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Tom, I stand right behind you on this issue. But where were you & I when the Japanese's did the very same thing to our TV industry. I don't know what you were doing but I sure know what I was doing, sitting around in sunny Southern Calif watching a 13" Japanese's TV. It was nice, small, cheap, I paid just $65.00 out the door. I never thought for one minute that w/in 15 years they would be doing the same thing to our auto industry and that was with our and their governments's blessing. Hell when I went to work Ford Motor in July of 1979 the USA auto industry was going out of business. We were fighting not only Japan but we were fighting the same old people that is running our government right now. If anybody is so naive to believe that George W Bush is not lining his pockets and the pockets of all his kids and his cronies also? Anybody that thinks otherwise is a complete idiot. And who is behind all of this, George W, hell he has to ask Dick Cheney as to just what day it is to just what to say and when to say it. I believe it's the WTO that is behind all of this. The ones that I feel bad for is the very next generation because they will be the very first generation in the history of our way of living that will not be able to live as well as their parents. Now just think what I just said the very "First Generation" that will not be able to buy a home, a VCR, a new American built car not one of those Japanese home grown piece's of crap but a true American built vehicle's. If anybody has even a thought that they want a Camry or a Honda that they are buying an American made vehicle, is lying to themselves, think for one minute, a Camry has only 36% local content. Which means that the Toyota Camry has only a true local content is 18% because 18% of all cars / trucks no matter how much material or how much assembly labor goes into the vehicle it comes to 18%. Honda has a Whopping 55% local content which is the best of all the foreign built vehicle for local content. But if you have been really watching and listening real close when the Camry vehicle ad's come on the radio or the TV they do not say any more about their "BEST IN CLASS" quality, which by the way is shared by two (2) American Car companies, Ford AND Chrysler corp. It might of taken a few more years then we wanted but we are fighting back.
RK
Oh by the way most American built vehicles have at least a 90% local content. And if anybody wishes me to give them a local content for most of Ford Motor's engine parts i can do that and boy will they be surprised
-------Original Message-------
Date: Friday, August 01, 2003 9:51:07 PM
Subject: Re: ShopTalk: Bush and Unemployement
Dr Tutelman;
I don't mean to be maudlin but let me ask this (and I hope for one of your
typically "reasoned" responses."
Suppose your son is working in the tech field and he dearly loves his job.
Suppose further that your son learns that he's going to train his
replacement, who comes from another country. Further still, suppose the
trainee semi-learns the job and then returns to his country where your son's
job has been transferred to. Then, you son loses his job, and can't find
another in the same field because the foreign country has usurped the field.
Finally, suppose your son becomes destitute to the point where he can't go
on any longer.
Would any of that scenario cause you to consider that the exportation of
American tech jobs is an absolutely terrible fact of tech life?
Please do not respond with platitudes. My wife and I have been living a
nightmare caused in large part by the very fact of exported jobs. We lost a
son in large part as a result of these awful programs (h1b, L1, NAFTA,
et.al.)
Sorry to say, I voted for GW. Now, after having observed him in action, I
belive he's a complete fool. A dunderhead. I'm anxiously awaiting our next
presidential election so I can vote for someone else.
Our government is screwing us and we're making philosophical excuses for
them.
TFlan
----- Original Message -----
From: "Dave Tutelman" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Friday, August 01, 2003 2:58 PM
Subject: Re: ShopTalk: Bush and Unemployement
> Ed Reeder,
> First off, thanks for the link to PPI. Just got up from ROTFLMAO. While it
> is inherently no laughing matter, it was only a matter of time before
> somebody would find some humor in it.
>
> And thanks for the link to the IEEE web site. I did use it to email the
> president. Here is the contents of my note:
>
> "In my software development work, I have been involved with two different
> types of export of jobs. In neither case was the competence of US workers
> inferior:
>
> "(1) The entire development was "shipped offshore" to Russia, and the
> specification and testing was done by the old [stateside] workers. Those
> workers' experience was that the software developed by the Russians was
> decidedly inferior to the work they were used to from the in-company,
> in-USA developers. But management deemed it a success because the cost of
> labor was substantially lower, even though product quality suffered.
>
> "(2) Many foreign-visa workers were hired to work alongside US workers. On
> the two projects like this that I worked, the majority of foreign workers
> were from India. There was certainly no superior competence among the
> foreign workers. They were competent, but no more so on average than their
> American counterparts. And the best individual performers on both projects
> were US born and raised. The foreigners were deemed to have a "better work
> ethic" than the US workers -- meaning that management could bully them
> into far more unpaid hours. But talking with them, it was easy to tell
> that they were more malleable because they depended on the job to stay in
> the country. Lose the job, lose the visa.
>
> "So on balance, the reasons Americans are losing software jobs are labor
> cost issues, either directly (much lower wages overseas) or indirectly
> (somewhat lower wages, and easier to get unpaid hours from a visa holder).
> The reason has nothing to do with the alleged inferiority of the skills of
> US workers."
>
> Guys, I'm torn about how I feel on the tech-job-export issue. Bush's
> statements were completely wrong and off-the-wall. And I sincerely believe
> what I wrote above; the export of jobs is motivated by cost of labor, pure
> and simple. But...
>
> On Tuesday, I returned home to find that this thread had started. I was
> returning from lunch with an ex-colleague -- we'll call him Mike, because
> that's his name. At least half that lunch was spent discussing this very
> issue.
>
> Mike has always been a strong supporter of free markets; I have tended to
> favor a regulated free market, to keep companies' short-term self-interest
> from running amok. But Mike was deeply disturbed, and with good reason. He
> has lost two jobs in the last two years to offshore developments. He
> believes that by 2006 there will be almost no software development done in
> the USA. Why? Unrestricted free markets.
>
> If we believe that free-market capitalism is the answer, then jobs WILL be
> exported. The cost motivation is just too juicy for any competent manager
> to ignore. And free-market capitalism judges the competence of managers by
> their ability to turn a profit: that is, to cut costs and/or increase
revenues.
>
> At the same time Mike (and I too) is hurt emotionally by the impending
loss
> of job opportunities in his chosen career. Yes, he is undoubtedly a better
> software developer than all but a very few offshore workers (or, for that
> matter, US workers). But, given the cost differential, he can be replaced
> by two or more developers in India for less money than he would cost his
> employer.
>
> So what is the correct answer:
> * A basically American belief in free markets?
> * An isolationist stance that job exports should be forbidden by
government?
>
> Sorry, but I don't know the answer. I don't even know which way I lean at
> the moment. With friends like Mike -- and my older son as well -- in this
> business, I'm looking for some reason to believe that isolationism makes
> sense. But, given my understanding of history, it never seems to work that
way.
>
> Sorry, just ruminating.
> DaveT
>
>
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