It doesn't matter how rich the workers are, in a dictatorship, they can still be executed at a moment's notice and all their money confiscated.
Which leaves you with... a billion angry workers. I don't know about you, but I don't see much of a future for that political system.
That's the problem with your line of reasoning - you hope the laws will be changed; but if they aren't, who cares?
If you'd wipe the froth off your chin for a moment and not accuse me of blithely dismissing the death of thousands, like a good lad... Globalism puts money where there was none before, generally into the hands of the poor, creating a middle class. Its up to them to resolve their problems, not anyone else. Or are you now advocating the "white man's burden" approach? The poor ignorant little brown people need the guiding hand of the ubermensch to even begin to join the civilised world, is that it? The 19th century called, it wants its rhetoric back...
So in one sense, "nukes are the most useless weapon" because they take an enormous amount of resources for a handfull of bombs the owners hope to never use.
Actually, in the Sun Tzu sense, nukes are the perfect weapon. They allow you to win a war without ever firing a shot.
Entire factories from the rust belt here have been dissasembled, crated up and shipped over.
Yes, but they neither designed nor originally constructed those factories.
it's brand name western consortiums and banks and large corporations that have dropped *serious* cash over there over the last 20 years-those investors, and at least from the US side they got *tax breaks* to do this.
Aha, but here you are confusing infrastructure with industry. Investors certainly built factories and plants over there; they didn't build the roads or string up the phone cables. As I said, most countries that don't have an equivalent infrastructure to China could have one fairly easily. And I might point out that this infrastructure is mostly confined to the cities; the rural countryside (vast majority of China) is extremely underdeveloped.
that will bring stuff in from mexico, that comes from china via these new(expanded) ports, and thereby by-pass the exensive US ports and truckers... They are now importing so much stuff into the US that they leave the shipping containers *here*, it's cheaper for them to build new ones then send the old ones back empty.
For a group trying to make the US obsolete, they certainly seem to be putting a lot of effort into setting up trade routes into the country...
As to the trade deals, I'd call buying up entire mines all over (and they aren't done shopping yet) and negotiating 20 year energy supply contracts for huge amounts from the heavy hitters pretty serious planning and lock-in efforts.
It is a large and concerted effort. However, it is not, categorically a monopoly on the resources of the planet, nor anywhere close. Also I recall there were similar concerns about the Japanese buying America at one stage. Needless to say, that fell through as well.
And once they don't need to export to the west as much, when the rest of the planet hasd what they want and their infrastructure is advanced enough-they won't. the cheap goods gravy train will be over then.
If not the west then where will they export to? There are a few factors that will, in my opinion, prevent China from becoming a gargantuan superpower.
1. The yuan is overvalued. When (and its a when, not an if) it is returned to its true value, it will no longer be as economically advantageous to deal with China. This will produce a diaspora of industry and demand, probably gravitating towards the ASEAN countries, and former Soviet Union.
2. China is a fascist dictatorship. Thats all well and good when you have no middle class, but when a middle class reforms (as it is in the process of doing) the educated and fairly well heeled have a noted distaste for fascism. There is political turmoil in China's future, and I would be rather surprised if it does not splinter into the numerous states it is historically composed of.
3. China is not, as previously mentioned, a meritocracy. The best do not rise to the top, which is why they are having serious difficulties copying advanced technology. I'd go so far as to say it is beyond them, and will continue to be so until they allow the (often antisocial) best to do their jobs. This leads back to point 2.
Chairman Mao died. The moment he did, the Chinese began switching to a relatively free-market economy and getting back the educated middle class. It's taken some time of course, but they did it.
Chairman mao is still largely revered in China. They have the first glimmerings of a middle class, but they are nowhere near where they were previous to the "great leap forward". Maybe in another couple of generations, if they can maintain the growth.
The investment guys who have dropped their cash there want a return,. they are getting it now, so I don't see them just deciding to abandon all of that real soon after spending all this time and cash getting it set-up.
Which investment guys? If you mean the Chinese government (which accounts for a lot of Chinese businesses), there are similar people in every government in the world, who care not a whit that China has invested in infrastructure. Except as a blueprint on how to do it themselves.
