Posted on 08/25/2003 2:05:47 PM PDT by snopercod
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- This year's highly publicized job losses in North Carolina manufacturing, including the Pillowtex bankruptcy, could mean trouble next year for President Bush in a region that was a stronghold in 2000.
Bush won more than 56 percent of the vote in both North Carolina and South Carolina in 2000. But his strong support of free trade has turned some against him in the South, where U.S. trade policies are blamed for the loss of jobs in textiles and other manufacturing sectors.
Andy Warlick, chief executive officer of Parkdale Mills in Gaston County, said he doubts he will repeat his 2000 vote for Bush next year.
"He made a lot of promises and he hasn't delivered on any of them," Warlick said. "I've had some firsthand experience of him sending down trade and commerce officials, but they're just photo ops. It's empty rhetoric."
Fred Reese, the president of Western N.C. Industries, an employers' association, said executives are beginning to raise their voices against Bush and are planning education and voter drives.
"We're seeing a new dynamic where the executives and employees are both beginning to see a real threat to their interests. You're going to see people who traditionally voted Republican switch over," Reese predicted.
The hard feelings were on display days after Pillowtex's July 30 bankruptcy filing, when Republican U.S. Rep. Robin Hayes walked into a Kannapolis auditorium to meet with former workers.
"Thanks for sending the jobs overseas, Robin!" shouted Brenda Miller, a longtime worker at the textile giant's Salisbury plant.
In December 2001 Hayes -- who is an heir to the Cannon family textile fortune -- cast the tie-breaking vote to give Bush the authority to negotiate "fast-track" trade agreements, trade treaties that Congress must vote up or down with no amendments.
At the time, Hayes said he won promises from the Bush administration that it would more strictly enforce existing trade agreements and pressure foreign countries to open their markets to U.S. textiles.
"Are we pleased with the way they responded? Absolutely," Hayes said. "Are we satisfied with where we are? Absolutely not."
Jobs in many industries have fled overseas since 1993, when Congress passed the Clinton-backed North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA. About half the textile and apparel jobs that existed in 1994 are gone.
Since Bush took office in January 2001, it is estimated North Carolina and South Carolina have lost more than 180,000 manufacturing jobs.
And even more textile jobs could be out the door once quotas on Chinese imports expire at the end of next year.
Republican U.S. Rep. Cass Ballenger voted for NAFTA and fast-track, and has seen his 10th District lose nearly 40,000 jobs, primarily in the textile and furniture industries.
"Certainly, there's a political cost to any controversial vote no matter which side you take," he said. "People are casting stones, but we're trying to pick them up and build something."
Democratic U.S. Sen. John Edwards voted against fast-track in 2002 after voting for an earlier version. In 2000 he voted for permanent normal trade relations with China.
Recently, though, while campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination, Edwards has attacked Bush's trade policies and called for fairer trade measures.
Robert Neal, vice president of the local chapter of the Pillowtex workers' union, said Hayes has worked to try to ease the impact of job losses in his district.
"Though he (Hayes) voted for fast-track, he is really concerned about the workers and their conditions in the state of North Carolina," Neal said.
Not everyone feels that way.
Reese is organizing 1,500 manufacturing companies across North Carolina in an effort to leverage what he calls a new voting bloc.
In South Carolina, voter drives are planned for the first time at Milliken & Co., which has about 30 plants in the state. Mount Vernon Mills of Greenville, S.C., is forming a political action committee.
The company's president Roger Chastain, a one-time Bush voter, doesn't expect to support the president or Jim DeMint, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Democrat Ernest Hollings.
"We're basically liquidating our whole middle class, polarizing people on the two extremes, have and have-nots," Chastain said of the manufacturing job losses. "We'll be a Third World country."
Will manipulating one's symbol make him go blind?
So, the fact that the Constitution of the United States of America specifically empowers the Government of the United States to set tariffs would imply, to you, that the Framers were Socialist and the Constitution itself a Socialist construct? Intriguing.
If it is not expressable in mathematics it is not science. You do not understand economics.
You can't measure what products I would have purchased, what industries I would have invested in, etc. when I can't do it because the money has been taken away.
