Nothing else to say but...
Here-Here!!!

Pleasure sharing views with this guy... he's got it.

 

Didn't see the big peice on Dateline last week where all the computer jobs are going to India, Russia, Pakistan, and Taiwan, did you?

They are even taking courses over there to learn to "sound more American" and to learn American Slang like "it was alright, then just died" and "it screwed-up". (They have no idea what those terms mean in literal translations BTW.) Most all 1-800 numbers for tech support are now directed to India dude, I swear it.

The coup-ge-gras for me was when they interviewed IBM and Xerox managers who were bringing foreigners over here to let our WHITE-COLLAR workers TRAIN THEM so they could lay-off the American workers and get the jobs done overseas. These people KNEW they were training their replacements.

If you think you are safe for employment here just because you know how to turn on a computer, you are in for a nightmarish next 10 years my friend. We just got done building an entire new facility in Kunshan China to support business over there that builds PC boards. The company is the largest maker of printed boards in the world, supplying ALL PC makers to some capacity, and they are actively forcing their suppliers to source locally. Their proposal to us was "Build it here and sell it to us here (Both in China) or we will buy from someone else." It has basically shut-down a huge plant here in NC dropping the workforce from 1450 to about 500, and running the plant at 33% capacity. That won't last long.

So keep thinking that we can be a nation of computer geeks and upper managers. Live the dream while you sleep, but the time to wake up is rapidly approaching you my friend.

Like Ken said, there is a gap growing wider every day between the very poor and the very wealthy. If we don't employ EVERYONE, we will eventually become another third world country or nation similar to Mexico, with the elite and the poverished.

 

Typo.

This time, no kidding.... the "C" and "V" keys are right next to each other!

 

Let me be brief here, because all too often I end up in passionate, heated debates over this very subject...and I do nothing but get p!ssed off every time, and get nowhere with those I am arguing with...

I am tired of having to defend my choice, as an American, to buy an American car. Where I work ($26 billion dollar bank spread all over the northeast), I have had many car conversations with those who know I used to sell. They ask what I drive...I tell them. They scoff, and ask why didn't I buy a Nissan, Honda or Toyota. I ask them why they can't support their own countries products. They say "Well, it was built here..." I say "Yeah, but the profits go overseas, Mr. Banker. Didn't you know that?"

They have no response...except that America can't build a car. With my generation, there is no brand loyalty. No U.S. loyalty. Amazing how my generation (and millions of baby boomers for that matter) assume we can't make a decent car these days.

I am tired of defending my choice to support my own damn country. I am tired of knowing one day the U.S. will be nothing more than hotels, banks, insurance agencies, hospitals, Wal Marts and universities. We can't even support our own products...you better believe no one else will, either.

I'm stepping off my soapbox now...I'm just tired of the apathetic nature this country takes to its own economy. Being an Economics major in college woke me up to just how stupid this economy is...where we don't even protect our own products. Is free enterprise so wonderful?

Tell that to every DCX employee that will be out of a job in less than 10 years, once Daimler gets done pillaging them and throwing away the carcass....

 

And you better believe Germany never would have let GM buy out Mercedes

 

funny how GM can build a 405 hp pushrod V8 that gets 29mpg and magazines don't oggle over that fact.

 

You have got to be kidding.

 

Frankly, it is a very depressing state of affairs.

I have a 20-month old child. I wanted to buy my child toys made in the U.S. Everywhere I went, from bargain houses, to expensive retail outlets, all I find are toys made in China. I don't want to buy my son toys and clothes made in China............ however, what choice do I have. Oh yipee, the companies are American............. but not the product ( if anyone knows where I can buy domestically built and sources toys, please let me know).

Buying an American made/owned vehicle is not enough. We also have to look at the content sourcing. It may sound funny, but my '03 Mazda Tribute (same as Ford Escape, and Mazda is majority owned by Ford) has a higher domestic content than most domestic vehicles out there (92%). American made trucks also have a pretty high domestic content (usually around 90%). When you get to the cars though........... watch out. Many of them can barely be considered domestic.

Maybe it is just me, but I find it disturbing that General Motors bought Daewoo and is marketing its cars here.............. as GM products. It is like they are admitting that they cannot design and market their own entry level vehicles anymore. Yes some of the profits will go to GM (like Mazdas go to Ford), but those cars will be 90%+ foreign content.

I try to buy domestic in everything that I buy. However, with many products these days................ it is downright impossible.

How depressing is that???

 

Maybe I'm missing something here, but don't you list a 2002 Honda in your sig?

 

Gads people... you'd think the US of A was grinding to a halt next week, the way you talk! There are a lot of reasons various goods have been, are, and will in the future be made elsewhere. America has some challenges ahead... what else is new? Competition from abroad will improve everyone's lot... in fact it already has.

 

I have never owned an import. I can't name one import I'd buy, even though I like quite a few of them. But the last person I'd blame for the proliferation of imports is the consumer. The person on the street is going to go for the best item at the best price...... Period. Always have, and always will.

Before we start blaming anyone buying an import and putting a US employee out of work, consider:

*Auto executives are paid insane money today than 40 years ago when adjusted for inflation. A CEO's measure of success is how much they expanded profits over the previous year. This means that if money can be saved moving certain operations overseas, cutting costs out of vehicles, shutting down a plant, the pressure is on to do it.