And back to my other point, they-china- have been *buying up the access to the raw materials*, all over the planet, in locked-in long-term contracts.
Sorry now, this is the first time I've heard of this. They have negotiated a number of favourable trade deals with Venezuela, African nations, Canada, and Iran, but there aren't any "fixed long term contracts". If someone else wants to buy the resources, you may be assured that these countries will be more than happy to sell. Alternately, they might use the profits from the sales to organise their own industry.
As to how good their tech is or isn't, they are only the third nation to get a human into actual orbiting space.
Next on the list, indoor plumbing for the majority of the population. The space race is just a propaganda goal to them, not an indicator of a broad ranging and far reaching deep technology like the west. And comparing their achievements to individual states like Britain and Germany is disingenuous. They are as much as single state as the US, and the EU is politically very close to being a single state.
They manufacture airplanes, huge ships of every description (they now have the largest total amount of ships if you combine civil with military), and every sort of electronic or mecahnical gadget from cheap and flimsy to sold all over the world because it is at least "good enough". I doubt there is anyone here at slashdot who doesn't own and use chinese tech daily in some form or another.
Most or all of which was built from western blueprints.
The word commonly used is "powerhouse" because it fits.
It fits because they had a low starting position.
That is the western tech being used. It's being bascially given away.
That doesn't really matter since, as I have pointed out, you need more than just a blueprint to make things work.
In short, they aren't going away anytime soon and will continue to dominate manufacturing and start to dominate most global trade, pulling it from the west primarily and to some extent from the other asian tigers and japan.
China is a fascist dictatorship. Its not a meritocracy, so its scientists and engineers will not be the best. The cream that should have risen to the top is displaced by the best politicians and bootlickers.
If it gets to the point that the west slows down imports from there, it *won't matter* to the chinese
So you're telling me that they are going to find an equivalent market to west any time within the next century? I have to say, I find that unlikely.
If they choose to keep their currency where it is-I certainly don't see any western nations doing anything about it besides bitching about it
For now. However it does underscore just how fragile their growth is. Any nation could devalue their currency in a similar manner, and outside pressures will inevitably return the market to equilibrium. If the yuan was valued where it should be, Chinese goods would be 30-40% more expensive.
Short term tactically, sure, it has made a ton of money for a lot of western people and got consumers just a plethora of cheaper products in the west, but longer term strategically-and this is a prediction so there's no proof one way or the other-it will be seen as a colossal strategic blunder.
Perhaps. My feeling is that the other third world nations will follow shortly in China's footsteps, leaading to an overall improvement in global living conditions. There will be no Chinese domination.
It's working fine, and in fifty years or so we'll have a fairly serious competitor in the world economy.
Why do you see them as a competitor? Sounds to me like Disneyland for American businesses. A billion new people with plenty of money to spend?
However, that doesn't apply to China and other communist countries... but if you think that enough money from the US gets passed to workers in China to raise their standard of living you have another think coming.
This is flat out wrong. Not only do I think that, I know that for a fact. Thats why they are having to keep their currency artificially low to keep their goods low. If the yuan were to be valued at its actual value, the price of Chinese goods would rise 30-40%. What you described as happening in India is exactly whats happening in China. China is not a communist country, its a capitalist fascist dictatorship with trimmings of communist propaganda.
Your logic is like attempting to free pre-Civil War slaves by buying a lot of cotton from slave-owners, thus the slave's standard of living will go up and they will eventually be able to afford a better life.
Um, no, the slaves got 0.0% of price increases because they weren't paid. Wages are rising in the outsourced-to countries. There is no parallel whatsoever.
Instead, we offer China incentives for...I have no idea.
On a purely economic level, they can produce lots of things cheaply, so its a good idea to keep them sweet. On a moral level, you're building that middle class back up.
1) Bhopalm India, was the site of the most horrific industrial accident ever, caused by an American company, United Carbine, due to cutting corners on their almost non-existent safety systems.
Eh I offer no reasons or excuses for that. I do hope however that the laws were adjusted to ensure it never happened again.
