Posted on 11/09/2004 1:11:34 PM PST by Willie Green
In Circleville, Ohio, population 13,000, the local RCA television manufacturing plant was once a source of good jobs with good pay and benefits. But in late 2003, RCA's owner, Thomson Consumer Electronics, lost a sizeable portion of its production orders and six months later shut the plant down, throwing 1,000 people out of work.
Thomson's jobs have moved to China, where cheap labor manufactures what the American consumer desires--from clothing to electronics--and can buy at "everyday low prices" at the local Wal-Mart.
On Tuesday, November 16, at 9 P.M. on PBS (check local listings), FRONTLINE® explores the relationship between U.S. job losses and the American consumer's insatiable desire for bargains in "Is Wal-Mart Good for America?" Through interviews with retail executives, product manufacturers, economists, and trade experts, correspondent Hedrick Smith examines the growing controversy over the Wal-Mart way of doing business and asks whether a single retail giant has changed the American economy.
(Excerpt) Read more at pbs.org ...
I cannot believe someone actually asked this question.
Is it good to displace hundreds of small businesses in favor of one large store? Duh.
Is it good to wreck small-business America by undercutting it with cheap foreign goods? Duh.
Is it good to put thousands out of work for one hundred working at WalMart? Duh.
Think, people, think.
"Something Wall-Mart this way comes"
8^)
July 8, 2004
China is losing more manufacturing jobs than the United States. For the entire economy between 1995 and 2002, China lost 15 million manufacturing jobs, compared with 2 million in the U.S., The Conference Board reports in a study released today.
“As its manufacturing productivity accelerates, China is losing jobs in manufacturing – many more than the United States is – and gaining them in services, a pattern that has been playing out in the developed world for many years,” concludes The Conference Board study.
According to Robert H. McGuckin, Director of Economic Research at The Conference Board and co-author of the study: “Increased unemployment has also accompanied the restructuring of the industrial sector, but per capita income has risen over the period.”
The new report from The Conference Board, the global research and business membership network, is the result of a joint research project with The National Bureau of Statistics of China. The study is based on data for the 51,000 large and medium sized firms in China’s manufacturing, mining and the utilities industries. While the study focuses on the larger firms, according to McGuckin, “the same patterns are observed among smaller firms.”
China is rapidly losing manufacturing jobs in the same industries where the U.S. and other major countries have seen jobs disappear, such as textiles. Matthew Spiegelman, Economist at The Conference Board and co-author of the study, notes: “The U.S. lost 202,000 textile jobs between 1995 and 2002, a tremendous decline by any measure. But China lost far more jobs in this sector –1.8 million. All told, 26 of China’s 38 major industries registered job losses between 1995 and 2002.”
The study points out that while developed countries’ jobs are being offshored to China, exports are only one piece of China’s industrial expansion.
Says The Conference Board study: “The rapidly growing domestic Chinese market, which has developed a voracious demand for goods and services from both local and imported sources, has fed China’s economic boom.”
China’s Industrial Productivity Rises
China’s industrial labor productivity growth exploded at a 17% annual rate between 1995 and 2002. As in the more developed countries, this rise in productivity comes from improved technologies and the reallocation of resources from lower to higher value activities.
McGuckin states that “continued restructuring within the industrial sector as well as from shifts to services should lead to further productivity increases and improved incomes.”
The advances in productivity are broad-based across the industrial sector, with 36 of the 38 major industries experiencing increases between 1995 and 2002. In fact, 27 of the 38 saw annual average productivity growth of over 10% (compared to just 4% in U.S. manufacturing over the same period).
China’s industrial growth comes from both the downsizing and restructuring of government firms and the upsizing of foreign and foreign-invested firms as well as private domestic Chinese firms. Both the foreign and government firms increased labor productivity by similar magnitudes. The private domestic firms showed somewhat slower, but robust productivity growth of 9% and much faster employment growth.
Because foreign and foreign-invested firms are upsizing, they are responsible for an increasingly large share of China’s industrial output and productivity growth. These firms, which include both joint domestic-foreign partnerships (79%) and pure foreign enterprises (21%) accounted for 34% of the output in 2002. While their share of industrial output plummeted from 64% in 1995 to just 30% in 2002, state-owned firms remain an important force in China’s industrial economy. Domestic private firms increased from 8% to 29% of output in 2002.
Other Key Findings:
The impact of job losses has been widespread across the industrial sector. In addition to the losses in textile manufacturing, industries with the highest job losses included steel processing (557,000), machinery (588,000), and non-metal mineral products (429,000).
This pattern of job loss is repeated across the manufacturing sector. The only three manufacturing industries showing any substantial job gains in China are electronics and telecommunications (374,000), garments (160,000), and leathers and furs (129,000). Most of these positions were in firms involving some kind of foreign ownership.
The pace of downsizing has been extremely fast at state-owned enterprises, in particular, with over 12 million jobs lost between 1995 and 2002 in the industrial sector alone. While the upsizing of private sector enterprises was substantial – almost 9 million new jobs – the net loss in jobs in China’s industrial sector was still over 4 million jobs. While there has been much discussion about offshoring high-wage jobs from the U.S. to low-wage countries like China, the loss of large numbers of manufacturing jobs is actually occurring in both countries simultaneously.
Source: China’s Experience with Productivity and Jobs:Benefits and Costs of Change Report R-1352, The Conference Board.
Read this report at Conference Report at URL Of http://www.conference-board.org/utilities/pressDetail.cfm?press_ID=2432
Most of the stuff at Walmart is tacky --- I can't imagine how people's homes look who furnish them with Walmart furniture and all.
"Is Wal-Mart Good for America?"
You forgot something... Is Wal-Mart Good for America AND RED CHINA?
