> Believe it or not, he's actually got a plan for > this. Unlike so many of his other proposals, > this one doesn't revolve around ludicrously > jacked revenue projections or unfunded > mandates. Kerry's plan is to get Congress > to pass a tax penalty on companies that > send jobs overseas.
The guy is a populist fucking retard if he's pulling tricks like this.
I get so angry when I see politicians screwing people over because people *think* what's being done is *good* when in fact the politicians *know* it screws them over but do it anyway because it will get them *elected*.
You have an ethical responsibility to do what is *best* for the people and whether you suffer or benefit by it is totally fucking irrelevent.
I may be totally wrong, because I've not read the full report nor have I sat down and done the research necessary to properly address the arguments raised in the report, and anyways, a./ reply is hardly the place to properly reply to what is a very long article, but my strong feeling is that what is written is entirely incorrect; the reasoning presented seems simplistic, sensationalist and highly selective, and reflects the authors pre-existing beliefs rather than accurate objective conclusions.
There is a simple and direct relationship between wages and the economy.
When the economy is expanding, labour is in demand, and wages rise.
When the economy is stable, labour supply is more or less in balance with demand, wages are stable.
When the economy is contracting, labour is not in demand, and wages decrease.
By and large, Western cultures are entirely inexperienced with a long-term contraction of the economy, which leads to enourmous poverty and suffering, because our more-or-less free market economies, by their efficiency, have more or less been continually growing, despite the various discouragements poor Government has imposed over the years and decades.
The weakness of the US economy in recent years led to stable or decreasing wages in some sectors. The recent recovery has led has reversed this trend.
It is, after all, merely a much more accurate and timely version of what happens normally, which is that if demand for staff is high, pay rises, and if demand for staff is low, pay drops.
An issue I see with current system is that it seems to have no mechanism by which hospitals can specify more or less experienced nurses; all nurses are percieved by the system, as equal, which they are not.
I note in the comments there is considerable comment on the fact that "the lowest bidder will win the auction." This is a red herring, an improper way of thinking of the mechanism at work.
The work offered has a certain value, which derives from how unpleasent the work is and how skilled the work is. This system should accurately determine the correct market value for work offered, and it is *this* value which is being offered and accepted, *as it should be*.
By properly pricing nursing work, nurses will either be paid more (if they are currently underpaid) or the paid less (if they are currently overpaid). In both cases, the market is more efficient, and so the overall production of wealth in the economy improves, which is the key to improving the long term wealth of all.
Is this really an effective way in which to spend that money? this approach will not materially reduce the volume of spam, since spam is a worldwide issue. But it is once more another charge on public funds. It is very easy to make recommendations for spending public funds, which is one of the reasons Big Government is a bad idea; you get a lot of people coming up with bad ways to spend lots of money.
> Technology companies are laying off American > workers from high-paying desirable jobs while > they add thousands of jobs overseas. > Corporations are shifting jobs in call centers, > accounting, engineering, computer, and financial > services offshore, among others.
It is important to remember that these companies are in effect private individuals. The State, which is to say, you and me, private individuals, has no more right to *force by law* these companies to order their economic affairs in the manner of our choice than we have of forcing by law our neighbour to buy a particular brand of car.
This is purely an ethical issue, quite aside from the economic self-harm which is caused by such acts.
> Some local and state governments have even begun > to outsource administrative jobs, which is an > outrageous misuse of taxpayers' dollars.
Why is this outrageous? the purpose of State is to perform certain tasks, and, preferably, as cheaply as possible, so that taxes are as low as possible.
If the State should always purchase indiginously, this will raise taxes because the costs of the services and goods they buy will rise, and by doing so, apply a discouragement to the industry of the entire nation.
> The use of cheaper foreign labor has already had > a negative impact on U.S. wages in certain > sectors.