How long did it take for China's economy to turn around? Five years? Six at the outside? Thats exactly how long it would take to move the lot somewhere else. Probably even less, since the ships don't have to be rebuilt. When their wages begin to rise, watch and see what happens. Even now. they need to artificially keep their currency low in order to remain competitive.
while everyplace else has been concerned with next quarter's profits, they have been working towards the next generation's profits.
Err, is this meant to be a comment on Chinese business sense, or the culture and educated middle class that chairman mao successfully wiped out?
They got to be seriously laughing about it over there, how naieve and shortsighted the west has been to purposely kill off wealth producing for some relatively short term gains.
Yes, I bet they are laughing through the fog of toxic smoke that the west's industrial requirements produce. Other than that, your comment makes no sense. They try, and fail, to reproduce advanced technology, even when they stole the entire blueprints from the original. Yes, they make shoes and cars cheaply, but its a far, far cry from that to being technologically equal to the west. They have the grunt work, the cheap labour. They don't have a great deal more.
The global race for the bottom must eventually hit the rocks, because there is only so far wages can drop before the unrelenting cost of living becomes unbearable.
No, the mark that globalism leaves behind it is higher wages for the previously third world countries. Its already extant in India. So instead of lowering wages in first world countries, its increasing wages in poorer countries. Might take a while, but it gets there.
US companies already can't sell their goods abroad - or, more specifically, we're running a global trade deficit large enough to have its own gravitational field. Exactly what do we have to lose here?
About 25% of the economy of my own country, Ireland, is composed of American multinationals, like Dell, Microsoft, Medtronic, Boston Scientific and so on, exporting to the half billion citizens of the EU. I'd say you have quite a lot to lose. I know we do.
Your rebuttal makes no sense - if Nike and its sweatshop operations moves to Singapore, they still have to deal with the tariff.
Thats because you are seeing the US as the sole export destination. There are many other places to earn just as much money. What I am saying is that if these tariffs were in place, people would just not bother to even do business with the US. No profit in it.
Free trade with sweatshop nations / undemocratic regimes is going to ruin us any way.
Politically its not a great idea to outsource everything, naturally. However you need to realise that a strong economy leads to the growth of a middle class, which is the downfall of dictators everywhere. You'll note that not many countries are dealing with places in Africa, where the cash won't go to the workers, but to the fuhrer du jour.
They're owning all our debt
Have you ever heard the saying, if you owe the bank a thousand dollars, its your problem, but if you owe the bank a hundred million, that's the banks problem? After a certain point, ownership of debt becomes an interdependant realtionship; they need to see the US economy succeed, or they will never get their money back. And the more money they lend, the more dependant they are.
5) Free trade with nations that are attacking the United States will also lead to our annihilation. They can strike with impugnity, and others will follow.
No, you won't be annihilated. Maybe equalised. Although I do believe that these nations should be slapped hard on the wrists for their activities; I'm no fan of the Chinese government, thats for sure.
I say die fighting; you say die in supplication.
Oh grow up. The world may be what we make it, but we have to live in it too. You want my advice, open a software house in Bangalore.
Globalism. Another word for "screw national sovereignty, screw your own citizens, let's transfer all our wealth elsewhere". See: the national deficit and the national debt.
Okay so, lets take a hypothetical situation. Lets say the US government applies a new law to state that all foreign workers must receive US-equivalent wages and benefits. The net result is that it makes no sense for companies to offshore anymore, except in cases where specific resources can't be found locally and it costs too much to transport them.
However, now you have companies moving to Europe and Australia, where these new laws don't apply, and reselling their goods for cheaper in America than American companies can make them. So what's a benevolent government to do? Apply tariffs to these goods, or simply ban their sale entirely? So then, these companies go elsewhere, and they do. Meanwhile, US companies can't sell their goods abroad, because they cost too much. Thus, non-US companies have a massive competitive advantage.
It doesn't take a genius to see that this situation would utterly ruin the US economy. Ban all imports and have effectively no exports, while the rest of the world surges ahead? You may as well accept globalism and work within it. Its a fact thats not going to go away until the third world catches up fully with the first world. That process is accelerating largely due to globalism, happily.
On the other hand, don't be too concerned about China. Globalism is a double edged sword. They have one single advantage, and that is cheap labour. If and when they get too uppity or expensive, corporations will shift to places like the Philipines and Cambodia.
