Is offshoring entirely about corporate greed?

[Deja Q]

I want to think it is, and that their claim of Americans being lazy and uneducated has no merit.

Never before have I seen, heard, or read about corporate and political leaders openly insulting Americans like this.

And that's despicable.


It's also a reason why the enlistment rates are so low. (I need not mention the obvious one :) .) Few people think anything is worth defending.

And is that deliberate? Is America being dismantled?

I mean, they can build all the chain franchise stores all they want ("Oooh, a new Marshalls in my area! Whee!"), but the content within those stores can easily be shipped overseas along with our jobs and infrastructure...

Is America being buried alive?

All this is clearly :tinfoilhat: as I have no proof... and I've been staying along with the media to see what sort of fields are to replace IT and engineering, much like how they replaced manufacturing ~25 years ago.

[The Backlash Cometh]

1. Free Market dismantled our country. We didn't even need a

revolution. America was lost without even one shot being fired, on either side.

[Pavulon]

4. Free market

is how we built the country. It took organized companies to build what we have. De-regulation of business practices allowed jobs to move.

Economics are not zero sum, in a perfect world the textile collapse in the 80's moved people from mills to factories. In a perfect world off shoring of some factory work would move people into other more lucrative fields, health care, construction. Other skilled labor positions.

Is this happening, I do not know. I don't think it is but I don't have data to back up my opinion.

[Deja Q]

7. Amusing. We left England for the same reasons...

We left England because of oppression and high prices for goods we worked at piss poor pay for.

Goods including military and other needs, in the form of taxes.

Today is little different. Except "King George" is replaced by any quantity of "CEO Georges".

[Pavulon]

11. True

But I believe the timing is a bit off. This picked up in the 80's with the improvement of JIT manufacturing and the systems needed to support it.

First it was Japan, now China.

Ultimately the business has to set supportable pricing or it will cause its own demise.

[Deja Q]

13. Exactly! And I see a lot of demise coming soon.

People can't live on one minimum wage paying job and are damn scared of losing every job they have. Because they more than just need every penny coming in. Heck, two minimum wage paying jobs aren't sufficient anymore either.

What does constant fear and anxiety do to a person? It destroys them. Not very nice in a "culture of life".

American workplaces are becoming battlefields, literally. The worker being the soldier hearing bombs dropping to the left and right of him. Must perform uber-well or die. Or might die anyway. And spit on by everybody else.

Not to make the wrong parallel, but we've all seen what happened to those coming back from wars.

[Yupster]

32. One of the ironies is

the internet has been the catalyst for much of the off-shoring.

Because information can be transferred so quickly a financial services firm can now have their phone banks in Manila and the Filipino worker can call up your investment account at 3 am her time in two seconds just as easily as an American worker in Minneapolis can.

Same thing for a doctor who writes notes in your file. Those notes can be sorted by a worker in Bangalore, India in real time thanks to the internet.

Our great invention of the last 30 years has increased productivity so much that we've producted ourselves out of millions of jobs.

[The Backlash Cometh]

20. The word has already been spoken about Libertarianism and

free market. Just that no one is listening. Libertarianism worked best when there was an abundant amount of resources and land was cheap. It doesn't work wherever there is limited resources and a NEED for regulation.

Do you really want to argue whether there is a need for regulation in this day and age when we can't open a paper without finding out that we have old gasoline stations which have had underground tanks leaking and contaminating the area for years? Factories which not only poisoned their workers, but sold products that caused cancer? Agricultural industries that sell contaminated foods?

As the world's resources get scarcer, there will be fewer opportunities for free marketers, not more. Because the tipping point for revolution will not make it cost effective for anyone to get rich and enjoy it.

[rman]

33. There's only so much health care and construction to be done

There's a limit to demand for labor in any sector. So you can't solve unemployment by having everyone move into another sector.

Moreover, the free market of yesteryear isn't exactly similar to the free market of today.
Staunch capitalists would argue the old free market was not free because of the regulations on corporations, and that the market has become more free due to deregulation and reform. It's "free" only in that corporations have more freedom then ever before to make more profit at the expense of workers.


