America’s Descent Into the Third World

Chronicles Magazine ^ | Monday, July 25, 2005 | Paul Craig Roberts

[A. Pole]

The June payroll jobs report did not receive much attention due to the July 4 holiday, but the depressing 21st century job performance of the U.S. economy continues unabated.

Only 144,000 private sector jobs were created, each one of which was in domestic services.

Fifty-six thousand jobs were created in professional and business services, about half of which are in administrative and waste services.

Thirty-eight thousand jobs were created in education and health services, almost all of which are in health care and social assistance.

Nineteen thousand jobs were created in leisure and hospitality, almost all of which are waitresses and bartenders.

Membership associations and organizations created 10,000 jobs, and repair and maintenance created 4,000 jobs.

Financial activities created 16,000 jobs.

This most certainly is not the labor market profile of a First World country, much less a superpower.

Where are the jobs for this year’s crop of engineering and science graduates?

U.S. manufacturing lost another 24,000 jobs in June. A country that doesn’t manufacture doesn’t need many engineers. And the few engineering jobs available go to foreigners.

Readers have sent me employment listings from U.S. software development firms. The listings are discriminatory against American citizens. One ad from a company in New Jersey that is a developer for many companies, including Oracle, specifies that the applicant must have a TN visa.

A TN or Trade NAFTA visa is what is given to Mexicans and Canadians who are willing to work in the United States at below prevailing wages.

Another ad from a software consulting company based in Omaha, Neb., specifies it wants software engineers who are H-1B transferees. What this means is that the firm is advertising for foreigners already in the United States who have H-1B work visas.

The reason the U.S. firms specify that they have employment opportunities only for foreigners who hold work visas is because the foreigners will work for less than the prevailing U.S. salary.

Gentle reader, when you read allegations that there is a shortage of engineers in America, necessitating the importation of foreigners to do the work, you are reading a bald-faced lie. If there were a shortage of American engineers, employers would not word their job listings to read that no American need apply and that they are offering jobs only to foreigners holding work visas.

What kind of country gives preference to foreigners over its own engineering graduates?

What kind of country destroys the job market for its own citizens?

How much longer will parents shell out $100,000 for a college education for a son or daughter who ends up employed as a bartender, waitress or temp?

[RAY]

Our multiculturalism leads the way to a third world existence!

[GingisK]

:"I think no small part of preferring foreign-born engineering graduates to home-grown is in their scholastic performance. Too many here are content to just squeak by on math and science." pretty well sums it up.

You are actually quite ignorant concerning what is happening in this country. I have a BS with honors in Computer Science (Engineering based), with Physics and Math "areas". I graduated in 1972, so I've been in the industry for over 30 years. I have four eight-foot bookshelves crammed with books about my trade ... and I have read them all. Yet, it is difficult to find a decent job in the field now.

The difficulty in finding a job is purely because they are no longer available; however, they were bountiful merely five years ago. The difference is that American companies, practicing the "United We Stand" mantra, have sent the jobs offshore.

They are gutting America in order for temporary inflation of the bottom line. Wise up before it is too late.

[auntyfemenist]

This may be far afield of our topic, but while we are on it...If American colleges and universities would not devote so many resources to "fun days," all Greek housing developments, goofy games (and other such distractions), a hundred different activist organizations that have nothing to do with education and the holy grail of every university: football and sports, then maybe students in the US could actually pick up some real education.

College is just an extension of high school, complete with costume Friday and pep rallies on the green. Adult students should be concerned with applying themselves to preparing for their serious careers, not bungee jumping from a crane in the parking lot on goofy game day.

[DM1]

"How much longer will parents shell out $100,000 for a college education for a son or daughter who ends up employed as a bartender, waitress or temp?"
as long as these doofie kids take psychology, sports science, sociology and philosophy. when parents force them to take business, premed or engineering then maybe these kids will move out of the basement and get a real career

[GingisK]

brain washed in Marxism by a bunch of left wing kooks

No Engineering professor I met has these traits. The article is thrust primarily at technical decline.

[rvoitier]

Did someone say Banana Republic? He ought to take a look at Louisiana. We're already there.

Add to that our state budget increased by $1B this year to $18B+ where Haley Barber's Ms. is running on only $4B but pulling in a Fortune 100 company where our 'rat governor is talking to Cuba.

And to top it off, legislation was passed where the state can confiscate private land and resell it to 3rd parties. This has already been done with lakes being built as economic development. The lakes cost us La. taxpayers $40M but the land is being sold by friends of politicians. sigh

[brownsfan]

"They are gutting America in order for temporary inflation of the bottom line. Wise up before it is too late."

We've seen this happening over time. I wonder if it's not related to the creation of 401k thus the en masse movement of people into the stock market?
American companies around that time period began to de-emphasize R&D and strategic plans in favor of tactical moves and quarterly profits. Perhaps in response to added pressure from the public?
This seems to be the fuition of that type of activity. Nothing matters but this quarters earnings statement.
Thus, America is sold out.

[hlmencken3]

http://www.asianlabour.org/archives/000247.php

...An initial study by Alliance found a decline of 16 million manufacturing jobs in China from 1995 through 2002. However a bit more intensive data mining revealed a total loss of 25 million, while an initial finding of a 2 million increase in manufacturing jobs in China since 1999 suddenly got transformed into a loss in every year since 1995. According to Alliance's head researcher Joe Carson "All of China's 28 industry categories showed losses between 1995 and 2002. ... Only two industries - garments and electrical and telecom equipment - experienced positive job growth since 1999...

