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The Jobs Crunch
randall_burns writes "Neither major party is accurately describing or combatting the Jobs Crunch that Americans are facing. Bad immigration policy-and bad trade deals are combining to decimate the middle class in America."
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Since it's so fashionable to compare our policy to the European powers, let's look at some of the numbers. In France, unemployment was 9.3% as of last year. Germany's unemployment rate was 9.7% as of 2 years ago. We had a bubble during the 90s, and it's only expected to pay the price now. The economy moves in cycles and is an extremely complex nonlinear system. To conclusively blame immigration and trade policy as the cause for an increase in unemployment is easy, but unfortunately also meaningless.
Oh no neither party is helping? Gee.. wouldn't it be great if there were other parties besides the Dems and Reps? OH WAIT
Randall Burns ... recently helped create the Kucinich campaign's position paper on H-1b/L-1 visas.
I guess he hates both Kerry and Bush equally. Should we call him non-partisan?
The problem is that these men who represent our presidential canidates, are the best that the parties could come up with. Out of everyone in the whole country. These four pricks. Thats insane. If this is the best that the dems and republicans can come up with then we need some different parties invovled in politics.
How I long for a candidate who actually cares about both workers and business owners...
Welcome to the wonderful world of free trade. Not only does free trade totally destroy 3rd world countries, it harms 1st world one's too.
"The story itself is just a massive advertisement to vote against Bush too."
Why? According to Bush the economy is doing great. If Bush is good for jobs then this thread may be an advertisement for voting for bush. It's only anti bush if Bush is horrible for jobs in the country.
" I know I wont be trying to moderate anyone in this thread, because every second post will look like trolling or flamebait depending on the perspective of the reader."
I have to agree with you there. I have never seen our country divided so much. The people who relish driving wedges to set the country apart have been very successful. I don't know what it would take to get the country back together again. Maybe if we had a president that was a "uniter not a divider" things would be different.
evil is as evil does
It is difficult to be sure from a distance (I live in the UK), but what seems to be happening in the States is a move to what I can best call a neo-feudal society.
At the top end you have the rich and super-rich, with limited call on their wealth in terms of taxes.
At the bottom end you seem to have people who have to hold down more than one job to make ends meet, have limited access to medical care and whose children receive only a poor quality education.
This leaves your middle classes, who are being squeezed. If they don't work in a service that requires personal contact then they are in danger of being outsourced to cheaper locations elswhere on the globe.
Barons, serfs and guilds is the way it appears to be. It isn't quite as extreme here in Britain, but we are going the same way.
If you are good enough to do the job of Prez, you are also likely to be sane enough to not want the job.
His stated policies, among other things, are to enforce the tax laws already on the books. Something the Clinton administration was lax in, and something the Bush administration simply doesn't do, unless you're relatively poor. Close existing legal tax loopholes, and benefits for companies that outsource. As well as provide tax incentives for companies that don't. Which is of course just what he claims, but 180 degrees from what the current administration does, and admittedly plans to continue doing. He also planned to be more aggressive, and possibly heavy handed in dealing with trade organizations when it comes to protecting US interests. He also supports enforcement of current immigration laws, and proper funding for border patrols and NIS. (Which Bush won't do since a "let 'em run free" policy puts a downward pressure on what services cost.)
The trade deficit, and outsourcing aren't about cheaper labor, their about unequal access to capital. People are forced to pool and discount their capital which no longer is used to build infrastructure in their local communities or the larger community of the whole of the US. But rather it's hemoraged out to other locales where a quicker short term gain is percieved, rampant corruption is considered a cost of doing business, and it's hard to blame people in other legal jurisdictions. We in America have the most capital and have to pay a premium for access to it. Thanks to the 80's the 'B' in MBA stands for "Bullshit".
If Kerry followed his plan up with a pledge to subsidize lighting up a bunch of huge walk away nuclear reactors, I'd say his was the beginings of a perfect economic policy. Bush, yeah, that's not going to happen.
Or maybe the point is right now there are jobs to be had. The OP said that these jobs are still unfilled.
Data just came out showing that Cleveland, Ohio has the largest unemployment rate of any major city in the US. Cincinnati is on the brink of (and has fallen into) racial and class conflict. The whole state is an unbelieveable mess and it appears that even with an inept Republican govenor that Ohio will vote Republican and give the rich and corporations more and more tax cuts which they, in turn, will use to buy more foreign products and fund more outsourcing projects.
Distribution of wealth is an nasty necessity that is created by the greed in all of us (once I hit the million dollar threshold I will give to the less fortunate - then it's once I become one of the 331 billionaires in the US -- well you get the drift...). Anyway, the Republicans have never and will never talk about redistribution of wealth. Flat taxes and sales taxes are rigged against the poor, but people seem to think they are a great idea because of conservative thinktank spin.
The Democrats may have become as much of the problem as the Republicans, but at least they are still talking about these issues. I can't for the life of me undersand why a the population of a state on the brink of disaster would vote for a party that still talks about supply side economics and trickle down. I shake my head and then realize that to be a politician these days you have to be rich already -- it's no wonder that we are where we are.
There will never be another farmer from Illinois in the Whitehouse, and I just don't see any solutions on the horizon...
All the layoffs of recent times have flooded the teaching ranks with people getting alternative certification. Add to that a recent flood of people who spent years in other roles in education just now finishing their degrees, and the new teachers are getting pushed out. That whole ETS scoring fiasco didn't help either.
Read again to understand this: there are too many teachers. People in other countries may not understand the gravity of this, but for people who are used to teachers being the most pissed on of American professionals, this should be the ultimate sign of how bad things are right now.
"You're never ready, just less unprepared."
Agreed. Twice today we've had whining that draws directly from the Kerry camp:
1. It's a bad economy, and things are getting worse.
2. Google's evil, because searching for John Kerry in the news section shows a lot of negative articles.
First off, the economy isn't doing badly - I'm right here in the valley, and things are picking up quite nicely. Is it at dotcom levels? No - and that's ok too. After all, the dotcom era was essentially a lot of people spending money while providing no real service or product. Sooner or later, the economy pays the price for that kind of crap.
Second, Kerry's getting more negative articles written about him because his campaign is virtually tripping over itself to incur more PR drubbings. The race was Kerry's to lose, and he's well on his way if they don't get it together.
One way or the other, it's a joke to try to disguise this as some sort of outsourcing article... try attaching an example to your editorial commentary.
Yeah, it's always the fault of those pesky foreigners...
It's official. Most of you are morons.
Well, I never expected to see this story on the front page of slashdot. What next?
Mod parent up!
The unemployment numbers are political dynamite in any country, so they're pretty heavily doctored everywhere.
My native Sweden has fairly low official numbers, but they are achieved by having some 10% or 20% (*) of the working age population that is not working being classified in other categores. The big ones are long term sickness, early retirement and "education". Some of that education is no doubt useful in the way you describe, but most is little more than long term people storage, and everybody involved knows it.
In all these categories you are getting paid fairly well by the government, to a much larger extent than in the US, which you may or may not think is a good thing.
So where is the unemployment really highest? Who lies the most and the best? I don't have that information, though I'm sure there are plenty of studies someone can look up. But as a Swede living in California I have no doubt at all that there are far more Americans gainfully employed, and that it's much easier to get a job here.
(*) I haven't seen actual numbers in a long time, and these things are very hard to measure precisely anyway, but that's the range.
When the rantings on a xenophobic loonie site are presented as fact.
_O_
.|< The named which can be named is not the true named
LOL, Out of everyone "these four pricks"? I don't think it is the party that picked them. It is special interest and money that picked them. The candidates that can be purchased get picked. Look at Cheney and Haliburton. Look at Edwards and the Trial Lawyers. It does not matter what party gets in the white house, they are pretty much the same. What we need is campaign finance reform.
Come and say hi. http://forum.penpals.com/index.php
For the first time in my life, within 4 weeks of one another, my sister lost her job, my friend lost his job, and his wife lost her job. These are NOT good times...although Bush would have us believe otherwise.
And you'd have us believe everyone we know is out of work. 5.4 are the latest numbers, the lowest since Oct 2001. sorry
-- "of course thats just my opinion, I could be wrong." --Dennis Miller
5.4 are the latest numbers, the lowest since Oct 2001.
These figures are inaccurate. They don't count people who're no longer collecting unemployment and have simply given up. Many households which formerly had two parents working now only have one parent employed but the government, in it's infinite wisdom, doesn't count these folks as being unemployed.
This is nothing short of 'voodoo unemployment numbers': pretending that people who can't find a job prefer not to work, and therefore don't need to be counted.
We should also note that of the jobs created (about half of those lost so far) the average pay is almost $9,000 lower than the jobs lost. Things are much, much grimmer than our government would lead us to believe.
This isn't new, though. The government did the exact same thing during the Reagan Era depression, declaring that things were looking up despite the fact that, for example, nearly one in three people in Oregon were unemployed and that the few jobs created paid about *one-half the wage* of the timber jobs lost.
Don't trust the government for unbiased numbers; you won't get them.
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Internet bubble bursting = no funding = no work.
Then your out your savings and 911 hits. worst your stuck in a area code recruiters ignore and don't find this out till two years later. Now I nolonger equate MBAs as idiots who can't do like Gym Teachers teach Gym. However I still don't like their choice of clothes.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
This article is not economics, not public policy, not even deserving opinion. Just the typical xenophobic, bigoted kind of rant that the nativist crowd likes to engage in. Anti-immigrant sentiment is the omnivorous reptile in the fauna of politics. A recession with falling wages? Cheap immigrant labor must be to blame. Terrorism? Without immigration there wouldn't be any. Traffic? Too many immigrants must have moved in. Whatever the issue at hand, the subterfuged racism of the nativist crowd always translates into an immigration problem.
