An Open letter to President Bush (End run vs. Outsourcing)

Me | Me

[Havoc]

Excuse me. I'm not asking for a higher paying job. I'm not demanding a higher paying job. I didn't ask the government to get me a job or threaten anyone. I have a middle class job that is going away not because we didn't perform enough, we're tops, we've never failed, never dropped the ball and the company is making a fortune off us.
I get a small fraction of what they make on my seat. And I'm not one that goes shouting for raises or complaining they aren't giving me anything - on the contrary, I am one who signed up to work for a given rate and haven't asked for anything more.. ever. I have gotten two raises in 4 years though because of my performance and a few small bonuses on top of that. I'm one of the very few that has.

I earned my position. It's being sold out from under me to mexican labor for no other reason than mexican labor is cheaper and the client wants the cheaper mexican labor now because it's available. If it weren't available, we wouldn't be having this discussion. And it took Nafta to do it. Prior to nafta, this would have fallen under anti-dumping laws. So it's not like I'm asking for something that didn't exist before.

All the same, thank you for tacitly lying about my position or misconstruing it decietfully. You can't argue what's there; but, you sure can run your mouth.

[Texaggie79]

Do you support liberty? Does that not also apply to the business sector?

Look, I don't support many of the gov. programs to help businesses that outsource, nor any other business period. But I am absoloutly against any government telling a company how to do it's business.

No where, should it ever be a government's job to secure employment for its citizens. It is up to each person to secure employment for themselves.

Now, I ask you, what is it that you want the government to do for you?

[brownsfan]

I'm not voting for John F. Kerry, dude. That would be you, as the limp junior senator reflects your horror at people buying and selling freely. Free minds and free markets will always terrify those for whom security is an alibi for their wretched inadequacies. Yes, dude, I truly do not care: life does not owe you a living, nor does the government, nor do I. Nor will I ever compromise on issues of virtue or freedom.

You project things on me that aren't there. You are arrogant, you are uncaring, and I believe in such a thing as karma.

[Havoc]

I appreciate that you're in a tough situation. Where I do have a problem is that you are blaming the government for what a business had done and seem to be expecting the government to fix things for you. The US government just doesn't do that sort of thing -- when it has tried, it certainly hasn't done them well.

What's going on was pretty much illegal under the laws we had prior to Nafta; so, what you're saying is patently false. Nafta did away with anti dumping measures. The government by doing that set the stage for what is happening now. It's called cause and effect, sir. One company outsourced and started competing with others using labor rates available in another country. Next thing you know, those companies are competing with the company I work for and force them to do the same or go out of business. It has tentacles. The client we represent is putting pressure on EDS and all it's suppliers to do the same. And it's one of the big 3. That's a whoppin chunk of the US economy. So, you really need to catch up with all due respect.

As far as government assistance is concerned, you need to go check out what government assistance is available for IT workers put out of work by outsourcing. I can tell you what it is right now because that's the first thing the people I work with did - ZERO. No retraining benefits. We don't qualify because "we don't produce a product". It seems everyone has great advice for a situation that doesn't exist for me.

[Chuckster]

A "Recession" is when my neighbor is out of work. A "Depression" is when I am out of work. A "Booming economy" is when I and everyone I know is working and I am looking for a raise or a better job.

[brownsfan]

What's YOUR plan brownsfan? What's your big fix? Come on...waiting...

I have to go do some errands. I am in favor of some form of limited protectionism. But, I am not the president. When I hire a mechanic to fix my car, I know roughly what he's going to do, and agree with the plan, but he proposes the plan. If I don't think he knows what he's doing, I get a different mechanic. Right now, the mechanic doesn't appear to have the solution.

[kevkrom]

One company outsourced and started competing with others using labor rates available in another country. Next thing you know, those companies are competing with the company I work for and force them to do the same or go out of business.

That's competition -- I fail to see how an "anti-dumping" law would stop companies from trying to increase businesses by lowering their personnel costs.

As far as government assistance is concerned, you need to go check out what government assistance is available for IT workers put out of work by outsourcing. I can tell you what it is right now because that's the first thing the people I work with did - ZERO.

You should still be eligible for unemployment. You also appear to have internet access -- you should be able to train yourself in many things by getting information that is freely available on-line. It may not be a formal class or workshop, but at least it's something. Google is your friend for this type of thing the search engine should help you find what you're looking for.

[Southack]

Post #15 rocks!

[Chi-townChief]

Well, you're a Browns fan so there's one thing going for you. But you're late to the game.

I've been harping on our jobs problem for nearly 30 years now.
Fact: I was laid off from the auto industry in May of 1980.
Fact: I was downsized from Zenith Electronics in September of '98 during the wonderful Clinton years you refer to. My wife lost her job about a year earlier.

I'm tired of you suckers going out and buying foreign-made products because they're cheap and then coming and complaining that all of your jobs are gone and the government needs to do something about it.

But, hey, go ahead and vote for Ketchup Boy. Maybe he and the Ketchup Queen will bring back all of those outsourced Heinz jobs and you can fill squeeze bottles for them.

[Southack]

"How many electronics stores would have the gaul to tell you after 4 years you weren't worth more than 7.50 an hour to them when McDonalds across the street was hiring at 7.50 an hour."

How many? Most or all of the stores who know that you wouldn't leave them, especially to go work in a more difficult job.

You only pay people what it takes to get what you want out of them, you know. It's called a job, not welfare, after all, and excess pay is a sure sign of poor people management.

So you don't work for Wal-Mart any longer, you're losing your EDS job, and you don't like MicroSoft products...but it's all Bush's fault.

