[Sender]

I worry about the same thing, that the types of jobs leaving the US are not merely manufacturing or farm labor but rather our intellectual capital. The very high tech jobs such as writing software code for future networks and operating systems are not just "retraining opportunities", these jobs are more or less eternal jobs of the future now that they're here...we will always need new software written, etc.

So if irresistable economic forces push all the software and chip fab technology etc out to the low wage countries, I am not sure what all the displaced tech workers will be "retrained" to do. Perhaps this is all part of the "great circle of life", hakuna matata and all. Perhaps the US is cycling back towards a time in which we will largely work in retail and service industries, grow food for the rest of the world, and buy our technology from them. I wonder what kind of license fees China and India will demand for keeping my PC running? Maybe it will become too expensive to support the Indian IT workers lavish lifestyle and Chinese companies will sub the work out to us?

/rant off

[Jim Cane]

I worry about the same thing, that the types of jobs leaving the US are not merely manufacturing or farm labor but rather our intellectual capital.

Bingo!

[looscnnn]

" I am not sure what all the displaced tech workers will be "retrained" to do."

Don't you know; they are going to start their own businesses, become doctors, become nurses, do construction, etc.

Of course the business owner will have to compete with the imports and outsourced jobs. Construction workers will have to compete with immigrants. Doctors and nurses will have to compete with immigrants, deal with high insurance premiums and lawsuits. Also, there is the problem of saturation of too many job seekers and not enough jobs.