And a beneficial effect everywhere else. I'm quite sure the people who wages are reduced by the increase in competition object strongly to the increase in competition. But the fact that taxes are lower than they would otherwise be for *everyone* is overlooked. Moreover, it is much easier for a lobby of worried programmers to create noise than it is for the broad mass of people, unaware of the effect of this issues on their taxes, to make noise; these people do not realise they are affected, or, if they do, appreciate that the effect on them personally is very small (taxes in this one issue wouldn't change much), and so are weakly interested. But the problem is that there are many such issues, which combine to have a most significant effect upon taxes.
> According to Sharon Marsh Roberts, chair of the > government relations committee of the > Independent Computer Consultants Association, > outsourcing has forced down hourly rates by 10 > percent to 40 percent for many U.S. computer > consultants.
This is excellent news. It means software is that much cheaper to produce and so to buy. All buyers of software - and there are many - benefit.
I might note that if Ms.Roberts finds this objectionable, it might be that anyone who is the chair of a body named "Independent Computer Consultants Association" is likely to be themselves a computer expert, and so find their personal interests affected by this change. Independent means nothing in this case.
> If an advanced degree, years of experience, and > excellent work habits are not enough to land a > job,
But they usually are; perhaps not, for now, as easily as before in computing, because competition has improved, but this is why the economy is where it is today - the market acts to drive down the prices of services and goods, to the enourmouy long term benefit of all, although sometimes at the short term inconvience of a very few.
The majority of people are not well-informed about economics. Many people have selfish interests. This report is certainly a produce of the former and probably also a product of the latter.
> Reducing wages is as appropriate as raising > wages. The amount of money any firm or > individual makes in an enterprise or employment > properly depends upon the difficulty and risk of > the enterprise.
> Ok, I see the disconnect.
Note the use of the word "properly". This means that difficultly and risk *should be* the determinants of profit.
> Buy your competitor outright or destroy him by > fixing the market (like Intel did with chips and > Microsoft did with their OS). Pepsi and Coke > control the distibuters. The reality of the > business situation is that it's not about > competition. It's a race to become the biggest > and then put the others out of business using > financial means once a company becomes large > enough.
Generally speaking, monopolies are rare. I point out to you the variety of food in your supermarket and the variety of cars that you could buy.
Monopolies are improper, and it is one of the responsibilities of the State to ensure they are not artifically created.
> Large software companies moving to offshore will > produce Microsoft crap and YOU WON'T HAVE ANY > CHOICE BUT TO BUY IT.
Absence of choice is a property of a monopoly. It is one of the reasons why monopolies are unhealthy. Normally, if a company produces a product or service which does not justify it's cost, consumers buy elsewhere. If consumers *cannot* buy elsewhere, the market is no longer free, because the contract between the consumer and manufacturer is no longer voluntary.
> I think your perspective is very idealistic.
My "perspective" is no perspective at all. I am describing economic theory. In just the same way that physics is not a persecptive, the operation of the market is not a perspective.
The issues you describe are part of a restricted market. I had not touched upon those issues, which is not to say they do not exist.
> Reducing wages reduces costs and increases > profits. I believe Charles Dickens wrote a story > or two about a country with no middle class > because poor people do provide cheap labor.
Reducing wages is as appropriate as raising wages. The amount of money any firm or individual makes in an enterprise or employment properly depends upon the difficulty and risk of the enterprise.
Just as it would be inappropriate for every programmer to be paid 100,000 USD (although I have no doubt programmers would be very happy with this state of affairs, despite the harm it would cause to the rest of the economy), it would be inappropriate for every programmer to be paid 10,000 USD.
In fact, neither case would long occur, because if pay was very high, many people would move into programming; if it were very low, many people would leave. In the former case, wages would drop from competition amongst programmers, in the latter case, wages would rise as competition between programmers for work reduces.
The market properly sets the wages of programmers to be that which is appropriate for the work undertaken and the investment of time and money on the part of the programmer to obtain his skills.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with reducing wages to the correct market level; but if a single company decides to reduce wages below the market rate, it will soon find it has no employees, either because it's employees move to other companies paying the market rate, or because, in the longer term, people no longer become programmers since they can make better money elsewhere.
Wages naturally find their correct level through the action of the market.
> The problem with that statement is it doesn't > not counter with why pay wages at all?
Accidental double negative, I think?
