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Post by whoswho on Aug 15, 2007 6:55:02 GMT -6
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Post by unlawflcombatnt on Aug 16, 2007 0:16:52 GMT -6
"Yet the strategy continues to fall short in a couple of key areas. First, while labor and capital are being "reallocated," they're often idle -- which in the case of labor means unemployed. Second, statistics suggest that while most employees who lose their positions to overseas rivals wind up with new jobs, the new ones typically don't pay as much...."
Capital is doing more than just "siting idle". It's flowing out of the U.S. into cheaper labor markets (even to places like South Korea.)
Though the idea of increasing training programs sounds all fluffy & nice, it really does nothing to keep American capital from flowing to countries with cheaper labor. It helps little for Americans to be 10x as productive as a foreign worker, if the foreign worker costs only 1/20th as much.
To keep jobs from flowing out of the United States, and prevent the resultant wage suppression, we need to discourage American companies from moving production facilities overseas. We need to put tariffs on imports, especially those coming from countries with the lowest wages and our largest trade deficits (like China). We also need to get rid of the export-import bank, and all of the other government agencies that assist Corporate America when it wants to outsource jobs. Needless to say, we need to eliminate any tax advantages Corporations receive for outsourcing jobs.
The idea that we can "educate" or "train" our workforce to stop outsourcing is nonsensical. It's just Corporate propaganda disseminated to pacify the people who've lost jobs, and those afraid of losing them.
There is no lack of engineers or any other skilled professional in this country to fill every single job Corporate America creates. What there is a lack of, however, is a skilled professional willing to work for 3rd world wages.
Business and Corporate America should help train workers. But the fact that they don't sends a strong message. That message is that there isn't enough demand for currently available workers for business to train them.
And again, no amount of training is going to keep an American worker making $20/hour from being replaced by a Chinese worker making 60-cents/hour.
Education & training are not the solution to outsourcing of American jobs. Only tariffs and other government policies to reduce outsourcing profits will fix the problem.
All nations on this planet have policies to protect domestic jobs from outsourcing.
All except one--the United States.
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Post by whoswho on Aug 16, 2007 6:55:39 GMT -6
In my experience, the "retraining" was all lip service. I don't know if Kentucky unemployment services are just more inept than other states, but all the talk of retraining turned out to be bullshit. The only person I know who got retrained.... did not receive ANY severance pay whatsoever. He was given retraining rather than severance. After going to school for years in another field with no other financial help, his circumstances become very desperate. He was selling personal momentoes simply to buy groceries. Then, the company he was co-oping with and hoping to get full time employment with, did not pay him at all. They thought the job experience he was getting was adequate compensation. I was flabbergasted. When I co-oped, I always got paid. It wasn't big bucks, but it was a paycheck. Even if he does get re-employed, how can he ever catch up to the enormous wage loss? Total bullshit.
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Post by whoswho on Aug 16, 2007 6:57:47 GMT -6
All nations on this planet have policies to protect domestic jobs from outsourcing.
All except one--the United States.
And THAT is why life has become hell on earth in our beloved country.
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Post by syphax on Aug 16, 2007 18:13:20 GMT -6
All nations on this planet have policies to protect domestic jobs from outsourcing.
All except one--the United States.
Well the United States has policies to prevent "outsourcing" but, like other countries, they simply don't work. Japan and Germany for example both have large trade surpluses and have a great number of policies to "protect" jobs... but they have lost more manufacturing jobs than the United States. The primary reason for the decline in manufacturing jobs(a pattern that has been going on for decades) is increased productivity. Surely you don't oppose higher productivity? Considering tariffs were one of the primary causes of the Great Depression... www.clubforgrowth.org/media/uploads/CfG_Hoover_Final_WSJ.pdfI find it somewhat disturbing that so many advocate increases in tariffs once more. Luckily, almost all economists( even very liberal ones) support free trade. Its also worth pointing out that exports to China are growing faster than imports from China. China is just as hungry for our goods and services as we are for theirs. A trade war will hurt us both greatly.
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Post by unlawflcombatnt on Aug 16, 2007 19:54:26 GMT -6
All nations on this planet have policies to protect domestic jobs from outsourcing.
All except one--the United States.
Well the United States has policies to prevent "outsourcing" but, like other countries, they simply don't work. Wrong. They "don't work" because we have almost none. Every other country has more. And they work in every single one of those cases, and have worked in every other country throughout history. Furthermore, they've been used in the past in this country, and were absolutely essential in protecting American industry. Throughout most of U.S. history, tariffs have been the "rule", not the exception. And they've generally worked very well at protecting American industry, and ensuring that American consumer demand was met by American production. The primary reason for the decline in manufacturing jobs(a pattern that has been going on for decades) is increased productivity. No, it is not the primary reason. It has been the unrestricted flow of American capital to cheap labor countries, without any restriction on the importation of these cheap foreign labor produced goods back into the United States. And again, it has absolutely NOTHING to do with increased productivity, except for the increased productivity of cheap labor in foreign countries due to the massive efflux of American capital chasing the cheapest labor on the planet. American workers are more productive than ever. And they're still losing jobs at an astronomical rate. Despite American workers' increased productivity, real American wages are NOT increasing. This has caused a rising wage-productivity gap, since cheap foreign workers undercut the wages of their highly productive American counterparts. Considering tariffs were one of the primary causes of the Great Depression... Tariffs were NOT the primary cause of the Depression. The biggest factors were the Federal Reserve's creation, the resultant massive monetary/credit expansion, massive credit-enhanced overinvestment in non-productive endeavors, an ensuing collapse in investment, and later a huge decline in aggregate consumer demand from massive unemployment. Furthermore, tariffs had exactly the opposite effect on the U.S. then. We were the major exporter at that time, with a huge trade surplus. We didn't need tariffs because our manufacturers had little competition with foreign exporters for the American consumer market. Retaliatory tariffs do make a big difference if we are a major exporter, and they prevent sale of American goods to foreign countries. At present, the situation is exactly the opposite. America's exports pale in comparison to imports-- to the tune of about $800 billion. Countries like China buy almost nothing from the United States, as evidenced by a $300 billion+ annualized trade deficit with China. Putting sufficient tariffs on Chinese goods would reduce imports from them, and cause a compensatory increase in demand for domestic production of the same goods. On the other hand, retaliatory tariffs by China would affect our exports to China very little-- because we export very little to China in the 1st place. I find it somewhat disturbing that so many advocate increases in tariffs once more. Luckily, almost all economists( even very liberal ones) support free trade. I find it disturbing that the Corporate Plutocracy's propaganda is so widely disseminated by the press, when it has no basis in fact, no basis in theory, and has been resoundingly proven wrong. Its also worth pointing out that exports to China are growing faster than imports from China. China is just as hungry for our goods and services as we are for theirs. A trade war will hurt us both greatly. Once again, you're categorically wrong. It's nice to see you don't let the facts stand in the way of your soundbites and alternate reality dissemination. The truth is, that the trade deficit with China is growing, not shrinking. The most recent monthly deficit puts us on track to a $300 billion trade deficit with China, much larger than last year's deficit.