A tariff does not just take money away from you. No one forces you to pay a tariff or to by anything. You are still free to pay for the product with the price including the fee for crossing into this nation. I note uniform tariffs were among the reason that the articles of Confederation were abandoned. You do not seem to understand that basic fact of American History. The revolution was fought over no taxation without representation not for no government and no taxation.
Simplistic economic models assuming 'everything else is equal' are absurd and can't be applied to human action, because there is no 'control group'. Regression analysis is hardly a simplistic mathematical tool and your calling it that and your entire argument is a rejection of economics as science. If you don't take my money in tariffs, what will I do with it?
Tell me how you quantitatively measure what I didn't get a chance to do. ALL you can do is see that, barring your taking my money away from me under the guise of making someone else better off by compelling me to buy their product that I don't prefer, I have less wealth than I otherwise would.
This is a total mistatement of tariffs there is no force on you to buy anything. If you do not wish to pay the cost of the good no has to give you what you want because you want it. Tariffs are a legitimate power of the Federal government.
Your interference drives down my standard of living by raising my costs and funneling my money to bureaucrats
There is no interference with you personally merely a tax on bringing things into this nation. Your objection to the exercise of the duly enumerated power of Congress interferes with the rights of other Americans to enjoy the benefits of the Free Market and earn a decent return on their industry. Your premise is based on your philosphy not the governing priciples of the United States of America. If you wish to find a nation that embodies the philosophical principles you laid down which are not economic I suggest you start looking as I know of no such nation.
First you deny the science part of economics then you start discussing what consitutes benefit in abstract philosophical terms I really do prefer dealing with logic and reason and mathematics on this issue. Because by definition dealing in metaphysics is counterproductive in determining policy. You alsmost sound like the French polemicist Bastiat who argued tariffs were tyranny and the USA was wrong to have them. IMHO he was at best a naive idiot.
Am I supposed to cry for you? Do you understand what life was like for the Americans that created this country for you? Do you realize they had many times in their lives where they would have killed to work for the wages and comfort that a McDonald's offered? The whining and class warfare from the "little men" at FR is what is truly a joke. You don't even realize that there are just as many conservatives and people on FR that are making no more than a lot of these people whining about being unemployed (on the freaking internet!) yet they actually believe in conservatism unlike these people whining and blaming George Bush and capitalism for their problems.
The DNC could do no better than collect your "let them eat cake", "suck it up, whiner", "if your unemployed its because you're a loser who deserves to be removed from the gene pool" posts and distribute them on election day. You are a New Dealers parody of a fat cat Republican, the stuff Democratic landslides are made of. So how can you be so confident Bush will win ? Most people, thank God, are nothing like you.
Ah the anarchy is wonderful argument. Are you sure you want to take that road?
Because he's not stupid. Neither am I. Do you think if I was running for President I would actually speak this way? No, I would smooth it over and talk about bipartisanship and fighting for "the little man" and the evil illegal immigrants and all you want to hear.
Hmm, you are not very logical. You want to move the American capital and production base to be moved to Communist China, don't you? But of course I will remove you from the list.
BTW, are you against the anti-trust laws? They intervere with the free market decisions.
Even if Bush is reelected, the Democrats will retake the House and Senate.
You want to bet me on any of this? I bet you the GOP will keep all 3.
Yes.
Firstly, small businesses that have little or nothing to do with exporting jobs overseas will indeed flock to this idea. We would see a drastic move from C corporations to fully incorporated because it would be a gigantic tax break with having to give up very little. Unless accompanied with discretionary spending cuts, this just adds to the tax burden of the personal income taxpayer and does little or nothing to solve the problem.
Well the tax break for small business will encourage more small business and I will heartily support such tax cuts. I certainly support the idea of eliminating the corporate income tax completely and do believe that busdget cuts are essential. Many such budget cuts will come automatically by means of reducing regulations and increasing employment. Further the impetus to wards a national retail sales tax would also be strong. This is becuase once it is demonstarted that a major increase in economic activity genrates jobs and a lot of them the message starts getting accross. Now I would also argue that elimination of the personal income tax would be a logical step after this plan.