The reason wages are paid, ultimately, is because people need to buy food and cloth themselves, or they die:)
If you paid a man no wages, he would be unable to buy food, and so would leave you employ to find work which did pay money.
> Every > time the Democrats move to raise minimum wage, > the Republicans counter with your argument. > Raising wages raises costs and decreases > profitibility.
I don't follow you; I don't see the connection between my discussion of the operation of the market relates to the minimum wage.
The minimum wage is a terrible thing. It benefits those people who have employees who can afford to raise their wages from what they ought to be, to the artifical, higher level; but it totally eliminates all of the low-paid jobs which would otherwise exist, jobs which would be taken by the poorest of the poor, who lack the skills for any other job and more desperately than anyone else, need the money. These people currently are forced onto benefits.
The minimum wage isn't much, but it's a lot better than no wage at all.
The only justification for the minimum wage is to prevent exploitation by employers; but the market itself will manage this.
> Fact is though that raising minimum wage has > never had that effect.
I think you're saying that raising the minimum wage has never reduced profitability?
IMO, this is wrong. If a company employs low paid workers, and the work they do is not worth the minimum wage, but the company is forced by law to pay them the minimum wage, profits are lowered.
> There is a formula. One can pay too high of > wages. When a tech worker was paid high wages > what did he spend his money on? Tech stock and > products.
What about the company which now has less capital that it otherwise would have to invest? they hire less people, purchase less goods, demand less services.
> Point. Wages are a balance of giving consumers > money in their pocket to buy the products and > services that businesses are selling with > businesses ma
There's a difference between censored and ignored.
Twenty-five stories is a lot to read, and I'm not well informed about most of them, but one thing I do know is that battlefield depleted uranium is not a radiological hazard. It is *A* hazard, because uranium, like all heavy metals, is exeedingly toxic.
This point is invariably lost in the hyperbole that stories recieve in the act of entering the press.
--
Toby
Slashdot Mirror
> Believe it or not, he's actually got a plan for
> this. Unlike so many of his other proposals,
> this one doesn't revolve around ludicrously
> jacked revenue projections or unfunded
> mandates. Kerry's plan is to get Congress
> to pass a tax penalty on companies that
> send jobs overseas.
The guy is a populist fucking retard if he's pulling tricks like this.
I get so angry when I see politicians screwing people over because people *think* what's being done is *good* when in fact the politicians *know* it screws them over but do it anyway because it will get them *elected*.
You have an ethical responsibility to do what is *best* for the people and whether you suffer or benefit by it is totally fucking irrelevent.
--
Toby
I may be totally wrong, because I've not read the full report nor have I sat down and done the research necessary to properly address the arguments raised in the report, and anyways, a ./ reply is hardly the place to properly reply to what is a very long article, but my strong feeling is that what is written is entirely incorrect; the reasoning presented seems simplistic, sensationalist and highly selective, and reflects the authors pre-existing beliefs rather than accurate objective conclusions.
--
Toby
There is a simple and direct relationship between wages and the economy.
When the economy is expanding, labour is in demand, and wages rise.
When the economy is stable, labour supply is more or less in balance with demand, wages are stable.
When the economy is contracting, labour is not in demand, and wages decrease.
By and large, Western cultures are entirely inexperienced with a long-term contraction of the economy, which leads to enourmous poverty and suffering, because our more-or-less free market economies, by their efficiency, have more or less been continually growing, despite the various discouragements poor Government has imposed over the years and decades.
The weakness of the US economy in recent years led to stable or decreasing wages in some sectors. The recent recovery has led has reversed this trend.
--
Toby
It is, after all, merely a much more accurate and timely version of what happens normally, which is that if demand for staff is high, pay rises, and if demand for staff is low, pay drops.
An issue I see with current system is that it seems to have no mechanism by which hospitals can specify more or less experienced nurses; all nurses are percieved by the system, as equal, which they are not.
I note in the comments there is considerable comment on the fact that "the lowest bidder will win the auction." This is a red herring, an improper way of thinking of the mechanism at work.
