Posted on 01/02/2006 4:19:44 AM PST by ventana
Yeah, this "battered" economy is killing me. Especially the years of solid growth, low inflation and low unemployment. Brutal.
Somebody's got to be pulling my, err, leg.
Not to mention "Larry Keister".
Right, Keister! LOL, hubby said April Fools came early at the AP! V's wife.
This is PURE bunk. It is NOT a matter of the "whole world" being caught in some shift.. it is a matter of politicians and businessmen trying to shake down the average joe for profit motives. America didn't decide to up and change the way it approaches market economics. A few bastard traitors who got into office on other matters have seen fit to sell us all out and tell us - This is the way it is, like it or lump it. Personally, I'll lump it; but, just one question - how many do they want me to give them, one or two? I'd be just as happy with three or four; but, this isn't exactly something out of either your control or mine. But it's being sold as some abstract notion out of everyone's control in hopes you won't all protest too much and ruin it for the treason lobby.
God forbid they should have to live with American sovereignty, market rules and less profit than they could get if slavery were still in vogue. Since nobody is about to let them tatoo your neighbor with a livestock mark in today's world (that would be too blatent), they've resorted to dumping you on the street, handing your job to MoaYen for .37 cents an hour so they can charge you the same price for reimporting your old product from China and sell in the market they couldn't be bothered to build in.
This is one worlder horse hockey hoping to be bought as a factual appraisal of the world today. The fact is, we don't have to go along for the ride. We don't have to live with the death of retirement, the death of benefits, the death of the 40 hour workweek, etc. I mean, I don't think I slept through the years of my life where I learned that market forces in the US are what produced these things.. and that those market forces would be what saw them out. Yet, today, we watch as politicians tell us how it will be because they have an agenda.. Since when. Last I checked, this was still America. Last I checked, nobody here had a sign on their back saying "will lay down for nonsense from politicians", yet that's precisely what the treason lobby et al expect Americans to do. "Shut up and take it. This is the way it is." It seems to me that isn't far from what King George told our founding fathers many years ago - and it didn't sit well then either...
IT'S THE UNIONS, STUPID!
This must'a been 'ghost-written' by Lucy Ramirez... during a conference-call with Mary Mapes & Howard Dean.
Naahhh........Posthumus was our Lt. Governor for years....
NAFTA and CAFTA are travesties, granted. I personally am doing great under Bush's fantastic economic management. Except for illegal aliens, W's doing well there.
I personally blame any middle-class shrinkage on greedy unions and traitorous politicians, not W.
Havoc, the Unions have forced this on themselves and us, no? Now, as to your point about, I think, multi-nationals benefitting from politicians who take OUR money to pave highways, maintain ports, support satellite systems, the internet, federal funded communications and the like, ie, all the infrastructure that makes markets viable and that we, the American shlubs, fund-well, I think you are spot on about that. It's a bit of a shake down. V's wife.
You're right; we can move to France. In the USA, if you're valuable, you'll do ok. But if you want to tighten bolts for $30/hour and a hefty pension, those days are gone.
"Middle Class Job Losses Batter Economy"
Looks to me like the correct title should have been:
"Union Job Losses Better Economy"
http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0508/09/A01-274912.htm
John Sheehan, Delphi's acting chief financial officer, said the company is seeking an agreement with the UAW that would make Delphi more competitive with rivals such as Johnson Controls Inc. and Dana Corp., which pay lower wages.
"It's a fair summary to say it's the crux of what we're trying to achieve," Sheehan said.
As part of its 1999 split from GM, Delphi is locked into the same contract covering pay, benefits and job and income security -- at an annual cost of nearly $130,000 per worker -- as the carmaker.
Other suppliers "do not have the same post-employment benefits, the same wage rates, don't have the same guaranteed employment, don't have the same prohibition from facilities closing," Sheehan said.
In May 2004, Delphi won the right to pay new hourly workers a lower starting wage of $14 an hour, as well as offer reduced benefits. But production cuts at GM have slowed Delphi's efforts to hire employees at the lower wage. And as part of the separation agreement with GM, laid-off hourly Delphi workers can apply for open positions at GM. But the automaker is also downsizing and has not been able to accommodate many so-called "flowback" employees.
Delphi also wants relief from job and income security agreements with the union that require Delphi to pay an estimated 4,000 workers who remain idled. In the second quarter, those costs totaled more than $100 million.
"We can no longer afford to continue to pay all-in wage and benefit costs of approximately $130,000 per year per U.S. hourly worker," Delphi Chairman and CEO Robert S. "Steve" Miller said Monday.
Starting pay under the supplemental agreement is $14 an hour for all new Delphi hires. The hourly pay rate grows to $18.50, $16.50 or $14.50, depending on the work performed. At major Detroit automakers, the hourly rate for an assembler is $25.57; a janitor starts at $24.98, and tool and die workers start at $30 an hour.
Well, it's sundown on the union
And what's made in the U.S.A.
Sure was a good idea
'Til greed got in the way.
Union Sundown ~ Bob Dylan
Who sets trade policy? Offshoring at EDS, IBM and HP had nothing to do with unions. It had to do with Companies deciding they didn't want to pay americans to do jobs in america. More, they didn't want to pay professionals the going rate and decided to bail on America to get a cut rate price elsewhere while re-importing their services at below market cost to undermine the rest of the market and thusly drive wages and benifits down. In short, they have used the rest of the world to their advantage in manipulating our market - subverting it for "higher" profits. Unions didn't do that, they're just one of the lame excuses the treason lobby invokes for undermining the nation for profit.
Without all the benefits and just at minimum wage, No one in this country could compete with .37 cents an hour. No one. When the least common denominator can't compete with foriegn labor, the last people you can blame any of this on is the Unions. Basic logic. If 5.53 an hour can't compete, whether 30 dollars an hour can or not is moot. Clinton and George W share blame in this along with the politicians in both parties that have been responsible for signing off on both presidential trade policies. W doesn't get a pass, sorry. I love my president; but I also left the party because of him. Some of us hold people to account for their actions - it's why we aren't democrats. But, somehow, in the minds of well-to-dos here, we're supposed to think that way with dems and then switch our brains into neutral around pubs doing the same or worst. Ain't happinin.
If your work isn't worth any more than the pay the Chinese worker gets, upon what basis should I and others pay you more?
When my job was offshored, I wasn't doing any thing so useless as tightening bolts for $30bucks an hour. I was responsible for fixing computer problems that caused hundreds to millions of dollars in downtime per minute. My job wasn't Union. So, tell me precisely how the unions which have to do with a minor percentage of offshored jobs brought this on all of us? Blow smoke elsewhere. Unions may be abusive, and on that we will far more than agree; but, they are not the reason for what is happening by far. Companies don't want to pay market rates. So they've settled for subversion because it's profitable. Chambers was right. And I'm with Coulter, the left would hate him too but it would require some reading..
You were in a job that was bound to go bust. With the huge surge in networking and computerization in the late 80s and 90s, there was a shortage of IT professionals in the marketplace....some were being hired at 6 figures!
Lots of people became IT certified and the market was then flooded.
Your job loss was simple supply and demand.
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