The last time I heard of a more common man in government in this continent, it was after the people rose up and overthrew the existing government.
All politicians rest upon a beaurocracy or civil service; this is their pyramid of power. If you know a postman, a policeman, a soldier, any government employee, you know a member of the government. Without these employees to carry out their will, even the greatest politician must do it himself. Once you understand that fundamental fact of government, you'll see things in a different light. What happens when all of the teachers go on strike, for example?
As for making an example of somebody, believe it or not but that is part of what the criminal system does.
No, it really isn't. The punishment should fit the crime, which is why we don't have executions for shoplifting. There are very good social reasons for that. This is why I say that judge overstepped her bounds. Not that I'd hold a street protest or anything.
Sadly the idealism of pretecting yourself from your government is a long lost cause
This is a fundamental error that a lot of people make. The "government" isn't a group of aliens or some amorphous blob-like entity which is different from the rest of us. It is us. Its composed of people just like you and me, people who are your neighbours, friends and family. The only real difference is that they have been mandated by the rest of the people to do certain things, like enforce laws, or collect taxes. If you don't want these people to do certain things, the rest of the population needs to tell them that, change their employment contracts. Its when they refuse to listen to the rest of the people that a problem arises.
I think that three years in this case is an excessively long sentence, probably handed down by a judge trying to make an example of this man (am I the only one who feels that lawyers, lawmakers and judges are terrified of the internet for some reason?), but it could have all sorts of knock on consequences for any clown who gets his hackles raised in a flamewar with a troll on the internet, with spurious suits and wasting the time of the courts which could be better spent elsewhere.
Yes, what he said was very wrong and offensive. But three years in jail with rapists, murderers, violent criminals and drug dealers isn't going to make him any better a human being. If he was any way serious about his statements, what it will do is make him a much better connected hate monger. If he wasn't serious about his statements, he most likely will be by the time he makes it out.
The judge in this case could well be accused of knee jerk reactionism, and frankly an abuse of powers.
Yes, the segregation of the children from the traditional family unit is certainly one of the most valuable modern tools in the arsenal of the profit-minded corporation. It rather puts one in mind of lions hunting herds across the savannah - seperate the weak and young, then feed on them...
It's gayer than finding a man wedged between your cheeks.
I'll take it that you know the feeling... and if I had mod points, I'd mod you down too! \o/ Whining about someone whining about how they were modded is gayer than George Michael sucking the cream filling out of a jelly donut in a port-a-potty at an NSync concert.
Many see him as a brutal dictator who ended democracy and led a regime characterized by torture and favoritism towards the rich, while others believe that he saved the country from communism, safeguarded Chilean democracy and led the transformation of the Chilean economy into Latin America's most stable and fastest growing economy.
All present and correct except for the good bits!:D
End *quest for the holy grail voice* I don't know why someone modded me troll, above, but they might also want to mod down this thread on Fark, about 1200 odd posts long. That would be moderation abuse for four points, Trebek. The fact is they DID TRY TO PARDON THEMSELVES FOR WAR CRIMES. Don't know if it got through or not.
Why would they insist on starting a war based on lies? Why would they give no-bid contracts to the same companies that they used to run? Why would they let thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians die unnecessarily?
This brain mapping might be just about a step too far with mouse experimentation. If you add up all the other improvements on them, and make them smart enough to escape, they are going to kick our asses. Then take our women. Not that the last part will bother too many people here.:p
Sell graphics and other features...' Hey, I've got an idea. Why not just build your own website and run a blog on it. Sounds cheaper and more exclusive.
Yeah, I can see this becoming a hotbed of hotlinking in an awful hurry...
Slashdot Mirror
It doesn't matter how rich the workers are, in a dictatorship, they can still be executed at a moment's notice and all their money confiscated.
Which leaves you with... a billion angry workers. I don't know about you, but I don't see much of a future for that political system.
That's the problem with your line of reasoning - you hope the laws will be changed; but if they aren't, who cares?
If you'd wipe the froth off your chin for a moment and not accuse me of blithely dismissing the death of thousands, like a good lad... Globalism puts money where there was none before, generally into the hands of the poor, creating a middle class. Its up to them to resolve their problems, not anyone else. Or are you now advocating the "white man's burden" approach? The poor ignorant little brown people need the guiding hand of the ubermensch to even begin to join the civilised world, is that it? The 19th century called, it wants its rhetoric back...
