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Sorry Protesters: Your Jobs Are Being Sent To China And They Aren't Coming Back
Sorry Protesters: Your Jobs Are Being Sent To China And They Aren't Coming Back
Courtesy of Michael Snyder, The Economic Collapse
Did you see the huge crowds of protesters that flooded the Michigan Capitol on Tuesday? They were there to protest two bills there were being considered by the state legislature that would limit the power of unions in the state. Michigan lawmakers approved the bills and this absolutely infuriated the protesters.
There is a lot of passion on both sides of this debate, but I am afraid that both sides in this debate are missing the bigger picture. If we keep shipping millions of our jobs to China, there isn't going to be work for anyone no matter how much power unions have or don't have.
During the month of October, the U.S. trade deficit increased to 42.2 billion dollars. Our trade with China accounted for most of that deficit. Our trade deficit with China in October increased to a new all-time one month record of 29.5 billion dollars. Nearly 30 billion dollars that could have gone to U.S. businesses and U.S. workers went to China instead. Since 1975, a total of about 8 trillion dollars that could have gone to U.S. businesses and U.S. workers went to the rest of the world instead.
Shiny new factories are going up all over China, and meanwhile our once great manufacturing cities are degenerating into desolate wastelands. So what is going to happen when all of the good paying manufacturing jobs are gone? Are we all going to fight bitterly over whether we should unionize the low paying jobs that remain at places such as Wal-Mart and McDonalds? Such an approach is not going to bring back prosperity to America. We desperately need to start building things and start creating real wealth inside this country once again. We desperately need to stop sending tens of thousands of businesses, millions of jobs and trillions of dollars of our national wealth out of the country. Unfortunately, I don't see anyone out there holding protests about our trade deficit. Nobody really seems to care, so our economy will continue to bleed good jobs and the middle class will continue to be destroyed.
The funny thing is that the workers that are out there protesting these union bills actually voted for the politicians that are killing their jobs. Both parties are married to the one world economic system and the "free trade" agenda, and Barack Obama has been one of the worst offenders. He has been pushing for more "free trade agreements" throughout the past four years, and yet union workers continue to support him enthusiastically.
How foolish can they possibly be?
Yeah, let's merge American workers into a global labor pool with workers in third world countries on the other side of the globe that work in absolutely nightmarish conditions for as little as 45 dollars a month. That sounds like a great idea, doesn't it?
Oh, but you don't want to work for 45 dollars a month?
You don't even want to work for 450 dollars a month?
Well, then the big corporations that fund politicians like Obama will just take your jobs and send them halfway around the planet.
Do you think that your unions will save your jobs?
Michigan already has the highest rate of union membership in the Midwest.
It also has the highest rate of unemployment in the Midwest.
Over the past couple of decades, thousands of businesses in Michigan have either closed down or moved facilities overseas.
Did the unions prevent any of that?
No.
If union bosses really wanted to do some good, they would be organizing protests against our incredibly foolish trade policies.
But instead, they tell their members to vote for politicians like Obama and then they run out to the stores and fill their carts with huge piles of products that were made in China.
Union workers need to wake up to one fundamental economic fact - in a one world economic system, the big corporations simply do not need you. They can make their products in lots of other countries where it is legal to pay slave labor wages.
But instead of getting upset about what is really killing their jobs, union workers in Michigan are screaming mad about a couple of new laws that will take some power away from the unions.
That is kind of like being obsessed with a broken fingernail when your leg has just been sawed off and you are gushing blood all over the floor.
Oh, but union workers did put on a good show up in Michigan. The following is how a Bloomberg article described the protests...
Officials spent days gearing up for crowds brought out by the legislature’s sudden action last week to give initial approval to three anti-dues bills, which exclude police and firefighters. At least one helicopter buzzed overhead today, and mounted police surveyed the protesters. Signs reading “Don’t hurt working families” dotted lawns.
The crowd numbered more than 10,000, according to State Police Inspector Gene Adamczyk, with more buses still arriving. The Capitol was closed when it reached its capacity of 2,000.
The anger surrounding these protests was almost palpable. One state representative even declared that "there will be blood".
Meanwhile, many of those same protesters will buy toys for their kids that were made in China with wrapping paper that was made in China and they will put them under a Christmas tree that was made in China.
Merging our economy with the economy of communist China was one of the stupidest economic moves that we could have ever made. They are systematically taking our wealth, and then we have to go over there and beg them to lend money back to us.
Pretty soon the Chinese economy will dwarf ours. According to the National Intelligence Council, the GDP of Asia will have surpassed the GDP of North America and the GDP of all of Europe combined by 2030.
But if we had never opened up trade with communist China none of this would have ever happened.