The work offered has a certain value, which derives from how unpleasent the work is and how skilled the work is. This system should accurately determine the correct market value for work offered, and it is *this* value which is being offered and accepted, *as it should be*.
By properly pricing nursing work, nurses will either be paid more (if they are currently underpaid) or the paid less (if they are currently overpaid). In both cases, the market is more efficient, and so the overall production of wealth in the economy improves, which is the key to improving the long term wealth of all.
--
Toby
Is this really an effective way in which to spend that money? this approach will not materially reduce the volume of spam, since spam is a worldwide issue. But it is once more another charge on public funds. It is very easy to make recommendations for spending public funds, which is one of the reasons Big Government is a bad idea; you get a lot of people coming up with bad ways to spend lots of money.
--
Toby
> Technology companies are laying off American
.
> workers from high-paying desirable jobs while
> they add thousands of jobs overseas.
> Corporations are shifting jobs in call centers,
> accounting, engineering, computer, and financial
> services offshore, among others.
It is important to remember that these companies are in effect private individuals. The State, which is to say, you and me, private individuals, has no more right to *force by law* these companies to order their economic affairs in the manner of our choice than we have of forcing by law our neighbour to buy a particular brand of car.
This is purely an ethical issue, quite aside from the economic self-harm which is caused by such acts.
> Some local and state governments have even begun
> to outsource administrative jobs, which is an
> outrageous misuse of taxpayers' dollars.
Why is this outrageous? the purpose of State is to perform certain tasks, and, preferably, as cheaply as possible, so that taxes are as low as possible.
If the State should always purchase indiginously, this will raise taxes because the costs of the services and goods they buy will rise, and by doing so, apply a discouragement to the industry of the entire nation.
> The use of cheaper foreign labor has already had
> a negative impact on U.S. wages in certain
> sectors.
And a beneficial effect everywhere else. I'm quite sure the people who wages are reduced by the increase in competition object strongly to the increase in competition. But the fact that taxes are lower than they would otherwise be for *everyone* is overlooked. Moreover, it is much easier for a lobby of worried programmers to create noise than it is for the broad mass of people, unaware of the effect of this issues on their taxes, to make noise; these people do not realise they are affected, or, if they do, appreciate that the effect on them personally is very small (taxes in this one issue wouldn't change much), and so are weakly interested. But the problem is that there are many such issues, which combine to have a most significant effect upon taxes.
> According to Sharon Marsh Roberts, chair of the
> government relations committee of the
> Independent Computer Consultants Association,
> outsourcing has forced down hourly rates by 10
> percent to 40 percent for many U.S. computer
> consultants
This is excellent news. It means software is that much cheaper to produce and so to buy. All buyers of software - and there are many - benefit.
I might note that if Ms.Roberts finds this objectionable, it might be that anyone who is the chair of a body named "Independent Computer Consultants Association" is likely to be themselves a computer expert, and so find their personal interests affected by this change. Independent means nothing in this case.
> If an advanced degree, years of experience, and
> excellent work habits are not enough to land a
> job,
But they usually are; perhaps not, for now, as easily as before in computing, because competition has improved, but this is why the economy is where it is today - the market acts to drive down the prices of services and goods, to the enourmouy long term benefit of all, although sometimes at the short term inconvience of a very few.
The majority of people are not well-informed about economics. Many people have selfish interests. This report is certainly a produce of the former and probably also a product of the latter.
--
Toby
> Reducing wages is as appropriate as raising
> wages. The amount of money any firm or
> individual makes in an enterprise or employment
> properly depends upon the difficulty and risk of
> the enterprise.
> Ok, I see the disconnect.
Note the use of the word "properly". This means that difficultly and risk *should be* the determinants of profit.
> Buy your competitor outright or destroy him by
> fixing the market (like Intel did with chips and
> Microsoft did with their OS). Pepsi and Coke
> control the distibuters. The reality of the
> business situation is that it's not about
> competition. It's a race to become the biggest
> and then put the others out of business using
> financial means once a company becomes large
> enough.
Generally speaking, monopolies are rare. I point out to you the variety of food in your supermarket and the variety of cars that you could buy.
