So if India can demand better wages and reject outsource work, can America have those jobs back?
No, they're more likely to go to Nigeria. As India becomes too expensive, there will always be other places where labor is cheaper and workers more desperate.
Unfortunately, at the drop of a hat, any corporation currently has free reign to make decisions at board room level that affect the lives of thousands of workers
The problem for workers, wherever they are, is that capital is now completely mobile across international boundaries, but labor is not (or much. much less so, anyway).
As trade barriers fall, companies are increasingly international entities that are free to buy their labor and materials where they are cheapest, and to sell their products where people are willing to pay the most for them. They see the world as their playing field, and there is no longer real allegiance to any particular nation or national interest, at least not for which they'll sacrifice their bottom line.
This is all very good news for workers where labor is cheap, but for those where it is expensive... well, not so much. Enjoy the race to the bottom.
Just because people will turn to welfare if insurance doesnt exist, doesn't make welfare any less socialist.
Does it make insurance any less socialist?
What you call welfare is insurance paid for by everyone through taxes, and with universal coverage.
Insurance is welfare paid for through premiums but limited to a select membership.
Participation in the "welfare" insurance plan is involuntary for taxpaying individuals, yes.
Participation in the "insurance" welfare plan is somewhat voluntary (although less so than you probably think), but is denied to broad categories of people who are either deemed high risk or are unable to afford it.
Dwelling on labels like "capitalist" and "socialist" does nothing to further your understanding of either insurance or welfare, which are both just mechanisms for spreading risk from the individual across a broader population. The real difference is simply how broadly you wish to spread it, and whether it will be denied to those most in need of it.
I don't know... Being an asshole and/or prick has been a pretty successful formula on AM talk radio and Fox News; not many liberals there. Many people want fear and hate, not reason, so persuasion is often moot.
Of course, I agree that it's always annoying when other people who share our viewpoints deliver them clumsily, incompetently, or unpersuasively.
But please, stop with the hippies. It's the beatniks you should be worrying about...
The worst thing that can happen is for your ideals to be tied in with obnoxious behavior (this is what happened to liberals).
Yes, those rascally liberals are screwing things up for everybody. Always using reason when force and threats would work perfectly well.
If you want to enjoy the rights of a full citizen and human being, please ask us politely. Your request will be considered (at our sole discretion) in the order in which it is received.
"Why worry if you're not doing anything wrong?" is the typical response. These people don't understand what "freedom" means.
The kind of argument to which you refer is really kind of fascinating, when you probe into it. It is often given by otherwise intelligent people, and yet it belies an astounding trust and faith in remote authority figures who are presumed to be always honest, diligent and conscientious. Our overseers always have our best interests at heart, and would never seek to harm us for their own greed or avarice.
Wherever do you find that kind of blissful relationship with authority? Why, with your own parents, of course, when you were a small child.
The "intelligent" people that give this argument often don't literally believe in the incorruptibility of authority. But what they are doing is to create a comforting fantasy for themselves in which unseen government officials take the place of mommy and daddy, watching over us all and guaranteeing their safety. Once this fantasy womb has been created, it becomes unimaginable that they might ever be the target of abjectly malicious government authority. It would be like your loving parents turning on you with no cause or warning.
It is ironic that this most often afflicts conservatives, who otherwise like to rail on about the "nanny state" in economic contexts.
The more we are fearful, the more likely we are to construct this parental fantasy around our government. This is something that people like Karl Rove understand all too well.
Id for grille lighters and peaches, huh? And why didn't you just walk away loudly commenting on the store's idiotic policy?
Somebody who "just walks away" in that situation is probably trying to hide something. At the very least, he should be taken into a back room and thoroughly interrogated, Gitmo style.
Private interests may be collecting much - or even most - of the information, but even the privately collected stuff is increasingly available to the government, and with little or no judicial oversight. Thus it makes very little difference who collects the data, or for what original purpose. It just saves the government a lot of money and effort to let your phone company do the heavy lifting and then issue a secret warrantless subpoena whenever somebody in authority gets curious.
