Why aren't you locked up yet?
Posted on 12/07/2005 11:46:30 AM PST by Sonny M
The November payrolls job report was announced Friday with the usual misleading hype. Spinmeisters made the most out of the 215,000 jobs. Looking beyond the glitter at the real facts, this is what we see. Twenty-one thousand of those jobs were government positions supported by taxpayers. There were only 194,000 new jobs in the private sector. Of those, 37,000 are in construction and only 11,000 are in manufacturing. The bulk of the new jobs – 144,000 – are in domestic services.
Wholesale and retail trade account for 20,000. Food services and drinking places (waitresses and bartenders) account for 38,000. Health care and social assistance account for 27,000. Professional and business services account for 29,000. Financial activities gained 13,000 jobs. Transportation and warehousing gained 8,000 jobs.
Very few of these jobs result in tradable services that can be exported or help to close the growing gap in the U.S. balance of trade.
The 11,000 new factory jobs and the 15,000 of the previous month are a relief from the usual loss. However, these gains are more than offset by the job cuts recently announced by General Motors and Ford.
Despite the gains, total hours worked declined, as the average workweek fell to 33.7 hours. The decline in the labor force participation rate, a consequence of the shrinkage in well-paying jobs, masks a higher rate of unemployment than the reported 5 percent. The ratio of employment to population fell again in November.
Average hourly earnings (up 3.2 percent over the last year) are not keeping up with the consumer price index (up 4.3 percent). Consequently, real incomes are falling.
This is not the picture of a healthy economy in which growth in high productivity, high value-added jobs fuels the growth in consumer demand and provides savings to finance Washington's red ink. What we are looking at is an economy that is coming unglued from the loss of jobs that provide ladders of upward mobility, and from massive trade and budget deficits that are resulting in unsustainable growth in indebtedness to foreigners.
The consumer price index measures inflation at 4.3 percent over the past year. Many people, experiencing household budgets severely impacted by fuel prices and grocery bills, find this figure unrealistically low. PNC Financial Services has a Christmas price index consisting of the gifts in the song, "The 12 Days of Christmas." The index reports that the cost of the collection of gifts has risen 6 percent since last Christmas. Some of the gifts have risen substantially in price. Gold rings are up 27.5 percent, and pear trees are up 15.4 percent. The cost of labor (drummers drumming, maids-a-milking) has remained the same.
Populations are hard-pressed when the prices of goods rise relative to the price of labor, because this makes it impossible for the population to maintain its standard of living.
The U.S. economy has been kept alive by low interest rates, which fueled a real estate boom. Consumers have kept growth alive by refinancing their home mortgages and spending the equity in their houses. Their indebtedness has risen.
Debt-fueled growth is qualitatively different from economic growth that results from an increase in high value-added jobs. Economists who look at the 3-plus percent economic growth rate and conclude that things are fine are fooling themselves and the public. When the real estate boom ends, what will be the source of new spending power?
* Sorry, but you have failed despite mighty rhetorical exertions, to demonstrate a single error by Roberts. *
Very weak try, Paul -- Or should I call you Mr. Roberts?
I already refuted what's below, something Roberts wrote:
PCR:
* The ratio of employment to population fell again in November. *
"Fell again." Roberts tries to suggest with this wording that the one month drop in November (by 0.1 percent) is a trend.
I posted this earlier. You perhaps missed it or you also are attempting to distort matters.
Calif. Conservative:
In November 2005, this employment to population ratio was 62.8. In 11-04, it was 62.5. In 11-03, it was 62.3. In 11-02, it was 62.5. And in 11-01, it was 63.0. So the trend generally has been improving for the last four years.
This ratio -- a way to measure whether employment growth is keeping up with, or lagging behind, population growth and the presumptive labor force, also has been improving during 2005 itself.
I also pointed out that despite Roberts whining about govt. jobs, over the last 12 months, private sector employment has increased much more rapidly than government sector employment.
To review
Over the last 12 months:
-- Non-farm payrolls have increased 1.5 percent, or 2 million jobs
-- Private sector employment is up 1.7 percent, or 1.8 million jobs.
-- Government employment is up 0.8 percent, or 166,000 jobs.
As you can see, Roberts is guilty of distortions when focuses on the government jobs created in November 2005, when the rate of job growth is far greater in the private sector compared with the public sector.