Monopolies are improper, and it is one of the responsibilities of the State to ensure they are not artifically created.
> Large software companies moving to offshore will
> produce Microsoft crap and YOU WON'T HAVE ANY
> CHOICE BUT TO BUY IT.
Absence of choice is a property of a monopoly. It is one of the reasons why monopolies are unhealthy. Normally, if a company produces a product or service which does not justify it's cost, consumers buy elsewhere. If consumers *cannot* buy elsewhere, the market is no longer free, because the contract between the consumer and manufacturer is no longer voluntary.
> I think your perspective is very idealistic.
My "perspective" is no perspective at all. I am describing economic theory. In just the same way that physics is not a persecptive, the operation of the market is not a perspective.
The issues you describe are part of a restricted market. I had not touched upon those issues, which is not to say they do not exist.
--
Toby
> Reducing wages reduces costs and increases
:)
.
> profits. I believe Charles Dickens wrote a story
> or two about a country with no middle class
> because poor people do provide cheap labor.
Reducing wages is as appropriate as raising wages. The amount of money any firm or individual makes in an enterprise or employment properly depends upon the difficulty and risk of the enterprise.
Just as it would be inappropriate for every programmer to be paid 100,000 USD (although I have no doubt programmers would be very happy with this state of affairs, despite the harm it would cause to the rest of the economy), it would be inappropriate for every programmer to be paid 10,000 USD.
In fact, neither case would long occur, because if pay was very high, many people would move into programming; if it were very low, many people would leave. In the former case, wages would drop from competition amongst programmers, in the latter case, wages would rise as competition between programmers for work reduces.
The market properly sets the wages of programmers to be that which is appropriate for the work undertaken and the investment of time and money on the part of the programmer to obtain his skills.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with reducing wages to the correct market level; but if a single company decides to reduce wages below the market rate, it will soon find it has no employees, either because it's employees move to other companies paying the market rate, or because, in the longer term, people no longer become programmers since they can make better money elsewhere.
Wages naturally find their correct level through the action of the market.
> The problem with that statement is it doesn't
> not counter with why pay wages at all?
Accidental double negative, I think?
The reason wages are paid, ultimately, is because people need to buy food and cloth themselves, or they die
If you paid a man no wages, he would be unable to buy food, and so would leave you employ to find work which did pay money.
> Every
> time the Democrats move to raise minimum wage,
> the Republicans counter with your argument.
> Raising wages raises costs and decreases
> profitibility.
I don't follow you; I don't see the connection between my discussion of the operation of the market relates to the minimum wage.
The minimum wage is a terrible thing. It benefits those people who have employees who can afford to raise their wages from what they ought to be, to the artifical, higher level; but it totally eliminates all of the low-paid jobs which would otherwise exist, jobs which would be taken by the poorest of the poor, who lack the skills for any other job and more desperately than anyone else, need the money. These people currently are forced onto benefits.
The minimum wage isn't much, but it's a lot better than no wage at all.
The only justification for the minimum wage is to prevent exploitation by employers; but the market itself will manage this.
> Fact is though that raising minimum wage has
> never had that effect
I think you're saying that raising the minimum wage has never reduced profitability?
IMO, this is wrong. If a company employs low paid workers, and the work they do is not worth the minimum wage, but the company is forced by law to pay them the minimum wage, profits are lowered.
> There is a formula. One can pay too high of
> wages. When a tech worker was paid high wages
> what did he spend his money on? Tech stock and
> products.
What about the company which now has less capital that it otherwise would have to invest? they hire less people, purchase less goods, demand less services.
> Point. Wages are a balance of giving consumers
> money in their pocket to buy the products and
> services that businesses are selling with
> businesses ma
There's a difference between censored and ignored. Twenty-five stories is a lot to read, and I'm not well informed about most of them, but one thing I do know is that battlefield depleted uranium is not a radiological hazard. It is *A* hazard, because uranium, like all heavy metals, is exeedingly toxic. This point is invariably lost in the hyperbole that stories recieve in the act of entering the press. -- Toby