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Post by syphax on Aug 17, 2007 0:26:49 GMT -6
"Wrong. They "don't work" because we have almost none. Every other country has more. And they work in every single one of those cases, and have worked in every other country throughout history. "So countries with protectionist policies(Germany and Japan) lost more manufacturing jobs than the United States(16.3% drop in US, 24.1% in Germany and 27.2% in Japan Source : bls.gov)... why? If tariffs are such an important policy for ensuring job security and economic prosperity than why is the United States out performing Europe and Japan in both by leaps and bounds? Why has job creation been so strong since the early nineties, when outsourcing supposedly began? It may have been lackluster this recovery, but that is likely a result of growing affluence and social conditions... More kids are choosing to go to college and female work participation is stagnant after women who were from 1955-1990 entering the workforce in droves have stopped. www.econbrowser.com/archives/2005/07/how_many_people.html"Furthermore, they've been used in the past in this country, and were absolutely essential in protecting American industry. Throughout most of U.S. history, tariffs have been the "rule", not the exception. And they've generally worked very well at protecting American industry, and ensuring that American consumer demand was met by American production. "This is true, but America experienced rapid growth in spite of tariff policy, not because of it. During the time the United States had high tariffs, it was not nearly as trade dependent. Tariffs were also one of the only sources of federal revenue and the economy in general was much freer than now. "No, it is not the primary reason. It has been the unrestricted flow of American capital to cheap labor countries, without any restriction on the importation of these cheap foreign labor produced goods back into the United States. "The United States manufactures much more than it did in 1990, yet manufacturing jobs have declined by 16.3% since then(bls.gov)... That is impossible without increased productivity. Furthermore, losses in manufacturing jobs have been offset by gains in other jobs in finance, real estate, insurance, teaching, technology and engineering. Do you want your kids to grow up to work in a factory or do you want them to be an engineer? Also, the myth that "good" manufacturing jobs are being replaced with "McJobs" is not true. Retail jobs made up 20% of the workforce in 1970 and they still make up only 20%. In other words, manufacturing jobs have not been replaced with Wal Mart and fast food jobs as some incorrectly believe. "American workers are more productive than ever. And they're still losing jobs at an astronomical rate. Despite American workers' increased productivity, real American wages are NOT increasing. This has caused a rising wage-productivity gap, since cheap foreign workers undercut the wages of their highly productive American counterparts." Real wages have been increasing lately biz.yahoo.com/c/ec/200731.htmlHourly earnings are up 3.8% year over year while headline inflation is up roughly 2.6% yoy. It is true they haven't been particularly impressive, but that is because benefits have eaten up total compensation of an employee(think health care costs). What happens when you include benefits? www.nabe.com/images/graphweek/gw061008.gif"Tariffs were NOT the primary cause of the Depression. The biggest factors were the Federal Reserve's creation, the resultant massive monetary/credit expansion, massive credit-enhanced overinvestment in non-productive endeavors, an ensuing collapse in investment, and later a huge decline in aggregate consumer demand from massive unemployment. "Tariffs were certainly one of the major causes. But I agree the Federal Reserve is the biggest one. Still, the trade war greatly reduced both exports and imports and greatly reduced demand for US goods. "At present, the situation is exactly the opposite. America's exports pale in comparison to imports-- to the tune of about $800 billion. Countries like China buy almost nothing from the United States, as evidenced by a $300 billion+ annualized trade deficit with China. Putting sufficient tariffs on Chinese goods would reduce imports from them, and cause a compensatory increase in demand for domestic production of the same goods. On the other hand, retaliatory tariffs by China would affect our exports to China very little-- because we export very little to China in the 1st place. "We are on pace to export 65 billion dollars to China(census.gov). Its also worth noting that bilateral trade deficits are not at all paid attention to by most economists because they deserve no attention. gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2007/07/bilateral-trade-deficit.html#linksIf we have a 300 billion dollar trade surplus with a country who has a 300 billion dollar trade surplus with China, the net trade balance is zero. Therefore you need to look at the whole picture. We export a trillion dollars worth of goods and services. If tariffs were passed on our exports... we would be in trouble. "I find it disturbing that the Corporate Plutocracy's propaganda is so widely disseminated by the press, when it has no basis in fact, no basis in theory, and has been resoundingly proven wrong. "Even if tariffs worked, it would be at the expense of the poor Chinese worker... I'm not sure how you justify saving someones manufacturing job when it comes at the expense of the poorest of the poor. Shouldn't we rich Americans be forced to innovate and adapt to globalization if we want to stay rich? Well that doesn't really matter because it DOES benefit Americans. How exactly has free trade been proven wrong? America has lost jobs, but it has gained many more than it has lost. Compensation is increasing as fast as productivity(which has been increasing very quickly too recently) and peoples net worths are skyrocketing... Income inequality may be increasing, but that is largely a result of higher returns from education and changing demographics. "Once again, you're categorically wrong. It's nice to see you don't let the facts stand in the way of your soundbites and alternate reality dissemination. "If you have Microsoft excel run this quick experiment. Write down the total exports to China in 2006(55 billion) and the total imports to China(287 billion). Subtract exports from imports(trade deficit). On the next line simulate 2007, multiply exports by 1.35(a 35% increase) and multiply imports by 1.15(15%). Subtract imports by exports. The deficit is bigger than before. So even though exports are increasing faster than imports the overall deficit is increasing because the imports are increasing from a bigger number. Those figures are from here(They aren't exact, but are pretty close) bp1.blogger.com/_5aAsxFJOeMw/RgRKVlBlyZI/AAAAAAAAAG8/Ysl8WI9_1U8/s1600-h/trade-us-china-Jan-1993-Jan-2001-rolling.JPGSo while you are correct that the deficit got bigger, it is still true exports are increasing faster than imports. If this trend continues, eventually the deficit will shrink and even turn into a surplus. I'm not really concerned about that because again, bilateral trade balance is meaningless, but still the fact that China is hungry for our goods and services is great news for us.
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Post by blueneck on Aug 17, 2007 4:48:01 GMT -6
These unsubstantiated talking points read like they are right out of the Heritage Spindation or NAM.
You pro globalists need to come up with some better arguments.
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Post by unlawflcombatnt on Aug 19, 2007 17:53:41 GMT -6
So countries with protectionist policies(Germany and Japan) lost more manufacturing jobs than the United States(16.3% drop in US, 24.1% in Germany and 27.2% in Japan Source : bls.gov)... why? This is simply a false statement. (by the way, writing "bls.gov" is not any kind of acceptable reference, except maybe on Fox Pseudo-News) In fact, from 2000-2005, according to a legitimate BLS reference, U.S. manufacturing employment declined -3.7%. Meanwhile, German manufacturing employment only declined -1.5%, while Japanese manufacturing employment declined only 2.5%. (See page 7, BLS News Release. ) If tariffs are such an important policy for ensuring job security and economic prosperity than why is the United States out performing Europe and Japan in both by leaps and bounds? You've gotta be kidding. The U.S. is certainly not outperforming Europe or Japan in job security. Rather, we're outperforming them in job insecurity. Prosperity-wise, only the top 1% of Americans are "outperforming" Japan and Europe. For the lower 99%, Japan and at least Germany, are doing much better than the United States. In case you weren't aware of it, the number of Americans below the poverty level has increased under the Bush junta. Why has job creation been so strong since the early nineties, when outsourcing supposedly began? Several reasons account for that. For starters, the domestic economy in the middle and late 90's was so much stronger that it overcame the jobs losses from outsourcing. We were creating so many jobs that no one noticed any outsourcing-related jobs losses. Second, the effects of globalization and outsourcing didn't really pick up speed until Bush stole his 1st election in 2001. Many cheap-labor/free trade deals had barely gone into effect. After that, and with the help of an explosion more cheap-labor/free trade deals, the effects of outsourcing-induced job loss skyrocketed, and became more obvious. It may have been lackluster this recovery, but that is likely a result of growing affluence and social conditions... More kids are choosing to go to college and female work participation is stagnant after women who were from 1955-1990 entering the workforce in droves have stopped. www.econbrowser.com/archives/2005/07/how_many_people.htmlI don't know what you're trying to say here. Nor did the author's commentary at the above link make any sense. There was one passage, however, that did make perfect sense. It was originally a quote from the Federal Reserve's Katherine Bradbury, discussing the connection between the falsely low unemployment rate, and how the falsely high "not-in-labor-force" rate has caused this deception. Since you provided this link, I'll quote Bradbury's statement from the site: " Measured relative to the business cycle peak in March 2001, labor force participation rates almost four years later have not recovered as much as usual, and the discrepancies are large.... Depending on the scenario, the current labor force shortfall ranges from 1.6 million to 5.1 million men and women. With 7.9 million people currently unemployed, the addition of these hypothetical participants would raise the unemployment rate by 1 to 3-plus percentage points. Current low rates of labor market participation thus potentially represent considerable slack in the U.S. labor market." I'll sum this up. The unemployment rate would be 1 to 3% points higher if the labor force participation rate had not been dishonestly understated by the Bush administration. Were it not for this manipulation, the unemployment rate would be between 5.6% and 7.6% at present. (The government claims it's only 4.6% at present.) "Furthermore, they've been used in the past in this country, and were absolutely essential in protecting American industry. Throughout most of U.S. history, tariffs have been the "rule", not the exception. And they've generally worked very well at protecting American industry, and ensuring that American consumer demand was met by American production. "This is true, but America experienced rapid growth in spite of tariff policy, not because of it. What do you base such a preposterous (and false) statement on? ESP? If a country protects its domestic industry from foreign import competition, it always increases domestic job creation. It increases demand for domestic production, and reduces the ability of foreign imports to replace domestic production demand. Countries throughout history have done this, and it has been successful in increasing jobs nearly 100% of the time. Allowing American consumer demand to be filled by foreign imports reduces demand for American goods, and reduces demand for American labor to provide those goods. This is just common sense, and all of the bizarre pseudo-economic concoctions in the world don't refute this. If suddenly no Chinese goods are available in the United States, Americans will have to rely on non-Chinese produced goods. And that would create