These are some of the rules of old:

excerpts from
http://reclaimdemocracy.org/pdf/primers/hidden_corporate_history.pdf
www.reclaimdemocracy.org

<snip>

"In 1776 we declared our independence not only from British rule, but also from the corporations of England that controlled trade and extracted wealth from the U.S. (and other) colonies. Thus, in the early days of our country, we only allowed corporations to be chartered (licensed to operate) to serve explicitly as a tool to gather investment and disperse financial liability in order to provide public goods, such as construction of roads, bridges or canals.
After fighting a revolution for freedom from colonialism, our country's founders retained a healthy fear of the similar threats posed by corporate power and wisely limited corporations exclusively to a business role. These state laws, many of which remain on the books today, imposed conditions such as these:

- A charter was granted for a limited time.
- Corporations were explicitly chartered for the purpose of serving the public interest-- profit for shareholders was the means to that end.
- Corporations could engage only in activities necessary to fulfill their chartered purpose.
- Corporations could be terminated if they exceeded their authority or if they caused public harm.
- Owners and managers were responsible for criminal acts they committed on the job.
- Corporations could not make any political contributions, nor spend money to influence legislation.
- A corporation could not purchase or own stock in other corporations, nor own any property other than that necessary to fulfill its chartered purpose."

<more>

[Douglas Carpenter]

34. If the U.S. had to operate under the restriction it is imposing on the

developing world -- it would have never had an industrial revolution. Both the U.S. and the UK during their period of rapid industrialization maintained high tariffs to keep out excessive competition from abroad. Imagine if U.S. markets had been flooded with heavily subsidized agricultural imports. Imagine if the U.S. had to operate under the agreements on "intellectual property rights". Imagine if the our ancestors had to wait on the "free market" to build the Erie Canal or the Panama Canal for that matter.

Japan, Taiwan, South Korea and all the so-called Asian tigers all grew their economies with strong state subsidies, protections and interventions.

There has never in the history of the world been one single successful economy based on what is now called the "free market"; not one, not a single one.

[Pavulon]

2. Like water cash follows

the path of least resistance. Manufacturing has moved from union plants to right to work states because it is cheaper.

Functions, like call centers where someone reads from a script, has been moved because it costs less to operate in other nations.

IT services are stable and growing. Some things will never change, you have to have water, power, lights, phones, and now computers in any office. You have to have the systems to support them.

Storage, security, systems administration can not go overseas for many reasons. Programming and application support can.

The question of should is very different. IMHO the loss of these jobs hurts the economy by hurting workers. Workers are the largest contributors to our consumer driven economy.

[rfranklin]

3. Are you living in a cloud?

Why do you even have to ask? If the means exist to export work overseas that will cost 1/4 or less what it does here, it will be done. That's as obvious as the (figurative)nose on your face.

[Deja Q]

5. No, I'm being rhetorical...

Of course, why they won't re-engineer society so that we can live on basic needs for lower prices would then allow us to not mind lower paying jobs so much.

[mdmc]

6. I would love to help you understand this hypnotoad

But I am not sure what you are asking. Outsourcing is definitely profitable (so I guess it could be described as greedy, like you did in your OP). Outsourcing definitely takes employment from the USA and invests in outside the USA. This transaction definitely makes the USA somewhat weaker and the rest of the world somewhat stronger.

Perhaps the debate is whether the benefits outweigh the problems. I personally think that outsourcing is a good business practice and would love to discuss this opinion with you, if you like.

Peace and low stress!:yourock:

[Deja Q]

9. The question is, how good is business when it removes the ethics?

If wages around the world were equal, I'd have less of a gripe.

If the peoples of the world weren't working in sweatshop conditions, I'd agree with you.

But those are not the case. There is exploitation and sweatshop activity going on.

Indeed, the day I noticed Daytons selling the same clothing items as Target, albeit with a different brand label and 4x the sticker price was the day I reslized the high price stores are a load of steaming cowpies. Funny, that...