[GingisK]

College is just an extension of high school, complete with costume Friday and pep rallies on the green..

I guess it depends on what one studies, and whether or not the student is serious. I studied Computer Science, Physics, and Math. I didn't have much time for play. Up until the last five years or so, I had no trouble finding an appropriate job. If you read the articles on outsourcing and tallied the numbers, you would see that engineering jobs are indeed being outsourced merely for temporary relief on the bottom line.

Recently I saw an article that followed the prediction I made two years ago: The government would next outsource defense related R&D and engineering. They are now making these very deals with India. Now we will observe that India will develop advanced defense hardware, and we will be allowed to purchase the recently obsolete stuff. (Why, after all would the Indians provide their best to a foreign power?)

[guitfiddlist]

We represent five percent of the world's population and we have been living large for fifty years.

The rest of the world is catching up with us and we are going to have to compete for the lucrative jobs.

Before we only had to compete against other Americans, now we have to compete against the world.

Being born in this country gives us a huge advantage against others, but it is no longer a guarantee of success.

Nowhere is that more abundantly clear than here in Shanghai. So much so, that you'll be interested to hear that Indian software companies are moving here to set up operations to produce software for Bangalore companies developing outsourced software from the US. I met two Indian engineers last week while doing my gig at a local pub, who told me that Bangalore wages have skyrocketed from virtually nothing to 30K a year, and still - they can't find enough engineers to do the work.

Now, they're coming here to take advantage of Shanghai wages that range from 7K to 14K a year - which are considered primo local wages.

[superiorslots]

Quote: And please, people, spare us the routine FR bromides about "it's their own fault for choosing the wrong field", or "start your own business, you lazy bum".



I could not have said it better. So true

[dennisw]

good post!!

[superiorslots]

Quote: Our multiculturalism leads the way to a third world existence!

On another thread the hispanic population of the south grew by 390% in someof the southern states.

[dljordan]

" Too many here are content to just squeak by on math and science."

It's because of the "non-competitive" attitude present in todays educational establishments. We did this to ourselves.

[Modernman]

U.S. manufacturing lost another 24,000 jobs in June. A country that doesn’t manufacture doesn’t need many engineers. And the few engineering jobs available go to foreigners.

Sigh. This old canard. We manufacture more than we ever have. The problem is, manufacturing has gotten so efficient that it doesn't need all that many workers. There's really nothing that can be done about that. A couple of decades from now, most manufacturing will probably be completely automated.

[iconoclast]

I think no small part of preferring foreign-born engineering graduates to home-grown is in their scholastic performance. Too many here are content to just squeak by on math and science.

WOW!

Blame the victims ... even if they're your own kids!

[superiorslots]

Listen!!
All you people that keep complaining that we are losing jobs because of our sorry education is just plain wrong.

American workers are the smartest and most productive of any workers in the world and that is a proven fact.

We are losing jobs because corporations are going after cheap labor. Hard to compete with an 88 cent per hour job in china no matter what your education level maybe.

I'm not totally discounting our education problems as I know we have them. However everything I have seen why we are losing higher paid jobs just has to do with corporations wanting cheap labor. US corporations that are home grown have no allegiance to the US workers or the US in any way.

It all comes down to the bottom line... profit.

[iconoclast]

I'd hire the foreign one over the American every time.

What kind of human being relishes sacrificing his fellow Americans to satisfy their own short sighted ideology?

[Neoliberalnot]

"This may be far afield of our topic, but while we are on it...If American colleges and universities would not devote so many resources to "fun days," all Greek housing developments, goofy games (and other such distractions), a hundred different activist organizations that have nothing to do with education and the holy grail of every university: football and sports, then maybe students in the US could actually pick up some real education."

This is a small part of the problem. The big part is in the liberal arts curriculum, both the old and new parts. The old parts consist of programs offering degrees, such as social work, art history, and others for which there is no job market. The new part consists of programs such as gay studies, women's studies, multiculturalism, transgender sexuality, etc., again what the hell do you do with these degrees except attempt to convert others to your way of thinking?

I hate to say it, but many foreign students in the hard sciences, engineering, and math are on average, the better students because they work harder.

[Paul Ross]

You can't handle the truth.

BTW: Paul Craig Roberts is the Supply Side economist who worked for Donald Reagan (Treasury Sec.) in the early 80's, and drafted the Kemp-Roth tax cuts during the Reagan Administration.

He also worked in the Cato Institute for about 4 years.

Before you call something BS, maybe you will come up with some alternate facts. I doubt you can. Where are the new manufacturing jobs? Not to mention restoring skilled manufacturing engineers and machinists to a society that wants law degrees.

And if the dollar crashes, just HOW will the U.S. suddenly start manufacturing things again for itself when all of the machine tools have been auctioned off to China?

Do you even know why Thomas Jefferson switched emphatically from being an ardent advocate for free trade, and became an industrial protectionist?

The raving loonies in our government are playing global economic musical chairs. And when the music stops...the U.S. will be left standing without anything for its fundament. Every time one of you pop off with your dithering anti-U.S. industry misreprentations, they are smiling widely in Bejing. You are very useful to them.