The key difference being, of course, that these corner grocers didn't enter your information into a central database that is accessible by who-knows-whom for purposes legitimate or not.
I've been looking for someone to offer the old "if you've done nothing wrong you have nothing to worry about" argument so I could jump down their throats, but I'm pleased to say that you're the closest that anyone's come so far. I'm still reading, though...
My fear is, the fact that we find out about these domestic wiretaps, secret European prisons - means that the people put in charge of these things are morons.
Unless, of course, they want us to be aware that our every move may be monitored. I know of no better way to keep people in line and afraid to speak out.
So if I want something, I can stop at a B&N on the way home from work; and if they have the book I want I can go home with it immediately, if they don't have the book I can just ask them to order it
Ummm... Isn't this the way bookstores always worked?
Don't blame "humanity" for this, except maybe for its gullibility and willingness to follow like sheep. It's really a fairly small cabal that's been pushing for total war in the mideast and the destruction of liberty at home, but they know how to manipulate the public and the political system to achieve their ends (which of course they lie about).
All we need is for a few more people to see how they're being manipulated against their own interests. It happens gradually and at the margins, but it does happen, and once you've seen the Man Behind the Curtain it's hard to stick your head in the sand again.
Pretty much everybody without his/her head up his/her ass knows that "fighting terrorism" has very little to do with this.
But then, spying on and harrassing political opponents a la Nixon may not be the main motivation behind it, either.
The BIG concern within the Bush Administration is the threat from people inside of it. They need their own people to know that if they divulge any embarrassing or incriminating information, even anonymously, that they will be tracked down and punished. The war is against potential whistleblowers.
Ever wonder why you never hear interviews with anybody who knew Dubya back in his wild days before he became governor of Texas? Every college friend of every other president had stories to tell, some positive and some not, but not so with George II. Why is this? Well, pretty much everybody with an embarrassing story to tell about cocaine or girls or his desertion from the National Guard now has a cushy high-level job in the government or the energy industry. Better jobs with more power than they'd ever dreamed they'd have, and jobs they're not going to jeopardize by telling stories.
That's how you go from being a horse show official to being head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency with zero experience. Anybody who works in Washington knows there's hundreds - maybe thousands - of 'em.
Without the extensive eavesdropping powers Bush claims, these people would be free to contact reporters or blog information anonymously. By advertising these "powers" via carefully planned "leaks", Karl Rove is letting insiders know that they're taking a big risk if they spill any beans.
And you can bet they'll know who I am as soon as I hit the "Submit" button...
That's because it's not really a matter of the old generation holding onto their ways (no insult at all). It's that people continue to teach children, friends, etc.. misguided views.
I think there's been a growing tide of greed, fear, and intolerance in this country, and it has nothing to do with generations. I grew up in the 60s, and ever since I've always been disappointed that the spirit of activism and involvement that flourished then seems to have died out among the young.
One reason for this is that politicians - and I am referring to the Repugnicans in particular - have become very adept at creating and exploiting fear and bigotry in an increasingly ruthless and Machiavellian way to advance their own power and wealth. It's an old story, but today it's being done with unprecedented discipline and efficiency.
As for the young, they've been dazzled with an ever-changing stream of techno-toys and media, and are far too busy with their video games and MySpace and iPods and (still) TV to be distracted by what's going on in the world, much less care about it. Maybe things will change when the military draft comes back, which it's just about guaranteed to do if we're going to fight the World War Whatever that the neocons have planned for us.
Congress can do some crazy things sometimes, but most things like this get a scant margin of victory. This vote was 410 to 15, an overwhelming show of support!
I expect this sort of nonsense from the Repubs, but there must have been a lot of Dems that went along with it, too. They probably voted for it knowing it was a stupid and almost certainly unconstitutional law, only because they were afraid of giving their opponents in November a chance to attack their "support" for child molesters et.al.