Man, you are going to live a frustrating life. You are blaming everyone but yourself for the fix that you repeatedly get yourself into, plus you have an ego that won't let you stoop to working for McDonald's.

If you are *lucky*, things will get so bad for you that you will hit that rock bottom point where all of your old biases break and your ego snaps. Should such a humbling expereince occur for you, then you might actually change yourself and your outlook and begin to live a healthy, happy, productive life (even if it means working at Wal-Mart).

If you are *unlucky*, then you will just manage to muddle along at the very bottom of your base hatreds and biases, blaming everyone else for your own troubles, and never learning who you really are.

So like I say, you are in for a very frustrating life. You've set yourself up to fail by not being self-critical and introspective...and failing is what you are repeatedly going to do.

[Havoc]

The next easiest way to destroy a nation is to destroy it's economic base. That is why Osama went after the trade towers and the centers of national government and of defense. This is no secret. It is why we used to have anti-dumping laws - to protect the economy and to keep US workers from being put out of business by foreign trade.
I don't know why you guys keep repeating this stuff because it's a lie on it's face. It is the government's job to secure the economy as a national defense measure. They haven't done it. And Nafta has, as a result, aided in the decline of our economy after it began to tank and was helped along by Osama.

That may not make you happy to hear, but that's the facts.
The government didn't secure employment for specific citizens, and that's not what I'm asking. It secured the economy in a way prior that would have prevented me from being put out of work the way I have been. It is too late.
Government has already screwed me. The companies just did what they had to as a result of policy the government put in place - unconstitutional as that policy is. I expect the Government to correct it for everyone else. Me, I'll worry about fixing myself cause the government has already screwed me and made it quite clear I'm not worth helping. I'm just a citizen of the US. I'm nobody special. I wasn't given the due process that the constitution says I have a right to before doing something that effectively took my job away from me.

Let's face reality here. My job isn't outmoded, it isn't being replaced by another technology, it didn't go away due to being obsolete, I didn't get bought out by a local competitor, I didn't lose it because I did a bad job or because market forces put a stateside competitor in a better position. I lost my job because the mexicans can't seem to create their own jobs #1, because the mexican cost of living is far lower #2, Because as a result of the mexican cost of living being far lower, a worker there can work for what constitutes sub-poverty wages here #3, and because nafta did away with restrictions keeping foriegn business interests from undercutting US prices to bankrupt US companies and take over our market #4. I lost my job because the US government decided not to protect our market anymore the way they decided not to protect our southern and northern borders any more, the way they decided not to do on the ground intelligence. The way they decided not to let the FBI and CIA talk to each other. I'm out of a job because the US government dropped the ball and started something in motion that just got to me. And I'm not asking for government assistance. I'm demanding the damned government get off it's laurels and start doing it's job at least as hard as I was doing mine before they lost it for me.

I secured employment for myself and Government policy got me. What do you want to hear from me, that it isn't their fault that it's their fault for looking out for the interests of business instead of looking out for the interests of us citizens. I must have missed that part in the constitution where it says of for and by big business.
I keep hearing it's not their responsibility to look out for me; but, actually, that is their primary responsibility, is it not? Not to get me a job, but to get out of my way so I can do for myself and not deprive me of what I have without due process - isn't that what the constitution says. Where was and is my due process? I guess that's a good place to start. Government policy took my job. Where is my due process. Where is my equal protection under the 14th ammendment? I mean, I was put out for essentially not being a mexican in Mexico or in other cases, people have been put out for not being an indian in india. They had no say either, no due process, no protection against descrimination based on national origin. And no, it isn't a race thing, and that's not what I'm charging, it's a national origin thing - I'm an american in an american economy. I was put out of work because of that and that alone. And if that doesn't fall under equal protection, I'll eat my seat, my computer and all. And I think I can find a constitutional lawyer to back me up. Probably a bunch of them. I got canned because I'm an American working in America. Any lawyers present that want a client? Isn't that how we do things nowdays...

[Southack]

"Free traitor Platitude #3 3. Get a job, any job (just throw away everything you ever learned or worked to have)"

One of my firm's major clients is BellSouth. Years ago BellSouth would send its switchboard operators to class after training class. They took foreign language classes, people management classes, technical classes, operations classes, you name it, they had access to it...and many of them took full advantage of it.

But computers from the 1970's on have slowly replaced the need for BellSouth's customers to ever need operators...so thousands of them have been "retired" or laid off over the years.

What are you going to tell them? That you want to pay *more* to make your phone calls so that they can still have their old jobs...or that they should forget all of their switch operator training and go get a *different* job?

[Southack]

"Nafta has, as a result, aided in the decline of our economy after it began to tank and was helped along by Osama."

If NAFTA has aided the "decline" of our economy, why are *more* people employed overall, and at higher salaries today, than back in 1993 when it was ratified?

[clamper1797]

Hi tech workers ... like chip designers ... are NOT phone operators.

[clamper1797]

Im sure the free traitors will show up on this thread soon and explain how this is actually a GOOD thing, probably using a buggy-whip maker analogy

[Southack]

"Right, start a new business with nothing while I'm going bankrupt and losing my home. That sounds like it will work. Heard this one before too."

EDS gave you a raise, you said...yet you are going bankrupt *and* losing your home?!

Whoa boy. You've lost your Wal-Mart job, your EDS job (but they gave you a raise first), and now you are losing your home.

Shoot, you don't have time to be typing at your own keyboard! You should be out working two jobs and interviewing for a third one because you know that you are going to lose those two jobs, too!

[Havoc]

Boy you really assume quite a bit don't you. You guys are shameless decietful lying jerks. You don't know me; but, you are good at twisting what I've said to try and justify your position. Why do you suppose you have to twist what I said to do that?