production demand for American goods, and create investment opportunities for American investors and Corporations to provide that production, and hire American workers to fill the production demand. During the time the United States had high tariffs, it was not nearly as trade dependent. No, the United States was a major exporter back then. Under those conditions, retaliatory tariffs by foreign countries had a much bigger effect on the sale of American production. At present, such retaliatory tariffs would hurt the U.S. much less, as we import far more than we export (to the tune of $800 billion+/year), Between 80% and 90% of American production is sold to Americans. It is the American market, not our foreign export markets, that need protection. Our domestic consumer market is the mainstay of our economy, not the export market. We'd be far better off giving away all of our export market, if we could regain all of our domestic market. (It would add about $800 billion to our GDP, or about +6%) Tariffs were also one of the only sources of federal revenue and the economy in general was much freer than now. The "freer" part may or may not be true. Regardless, however, we could afford to be "freer" on trade because we had very little import competition for the American consumer market. Also, back in those days, it was very difficult for American firms to move their production facilities overseas, and substitute cheaper foreign labor for American labor. Times have changed. And trade policy needs to change in order to protect American workers from threats that didn't exist in earlier times. The United States manufactures much more than it did in 1990, yet manufacturing jobs have declined by 16.3% since then(bls.gov)... That is impossible without increased productivity. There's no debate about whether American productivity has increased. It has increased greatly since that time. In contrast, real wages for highly productive American workers have only increased 0.76% since July 2002. This is simply because of stagnation in demand for American labor, especially manufacturing. This has nothing whatsoever to do with increased productivity. It's due to American labor demand being suppressed by its replacement with cheap foreign labor. [Furthermore, losses in manufacturing jobs have been offset by gains in other jobs in finance, real estate, insurance, teaching, technology and engineering. Do you want your kids to grow up to work in a factory or do you want them to be an engineer? No, they have been "offset" largely by a reduction in the labor force participation rate, and by lower paying service jobs. Engineering??? Are you kidding??? Engineers are one of the hardest hit fields in the Bush pseudo-recovery. Estimates are that the U.S. produces 300,000 engineers/year. Meanwhile, only a little over 100,000 engineering jobs are created per year. And slime-ball pukes like Bill Gates are advocating removing the cap on H1B visas, so that all American engineering jobs can be filled by foreigners, and engineering wages can be driven down to those of a burger-flipper at McDonald's. Do you want your kids to grow up to work in a factory or do you want them to be an engineer? I want my kids to grow up and have a job. And going into engineering sounds like the worst way imaginable to accomplish that. Also, the myth that "good" manufacturing jobs are being replaced with "McJobs" is not true. The reality is that manufacturing jobs aren't being replace with anything (except low-paying jobs in China) and more people who've "dropped out of the labor force." Retail jobs made up 20% of the workforce in 1970 and they still make up only 20%. In other words, manufacturing jobs have not been replaced with Wal Mart and fast food jobs as some incorrectly believe. I don't know where you're getting you're false information (Fox News?) Goods-producing employment from the BLS has shown year-over-year declines since Bush took office. Meanwhile, low-paying service sector jobs have picked up some of the slack number-wise, though not wage-wise. "American workers are more productive than ever. And they're still losing jobs at an astronomical rate. Despite American workers' increased productivity, real American wages are NOT increasing. This has caused a rising wage-productivity gap, since cheap foreign workers undercut the wages of their highly productive American counterparts." Real wages have been increasing lately No, they have not. In fact, real weekly wages have declined -1% in 2007. What happens when you include benefits? Who cares? People can't "spend" benefits. Benefits don't pay the rent or buy food. And health care benefits often don't pay for anything at all, as many Americans are finding out. What good is health insurance if your health insurer denies coverage for everything you submit a claim for, or cancels your insurance as soon as you submit a claim? How much is such a benefit worth if it doesn't pay for anything? "Tariffs were NOT the primary cause of the Depression. The biggest factors were the Federal Reserve's creation, the resultant massive monetary/credit expansion, massive credit-enhanced overinvestment in non-productive endeavors, an ensuing collapse in investment, and later a huge decline in aggregate consumer demand from massive unemployment. "Tariffs were certainly one of the major causes. No, they were not. They were a minor contributor, and their removal would not have made a major difference. And, again, their effect was entirely different than it would have been today. But I agree the Federal Reserve is the biggest one. Still, the trade war greatly reduced both exports and imports and greatly reduced demand for US goods. The loss of aggregate production demand was the ultimate problem, and retaliatory tariffs had a minimal effect on U.S. exports. Other countries couldn't buy our exports because they couldn't afford to, due to lack of income, with only a minor contribution from tariffs. Its also worth noting that bilateral trade deficits are not at all paid attention to by most economists because they deserve no attention. Wrong. Completely and absolutely. ALL economists pay attention to it except dishonest NeoCon-Artist economists like Mankiw. gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2007/07/bilateral-trade-deficit.html#linksIf we have a 300 billion dollar trade surplus with a country who has a 300 billion dollar trade surplus with China, the net trade balance is zero. Therefore you need to look at the whole picture. We export a trillion dollars worth of goods and services. If tariffs were passed on our exports... we would be in trouble. What complete garbage. You've taken a false number and built a dishonest fantasy interpretation from the false number. This tripe is from an example Mankiw used, and has nothing to do with reality. Here's the quote from Mankiw's site: " For example, suppose the world has three countries: the United States, China, and Australia. The United States sells $100 billion in machine tools to Australia, Australia sells $100 billion in wheat to China, and China sells $100 billion in toys to the United States. In this case, the United States has a bilateral trade deficit with China, China has a bilateral trade deficit with Australia, and Australia has a bilateral trade deficit with the United States. But each of the three nations has balanced trade overall, exporting and importing $100 billion in goods." For starters, the U.S. trade balance with Australia is roughly $10 billion per year, not $100 billion, which makes this example completely idiotic. (See Trade Balance, Exhibit 14) Meanwhile, China exports well over $200 billion to the U.S. Obviously, there is no way the U.S.'s $10 billion in net "sales" to Australia balances out the U.S.'s net "purchases" of over $200 billion from China. This is the kind of nonsense that Right-Wing NeoCon-Artist economic theory is based on-- fantasy numbers, with fantasy theories based on these fantasy numbers. Even if tariffs worked, it would be at the expense of the poor Chinese worker... I'm not sure how you justify saving someones manufacturing job when it comes at the expense of the poorest of the poor. Shouldn't we rich Americans be forced to innovate and adapt to globalization if we want to stay rich? More false Neo-Liberal trade rhetoric to justify the profiteering from replacing American workers with Chinese workers. There are so many things wrong with this statement that I can't get them all in. For starters, the function of the U.S. Government and its policies is to protect the welfare of the American people first. And it is not protecting the people by assisting the transfer of American workers' wealth to rich American multinational Corporations--in the form of reduced labor costs, and then falsely claiming it's being done for the "benefit" of poor foreign workers. It's being done for the "benefit" of the rich and Corporate America. Meanwhile, there's been very little "uplifting" of Chinese workers. But there's been tremendous "uplifting" of America's most wealthy, by increasing their profit margins at the expense of American employment and wages. Well that doesn't really matter because it DOES benefit Americans. How exactly has free trade been proven wrong? America has lost jobs, but it has gained many more than it has lost. Compensation is increasing as fast as productivity... Now you've gone from extreme distortion to outright lying. Compensation is not increasing as fast as wages, and you know it. And making this claim is a bald-faced lie. Period. Real wages have increased 0.76% since July 2002. Productivity has increased 14.4% from the end of 2001 to the end of 2006. Do you think a 0.76% increase in real wages is keeping up with a 14.4% increase in productivity? Looks like about a 13.6% gap to me. Income inequality may be increasing, but that is largely a result of higher returns from education and changing demographics. Another bald-faced lie. The real incomes of college graduates are increasing less than those of less skilled workers. It is only the incomes of the super rich that are increasing, and that has nothing to do with their "training." If you have Microsoft excel run this quick experiment. Write down the total exports to China in 2006(55 billion) and the total imports to China(287 billion). Subtract exports from imports(trade deficit). On the next line simulate 2007, multiply exports by 1.35(a 35% increase) and multiply imports by 1.15(15%). Subtract imports by exports. The deficit is bigger than before. So even though exports are increasing faster than imports the overall deficit is increasing because the imports are increasing from a bigger number. I don't need Microsoft excel to verify this. The real point, which I think you've acknowledged, is that the dollar value of our trade deficit with China is increasing. And that's all that counts. The trade deficit is growing in terms of dollars. So while you are correct that the deficit got bigger, it is still true exports are increasing faster than imports. If this trend continues, eventually the deficit will shrink and even turn into a surplus. I'm not really concerned about that because again, bilateral trade balance is meaningless, but still the fact that China is hungry for our goods and services is great news for us. Once again, this "bilateral trade balance" you're espousing is nonsense. It's based on false statistics posted at Mankiw's site in an example given. In fact, Mankiw isn't even claiming these are actual numbers. They're simply an "example," and a ridiculous one at that. So while you are correct that the deficit got bigger, it is still true exports are increasing faster than imports. If this trend continues, eventually the deficit will shrink and even turn into a surplus....still the fact that China is hungry for our goods and services is great news for us Hungry for our goods??? Chinese workers don't make enough to ever be "hungry for our goods." China has an unbelievably large labor surplus, and there's absolutely 0 upward pressure on their wages. There are 100 million transiently employed Chinese workers who have no permanent job, and are always available to fill any temporary labor shortage, at pennies per hour wages. It takes income to purchase goods. It's not the number of potential consumers who create markets. It's the amount of money those consumers have to purchase goods and services. Chinese workers and consumers have very little, making their "hunger" for American goods a false claim. Most are just trying to stay alive, and have nothing approaching the financial means to purchase American goods. Not now, and not in the foreseeable future.
