Whirlpool to lay off 730 U.S. workers [Mexico Gains]

UPI ^ | 12/12/2005

[TXBSAFH]

My Great, great, great, grandfatehr did the same for his workers. But that was in Louisiana in 1850. They were about as free as these chicom workers.

[frgoff]

Move. I did. 2300 miles. with 4 children. And no work. I went where the jobs were.

[OpusatFR]

I'd like to know when the American people went from citizen to consumer as definition of nationhood.

I also think mercantalism is a terrible evil.

[TXBSAFH]

Mercantalism knows no nation.

[hedgetrimmer]

I'd like to know when the American people went from citizen to consumer as definition of nationhood

When "free trader" Bill Clinton signed the bill creating the WTO.

[hedgetrimmer]

Payson Cha, Sloan '73, is one of the key players in the creation of China's first joint-venture investment bank, China International Capital Corp. (CICC). The new bank, capitalized at $100 million, was created last year by joining together Morgan Stanley, Inc., the People's Construction Bank of China, the Government of Singapore Investment Corp., China National Investment & Guarantee Corp., and Cha's firm, Mingly Corp., Ltd., to help China gain access to international financial markets.

Speaking at the Business School in November, Cha advised potential developers in China to find a local partner and be prepared to spend time shepherding projects through the bureaucracy, which can require a hundred approvals.

***

A shining example of "free trade" in Hong Kong. First make a 50% partnership with a Chicom owned companies, Morgan Stanley is the example here. Next, use them to help you 'negotiate' through a massive bureaucracy.

Yep, having to negotiate with a bureaucracy sure is "free". Its great you can go to Hong Kong and just trade with each other "freely", with no government interference by gosh. That surely is the most "free" trade system of all.

[OpusatFR]

That's the classic definition of mercantilism.
But, our corporations have the US government in their pocket playing the same game. "Free trade" indeed!

[groanup]

Hong Kong was transferred in July 1997. At least up until then it is the world's shining example of the wealth that can be created by unvarnished free trade, low taxes and hands off government.

Hong Kong's number one natural resource:

Deep harbors.

Hong Kong's current position in the world based on per capita income:

Ninth.

Communist China had no effect on Hong Kong for the last 50 years. Neither did Great Britain. Hong Kong built Hong Kong.

And they did it because of free trade and free capitalism.

Your argument has nothing whatsoever to do with the point I am trying to make and get you to refute.

[hedgetrimmer]

Communist China had no effect on Hong Kong for the last 50 years

In the 1970s Hong Kong was booming and there was so much work," says Painter, who is secretary of the Royal Asiatic Society in this Asian megalopolis.

While the "West meets East" entrepot has suffered setbacks over the decades -- among them an invading Japan and a communist revolution next door -- the city has been in a real funk since it changed hands in 1997.

As Hong Kong marks five years under Chinese rule, it is wrestling with a swathe of economic troubles -- record unemployment, skidding confidence and property prices -- and expatriates are leaving in droves, or not coming at all.

There are now only half as many Americans as there were one year before the handover.

[unseen]

The time it takes to train and improve the workers causes the pay to rise so the company must shut down and get cheaper labor which cost money to train and improve the work force so at the end of the game what you have is someone else's country having the good paying jobs. But there is a lot of money to be saved in them thar hills! CEO's are some of the stupidest people on the face of the earth. Who else will lay off their customer base, pay to move/build a new factory hire new workers train those new workers, pay to ship their product half way around the world, lose the control over their supply chain, get rid of all inventory, then when the product finally arrives its crap and the customers that weren't laid off and can maybe afford their product doesn't because it's crap and at the end of the day the profits might have improved slightly. It takes brains to be that stupid!