BTW: Where do you work? What's your position and duties? Do you fear your job going bye-bye, which in turn causes any amount of stress and depression?

What will it take for you to see those ugly parts of the picture? It's far more than the almighty dollar.

Never mind how the quest for lower prices has created products that don't withstand much use. Kindly explain how it's ghreat for a consumer to buy a 3-pak set of underwear for $6 that has to be repurchased in 2 months because, 6 washings later, the damn thing sdevelop holes?! That's great for you. But one day I may say "piss off" and go commando. The pants I wear last a hell of a lot longer.

Shoes should be able to last more than 3 months as well, I don't care if it's $10 per pair. People on today's wages cannot afford continual repurchasing of goods.

Indeed, I will shop at walmart because it's all the same garbage-quality fluff - but at prices closer to what they're worth. And even then, a gigantic - undeserved - profit is being made. People work hard for their money. Especially these days.

People will pay for quality. But there is less and less quality. And it's not difficult to spot; I am very choosy when buying anything these days.

Put everything on profit, and the quality goes down as well. We've all seen it before.

BTW: The business world is still forced to operate in the real world. Once a country we "trade" with turns on us, bad things happen. Exhibit 1: China. Exhibit 2: India (though they haven't turned yet and within 20 years, you bet they will.)

I have often tried to understand your business (not you personally, this business concept), but things don't add up.

Quality (and loyalty) go out the door along with it. And I know many Republicans who agree; they have seen how offshoring's unwanted side-effects have become the norm.

Another case is "business-grade" PCs being sold dirt cheap - they also have any number of defects and problems. I know people angry with Dell, for example... I ain't so happy with HP either. $500 for a PDA with problems they have yet to address despite numerous amounts of people reporting the same exact problem. That's BAD BUSINESS PRACTICE and it's not solely a problem from HP...

I sure as hell haven't seen Microsoft products improve inreliability. And they offshore programming. To countries with 70%+ piracy rates... why are business rewarding countries that steal? That sends a whacking HUGE message to everybody in the world. And you ought to be seeing it too since you are in support of it.)

Indeed, for corporations to LEECH off of products like Linux and FreeBSD and sell it for hundreds or thousands of dollars is despicable. No volunteer programmer expected this to happen. Especially with Apple; people were up in arms. (I should find out if they kept their promise and put things back into the FreeBSD pool where they took things out...) Red Hat Fedora now a hot topic because the programmers were angry over RH taking what came from Fedora and plopping it into their Enterprise Linux product while making those people beta testers! Leeching is immoral. I'm sorry if it's "just business".

Once the ethics come back into business will I take you at face value. But, right now, I would like a refresher as to why you believe it's a good business practice. I've just stated my reasonings.

[mdmc]

10. that is a big post.. . let me read it and get back to you in a couple of

minutes..

Thanks!

Peace and low stress.

[mdmc]

17. ok... I read your post, and was able to reply

But first I must say that I think that you are a great person and I love reading your stuff here at DU.


If wages around the world were equal, I'd have less of a gripe. <- this would = no need to outsource.

If the peoples of the world weren't working in sweatshop conditions, I'd agree with you. <- this is a big concern, especially when using child labor.

But those are not the case. There is exploitation and sweatshop activity going on. <-I agree, and this needs to stop.

Indeed, the day I noticed Daytons selling the same clothing items as Target, albeit with a different brand label and 4x the sticker price was the day I realized the high price stores are a load of steaming cowpies. Funny, that... <- True high end fashion has still not been outsourced. If you buy Gucci, Armani or Versace', the clothing is made by union labor in Italy. Both of these firms also have crap made in China. You could by the good, expensive stuff, or you can buy the cheap China crap. These designers still offer both.

BTW: Where do you work? What's your position and duties? Do you fear your job going bye-bye, which in turn causes any amount of stress and depression? I am currently unemployed. I used to work as an outsourced child protection caseworker (In the USA, each county is responsible for making sure that children are not abused or neglected. In my county, this work is not entirely done by unionized, county employees. This saves the taxpayers money). There are some jobs that cannot be off-shored (regional, service jobs). I do suffer from anxiety and depression.