The United States has millions of illegal Mexican immigrants who live in fear of getting caught and are regularly abused by employers who can get away with paying them slave wages. Both from the point of view of the immigrants and the citizens, we do have some sort of immigration problem. It isn't the key problem behind everything wrong in the United States, but at the very least, SOME sort of problem is there. There's no reason to jump between the extremes of "the immigration problem is the new apocalypse" and "there is no immigration problem, you bigot". There's a very wide area between those two ideas, and I believe that the United States is somewhere within it.
Yes, we've got a job crunch in this country, and we had a severe job crunch in the dot-bomb technology industry, with an estimated 49% of San Francisco's high-tech jobs disappearing, so my friends were affected much more strongly than the average American, and there's a non-trivial chance I'll get laid off next week.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Thank god for that article. I was beginning to wonder if *I* might be the one responsible for my unemployment due to my choice of remaining in a one factory town, with my limited skill-set, narrow education, zero-ambition and unwillingness to take any job that was far beneath my abilities that can apparently be replicated by someone who grew-up in a third world country without indoor plumbing while educated in a classroom with a dirt floor. I'm so glad I can blame them foreigners and people in Washington. I was almost thinking that I was some kind of loser slacker who spent all my time on message boards downloading music (cause it was meant to be free!) and not trying to make myself into someone with valuable assets. Not my responsibility. There's no way you can convince me otherwise now. Forget the "data", this economy sucks because all my loser friends are out of work too.
.. stop whinily suckling their corporate and/or public sector feeding/cocoon pods and shed their fat middles and go do some real inventing and entreprenuering. Its shameful to see so much whining from the offspring of those who kicked Nazi and Soviet ass, gave us the moon landing, modern computing etc etc. Sheesh, at the very least these whiners can daytrade on indian and chinese and korean companies' stocks from a starbucks for crissakes...
Hey, this is strange: the "lowest grade" people from east europe, asia etc. get new jobs in US sector, while the "middle grade" people loose them? Don't you see there is a problem with the americans on themselves?
I don't think the average worker has anything to take 'resoponsabiltiy' for, as you so elloquently put it.
It's bastards like that current US administration, who's family and buddies are making billions of dollars on weapons sales and oil deals and such.
It is a complete myth that unions are wrecking the economy. Pure greed makes companies turn to the lowest cost of production, and it won't be until the people decide that they want to force their companies to only buy labour at a nationally agreed 'fair price' - no matter what country the labour comes - that this myth will be fully exposed.
I have to say that a lot of issues presented in that article are the same sort of crap that's been tossed around for decades.
For instance, mining and metallurgical refining are extremely high-risk cost-dependent ventures, and they always go wherever is cheapest. My dad's been designing mines for decades, works around the world, and sometimes you can't even get a gold mine going in a place with incredibly low labour costs like Costa Rica! So to point to a shift of refining work to Canada and Mexico as being a fault with NAFTA is just incorrect-- it's exactly what NAFTA was designed to do, in order to make it cheaper for Americans to buy products.
As for Visas, many people on HB-1s, J-1s, etc... leave the U.S. after a few years. They're here for training, and that's it-- and when you consider the legal hurdles that companies have to go through in order to get foreigners (like moi) into the country in the first place, you should realize it's not going to happen if companies could easily find adequately skilled people here in the U.S.
No, I'm afraid what's really wrong with the U.S. job situation is very simple-- there are extreme disincentives for companies to hire new employees if they can make current employees work overtime.
'Fess up. How many of you work overtime for little or NO pay? 50% of you? 75%? How many of your companies had massive layoffs in the past decade, then been very slow to rehire even as the bottom line improved?
I'm good at what I do, and I'm willing to work hard, but realistically, the company I work for should have hired half a dozen more people instead of just me.
The people who want to die, are going to die. They have given up and want me to take care of them, I do not care about these people. I am worried about the people TRYING to find work.
Please do not be a tool. The "given up" remark is something getting said a lot in the media regarding some people who are married and have a spouse who gets laid off and can't find work. The household then learns to get by on a single income, then the pressure to find work is much less. This works and has been popular for the families who will sacrifice that Lexus and drive a Honda instead. This means nothing for the masses across middle america who's factory jobs are gone. So are all the Walmart and McDonalds jobs in many areas.
The men and women who are trying to support families who have had their unemployement benefits dry up do not just "give up" on getting a job. They do anything and everything they can to keep their kids and spouse fed. The only thing they don't do is count towards the damn numbers our government is trying to pass off on us as "getting better". If nobody noticed, more people matured to legal working age than jobs created this year.
Frankly it is tiring, Western Europe and what is today's EU has always respected free enterprise and private ownership, cornerstones of a capitalist economy.
People in the US have no idea what they are talking about when they say EU countries are socialist.
They may be more socially responsible than the US goverments perhaps, but private property and free enterprise has never been stopped.
If you want examples of Socialist countries look at Cuba or North Korea, where everything is Socialized by means of state control and ownership.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Bad immigration policy-and bad trade deals are combining to decimate the middle class in America.
In the country where I live now I'm an immigrant, having settled and got citizenship about 8 years ago. I have been through many arguings and blind quarrels over the years over "immigrants take our jobs" and the like.
What I've found is the people who complain the most are those who are just down in the dumps, not necessarily because they couldn't get a job, but because they didn't want to accept any job, or just politicians who are what they are, anyplace, or just bloody ignorant.
It's the most easy to blame increasing uneployment rates on others who have jobs, especially if they come from abroad.
Really no offence and forgive my ignorance, but I have to tell, U.S. people also have their history on intolerance, racism and xenophoby.
You also have to take into account that some effects of the late dotcom boom and blow are still showing today. I mean there was a continuing very large over-employment of IT "professionals" , very many of which are dismissed even today.
What I want to point out is that there are very many aspects that lead to the given rising unemployment rates in the U.S. (and just that you know, that is _not_ that high if you consider other countries as well, which americans tend not to do), and only one of them may be connected to immigration of qualified professionals (I intentionally don't mention seasonal uneducated workers, that's another area of the problem).
I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I can think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do.
...and a recovery is when George Bush is out of work.
"BSD: Free as in speech. Linux: Free as in beer. Windows 10: Free as in herpes." --Man On Pink Corner in #52607549.
Look, the rate of unemployment is 5.4%. It was 5.5% when Bill Clinton ran for reelection in 96. Amazingly, 5.4% for Bush is considered bad, 5.5% for Clinton is considered good. Go figure. Now if you're going to rant about job losses, you must remember the average rate for unemployment is roughly 6%. The mid-4s when Bush entered office were downright unusually low rates.
Then enter the dot-com bust, the accounting fraud crisis that boiled over after it festered under the Clinton years, as well as 9/11.
A very real change in Iraq policy would need to send some serious messages. It might even require some mass civilian casualties. Drop a BLU-82 or MOAB on Tikrit and Fallujah. Stop interrogating Iraqi detainees, but killing them and letting dogs and pigs eat at their rotting bodies. Let them know that these little kidnappings and chicken-shit roadside bombings will be punished 100-fold, 1000-fold.
Hello? This is 2004, not 1004. You're not on a crusade to get the Holy Grail from the infidels. It is apparent you have no respect for them if the human in question does not have an American passport --- a form of racism, I suppose.
"Long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. In the long run we are all dead." (John Maynard Keynes)
before that, your sister, your friend, and his wife were thinking ... hmmm... perhaps we can go to Europe for a nice vacation, and never realize that their own jobs were hanging by a rope.
Wake up, people.
Don't blame "bad immigration", or "globalization", blame YOURSELVES for being COMPLACENT !
This world we live in is increasingly interconnected. Whatever we'd seen playing in the halls of UN 20 or 30 years ago today is playing right at our doorsteps - and that is, we aren't compete against other Americans for our own survival, but against THE WORLD !
Yes, globalization goes both ways. While the third world countries are whinning about "Developing world conspire to re-colonize us", we, who live in FIRST WORLD COUNTRIES, must realize that while those sons-of-bitches are whinning, their cheaper labor is taking away our jobs.
Usually, we single-minded Americans will yell and shout and demand our "representatives" to "DO SOMETHING" - which, more than always, mean "closing our borders", "stop outsourcing" etc, which in itself WILL NOT WORK ANYMORE IN THIS WORLD WE ARE LIVING.
Instead of closing up, we SHOULD be OPENING UP EVEN MORE, and yes, that means, we should roll up our sleeves and COMPETE AGAINST THE CHEAPEST LABOR IN BANGLADESH, by using OUR BRAIN.
Our plush lifestyle is at threat. If we don't do something, our high cost of living ain't gonna last. We gotta figure out ways to be BOTH the CHEAPEST COUNTRY IN THE WORLD TO DO SOMETHING, and THE COUNTRY WHERE WE CAN LIVE In WHATEVER LIFESTYLE WE WANT.
I am saying this base on my experience of a guy who have traveled and worked in all over the world. I am not that type of "Americans" who coccoon himself in the "protection of Uncle Sam". Rather, I go out into the WORLD and see what's going on, and btw, making money at it.
Yep, there are people in the third world countries who will accuse me of "exploitation", but I don't mind. If they won't let me exploit them, then they won't get jobs. It's that simple.