What is the cost of a welfare program when there are no welfare recipients? We are talking of ending regulation and subsides in this plan and stimulating the economy. We have additional revenue from tariffs to partially offset this loss. We have additional personal income to partially offset this loss and we have cost savings.
Secondly, corporations which deal with direct services or corporations that have little or no overseas market would also flock to this plan as it is a nice tax break. However since these corporations have little or nothing to do with the problem it is just a tax break that (without spending cuts) is just shifted to the personal income taxpayer.
I have no problem with this as it is increased economic activity that I am seeking and the increased personal income resulting from that activity will provide revenues to the government that will not place an addition burden on the taxpayer. It costs money to provide welfare and unemployment benefits. The savings in these areas alone would take up much of the loss of revenue.
Thirdly, those corporations that do export labor may not see this as an enticement to stop. Each would have to weigh the net profit of “buy America / hire America against whatever they pay in corporate income tax. Many of these companies (primarily due to breaks given by congress since 1986) pay a small percentage of their real profit on federal corporate tax. Small businesses (C corporations) carry a much larger load, both in numbers and amount).
Clearly each would have to weigh the net benefit of "Buy American / hire American" against what they pay in income taxes. I for one do not have a problem with taht as the administration of stringent regulations is counter productive for encouraging improvements in teh American economy. I am not seeking to destroy big business per se. I am seeking to make it marginally more profitable to invest in the USA than to invest offshore. When corporations have to take the full risk of offshore investment, pay tariffs on the importation of products from that offshore investment and continue to have pay taxes on the profits from those offshore investments then the decision to invest offshore is less an appealing alternative. On top of that the encouragement for start up companies in these zones which I hope will soon include the entire USA means they will be facing competition from start ups and existing small businesses.
Now as to these big companies paying a small percentage of their profits due to tax breaks enacted since 1986 that smaller corporations do not have to pay. This tends to cut the loss of tax revenue. It also makes the competition between large and small corporations more even becuase both will be able to avoid teh corporate incmoe tax not just the beheamoths.
I would love to see corporate income tax reduced. However, I would also like to see personal income tax reduced. I am a little hesitant to favor any change that would lower one to the detriment of raising the other.
Well IMHO showing increased economic activity by eliminating the one and showing increased employment, increased personal income, and giving more voters a stake in reducing the personal income tax will lead to the elimination of both.
What can ya do though? This is mostly an anonymous forum, and those who want to slander you, can pretty much do so. It just makes me grow stronger in my convictions.
No the idea is profoundly stupid. The government has absolutely no right dictating salaries. Besides, what is considered, "make"? Is that salary? Is that stock options? Is that bonus? Is that in perqs? What is the value of the country club membership that the CEO uses to entertain business prospects? What is the punishment for success going to be?
In the time it took me to read that post, I already came up with several ways around it. The most obvious is to subcontract the outsourcing so that those things outsourced are handled as a separate company. This is how most building contractors get around I-9 and other immigration law. They simply subcontract work to an "agency" who provides the skill and talent to do the labor.
Hasn't everyone heard of Administaff? This is the company that "hires" the people you select, and they turn around and contract them to you. There are plenty of CEO's who has no one working for them, but they still lord over hundreds of people.
"This proposition is brilliant!"
No it isn't! This smacks of Communism! We do not want to open the door for government run businesses!! If we do, then we'll end up like the Europeans- completely screwed up!!!
Gee, what counts as strong? 2% of a 10 trillion dollar GDP, 50% of a 1 trillion dollar GDP? Your focus is misplaced.
I guess you do like to use some mathematics after all but clearly not any that have any real meaning. First, there is a confusion of industry with manufacturing. Other industries include mining, agriculture and services. However, if we limit it to manufacturing the % of the overall economy is actually relatively meaningless as I think you have an inkling of understanding. If one were to use percentage as the only method of determining a strong manufacturing base then it would be the percentage of manufacturing compared to other prosperous nations but even then there is a whole lot of necessary data left out i coming up with the measurement that shows the relative health of that sector of the economy. Your question as stated is meaningless.
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