What will it take for you to see those ugly parts of the picture? It's far more than the almighty dollar. I do see the ugliness of it all. I have a solution. The solution is to keep your money in the revolution! Buy local. Choose to pay more for American products. Choose to pay more taxes. Choose to support our collective quality of life as opposed to buying the cheapest product available. Take personal responsibility for your actions.

Never mind how the quest for lower prices has created products that don't withstand much use. Kindly explain how it's great for a consumer to buy a 3-pak set of underwear for $6 that has to be repurchased in 2 months because, 6 washings later, the damn thing develop holes?! That's great for you. But one day I may say "piss off" and go commando. The pants I wear last a hell of a lot longer. <- As long as Americans want to buy crap, it should be available for sale. We should compete with this off-shored crap by creating a marketing campaign in support of quality, union made goods. People should have a choice, and should choose the right choice (quality, union made goods that cost a bit more).

Shoes should be able to last more than 3 months as well, I don't care if it's $10 per pair. People on today's wages cannot afford continual repurchasing of goods. People should be allowed to buy what they want. Again, there are tons of quality footwear manufacturers that have not off-shored their production. Many offer both Chinese made shit and unionized made products. We should buy the union made products and avoid the off-shored crap.

Indeed, I will shop at walmart because it's all the same garbage-quality fluff - but at prices closer to what they're worth. And even then, a gigantic - undeserved - profit is being made. People work hard for their money. Especially these days. <-Why? Please shop at locally owned stores. Shop at unionized stores. Shop at stores that are "blue", like Costco. Shop on-line. We can do better then Wal-Mart, although it might be less convenient and more costly. It will be better for all of us in the long run.

People will pay for quality. But there is less and less quality. And it's not difficult to spot; I am very choosy when buying anything these days. Along with quality, please remember that there is also a quality of life. A pair of Nikes (made by kids in China) can be of better quality then a pair of Prada sneakers (made in Italy). Companies can still be excellent community neighbors by supporting community based actions. I try to buy products that support my world view.

Put everything on profit, and the quality goes down as well. We've all seen it before. Yes. But sometimes quality can be duplicated offshore. We must remember to support quality of life.

BTW: The business world is still forced to operate in the real world. Once a country we "trade" with turns on us, bad things happen. Exhibit 1: China. Exhibit 2: India (though they haven't turned yet and within 20 years, you bet they will.) Collective security is the only sure bet to promote security. The more people that are invested in a "middle class lifestyle", the less hostility and violence you are forced to deal with.

I have often tried to understand your business (not you personally, this business concept), but things don't add up. People should be allowed to buy what they want (cheap imports, or union made, American product). It is up to us (you and me, and people that want unions to be successful) to change public opinion. It is better to pay a little more to support our collective way of life. When we buy cheap outsourced shit, we are cheating ourselves in the long run. As long as Americans would rather build themselves up at the expense of their country, we will continue to offshore production.

Quality (and loyalty) go out the door along with it. And I know many Republicans who agree; they have seen how off-shoring's unwanted side-effects have become the norm. The solution is to be loyal to unionized products. They cost more. They won't last any longer or work any better. But it is better for us to buy them because they support our local community.

Another case is "business-grade" PCs being sold dirt cheap - they also have any number of defects and problems. I know people angry with Dell, for example... I ain't so happy with HP either. $500 for a PDA with problems they have yet to address despite numerous amounts of people reporting the same exact problem. That's BAD BUSINESS PRACTICE and it's not solely a problem from HP... <- that is bad business.:shrug:

I sure as hell haven't seen Microsoft products improve inreliability. And they offshore programming. To countries with 70%+ piracy rates... why are business rewarding countries that steal? That sends a whacking HUGE message to everybody in the world. And you ought to be seeing it too since you are in support of it.) As long as they make money, and no one challenges them, what is the alternative?