And then, there are Americans who accuse me of "exporting jobs to other countries". Again, I don't mind.
You see, if I can't make a toaster oven in America under U$ 2.25, then I won't make money selling them not only in America, but also all over the world. I gotta find the CHEAPEST PLACE IN THE WORLD to do what I need to do, and if that means doing it OUTSIDE AMERICA, I'll do it in a jiffy.
In the same token, the money I earned, I sent back to my good ol' U. S. of A. for safekeeping. No matter how I like the world outside America, America is still my country.
To to those who want to close our borders - please don't buy any clothing, any furniture, any electrical appliances, any thing, in fact, because 90% of them are MADE OUTSIDE America !
You can close the border to "immigrant, but you can't stop those things from coming in. It's us, the Americans, who demand CHEAP but QUALITY goods, so something gotta give.
Until the day you realize you can't live the way you did, you wouldn't understand which world we are living in, my friend.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
"After I realized that finding a similar-paying job wasn't going to happen, I went out to the usual teenie-employers to try my luck... Wal*Mart, Burger King, etc etc. I've been unsuccessful even with these places, and have been since I've started my job-hunting two and a half years ago."
I'm sorry, but if you can't get a job at one of those places, or any job at all for that matter, then the problem lies with you even if it makes you feel better to blame it on someone else.
I live in CA but I quit my job and went away for the summer. I didn't have a job when I came back but it took me less than a week to land a new one. I wasn't willing to take just any job, either, I wanted something that paid decent and that had a good working environment. So I'm making about $20 an hour (depends on tips, I'm waiting tables) and I get benefits. I'm 21 years old and had very little experience in food service.
I have however had some management experience. When people come in and ask for applications or to talk to a manager about a job I can tell right off the bat which ones definetly aren't going to get hired. Are they well kept, are the articulate, etc. If you can't get any job after two and a half years, any job of any type, then it is definetly you doing something wrong so stop blaming other people for your problems and get your act together.
--HC, who has not tolerance for woe is me bullshit.
So I'm jump'n up and down screaming show me the money.
I was gonna mod you up, but I decided to post a response instead. Lucky you! I don't entirely agree with your post, so I wanted to blab on about my silly ideas.
n -idea is not going to offshore anything. He is going to find someone local. The easier it is for him to stay in business, the longer that someone local has a job. And, the more people who can start small businesses are more people who can try their ideas out and perhaps start the next industry people will be scrambling towards.
I take serious issue with anyone who wants to try and suppress outsourcing or "globalization" in any way. Not because I think it's good for me personally - it's bad for me personally, as a software engineer in the Silicon Valley... at least in the short term. But this attitude is similar to the attitude of the RIAA who wants to fight the inevitable. The world is changing, national economies are becoming one global economy. You can try and fight it, but we will just be damaging our position in this new global economy. It's going to happen, whether we like it or not. The ubiquity of the Internet that gave us such prosperity in the late 90's has also helped to ensure the inexorable approach of globalization.
The question we has to ask ourselves is not "How do we stop outsourcing/globalization?" The question is "How do we make sure we have a strong position in the new global economy?"
Unfortunately, I don't have any firm answer I can beat people around the head with. It's a hard problem. I have some ideas, though (of course). I think what will keep us fiscally healthy as certain types of jobs become more efficient to export is innovation, pure and simple. We need to encourage innovation and entrepreneurialism, which will not only create new jobs, but new TYPES of jobs, new fields, and new skills that we will have a distinct advantage in possessing.
Assuming you buy that idea at all, the question then becomes, how do we promote that? We already have a culture that encourages individualism, creativity, and risk-taking. I think that's a good start. But we need to focus more heavily on education. We should be more aggressive about the expectations of our children. Perhaps have some government subsidy of pre-schooling. More education about education - make sure kids know what their options are. Anyone that can finish high school can go to a university or a vocational school and get some basic knowledge about a field where there is a chance they will innovate. There's all sorts of loans or scholarships available for people who don't have the money. There are some exceptional people that will be revolutionary no matter what schooling or environment they come from, but innovation will be more common given more rigorous and effective education. I think the government should aggressively fund and incentivize education at all levels.
The other thing that's REALLY important is making it EASY to start and run a small company. Small business is extremely important in innovation, and local job creation. Joe (or Jane) Upper-Middle-Class-with-a-Bachelor's-degree-and-a
I think the US government, in order to protect its country's position of economic dominance over the next 20 years, must take an active role in shaping America into as Educated and Creative a country as it can. Big business leads to monopolies leads to a lack of innovation, competition, and freedom leads to mediocrity and the death of Capitalism. Why does our government encourage big business over small business, other than simply corruption?
Ok, I've started ranting. I'll stop now.
-If
Run a pencil-and-paper RPG campaign with your far-off friends: Gametable!
we aren't compete against other Americans for our own survival, but against THE WORLD !
That's what tariffs are for, boy.
their cheaper labor is taking away our jobs.
That's what tariffs and restrictive trade policies are for, boy.
COMPETE AGAINST THE CHEAPEST LABOR IN BANGLADESH, by using OUR BRAIN.
Oh, good show! Now provide some concrete, real-world examples of how our 'brains' will allow us to compete with labor you can pay $2/hour.
Why, I know! Tariffs and restrictive trade policies! Problem solved!
And then, there are Americans who accuse me of "exporting jobs to other countries". Again, I don't mind.
Then do us all a favor and stop pretending that you're an American. If you're exporting jobs to India, then go become a fucking Indian citizen; it's certain you're doing more for India than for the U.S.
Really, if we had any brains at all we'd ban corporations that employed foreigners in excess of 10% of it's workforce. Half your employees are Indian? Then fuck you and the horse you road in on! You're no longer an American company, but an Indian one! And now you're subject to tariffs and - you guessed it - trade restrictions! Eat shit, traitors.
No matter how I like the world outside America, America is still my country.
Yeah, right. Go ahead and tell yourself that while you're selling out your neighbors. Bastard.
You can close the border to "immigrant, but you can't stop those things from coming in.
We sure can. It's called 'tariffs' and 'restrictive trade policies'. It might put guys like you out of work, but why should I give a shit? It's just the way things go, and you're okay with that, right?
Next thing you know you'll be hearing your (gainfully employed) wife yelling "get in the kitchen and make me a pot pie, bitch!" Scamper along now, before she gets angry with you!
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Bad immigration?
Bad immigration are the social leeches, criminals and terrorists.
Anyone who comes and works is good. Being born in the US isn't a right to a nice high paying job, it is just a better opportunity then almost everyone else has. Since when is more people a bad thing? They can only 'steal jobs' if someone owned it to begin with. When I buy my gas from one gas station and switch to another you don't see the owner complaining the other guy stole his customer.
Bad trade deals? Walmart and your local car lot are full of the results. Cheap goods available to raise your standard of living.
The trade deficit is just a choice that people make. If you choose to buy a hard drive made in taiwan, or a chinese chair, the trade deficit will increase.
The only way to stop this is protectionism, which will cause a downward spiral in the economy.
Plus this is also self correcting, the US dollar will eventually drop relative to other currencies if the trade defecit doesn't change.
Presidents don't create jobs, unless it's a massive make-work program like the Civil Conservation Corps in the 1930s. The real responsbility lies with the hundreds of CEOs who decide to lay off or add more workers. Period. And it's been far more of the former, than the latter - and that's been the case for about the last 30 years or so. Shedding workers is really a redistribution of wealth - from rank and file workers at the bottom, to the executive leadership at the top and the shareholders. But this is something that a sitting US President has little control over - each of these business leaders indivudually decides, "I want fewer workers and therefore more money for myself" which adds up to a grisly collective result. Since the early 90s I've read Business Week, Forbes and the Economist on a fairly regular basis, and I never once recalled reading about a specific economic policy of Clinton's that lead to the spectacular economic growth of that decade. In fact, his tax increases shortly after he took office probably had the effect of dampening growth. He was the lucky beneficiary of Greenspan's aggressive rate-lowering from 1990-1992, and a wave of IT investment and payoff. Am I writing this to defend Bush? Perhaps a bit. But I sincerely believe that it's easier for people to blame a President than an amorphous mass of private sector executives for their economic woes.
And income taxation is the best thing that ever happened to civilization. We just need more of it.
eat shiat and bark at the moon
In short, it is not the government's function to create jobs. It's the government's function to get out of the way and let businesses create jobs. Yes, government has a place in regulating businesses to ensure they are not endangering people or the environment unnecessarily. Every government regulation costs businesses money -- money that might otherwise go to hiring new employees to produce more product. These are especially hard on small businesses (who are responsible for over half of all US jobs). These regulations also affect the quality of your work life, so don't think they only affect the fat cats.
About three years ago, my employer was working out the details of a formal telecommuting program, which would make my work life easier and save them money (fewer people on site == lower expenses). This would have included picking up part of the tab for internet connections, new computers, etc. Unfortunately, the Labor Department announced that they had the power to regulate home offices used for telecommuting the same way they could regulate those office spaces provided by the emloyer. This extended to inspecting home offices just as they do employer-provided spaces, and the intention to fine employers for regulatory violations found in the home offices. Employers could also be held liable for injuries incurred in the home office.
Needless to say, the telecommuting project died before it began -- the potential liabilities were so great they posed a significant risk to the company's future.