This is what drives me nuts about the Democrats, actually. We rely on them to oppose the wingnut Republicans and bring some semblance of sanity to government, but when push comes to shove they vote with them anyway because they're afraid of being criticized if they don't. It happens again and again, and I'm sick of it.
...and when one only has so many laws on the books that the libraries are ready to undergo gravitational collapse into a black hole
Well, the Bushco solution to that is simply to keep laws secret. Not only do you save printing costs and shelf space, but it then becomes impossible to be sure that you're not breaking them. And when you inevitably do, your lawyer can't defend you because she's not allowed to read the applicable law, either.
That's the least of the problems with the second paragraph. I tried to parse it several times and couldn't get any (non-trivial) meaning out of it at all.
Monoamine oxidase inhibitors are an important class of antidepressants, and the most widely used before the newer SSRIs.
Too much MAO means that dopamine and serotonin are being broken down too fast, and those are both important neurotransmitters.
So, the interesting question here is: Has anybody noticed a connection between "neophilia" and any psychological affective disorders like depression or OCD?
I keep telling my girlfriend that, but she just won't go for it.
Funny, the first thing I thought of when I saw the word neophilia is people who get restless in relationships after a short time and have difficulties with commitment.
But this is Slashdot, and the context we find it in is... Gadgets!
At some point public companies that subject themselves to what has become unnecessary expense and legal exposure will have to explain to their shareholders why they continue to do so. Certainly there will be cases where the transition costs are prohibitive, but that's no reason not to be looking into it.
Slashdot Mirror
So if India can demand better wages and reject outsource work, can America have those jobs back?
No, they're more likely to go to Nigeria. As India becomes too expensive, there will always be other places where labor is cheaper and workers more desperate.
Unfortunately, at the drop of a hat, any corporation currently has free reign to make decisions at board room level that affect the lives of thousands of workers
The problem for workers, wherever they are, is that capital is now completely mobile across international boundaries, but labor is not (or much. much less so, anyway).
As trade barriers fall, companies are increasingly international entities that are free to buy their labor and materials where they are cheapest, and to sell their products where people are willing to pay the most for them. They see the world as their playing field, and there is no longer real allegiance to any particular nation or national interest, at least not for which they'll sacrifice their bottom line.
This is all very good news for workers where labor is cheap, but for those where it is expensive... well, not so much. Enjoy the race to the bottom.
Just because people will turn to welfare if insurance doesnt exist, doesn't make welfare any less socialist.
Does it make insurance any less socialist?
What you call welfare is insurance paid for by everyone through taxes, and with universal coverage.
Insurance is welfare paid for through premiums but limited to a select membership.
Participation in the "welfare" insurance plan is involuntary for taxpaying individuals, yes.
Participation in the "insurance" welfare plan is somewhat voluntary (although less so than you probably think), but is denied to broad categories of people who are either deemed high risk or are unable to afford it.
Dwelling on labels like "capitalist" and "socialist" does nothing to further your understanding of either insurance or welfare, which are both just mechanisms for spreading risk from the individual across a broader population. The real difference is simply how broadly you wish to spread it, and whether it will be denied to those most in need of it.
I don't know... Being an asshole and/or prick has been a pretty successful formula on AM talk radio and Fox News; not many liberals there. Many people want fear and hate, not reason, so persuasion is often moot.
Of course, I agree that it's always annoying when other people who share our viewpoints deliver them clumsily, incompetently, or unpersuasively.
But please, stop with the hippies. It's the beatniks you should be worrying about...
The worst thing that can happen is for your ideals to be tied in with obnoxious behavior (this is what happened to liberals).
Yes, those rascally liberals are screwing things up for everybody. Always using reason when force and threats would work perfectly well.