Indeed, for corporations to LEECH off of products like Linux and FreeBSD and sell it for hundreds or thousands of dollars is despicable. No volunteer programmer expected this to happen. Especially with Apple; people were up in arms. (I should find out if they kept their promise and put things back into the FreeBSD pool where they took things out...) Red Hat Fedora now a hot topic because the programmers were angry over RH taking what came from Fedora and plopping it into their Enterprise Linux product while making those people beta testers! Leeching is immoral. I'm sorry if it's "just business". I don't know any of this stuff. I am sorry.

Once the ethics come back into business will I take you at face value. But, right now, I would like a refresher as to why you believe it's a good business practice. I've just stated my reasonings. Choice is good business practice. Americans should be willing to purchase products that strengthen America instead of strengthening only their pocketbook. It is up to progressives to change the heart and minds of consumers. It may cost more money, but it is worth it. Until buying "Made in America" product is more important then buying the cheapest products, I don't see a way to end offshoring. The solution is a collective change of heart. Until Americans avoid Walmart, and support unionized products, off shoring is what America wants and deserves. It is up to us to change this situation.

[Kare]

23. Where are they?

"The solution is to keep your money in the revolution! Buy local. Choose to pay more for American products."

Where are these American products? When was the last time you saw something with a Made in U.S.A. sticker on it? I have heard that those stickers are made in another country even!

I completely agree that products are mainly crap and you have to buy them again in a few months just to have the same worthless product that lasts a couple months.
I actually bought a washer/dryer set last year and the salesman admitted to me that the ones built today should only last about 3 years. My mother had hers for 20 years, the ones I replaced were at least 10 years old.
I personally would pay more to have the products last longer but where are they now? There is no quality in anything.
My Refrigerator is 3 years old. The shelves sit on cheap plastic supports, one of them broke recently, theres no way to replace the part its connected to the wall of the frig. I don't want to buy a new frig just because one shelf broke so I have to live with this.

It's ridiculous the low quality of products that are put out today. There used to be pride in workmanship where did that go? Maybe it is an outdated thing, and now that the pride is in making things as cheaply as you can, quality goes out the window.

I would love to be able to buy American but where are the products?

[mdmc]

25. I guess what I am saying is that Americans get the economy we

deserve.

Some things, such as a tv, are not made in America. However, the American consumer can choose which retail outlet to purchase the tv from. Recently I saw the same tv for sale at Shoprite (which is organized under the Teamsters) and at Walmart. The wise choice is to pay more for the tv at Shoprite. The selfish choice would be to save $20.00 and buy the tv from Walmart.

Americans get the economy that they deserve.

ps- there are still some things (clothing) that is made in the USA.

[Mugu]

35. Seems I remember an old saying something to the effect:

The satisfaction that quality endears remains long after the sting of payment is forgotten.

Regards,

Mugu

[mdmc]

36. very nice saying

peace and low stress. Welcome to DU!

[seabeyond]

8. employees have changed the last couple decades and it is an

issue for companies. whenever talking to my republican business owner i always have to validate their complaint on employee, but..... i tell them regardless at this time the issue is the corporations. when talking on this board i try to express how there is issues, serious issue with our work force. i see the mentality mentioned often here on this board all over the place, about what the company owes them, but little about what there part of the equation is. i have worked in two totally different businesses. one pays minimum wage and is hard physical work. the other pays top pay for this area, a lot of sittin and thinkin and lots of advantages. i truely see the minimum wage worker kicking ass, doing way more work with way less complaining as the other group whines all the time, incessantly about being picked on, not getting enough, boss not fair, hard work (my ass), i deserve more bullshit.

i am on my kids asses and nieces and nephews, when doing a chore, not good enough, would fire your ass if you were an employee. too many kids going into the work force dont know what work is, with a good attitude which is part of the pay.

[Deja Q]

12. In another world, I'd agree...

But America made those corporations. Corporations who don't pay their fair share of taxes, amongst other things.

I don't disagree that employees may have too many ideas that they are "owed". But we're seeing time and time again how corporations are far worse than employees with this entitlement crap.

I don't disagree that video games are taking up too much of young peoples' time. But why is nobody doing anything about that? (you don't want me to expound on this point, so let's leave it at that...)