I don't think so. And their benefits. You might as well not have insurance; because they won't pay for anything. They pay nothing, cut your hours without telling you. It's like a cancer taking over the world.
Sure. It's a nice store layout. The products are reasonably sturdy. Fair number of brand names. Quality isn't quite that of Costco/Kirkland. But it's good stuff. As someone suggested, check out K-Mart, and you'll see the difference in Wal-Mart. Target isn't so bad, either, and precisely a similar sort of discounter. I just hate the queues at Wal-Mart, and Costco. But the quality is perfectly fine.
It's the problem of the 'system'. Wages for many are stagnant, which means they lose purchasing power (or I should say, rather, investment power) every year, even with relatively low inflation (many items, like gas, suffer huge inflationary hits). How to maintain the 'middle class' lifestyle? Well - Home Depot, Loews, Wal-Mart, Target, Costco. Etc. And whatever one thinks of retail management, or these retail managers and employees, this country is well-served and getting by with these sort of large-box chains. Customer service isn't always great, even sometimes hostile. I don't think there'd be a suburbia without all those imports, dutifully sold at Cost Plus, and Trader Joe's, and all the others mentioned and not.
But isn't is even more a necessity for those not in 'affluent' suburbia but still in the city flatlands, and the 'old neighborhoods'. I personally WOULD prefer to see far more people earning a living wage, and not by any ruse of a minimum wage, which by all rights should be $20/hr. As Rush points out, if it can't be that, then it can't be - AT ALL. Jobs paid real money in the post-war boom. That even true in the 80s, for many people, in the opening of the Reagan boom. But under Clinton, many of the poor, in my opinion, have grown worse off because they aren't paid wages to match inflation. And assuming, if, that's a structural problem that will only grow worse in the coming years, then no one should be complaining about the large chain stores importing slave labor items mostly from Red China. I would complain of the slavery. And I would complain of the tyranny. And I would ask - can't business find another way, and bypass the Chicoms? Can't one single 'brain-trust' figure out a way? But without that product, the illusion of a middle class life would elude so many Democrats. And on the other hand, if the consummerism weren't so easy . . maybe they'd get serious about the politics, and stop voting for a buch of leftwing socialists, who only want to tax and impose intrusive government. Perhaps that sounds like the worst elitist thing to suggest. But I eagerly shop at Wal-Mart and Costco, much moreso at the later. And so I do think that criticizing these stores is completely off-base, and wrong for so many reasons.
The second person in line was a man and he was paying by credit card. After his order was rung up he proceeded to swipe his credit card through the reader. Nothing happened. He did it again. Nothing. He turned the card around and swiped it with vigor, and ripped the reader right off the bracket. It was hanging by the wires. It took the clerk about five minutes to reattach the reader to the bracket and she swiped the card. Transaction finally complete.
The third person in line was an old woman. She had just one item and a ten dollar bill in her hand. Finally, I thought. This will be fast. How wrong I was. The clerk gave her the total and she said, "Oh, I have the correct change." Into her pocket book she rooted until she found her wallet. In the wallet went the ten dollar bill, out came a few ones. Back into the pocket book went the wallet and after a few minutes of rooting out came a small change purse. I stood there fuming while she counted out penny after penny, one by one.
Finally, after waiting in the express lane for thirty minutes, with only 3 people in front of me, I reached the cash register.
My wife works for Target.. So I like Target.. Especially with the employee discounts..
I apologize my fellow freeper, but I am glad to hear that Italians do not like the Euro and the EU concept. I predict that this EU joke will not last for another ten years.
I think President Bush is serious about reforming our tax system and so I think it will happen.
It could be his second greatest achievement. The first is successfully going on the offensive against terrorism. Otherwise the second is moot. For if the terrorists win we all either die or are converted to Islamic fundamentalists.
Perhaps someone can reassure me- yes I ask sincerely, what happens to a country, any country that goes deeper and deeper in debt?
I remember my history. It is said that the debt of post WW1 Germany, was unpayable. Inflation blasted their currency. Widespread unemployment and misery followed. Hallo Adolf - how the 'ell did you come to power? Enough said.
How many workers does Wal-Mart employ?
How much was their actual profit last year?
My figures confirmed. 600 Billion years deficit. Overall debt 3 Trillion.
I would like to see these figures addressed- post triumph of Coalition forces in Iraq.
Yes.
I'd ping you to this thread, except that you posted it.
I think someone was scared by a Walmart greeter at an early age and has created this vendetta.
Well, you're in the right ballpark on the Trade Deficit.
But you're $4.4 Trillion LOW on the National Debt.
U.S. National Debt Clock
BTW, foreign nations use the dollars they get from the Trade Deficit to purchase the T-Bills issued by our Treasury to finance the Government's Budget Deficit.
They currently own about half our debt.
And the last I checked, about 18% of the tax revenue collected by our Government goes to pay interest on the debt.
Don't you love knowing that the taxes you pay goes to foreign governments rather than supporting our own??? </sarcasm>
As interest rates rise, EVEN MORE of our tax dollars will go directly overseas as interest payments on the debt.
Actually, it means that the consumers didn't have the money they SHOULD have had in the first place to buy a decent product.
WallyWorld prospers because of two underlying phenomonena: the power of advertising (you GOTTA have THIS!) and the erosion of disposable income over the last 25 years.
One could add a third--Greenspan's recent conversion to 'credit is great, pump up the presses' philosophy.
Good analysis. Certainly, management matters. And as you stated, PBS could become an asset. Yes, Lynne Cheney would be terrific. She really cares about helping our young people learn more about American History. How we got here is important in understanding where we're going.
I find good management is critical to success. It doesn't take long to learn which businesses, retail stores, restaurants, etc. one wants to frequent or avoid.
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