Bush: Outsourcing painful, but remedy is worse

CNN.com ^ | Friday, March 3, 2006 Posted: 1640 GMT (0040 HKT)

[Gengis Khan]

NEW DELHI, India (CNN) -- Praising India's expanding economy, President Bush warned Friday that fears about job outsourcing to other nations should not prompt the United States to limit global trade. "It's ... important to remember that when someone loses a job it's an incredibly difficult period for the worker and their families," Bush said in a speech in New Delhi. "It's true that some Americans have lost jobs when their companies move their operations overseas," he said. "Some people believe the answer to this problem is to wall off our economy from the world through protectionist policies. I strongly disagree."

[Dane]

Do you mean I'm supporting it by being against outsourcing?

Yes. The French and German economies have, IIRC, half the growth rate of the US economy, and that can be related back to their restrictive and more protectionist economic model that you preach.

[nopardons]

Wouldn't "globalization", the way you use the term, preclude such low unemployment figures? If not, why not?

[gogoman]

We have the lowest unemployment rate in the industrial world. This ends the debate.

You are just going off topic. Unemployment rate has little to do with globalization and more to do with domestic policies such as being a welfare state or not. Policies like smaller/shorter unemployment insurance and health insurance plans tied to employers are what is responsible for the low unemployment rate in the US; low unemployment rate has little to do with globalization. The debate continues.

[Do not dub me shapka broham]

Work that doesn't involve feasting off the public trough.

[jveritas]

France and Germany have much more restrictive rules than us on globalization and they have an unemployment rate of 10% and 12% respectively.

[dfwgator]

You want to see high rates of unemployment? Have foreign companies take away all of the jobs they've "outsourced" to the US.

[nopardons]

Which is WHAT, exactly?

Any job not connected with any American government department; perhaps?

That is the answer, then G.H.W. Bush and G.W. Bush, did real work.

[jveritas]

The whole thread is about outsourcing and how some people claim that it is destroying our economy and putting a lot of people out of work. Stating the most important fact that the unemployment rate of 4.8% just annihilates this argument once and for all.

[Do not dub me shapka broham]

The French and German economies are stagnating because they are supporting unsustainable welfare states.

Even if they did away with every import tax and tariff the structural problems plaguing their economies, e.g. a dissipating birth rate and increased costs from pensioners, organized labor's veto power over any economic reforms, inflexible work rules, etc., would still exist.

[A. Pole]

The company I work for has had to cut manufacturing jobs and start up a joint venture in China purely to stay alive if it had not it would have gone bankrupt.
[...]
My company ensure that our intellectual rights are protected by ensuring that design is not outsourced

So the only thing left will be a piece of paper with "our intellectual rights"?

[investigateworld]

>>>I tell anyone I can that realistically to only expect to work for somebody else until you're 40, and then work for yourself after that, because when you hit 40, companies are going to start to look for any excuse to get rid of you. Make the most of the money you make in your 20s and 30s, and save up to start your own business.<<<

Keep preaching that message Brother, the temp agencies send me lots of 40 and 50 YOA plus males with degrees for basically 'grunt labor'.

Some of the stories they tell...

[jveritas]

Link to what? We have the best and in many cases a conservative methodology to measure unemployment rate, all the other nations always underestimate their unepmloyement rate as in the case of Europe.

[ScreamingFist]

The French and German economies have, IIRC, half the growth rate of the US economy, and that can be related back to their restrictive and more protectionist economic model that you preach.

Dane. I'm not preaching anything. I believe American kids can dig ditches just as good as illegals from the South...for $10 an hour. I also believe that outsourcing or importing engineering jobs, when we have hundreds of universities producing thousands of graduates is just plain silly. I understand that this is a race to export jobs to the lowest bidder, but there comes a time when you have to ask yourself if you want to live in Mexico or America.....

[A. Pole]

We cannot wall off our economy any longer.

Why? What was wrong with tariffs? Why the import, dividends and capital gains are to be exempt from taxation but wages/incomes will not?

[jveritas]

I am absolutely sure that you did not vote for President Bush.

[gogoman]

Wouldn't "globalization", the way you use the term, preclude such low unemployment figures? If not, why not?

No... People find new jobs after they've been outsourced... but their wages might be much lower than their previous jobs, and their new jobs might be a very poor match of their skills. Very small unemployment assistance and the high expense of buying health insurance on your own force a lot of middle class people to find another job (that may not fit them well) as soon as possible, hence the low unemployment rate even with globalization. But is this necessarily for the best? That's the debate. I mean for someone who has spent a dozen years training for a certain profession to be suddenly outsourced and forced to work for Wal-mart, is that good for society? What kind of message does that send to our youths?

[Do not dub me shapka broham]

It might be real work, but perpetual government service does not give one the most comprehensive perspective on what it's like to operate in the economy on a day-to-day basis.

The description of the Bush-Clinton policies as "strip-mining" is apt.

The same skewed attitude that compels mining concerns to disregard the long-term consequences of their actions-doing irreparable damage to the environment of the communities that live down-stream from this eyesores on the landscape, in order to reap short-term profit-is what animates the obsessive quest to deracinate American industry.

The fact that this country prospered because of its vast middle class is lost on these "flat-world" theorists.

Turning this country into a retail/consumer-driven economy is what they exalt, even if it comes at the expense of American citizens.

[Dane]

Dane. I'm not preaching anything. I believe American kids can dig ditches just as good as illegals from the South...for $10 an hour. I also believe that outsourcing or importing engineering jobs, when we have hundreds of universities producing thousands of graduates is just plain silly. I understand that this is a race to export jobs to the lowest bidder, but there comes a time when you have to ask yourself if you want to live in Mexico or America....

Fine, you can try to micromanage the economy all you want(ala karl marx), I'll stick with Adam Smith.

[gogoman]

The whole thread is about outsourcing and how some people claim that it is destroying our economy and putting a lot of people out of work. Stating the most important fact that the unemployment rate of 4.8% just annihilates this argument once and for all.

No, it does not. There is a difference between your current employment at Wal-mart and your former employment as a technician at a semiconductor plant. Anyone can get a job a Wal-mart, but you have to be trained and certified to be a technician at a semiconductor plant. That amount of training gone down the drain is a COST on society that is not accounted for by simple unemployment rates. Hence it's not as simple as you make it appear.

[Dane]

The description of the Bush-Clinton policies as "strip-mining" is apt.

The same skewed attitude that compels mining concerns to disregard the long-term consequences of their actions-doing irreparable damage to the environment of the communities that live down-stream from this eyesores on the landscape, in order to reap short-term profit-is what animates the obsessive quest to deracinate American industry.

The fact that this country prospered because of its vast middle class is lost on these "flat-world" theorists.

Turning this country into a retail/consumer-driven economy is what they exalt, even if it comes at the expense of American citizens

Yeah an economy where Americans own 2 cars, 3 televisions, 3 DVD players, cell phones galore, etc.etc.

BTW, you do know that American home ownership is at an all time high.