This is but one example of the government often doing more harm than good. And there's not much any president can do to alter that -- the people who came up with this hare-brained idea are probably still there, waiting for a more favorable time to put this idea into action. They can't be fired because they're civil servants, so they don't change with the administration.
There really isn't much a president can do to create jobs (and it's not his responsibility anyway). The best thing he can do is push policies that give businesses the freedom to act.
Also, note that the Labor Department just declared they had this regulatory power -- no act of Congress granted it, they just assumed it -- such is the power-hungry nature of any bureaucracy. And any entity that has the power to find you a job has the power to have you removed from that job. Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it.
You and i know it only takes like 2 days to set up a profitable business that can employ others.
Then do it. Every two days, set up a profitable business employing others. You will be incredibly wealthy and give many people who want jobs a place to work. Or was that just more right-wing bullshit -- the kind of unsubstantiated thing that Rush Limbaugh or Bill O'Reilly says because it sounds good but isn't really true at all?
All he did was state data, interpret, and generalize. He indicts rebuplicans and the current administration for corporate decisions; democrats for their failure to understand their constituents. He is assuming the Kerry-Edwards campaign will succeed in November by advising them in what they should be doing, manage the trade defecit and immigration. By doing so will magically grow the middle class and their disposable income.
For being an economist, why doesn't he understand that and unemployment rate of 5.4% is very good and one of the lowest in the world. Its certainly better than the double-digit numbers in most of the world and certainly this overall number from India.
As for the shifting of capital and the growing divide of the classes, name one successful society, where the controlling power had a monetary policy will divide the currency exactly among its citizens. Just one... Nope? I didn't think so. The closest example I can think of is the USSR, and they still had the rich elite controlling the working class; and it only lasted 70 years.
Last time I checked, my blue-collar, low-wage friends and I all have the same opportunity of wealth as the rich kids we tend to resent. Notice, I did NOT say that it would be easier because often capital is more difficult to obtain, but we have the same basic opportunity to start a business as the next person. We have the greatest entrepreneurial environment in the world and its ours to take advantage of. People from other countries see this and other advantages our country offers and immigrate. Is the global playing field level? No, it never has been and it never will be. Life is not fair. Life is hard. Get over the idea of being employeed in one place for your entire life in a job that a trained monkey or robots can do.
Will the election in November help? No. Its just a corporate sponsored figurehead with a puppet administration. Either one. What about a third party? Well, we effectively shut them out a generation ago and now, they're just a talking point.--Amigori
"The quality of life is determined by its activites."--Aristotle
Check the date on that one. IIRC Bush changed how the government collects it's data by purposefully underfunding and cutting certain unemployment tracking programs.
Let's face it - the gang in power is just a bunch of "Cheap Labor Republicans." They are gunning for your job because it can be done cheaper somewhere else. These guys make money by keeping labor costs down, not by a a booming economy that benefits you or yours. Catch a clue.
Political Reality Redacted
Several months ago I watched Joe Hough, President of the Faculty and William E. Dodge Professor of Social Ethics at the Union Theological Seminary, speak on Bill Moyers "Now" and I was immediately impressed by both his passion as well as the following statement that he made:
HOUGH: The growing gap between the rich and the poor which has become almost obscene by anybody's standards, and the stated intentional policy of bankrupting the government so that in the future there'll be no money for anything the federal government would decide to do. http://www.pbs.org/now/printable/transc...print.ht ml
Now some of you may be thinking that the above statement is somewhat extreme, and I used to wonder about that myself. But the statement haunted me. The reality is that some of what our current government is doing only makes sense if you consider "bankrupting the government" their actual goal. Have they not reduced taxes for the top 1%? Have they not also run a record deficit? When is a tax cut not a tax cut? When you run a deficit.
The bottom line is that it seems to be okay to run a deficit paying off federal war contracts to Halliburton, but god forbid they should run a deficit supporting job creation programs. And you'll forgive me if I don't consider the expansion of our military "true" job creation.
So what are they really doing? Why are they doing it? You have to ask those questions because it would be a mistake to assume that anyone, esp. an apparent imbecile like Bush, acts without purpose. The appearance of the dolt just might be the mask of a sly con man.
So who has the answers? There's this one guy that has it completely nailed. His stuff is so savvy, so on point that it is frankly scary in it's simplicity and clarity. So don't hesitate - go read it. If you can't handle it all at once, pace yourself - but read it, all of it. It's just four pages: two long, two short. And the rest of the site is excellent too if you still need more.
"CHEAP-LABOR CONSERVATIVE" ISSUES GUIDE
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/blurbs.htm
CATALOGUE OF BOGUS CONSERVATIVE IDEAS
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/bogusideas.htm
"PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY" AND WAGES
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/wages...bility.h tm
THE WRATH OF THE MILLIONAIRE WANNABE'S
http://www.conceptualguerilla.com/milli...nnabes.h tm
What's all this about in a few short sentences?
Labor is the true engine of any economy, wealth is not (it is the mere distribution of the results of labor). A boom economy benefits anyone that works for a living because labor is then scarce and labor is valued more highly. Those at the top require cheap labor to maximize their profits - so they hate boom economies. Everything our government is doing right now is intended to devalue labor. The unequal distribution of vast amounts of wealth into the hands of non-laborers makes democracy almost impossible (which is why the founders favored limits on almost everything that concentrated wealth into too few hands).
Let it sit with you a while and you will begin to realize that it explains everything from bad schools, pri
Look, the rate of unemployment is 5.4%. It was 5.5% when Bill Clinton ran for reelection in 96. Amazingly, 5.4% for Bush is considered bad, 5.5% for Clinton is considered good. Go figure.
During the Clinton administration, ten people are working at $45K/year factory jobs. 0% unemployment among the ten. Their retirement account mutual funds are all showing healthy gains.
Bush takes office. All ten get laid off when their company outsources. Three get jobs at McDonalds, four get jobs at Walmart, and the other three get jobs in the mall. The mutual funds they hold stagnate and even lose money. Average pay: $10K/year. Unemployment (among the sample set): 0%.
See? There's more to judging the health of the economy than counting people who are out of work.
If what you used to do doesn't earn the living you want, be creative, be an American and "change" your output into creating something other people want to buy.
Stop feeling sorry for yourself - get over it, AND do something different until you are employed.
Ah, the vague tripe of the right-wing. Chest-pounding patriotism backed up with hollow, unspecific recommendations, based on the false premise that changing careers has zero cost and can be done overnight.
Some guy who's worked on an assembly line for 26 years or some woman who's been employed as a customer service rep at a phone bank for 12 probably can't afford to start their own business or even go to school to learn some new skill. Perhaps you think that their families should live in refrigerator boxes under bridges while the ex-breadwinners get the training to change careers. Even if they did change careers, they'd be back that the bottom rung of the ladder in their new field, probably making very little money and facing tuition loans on top of that.
Then you ignore the fact that most people don't have the intelligence to quickly change careers, start their own businesses, and learn a whole new set of skills. Any economic plan that requires that everyone be of above average intelligense is destined to fail.
We Americans have a right to protect our jobs. And we have the means to do so.
This economic treason by the elites all started decades ago when they shipped out our advanced manufacturing jobs to Japan. Advanced manufacturing jobs are not assembly jobs, but more like fabrication jobs. See this article for more info.
Now they are doing the same thing to office work (like software, financial etc) that they did to advanced manufacturing. But we office workers are more able to stop them this time, mainly because we have some access to the media via the internet and boards like Slashdot.
Tariffs do make things worse, but only for the upper income group. For the average working person, tariffs are good.
Let me ask you something: if free trade is so good for lowering prices, then why is an average car costing more of the average salary now than it did 25 years ago? For more details on this check out Marshall Brain's Concentration of Wealth blog.
eat shiat and bark at the moon
Your major problem is a severely limited grasp of analytical thinking. To explain it in the most fundamental of terms: survival occurs in groups, and if a group does not protect itself - it simply doesn't survive. That is what is occurring in the USA today (and other countries) and all the corporate misinformation and disinformation won't change that. The offshoring of jobs has nothing to do with free trade - it simply raises the perks and wealth of CEOs and senior management!
Labor costs are the PROFITS of the worker. You don't hear business owners complaining when their profits get too high, do you?
Look, the highest standards of living in the world are in the social demcracies of Europe, and they have HIGH labor costs--they have minimum wages levels of like $12/hour. High lahor costs are a GOOD THING...IF, and ONLY if you are a WORKER. Now, if you are an investor or business owner, that is a Bad Thing.
Fortunately, over 90% of Americans are WORKERS. Your problem is that you have been tricked by investor/corporate propaganda into thinking that YOU are an INVESTOR. Well, you AIN'T an investor. YOu are a WORKER. Deal with it. Accept it, and then help organize your country to HELP THE WORKER, like they do in Scandanavia.
The reason the 3rd world IS the 3rd world is that they have LOW LABOR COSTS. That is the DEFINTION of being 3rd world.
The reason many of the countries in NW Europe have the highest quality of life is because they have the HIGHEST COST OF LABOR. And it aint no accident. The two concepts are DIRECTLY RELATED.
eat shiat and bark at the moon
FDR tried to alleviate the suffering caused by
the depression's very high unemployment rate by
instituting SS, and work programs like CCC and WPA
that provided a public benefit. He did not make
lies, half-truths, and political doublespeak
an Executive Branch SOP. He did not slash
corporate taxes, and the tax rate of the very
wealthiest Americans, and then shift the tax
burdeon onto the backs of the shrinking
middle class. FDR did not encourage the flight
of American jobs overseas because "what's good
for General Motors is good for America". FDR
did not open the floodgates of illegal
immigration into this country to force wages
lower.