They did a good job of reverse engineering pebble bed reactors and putting men in space, did they not?
And some day soon, indoor plumbing for all! Hurray!
Exactly which advanced technology has China failed to reproduce?
Do keep up with the program, please. And that was one of the founders of the chip manufacturing industry in the country.
So in one sense, "nukes are the most useless weapon" because they take an enormous amount of resources for a handfull of bombs the owners hope to never use.
Actually, in the Sun Tzu sense, nukes are the perfect weapon. They allow you to win a war without ever firing a shot.
Agreed. Good debating with you.
Entire factories from the rust belt here have been dissasembled, crated up and shipped over.
... They are now importing so much stuff into the US that they leave the shipping containers *here*, it's cheaper for them to build new ones then send the old ones back empty.
Yes, but they neither designed nor originally constructed those factories.
it's brand name western consortiums and banks and large corporations that have dropped *serious* cash over there over the last 20 years-those investors, and at least from the US side they got *tax breaks* to do this.
Aha, but here you are confusing infrastructure with industry. Investors certainly built factories and plants over there; they didn't build the roads or string up the phone cables. As I said, most countries that don't have an equivalent infrastructure to China could have one fairly easily. And I might point out that this infrastructure is mostly confined to the cities; the rural countryside (vast majority of China) is extremely underdeveloped.
that will bring stuff in from mexico, that comes from china via these new(expanded) ports, and thereby by-pass the exensive US ports and truckers
For a group trying to make the US obsolete, they certainly seem to be putting a lot of effort into setting up trade routes into the country...
As to the trade deals, I'd call buying up entire mines all over (and they aren't done shopping yet) and negotiating 20 year energy supply contracts for huge amounts from the heavy hitters pretty serious planning and lock-in efforts.
It is a large and concerted effort. However, it is not, categorically a monopoly on the resources of the planet, nor anywhere close. Also I recall there were similar concerns about the Japanese buying America at one stage. Needless to say, that fell through as well.
And once they don't need to export to the west as much, when the rest of the planet hasd what they want and their infrastructure is advanced enough-they won't. the cheap goods gravy train will be over then.
If not the west then where will they export to? There are a few factors that will, in my opinion, prevent China from becoming a gargantuan superpower.
1. The yuan is overvalued. When (and its a when, not an if) it is returned to its true value, it will no longer be as economically advantageous to deal with China. This will produce a diaspora of industry and demand, probably gravitating towards the ASEAN countries, and former Soviet Union.
2. China is a fascist dictatorship. Thats all well and good when you have no middle class, but when a middle class reforms (as it is in the process of doing) the educated and fairly well heeled have a noted distaste for fascism. There is political turmoil in China's future, and I would be rather surprised if it does not splinter into the numerous states it is historically composed of.
3. China is not, as previously mentioned, a meritocracy. The best do not rise to the top, which is why they are having serious difficulties copying advanced technology. I'd go so far as to say it is beyond them, and will continue to be so until they allow the (often antisocial) best to do their jobs. This leads back to point 2.
English muthfucka!! Do you read it!?
Why haven't they already moved, Einstein?
There are no tarriffs like that in place. Hypothetical situation. You might want to look that up.
Chairman Mao died. The moment he did, the Chinese began switching to a relatively free-market economy and getting back the educated middle class. It's taken some time of course, but they did it.
Chairman mao is still largely revered in China. They have the first glimmerings of a middle class, but they are nowhere near where they were previous to the "great leap forward". Maybe in another couple of generations, if they can maintain the growth.
The investment guys who have dropped their cash there want a return,. they are getting it now, so I don't see them just deciding to abandon all of that real soon after spending all this time and cash getting it set-up.
Which investment guys? If you mean the Chinese government (which accounts for a lot of Chinese businesses), there are similar people in every government in the world, who care not a whit that China has invested in infrastructure. Except as a blueprint on how to do it themselves.
And back to my other point, they-china- have been *buying up the access to the raw materials*, all over the planet, in locked-in long-term contracts.