*Although labor unions also get more today when adjusted for inflation than they did 40 years ago, the gap between the average factory worker and CEOs are more massive than before. But still, we are talking huge pay for what amounts to repetitive work, that doesn't (in most positions) justify the pay. Union reps score big points gaining new wages & benefits, never mind how it measures with the actual job itself. But when an executive gets big pay bonuses when people are getting thrown out of work, I can understand the union's frustration.

*There has been massive numbers of jobs lost to improved efficiency (ie: one person today running a machine that once did the job of 4 or 5 workers, or "just-in-time" methods that wipe out whole divisions of industry warehouse and storage people).

*During the 1980s, Ford and it's unions worked together & focused their attention on their vehicles. By the late 80s, Ford's quality ratings were not only the best of any US maker, but was solidly in import territory. Ford was making sales & money. GM, on the other hand was drifting towards bankruptcy.

Note, none of these I mentioned the word "imports". The bulk of the problem is right here in our own industry.

As far as "Buy American", that phrase began in the late 70s as consumers began to turn away from American cars. It was the favorite call of unions whose work ethic at the time was pathetic, and companies who initially felt that US buyers had no choice but to buy whatever they put out.

You can't take the "pride of buying American" of the old days and use it today in the auto industry. In the 1960 and before, there was simply no cars in the world that measured up to ours. BMW? they were cheaply made economy cars back then. Mercedes? No better than Cadillacs. All the cars of Asia were substandard.

So what happened? Are we to believe that suddenly, massive amounts of people decided to be "unAmerican" and buy imports? Or is it far more likely that as everyone else moved forward, we stopped or moved backwards and consumers (always looking for the best item at the best price) went elsewhere?

The consumer knows what's best, and they are the last people anyone should blame.

But I think the future is looking up because at least there are some great cars comming down the pipeline that show the industry taking responsibility for their own future instead of relying only on patriotism (meaning pity) for sales.

As for autoworkers, manufacturing is a changing business. The only place manufacturing will survive in the US auto industry is where wages and benefits are cheaper. If the south or Canada is where the lower wages are, then that's where manufacturing will go. The only way manufacturing is going to survive in areas where most wages are $30 per hour before benefits is to have more automation & fewer workers.

Not pretty, but I suspect a pretty correct assesment.

 

Nifty article...

Too bad it misses a simple fact...

GM pumped $3,000,000,000 directly from income into it's pension fund last quarter. This is not part of the bond issue, this is money that came straight from the bottom line.

Take away the pension liability (which will disappear completely by mid next year according to some estimates), and GM out-earned everyone. Even Toyota. Even WITH incentives.

The sky is not falling. GM is not in trouble. Chevrolet, Buick and Cadillac ALL out-scored Toyota on the JD Powers survey this year. Toyota can't build a truck to save it's life.

If I were Toyota, I would be shaking in my boots right now.

If the Japanese government bows to the pressure being exerted worldwide concerning artifically propping up the yen, Toyota's earning will vanish like a puff of smoke.

And if the Japanese government doesn't, their economy is going to take a gigantic hit.

 

While indeed it is true that typically a consumer will buy the best-available choice, now the consumer acts as if there IS no choice. Its Japanese, German or nothing. Thats a shame. To me, "Buy American" should be more than a motto...it should be a natural course of a consumer's life. When products were substandard, I can understand...but they are not anymore. What will it take to change the perception?

The perception out there that US built cars are substandard runs deep...very deep. I don't know what it will take to win back import buyers. Wanna know what I think? If this year's cars (2004) are as reliable as they appear to be, then in 10 years you'll see people starting to convert....MAYBE. Cars built today have to stand up to the test of time for people to consider them potentially equal...not necessarily better.

And even then, who is to say they'll swap? If their Honda or Toyota was great, why risk it? I get angry because of the bias...a bias that was true 10-20 years ago, but not necessarily now...

 

wow, really? I'm a CS major and I haven't been able to get a tech job for more than 2 years now. but that's not saying much since I have little realworld experience as a programmer. see, i have friends who have been working in the field for more than 5 years... up until they got fired to be replaced by some H1B at first and now by Apu and Chang overseas. they're all filling out McDonalds applications dude.

i have a year of school still left. if i can't get a job, what good was the cost of my higher education if all i'm doing is praying for a minimum wage job?

EDIT: I forgot to mention that tech jobs are prehaps the easiest of all to export. The only jobs we are going to be able to hold in the near future are service jobs because you can't really export those. And on the other end Jorge has the construction and agriculture jobs locked down tight. Good luck "networking" those...

 

Hang in there buddy, get that degree first. If jobs are hard to find after you do, then stay in and get your masters. IT has (believe it or not) had international competition for years... although yes it has become more acute lately. The solution, as always, is to be the BEST at what you do, then you will find work in what you do best. These foreign workers are not supermen/women. They are however well-trained and have fresh skills and a good work ethic. I believe a re-alignment is underway in (somewhat inflated?) domestic IT pay scales... once that's complete the temptation of business leaders to export IT jobs will wane rapidly. Meantime, there is no letup in the continually rising OVERALL NEED for IT help and support.