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Post by syphax on Aug 19, 2007 20:20:55 GMT -6
Interesting that you criticize my facts, which are cited and can be backed up yet you make up things without citing anything. The bls.gov citation is true. I can't find the exact page but the numbers are from 1992-2005 and I got it from this article. www.townhall.com/columnists/AlanReynolds/2006/06/22/our_capital_account_surplusI suppose it doesn't matter because Reynolds is pro-free trade and therefore he is owned by the corporations... My facts are "wrong" and your made up statements are impossible to dispute. Its laughable that you say Europe is doing better than us in job security. The average EU unemployment rate is 8.5%. Their immigrants are rioting in the streets because they can't find jobs. No serious person would argue the employment situation in Europe is better than it is here. They may have more "security" if they have a job but that means little when finding a job is much harder. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_unemployment_rateEurope in general is certainly worse off economically than the US. There is a notable exception for Ireland, a country which dramatically reduced government spending and taxation and has become in many respects the richest country in the world. www.timbro.com/euvsusa/pdf/EU_vs_USA_English.pdf"Second, the effects of globalization and outsourcing didn't really pick up speed until Bush stole his 1st election in 2001. Many cheap-labor/free trade deals had barely gone into effect. After that, and with the help of an explosion more cheap-labor/free trade deals, the effects of outsourcing-induced job loss skyrocketed, and became more obvious. "None of this is backed up with facts or expert opinions... so it is a meaningless statement. You also made very clear your political leanings(which are very clearly affecting your opinion on this issue)... you have a problem with Bush and everything he does is wrong in your opinion. Thats puts you in a very poor position to fairly judge issues. Heres a very fair site(browse through the articles and tell me its biased) which dismissed many of your claims during the 2004 election. www.factcheck.org/article225.htmlAccording to the article a study done by the labor department concluded that... "only 2.5 percent of major layoffs in the first three months of 2004 were a result of outsourcing abroad." Also... "Trying to assess whether offshoring might actually be a larger problem than the Labor Department figures indicate, veteran Democratic economist Charles Schultze tried another approach. He reasoned that if America's production needs were increasingly met by foreign outsourcing (and cheap imports) this would be shown as a rise in the value of U.S. imports relative to the overall economy, as measured by Gross Domestic Product, or GDP. But what he found was that the ratio wasn't rising at all - it had leveled off since 2000. He concluded that "there is nothing in the data to suggest that large increases in. . . offshoring could have played a major role in explaining America's job performance in recent years. "" "Schultze: In the short run, an increase in offshoring reduces U.S. job growth. But in the long run it improves the standard of living, increases real wages, and increases the country's economic growth. " and this guy was "President Lyndon Johnson's budget director in the 1960's, and was chairman of President Carter's Council of Economic Advisers back in the late 1970's."! also... "Even backers of Kerry's proposed solution concede that the problem is relatively minor. One of those backers is Christian Weller, senior economist at the Democratic-leaning Center for American Progress. Weller acknowledges that the problem of outsourcing is not large when compared to overall levels of unemployment. He said in an article on the subject:" and finally "Another assessment comes from Ben Bernanke, Chairman of the economics department at Princeton University and also a governor of the Federal Reserve. In a speech at the end of March he estimated that the total number of jobs lost to "offshoring" at roughly one percent of all jobs lost." "I don't know what you're trying to say here. Nor did the author's commentary at the above link make any sense."How didn't it make sense? He basically said that kids are choosing to goto college instead of entering the workforce(good), women no longer want to enter the workforce for social reasons(neither good nor bad) and the male participation rate has been declining since the 50's because of rising affluence(good, they can retire earlier because they are richer). "I'll sum this up. The unemployment rate would be 1 to 3% points higher if the labor force participation rate had not been dishonestly understated by the Bush administration. Were it not for this manipulation, the unemployment rate would be between 5.6% and 7.6% at present. (The government claims it's only 4.6% at present.) "Yes, and this is a result of the reasons stated above and is not a result of outsourcing. Also, notice how its all about the Bush Administration... FYI, the Bush administration did not change the method of calculating unemployment. Problems with the unemployment rate have always existed and thus it is impossible to say "the unemployment rate is worse than the stats say during the last 7 years... but before it was completely perfect." " it always increases domestic job creation"You certainly didn't provide any proof for this claim... and Most economists certainly disagree with this(look the quotes from articles), casting great doubt regarding the validity of this statement. Can I get a link? That being said, almost no economist would take seriously the idea that free trade isn't beneficial in the long run. Free trade creates a great deal of opportunities, creates more demand for goods, creates more jobs and creates more wealth than could ever be achieved in a protectionist world. Tariffs may protect jobs and increase the security for a short while, but in the long run high tariffs are horrible policy. India for example has tariffs to protect textile workers... they "protected" them all right. Textile workers in India lagged far where they could have been had free trade been allowed. Textile was produced using old out of date methods and wages as a result did not increase. Standard of living was poor and did not improve. international-tariffs.suite101.com/article.cfm/india_invests_in_lower_tariffsNow with lower tariffs both imports and exports are dramatically increasing. The quality of life is dramatically improving in India and they are far better off than they ever were or ever could be with high restrictive tariffs. " Who cares? People can't "spend" benefits. Benefits don't pay the rent or buy food. And health care benefits often don't pay for anything at all, as many Americans are finding out. What good is health insurance if your health insurer denies coverage for everything you submit a claim for, or cancels your insurance as soon as you submit a claim? How much is such a benefit worth if it doesn't pay for anything?"You cite no statistics, no articles... nothing to support your argument. Can I get a link? While true that people can't spend their benefits as they would like, there is no evidence that health insurance is worthless or that too many claims are denied. And to say health insurance is worthless is... an interesting assessment to say the least. On Smoot-Hawley www.bartelby.com/65/ha/HawleySm.htmleh.net/encyclopedia/article/obrien.hawley-smoot.tariffSome nice quotes(from EH.net)... "Economists are almost uniformly critical of tariffs. One of the bedrock principles of economics is that voluntary trade makes everyone involved better off." "Considering employment first, the usual answer is that a tariff will not affect the overall level of employment in an economy over the long run. Although the popular view is that tariffs create new jobs, or preserve old ones, most economists believe that the effect of tariffs on the total number of jobs available in an economy is temporary." "Most economists are skeptical because foreign trade made up a small part of the U.S. economy in 1929 and the magnitude of the decline in GDP between 1929 and 1933 was so large. " So perhaps they weren't a great contributer to the Great Depression, but they did have a negative impact... and They'll have a GREATER impact now because trade makes up a greater part of the economy. Finally "Real GDP actually declined by about 16.5% between 1929 and 1931, so the decline in real exports can account for about 21% of the total decline in real GDP. The decline in real exports, then, may well have played an important, but not crucial, role in the decline in GDP during the first two years of the Depression." Corporate propaganda I suppose? Are economists are all being bribed to say free trade is good? " Engineering??? Are you kidding??? Engineers are one of the hardest hit fields in the Bush pseudo-recovery. Estimates are that the U.S. produces 300,000 engineers/year. Meanwhile, only a little over 100,000 engineering jobs are created per year. And slime-ball pukes like Bill Gates are advocating removing the cap on H1B visas, so that all American engineering jobs can be filled by foreigners, and engineering wages can be driven down to those of a burger-flipper at McDonald's. "Sources? Links? "Wrong. Completely and absolutely. ALL economists pay attention to it except dishonest NeoCon-Artist economists like Mankiw. "Again, NOTHING to back up your statements(and you added a nice little attack on Mankiw as well, nicely done). "This is the kind of nonsense that Right-Wing NeoCon-Artist economic theory is based on-- fantasy numbers, with fantasy theories based on these fantasy numbers."This is a personal attack and nothing more. I think it was obvious that Mankiw wasn't using real numbers, he was just giving an example. "More false Neo-Liberal trade rhetoric to justify the profiteering from replacing American workers with Chinese workers. There are so many things wrong with this statement that I can't get them all in. "Right... if you can't "get them all in" why don't you tell me a few at least? Well again it doesn't matter. American workers aren't being replaced with Chinese workers just as Charles Schultze, Christian Weller, Ben Bernanke, Greg Mankiw, the labor department and uhh 1028 other economists believe(the ones who signed the petition linked in my previous post). Free trade is supported by economists of all parties, ideologies and nationalities, contrary to what you seem to believe. To deny that China is benefiting from the current economic situation is so easily disproved that it's ridiculous. The percentage of Chinese citizens living on less than 1 dollar has gone from 31.55% in 1990 to 6.6% in 2008. The percentage living on less than $2 has gone from 70% in 1990 to 22% in 2008. (From the World bank) siteresources.worldbank.org/INTEAPHALFYEARLYUPDATE/Resources/550192-1175629375615/EAP-Update-April2007-app-tables.pdf"Real wages have increased 0.76% since July 2002. Productivity has increased 14.4% from the end of 2001 to the end of 2006. Do you think a 0.76% increase in real wages is keeping up with a 14.4% increase in productivity? Looks like about a 13.6% gap to me. "I didn't say REAL WAGES kept up with productivity, I said COMPENSATION did. Which is true. You also randomly picked a year to start wages from... why 2002? If you look at a longer term picture you will clearly see that productivity=compensation. "Now you've gone from extreme distortion to outright lying. Compensation is not increasing as fast as wages, and you know it. And making this claim is a bald-faced lie. Period. "Yes... a bald-faced lie... straight from the Bureau of Labor Statistics!(The chart is made by someone using bls stats) marketliberal.org/Images/ProductivityVsCompensation.JPGRight wing neo conservative BLS.gov? "Another bald-faced lie. The real incomes of college graduates are increasing less than those of less skilled workers. It is only the incomes of the super rich that are increasing, and that has nothing to do with their "training." "Links? Proof? The college vs non-college may be true, but the notion that only the super rich are seeing wage gains is downright false... Apparently you don't need to back up your facts though... only I do. " I don't need Microsoft excel to verify this. The real point, which you are acknowledging, is that the dollar value of our trade deficit with China is increasing. And that's all that counts. The trade deficit is growing in terms of dollars. "The dollar value is increasing, but who cares? Exports(produced with American labor) are increasing FASTER than imports(produced with Chinese labor). In other words, both China and the US are benefiting from this free trade from both jobs and products. If these trends continue, eventually the deficit will become a surplus. " It takes income to purchase goods. It's not the number of potential consumers who create markets. It's the amount of money those consumers have to purchase goods and services. Chinese workers and consumers have very little, making their "hunger" for American goods a false claim. Most are just trying to stay alive, and have nothing approaching the financial means to purchase American goods. Not now, and not in the foreseeable future. "So uhh... how exactly are US exports to China growing at a ~30% per year pace? www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html