Sorry now, this is the first time I've heard of this. They have negotiated a number of favourable trade deals with Venezuela, African nations, Canada, and Iran, but there aren't any "fixed long term contracts". If someone else wants to buy the resources, you may be assured that these countries will be more than happy to sell. Alternately, they might use the profits from the sales to organise their own industry.
As to how good their tech is or isn't, they are only the third nation to get a human into actual orbiting space.
Next on the list, indoor plumbing for the majority of the population. The space race is just a propaganda goal to them, not an indicator of a broad ranging and far reaching deep technology like the west. And comparing their achievements to individual states like Britain and Germany is disingenuous. They are as much as single state as the US, and the EU is politically very close to being a single state.
They manufacture airplanes, huge ships of every description (they now have the largest total amount of ships if you combine civil with military), and every sort of electronic or mecahnical gadget from cheap and flimsy to sold all over the world because it is at least "good enough". I doubt there is anyone here at slashdot who doesn't own and use chinese tech daily in some form or another.
Most or all of which was built from western blueprints.
The word commonly used is "powerhouse" because it fits.
It fits because they had a low starting position.
That is the western tech being used. It's being bascially given away.
That doesn't really matter since, as I have pointed out, you need more than just a blueprint to make things work.
In short, they aren't going away anytime soon and will continue to dominate manufacturing and start to dominate most global trade, pulling it from the west primarily and to some extent from the other asian tigers and japan.
China is a fascist dictatorship. Its not a meritocracy, so its scientists and engineers will not be the best. The cream that should have risen to the top is displaced by the best politicians and bootlickers.
If it gets to the point that the west slows down imports from there, it *won't matter* to the chinese
So you're telling me that they are going to find an equivalent market to west any time within the next century? I have to say, I find that unlikely.
If they choose to keep their currency where it is-I certainly don't see any western nations doing anything about it besides bitching about it
For now. However it does underscore just how fragile their growth is. Any nation could devalue their currency in a similar manner, and outside pressures will inevitably return the market to equilibrium. If the yuan was valued where it should be, Chinese goods would be 30-40% more expensive.
Short term tactically, sure, it has made a ton of money for a lot of western people and got consumers just a plethora of cheaper products in the west, but longer term strategically-and this is a prediction so there's no proof one way or the other-it will be seen as a colossal strategic blunder.
Perhaps. My feeling is that the other third world nations will follow shortly in China's footsteps, leaading to an overall improvement in global living conditions. There will be no Chinese domination.
It's working fine, and in fifty years or so we'll have a fairly serious competitor in the world economy.
Why do you see them as a competitor? Sounds to me like Disneyland for American businesses. A billion new people with plenty of money to spend?
However, that doesn't apply to China and other communist countries... but if you think that enough money from the US gets passed to workers in China to raise their standard of living you have another think coming.
This is flat out wrong. Not only do I think that, I know that for a fact. Thats why they are having to keep their currency artificially low to keep their goods low. If the yuan were to be valued at its actual value, the price of Chinese goods would rise 30-40%. What you described as happening in India is exactly whats happening in China. China is not a communist country, its a capitalist fascist dictatorship with trimmings of communist propaganda.
Your logic is like attempting to free pre-Civil War slaves by buying a lot of cotton from slave-owners, thus the slave's standard of living will go up and they will eventually be able to afford a better life.
Um, no, the slaves got 0.0% of price increases because they weren't paid. Wages are rising in the outsourced-to countries. There is no parallel whatsoever.
Instead, we offer China incentives for...I have no idea.
On a purely economic level, they can produce lots of things cheaply, so its a good idea to keep them sweet. On a moral level, you're building that middle class back up.
1) Bhopalm India, was the site of the most horrific industrial accident ever, caused by an American company, United Carbine, due to cutting corners on their almost non-existent safety systems.
Eh I offer no reasons or excuses for that. I do hope however that the laws were adjusted to ensure it never happened again.
To use an IT term, china has the whole stack.
How long did it take for China's economy to turn around? Five years? Six at the outside? Thats exactly how long it would take to move the lot somewhere else. Probably even less, since the ships don't have to be rebuilt. When their wages begin to rise, watch and see what happens. Even now. they need to artificially keep their currency low in order to remain competitive.
while everyplace else has been concerned with next quarter's profits, they have been working towards the next generation's profits.