George W. Bush has done all these things, and
more. It is pretty sad when the only decent
paying jobs available to unemployed Americans
is to drive a truck through Iraqi free fire
zones. The high point of Bush's "job creation"
record was 135,000 new jobs in a month -- which
unfortunately doesn't even cover students from
high school or college entering the job market,
let alone those unemployed. Bush has embraced
"corporate national socialism", and abandoned
the working class. From all reliable accounts,
one of the Bush administration's top policy
goals was the invasion of Iraq, from before his
inauguration. All the lies and doublespeak that
was employed (WMD, terror links, and "imminent
threat" were cobbled together and used after
9/11/2001 as cover for this war. Each have
proved to be false. The Bush "war plank" was
an agenda hidden from the voters in 2000 by
such promises as "no foreign wars", "no nation-
building", etcetera, all while planning for
Saddam's ouster. Bush mismanagement of the
war in Iraq, and of domestic policy decisions,
have been equally disasterous to this country,
with the sole exception of the GOP-aligned
multinational corporations. George W. Bush
spoke the truth (finally) at a Washington,DC
fundraiser when he said "the HAVE's and the
HAVE MORE's are my base (constituency)".
If this country should be cursed with yet another
George W. Bush term of office, do not expect that
there will be any improvements in job growth,
health care, international relations, or the
war in Iraq. Do expect more tax cuts for the
corporations and wealthiest 2% of taxpayers.
Do expect SS and Medicare to be gutted, as Bush
finds new ways to drive the country deeper into
debt. Do expect greater loss of personal freedom
in this country, as "Patriot Act" extensions
are subverted to crush political opposition.
Do expect Bush to continue promoting religious
organizations as the only source of welfare
and social assistance. Do expect America's
open borders to continue to encourage illegal
immigration, because America's businesses
want ever cheaper labor.
... you're willing to give up all those cheap imports (including practically all your PC and electronic hardware) and live in economic isolation from the rest of the world. THERE IS NO ECONOMIC DIFFERENCE BETWEEN OUTSOURCING A JOB AND IMPORTING A GOOD. Here's a short argument to convince you. If you're still not convinced, ask your favorite Econ professor, or even anyone who paid attention in their International Trade class.
I'm always amused when presidents take credit for good economic times, and receive blame for bad times. Fact of the matter is, despite what the campaigns would like you to think, the Fed chairman probably has more influence on the economy than the president, and even the Fed chairman probably doesn't have that much influence. I say, by all means, go ahead and vote Bush out of office for the mess he created in the world and the assault on civil liberties at home, but don't think protectionism is good for the country, or that Kerry will solve the unemployment problem.
Imposing Libertarian views on everyone online since 1992.
"He [FDR] not only turned a routine recession into the great depression..."
:-)
When FDR entered office the unemployment rate was 25%, with an underemployment rate of 50%. [...] calling the economy of 1933 "a routine recession" is idiocy.
No it's NOT! I heard it on Rush Limbaugh and again on Fox News so it MUST be true!
All right! Really? So by Tuesday I'll have a nice profitable business?
Oh wait. First I need money to pay for an office to hold my new employees. Plus, I'll need money to pay for the employees. And I'll need money for whatever supplies are needed for these employees to do their jobs (computers, products, etc).
Oh, and then I'll need time finding the place to rent, supplies and employees. In addition, I'll need time to plan out what business I'm going into, as well as strategy to make it profitable.
Hm. Yeah, that ain't happening in 2 business days even given my full weekend head start. I might be able to muster up enough grocery money in 2 days, not enough money to start a business.
Did you really think about this comment before you posted it? I think you meant it takes two days for a rich person to set up a profitable business, with the previous months spent in planning.
I disagree... Outsourcing means taking money out of the American economy (wages that would be paid to someone getting taxed and buying stuff over here), and sends it overseas where that money (generated with the assistence of US-taxpayer funded US infrastructure, and taxpayer funder corporate tax breaks) now instead helps a competitor to America. That's not a good thing.
The free trade of high paying AMerican jobs for cheap overseas labor also would not naturally end until some natural balance in global salary levels has been achieved... Now, when you realize that the US *currently* has one of the highest salary levels in the worls, but only represents ~5% of the global population, you'll begin to realize where that eventual equilibrium may be achieved... it wont be the midway point between current US and Indian/Chinese/Russian salaries, but rather it'll be much closer to what those Indian etc salaries are right now, since their population sizes swamp our own.
Now, if you actually give a crap about quality of life over here, and your ability to earn a wage that'll pay an American mortage rather than paying for a Chinese apartment (not much use unless you live in China), then you'd be concerned about this, but don't go looking for enlightened CEO's to stop gunning for expense-cutting bonuses in this way, especially since there duty to shareholders is to maximize profits for them, regardless of anythign else (such as whether by doing so they're screwing the American economy, and screwing the job prospects of their shareholders and everyone else).
The only thing that will stop the quality of life in America being dragged down to what'll be supported on an Indian salary is indeed, as Kerry says, to have the government provide disincentives to do so... What I'd support is tax penalties that are proportional to the difference in cost of living between the US and where a company outsources to, since that levels the playing field. I'll happily compete with anyone in the US for a programming job, since I'm good at what I do, and my competitors have pretty much the same cost of living as myself... but trying to compete with someone on the same skill level who's cost of living is 20% of mine is going to be a losing proposition since they can work for 20% of the salary that I need. That's not competition, it's slaughter, and it may be good for globally reducing labor rates to a minimum (if that for some reason is your goal), but it's sure not good for the Americal lifestyle that we enjoy, even if you want to roll out the old excuse that I'll be able to buy a VCR at Walmart for $28.99 instead of $32, because of the Chinese labor.
I'd be voting for Kerry anyway based on the danger to America that Bush represents, but I certainly also support him on this issue - his policy will be good for working Americans, while Bush's outsourcing-happy policy is only good for the independently wealthy and business owners to which lower US labor costs are a plus rather than a negative.
http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_faq.htm#Ques5
Now, if you look at the qualifications for collecting unemployment, you'll see that unemployment eligible people are a proper subset of "unemployed" people. If you're unemployment benefits ineligible, you're not considered "unemployed." So the poster you were disagreeing with was exactly right in saying that the figures "don't count people who're no longer collecting unemployment and have simply given up.."
There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
The problem here is that we are shifting from a colonial economic system to a global one, and we've kept the worst part of both.
If you're going to have a global system, then you must adjust the relative value of human labor, so that the quality of life is elevated for the poorest, and the whole world isn't reduced to a huge slave shop. Just as we balance monetary worth between nations and currencies, we need to set up a fair trade balance in wage differential across nations to insure that the quick and the greedy don't just use this as an opportunity to make a cash grab (in the form of human value), and cause an economic implosion. This needs to be a slow process, allowing for global equalization to occur, at the same time we need to insure that trade and the flow of wealth is balanced so that the nations economy remains robust and flexible.
The current outflow of 'Dollars' is unsustainable. The current rate of increasing unemployment for American workers is unsustainable. What happens when every, job blue and white, collar is taken by either an illegal immigrant, or a foreign national working outside the country? What happens when the only jobs available in this country pay minimum wage? What happens when tens of millions of people have no way of finding work at all, no way of contributing to the economy, and are a drain on the national infrastructure? As the tax base erodes, how are government services provided? How do we prevent lawlessness, crime, ignorance, when government infrastructure begins to collapse? That's not a moot question. A small town on the California central cost just closed it's city government, Salinas has let go of over half it's city employees, and the kindergartens in Monterey have gone from an average of 20 students 4 years ago, to over 40 per classroom now, and teachers are terrified, because there have recently been a number of cases of 5 year olds wandering off of school property because there is no way for one person to watch that many young children.
Your idea about education is a good one, sadly, money for education is being cut across the board all over the country. A recent report describing the increased cost of education and the quickly dwindling money available for supporting education, is forcing student with resources to settle for less, and students without resources to settle for nothing at all. Add to that, a general educational system more intent on making people docile and obedient, than actually giving them anything that vaguely resembles knowledge, and you have one more critical ingredient for what is quickly becoming a global disaster.
As for small business... how do you start a small business if the middle class is gone and you have no local customers? Are you going to start off with a global business from the get go? If so, how will you compete against a third world country providing the same service as you for 10% of your cost? Your ideas are good, they just can't happen in the world that is getting made, they are literally impossible, if the current trends follow to their conclusion. The worst part, is that the European and Asian economies are intimately linked to ours. If we go down, we're taking the entire first and second world down with us. We'll be faced with an economic disaster that makes the great depression look like misplaced chump change. The current Libertarian Presidential candidate had some brilliant ideas, returning the country to a strict adherence of the constitution, fixing the big mistakes we made with corporations and bringing back a high level of personal responsibility to both business and society. Separating business from state, just as we separate church from state. Making government service the thing it was originally intended to be, a means to serve, not a means to get rich or empower lawyers/business/the highest bidder.
I am of the mind that all people everywhere need to be free, safe from harm, safe from violence, safe from slavery. I am of the mind that every person on earth should have a nom
No the Figure is not inaccurate, they are correct.
Spoken like somebody with food on the table. The unemployment figures may be an accurate representation of a statistic, but they are not even close to an accurate representation of the actual unemployment rate. Rather they are a stat for the numbr of people on unemployment. Once your benefits go away, you're no longer unemployed - congratulations!