Why won't American workers get upset about this stuff?
Do you really want your standard of living to decline to the level of a Chinese factory worker?
You can see some photos of what life is like for workers in China's toy factories right here. This is what the future holds for American workers unless something is done.
For much more on how our trade policies are absolutely gutting our economy, please see the statistics in this article: "55 Reasons Why You Should Buy Products That Are Made In America This Holiday Season".
But no, the big unions will never dare oppose Obama. They love him far too much to do that.
Meanwhile, we continue to bleed good jobs. Large companies have announced the elimination of more than 100,000 jobs since November 6th, and it looks like 2013 is going to be a very difficult year for American workers.
If you are an American worker, you need to ask yourself why anyone would want to hire you in this kind of economic environment. You are 10 to 20 times more expensive than workers on the other side of the globe. In addition, our politicians just keep piling more rules, regulations and taxes on to the backs of the employers in this country. It is more difficult than ever to make a profit from the labor of an American worker.
Honestly, I understand why most small businesses don't want to hire anyone in this economic environment. It just doesn't make sense. For much more on this, please see this excellent article by Charles Hugh-Smith.
And there are signs that things are going to get even worse. For example, the NFIB Small Business Outlook survey dropped like a rock during November. That is a very bad sign for hiring.
And another ominous sign for the economy was that the latest trade report showed that imports and exports are both declining. That is usually a signal that a recession is coming. Exports fell faster than imports did, and that is the reason why the trade deficit grew. If imports and exports both fall again next month, it will be time to become extremely concerned. When imports and exports both decline, that is a sign of slowing economic activity.
The United States will always need to trade with other nations, but we need to do it in a way that is balanced and that protects American workers. Right now there is a one way conveyor belt taking businesses, jobs and money out of this country. If we don't do something about our mammoth trade deficit, we will have no chance of reversing the steady decline of the U.S. economy.
Hopefully we can get the American people to wake up and realize this. Instead, most of the comments at the end of this article will probably be about the pros and cons of unions. That will be yet another sign that most people still don't get these issues.
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the 'no tariffs' meme has only been a 1 way street, a $27k Jeep here costs $85k in china. Europe has a VAT tax
It's called MFN status. In short, it gets you the best deal on the table. Once you open yourself up to tariff-free trade however, everyone with MFN gets those same terms.
The root problem is that we keep printing money to grease lending so we can continue to deficit spend. Otherwise there would be a balance of payments in global trade. We'd run out of dollars and actually have to sell something abroad in order to get them back, or be forced to trade internally. That was why under backed currencies -- like the gold and silver standards -- we could never run up such massive deficits which exported our manufacturing base to China, etc.
Politicians are to blame for allowing that to happen. They are in bed with the Baning Cartel which allows them to stay in power by hoodwinking the citizens into believing that their eating from a healthy economic harvest when all they're doing is looting the national stores of economic seed corn.
Free trade unto itself is not the problem. The problem is obvious enough: we've given up our liberty to a bunch of looters.
The answer is LIBERTY.
Of course it literally would not be a problem at all if the US stopped trying to play world-police. China's business model is one of strictly business. Glad to do business with a dictator, glad to do business with the next guy who takes over too. Not really all that reliant on having leaders being puppets to make deals happen, instead they are not one-sided and make sense for everyone. The US on the other hand, has it's economic base and power linked directly with a history of slavery and colonialism and plundering other nations when they can least afford it. The modern world doesn't look too kindly on that anymore.
Chinese investment is no-strings attached. You have a thing China wants? China has a thing you want? Cool, go for it. What you do with your new toys or how you spend your new cash is all on you. China's not going to set conditions on it.
Furthermore, setitng tariffs on goods ain't gonna work out all that well for the US. With the heavy reliance the US has on the Chinese market now and the way the US continually slams the door on Chinese companies trying to make inroads in the US, it wouldn't take much to levy additional taxes to make up for it to any foreign companies with ties to the US. The only way to enact the tariffs is either globally, which ain't gonna go over so well with the rest of the world. Or revoking MFN status, which will see the first situation unfold. Those tariffs by the way? They will hurt the US a whole hell of a lot more than China. As the majority of imported goods in the US, while being "made in china" are not Chinese brands. A massive shift of manufacturing bases takes time and money, and in the meantime, they'll go poof. Wait, what's that? jobs not going to the US? Bingo. Still cheaper and easier to manufacture overseas. Even if there are tarrifs imposed globally, it just does not make any sense. Furthermore, as goods leave China and pop into the US, they are typically very low-value. The "value-add" comes stateside. So the tariffs won't be all that biting anyways. While at the same time, it will just be passed along to the consumer. Who, by the way, now has a lower standard of living and starts to realize that the good-times are over for good.