Those are just two direct refutations that show errors/distortions/invalid conclusions by Roberts.
No rhetoric. No exertion. Just facts.
All those irrelevant facts. Hence wasted exertions, since you are inapt to the issues.
Wednesday December 7, 04:37 PM
Intel Opens Chip Plant In China's Chengdu
BEIJING, Dec 7 Asia Pulse - Intel, the world's largest chipmaker, yesterday opened its second chip plant in China, in a move to cement its position in this fast-growing market.
Intel Products Chengdu Ltd, a chip assembly and test factory located in the capital city of Western China's Sichuan Province, started production yesterday.
"The opening of this facility brings new manufacturing capabilities to China and further strengthens the country's ability to deliver products to the worldwide market," said Craig Barrett, Intel's chairman, at yesterday's opening ceremony.
Intel made an initial investment of US$375 million in 2003 and earlier this year it added US$75 million to this, bringing the total investment in the Chengdu facility to US$450 million.
The plant is expected to assemble Intel's cutting-edge Pentium 4 processors.
The assembly line began operations yesterday at the Chengdu plant, with a second facility scheduled to start production in 2007.
The global chip giant has another assembly and test facility in Shanghai, set up with a total investment of US$500 million.
China is the world's second largest computer market in the world after the United States. According to the market intelligence firm International Data Corp, the shipment of computers in China grew by about 30 per cent year-on-year in the third quarter to 5.2 million units.
Intel has been trying to shorten the supply chain with its Chinese customers, which has instigated the move to set up two assembly and test plants in China.
However, competition with its archrival AMD is also currently warming up.
AMD, a player in the microprocessor market, has been aggressively investing in order to progress in China.
It has recently opened a similar factory to Intel's plant in Suzhou, in East China's Jiangsu Province with an investment of US$100 million.
It has allied with several computer makers in the country including top player Lenovo Group, in an attempt to challenge Intel's current dominance in the market.
It announced last month that it is to license its microprocessor design technology to Chinese partners in order to help them design chips for industrial use, by adopting international level core microprocessor technology.
COMMENT: This is all extremely bad news, but Did you get that last part?
There were only 194,000 new jobs in the private sector. Of those, 37,000 are in construction and only 11,000 are in manufacturing. The bulk of the new jobs – 144,000 – are in domestic services.
None of your points deals with any of that.
*All those irrelevant facts.*
so when Roberts brings them up, they are relevant. When somebody refutes them, they are irrelevant.
*Hence wasted exertions, since you are inapt to the issues.*
Ah, now we get to the last refuge of the scoundrel who lost an argument.
The issue was the employment report being over-hyped. I respond to that directly. Then you claimed I didn't refute your boy Paul Craig Roberts. So I follow up with answers and facts that directly refute your boy Paul Craig Roberts.
All of a sudden employment and job trends are off-topic.
Get thee to a DUmmery!
** There were only 194,000 new jobs in the private sector. Of those, 37,000 are in construction and only 11,000 are in manufacturing. The bulk of the new jobs – 144,000 – are in domestic services. None of your points deals with any of that.**
Very weak, again. Yes, I did deal with that. Specifically, Roberts stated:
* There were only 194,000 new jobs in the private sector.*
"Only" 194k private sector jobs. That opens the door for a refutation that compares the gains to the only other part of the non-farm payrolls pie that is left, which is public sector jobs, i.e. government.
And that is why a comparison between private sector employment vs. public sector employment is apt. Roberts brought it up himself when he talked about "ONLY" a certain number of private sector jobs. Roberts' wording implies that this is rate of gain in new private sector jobs in somehow a weakness in the report.
So I did not misrepresent him, because Roberts uses the term "only", which suggests a shortfall or a lack in this context. I proved that private sector job gains are not lagging, but are actually growing at a rapid rate compared with government jobs.
Or are you falling back on "that depends on what the meaning of 'only' ... is." ?
Oh, and one more thing. You posted this:
* There were only 194,000 new jobs in the private sector. Of those, 37,000 are in construction and only 11,000 are in manufacturing. The bulk of the new jobs – 144,000 – are in domestic services.*
But you conveniently left this part out, which preceded the private sector comments from Roberts. Here is the full passage:
* Twenty-one thousand of those jobs were government positions supported by taxpayers. There were only 194,000 new jobs in the private sector. Of those, 37,000 are in construction and only 11,000 are in manufacturing. The bulk of the new jobs – 144,000 – are in domestic services.*
See? Roberts brought up the government jobs. So a comparison of government vs. private job growth is apt and on-topic.