The people who want to die, are going to die.
I dare you to go to the midwest and say that to somebody's face. With any luck, they'll kill you and take your job.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
Don't blame the immigrants - they come to the country, speak little English, are very willing to do low paid lobs
I don't blame the immigrants or the overseas workers who are doing jobs previously done by Americans. I blame the corporations who hire them and the government that makes it so easy for corporations to do that.
Capitalism is a system whereby a relatively tiny number of wealthy business owners and corporate officers have an economic incentive to drive down the wages of the vast majority of workers. The only thing that keeps wages stable is the limited supply of workers in most fields. Globalization is undoing that with an almost limitless supply of foreign workers desperate for jobs. Supply goes up and wages go down. Simple economics.
Companies which outsource are sending U.S. dollars abroad. If they paid U.S. workers, the U.S. workers would be spending money at Best Buy, Walmart, local grocery stores, car washes, beauty parlors, hardware stores, shopping malls, etc. So the company doesn't only hurt the workers it lays off. It hurts the entire economy.
Sure, the price of some consumer goods are lower because of outsourcing. But cheap power tools and lower prices for hair dryers don't make up for the fact that you're unemployed. When you don't know where your next meal is coming from, it's kind of hard to get excited about Walmart being able to sell a microwave oven for $38.
Now let's look at the uneven playing field. It costs less to hire an Indian software engineer in Bangalore than it costs to lease the office space that would be occupied by his U.S. counterpart. Even if the U.S. engineer was willing to work for $6,000 per year (about the going rate in India), he/she would still be far more expensive to employ.
Nike can hire 14 year old children to work in its Asian plants while we have strict prohibitions against such practices in the U.S. In addition to prohibiting child labor in the U.S., we have many laws and regulations which are designed to protect American workers. We prohibit discrimination. We limit exposure to dangerous chemicals. We require employers to supply appropriate protective gear (hearing protection, hardhats, dust masks, goggles, gloves, etc. U.S. companies are getting around these expensive regulations by outsourcing.
Many immigrants are willing to live with 8 people sharing a two-bedroom apartment. Is that the standard of living we want for U.S. citizens? Is that how we want our families to live? If not, then we need to do something to close the doors to foreign workers. We cannot afford to be an employment agency for the third world unless we want the standard of living for the average American worker to plummet.
The illegal Mexican immigrants are NOT squeezing the middle class in any way. There is nobody in the middle class that would their jobs.
Several researchers have actually said the illegal immigration is good for the country, from the job market perspective, that is. Sure, illegal immigration brings other problems, but they sure as hell aren't taking any jobs away from the us middle class.
In Soviet Russia, I ruled you
Then enter the dot-com bust, the accounting fraud crisis that boiled over after it festered under the Clinton years, as well as 9/11.
You're wasting your breath. People are way too short-sighted to believe that a president isn't the direct cause of everything that goes on during his term, especially when people have a political agenda.
Actually the really funny thing is that during Clinton's presidency, a lot of people(esp. Republicans) criticized Clinton for adopting Republican economic policies. But then they turn around and blame the recession on those same policies. How quickly we all forget what really happened during Clinton's years.....
I really think the whole blind Clinton bashing is a lot like blind Bush bashing, the other side so reviles the person that they are willing to say anything to keep their side riled up against the competetion.
My biggest gripe against Bush isn't that he "caused" the recession, you really won't be able to convince a single Republican that he did, but that he bungled the recovery while creating record deficits. That is something that even Herbert Hoover didn't do. The government is spending tons of money, but a lot of people are still having trouble finding work. Where is it all going? That is the question I really want answered from a Bush supporter.
Monstar L
And what happens when those skills get sent overseas? Are people in India or Korea any less creative than Americans?
What happens when China decides to stop taking our money, or stop exporting goods to us? We *need* a manufacturing sector. If China decides to invade Taiwan, where will we get our steel or semiconductors? This is a very real threat.
Finally, these "new industries" have extremely high costs of entry. What new industry would be possible? Biotech? Nanotech? Robotics? Space? How will a small business raise the hundreds of millions of dollars needed to start any of these businesses? Who the heck will buy carbon nanotubes if they don't do anything? And how the hell are we going to keep biotech open if we allow big companies to patent genes?
The answer isn't a "Creative" economy. That's bullshit. The only thing a creative economy will get us is more PHBs spouting jargon. There's only so much crap people will buy, especially when John Q. Sixpack lost his job and can't find anything in his field.
The economy of tomorrow is going to be... a service economy. Those are the *only* jobs that can't be exported, because it's kinda hard for someone in India to unclog your toilet or (increasingly) change your bedpan. Our economy will be based on the baby boomers retiring. There's already a *huge* nursing shortage, to the point where they're offering $10,000 signing bonuses and $50,000/year salaries.
If we want to save our country, we need to stop the culture of consumerism by REMOVING PERSONHOOD FOR CORPORATIONS and TAXING THE HELL OUT OF THEM. This is the only way we will prevent Wal-Mart from being the de facto retailer, selling things *not* made in America to people who *lost their fscking jobs* because it's cheaper to hire a person with no human rights in China or Bangladesh.
I'm in the hole of the broadband donut.
Your comments are premised on the notion that there is a distinct difference in the fundamental worldviews of the Demopublican and Republocratic parties; that's a big mistake.
Those two factions of our single party are both funded by the wealthy and corporations, and are both beholden to their funders. They employ different rhetoric to try to rally the populace, but there is no significant difference in their worldviews.
Compared to the range of parties and political choice that a citizen of most any European country has, there is no political freedom in the US -- we're a one-party state.
You're not guaranteed a high paying job that you like.
Outsourcing is what makes the free open market free and open.
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
I see that you have bought into the idea that the media have been trying to plant into our collective consciousness - that the "Dollars going out is unattainable" crap.
Stop thinking of the flow of money in the Zero Sum term. You have to understand, whatever that's flowing out of America is in US dollars, and whatever flowed out of America will flow into some other people's hands, and when they accumulate enough, they will use that money to BUY something !
After all, what else is money for, right ?
So, we shouldn't concentrate in how much our money has flowed out, we should instead, think of ways to get those money back - by earning it !
When those people want to buy something - and they ain't buying toaster oven, for sure - we better be prepared to provide them with whatever they want to buy, and charge accordingly for it.
The market isn't a static one, it's dynamic. So, don't worry.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
did anybody read the article or is this just about comiserating about unemployment?
American trade policy has been pro-"free trade" without requiring that the trading partner have equivalent environmental or employee protections. These blind spots have, for example, caused the export of almost all American non-ferrous metals processing jobs to Mexico and Canada.
while "made in china" might mean this, i can't believe how this article tries to take a shot at the NAFTA countries. Mexico might not live up to US standards (but i want to see the American consumers pay the prices for "made in USA" DVD players etc.
immigrants are an important economic factor in the western world.
-look at Europe: europe is struggeling because of its aging population which causes health and old age pension costs to skyrocket; not so the US. the birth rates are no higher in the US but immigration keeps the average age at bay because young people enter the country.
-immigrants are not only workers; they are also consumers. so they don't take jobs away from americans, they simply increase the population.
-legal immigration should be simpler because legal immigration is much better than illegal immigration - legal immigrants work under the same labour and health standards as Americans and they pay taxes. none of this can be said of illegal immigrants. they are at high danger of abuse in many ways by their "employers" (or slave drivers) and they have no way of defending themselves because any legal action would cause them to be kicked out.
in my opinion, this article is full of xenophobia and uses the current anxiety about jobs to try to convince people that immigration and immigrants (clearly one of the weakest groups of society who have little or no political voice) are the root of all evil. this is simply disgusting.
OK, look at it like this:
x .shtml
1) You propose economic treason for a guy that wants to buy a $2 toaster from overseas.
2) You buy foreign goods, even though you say the gov'ment 'made you do it.'
Statement 1 + Statement 2 = Do as I say, not as I do.
Tariffs lead to this:
http://www.bethsteel.com/BethSteelEstate.com/inde
The US steel industry, with tariffs so restrictive and protective that he Europeans brought out the WTO, is shit.
Bethlehem and USSteel had no need to innovate, no need to get better, no need to control the labor costs. Look where it got them.
I think I need a new sig here.
I don't know about becoming fascist, but I would have thought someone would check the credentials/site before approving the article. From vdare.com:
So, on to The Center for American Unity:
Regardless of what you think about affirmative action, I would hardly see mass immigration, multiculturalism and multilingualism as "threats". It seems that vdare.com is funding by yet another one of those groups that forgets that the founders of America were immigrants, America has always had immigration as one of its strengths and that a large portion of the economy is supported by immigration. Idiots.
Shame on whoever approved this claptrap. It's a step above the KKK, at best. I wonder if any of Slashdot's staff members are immigrants or first generation Americans. I wonder how they feel knowing this sort of crap gets posted to the main page.
OK, perhaps Bush isn't responsible for mismanagement of a floundering game company, but it stings nonetheless.
You have it right. But there are many people who believe that the future of their financial position depends upon the actions of some politician.
If someone honestly believes that, he will never be successful, because success is a function of external circumstance.
Oh well.
....Labor is the true engine of any economy,.....
That's what Hitler said as he changed the basis of the German money and economy from the gold standard, essentially making gold nothing more than another metal commodity. All this was to the chagrin of all the wealthy people in the US and elsewhere, since now the gold they had amassed did not help them to control others any more. Soon after Hitler did this, the rest of the world abandoned gold and now the worth of money is entirely arbitrary, controlled by the bankers of the world. In the US it even became illegal for the citizens to own gold.
