I don't know that your premise is correct. As long as America is a member nation with the rest of the world with respect to trade, imports and exports, the individual worth of each employee connected to that trade is only fractionally related to the economies of the participating nations. Closing our borders to trade would result in massive inflation and unemployment. The cost of labor is a balancing act between COGS (costs of goods and services) and profitability. Corporations have profit responsibilities to their shareholders. They do not have the option of raising pay scales if it means lowering profits beyond a healthy operating margin.
NAFTA did not destroy your job, but indeed it has provided jobs for millions of Americans. It really depends on where you are in the manufacturing chain, whether NAFTA would or would not effect you. The biggest pressure on jobs today is not competition but technology, which has greatly reduced the number of necessary persons for almost any task related to the production of goods and services.
In areas where large numbers of persons are still required to produce a product or perform a service, it makes no sense to pay anything but the lowest possible wage. NAFTA allowed corporations to stay in business by reducing COGS and keep a certain number of people employed, instead of going bankrupt and throwing entire staffs into the street. Competition does force corporations to become as price and cost competitive as they possibly can, but that has been the case long before Bush, and long before NAFTA.
I'm losing my job because labor in Mexico can be had for a fraction of what is paid here. The difference in per-seat cost is staggering.
Would you want to live in Mexico? Low costs and low standards of living go hand in hand. In this country you expect a paved road, a working traffic light, a policeman who will actually assist you rather than rob you at gunpoint, and due process. All that is guaranteed you here and none of it is free. Every Corporation that ever employed you had to factor those things you expect into their cost model in taxes. People scream about 'corporate welfare' whenever someone attempts to lower or control those costs, which is something Bush is actually doing to great effect.
Every single country that has attempted to moderate their free trade participation has ruined their own economy. Look at what Japan has been struggling with for a decade. Your argument suggesting that Bush and NAFTA are responsible for your job is an emotional one, not supported by economics or reason. I am sorry about your situation, but you are living the same fate that has happened to millions of others during historic times like these where we are experiencing a second industrial revolution, where technology, not labor is the primary cost factor.
Thanks, PD. I wish I could have said it as well as you did.
Whoa, drop anchor. Nobody said anything about closing boarders to trade. Zip, zilch, nix, nada. So until you can tell me where that came in from, I'll suspend discussion on this point. This is something that seems to be coming out of a set of talking points and thre is no foundation for it; so, I'll ask you for some foundation and then we can move on.
NAFTA did not destroy your job, but indeed it has provided jobs for millions of Americans.
That remains to be seen. As for my job specifically - I sit on a non-leveraged desk running at a pay per seat rate. If it were not for outsourcing, I would still have a job after November of this year. The guy that negotiated our contract came in and gave us a free shot at him a week ago and apologized for the company. He fought pretty hard to keep our jobs but in the end, competition with other US firms that had already outsourced put them in a position where the customer said either outsource or you won't have a contract. Period. So, yes, Nafta and free trade are directly responsible for it. I suppose I could have provided those details up front; but, doing so would not tell me if you're reading off the standard talking points or just generally trying to deny any connection by trying to generically explain it away.
Tell me, if I hang a tub of water over my head with a plug in it to keep the water in and the water does stay in while the plug is in place. If I then remove the plug and get drenched, who's fault is it. Or did it just happen..
The biggest pressure on jobs today is not competition but technology, which has greatly reduced the number of necessary persons for almost any task related to the production of goods and services.
That's nice and all; but, you were explaining how MY job was affected by this with no real background on what my job is or how the contract defined it. Unfortuneatly you're wrong. My job is pay per seat. Meaning the client got what service level they were willing to pay for. Agents have so much time in a day to handle incoming cases and there are only so many calls that can be taken in a day depending on several factors - not the least of which is the system employed for documenting the calls. When you have the best stats of any desk in your company and happen to be the in one of the best IT companies going, it isn't an issue with productivity. It's all money. And as it happens, that's exactly what the company rep told us. Bottom line is, if they can outsource the best helpdesk in the company, Every helpdesk in the company can be outsourced - all of them. And with competition what it is - that is the way it will ultimately go - because they won't have any choice - they will have to hand all our jobs to foriegners or close their doors. And the foreigners are saying do it or else. Do it or else. That is specifically coming from India. And it's on the record in congress in the h1 and L1 hearings.
I'm sorry; but, what you are saying doesn't line up with the reality. Are you reading from talking points? Seriously. because this is the standard spiel we here on one thread after another and it doesn't look anything like the reality any of us being replaced is facing. It does sound like the company line invented to keep a lid on things so they can get by with it.
In areas where large numbers of persons are still required to produce a product or perform a service, it makes no sense to pay anything but the lowest possible wage.
I'd generally agree; but, if you're an American company doing business in America serving an American client, the ethics of putting Americans out of work to go do a job in another country for higher profit aren't real sound.. which perhaps explains why employers are hiding behind the word "productivity" when productivity has nothing to do with it - it's about cost of the workforce, regulation, taxation, etc. The companies want US profits; but, don't want to play by US rules to get them. Thus, free trade. Free trade lets them go back to indebting people to the company store as is happening in China. If it were about productivity, they should be paying the exact same wages I get here to those overseas because the productivity is better. In fact the productivity is worse; but, they can charge the same rates to companies here that they currently get and reap greater profit from each person while paying them nothing. In the china example, the only thing that seperates the workers from slaves is the fact that they have a paycheck that serves as the shackles. But hey, they get the American profits so it must be ok. Americans got put out of 30k+ a year jobs so that these people could be paid 600 dollars a year to do the same job because the workers work for the government of China - not the company - and can thusly be forced to do so. With the vast amounts the government is getting per person, they give 600 a month and by all reports are one or more months behind in providing it, meaning they have to live on loan from the business itself - eeking out a squaler type living while the government gets fat. Sounds kinda familiar - similar to circumstances in a country we just liberated. But I digress.
In your opinion, why is it, do you think, that the rhetoric doesn't match the facts on the ground. Could it be this is what we're intended to hear and buy into so we don't do something rash? Just a question; but, a really good one don't ya think ;)