Waiting for the World to Change

I have been working on an entry about outsourcing for some time.  I find it difficult to make a concise and comprehensive declaration on the situation of jobs and outsourcing.  Even more difficult is to make it attention grabbing.  The truth of the matter is that it is not an attention grabbing subject unless one wants to use hyperbole.  The only thing I can say that will grab attention is:

OUTSOURCING JOBS IS GOOD FOR THE AMERICAN ECONOMY!

also

PEOPLE WANT THE BENEFITS OF CAPITALISM WITHOUT ANY CONSEQUENCES!

There.  I said it.

The complaint is that there are not enough jobs in the United States (and many European countries) and companies are sending jobs overseas.  Some things I no longer have to clarify due to the nature of the news cycle.  I had originally broken down how much these jobs pay but so many news stories have broken about the pay rates at Foxconn that this is no longer necessary.

I do believe that many people who have strong opinions about the situation of outsourced labour have a purely emotional response.  It is this drive to resent the “other” and attach negative feelings on outsiders.  When looking at the employment situation many aspects need to be considered.  There is the aspect of Cost of Living (not CPI) and wages, economic theory, international relations, technology… it is terribly complicated.  So, why the insistence that “Outsourcing is the problem” when analysing the employment situation?

Let’s look at this rationally:  Foxconn employees make 31 cents an hour to assemble the iPhone.  They work 12 hours a day, six days a week.  I have heard the argument that American wages would only increase the cost of the product by 26%, but what most of these statements ignore is the situation that allows these phones to be assembled at such a high pace.  When Apple needs new glass for the front of their phone, Corning can supply them with new glass the same day in China… the Corning plant is there, too.  Most of the components are in Shenzen, or close to it.  The cost of shipping components around the world would start increasing costs exponentially.

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Tags: apps, COLA, Cost of Living, CPI, Economics, economy, employment, foxconn, iphone, Jobs, NAFTA, outsourcing, reactionary, technology, unemployment, wages
Category Economics |

The United States’ Hostage Crisis of 2010

This is a bit of an angry rant.  If you do not like it, to quote Rep. Jim Bunning:  “TOUGH SHIT!“

I was reading an article in the Wall Street Journal online about the trend in lack of hiring.  This follows several stories that have come out that employers are not hiring the unemployed.  I did a little looking around and I noticed several things.

• The Right (all of the Right, the New Right and the old Conservatives) are blaming the current administration, and not corporations, financiers and businesses.
• Employers claim they are doing what they can.
• Many Americans are concerned with outsourcing.
• Everyone has an opinion on what is going wrong and some solution to fix it, none of it is really pro-democratic or in the best interest of the United States and the American people.

First, let us look at the Right’s attitude of the current unemployment trend. First we have a Republican like Jim Bunning saying “Tough shit” to the unemployed. And then there are tons of comments (too many to cherry pick) with Conservative politicians blaming the unemployed for being unemployed.  On top of that, they constantly talk about the Obama administration not giving an extension to tax breaks for the top 2% (or 20%) of Americans as part of the reasoning for the lack of employment.  This is on top of complaints about regulations (both environmental and safety) on corporations and companies that force them to have lower profits.

Employers echo these concerns. They cite that they are unsure of the future of the political and economic landscape and are timid to undertake mass hiring for fear of mass firing.  They claim that regulations are costing them too much, and the current administration is going to cost them more.

On top of all of these issues, I keep seeing complaints about outsourcing.  This is really a separate issue, but I wanted to make mention of it here.  Jobs that are below minimum wage are not going to create a mass employment situation.  Companies would simply reduce employees or raise costs rather than stop outsourcing.  On top of that, there are ways to outsource employment that would create a mutually beneficial situation for everyone.  But really, most of these jobs cannot be competitively situated in the United States.  It will never be cheaper to produce coffee or coconuts in the United States than in South America.  But the import and sale of these goods do create jobs.  Outsourcing is a complex situation, with very real problems in today’s world, but I do not believe that it is the problem the United States is facing today.  I will discuss this farther at another time.

So, what’s really going on?  And what is the solution?

