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Dell Closes Ireland Plant; 2nd Largest Employer
Wide Angle writes in with a PBS report on tough economic news from Ireland: Dell announced that it will relocate its manufacturing plant in Limerick, Ireland to Lodz, Poland. "Dell's announcement... is a severe blow to the Irish economy, which has been hit hard and fast by the global economic crisis. Dell is Ireland's second-largest corporate employer and the country's largest exporter. Nineteen hundred shift workers will lose their jobs. ...Dell's closing is not a result of the economic downturn, but of a pattern all too familiar in the United States — corporations' perennial search for cheaper labor. Since 2000 several companies, such as Procter & Gamble, Intel, Gateway, and NEC Electronics, have moved manufacturing jobs from Ireland to China, Eastern Europe, and elsewhere. When Poland joined the European Union in 2004, it became an attractive place for companies to set up manufacturing plants. ... However, Ireland has managed to maintain and attract... 'knowledge-intensive jobs.' Google's European headquarters are based in Dublin, and Facebook announced late last year that they would locate their international headquarters there. But the overall economic picture for Ireland is bleak."
There once was a man from Nantucket...
Perhaps Eire should have factored in that companies agile and willing enough to relocate once to Ireland would likely be sufficiently agile and willing to move to follow the sun again.
Nullius in verba
I suppose it is only reasonable. Now all these Poles who already work there will have much a much shorter commute. Good for them.
I would like to die like my grandfather did - sleeping. And not screaming in terror, like his passengers.
AOL was in Dublin for a long time, and they moved to Waterford, and then Waterford lost out. Soon the only tech place in Dublin will be eBay - if they count?
We the consumer, demand cheaper priced products, why should we be surprised when manufacturers look for methods of reducing their costs? You don't exactly see them firing up manufacturing plants in Tokyo or Manhattan.
It's a Global Economy, get used to it.
That's fine as long as you have a job to pay for it. If all the manufacturing and knowledge based jobs end up in the cheaper locations then can the Western Economies keep going. I know that many economists say that it is the beginning of the service economy, and we can all be rich in the west by buying and providing services for each other but I am rather skeptical. If a whole country consists of PR teams, lawyers, restaurant owners and so on can they really "generate" enough money to be able to buy their "real" things from cheap overseas sources?
I realize that this sucks for Ireland but Poland is in far worse shape and needs the jobs just as badly if not more.
The population of Ireland is somewhere around 6 million - what does every *else* do there?
Farm potatoes and brew Guinness.
The fact is, since China has the unfair advantage of near-slave labor, the rest of the world as a whole needs to have stiff import tariffs to equalize this imbalance.
This really shouldn't be completely about the "world economy" and if it can be done cheaper in China, "why not"? It is completely fair to take into account other factors such as China's complete disregard for workers rights and environmental issues, not to mention truth in labeling with regards to all the poisons they put in food products.
Make 'em pay, it's the only way to get their attention.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Having spent over an hour and a half on the phone with Dell Canada on Monday just to get a quote (and a quote for twenty computers I might add), I'd say there is such a thing as "too cheap".
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Scares them, doesn't it. But they didn't learn; you don't put all your potatoes in one basket.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
The 10 year discount is up. That's why they are moving, and Dell isn't the only corporation doing this. Ireland has a low corporate tax, and discounts it even further for the first 10 years a corporation operates there.
There. Fixed it for ya.
There once was an old man of Esser,
Whose employment prospects grew lesser and lesser,
It at last grew so small
He had no job skills at all,
And now he's a college professor.
I can't wait to see what happens when our economy takes such a nosedive, and unemployment becomes rampant that companies start moving jobs here since our labor is so much cheaper than china, india, taiwain, etc...
Actually our economy won't get that bad but a lot of economists were talking about what $200-$300/bbl oil would do to free trade. At a certain point it will become more expensive to ship goods than to just produce them here at home. The various economists and talking heads all disagreed as to what that point was but all agreed that it would happen sooner or later if oil prices had kept skyrocketing.
Of course the economic meltdown has dragged oil down but how long is that really going to last?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Well the Republic of Ireland is closer to 4 million (the north is part of the UK). There is about 2 million working I believe. 4 million - children - old people easily gives you that.
It says corporate employer so that rules out all public jobs. And in Ireland that means most education and health.
Most major companies would only have one major location in Ireland, so even the big ones are a few thousand. So it is easily believed. You'd only need a 1000 companies employing 2000 people to employ the whole country including the public workers.
Ireland would be the equivalent of a medium metro area in the US. Not many of those have many corporate employers employing more than 5k people I would guess, maybe Detroit?
There once was a man from Nantucket
Whose dick was so long he could suck it.
While wiping his chin,
He said with a grin,
"If my ear were a cunt, I could fuck it."
--- and here is the extended version of the original ---
There once was a man from Nantucket
Who kept all his cash in a bucket.
But his daughter, named Nan,
Ran away with a man
And as for the bucket, Nantucket.
part 2:
But he followed the pair to Pawtucket,
The man and the girl with the bucket;
And he said to the man,
He was welcome to Nan,
But as for the bucket, Pawtucket.
part 3:
Then the pair followed Pa to Manhasset,
Where he still held the cash as an asset,
But Nan and the man
Stole the money and ran,
And as for the bucket, Manhasset.