Our country is a big community. We all owe each other.

And with the trade deficit and national debt being big issues, we need to take care of our own or abandon America now and let us all die.

For, you see, offshoring is not sending the right message to people. I see how it is a kick in the pants for some people to further their careers, no doubt about it. But I know too many people - good, HARD, workers, who are so disillusioned over the corporate sect that they have stopped because of it.

Indeed, I sure as hell am getting out of IT by 2007. I'm moving into a different field. I see no future in IT. Or engineering. Corporate leaders offshoring this for pennies on the dollar. NO INCENTIVE TO DO IT. And money is an incentive to do things - as we've all discovered.

See my other response above, but don't blame everything on the workers. There's far more to the issue. (it's as bad as election 2000 - Nader became a scapegoat when there were numerous other factors involved, and people wilfully choose to ignore those. Sorry, that doesn't cut much ice with me.)

You can see what you want, BTW, regarding minimum wage workers doing harder... I've seen how they're treated too. With intimidation. You should have seen what I had at walmart a few months' ago. Disgusting...

We all wear rose colored glasses...

[seabeyond]

15. firstly clearly i did NOT blame EVERYTHING on the worker

clearly i said corporations are the issue in todays world NOT the worker. that is what i address with all the repug business owners. the people that have been in business 4 decades and more. that know the only way to a successfully run business is a three way equal flow from corp to worker to customer. but this post of yours is exactly the example of what i am tlaking about when addressing employee responsibility on this board. you start a thread on employee work ethics,..... i pin all responsibility on corps today, yet then i talk about what i am seeing iwth employee. and you jump my ass, dismiss what i say, and say quit blaming employee

get it

rose color glasses. another way dismiss. but, not a correct assumption on your part i assure you. you want a serious conversation i am there. if you are just to dump on corp rah rah employee and not try to resolve or see the issue, why waste my time

[acmejack]

14. Yes!!!!

No matter what kind of smoke they try to blow up your ass in the final analysis it boils down to one thing-PROFIT! They can get the same skills for a quarter of the price, it is a simple analysis, they save money-done deal. There is no loyalty in business. They like employee loyalty they tout it, corporate culture all that crap, but it is a one way street, employees are a commodity, to be consumed and discarded at the company's pleasure.

that's exactly how they look at us right here: from Seabeyond's post: (Seabeyond must be an HR person, no one else could possibly be such a JERK) talking about us: "top pay for this area, a lot of sittin and thinkin and lots of advantages.<snip> whines all the time, incessantly about being picked on, not getting enough, boss not fair, hard work (my ass), i deserve more bullshit."

In other word's see ya, chump, enjoy your life while I offshore your job! You and the family go ahead and starve in the new compassionate America. But I care, cause I'm a DLC Democrat!

[Armstead]

24. They only get away with it because WE let them and encourage them

If Americans would stop condoning and accepting this kind of behavior and lack of human values in Corporate America, the corporate elite would change their ways in a heartbeat. Not because they are wonderful people, but because they'd have to.

But we idiots have cheered them on for 25 years as they dismantled America. The average American's attitude has been "keep turning the screwdriver to my gut, as long as my personal portfolio goes up, and as long as you give me cheap prices."

We have been idiots collectively ever since around 1980. The Corporate Elite is merely part of it.

[donsu]

16. YES PNAC wanted america destroyed and made into their fantasy

we are destroyed

[Armstead]

18. No -- It's collective short-sightedness, greed and stupidity

This would not be happening if we average people were not so stupid and short-sighted. "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars but in ourselves."

The basic problem is Human Nature. There's a little mechanism inside all of us that is able to separate our beliefs from our actions, when the connection seems too abstract. ..It's the economic version of pollution and Global Warming. All of our of cars are mucking up the atmosphere. But I don't relate to that when I drive down to the store.

Likewise, we don't look at the cumulative result of our economic decisions.

There is no Corporate Elite who is deliberately trying to dismantle America. But there is a Corporate Elite who doesn't really give a shit about the larger impacts of their actions. All they care about is the bottom line. There is a basic cognitive disconnect there.