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Post by unlawflcombatnt on Aug 20, 2007 5:30:31 GMT -6
Interesting that you criticize my facts, which are cited and can be backed up yet you make up things without citing anything. No, I backed up every single one of my facts with references. If you don't know how to use the links I inserted, let me know and I'll show you how it's done. The "bls.gov" citation doesn't tell me anything, nor any other readers. I researched the information and found it at the BLS, and posted a direct link to it. And you are completely, categorically wrong on your facts. I cited you the 2000-2005 statistics. The 1992-2000 statistics have no application whatsoever. This is just another way you NeoCon-Artists have of clobbering up an issue. As I correctly said, and completely documented from the very "bls.gov" that you vaguely referenced, both Germany and Japan lost less jobs than the United States during that period. Your lies are not only "possible" to dispute, they're very easy to refute with publicly provided information. I don't need to see the conjured up fantasies of a cheap-labor advocating NeoCon-Artist like Reynolds has posted. The actual numbers are available from the BLS, in the references I so generously provided you. You've done nothing but post unverifiable fantasies. More deception on your part. Europe doesn't remove anywhere near as many people from its participating labor force as the U.S. does. Unlike the United States, they still have some degree of Democracy, as opposed to the Corporate plutocracy that's taken over the United States, where our "democracy" revolves around the one-dollar, one-vote concept, instead of the one-person, one-vote policy that used to exist. As a result of their functional democracies, most European countries are forced to report their economic statistics more honestly than the United States does. No "serious person" would claim that Europe has lost more jobs as a result of tariffs than the United States. That was your previous false statement. Another falsehood. The major European countries, (Britain, France, Germany, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark), have per capita incomes similar to those of the U.S. And since their Gini indexes are much lower than that of the U.S., their middle class citizens are doing as well or better. Only the rich in those countries aren't doing as well as the rich in the U.S. Furthermore, the citizens of those countries have a much more extensive social welfare system than the U.S., which means even the citizens with a low per capita income are being taken care of. Apparently you are not only a NeoCon-Artist spin monster, you're a lazy one at that. My forum is full of references to this information, including the Economic Policy Institute and all major government bodies. A reference to "Fact-Check" doesn't prove a thing. I've already reviewed a ton of information from Fact-Check. And, like you, they inject their personal opinions and interpretations into their "fact-checking." A number of sources, including the Economic Policy Institute, have done studies concluding that we've 3 million jobs from outsourcing since Bush took office in 2001. Yours couldn't be more clear as well. As a result of your NeoCon-Artist leanings, you've routinely substituted unsubstantiated statements, here-say, and outright lies for documentable facts. Schultz's "study" is pure gibberish. I've read the study and it makes no sense whatsoever. His whole premise is illogical in the 1st place. However, I can provide some simple common sense to globalization and outsourcing. If a multinational Corporation can move it's factory to China, and replace $130/day American workers with $2/day Chinese workers, and still be allowed to export these now Chinese-made goods back into the United States without any tariffs, it will move its factory to China. And that Corporation will put Americans out of work. And that Corporation is even more likely to do this if the U.S. government gives it a tax break for doing so, and loans that Corporation money inexpensively through the Export-Import Bank (which is backed by U.S. taxpayers-- some of the same taxpayers that the Corporation put out of work and replaced with Chinese workers.) This is the only part of his Shultz's statement that's true. There is no logic whatsoever after that point. Replacing $130/day American workers with $2/day Chinese workers doesn't increase anyone's standard of living, save for that of Corporate America. It is simply illogical to claim that American workers will be better off if their replaced with foreign workers. A rhesus monkey could understand this. Ah. This is the same Bernanke that said there was no housing bubble, and that the subprime meltdown was contained, and the economy was strong. And then had to eat crow and had to "inject" $62 billion into the markets to bail out investment banks, and then had to drop the discount rate to further assist with the liquidity crisis. But the economy is still "strong." It's just that Bernanke had to bail it out to keep it "strong." Bernanke has 0 credibility here, especially when he talks about outsourcing. It doesn't make any sense because he's made no logical or substantiated connection between his rambling statement and anything else. What exactly is he claiming? If he's claiming that the labor force participation is declining because of these bizarre factors, he's wrong. He's using minutia to claim this accounts for a major trend. People drop out of the work force when jobs are scarce. Throughout all of pre-Bush history, the labor force participation increased as employment increased. When it's declined, employment has also declined, and unemployment has risen. Amazingly under Bush, unemployment has "declined" while labor force drop-outs have increased. That's because the Bush junta has deliberately and dishonestly reclassified as "not-in-labor-force" when they would have previously been classified as "unemployed." So if the point being made by your source is about the "cause" of the reduced labor force participation rate, and the increased labor force drop-out rate, he still doesn't make any sense. He's just throwing mud at a wall and hoping that some of it sticks. Yes, as I've already stated above, it is due to outsourcing. And the gibberish you've quoted and referenced means nothing whatsoever. Yes, and this is a result of the reasons stated above and is not a result of outsourcing. The rate of increase in those classified as "not-in-labor-force" has doubled under the Bush administration. During the Bush administration, the number of those classified as "not-in-labor-force" increased 8.3 million. During the same number of months ending the Clinton administration the number of those "not-in-labor-force" increased only 4.2 million. This is simple common sense. Nothing needs to be "proved." If you increase demand for production, you increase demand for labor to provide that production. If you reduce importation of foreign products, you increase the demand for domestic production to replace it. This is simple economics. More so, it's just common sense. What exactly, needs to be proved? Few economists currently claim that outsourcing American jobs increases American employment. This fantasy has been abandoned by most economists, even those that previously believed it-- like Paul Krugman, Paul Samuelson, and Alan Blinder. Many never accepted this in the first place, like former Reagan Treasury undersecretary Paul Craig Roberts. Outsourcing of American jobs does not create more American jobs and does not increase the wealth of American workers. It increases the wealth of the multinational Corporations that replace them with cheap foreign workers, while reducing the wealth of American workers as a whole. As Keynes said, "In the long run we're all dead." No one knows how long the long-term is. But everyone understands what a short-term loss outsourcing is. And the long-term might be a decade, or even a century. A link to what?? The fact that you can't spend benefits? The fact that I, along with a dozen people I know, have had medical claims rejected by an insurance company? What exactly would you like a link to?? Do you live in a closet and have no contact with the outside world? LOL. "Can't spend their benefits as they would like"?? You mean they can't use their health insurance to buy food or pay rent?? Or buy gasoline? Spoken like someone who is independently wealthy, and has no contact with insurance companies or with medical professionals (of which I'm one.) To say you're completely ignorant is an even more astute "assessment." I've had 3 close personal contacts, including both of my parents, who died as a result of Corporate medicine's interference and mishandling of medical problems. (No, I'm not blaming the M.D.s. I'm blaming the non-medical management of health insurance companies who actually practice medicine, while claiming they don't.) I can't walk down the street without finding someone who hasn't had a misadventure with a medical insurance company or HMO. You really do live in a closet, don't you. from your reference: " the Smoot-Hawley Tariff was a policy disaster that significantly worsened the Great Depression" Doesn't sound much like "it was the major cause of the Depression," as you falsely claimed in your earlier post. Furthermore, the Depression stared in 1929, and the Smoot-Hawley Tariff wasn't signed until June 1930. As I said earlier, it contributed, but was not the cause. Again, "over the long-run, we're all dead." We can see and document what happens in the short-run. But no one knows how long the long-run is. I'd rather have a "temporary" benefit, than none whatsoever. Or one that only doesn't occur until the "long-run," as in maybe 100 years. Wow! We agree. The difference is that now tariffs will have a large positive effect, since we have a huge trade deficit, instead of a negative effect, like they did in the 1930's when we had a trade surplus. . Yes, they had a significant (though not causative) effect because we were a net exporter and previously had a large trade surplus. And the situation is exactly the opposite now, since the U.S. has a large trade deficit. No, just the ones you quote. Economists like Paul Craig Roberts and Dean Baker wouldn't agree with your points at all. And Paul Krugman has definitely acknowledged that American workers are losing on trade. Go to Lou Dobbs. It's discussed at length on one of his recent shows. I've posted a link to the Lou Dobbs show in my "links" section if you're actually interested. . Thank you. Mankiw is nuts, and I'm tickled to death to take a shot at a dishonest NeoCon-Artist economic mythologist. No, it's clear that you were using false numbers (from an "example") to prove a false statement and concept. Using an the U.S. export of "$100 billion" to Australia is so far from reality that it isn't even an honest example. (It's only $10 billion in reality.) And using "$100 billion" of exports to the U.S. from China isn't an honest example either, when the real number is over $200 billion. Like I previously stated, Mankiw used false numbers in phony example to prove a false point. And you used the same numbers, to prove the same false point. [/i] Right... if you can't "get them all in" why don't you tell me a few at least?[/i] Yes... a bald-faced lie... straight from the Bureau of Labor Statistics!(The chart is made by someone using bls stats)[/quote] You're not only a liar, you're a pathological one at that. I've done this dance with another liar who swore up and down that his chart "came from the BLS," when he actually made the chart himself from statistics he allegedly got from the BLS. You can make up your own chart to show anything you want. And this chart you're talking about is made by a private individual, not by the BLS. But I have a better chart from the New York Times, showing the wage-productivity gap. No, a Right-wing NeoCon-Artist who is making up his own chart, and falsely attributing it to the BLS.
