Free Republic

Tuesday, December 26, 2006 Everybody knows that the loss of huge portions of their home U.S. market to imports has decimated U.S.-owned automakers Ford and GM (as well as Chrysler, which is no longer U.S.-owned, but shares many of Detroit’s biggest problems). What everybody doesn’t know is that literally dozens of U.S.-based manufacturing industries have suffered the same kinds of losses since the late 1990s. The clear bottom line, as revealed by the U.S. Business & Industry Council’s latest annual survey of domestic manufacturing’s competitiveness: The United States is a military superpower, but is steadily becoming an industrial also-ran. The...

Globalization will lower the real wages of unskilled workers in advanced economies with or without the free flow of labor between countries, Bank of England Governor Mervyn King said Thursday. ..... "The downward pressure on the real wages of the unskilled in advanced economies doesn't require migration to bring it down - trade will do the same."

THE NEW WORLD DISORDER Truck drivers from India to take U.S. jobs? Union protests plan as attempt to undercut 'hard-working Americans' An American company is recruiting long-haul truck drivers from India with the goal of placing them with U.S. trucking firms. The Teamsters Union strongly opposes the plan by Gagan Global LLC of Garnerville, N.Y. Teamsters Union spokesman Galen Munroe told WND the plan "is yet another example of corporations exploiting a visa program to replace highly trained, hard-working Americans with cheap labor from overseas." Gagan Global has contracted with the Indian state government of Andra Pradesh and its Overseas...

Is your job safe? Not if it can be done abroad. The only safe jobs are in domestic services that require a "hands-on" presence, such as barbers, hospital orderlies, and waitresses. For a number of years the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ monthly payroll jobs reports have been sending US policymakers dire warnings, only to be ignored. The March report repeats the message. Ninety-five percent of the new jobs created are in domestic services. The US economy no longer creates jobs in export or export-competitive sectors. Wholesale and retail trade, waitresses and bartenders account for 46% of the new jobs. Education...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. New Delhi, Nov. 10 (NNN): America is likely to lose its overall lead in technology and innovation sector to Asian nations such as India, China, South Korea, Malaysia, Taiwan and Singapore, according to a top foreign policy expert. Adam Segal, Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations writes in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs that though American technical dominance remains solid, the globalisation of research and development is exerting considerable pressure on the American system. In addition to the increasing science and research and development budgets, India, China, South...