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Paul Samuelson Challenges Outsourcing
Noryungi writes "Paul A. Samuelson, Nobel Laureate in Economics, a professor at MIT challenges the outsourcing of jobs (retinal scan login required) to India and China. Choice quote: To put things in simplified terms, he explained in the interview, being able to purchase groceries 20 percent cheaper at Wal-Mart does not necessarily make up for the wage losses."
And here is the Reg-Free link.
In the future please use the NY Times Blog Link Generator when linking to the soul suckers.
(retinal scan login required)
Is this really necessary anymore? How many people DON'T know about bugmenot? Hell, there is even a firefox extension to plop it straight into your browser!
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Love those pickles
Walmart, by itself, can combat inflation. However, at what cost?
(Posting anonymously to preserve minute amount of karma)
Outsourcing happens to to both increase corporate profits and decrease prices. If you feel a company is charging too little, you have the right to not do business with them. You do not have to shop at Wal Mart and have the right to pay the markup for any item in order to make yourself feel better.
It comes down to basic childhood economics. I have money. I want a candy bar and a soda pop. If I shop it where it is cheap enough, I can buy both. Most children do not weigh the long-term economic ramifications of their choices. They do not care if the candy was packaged by hand or by machine either in Boston or in Bangkok. Neither do most Wal Mart shoppers care. They shop there because they stretch their budgets further.
Guilt carries a very large markup.
"The Wal-Mart You Don't Knowm l
The giant retailer's low prices often come with a high cost. Wal-Mart's relentless pressure can crush the companies it does business with and force them to send jobs overseas. Are we shopping our way straight to the unemployment line?" : http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/77/walmart.ht
If you read the whole article, you'll see this isn't true. He won his Nobel Prize for his work showing how internationalization can help make a rich country. He notes that until now, globalization has helped us, rather than hurt us. He just tries to make the qualification that globalization doesn't *necessarily* always lead to benefits, as most economists believe.
His statement is quite a bit mroe subtle than you can put in "simplified terms." Basically, his point is that while the traditional theories of comparative advantage hold, it is possible that certain types of trade can cause you to loose your comparative advantage.
Makes sense, but I'll reserve judgement until the majority of economists have had a chance to weigh in on it.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
Highly skilled?
Are you kidding? So far, my exposure to outsourced crap has been just that, crap. Not worth the beans we paid for it.
We could hire bums off the street ( fresh out from giving blood and buying booze ) to code better than some of the stuff flowing out of india right now.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
the phrase "My 2 cents worth" came from the days when postcards could be sent for 2 pennies, thus you could write an opinion and send it to your congressperson for 2 cents. Today, a regular size postcard is $.23, so an easily ignored inflation-adjusted opinion is now worth almost a quarter! (USD).
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Hmm, I knew this would come up. When I say "US education system" I'm talking about the one most Americans go too --- our public K-12 system. Only 21% of Americans have taken any college courses, and only 15% have a college degree. The other 80-85% attend our attrocious public K-12 schools.
Yes, our university system is one of the best in the world, and we have a couple of top-notch high-schools, but it's not the Harvard and Yale folks who are out of a job...
PS> Oxford isn't in the US.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
You're wrong, actually. About 50% of Americans 15 years and older have some college. Go to the census website and take a look at the 2003 stats for education.
110.327 million of people 15 years and older have _some_ college, at the very least. That's out of 225.25 million, which means the total percentage is 49%.
-Erwos
Plausible conjecture should not be misrepresented as proof positive.
At least Senator Kerry claims he will address the outsourcing issue, if he is sincere, I'm sure there are things that can be done to change the tax structure to at least improve the situation.
Take a look sometime at how many of the employees of Heinz and other Kerry-affiliated companies are in the United States.
Kerry Now Claims "Benedict Arnold" Line Does Not Refer To Companies Outsourcing Jobs, Saying "I Support That." Kerry: "But the Benedict Arnold line applied, you know, I called a couple of times to overzealous speechwriters and said 'look that's not what I'm saying.' Benedict Arnold does not refer to somebody who in the normal course of business is going to go overseas and take jobs overseas. That happens. I support that. I understand that." (Jerry Seib, John Harwood and Jacob Schlesinger, "Excerpts From An Interview With John Kerry, The Wall Street Journal, 5/3/04)
Kerry Previously Railed Against "Benedict Arnold" CEOs Shipping Jobs Overseas. Kerry: "My economic policy is not to export American jobs, but to reward companies for creating and keeping good jobs in America. Unlike the Bush Administration, I want to repeal every tax break and loophole that rewards any Benedict Arnold CEO or corporation for shipping American jobs overseas." (Sen. John Kerry, Statement From John Kerry In Response To President Bush's New Economic Report, 2/10/04)
I foo-bar'ed the statistics. My numbers (from the 2000 census) are exclusive. Ie: the 15% with a bacholers degree does not count those with higher than a bacholers degree. In all, 24% (as of 200) of Americans had a college education.
The actual report is here if you're interested.
In any case, that still means that that 3 out of 4 Americans do not have a college education, which means the criticisms about our K-12 system are valid.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...