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To: Chuck Dent
Nice Econ101 summary. Wages can only increase in proportion to productivity.

So what happens when the wages are decreased few times because the work is being done in a Third World country?

"Let London manufacture those fine fabrics of hers to her heart's content; let Holland her chambrays; Florence her cloth; the Indies their beaver and vicuna; Milan her brocade, Italy and Flanders their linens...so long as our capital can enjoy them; the only thing it proves is that all nations train their journeymen for Madrid, and that Madrid is the queen of Parliaments, for all the world serves her and she serves nobody." (Prominent Spanish official - Alfonso Nunez de Castro in 1675)

29 posted on 09/15/2006 6:31:09 AM PDT by A. Pole (If the lettuce cutters were paid $10 more per hour, the lettuce head would cost FIVE CENTS more.)
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To: A. Pole
So what happens when the wages are decreased few times because the work is being done in a Third World country?

How are wages decreased by shifting production overseas? If a US textile plant is closed where the prevailing wage was $20/hr, and moved to China where it is $2/hr, how have US wages dropped?

Former employees are no longer employed; we may have increased unemployment, but not "falling" wages. Now, the key questions are: is this unemployment permanent, and if not, what new jobs created as capital is freed up to pursue other opportunities?

This is why education/training are so important. For example, what happens if Toyota decides to open a mfg plant in the vicinity of the textile operations? (Which is happening all over the South.) Now our former textile worker is making $30/hr, but paying for jeans that only cost $2/hr to produce.

This, btw, is a short explanation of why real estate prices have increased so dramatically: low inflation=low interest rates + high job formation= asset appreciation in key geog sectors.

37 posted on 09/15/2006 6:54:56 AM PDT by Chuck Dent
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