I don’t know of a definitive solution.  But what is really going on is simple: Corporate interest and the wealthiest, top 2% of America are determined to get their own way. They are going to maximize profits at any cost.  And they are going to get legislation passed any way that they can do this.

“Employers are slow to fill job openings.” This does not mean there are not job openings.  The employers are behind this.  Not the government.  Not the unemployed. It is the people with the means to create jobs that are refusing to do this.

Many people have solutions that would work.  They propose we re-legislate and give the wealthy their tax breaks, remove regulations on companies and corporate interests, and some even propose to remove the “minimum wage.” Then companies will start hiring again.

This is nothing short of a subversion of democracy. They are proposing we kowtow to the wealthy and give them what they want, regardless of the cost to the people or the country.  This is not how democracy works.  At worst, this is how a dictatorship works.  At best, this is how a plutocracy works.

How is this any different then changing legislation for terrorists?  Or paying a ransom to pirates?  It really is not any different. That is what the GOP is proposing.  They want to give in to the corporations and give them what they want.  Where does it stop?  How does this benefit the American people?  (Some of us are still waiting for that “trickle-down” from 30 years ago.)  The Conservative legislators and their reactionary supporters are no better than people who want to “give in to the terrorists.“  How Patriotic is that?!?

If someone blows up a building, or a school bus, and claims they will continue to do this until they get what they want, should it be done?  I mean, logically, we should look at the reason they have felt this was the best recourse to make their grievances known.  But, giving in sets a bad precedence.  Now, everyone who need air a grievance only has to blow something up to get their own way?  Of course, this is something that cannot be considered.  This is why terrorism is typically a last recourse of the disenfranchised.  It typically only leaves the option of a full insurrection.

This is the equivalent of the economic situation we have currently.  The corporate interests have said “No jobs for you!” until they get their own way.

And are they funding these “Tea Party” candidates?  Evidence supports this is likely true.  Just Google: Koch industries and tea party to get an idea.

(I want to state here, as I have stated constantly, searching Google is not research!  It is just a general query.  Using Wikipedia or an Encyclopedia is not research!  It is just a tool for a general picture.  Real research takes a lot of work and a lot of primary sources.  I can throw up a website in 24 hours that states that Ann Coulter is really the alter ego of Sharon Angle, and they are both members of the Illuminati planning to exterminate all non-whites on the planet and subjugate the poor into labor camps.  I can even make some official looking documents to put on there.  This does not make any of that true.  There are a thousand conspiracy theories on the internet.  I’m sure some of them are true, but not all of them are, and none of them have extensive research to verify them.)

If this article seems a bit hostile, it should and it is. I’m sick and tired of this bullshit, everywhere, with every person throwing in their 2 cents, that really amounts to personal interest.  That is what giving in to corporations will serve, the short term personal interests of those effected by this unemployment situation.  Our children will not benefit, except the progeny of the top 2%.  The rest of our children are going to be left to work in some dystopian future that we never intended.

HAVE ANY OF YOU SEEN ROBOCOP? I mean, seriously?  Watch it again.  And again.  And again.  And again.  It is what you are asking for.  OCP Detroit is what the GOP and the Tea Party are proposing.

And we are in the Hostage Crisis of 2010.  Corporate America is holding the American people hostage. They are refusing to give us employment until politicians give them the legislation that they want.  This is not democratic.

You can throw all the words around that you want to pretend that you are “For the people.“  You can call yourselves Patriots and talk about the Constitution and a Democratic Republic and the Founding Fathers and morality and limited government and fiscal responsibility.  It is not about that.

Most of you seem to have no clue, so I’m going to tell you – A democratic republic works this way:

People elect politicians to represent them in government.  An electoral system is used to designate how these politicians are elected in an attempt to represent the most people possible in the fairest way possible.
In our system, we also have checks and balances to provide that the majority cannot override the rights of the minority and the dominants cannot dictate the rules to the minorities.

Democratic systems are egalitarian.  No one has a higher vote than someone else.  The means in which to measure the weight of a vote vary, but none of them give specific individuals a higher level of leverage over others.