All of your surmises show an ignorance of the context that Roberts used, as well as unfamiliarity with his past postions. From his previous posts, when he makes reference to jobs growth being "only" he is making a judgement based on the monthly job growth requirements to stay even with or keep up with growth in the population and labor markets. Just what do you suppose that is? I can give you a hint...its a lot more than 194,000 per month.
And then there is the evidence that U.S. wages are not actually keeping pace with inflation...
Others have noticed the disparate pay issue even in the growth sectors...belying the miscreants boasting of mythical boom-times.
So in sum, you did misunderstand Roberts. You misrepresented Roberts. And you apparently misunderstand what job growth would actually be consistent with a restoration of U.S. manufacturing...which is something you can't begin to appreciate is essential for the long term survival of the United States.
But of course, you could probably care less, as you likely are a "citizen of the world." This would not be a surprise. I commend Christopher Lasch to your attention, in The Revolt of the Elites
No, it isn't because Roberts makes no further mention of Government as a proportion of the job growth. He isn't belaboring that, so your whole effort to argue against that position he doesn't take... is a straw man argument.
You are hence off topic and inapt. Still.
I'll attempt to answer your previous post later - there's a lot to correct, and it will take some time to figure out where you get your information (China has 700,000 spies? - that's a good one. Maybe they're under the bed.)
And Maybe you're an real spy master. Not!
Maybe we should take seriously Larry Wortzel's report in the Heritage Foundation:
Sources and Methods of Foreign Nationals Engaged in Economic and Military Espionage
by Larry M. Wortzel, Ph.D.
November 4, 2005
Heritage Lecture #907
As a former military intelligence officer who has tracked the activities of the People's Liberation Army and Chinese intelligence services for 35 years, I know of no more pervasive and active intelligence threat to America's national security than that posed by the People's Republic of China. The workforce available to the Chinese government and its corporations to devote to gathering information in the United States is nearly limitless.
There are some 700,000 visitors to the United States from China each year, including 135,000 students. It is impossible to know if these people are here for study and research or if they are here to steal our secrets. The sheer numbers defy complete vetting or counterintelligence coverage.
In 2003, for example, the State Department granted about 27,000 visas to Chinese "specialty workers," the H1-B visa. Some of these were intra-company transfers coming to the United States from U.S. firms operating in China. Between 1993 and 2003, the United States has granted an average of 40,000 immigrant visas to Chinese each year. The sheer magnitude if these numbers presents a great challenge to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, particularly when the U.S. is also concerned about terrorism, which occupies a lot of investigative time for agents.
The Chinese People's Liberation Army and the defense establishment in China started programs in the late 1970s and 1980s to create companies designed to bring in needed defense technology; the goal was to produce defense goods for the PLA and for sale to other countries. The General Political Department of the People's Liberation Army started a proprietary company, Kaili, or Kerry Corporation, that for years operated in the U.S. as a real estate and investment company.
The General Equipment Department of the PLA operated a proprietary company, Polytechnologies, or Baoli, that had offices here in the U.S.
In addition, the General Logistics Department operated a proprietary called Xinshidai, or New Era, that had offices in our nation and continues to be responsible for a network of PLA manufacturing plants in China.
These technically are independent legal entities under Chinese law, but the Central Military Commission of the Chinese Communist Party established them to serve the interests of the PLA and the military-industrial complex. Active or retired officers of the PLA or their families originally staffed these companies. The PLA and related defense science and technology research and development organizations in China regularly operate trade fairs to attract American high technology into China.
The Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Technology Security and Counterproliferation has testified that there are between 2,000 and 3,000 Chinese front companies operating in the United States to gather secret or proprietary information, much of which is national security technology or information. The deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation for counterintelligence recently put the number of Chinese front companies in the U.S. at over 3,200. Many of these front companies are the spawn of the military proprietary companies discussed in the preceding paragraph.