Err, is this meant to be a comment on Chinese business sense, or the culture and educated middle class that chairman mao successfully wiped out?
They got to be seriously laughing about it over there, how naieve and shortsighted the west has been to purposely kill off wealth producing for some relatively short term gains.
Yes, I bet they are laughing through the fog of toxic smoke that the west's industrial requirements produce. Other than that, your comment makes no sense. They try, and fail, to reproduce advanced technology, even when they stole the entire blueprints from the original. Yes, they make shoes and cars cheaply, but its a far, far cry from that to being technologically equal to the west. They have the grunt work, the cheap labour. They don't have a great deal more.
The global race for the bottom must eventually hit the rocks, because there is only so far wages can drop before the unrelenting cost of living becomes unbearable.
No, the mark that globalism leaves behind it is higher wages for the previously third world countries. Its already extant in India. So instead of lowering wages in first world countries, its increasing wages in poorer countries. Might take a while, but it gets there.
US companies already can't sell their goods abroad - or, more specifically, we're running a global trade deficit large enough to have its own gravitational field. Exactly what do we have to lose here?
About 25% of the economy of my own country, Ireland, is composed of American multinationals, like Dell, Microsoft, Medtronic, Boston Scientific and so on, exporting to the half billion citizens of the EU. I'd say you have quite a lot to lose. I know we do.
Your rebuttal makes no sense - if Nike and its sweatshop operations moves to Singapore, they still have to deal with the tariff.
Thats because you are seeing the US as the sole export destination. There are many other places to earn just as much money. What I am saying is that if these tariffs were in place, people would just not bother to even do business with the US. No profit in it.
Free trade with sweatshop nations / undemocratic regimes is going to ruin us any way.
Politically its not a great idea to outsource everything, naturally. However you need to realise that a strong economy leads to the growth of a middle class, which is the downfall of dictators everywhere. You'll note that not many countries are dealing with places in Africa, where the cash won't go to the workers, but to the fuhrer du jour.
They're owning all our debt
Have you ever heard the saying, if you owe the bank a thousand dollars, its your problem, but if you owe the bank a hundred million, that's the banks problem? After a certain point, ownership of debt becomes an interdependant realtionship; they need to see the US economy succeed, or they will never get their money back. And the more money they lend, the more dependant they are.
5) Free trade with nations that are attacking the United States will also lead to our annihilation. They can strike with impugnity, and others will follow.
No, you won't be annihilated. Maybe equalised. Although I do believe that these nations should be slapped hard on the wrists for their activities; I'm no fan of the Chinese government, thats for sure.
I say die fighting; you say die in supplication.
Oh grow up. The world may be what we make it, but we have to live in it too. You want my advice, open a software house in Bangalore.
A talented and devious speaker says words meant to stir people into a frenzy. Big whup.
Was world war II a big whup?
Globalism. Another word for "screw national sovereignty, screw your own citizens, let's transfer all our wealth elsewhere". See: the national deficit and the national debt.
Okay so, lets take a hypothetical situation. Lets say the US government applies a new law to state that all foreign workers must receive US-equivalent wages and benefits. The net result is that it makes no sense for companies to offshore anymore, except in cases where specific resources can't be found locally and it costs too much to transport them.
However, now you have companies moving to Europe and Australia, where these new laws don't apply, and reselling their goods for cheaper in America than American companies can make them. So what's a benevolent government to do? Apply tariffs to these goods, or simply ban their sale entirely? So then, these companies go elsewhere, and they do. Meanwhile, US companies can't sell their goods abroad, because they cost too much. Thus, non-US companies have a massive competitive advantage.
It doesn't take a genius to see that this situation would utterly ruin the US economy. Ban all imports and have effectively no exports, while the rest of the world surges ahead? You may as well accept globalism and work within it. Its a fact thats not going to go away until the third world catches up fully with the first world. That process is accelerating largely due to globalism, happily.
On the other hand, don't be too concerned about China. Globalism is a double edged sword. They have one single advantage, and that is cheap labour. If and when they get too uppity or expensive, corporations will shift to places like the Philipines and Cambodia.
