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"and RFID technology is going to put all those retail checkers on the street too."

This is a good example of technology at work. *IF* the RFID makers are US related, producing better jobs here overall, it's a good thing.

The offshoring we're seeing however is me at Exxonmobil's IT making a crummy wage already going off to Canada.

This is what's *killing* the country, and it'll end Bush's career unless he beats it with everything he has. Ignoring it, or actually ENCOURAGING it, is going to do more hard to Bush by far than even him signing an assault weapon ban. We might see a Mondale style rout here.

This is a good example of technology at work. *IF* the RFID makers are US related, producing better jobs here overall, it's a good thing.

RFID will only create a tiny number of jobs in comparison to what it destroys. It essentially consists of three components: The RFID chips (which are already being manufactured in Asian countries), RFID scanners (also manufactured offshore), and the database software to tie it all together (currently US dominated, but ripe for outsourcing).

I was lucky enough to see an RFID demo once, and it was pretty impressive. The "shopper" had a cart loaded with RFID enabled merchandise and rolled it through the scanner. The scanner read the entire cart at once and calculated the total in seconds (it even made sure that nothing had been de-tagged by comparing the carts weight against its baseline). The computer then read the "shoppers" RFID enabled credit card, instantly billed them, and produced a receipt. The "shopper" only broke stride long enough to pull the receipt from the machine.

Walmart has already directed ALL of their top suppliers to start providing RFID enabled products by 2005, and it's expected that most manufacturers will have RFID support by 2010. Once RFID is commonplace, the need for checkers disappears. They will be replaced with "Checkout Assistants" who will help those few people who have difficulties with the system, but we'll only need about one of them for every 15 registers.

So what's left after we gut the service sector?