Under current GATT/WTO rules, a country can levy a general tariff on another country if there is a longstanding import/export deficit with that country, and negotiations betwen the two trading parties do not address the problem. Blaming China is very clever, but wrong, since they are simply following their own self-interest - which happened to coincide with the self-interest of the US foreign investment banking class. A low but increasing tariff until the balance of trade equualizes would work, and I seriously doubt the Chinese would do anything impulsive. A lot of food eaten in China is grown stateside. Plus, "they" would completely understand our position, because they are very much aware of what they would be doing if the situation was reversed.
"A lot of food" Not really. It's mainly just soy, and that can be had from many other locations. China's focus for agricultural imports is primarily on things that are land-intensive. It's not that China *can't* grow them, it's just that it makes no sense to do it when the land can be used more productively.
Aside from quibbling about foody issues, I agree with the first paragraph of your post 100%.
Laomei stop making sense the USA must blame someone for their woes. God forbid we blame the true culprits for our problems. People prefer to believe is is everyone elses fault.
So you advocate appeasement of business to the exclusion of all others, how Victorian of you. If anything, the government should be willing to make it more expensive to even *try* relocating to such locales, as well as empowering citizens to repatriate wayward businesses.
Getting rid of the ALEC apparatus and replacing it with people willing to repeal the law would be acceptable enough. That said, it looks like Hell, MI has now expanded to include the whole state.
If you are the United States, you need to ask yourself why would you want to continue the job of destroying yourself by building up your most dangerous competitor- China.
I'm still trying to understand the point these corporations thought they were making when they moved everything to China. Sure, they got lower taxes and paid lower wages, could pollute with no consequences, and abuse the workers without remorse. But did they ever have a long-term plan, and if so, what was it? Did they really think they were going to install western corporations into key eastern countries and gain access and control of their governments? Or, was it all just short term, paid for inadvertently by the US taxpayers, and a temporary situation while they wait for the US workers to finally see the wisdom of making $1.00 an hour?
Or maybe they really thought the Chinese were going to continue laying out the red carpet for them indefinitely, and they were all going to move themselves and their families to China (like Jim Rogers), and live happily ever after?
I guess they didn't think that the Chinese might be smart, and might have a long-term plan for using all the information and technology they have had the good fortune of gleaning from US corporations (as well as being very nationalist). Chinese must be rolling on the floor laughing, like they did when Geithner was over there telling them their Dollar assets were "safe".
"I'll gladly pay you tommorrow for a hamburger today"
There is already a significant backlash on IP issues... the general rule being don't disclose anything in China you want to keep secret or otherwise keep out of the market.
The other issue is that corporations are run by people who aren't incentivized to see past their noses. Further, the model is more akin to a locust than fostering some child overseas. The entire point is simply to devour resources until resource constraints limit profit or, alternatively, create too much opportunity cost (can move to a cheaper country, e.g. vietnam or boratistan). The point is very simple... profit...
At the end of the day, they'll come back to america when it's cheap enough... in other words, they can actually create the market conditions in the vacant country that ensures they can return and demand a higher profit level than before (capital > labor). Fairly ingenious... although, wrought with... risks of all sorts and, eventually, a rising tide.
corporations are run by people who aren't incentivized to see past their noses
From the executive point of view, it's supposed to be like this.
If the stock price goes up and I sell before any consequences, I *won.* How far is anyone supposed to have look into the future when making investment decisions?
In the long run, we're all dead.
How far is anyone supposed to have look into the future when making investment decisions?
longer than the present common consensus...
The problem with the United States economy is too much legislated (legalized) parasitism. It's not a lack of trade barriers.
And by parasites I mean:
All of this consumes parasitically and does nothing to improve the overall economic standard of living. It is akin to the villagers turnign on the farmers of the town voting for and and leeching off the farmer's seedcorn. Eventually the crops get smaller and smaller, while the whole town is addicted to stealing seedcorn -- laundered through democracy -- rather than producing something of real value that would actually be demanded absent the force of government.
Great topic, but may I digress...when will the general population understand/comprehend how truly mind-numbing the figure of "16 trillion dollars" is ?!?! We will never dig our way out of this hole.
Debt is for the poor people.
And still; No one wants to mention "Free Trade". As long as we keep this lie going we will keep seeing job after job going to those who will work for a dollar a day, and we will keep buying that what they make. We are doing this to our self.
How can we "keep buying that what they make" when the jobs and therefore income, as you mention, are leaving?
When I hear phrases like "general population" and " in the hole" I do think of prisons...Oh wait.