Their population is more than 3-times that of the US's. In an all-out hacker war, the nation with the biggest population would most likely win.
In a world where a lone hacker can compromise tens of thousands of machines and turn them into a bot net, I beg to differ.
The last time I heard of a more common man in government in this continent, it was after the people rose up and overthrew the existing government.
All politicians rest upon a beaurocracy or civil service; this is their pyramid of power. If you know a postman, a policeman, a soldier, any government employee, you know a member of the government. Without these employees to carry out their will, even the greatest politician must do it himself. Once you understand that fundamental fact of government, you'll see things in a different light. What happens when all of the teachers go on strike, for example?
As for making an example of somebody, believe it or not but that is part of what the criminal system does.
No, it really isn't. The punishment should fit the crime, which is why we don't have executions for shoplifting. There are very good social reasons for that. This is why I say that judge overstepped her bounds. Not that I'd hold a street protest or anything.
Sadly the idealism of pretecting yourself from your government is a long lost cause
This is a fundamental error that a lot of people make. The "government" isn't a group of aliens or some amorphous blob-like entity which is different from the rest of us. It is us. Its composed of people just like you and me, people who are your neighbours, friends and family. The only real difference is that they have been mandated by the rest of the people to do certain things, like enforce laws, or collect taxes. If you don't want these people to do certain things, the rest of the population needs to tell them that, change their employment contracts. Its when they refuse to listen to the rest of the people that a problem arises.
I think that three years in this case is an excessively long sentence, probably handed down by a judge trying to make an example of this man (am I the only one who feels that lawyers, lawmakers and judges are terrified of the internet for some reason?), but it could have all sorts of knock on consequences for any clown who gets his hackles raised in a flamewar with a troll on the internet, with spurious suits and wasting the time of the courts which could be better spent elsewhere.
Yes, what he said was very wrong and offensive. But three years in jail with rapists, murderers, violent criminals and drug dealers isn't going to make him any better a human being. If he was any way serious about his statements, what it will do is make him a much better connected hate monger. If he wasn't serious about his statements, he most likely will be by the time he makes it out.
The judge in this case could well be accused of knee jerk reactionism, and frankly an abuse of powers.
Yes, the segregation of the children from the traditional family unit is certainly one of the most valuable modern tools in the arsenal of the profit-minded corporation. It rather puts one in mind of lions hunting herds across the savannah - seperate the weak and young, then feed on them...
It's gayer than finding a man wedged between your cheeks.
/ur ma
I'll take it that you know the feeling... and if I had mod points, I'd mod you down too! \o/ Whining about someone whining about how they were modded is gayer than George Michael sucking the cream filling out of a jelly donut in a port-a-potty at an NSync concert.
Pinochet did this, too.
:D
Bwaahaha, I just checked him out on wikipedia:
Many see him as a brutal dictator who ended democracy and led a regime characterized by torture and favoritism towards the rich, while others believe that he saved the country from communism, safeguarded Chilean democracy and led the transformation of the Chilean economy into Latin America's most stable and fastest growing economy.
All present and correct except for the good bits!
BushCo have already pardoned themselves. Or tried to anyway.
End *quest for the holy grail voice* I don't know why someone modded me troll, above, but they might also want to mod down this thread on Fark, about 1200 odd posts long. That would be moderation abuse for four points, Trebek. The fact is they DID TRY TO PARDON THEMSELVES FOR WAR CRIMES. Don't know if it got through or not.
Why would they insist on starting a war based on lies? Why would they give no-bid contracts to the same companies that they used to run? Why would they let thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians die unnecessarily?
And here's another poser for you... why would they pardon themselves from war crimes prosecution?
This brain mapping might be just about a step too far with mouse experimentation. If you add up all the other improvements on them, and make them smart enough to escape, they are going to kick our asses. Then take our women. Not that the last part will bother too many people here. :p
/narf
Well said that man.
Sell graphics and other features ...' Hey, I've got an idea. Why not just build your own website and run a blog on it. Sounds cheaper and more exclusive.
Yeah, I can see this becoming a hotbed of hotlinking in an awful hurry...