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Post by blueneck on Aug 20, 2007 10:56:20 GMT -6
Gregory "outsourcing US jobs is good for the economy" Mankiw was too ideological and incompetent even for the Bush administration who shuffled him aside after this infamous statement. Mankiw also authored the 2004 Bush Admin policy that blurred the lines between service and manufacturing that allowed for some service jobs like fast food preparation to be counted as manufacturing, further skewing the job creation numbers - overstating mfg growth and understating service growth.. The blip in US exports to china is the big Boeing aircraft order, a condition of which is that the new planes must have over 50% chinese content. Given china's poor quality record and lax safety regulations this does not sound like the kind of airplane I would like to be riding in. The mercantile argument that somehow third world countries would be buying US products and services in any meaningful way is the oldest and biggest falsehood by the pro globalists. Like I said you guys need to come up with some new and more convincing arguments than the same old same old tired and easily refuted memes. I am wondering if our new member here is some sort of shill for Heritage or NAM or some other right wing pro open border globalist stink tank? Sounds awfully familiar to some past participants
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Post by syphax on Aug 20, 2007 16:07:49 GMT -6
"No, I backed up every single one of my facts with references. If you don't know how to use the links I inserted, let me know and I'll show you how it's done."Very few of your facts had inserted links. Look back up at your post. Only 4 links were included. "And you are completely, categorically wrong on your facts. I cited you the 2000-2005 statistics. The 1992-2000 statistics have no application whatsoever. This is just another way you NeoCon-Artists have of clobbering up an issue. As I correctly said, and completely documented from the very "bls.gov" that you vaguely referenced, both Germany and Japan lost less jobs than the United States during that period. "First of all I am not a neo-con. Sorry to disappoint. Secondly you are wrong. The statistics are 1992-2005, not 1992-2000. Both Germany and Japan lost more jobs during the 1992-2005 period percentage wise(Which is obviously more important than raw numbers, which don't account for population). www.allbusiness.com/human-resources/workforce-management-hiring/1084-1.htmlAccording to that article, outsourcing "mania" occurred during the early 90s(companies outsourced TOO much) and therefore the 1992-2005 more correctly shows outsourcing effects than the 2000-2005, when not as much outsourcing occurred. "You've done nothing but post unverifiable fantasies. "Not at all true... you simply won't listen to anything that you don't like. "More deception on your part. Europe doesn't remove anywhere near as many people from its participating labor force as the U.S. does. Unlike the United States, they still have some degree of Democracy, as opposed to the Corporate plutocracy that's taken over the United States, where our "democracy" revolves around the one-dollar, one-vote concept, instead of the one-person, one-vote policy that used to exist. As a result of their functional democracies, most European countries are forced to report their economic statistics more honestly than the United States does. "This sounds an awfully lot like a conspiracy theory. While it may be true that unemployment is calculated differently, I seriously doubt EU unemployment is lower or at the same level of the US even if these differences are accounted for. The US participation rates is higher than Europe or Japan. Undeniable fact : research.stlouisfed.org/publications/iet/20060801/cover.pdfHow about some proof? Like a link? "No "serious person" would claim that Europe has lost more jobs as a result of tariffs than the United States. That was your previous false statement. "Europe lost more manufacturing jobs from 1992-2005. As previously cited. "Another falsehood. The major European countries, (Britain, France, Germany, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark), have per capita incomes similar to those of the U.S. And since their Gini indexes are much lower than that of the U.S., their middle class citizens are doing as well or better. Only the rich in those countries aren't doing as well as the rich in the U.S. Furthermore, the citizens of those countries have a much more extensive social welfare system than the U.S., which means even the citizens with a low per capita income are being taken care of. "Again no link or evidence given. I on the other hand WILL give one. www.timbro.com/euvsusa/pdf/EU_vs_USA_English.pdf"IF THE EU WERE A PART of the United States of America, would it belong to the richest or the poorest group of states?" Go down to page 9, it disproves your per capita income statement showing US per capita GDP being 30% higher in the US than in most European countries. Also this wikipedia page provides some actual per capita income data which also disproves your statement(with the exception of Norway). en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Per_capita_incomeeven the poor in the US are better than the poor in Europe. "As we saw in the preceding section, for example, 40 per cent of all Swedish households would rank among low-income households in the USA, and an even greater number in the poorer European countries would be classed as low income earnings by the American definition." "Apparently you are not only a NeoCon-Artist spin monster, you're a lazy one at that. My forum is full of references to this information, including the Economic Policy Institute and all major government bodies. "So I'm lazy(and even a monster...) because I didn't read all your references you posted previously on the forum...? If its so easy to find them, get them and link them on THIS thread. "A number of sources, including the Economic Policy Institute, have done studies concluding that we've 3 million jobs from outsourcing since Bush took office in 2001."EPI is known to be liberal and out of the main stream. For every study you can cite that states outsourcing cost millions of jobs I can cite 10 that state outsourcing is beneficial, its effects are overstated and tariffs are bad policy. www.foreignaffairs.org/20040501faessay83301/daniel-w-drezner/the-outsourcing-bogeyman.htmlmba.tuck.dartmouth.edu/pages/faculty/matthew.slaughter/MNE%20Outsourcing%200304.pdfen.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_is_Flatwww.heritage.org/Research/TradeandForeignAid/wm467.cfm#_ftn4www.mdfsystems.com/artman/publish/article_19.shtmletc. "Yours couldn't be more clear as well. As a result of your NeoCon-Artist leanings, you've routinely substituted unsubstantiated statements, here-say, and outright lies for documentable facts."I'm not a neo-con at all. Again sorry to disappoint you. I never said anything political at all here and therefore you have no clue what my leanings are. I happen to be a libertarian. I am not happy with Bush. You are just dead wrong here. "Schultz's "study" is pure gibberish. I've read the study and it makes no sense whatsoever. His whole premise is illogical in the 1st place. "How so? Please explain. "Bernanke has 0 credibility here, especially when he talks about outsourcing. "There is no way I could ever provide a source you would find credible because anybody that is against tariffs instantly has no credibility in your mind... regardless of their arguments/achievements/reputation. "So if the point being made by your source is about the "cause" of the reduced labor force participation rate, and the increased labor force drop-out rate, he still doesn't make any sense. He's just throwing mud at a wall and hoping that some of it sticks. "I think his points are clear and irrefutable. Do you honestly believe that women would have kept on joining the labor force at the rate they were in the 60's and 70's forever? They slowed down in the 80's and stopped and actually started to decline in the 90's(During a booming economy). This is clearly a social factor. The decline in youth participation reflects their growing participation in school. www.bls.gov/opub/ils/pdf/opbils49.pdf"Yes, as I've already stated above, it is due to outsourcing. And the gibberish you've quoted and referenced means nothing whatsoever. "So more teens are going to college because of outsourcing? And women are deciding to be stay at home moms because of outsourcing? That may be plausible if the trends started since 2000, but they started in the 90's during an extremely strong job market. "The rate of increase in those classified as "not-in-labor-force" has doubled under the Bush administration. During the Bush administration, the number of those classified as "not-in-labor-force" increased 8.3 million. During the same number of months ending the Clinton administration the number of those "not-in-labor-force" increased only 4.2 million. "This is again, likely the result of increased college enrollment and the wall being hit for female participation. But again, this flaw always existed in unemployment and therefore to say that unemployment stats were always correct before but now mean nothing is no fair. "This is simple common sense. Nothing needs to be "proved.""In the short run perhaps(although if it can be so easily proved, give one example of it happening), although certainly not in the long run. Just as banning the use of any physical capital would increase employment in the short run, productivity would fall, wages would fall and everyone would be MUCH worse off. Banning outsourcing is a ban on efficiency and although it won't make anyone worse off, it will limit how much better off we can get. "Few economists currently claim that outsourcing American jobs increases American employment. This fantasy has been abandoned by most economists, even those that previously believed it-- like Paul Krugman, Paul Samuelson, and Alan Blinder. Many never accepted this in the first place, like former Reagan Treasury undersecretary Paul Craig Roberts. "This is untrue. Most economists are against tariffs are for free trade as articles I previously cited stated. Give me one article that says "Economists believed, until recently, free trade was a positive sum game but few economists still believe this is the case. Most economists now believe the costs of outsourcing outweigh the benefits". You will never find such a claim anywhere. "Outsourcing of American jobs does not create more American jobs and does not increase the wealth of American workers. It increases the wealth of the multinational Corporations that replace them with cheap foreign workers, while reducing the wealth of American workers as a whole. "Seeing as how net worth is higher than it was in 2000, and much higher than it was in the early 90's, I'd say Americans are becoming wealthier despite your false claims. www.businessweek.com/the_thread/economicsunbound/archives/2006/06/net_worth--and.html "As Keynes said, "In the long run we're all dead." No one knows how long the long-term is. But everyone understands what a short-term loss outsourcing is. And the long-term might be a decade, or even a century. "So short term consequences should take preference over long term consequences? So I take it you oppose environmental regulation? That would be great for the short term interests of manufacturing and the economy in general. Are you for big budget deficits? Why would this argument not be valid in these respects but would be perfectly valid to use for the support of tariffs? Seeing as how the short term consequences so far have at worst been that real wage gains have been small for the middle class this recovery and that manufacturing workers have been displaced... the long term effects should be given preference over the minimal short term problems. Especially considering manufacturing workers will be displaced eventually anyway by physical capital just as agricultural workers were decades ago. "A link to what?? The fact that you can't spend benefits? The fact that I, along with a dozen people I know, have had medical claims rejected by an insurance company?