Jack Welch, one of the early prime movers in this strategy, thinks of himself as a Good American. But he also developed the ability to disassociate his actions as a business execute from their actual impact on America.

There are also a lot of businesspeople who don't want to offshore, but who believe they have no choice. And they are correct to an extent......I was talking with a guy recently, for example, who invented a little product with plans to manufacture it. His original idea was to manufacture and subcontract it right here, because he is a community type of guy. But when he got the cost estimates and compared it to comparable products made overseas, he reluctantly decided there is NO WAY he could do that. The difference in cost ws just too great.....So he reluctantly decided he'd have to have it made overseas too.

And then of course there are us consumers. We want to save a buck or two, so we don't bother to look at where the products are made. And, like lemmings, we keep going to Wal Mart, which is a prime driver of offshoring.

[acmejack]

21. I worked at General Electric when Neutron jack started his reign of terror

It was at the time the greatest job I ever had. I fully intended to work there until I retired. Everyone there did, just as people always had. It was an engineering Department run by engineers, doing engineering. We had our best year ever, Jack came, we expected he would say something nice about our record setting year, no, he told us we were overpaid, underworked, and overstaffed.

They fired 25% of the department the next quarter, froze everyone's pay for the next year, and replaced our management with outsiders that had no idea what we did, how we did it, or who we did it for. Morale naturally soared resulting in the kind of problems Seabeyond was complaining about with American workers. We never had them before Jack crapped all over everybody, but after you treat people like shit ,you can't expect them to have good attitudes! Duh....

[Armstead]

22. My father worked for GE and took early retirement

After a long career with GE, my father got fed up with the "new GE" of Jack Welch and took early retirement. He had been a very loyal "company man" for many years, and I'm sure would have stayed with the company under different circumstances. But he had integrity and saw the ciorporate culture changing in a way he couldn't tolerate. So he got out.

It's subsequently always baffled me why Welch is always touted as a model for the modern executive, and GE as a "most admired" company.

It shows my original point. We as a society enabled and rewarded bad behavior throughout the 80's and 90's, making the most ruthles dismantlers of the American Dream into our heroes.

[madrchsod]

19. yes it is.

cheap labor is the life blood of the corporate class. everything in the united states is based on short term results. every quarter business decides what must be done to maintain or improve the next quarter. walmart has it down-if a company sells to walmart they demand a lower price on the next contract or they lose..

[Asgaya Dihi]

26. The way I look at it...

the basis of our problems as a nation come down to two key mistakes. The first was a decision of the Supreme Court to read the constitution as giving corporations person-hood, and the second was a decision to equate money with speech. We now have massive, immortal "people" out there who aren't bound by the same laws that we are, who aren't subject to prison or any retribution at all in too many cases, and who can shout down any opposition by simply buying the press.

Our nation, and our future, was bought and sold long ago. We're just now starting to realize it. In a global economy we don't even matter anymore, those corporations aren't "American". They can take their profits, and their business, anywhere they want when we're all used up. In the meantime, we make good enforcers for their policies and needs.

[area51]

27. "And is that deliberate? Is America being dismantled?"

Yes and yes.

[Hoping4Change]

28. My question is what jobs are going to replace outsourced jobs.

Anything that can be done with a computer can be outsourced. What can possibly replace these millions of jobs? Health care is said to be a growing industry but with people forced into service jobs that don't have benefits won't fewer people be able to access heath care? Hilary Clinton says outsourcing is inevitable but what jobs does she see replacing the outsourced jobs? Even if a new industry was developed like for instance cheap solar power, what guarantees that that the new industry isn't going to outsource?

[LongTomH]

29. More Bad News

Some health care jobs can be outsourced - people in India are evaluating X-Ray pictures for American healthcare corporations. Also, they can be insourced, by people on H1B or L1 visas - visit someone in an American hospital and notice the accents of the nurses and techs.

[Blue_Tires]

30. yeah

nt

[Neil Lisst]

31. 99% greed. 1% having board meetings in exotic locations.