What you get paid in dollars, pounds, pesos, euros or whatever is immaterial. What matters is how long you have to work for a loaf of bread or whatever. In the US, the time needed to work for most items is still much less than in many other countries. Today you can buy a pair of shoes for a few hours of labor, but my grandparents in Germany had to work for about a month for a decent pair of shoes. A good suit of clothes took three months wages for an average tradesman. Today, even someone flipping hamburgers in the US, works less time to buy almost everything and can buy those same shoes for a lot less work time than the worker in Indonesia who works in the factory that made those very same shoes.
Compared to generations past, and to the vast majority of people on Earth today, we are spoiled and rather unthankful for what we do have here in the US. If things here really are as bad as some of the posters on this forum complain, then why is it that so many foreigners still clamor to come here, such as some from Mexico risking a horrible death in the deserts of the southwest?
All theory is gray
You are correct in that the economy was failing even before Bush took office. Gillette laid off thousands just after the election but before Bush took office, and that's when I knew we were in for some problems. I'm willing to bet that those companies waited to lay people off until after the election (recall that Gillette donated razor blades to DNC attendees who were then promptly pulled aside by security guards).
This brings up another question. What's going to happen after this election? Who is waiting until after the election to do something that might make Bush look bad? I personally don't know, but you have to wonder.
That said, I'm in a decent job now and I'm assuming that this will still be the case in December, so economy isn't a hot topic with me. Ashcroft on the other hand, is. The guy's ultimate goal is to monitor all of our actions/thoughts and prosecute if we deviate from conservative/Christian ideals. Not saying church goers are bad, but I would prefer that they do their worshipping and I look at my pr0n and all of us can be happy.
But again, you are correct. The shit was going to hit the fan regardless of who won in 2000. And if the shit's going to hit the fan again, it will do so in a few months regardless of who wins.
Corporations and Investors want a Race to the Bottom, which increases profits by decreasing wages and benefits. The end result will be a large amount of wealth concentrated in the hands of a few.
Workers want a Race to the Top by increasing wages and benefits. THe end result here will be a large amount of wealth dispersed into the hands of many.
As we can see here on Slashdot, the real problem we have is that the wealthy and the corporations have funded a network of think tanks and foundations that have spent the last 30 years spewing propaganda to make everyone think that a Race to the Bottom is good and that a Race to the Top is Bad. And most Americans (and most Slashdotters!) are buying into the corporate propaganda!
It just goes to show you the power of propaganda over a long period of time--if you spend billions of dollars saying that black is white and white is black, that after 30 years, you will have a bunch of people walking around telling you black is white and that high labor costs and protective trade laws are bad....
THe details of the this RightWing/Corporate propaganda machine are starting to be made public. You can get more info about these "Tentacles of Rage" in the lastest edition of Harpers Magazine here.
eat shiat and bark at the moon
The level of economic activity is not the whole problem. The problem is shifting wealth away from the middle classes and lower classes and towards the wealthy. Liberal H1B laws do not help the American people but they do help American businesses. Low taxes on capital gains, dividends... while there are very high taxes on wages (combining income tax and social security) means the American tax system is anti-progressive.
Then do us all a favor and stop pretending that you're an American.
This is the rhetoric we've come to. "If you support outsourcing, you're not an American," and others... "If you criticize the government..." "...if you don't submit to a full body-cavity search and background investigation before boarding a plane..." etc. etc. you are not an American.
I SWEAR that I am not deliberately invoking Godwin's law here, but think about it. Getting the country afraid of unseen enemies, and promoting unquestioned nationalistic mindset is exactly how, over the course of a few years, Nazi Germany came about. I would HOPE that American society is intelligent enough to stand up and see what is happening, and stop it, before all civil liberties are lost. I don't think Bush is a dictator in waiting, I don't think we're sitting here compacently waiting to become a fascist state. However there can be no question that as we go down this avenue of language and mindset, bigger and bigger breeches of freedom will be justified in the name of security or patriotism.
THAT IS A BAD THING.
I totally agree with your measure of "worth" as how long you have to work to get something.
But you have to compare apples to apples - same timeframe, and same relative framework. it's not helpful to compare a 1st world economy to a 3rd world economy (except to remind oneself how good we currently have it in North America).
A better comparison might be cost of shelter - how many days one has to work for a month's rent (or a month of mortgage, utilities, property taxes)
But two very key things;
First, we only have to work a couple hours to buy shoes... because we don't make them anymore. We get the 3rd world and to make them. ditto for alot of consumer goods. The price we pay is artificially LOW and we are going to get it between the eyes when we run out of cheap labour to exploit.
And second... since we still do have it relatively good... we should be INVESTING AS A SOCIETY in things that will insure future well-being - eg education and research. As a class, the thing rich people are mostly good at is staying rich. Giving them more wealth via tax cuts in this day and age... makes them wealthier, period. They are not reinvesting in things that produce jobs.
So I agree that we have it good, but we're on the wrong course for keeping it good... unless the intent is to maintain our wealth through world domination and intimidation by force (military and capital). Which doesn't seem to be working so well, lately.
Thanks for trying to break the spell on these blockheads.
If you like what you're getting and where things are going, you must be rich and a corporate owner.
If you don't, and want to have a future with a decent retirement, and fight for the middle class, vote Kerry. Work to turn the tide.
Get your teeth into a small slice: the cake of liberty
But its even more profitable if you don't emply others..
See This interesting piece about what is happening with call center jobs (from Simon Head's "The New Ruthless Economy" - a must read book)
You and i know it only takes like 2 days to set up a profitable business that can employ others. Thank god the government is there to do it for us!
;-))
Ok, in context, I guess you are telling a joke. I didn't find it very funny though. MAybe it will take you 48 work hours to get the ground-work set up for a business which may eventually become profitable though....
When I started my consulting business, I spent something like a full week (more than 40 hours too) writing my business plan. I probably spent another 8 hours or so setting up network infrastructure, buying licenses, setting up office space, etc. So that is 48 hours or more (2 days, right? if I don't eat or sleep
BTW, my business plan is about 100 pages long.
My business has been profitable every month since inception. Granted it hasn't always made enough for me to pay myself enough to cover all *my* bills, but the business has been otherwise self-supporting.
Now, six months later, I am finally being able to cover my bills (mortgage payment, electricity, groceries, etc). So my seed capital (tax refund, IRA) basically was used to pay my living expenses for those six months. Someday soon, maybe I can even look at hiring people fulltime.
However, I have a different perspective on this job crunch. I think that we are in the midst of a major economic change in this country. It is going to take some time for businesses to understand how to best use off-shore outsourcing and global networks such as open source project teams. This transition creates an opportunity for me because many people feel orphaned by the current trends in the small business markets.
In the end, I think that services businesses in the US will do well.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
The next generation (Generation X if you will) will simply have to save much much more for retirement (I need to save more for one) since importing more people to be taxed won't work forever as those people will also get older unless the visas on which immigrants work are strictly time limited and they get booted out at 65. If the US dollar is high compared to the costs in their home countries this might actually work, however, as money saved working in the USA might offer a comfortable retirement for them in their country of origin (and without being a burden to their country of origin) as well as offering the USA the chance to garner additional tax receipts while they are working in the USA.
There are plenty of things that could go wrong, and encouraging immigration is not necessarily a popular choice. However the costs of an aeging population sometimes scare the pants off me.
Ok and what has SS turned into? A pyramid scheme that is looted by Congress. It's dying and needs to be replaced. Support Bush's plan [whitehouse.gov] for SS reform.
As anybody with a calculator can figure out, Bush's plan has a huge hole. The cost of switching from pay-as-you-go to individual-investment plans is dumbfoundingly large (some estimate it as $1 trillion), and I've seen no coherent explanation from Bush's administration as to where the money will come from.
I think pension plans with up-front contributions and more individual control are a great idea, and I'm glad that people have at least started to talk about reforming Social Security. But Bush, et al, have only given us fairy tales and titanic defecits, so it's hard to believe that they're serious.
And how many of those businesses last 2 years? Not many, given that hardly anyone is hard-nosed enough to create a successful business.
It takes guts and giving up any other things in your life for a long time to build a successful business. I'd much rather be an employee working 40 hours a week and have a life and I bet I'm in the majority.
Outsourcing may be highly beneficial in the short term for big business, but when no-one can afford their products anymore because they're all working for minimum wage (or not working at all) all that rush to save money will look a bit stupid. Not that the middle-classes will ever allow it to go that far.
Does a Christian soccer team even need a goalkeeper?
I feel that some of the compairsons that you make here are a little unfair. I assume that when you say "your grandparents in germany" you refering to a economic situation that existed 60 years ago... not exactly current. The Indonesia example is also a little unfair since it can be argued that situation exists due to the US (and others) creating that enviorment for "cheap labor" and supposed "free trade".I would like to say as well that I was born and raised in the US for the first 22 years of my life and I now live in europe (Norway) I am now currently 27 and I can say confidently that my wage here is better, I pay nearly the same amount of taxes, I am able to save money here FAR more easily then I ever was in the US and do not have to live "paycheck to paycheck" as was the case 95% of the time I lived in the US. I have met other Americans that have moved to europe as well living in Germany, France, Holland, Danmark, Beligum that all told me they felt the same way. While I agree the US is not the "worst off" The situation is bad in the US right now, it has not reached a crisis yet but it will and I hope the country will not just sit on the sidelines and watch it happen because "we are better off the indonesians so quit complaining"
Kerry can't win in the PR campaign about "simple solutions". The system is too complicated for simple solutions, but every time Kerry tries to get into detail about his plans, no one wants to cover it because they can't get any juicy sound bites (& he gets accused of being another ivory-tower egghead proposing an overly complicated solution). So when he "dumbs it down" so that the media will accept it, he gets accused of being condescending to the public, and proposing overly-simple solutions to a complicated problem.
