Posted on 04/18/2007 7:59:30 AM PDT by A. Pole
In the 1950's 30% of US employees were in manufacturing - almost 1 in 3 jobs. This country was a relative manufacturing super power, we were the world's richest and most productive country. In 1994 approximately 1 in 8 jobs were in manufacturing. In 2014 if the US government (Bureau of Labor Statistics) projections are accurate that figure will have slipped to 1 in 12 jobs.
The government is telling us in black and white that the policies they are enacting will decrease both absolute and relative manufacturing employment to levels below that of the 1950's - over 2 million below.
In less than 20 years since America put in place some of its most self-devastating policy decisions (NAFTA, WTO, CAFTA, etc.), this country will have almost completely converted from a self-sufficient sovereign state, capable of manufacturing what it needs to sustain and protect itself, to a country of servants – serfs, working at the behest of foreign employers or engaged in the sales, marketing, and distribution of foreign-made goods – working at their discretion, for wages they determine, and forced to pay their prices for needed goods. This is the definition of a servant.
A country that ends up producing little of value will have little to consume at home and little to trade abroad, and will have a low standard of living. The way this country was built was by developing world-leading industries and dominating the markets for products that we invented. Now we have conceded that we are instead going to exist by selling our assets and eliminate most of our ability to produce for ourselves. This would make any country extremely vulnerable.
From 1994-2004, manufacturing was the second fastest job-losing sector in our economy (second only to agricultural employment). From 2004-2014, the government predicts that most of the employment growth will come from retail, health care, leisure and hospitality, government jobs, and “professional and business services.”
This country needs salespeople, waiters, attorneys, doctors, and managers. But how could we have ever built a superpower country on those professions alone?
Many say that we are shipping jobs overseas because they are too low-paying or too rudimentary. Anyone who has worked in factory operating a million-dollar piece of equipment can tell you the satisfying difference from being forced to work in a restaurant as a waiter because of lack of alternatives. Why would we send factory jobs overseas to replace them with jobs in retail and hospitality? Factories sustain communities. Retail and hospitality enriches absentee corporations and shareholders. Offshore outsourcing strips us of technology, taxes, profits, and career opportunities. Why would we choose that path as manufacturing jobs pay much more on average than service jobs?
Some other countries, like Japan, pay wages as high as or higher than America because their manufacturing is capital and knowledge intensive and requires fewer workers per unit of output. In addition, other countries like China that pay wages as low as 1/10 of ours, also does not have the same cost of living as the US. Their goods cost a fraction of what they cost here in America; therefore it is not possible to compare the wages on an absolute basis.
Many people also say education is the key. They say that not enough Americans are being trained for engineering, science, or production occupations. There is no point in educating people when there are no jobs – when these industries are being systematically and predatorily destroyed by foreign subsidized competition producing and operating both externally and here in this country through insourcing.
We are living in a fool’s paradise, being propped up by foreign loans to our government and foreign subsidized consumption of our incredulous trade deficits which is approaching $800 billion ($1.6 million per minute) this year alone..
The net takeaway of the Bureau of Labor Statistics report is that if you expect to earn a decent living by producing a product – any product – in this next 10 years, you will have little opportunity to do that in this country.
That is not entirely a good thing. Raising kids in a rural environment would go a long way to stop the gang/criminal activities in our urban areas. So called 'progress' isn't always progress.
Thank you! A voice of reason from Age of Reason!
Such as? Monopolies are frowned upon, they can't dump raw sewage or hazardous chemicals into the Great Lake's any more, what?
Most of these things [regulations, unions] have been around since the industrial revolution and now all of a sudden they are the cause of off-shoring? I believe you should pay more attention to more recent events such as free trade agreements, Most Favored Nation status, WTO, etc.As if the burdens on companies have remained static since the Industrial Revolution. What a silly notion.
And I suspect that the current craze for globalism is foisted upon us by intellectuals who--or whose intellectual predecessors--formerly espoused communism as the way to global utopia.
That is the biggest load of BS ever shoved off onto the American people, with the exception of GW. Americans do those jobs and Americans will do those jobs. The fact is that our manufacturing jobs have gone away and with it a large part of our strength. The so called free traders, who want to call everyone who believes in keeping our jobs in the country a protectionist, are full of it and the facts and figures they throw out are shown to be the lies they are when you compare what we manufacture now and the volume we used to manufacture, plus the wages, on average, are lower than they were 30 years ago if you use real world dollars. Don't believe the free traders, Nafta and the other so called free trade agreements are raping America not helping her.
Several years ago I read article in which US business experts were warning that Toyota is over-investing in technology and equipment and looking too far into future. They were recommending more focus on short term profits and bottom line.
Well, this distant future is now.
I suspect you are correct. Plus the corporate desire for cheap labor. Never underestimate greed.
You nailed it. I call it "Conscience FREE trade".
Hey, don't you not know this famous saying - "Non cogito ergo sum"?
Proving yet again, that "so called" protectionists return to the same emotional garbage on thread after thread, like a dog returning to vomit.
Devise a product people want or need, manufacture it, sell it for as much profit as humanly possible. Whats changed?
Can you be very advanced in many fields? How many people are capable to have Renaissance personality like Leonardo da Vinci?
teachers, postal workers, police, military, firemen, forest rangers, IRS agents...all govt employees and as long as Uncle Sam keeps heaping money and benefits on them, there will be money around....just not in my pocket....
the people that make the paychecks will also have to pay for the entire Federa/state/local govt entities....as well as carry SS....because no one else will have any money....
You quoting the Bible? (Prov:26:11: "As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly.")
I heard that....... Absolutely nothing wrong with manufacturing your product within the target market, everybody wins.
(1rude:4:18: "As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his emotional outbursts.")
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