If you want to enjoy the rights of a full citizen and human being, please ask us politely. Your request will be considered (at our sole discretion) in the order in which it is received.
"Why worry if you're not doing anything wrong?" is the typical response. These people don't understand what "freedom" means.
The kind of argument to which you refer is really kind of fascinating, when you probe into it. It is often given by otherwise intelligent people, and yet it belies an astounding trust and faith in remote authority figures who are presumed to be always honest, diligent and conscientious. Our overseers always have our best interests at heart, and would never seek to harm us for their own greed or avarice.
Wherever do you find that kind of blissful relationship with authority? Why, with your own parents, of course, when you were a small child.
The "intelligent" people that give this argument often don't literally believe in the incorruptibility of authority. But what they are doing is to create a comforting fantasy for themselves in which unseen government officials take the place of mommy and daddy, watching over us all and guaranteeing their safety. Once this fantasy womb has been created, it becomes unimaginable that they might ever be the target of abjectly malicious government authority. It would be like your loving parents turning on you with no cause or warning.
It is ironic that this most often afflicts conservatives, who otherwise like to rail on about the "nanny state" in economic contexts.
The more we are fearful, the more likely we are to construct this parental fantasy around our government. This is something that people like Karl Rove understand all too well.
Four words: Colour coded alert levels.
Nope. My way's still better.
Id for grille lighters and peaches, huh? And why didn't you just walk away loudly commenting on the store's idiotic policy?
Somebody who "just walks away" in that situation is probably trying to hide something. At the very least, he should be taken into a back room and thoroughly interrogated, Gitmo style.
Only then will we be Truly Safe.
So if we brought slavery back, then everyone would have a job and we'd all live happily ever after, no?
You can't make labor cheaper for employers than that, unless you actually charge people to work. Hmmm...
Private interests may be collecting much - or even most - of the information, but even the privately collected stuff is increasingly available to the government, and with little or no judicial oversight. Thus it makes very little difference who collects the data, or for what original purpose. It just saves the government a lot of money and effort to let your phone company do the heavy lifting and then issue a secret warrantless subpoena whenever somebody in authority gets curious.
The key difference being, of course, that these corner grocers didn't enter your information into a central database that is accessible by who-knows-whom for purposes legitimate or not.
I've been looking for someone to offer the old "if you've done nothing wrong you have nothing to worry about" argument so I could jump down their throats, but I'm pleased to say that you're the closest that anyone's come so far. I'm still reading, though...
My fear is, the fact that we find out about these domestic wiretaps, secret European prisons - means that the people put in charge of these things are morons.
Unless, of course, they want us to be aware that our every move may be monitored. I know of no better way to keep people in line and afraid to speak out.
Now, don't get me wrong, but I don't think we've come to that yet.
How will we recognize it when we do?
I'd say that neither of us knows what the other is talking about.
So if I want something, I can stop at a B&N on the way home from work; and if they have the book I want I can go home with it immediately, if they don't have the book I can just ask them to order it
Ummm... Isn't this the way bookstores always worked?
Don't blame "humanity" for this, except maybe for its gullibility and willingness to follow like sheep. It's really a fairly small cabal that's been pushing for total war in the mideast and the destruction of liberty at home, but they know how to manipulate the public and the political system to achieve their ends (which of course they lie about).
All we need is for a few more people to see how they're being manipulated against their own interests. It happens gradually and at the margins, but it does happen, and once you've seen the Man Behind the Curtain it's hard to stick your head in the sand again.
Pretty much everybody without his/her head up his/her ass knows that "fighting terrorism" has very little to do with this.
But then, spying on and harrassing political opponents a la Nixon may not be the main motivation behind it, either.
The BIG concern within the Bush Administration is the threat from people inside of it. They need their own people to know that if they divulge any embarrassing or incriminating information, even anonymously, that they will be tracked down and punished. The war is against potential whistleblowers.
