Posted on 03/08/2004 3:14:41 PM PST by Mini-14
MARCH 08, 2004 room, and probably the stupidest. I get to learn from the ultrasmart and creative folks I meet. So why do I have an uneasy feeling these days about the place, even as an economic recovery for the technology industry starts to gather steam? One factor abounds with irony. A few years ago, I wondered if the Valley was sowing the seeds of its demise by creating the communications and collaboration tools that would make it much less necessary to be there in a physical sense. The near-unanimous consensus at the time among the top people in the field was that the Valley had nothing to worry about. I never entirely bought their faith, though the Valley has repeatedly shown an ability to rebound to new heights after deep economic downturns. The recent evidence, notably the surge of offshoring, makes me ask again -- about the Valley and the entire nation. And I wonder if something is genuinely different now. Intel CEO Craig Barrett put his finger on it a few weeks ago when he stopped by my newspaper for a long chat with some reporters and editors. What's new this time, he told us in a persuasive way, is the nature of the global workforce. For the first time in human history, Barrett said, a truly gigantic pool of well-educated, technically adept and eager-to-please labor is being created. This pool of talent, which will include hundreds of millions of people in China and India (many of whom speak English fluently), has another characteristic: a willingness to work for a fraction of what Americans expect. This is not because they like living poorly. It's because local conditions and currency exchange rates make what would seem like a pauper's salary here a highly attractive one there. The U.S. largely came to grips with a similar crisis in low-end manufacturing. We moved up the value chain as a society, painful as this was for the less-educated, hardworking people who lost middle-class jobs and had to settle for lower-paid service employment. How high can we move on the value chain now? I travel widely. One thing I know for sure is that Silicon Valley and the U.S. have no monopoly on brains or energy. We do have an advantage in promoting a culture of risk, of entrepreneurialism. But other places are beginning to adopt even that value, too. The spectacle of politicians promoting trade wars in the name of stemming job losses is disturbing, if understandable. I wish they'd devote that energy to telling the harder truth: that the U.S. will need to buckle down in unprecedented ways, with vast new investments in education and infrastructure, plus a new commitment to the best aspects of entrepreneurialism. We may be facing big trouble in the near term, no matter what we do. That's the kind of news few politicians dare deliver. Barrett, running for no office, offered a hard truth. As he gave his litany of why conditions truly are different this time, we asked if this suggested a generation of lowered expectations in the U.S. "It's tough to come to another conclusion than that," he replied.
You believe in the myth of the rational voter. Democrats are already demagoguing outsourcing and have their own harebrained solutions to stop it. Democrats don't have to provide viable solutions. They just have to hammer it home how much "they feel" for busted down workers. Blue collar and white collar
What are you taking about? There is nothing inevitable about it. Make outsourcing illegal and focus on making great technology while we still have the lead. If the EU wants to outsource, let them ruin themselves. But they won't. If we do it theywill follow. Outsourcing will come to be seen for what it is: suicide for the West. If not we will place a tariff on them too. India and China do not have the research infrastructure we have right now. Let us not help them get it. It is only inevitable if we lose our science and technology edge. We had the internet decades ago, this is a problem created by free trade elitists, it can be unmade. If we pulled out of the WTO, and stop building up the Chinese and the Indians the problem would just go away. At worst we could have a teired economic order.
It is ridiculous to imagine that there is "no escape." What a strange sentiment, it is merely a matter of trade policy, national security strategy, and science and tech nology strategy. That and voting the globalists out of power. What do you think it is, a force of nature? An act of God? And do not think the voter will not act in four years or so if this keeps up. Can they take our votes away that quickly? And if they do vote against outsourcing you can say bye bye to the GOP if that happens, and I mean bye bye for another 70 years. They will unionize every job in the country.
And one of the main reasons for the permanent welfare class. As we move up the 'value chain. that class, consisting of those who cannot acquire higher skills and for whom there is no useful employment left, will continue to grow. Eventually, it will destroy all but the very top of the 'value chain' and result in a society much like that which we see in Mexico today.
It might help to bring back 8-track tapes.
If I understand your statement correectly, you assist in transferring ownership of American business and assets to foreigners?
1. The barriers to entry for developing a software product have got to be the lowest around - all ya need are a couple of guys, a living room (that's not gonna be foreclosed on for a couple of months), some computers (which everyone already has at least a couple of), and the s/w tools (which someone should have pirated from the company before they were let go).
2. Develop a product.
3. Sell it.
Being a slave to a corporation for a job is no way to go through life. F it - create your own job. Ok, this is a "sea change", a "paradigm shift", whatever. Goes against everything we were taught in public schools. I hope at some of them will see this as the opportunity it is. Word.
How are you going to man your armies with, conscripts> (and brother, will you need armys.) These people are not geniuses, just a cosseted management class. They can be outfought. They have over reached, IMHO. THey are living in a dream world. One city nuked in asia and it all comes tumbling down.
I know it sucks, but there is both precedent for and no escape from what is happening. Since the development of sedentary agriculture to now, every so many centuries, there is a quantum shift in how the world works. Sedentary agriculture, Roman legions, the serf system, the Renaissance, the Industrial Revolution, mass production, steam power, electric power, nuclear power, computers, the internet, a 24 hour international market. Chinese slave power...and it will defeat US and West....oh but that is powered by West Greed Power.
I think that the 'no escape' statement is more an attitude from the elites end of things. It has to do with the elites believing that the world is entirely under their control and at their mercy and no escape will be allowed. They believe they will get what they want and no one, no nation, can stop them. They may well be right.
No, it will be like the societies that were in Europe 500 to 600 years ago.
A return to serfdom?
200 years ago, wealth creation was clearing a plot of land.
100 years ago, wealth creation was building a factory.
20 years ago, wealth creation was designing a chip.
10 years ago, wealth creation was creating software.
All of this has led us to the situation where food, manufactured products, processing power, and software are, roughly speaking, free -- created for us with historically unimaginable quality by highly efficient equipment (including robots) or relatively inexpensive foreigners.
Yes, we have to figure out how to earn the relatively little money needed nowadays to live reasonably well, but more important the market needs to figure out the meaning of wealth for the next generation.
The answer lies somewhere in Maslow's hierarchy.
But what about their "standard of living"? After all they can get a VCR for about 50 bucks, a popcorn maker for 15, or a microwave for 50, rent a multi-million dollar movie for 2...what more do they want?...How much better could life be? < /sarcasm >
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.