryer, a television, and a telephone today? Today they count as essential. Decades ago they didn't. Thus, the "cost of living" goes up and the "disposible income" goes down.
Economics is the easiest thing to understand at a systemic level and the hardest thing to actually implement at the individual level. "Economies" do not change, the earning, spending and investing of individuals changes.
But when you get right down to it, you need the American people to keep more of their own money and for them to spend that money buying products from American companies that employ American workers. Those workers need to invest in those American companies and thus increase their personal wealth while giving the companies more capital to expand.
Oh, and those of you blaming the President for the economy need to remember that it is CONGRESS, not the President, who rules the country's taxes and spending. While the President provides the leadership, CONGRESS is to blame. Vote accordingly.
In my opinion (and, since I am not an economist, it is just my opinion), we need to:
- reduce federal spending (make Congress personally responsible for any deficit?).
- lower taxes for those who pay taxes (the lower 50% of the earners in America pay no taxes!).
- streamline the tax system with the Fair Tax. Once you get rid of most of the IRS, you lower federal costs, you lower the costs of businesses and individuals doing their taxes, you make your tax burden directly linked to your spending, you remove ALL tax burden from those living in poverty, and you lower the cost of American goods, thus making them more competitive in the world economy.
- as individuals, buy products from American companies (preferrably made entirely in America if you can still find one).
- phase out social security (the third rail of politics!). This will never happen, but it should. Over 12% of every worker's paycheck goes to retired people. Imagine if half that money went into your personal IRA account that would actually be worth something when you retired! (Also, as a side note, black men have the lowest life expectancy in America. White women have the highest. Statistically, social security takes money from young black men and gives it to old white women!)
- get the government out of the charity business. Let groups like the Red Cross, the United Way, religious charities, etc. do this work and treat people as individuals instead of numbers.
- put the government back on focus to what it MUST do, not what people WANT it to do. The government should not be a wealth redistribution plan. Government should provide the Common Good Required For Existence.
- Without breathable air, drinkable water, and land that can support farming and ranching,
Re:poor choice of story for slashdot frontpage (Score:5, Insightful)
Why? According to Bush the economy is doing great. If Bush is good for jobs then this thread may be an advertisement for voting for bush. It's only anti bush if Bush is horrible for jobs in the country.
" I know I wont be trying to moderate anyone in this thread, because every second post will look like trolling or flamebait depending on the perspective of the reader."
I have to agree with you there. I have never seen our country divided so much. The people who relish driving wedges to set the country apart have been very successful. I don't know what it would take to get the country back together again. Maybe if we had a president that was a "uniter not a divider" things would be different.
Parent
Re:Ohio is a mess... (Score:5, Interesting)
The author thought that it was due to cultural issues. I guess if somebody is doing bad you can always blame the homosexuals and the fornicators.
Parent
Re:Ohio is a mess... (Score:5, Insightful)
That's not true. We Republicans talk about it whenever the subject comes up. We say that the redistribution of wealth by the state is (a) immoral and (b) unconstitutional. The conversation rarely goes beyond that, granted.
Cleveland is a mess because its economy is shot. For more than twenty years the city has had a distinctly business-unfriendly fiscal plan, and consequently has failed to attract any significant outside investment. It's a slippery slope, because a city that's seen as bad for business is going to have a hard time correcting that image. But it's not impossible. It just take sound fiscal planning.
The seizure of private property by the state is not the answer. Not only is it not the answer, it's not even an answer. It's immoral and wrong, before you even get into a discussion about whether it's good or bad.
Flat taxes and sales taxes are rigged against the poor
Sales taxes do, in fact, hurt the poor more than the wealthy, because poor people spend a bigger fraction of their income than wealthy people spend. This is offset to an extent by exemptions. Proposals to replace the federal income tax with a national sales tax--proposals which have never gone anywhere--have traditionally included a fixed credit that effectively establishes a minimum taxable income level.
Flat taxes, of course, are not "rigged against the poor" at all. All citizens pay precisely the same fraction of their income in taxes. The only way you can come to the conclusion that they're rigged is if you start with the assumption that the wealthy should pay a bigger percentage, which is circular reasoning at its finest.
I can't for the life of me undersand why a the population of a state on the brink of disaster would vote for a party that still talks about supply side economics and trickle down.
'Cause it works? Nice job with the "brink of disaster" line, though. That's a play right out of Terry McAuliffe's book. Good job.
Parent
more about VDare (Score:5, Informative)
--
Simon
Parent
Re:Pathetic (Score:5, Insightful)
Several researchers have actually said the illegal immigration is good for the country, from the job market perspective, that is. Sure, illegal immigration brings other problems, but they sure as hell aren't taking any jobs away from the us middle class.
Parent