The nature of the Chinese state complicates the problem of knowing what the large numbers of travelers and students from China are actually doing. China is still an authoritarian, one-party state led by the Chinese Communist Party with a pervasive intelligence and security apparatus. The Chinese government is able to identify potential collectors of information and, if necessary, to coerce them to carry out missions on behalf of the government because of the lack of civil liberties in China. Let me quote the first three sentences of Chapter 1, Article 1, of the Chinese Constitution:
The People's Republic of China is a socialist state under the people's democratic dictatorship led by the working class and based on the alliance of workers and peasants. The socialist system is the basic system of the People's Republic of China. Disruption of the socialist system by any organization or individual is prohibited.
The People's Republic of China is methodical in its programs to gather information from abroad. In March 1986, the PRC launched a national high-technology research and development program with the specific goal of benefiting China's medium- and long-term high-technology development. This centralized program, known as the "863 Program" for the date when it was announced, allocates money to experts in China to acquire and develop biotechnology, space technology, information technology, laser technology, automation technology, energy technology, and advanced materials.
When I was at the American Embassy in China and conducted due-diligence checks to confirm the nature of Chinese companies seeking to do high-technology business in the United States, I most often found that the address identified for a company on a visa application turned out to be a People's Liberation Army or PRC government defense research institute. Thus, the United States faces an organized program out of China that is designed to gather high-technology data and equipment of military use.
Screening to Protect Trade and Military Secrets
In January 1998, the Visas Mantis program was developed to assist the American law enforcement and intelligence communities in securing U.S.-produced goods and information that are vulnerable to theft. Travelers are subject to a worldwide name-check and vetting procedure when they apply for visas. The security objectives of this program are to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and missile delivery systems; to restrain the development of destabilizing conventional military capabilities in certain regions; to prevent the transfer of arms and sensitive dual-use items to terrorists; and to maintain United States advantages in militarily critical technologies.
This program operates effectively and can vet a Chinese student in as few as 13 days. Non-students may take longer, as many as 56 days. However, I can tell you, based on my trip to China two weeks ago, that the American Embassy in Beijing and the Consulate in Guangzhou are able to process and vet in about two weeks visas for non-student travelers who fully and accurately outline the purpose and itinerary of their trip.
Still, many U.S. companies complain about delays in getting visas for travelers they want to bring to the United States. Automation and data-mining software can speed visa processing to ensure that these companies can be competitive. The government also operates a "technology alert list" to identify legal travelers from China that may benefit from exposure to advanced U.S. technology with military application. Of course, the consular officers manning visa lines in embassies must be trained to look for signs of espionage for screening to be effective.
Many provinces and municipalities in China now operate high-technology zones and "incubator parks" specifically designed to attract back Chinese nationals who have studied or worked overseas in critical high-technology areas. When students or entrpreneurs return with skills or knowledge that the central government deems critical, they are given free office space in the parks, loans, financial aid, and administrative help in setting up a business designed to bring in foreign investment and technology. Their companies are given tax holidays. Innovative programs, such as those at Beijing's Zhongguancun High Technology Park and Guangzhou's High Technology Economic and Trade Zone, get central government help.
These are admirable programs that will develop entrpreneurial skills among well-educated Chinese citizens. However, as students and employees of U.S. companies return home, it is important to know that they are not taking back American economic or military secrets. Good counterintelligence and industrial security programs are very important to U.S. security, given this threat. Inadequate Enforcement of Intellectual Property Laws
The enforcement of intellectual property protection laws in China is spotty and inconsistent at best. This is one of the major complaints of American high-technology companies about China's compliance with its obligations under the World Trade Agreement.1
The tendency to steal intellectual property and high-technology secrets in China is worsened when intellectual property laws are not enforced there. And the problem is further exacerbated when centralized Chinese government programs, such as the 863 Program mentioned earlier, are specifically designed to acquire foreign high technology with military application. This only creates a climate inside China that rewards stealing secrets.
I believe that U.S. government security, intelligence, and law enforcement agencies must focus on the national security. They should be looking for acts of espionage and for violations of the Arms Export Control Act or the Export Administration Act.
....
Larry M. Wortzel, Ph.D., is a Visiting Fellow at The Heritage Foundation. This analysis is adapted slightly from testimony presented to the Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security, and Claims of the Committee on the Judiciary of the U.S. House of Representatives.
Sigh right back at you... You can't have learned much good from your "business" experience, assuming its real.
Chinese students suspects in espionage
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES, August 5, 2003
Two Chinese students studying in the United States supplied China's military with American defense technology that allowed Beijing to produce a special metal used in sensors and weapons, according to a Pentagon report.