Bush's approach is a lot simpler: let his buddies write the laws. No thinking involved, and he looks like he's getting something done. As long as nobody can find out where the money's going, he can put on a happy face and pretend like everything's going great (because it IS - at least for him & his buddies...).
At least from those awkward moments in interviews where Kerry gets "too complicated", you can tell he's put some thought into the issues.
Eh? EH? I seriously suggest you check out the 10-15% long term unemplyment and microscopic growth rates in France and Germany. That is the price of socilaist distortions like in TFA above. And England is rapidly catching them up under Blairism. In spite of a IT recession in the US (now over), it is still far easier to get an IT job in America than England, and in England far more easily than France or Germany.
Where on earth do you people come up with this kind of stuff? There isn't a lump of jobs out their that can be divvied up between your favourite political groups. Individual people, wherever they are from, create jobs by creating wealth - spending their time to take somethng low value and make it higher value using their abilities. If you go down the socialist road that TFA wants, you will bring ruin to the very people you pretend to be helping.
But that doesn't make it OK to blame foreingers for all your country's problems.
The Labour force participation is dropping because baby boomers are retiring. This means that the generation younger will be paying a hefty bill for their retirement. Social Security will not withstand this problem--people do not have as many kids and the only way to "pay" for it is to have immigration. Grampa is not going to have the retirement he hopes for.
Much of Europe has the same issue. Many of those countries have declining populations. How will the old be able to have a secure retirement? They won't without immigration.
If you want to blame something for the unemployment rate, it is not sufficient to assume that every immigrant entering the US == one job lost to an American. It is simply a too simplistic view.
To blame trade agreements for lost jobs is unfair. Every time a government negotiates a trade agreement they claim that they will train people with new skills for those who have lost their jobs. They should do it. This is the right policy, but how many governments have actually followed through with the promise? Not many.
With free trade, those that have 3rd world skills will be offered 3rd world wages. Ask what your government has done to lower tuition lately?
There is a classic economic discussion about economies: "Guns and butter" Essentially, the argument is that some societies place more emphasis on the Guns than Butter (or vice versa). These are just two products, but they have symbolic value: You folks spend more than the rest of the world combined on the military. Could it be better spent? Do you really want to be an empire, knowing the costs to your own society? One stealth bomber can pay for an awful lot of teachers. North Korea has made it's choices. They blame the evil south and the evil US oppresssors--bla bla bla. They have a militaristic outlook. Their people must eat bark and roots and possibly each other. Don't walk down their shoes, alright?
To single out some arbitrary group, and then blame them for your ills, is a classic approach seen many times throughout history. It has never solved anything before, so why do they think it'll work this time? Sure it'll get one politician over another elected, but that doesn't really solve anything does it?
For those that agree with the page's ideas: Instead of thinking about how to worsen someone else's situation, at least try to think about improving your own first.
-b
The failure rate totally depends on the type of business, who your mentors are, who your partners are, how much previous experience you have in business, etc.... People are willing to spend 16 years in school to learn how to become a good employee (and they think this is a success) and they are unwilling to take risks and learn business by doing it (and, yes, failing in it often). Wouldn't you consider spending 16 years in school to end up in JOBS that you hate a bigger failure than starting a business and losing say $1000-$10000?
You're talking about Bush, right? I've never seen somebody who could so completely change their position & pretend like they've always thought that way. I'm not sure what you mean about his "vision" - about the only thing I think he's been consistent on is the "us" vs "them" mentality - all of his other messages seem to change depending on whatever his political handlers are telling him to say at any given moment.
Kerry's not a simple person (maybe unlike Bush). Based on what I've read about him, he seems like the type of guy who analyzes all sides of an issue before making a decision about what to do - and what he decides to do may not be the obvious thing that someone else who hasn't thought about the problem as much would have picked.
You can probably guess who I think is better suited to be a world leader. :-) I have no idea why so many people in the American public think Bush is a good leader. I keep having flashbacks to the popularity-contests called student government in high school. Bush is portrayed on TV as a personable-if-somewhat-slow guy, while Kerry seems to be portrayed as some kind of unlikable ivory-tower "Lurch" character. It depresses me to know that many of my fellow Americans don't pick their leaders based on demonstrated merit (or reject them based on demonstrated incompetence).
Even by usual Slashdot standards, it's stunning that the above crap actually got modded up.
His argument, explicitly spelled out, is that he buys foreign goods because they are cheaper than American goods and that if he bought American goods he would have less money for the rent and therefore, he argues, the government should FORCE him (and you and me and everyone else) to pay higher prices for all goods, bringing the foreign ones at least up to the price of the American ones he's unwilling to pay for, and thus to have less money to pay the rent. And someone somewhere bought into this?
Leaving asside the morality of forcing foreigners into poverty, leaving aside the practicalities of the negative effects on markets that we depend on, leaving aside the effects of retaliatory measures, you actually want the government to FORCE you to pay higher prices because it's not a choice you'd make on your own? This is insanity.
The real Ralph Yarro posts as Anonymous Coward. Anyone else is an impostor.
Greens: Organize your neighbors and start sustainable cooperatives, especially around "life necessities" (food, shelter, health care, education). Undercut the corporate monopolies.
These are both viable alternatives. However, they both require determination, optimism, personal responsibility and hard work; therefore, they won't be popular with people who were brought up in an educational system that encouraged them to be passive workers, rather than active owners.
DNA is a Turing machine. You, however, being dynamic and emergent, are not.
I seriously suggest you check out the 10-15% long term unemplyment and microscopic growth rates in France and Germany.
I suggest that you look at the unemployment and standards of living in countries where there aren't progressive taxes.
But it is mostly the possibility of failure. From this report
According to Dun & Bradstreet reports, "Businesses with fewer than 20 employees have only a 37% chance of surviving four years (of business) and only a 9% chance of surviving 10 years." Restaurants only have a 20% chance of surviving 2 years. Of these failed business, only 10% of them close involuntarily due to bankruptcy and the remaining 90% close because the business was not successful, did not provide the level of income desired or was too much work for their efforts
The old adage, "People don't plan to fail, they fail to plan" certainly holds true when it comes to small business success. The failure rate for new businesses seems to be around 70% to 80% in the first year and only about half of those who survive the first year will remain in business the next five years 3 .
The problem with this statement is that, to literally 10 million people in this country, anyone making $30,000 a year or more is 'rich' compared to them, so I'm sure you won't mind if your income tax is raised 10% since you can 'afford it'.
First off, you won. There are 0 examples of this.
.... where is this going?
.. and I'm not talking about monetarily, either.
Thank you. Words to that effect have probably seldom been read here.
And that fact leaves us with the obvious - that since there are none, then
I don't know. You tell me. My whole point was was to counter the claim that "You and i know it only takes like 2 days to set up a profitable business that can employ others."
That capitalism doesn't work? That some guy who said that there is one is wrong, and capitalist and therefore capitalism is wrong?
Not at all. Capitalism works fine when there are reasonable laws and government regulations to protect the workers from having their standards of living eroded by greed at the top. Something is wrong when people with decades of experience are being laid off at age 60+ just so that the companies that they helped make profitable can become slightly more so.
Man, go brush up on how to think in the first place then maybe you can get your own life working in some successful direction
My life is fine. No need to get insulting.
Hmm. Returning money to those who earned it is immoral and unethical...yes, that is doubleplusungood.
Now, Mr. Buffet may be a philanthropist, and he may have *so much money* that he no longer knows where to put it, but that is his opinion. I imagine that if we asked Mr. Gates for his opinion, we may find an interesting contrast (note: Microsoft IS issuing dividends). And Mr. Gates is the leading philanthropist.
From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. How about we let people keep their own damn money, and let them decide whether to donate it to charity?
I am John Hurt.
Ever read Wealth of Nations? Do you think that we have a ballance of power today between supplysiders and consumers? We no longer have villages of skilled craftsman competing, who weren't able to service more than a county. In order to have a free-market today it is necessary to ballance the power wielded by the large multi-nationals, or reduce them to the small businesses from whence they came. Government intervention is one way. View it as the power of the people of a country taken together as a whole. Regulation is necessary as elimination of corporations just isn't politically feasible.
Unlike you, I'm working as a software engineer, so it sounds like I was motivated enough to get the skills I needed to be desirable in a tight job market.
Personally it's not as difficult as you make it sound to switch professions, in fact I know quite a few people who have done so as of late, and are better for it.
It's one thing to go from being a recent grad in an entry-level programming position to some other entry-level position, but it's quite another for a family breadwinner who's got 15 or 20 years of experience and seniority in his field to switch professions.
I am a programmer first and foremost, unable to find a programming job in this shithole I live in
I went to the web page shown on your Slashdot link (http://www.aboring.com) and got the following:Maybe your inability to find programming work is not due to where you live...
I work as a heavy equipment mechanic.
I'm sorry that you've had to take such work, but I wouldn't call it a profession. It's a job.
and I will be voting GOP
I can see why given the way that your career is prospering under the GOP.