60,000 Manufacturing Plants Closed Since 2001

originally posted by: jonnywhite
Hypothetically, if you can move your workforce overseas and pay someone less who does the same job equally well then what's the moral failing???? It just makes business sense. Why would you hire someone who wants more money, but doesn't do an equivalent amount of work? Maybe you don't need to pay 2x for 1.1x productivity because you're doing fine as you're?

IMHO, US workers forgot how to work. They ask exorbitant wages and benefits but do not compensate you. And the government overtaxes everything, forcing you to be as international as possible. If you can build a part of your business in another country because the taxes are lower, WHY NOT? I'd do what makes sense.

What's happening is the fat americans are waking up to a bigger world and suddenly realizing they have to compete with them. And they're performing pitifully. Students are failing. Workers are failing. It's so bad foreigners come here to get formally educated and do great, proving the problem isn't our schools but our parents. Our parents aren't pushing students to excel and to pursue work at the level they should.

Sorry I have no sympathy. It can't be simpler.

You're right, I think your post is bunk. Blame blue collar workers for "forgetting how to work"?

The labor history is America was one of perpetual struggle to win safe workplace conditions and livable wages. Once it became possible to reverse these gains by off shoring capital did so and fled to various "developing" nations so the early industrial conditions could continue.

The megalithic profits being made for owners, executives and majority shareholders is inexcusable. They've done a great job of convincing, no, conning people like you into thinking US workers are lazy and unproductive.

a reply to: JeanPaul
Sorry. It really is this bad.

content.time.com - China Beats Out Finland for Top Marks in Education...

I sometimes wonder if the west just has bad ideas. Here's this:

Here point is to say that forcing coutnries like china to be democratic might be worse htan leaving them as they're, at least for the present time. When china has developed a stronger middle class, they'll naturally become more democratic. If we leave them alone, it'll happen easier.

originally posted by: Aazadan
a reply to: rainbowbear

3 years ago I was going on about the robot waiters that were coming to take away those service sector jobs. China and Japan have been developing and deploying them. In restaurants these days a robot serves you and takes your order. Whenever it finally catches on over here, those jobs will be gone.

I may have missed my prediction on when it will happen, but I promise it's coming. McDonalds is starting to use kiosks in their stores where you order without a cashier. These jobs will soon be gone. I think it's a good thing that we can supply humanities needs, wants, and desires with less labor but the question becomes... how do we then adjust the income system so that people are still self supporting when we don't have the jobs to go around?

Regardless of what we do with the minimum wage, this is coming and it will affect all of us. From the business owner who now has a new labor dynamic to the student trying to earn rent money while going to college.

Yes, technological unemployment is a major issue side by side with off shoring and "insourcing" cheaper labor.

originally posted by: jonnywhite
a reply to: JeanPaul
Sorry. It really is this bad. I look left and right and I see americans who expect a good life to be given to them. Nothing is given. It has to be taken. Get competitive or get used to welfare.

(Shakes head)

It's like playing a game of musical chairs with 20 chairs and 200 people. No matter what, when the music stops there will be 180 people left without a chair (living wage job).

You're just being a corporate mouthpiece. Like a good patriotic American should.

originally posted by: peck420

So, again...it is only fair when it benefits you.

Boohoo.

Of course I'm in it for myself and my nation.............. Great Britain that is. I do believe that there was more chance of our manufacturing doing well before the Commies got crafty in China and sold their products for next to nothing using slave labour and unfair working conditions to the detriment of the environment just to steal our western curreny and close down our manufacturing strength.

Anyway China is one very big opportunity to us. We have to sell our stuff over there and even if you sell to something like 1% of the population then that's 13 million Land Rovers and Jaguars. What a market! We need to forget about the pain maunufacturers in China have caused (the bankers in reality as you correctly point out) and loomk at teir emerging middle class and make and sell and sell.

It's all about branding. Making thinks that appeal to the new emerging middle class in China that scream Britishness or in your case USA and selling it to them. So many potential customers to provide a taste of the west

originally posted by: jonnywhite
IMHO, US workers forgot how to work. They ask exorbitant wages and benefits but do not compensate you. And the government overtaxes everything, forcing you to be as international as possible. If you can build a part of your business in another country because the taxes are lower, WHY NOT? I'd do what makes sense.

You are probably sort of right. I'm in Great Britain and many of our natives have forgotten how to work. Guess it's the same in the USA. You wouldn't believe what our social security net is like. People don't want to work for a living anymore. They want free hand outs from the state. Try and get them to work for a living? Forget it. That's only a proportion of our population but they have forgotten how to work. I know manufacturers around here and they prefer foreigners from eastern Europe as workers. They say they are superior workers. I know one pot bank and getting on for all their packers are female Poles. They know how to work

a reply to: ufoorbhunter

It's funny you say that because there's bigger issues at hand here.

They have screening process that screen out millions of people who would love nothing more than to work hard for a living and then they complain about the pool of workers that they have left.

Can't have it both ways.

a reply to: onequestion

I don't understand....... I'm thick and only understand ufos, can you explain please?

a reply to: onequestion

It's ok I get it now. I think So yes I know where you are coming from. Maybe we can do a swap............. Like a swap shop. We will take you in and let you work hard for a living if there is a way to rid ourselves of the lazy buggers as a swap.

I'm a few days late on this thread, amusingly enough because I have been working so much at a factory. I normally lurk but figured I'd post some of my thoughts.

There are still manufacturing jobs out there, but they are with small family or employee owned companies. The bigger ones of course all shipped their operations overseas years ago, but if you want to do manufacturing, it's out there. Are the wages like they were in the 70s? Of course not. But do they pay better than fast food work, retail, or other entry level jobs? Absolutely.

I can't speak for all companies of course, but at least at the one I work for, good workers are hard to come by. Many applicants fail the initial drug test, and occasionally even the basic math and reasoning tests given during the application process. The ones that do make it in seldom last very long, either due to not showing up for work, or from hurting themselves and then failing a post-injury breathalyzer or drug test. It's tragic. It's gotten so bad that the company has started offering large bonuses to anyone who refers a friend or family member that actually lasts a year.

a reply to: subarujump

Thats the key. If you want to work in Manufacturing, look for a small family owned company, don't work for a publicly traded corporation! I have seen places start off small, grow in success to a large operation, and eventually get sold to a corporation, at point which all the new corporate hires promptly start throwing the loyal long term workers who started the place under the bus to replace them with cheaper younger workers and to increase the pool of money available for their own pay scale. Alot of times nowadays its the accounting department that throws workers out in the street. Its much better to work at a small place that's on the upswing than a large company where you are just a number. And if you have the misfortune to work at a stock owned company, it will just be a perpetual spiral of lost benefits, overtime, and perks until they finally just outsource your job. Honestly the best thing anyone can do now is try to become self employed over time.