"This is a classic example of how the Chinese collect dual-use military technology," an FBI official said. "Students come here; they get jobs; they form companies."
The espionage, subject of an ongoing investigation, allowed China's military to develop a version of the substance known as Terfenol-D, which cost the Navy millions of dollars in research to create.
One of the Chinese students attended Iowa State University, where he worked closely with the Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory on the school's campus. The lab developed the material invented by the Navy in the 1970s. The other student attended Pennsylvania State University.
The Terfenol-D data were stolen within the past three years in a computer hacking incident, the FBI official said.
In its annual report on Chinese military power made public last week, the Pentagon stated that "one of the Chinese students admitted sending this information [on Terfenol-D] to the [People´s Liberation Army]." The Pentagon noted that "usually the connections between [Chinese] academic, commercial, and military organizations are not so clear cut."
The FBI official said a Chinese company linked to the theft of the Terfenol-D data, Gansu Tianxing Rare Earth Functional Materials Co. Ltd., known as TXRE, is directly connected to the Chinese military. TXRE was set up by a Chinese official who studied with one of the two Chinese students.
TXRE's promotional literature states that it has developed a substance that U.S. officials say is Terfenol-D.
Terfenol-D is a high-tech material that changes shape in response to magnetic energy, and can be used in both sensors and mechanical devices. Because it has both commercial and military applications, any sale of the technology is strictly controlled and requires an export license.
The Navy uses Terfenol-D in an advanced sonar system designed to track enemy submarines. The material also has applications for advanced aircraft and spacecraft. U.S. officials said it could be used by the Chinese in a multiple warhead missile stage and in "smart" aircraft wings.
The sole U.S. manufacturer of Terfenol-D is Etrema Products Inc., a private company in Ames licensed to produce it. A company spokeswoman declined to comment on the Chinese acquisition of Terfenol-D.
Last week's report was the U.S. government's first public admission that the Chinese military had obtained the defense technology. Details of the Chinese acquisition of Terfenol-D were reported by Insight magazine in October.
"The close relationships between the personnel and organizations involved often makes it difficult to separate the research, funding and cooperation triangle among Chinese universities, government institutes and businesses," the report said.
The Pentagon report stated that China is using students and scientists to develop its military technologies. "Husband-wife teams" also are employed, the FBI official said.
According to the report, Beijing's China Defense Science and Technology Information Center is the key collector of foreign technology and is part of the military's General Equipment Department (GED).
The GED "oversees a complex web of factories, institutes and academies that are subordinate to China's nuclear, aeronautics, electronics, ordnance, shipbuilding and astronautics industries," the report said. "Each of these institutions has an import/export corporation to facilitate the import of technology and knowledge."
The FBI official said China's government uses people who study advanced technology in the United States to infiltrate U.S. companies to gain access to sensitive information. The collectors then return to China and set up their own companies or provide the information to the military, the official said.
In another case, two Chinese students in the United States were caught sending submarine-related technology to China to a relative working for the Chinese military.
About 150,000 Chinese students currently study in the United States. U.S. officials said an unknown an unknowable percentage are involved in intelligence and technology-gathering work for the Chinese government.
"Our position is that the intelligence threat is asymmetrical, and it is all over the United States — in Iowa, Mississippi, Maine or Alabama," the official said.
The FBI responded to the foreign threat by putting counterintelligence squads in all FBI field divisions.
The usual suspects have been whining for months that all of our job growth is in the public sector. Now, apparently things have become inconvenient.
You sound like the Democrats in 1986, 1900, 1904 and 1908... They decried the loss of self employed farmers ... driven off the land and having to slave in factories for long hours and terrible working condidtions. They wanted the old style of farming to be enforced by government. Fat chance!!!
Manufacturing jobs peaked in the 1950s and have been falling ever since. By 2020 almost all manufacturing will be automated. A factory worker doing dull repetitive assembly tasks will as historical as one man making a living farming 80 acres with a team of mules.
A hundred years ago 96 percent of our population was in agriculture. Today it is less than 2 percent.
In 1955 about half our workers were in manufacturing.. today it is in the teens. In twenty years it will be less than 2 percent.
There are always those who want to stop the clock. No one has been able to do so yet.
Why aren't you locked up yet?
All those irrelevant facts. Hence wasted exertions, since you are inapt to the issues.
You have no issues at all, you're just a rude expatriate with no country.
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