It's called rural-sourcing, and it's why "import" cars are now made in places like Ohio and Alabama instead of Japan and Germany.
dom
RAmen to that! I RAGE when I have to call 1 800 India support. I hate the scripts they use, I hate the thick accent, and I hate having to be somewhat civil when all I really want to say is "get someone that can actually speak english on the phone". It's terrible when you call with a pretty good idea of what you want, but due to the communication barrier, you can't be sure what you are asking for, is what you will get.
How many times have you had to clarify something, three times, to the person on the other end, and after that, are still unsure if they have a clue what you want?
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Actually they're not the second-largest corporate employer. That seems to be an incorrect inference on the part of the Washington Post, because the Dell Ireland website claims they're the second-largest *corporation*.. and the metric for that could easily be something other than employees, i.e. revenue. Of course, 1900 people isn't their entire Irish workforce either.
There are _definitely_ larger employers in Ireland. 1900 people at a single factory is enough to sustain a mid sized factory town of about 30,000 people (1/3 of Limerick). I know because I've lived in one. And I'm certain Ireland has a handful of towns that size and larger.
But just to grab some random Irish companies out of a hat and look them up: Eircom has 6,500 employees. Bank of Ireland has 16,026.
You're kind of assuming that:
People in developing countries somehow are only capable of making things for export
Dell shut down all their plants in America and shipped them to China. Your plant is remaining in Europe. Personally, I have quit buying Dell.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Hey guys I am from Poland and guess what? I can more or less speak english and even know how to post on Slashdot.
And there's more. We do embedded software and hardware here, we know Linux and it's been that way for years already.
So it's not different compared to where you live. And as for dell, easy come easy go. They won't stay here longer than 3-4 years and eventualy will continue moving east.
Ok, maybe that's a little blase, but there are two points that have to be considered here:
1. Ireland is not nor never has been a manufacturing country. Sure there have be some manufacturing companies such as Dell, but essentially Ireland is a combination of a strong agricultural and tourism in rural areas with technological and financial bias in the urban areas. Dell is nice to have, and I feel sorry for those that have lost their jobs in Limerick - but it is not a core industry, even if it is a core employer.
2. Ireland has been growing at an incredible rate over the past 10 years, far faster than anyone could possibly hope to adapt to. Looking at the government's actions over this period, they have acted like lottery winners, squandering the growth to create an ever-burgeoning public sector. Coincidentally, the National Competitiveness Council in Ireland established that our competitiveness has deteriorated by 32% over this period. This loss as well as others is a good wake up call - and an opportunity to regroup and establish a firmer foundation for the future.
It is also important to note that Dell is not leaving Ireland - they are closing their manufacturing plant. Ireland's corporate tax rate is still extremely attractive to US companies.
Genesis 1:32 And God typed
Like Bush, Micheal Dell did not forget Poland.
Thank you I'll be here all week.
The basic problem is that "free trade" never is.
"Free trade" concerning commodities that are easily made (or grown) in an area, like tropical fruit towards northern climates, is one thing.
"Free trade" based on paying workers shit wages, or based on the fact that one country (*coughmexshitcocough*) has absolutely crappy evironmental protection laws while their neighbors don't, doesn't - it temporarily drives down "costs" while ensuring that the environment gets ruined and poverty is taken advantage of.
The solution is "fair trade" instead - place tariffs on any and all imported goods from countries whose labor protection and environmental laws are inferior to our own, such that the cost to produce them there and them import is the same (or better yet, slightly more expensive) as doing the production either here, or in a country with proper worker and environmental protection standards. If the USA/Canada/European countries would do that, then the countries with shit worker protection and environmental laws will have to fall in line and we can actually get things addressed.
As for Globalization, well USA is the current global top-dog expecting many other parts of the world to behave as it sees fit. We're probably a long way down this track already.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Bad examples serve a purpose.
Let the 'unskilled laborers' fight over the shit jobs that are uneconomical to move overseas.
The wage for those jobs will naturally be low.
Life's a bitch. Thanks for playing...better luck next reincarnation.
The fair consequence of never developing skills is subsistence living.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Some areas of Africa are currently stable. If I'm not mistaken Kenya is relatively stable, hence why Google seems to be interested in it. Also in France when we call a hotline it doesn't go to India but Tunisia or Morocco, French-speaking countries that have been fairly stable over the last few decades (Tunisia has nothing to envy regarding stability these days). So it's not all that bleak for Africa, mind you there's more to Africa than starving kids, guerilla wars and genocides, but there's many reasons why most of it will be the last to experience what Poland or China have just experienced, one reason being you can't really just put a big computer chip factory in the middle of Mali.
You just got troll'd!
Correct, but keep in mind this paradigm does not just apply to unskilled labour. "Skilled" jobs such as programming, tech support, design etc. also naturally seek jurisdictions were labour costs are lower.
If the voters in the USA had had to vote yes in each State under plebiscite to amend the US constitution *or* to agree to accept new member States then I doubt it would have grown much.
And the USA did not have European conservatives fronting the funding for proxy anti-Federalism parties within the USA.
Da Blog
So let's have the government hold a gun to your head, take the fruits of your labour and distribute them to unskilled labourers. That should be okay, since life's a bitch and you might have better luck next reincarnation, right ?
Or we could try to make the life a little less of a bitch to everyone, including those unskilled labourers.
The fair consequence of being an arrogant jerk is to get whatever fate you callously wished upon those you considered lesser beings.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.