When you subvert the process, the officials are no longer representatives of the people.

Now. You propose that we limit government to not impose regulations on corporations and that we use fiscal responsibility in government.  Somehow this translates into not having universal healthcare for the people, even though a majority want some type of healthcare reform.  And after Hurricane Katrina, the BP Gulf Spill, the several mine collapses, and many other events that have unfolded recently, how does lack of regulations serve the people of this country?  After the lack of regulations on Wall Street and in the Housing Market, how does this benefit the American people?  It doesn’t.  It benefits the wealthy.

“Reactionary” means a person who wants to go back to “the good ole days” or the status quo.  It is typically used to refer to Conservatives.  In the political perspective, the “reactionary” typically does not want to progress forward, even if it is in their own best interest.

Today, the New Right is a Reactionary force fighting a forward progress of democratic systems.  They want to “go back” in order to kowtow to Corporate interests and businesses and wealthy in order to feel comfortable.  They seem to fear any other alternative, even if going back will end up cutting them short in the end.

For this reason, I URGE EVERYONE TO GO OUT AND VOTE THIS NOVEMBER! I don’t care what your personal ideals are that prevent you from participating in the system.  I don’t care if you believe that Democrats are no better than the Republicans.  Or that the Democrats are part of the Capitalist, exploitative system.  Or … whatever.  The Republicans, The Tea Party, and Corporations are spending massive amounts of money to convince the American people that going backward is the only way to move forward. They are flooding Facebook, Google ads, and every other social network media with advertisements convincing people that “majority” of Americans are against policies that tax the wealthy and regulate industry.  They espouse the view that majority of Americans are anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim, anti-Obama, anti-Healthcare.  If ever before it was urgent to show the world that we are not a nation full of reactionary servants, the time is now.

Majority of Americans are not happy with the Health Care Reform Bill that was passed.  But most Americans wanted more extensive changes in health care in the United States, not less. But the important thing is that, for the First Time Ever – the United States Passed a Health Care Bill! We can amend and alter it later.

Many of these DNC candidates are nothing but elitist capitalist pigs. There are DINOs running for election.  There are Democratic candidates that only care about themselves.  There are several that are nothing short of bastards.  And there are many Republican candidates that really care about their constituents.  There are some that really want what is best for their country and their people.  Unfortunately, this is overshadowed by the current game that the GOP, Freedomworks, Koch Industries, the Tea Party Express and other organizations have played on the American people.  Any vote against Democrats will be a vote against multi-culturalism, progress, social equality, regulations for the environment, regulations on labor manipulation.  It will be a vote against fair wages.  It will be a vote against equal treatment under the law.  I hate to say it, I really do, but a vote not cast for a Democrat this November will be a vote against everything good that America stands for.

I did not create this situation. The Democratic Party did not create this situation.  We have no one to thank for this situation other than Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Sharon Angle, and the rest of the Kooky Conservatives that want to go on rants about “second amendment solutions” and eluding to class warfare.

Look. In 2008 the United States elected the very first non-White president.  He has a non-Anglo name.  The reason he won a huge amount of votes is that people were tired of the same ole “status quo.”  This was a step forward with the rest of the world. It opened doors across the globe.  It made America look just that much more civil.  It doesn’t matter, in this one instance, how great of a man he really is . . . what matters is that we have moved forward enough to elect a man for the content of his character, not the color of his skin.  Or, at the very least, we stopped hating non-white people enough to vote a person into the highest office in our representative government.  It is monumental.

Are we just going to give in 2 years later and go back to everything we were sick of?  Everything that created this mess?  Are we going to let the wealthy elitists hold the United States hostage until they get what they want?  Are we going to go back to the status quo?  Are we going to create OCP Detroit all over America?

RE-WATCH ROBOCOP.

Tags: Ann Coulter, business, coporation, corporate, Democrat, DNC, Glenn Beck, Jim Bunning, kowtow, Michelle Bachman, Miller, New Right, O'Donnell, Obama, OCP, outsourcing, reactionary, right, ROBOCOP, sarah palin, Sharon Angle, taxes, terrorism, unemployment, vote
Category Economics, news |