Ever wonder why you never hear interviews with anybody who knew Dubya back in his wild days before he became governor of Texas? Every college friend of every other president had stories to tell, some positive and some not, but not so with George II. Why is this? Well, pretty much everybody with an embarrassing story to tell about cocaine or girls or his desertion from the National Guard now has a cushy high-level job in the government or the energy industry. Better jobs with more power than they'd ever dreamed they'd have, and jobs they're not going to jeopardize by telling stories.
That's how you go from being a horse show official to being head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency with zero experience. Anybody who works in Washington knows there's hundreds - maybe thousands - of 'em.
Without the extensive eavesdropping powers Bush claims, these people would be free to contact reporters or blog information anonymously. By advertising these "powers" via carefully planned "leaks", Karl Rove is letting insiders know that they're taking a big risk if they spill any beans.
And you can bet they'll know who I am as soon as I hit the "Submit" button...
That's because it's not really a matter of the old generation holding onto their ways (no insult at all). It's that people continue to teach children, friends, etc.. misguided views.
I think there's been a growing tide of greed, fear, and intolerance in this country, and it has nothing to do with generations. I grew up in the 60s, and ever since I've always been disappointed that the spirit of activism and involvement that flourished then seems to have died out among the young.
One reason for this is that politicians - and I am referring to the Repugnicans in particular - have become very adept at creating and exploiting fear and bigotry in an increasingly ruthless and Machiavellian way to advance their own power and wealth. It's an old story, but today it's being done with unprecedented discipline and efficiency.
As for the young, they've been dazzled with an ever-changing stream of techno-toys and media, and are far too busy with their video games and MySpace and iPods and (still) TV to be distracted by what's going on in the world, much less care about it. Maybe things will change when the military draft comes back, which it's just about guaranteed to do if we're going to fight the World War Whatever that the neocons have planned for us.
Congress can do some crazy things sometimes, but most things like this get a scant margin of victory. This vote was 410 to 15, an overwhelming show of support!
I expect this sort of nonsense from the Repubs, but there must have been a lot of Dems that went along with it, too. They probably voted for it knowing it was a stupid and almost certainly unconstitutional law, only because they were afraid of giving their opponents in November a chance to attack their "support" for child molesters et.al.
This is what drives me nuts about the Democrats, actually. We rely on them to oppose the wingnut Republicans and bring some semblance of sanity to government, but when push comes to shove they vote with them anyway because they're afraid of being criticized if they don't. It happens again and again, and I'm sick of it.
...and when one only has so many laws on the books that the libraries are ready to undergo gravitational collapse into a black hole
Well, the Bushco solution to that is simply to keep laws secret. Not only do you save printing costs and shelf space, but it then becomes impossible to be sure that you're not breaking them. And when you inevitably do, your lawyer can't defend you because she's not allowed to read the applicable law, either.
All hail the GOP!
That's the least of the problems with the second paragraph. I tried to parse it several times and couldn't get any (non-trivial) meaning out of it at all.
I am feeling kind of cranky today, though...
Monoamine oxidase inhibitors are an important class of antidepressants, and the most widely used before the newer SSRIs.
Too much MAO means that dopamine and serotonin are being broken down too fast, and those are both important neurotransmitters.
So, the interesting question here is: Has anybody noticed a connection between "neophilia" and any psychological affective disorders like depression or OCD?
I keep telling my girlfriend that, but she just won't go for it.
Funny, the first thing I thought of when I saw the word neophilia is people who get restless in relationships after a short time and have difficulties with commitment.
But this is Slashdot, and the context we find it in is... Gadgets!
Passion also ensures that you will work long hours for little reward, while the CEO takes home all the company profits.
Ask not what your employer can do for you; ask what you can do for your employer.
At some point public companies that subject themselves to what has become unnecessary expense and legal exposure will have to explain to their shareholders why they continue to do so. Certainly there will be cases where the transition costs are prohibitive, but that's no reason not to be looking into it.