What exactly would you like a link to?? Do you live in a closet and have no contact with the outside world?"If the situation is so apparent, give me one link of widespread problems with insurance claims being denied. As far as I can tell, the problem with insurance is that many millions of Americans don't have it, not that its meaningless. Also, as I stated before benefits cover more than health insurance. They include disability insurance, life insurance, retirement plans, vacation and stock ownership plans. All useless I suppose? "Spoken like someone who is independently wealthy, and has no contact with insurance companies or with medical professionals (of which I'm one.) "I have health insurance and have had some issues with it. but its certainly not useless as you say it is. If it wasn't worth it I wouldn't buy it. "To say you're completely ignorant is an even more astute "assessment." I've had 3 close personal contacts, including both of my parents, who died as a result of Corporate medicine's interference and mishandling of medical problems. (No, I'm not blaming the M.D.s. I'm blaming the non-medical management of health insurance companies who actually practice medicine, while claiming they don't.)
I can't walk down the street without finding someone who hasn't had a misadventure with a medical insurance company or HMO.
You really do live in a closet, don't you."No need for name calling first of all. Lets keep this civil. Again, having issues with insurance does not mean that insurance is useless and any benefits including insurance are completely useless. If insurance was useless you wouldn't have it in the first place. Also as I said before... disability insurance, life insurance, retirement plans, vacation and stock ownership plans. "Doesn't sound much like "it was the major cause of the Depression," as you falsely claimed in your earlier post. Furthermore, the Depression stared in 1929, and the Smoot-Hawley Tariff wasn't signed until June 1930. As I said earlier, it contributed, but was not the cause. "Umm... a policy disaster that significantly worsened the great depression... that sure sounds like a major contributer to me! "Again, "over the long-run, we're all dead." We can see and document what happens in the short-run. But no one knows how long the long-run is. "So again, you put short run priorities over long run ones? Considering the short run problems are not very significant at all and the long run benefits are extremely significant(especially for countries like China who's citizens are extremely poor). "I'd rather have a "temporary" benefit, than none whatsoever. Or one that only doesn't occur until the "long-run," as in maybe 100 years. "Not too concerned about global warming I assume? I guess you agree with Bush on one issue ;D. "Wow! We agree. The difference is that now tariffs will have a large positive effect, since we have a huge trade deficit, instead of a negative effect, like they did in the 1930's when we had a trade surplus."Tariffs will certainly not have a positive impact. In fact the OECD has warned that re balancing the US trade deficit will be troublesome without tariffs, but with tariffs it will be much worse. www.forbes.com/finance/feeds/afx/2006/05/23/afx2765701.html "No, just the ones you quote. Economists like Paul Craig Roberts and Dean Baker wouldn't agree with your points at all. And Paul Krugman has definitely acknowledged that American workers are losing on trade. "All well outside the mainstream. I like the economist's quote regarding Paul Krugman "A glance through his past columns reveals a growing tendency to attribute all the world's ills to George Bush…Even his economics is sometimes stretched…Overall, the effect is to give lay readers the illusion that Mr Krugman's perfectly respectable personal political beliefs can somehow be derived empirically from economic theory." Paul Craig Roberts also happens to believe in 9/11 conspiracy theories. It takes someone who really loves to deny truth and facts in order to really believe the conspiracy BS. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Craig_Roberts"Thank you. Mankiw is nuts, and I'm tickled to death to take a shot at a dishonest NeoCon-Artist economic mythologist. "Mankiw is very mainstream and well respected by the economic community. Unlike Krugman or Roberts, you won't find the Economist calling him completely biased or find that he believes in any conspiracy theories. I challenge you to find anything that suggests otherwise. "Free trade is opposed by people of both parties, all ideologies, and the majority of people on the planet. Most voters oppose free trade in the United States, as well as those in other countries. The mains supporters are the rich and the Corporate elite, of both parties and all nationalities. "President Bush won the 2004 election... does that mean he was right? Although free trade does have strong opposition in politics and many Americans oppose free trade, most economists strongly support free trade. Its like saying global warming is not happening because 51% of Americans don't think it is. Although global warming is hotly debated in politics, it is not debated very much among serious scientists. I happen to put the opinion of experts above politicians and opinion polls. "To deny that American workers are being hurt by their replacement by Chinese workers is even more ridiculous, and has already been disproven. "Compensation=Productivity. Productivity has been rising at a very strong pace since 2000. The fact that wage gains have been partially eaten up by an increase in benefits as percentage of compensation can hardly be blamed on Chinese workers. And even if this statement were true, how can you morally justify sacrificing Chinese workers for American workers? What Americans "lose" from outsourcing is not even close to what Chinese workers gain from outsourcing. If you can morally justify sacrificing massive improvements in the quality of life of Chinese to protect a little wage gain(again this isn't supported by facts) then can easily justify invading a country for its oil. "No, you said no such thing. You said "Hourly earnings are up 3.8% year over year while headline inflation is up roughly 2.6% yoy." "I said that hourly earnings were up 3.8% yoy while inflation is only 2.6%, which is true. But I also said that when benefits were included Compensation=productivity. Look at the bls.gov statstics for productivity and for compensation. They rise at the same rate. data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet?data_tool=latest_numbers&series_id=CIU2010000000000Adata.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet?data_tool=latest_numbers&series_id=PRS85006092"I didn't "randomly" pick anything. I picked the start of the Bush pseudo-recovery, which shows just how much real wages have not increased since Bush's wholesale export of American jobs really took hold. "Real wages HAVE increased even by your statistic by 0.76%. But once again... productivity=compensation. The fact that employers are spending more on benefits rather than wages has absolutely nothing to do with globalization. "You're not only a liar, you're a pathological one at that. I've done this dance with another liar who swore up and down that his chart "came from the BLS," when he actually made the chart himself from statistics he allegedly got from the BLS.
You can make up your own chart to show anything you want. And this chart you're talking about is made by a private individual, not by the BLS.
But I have a better chart from the New York Times, showing the wage-productivity gap."You seem very hostile... please keep this civil. No need for name calling. I didn't call you any names, no need to get angry. That bls chart is made by an individual... but it is still TRUE. look at the BLS.gov stats I provided before and you will clearly see that the chart is true. Again you cite a wage vs productivity gap. For that to be valid it must assume that.. 1) Benefits cost nothing for employers 2) Benefits are completely meaningless for employees. Neither is true. "No, a Right-wing NeoCon-Artist who is making up his own chart, and falsely attributing it to the BLS. "Not everyone for free trade is a neocon... I am not, as I stated before(and my examples regarding global warming and Bush make clear). That being said, the chart is made from stats from the bls. To say that the chart is meaningless because it wasn't made by the bls is silly. News outlets often take such stats and make charts, that doesn't mean the chart is a "lie". Just because it wasn't made by the BLS doesn't mean the stats aren't from the BLS. They are. "I've backed up almost every single statement with well-publicized government statistics. You've backed yours up with commentary by private individuals, while even trying to claim that a chart concocted by a private individual came from the government. "Again, you only cited 4 sources in your previous post... you gave 2 links with solid data this post. Then you gave one other for epinet.org. "So, uhh...how exactly is the trade deficit with China growing at a greater than 10% per year pace???"Because the exports started at a lower number than the imports. If you don't believe this write in the numbers yourself straight from census.gov www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html
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Post by syphax on Aug 20, 2007 16:17:03 GMT -6
"I am wondering if our new member here is some sort of shill for Heritage or NAM or some other right wing pro open border globalist stink tank? Sounds awfully familiar to some past participants "
Ummm... no. Just as I don't accuse you of being some left-wing union leader who has some sort of secret interest in creating tariffs(without any evidence), I would appreciate that you don't accuse me of being a "right wing pro open border globalist stink tank".
I happen to be an average citizen who has examined facts and come to the conclusion that free trade is a good thing for all parties. I have never heard of "NAM"(Vietnam?) and have visited heritage only a few times.
I try to balance out where I get my news from. I generally get most of my economic news from blogs like Cafe Hayek(libertarian, general), The Big Picture(liberal, investing), Greg Mankiw(conservative, economics), Calculated Risk(liberal, economics), Econbrowser(moderate, economics), Roubini Global Economics(liberal, economics) and The Skeptical Optimist(conservative, economics). In my opinion a very fair lineup of blogs.
I also have on my iGoogle homepage links to CNN finance, Economist.com, Bloomberg.com and BBC News Business. Again, I don't think you could call that biased.
I also have never previously posted here.
P.S. Also stop smiting me! It hurts my feelings ;D.
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Post by unlawflcombatnt on Aug 21, 2007 16:41:19 GMT -6
I backed up ALL of my statistics with references. And if you can't find some of them, go to my "Economic Data Links" section and look them up. No, I'm right. You're not going to include a period when outsourcing was less of a problem, and job growth was strong, in order to make your false assertion. The correct time frame to use is 2000-2005, when Bush took over, and greatly accelerated outsourcing of American jobs to improve the bottom line of his rich Corporate campaign contributors. You references to the unsubstantiated opinions of a pro-Corporate, pro-business propaganda journal prove nothing whatsoever. "Undeniable fact" Now I know how your non-scientific thought process works. There is no such thing as an "undeniable fact" in the world of economics. (And very few in the world of Natural Science) And since you consider articles from any journal as proof of you "undeniable facts," here's an excerpt from an article from BigPicture. " So long as we are popping economic myths, let's also dispatch with the 4.5% unemployment rate. That number has been largely caused by several million exhaustees and others simply leaving the work force:
The actual unemployment rate is closer to 6.5%. And if we measured it the way the Europeans do, its closer to 8%. This explains why wages and labor costs have remained subdued despite the alleged 4.5% UE measure. " The U.S. lost more manufacturing jobs from 2000-2005. "As previously cited." Since I've ALREADY posted a general link to the CIA's information on this subject, I'll give you that link. (You can look up the individual country links on your own time, since l've already spent the time for you to find the general site.) Below are specific quotes from the individual countries sites on both per-capita GDP and Gini indexes. unlawflcombatnt.proboards84.com/index.cgi?board=links&action=display&thread=1149733686&page=1#1149733686Germany GDP - per capita (PPP): $31,900 (2006 est.) Germany Gini Index Distribution of family income - Gini index: 28.3 (2000) France GDP - per capita (PPP): $31,100 (2006 est.) France Gini Index Distribution of family income - Gini index: 26.7 (2002) United Kingdom GDP - per capita (PPP): $31,800 (2006 est.) United Kingdom Distribution of family income - Gini index: 36.8 (1999) Norway GDP - per capita (PPP): $46,300 (2006 est.) Norway Distribution of family income - Gini index: 25.8 (2000) Sweden GDP - per capita (PPP): $32,200 (2006 est.) Sweden Distribution of family income - Gini index: 25 (2000) Denmark GDP - per capita (PPP): $37,000 (2006 est.) Denmark Distribution of family income - Gini index: 23.2 (2002) Netherlands GDP - per capita (PPP): $32,100 (2006 est.) Netherlands Distribution of family income - Gini index: 30.9 (2005) United States GDP - per capita (PPP): $44,000 (2006 est.) United States Distribution of family income - Gini index: 45 (2004) As I said, the per-capita incomes are similar. And though they are slightly lower on average, that's more than made up for by the reduced Gini index, and the fact that most European countries have universal health coverage, so individuals are not paying for that our of their income, as they are in the United States. Again, you site a private, Corporate sponsored, horrendously biased source. This means absolutely nothing. It's simply alternate reality. Look at the CIA references. It was not easy for me to "find them", and then post them in my "Economic Data Link" section. It took a tremendous amount of time over the last 3 years to find them. You can certainly spend a few minutes and look them up yourself, since I've saved you the trouble of having to locate them in the 1st place. You've gotta be kidding. MBA? Heritage? Tom Friedman? Every one of them is Right-Wing spin machine (except Friedman, who's just an unclassifiable nut-job), funded by Corporate interests that benefit from perpetuating such lies. I sense an attempt to exhaust my time to refute your nonsense. For the time being, this is all I have time for. I'll get to the rest of your alternate reality statements in another post.
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Post by syphax on Aug 21, 2007 18:02:12 GMT -6
"I backed up ALL of my statistics with references. And if you can't find some of them, go to my "Economic Data Links" section and look them up."I must say I have an issue with you saying "My stats are all real and based off of sources" and then telling me to dig through a section on this forum with 31 separate threads to verify them. Still, I think you are forgetting the reason for this particular part of the argument. You said... "(by the way, writing "bls.gov" is not any kind of acceptable reference, except maybe on Fox Pseudo-News) "while you are simply citing references without even giving me the source... you're just telling me to flip through a group of sources to verify your facts. Note that I never doubted any of your facts... I just think that you are not being fair in criticizing my citation of bls.gov while you are not even doing that. "No, I'm right. You're not going to include a period when outsourcing was less of a problem, and job growth was strong, in order to make your false assertion. The correct time frame to use is 2000-2005, when Bush took over, and greatly accelerated outsourcing of American jobs to improve the bottom line of his rich Corporate campaign contributors." Although as I previously stated, I'm not fan of Bush, what exactly did Bush do that accelerated outsourcing? www.factcheck.org/kerry_blames_corporate_tax_code_for_shipping.html"But recent Labor Department data underscore what even Democratic economists have said for some time -- outsourcing jobs overseas, or "offshoring," accounts for just a small fraction of the many millions of jobs that are lost each year even in a good economy.There is indeed a tax break for US-based multinational corporations to locate operations overseas. Bush isn't to blame for it -- it's been there for decades. It's also true that Bush doesn't support Kerry's proposed remedy, which is controversial." "You references to the unsubstantiated opinions of a pro-Corporate, pro-business propaganda journal prove nothing whatsoever."You provide no evidence for this. It seems like every source you don't like just happens to be "pro-corporate propaganda". It appears as though it is impossible for me to cite anything. Perhaps if you provide proof that the sites were biased or were corporate propaganda... but beyond this this claim means nothing. I could just as easily say every source you cite is propaganda... but without proof, it would be a meaningless claim. ""Undeniable fact" Now I know how your non-scientific thought process works. There is no such thing as an "undeniable fact" in the world of economics. (And very few in the world of Natural Science)"Provide me any sort of evidence that the EU worker participation rate is higher than that of the US. You can't. Therefore it is essentially an undeniable fact. "And since you consider articles from any journal as proof of you "undeniable facts," here's an excerpt from an article from BigPicture."Barry Rithotlz is correct in what he says regarding the unemployment rate. But again... www.econbrowser.com/archives/2005/07/how_many_people.html"The U.S. lost more manufacturing jobs from 2000-2005. "As previously cited."""But recent Labor Department data underscore what even Democratic economists have said for some time -- outsourcing jobs overseas, or "offshoring," accounts for just a small fraction of the many millions of jobs that are lost each year even in a good economy." "Again, you site a private, Corporate sponsored, horrendously biased source. This means absolutely nothing. It's simply alternate reality. Look at the CIA references."An unfair criticism... prove it somehow. "It was not easy for me to "find them", and then post them in my "Economic Data Link" section. It took a tremendous amount of time over the last 3 years to find them. You can certainly spend a few minutes and look them up yourself, since I've saved you the trouble of having to locate them in the 1st place. "I think you misunderstood me... What i meant was if It was so easy for me to be able to find them on your website... why can you not simply link them on this page?(I happen to also have a large number of links gathered over the years and I have individually cited each fact) Again you were the one who happend to be criticizing my facts... yet you simply cite stats and point me to a library of 50 sources and tell me to "check the facts" myself. You aren't being fair. "I sense an attempt to exhaust my time to refute your nonsense. For the time being, this is all I have time for. I'll get to the rest of your alternate reality statements in another post. "I am willing to end this debate if you would like. It doesn't seem like much progress will be made anyway. Perhaps we can agree to allow readers to decide for themselves?
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Post by blueneck on Aug 21, 2007 19:05:21 GMT -6
Syphax, (or "empyrean") NAM is the National Association of Manufacturers, I am sure you know who they are, but just in case you don't they are a lobby group for pro global multinationals. You claim to not be some sort of shill, yet every one of your positions comes straight off the scripts of the Heritage foundation and other neo-liberal pro-global orgs just like them, who did a bogus piece (with flimsy and non existent supporting references) on why benefits should be counted as real wages that was then parroted by right wing radio and the ranting cable business shows like Kudlow or Cramer.
And actually yes I did once belong to a union ( and made good wages and had awesome bennies as a result) and even rose to a leadership position. That is no secret. But that was decades ago and I currently am in a managerial (non union) position and have been for some time.
I think I can clarify about benefits and why it is a non starter in calculating wages. while there may or may not be widespread claim denials (I know I've had a few), one can not deny that the costs for health care have risen yes for employers but also employees alike. In the not too distant past most manufacturing workers had full medical coverage with no fees, deductibles or copays. But just as costs have risen, so has the employees portion of fees, copays and deductibles. deductibles in most cases have risen to the point that a reasonably healthy person may never even make the deductibles each year and therefore most of a person's health care comes straight out of their own pocket rather than be at least partially or even fully covered with the plans of the past. People and companies are paying more and more for less and less coverage. That is why people refer to it as "insurance that doesn't cover anything".
So not only does the costs of health care continue to go up, so does the amount of the employees contribution and coverage of copays and deductibles that comes out of ones take home pay. And insurance companies (that is the whole purpose of the HMO in case you missed it) have been cutting and limiting just what they cover as well, how many people do you know that still have dental or optical as part of their benefit package? I have it - at an extra charge - even more out of my pocket.
So it clearly is just one sided to suggest that because employers benefit costs have gone up that it translates to higher wages- so too have the employees costs- and dramatically so. The root cause is an out of control medical and insurance system - the most expensive in the world that leaves 2/5 ths of the US population un or under-insured.
The real measure of ones wages is how much they take home, not some nebulous theories about "benefits" - period
And I can tell you from experience (not what some poindexter at a think tank theorizes) that manufacturing has been shedding jobs and closing plants for some time - and it has accelerated in recent years, as UC correctly states, in the 90's there was enough real job creation that the jobs lost to offshoring were barely noticed.
I would love for my kids to study engineering, except that as a long term career choice right now it is not one I would advise. Ads more and more manufacturing infrastructure and technology gets shipped offshore there is little demand left for new engineering grads. Who wants to spend 5 years in college, graduate thousands in debt to find the only opportunites are cable installation or copy machine fixing.
Take a drive thru your local industrial parks and look at all the vacant former mfg facilities for sale and see it with your own eyes. Closed mfg facilities and a busted real estate market are hardly signs of any strength in the economy. Common sense trumps BS any day of the week.
But now the tipping has been reached - the pace of offshoring has increased to the point where there arent any equivalent jobs to offset them - even pro global NAM has said that over 40,000 US manufacturing plants have been lost to outsourcing. Again regardless of what hacks like Mankiw or Friedman (Friedman??? you've got to be kidding me!) say, outsourcing US mfg has hurt US workers, not to mention putting a serious strain on our ability to manufacture our own defense. This isn't a left right thing - it hurts workers of all political stripes. Neo conservatives and neo liberals share common ground on globalization, whereas, labor and true conservatives share the common ground on keeping and creating jobs at home rather than abroad.
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