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Our tax structure is not quite the problem. You need taxes to maintain roads, bridges, a school system to educate these workers... Everything that makes this a first world country. The main issue in my opinion is you just can't compete with the ultra low labor rates of other countries like India and China. The tax structure in China is not much different than ours. With wages being a fraction of ours, we simply can't win. These countries can do most anything we can. Whose going to be getting the business?
This brings to mind a conversation I had with a plumber, an older guy who has been in that line of work his entire life. He's seen it all. He said in years past, parts were made here in the U.S. and were of very high quality. Those parts are now harder and harder to find. More often, his vendors will carry China-supplied parts. He referred to them as 'junk' but said they were good for his business. I asked, "How so?" He said, "The parts don't last". In a few years, he might have to redo the same repair, whereas with an American-made part, the repair would be good for decades, if not a lifetime. I thought of that when I read that San Francisco had awarded a huge contract for the rebuilding of the Oakland Bay bridge to a Chinese company. The city will save several million in construction costs, but only time will tell whether that was the right decision.
Which points to the fact that being a wage earner in this economy is more often than not a losing proposition.
The people that will get ahead in the coming years has skills and entrepreneurial drive that will allow them to take their skills out on the market and sell them.
The days of trying to getting ahead on just set salary are so 20th century.
"Which points to the fact that being a wage earner in this economy is more often than not a losing proposition."
I disagree.
When you start in most jobs you are paid a stating salary. as YOU learn your job better you are more productive and get raises accordingly.
I know auto mechanics making 6 figures a year.
In the trades you go from an Apprentice to Journeyman to Master. each position pays more.
Hundreds of thousands of hourly paid people over the years have mad a fine living becoming middle to high middle class and have retired comfortably.
Outsourcing work to companies within the United States is not a bad thing, IMO. Because the work is staying in the country. However, is it H1B holders from other countries that are coming to the US to work or are the jobs for Americans?
Offshoring the work to other countries is what is taking jobs away from Americans. That's a slightly different issue from the original post.
A separate issue that the OP seemed to raise indirectly is that there are many H1B visa holders that are coming onto the shores of the United States to work. They are here for months or years. They are competing against Americans for jobs within the Unitet States. This year, the GOP already expressed interest in increasing the volume of H1B visa holders that are allowed to come into the United States. There is a set limit of these that are allowed and the GOP wants to allow more.
So the jobs issues in the United States is twofold: 1) jobs being sent offshore and 2) H1B visa holders coming into the USA to work.
Outsourcing work to companies within the United States is not a bad thing, IMO. Because the work is staying in the country. However, is it H1B holders from other countries that are coming to the US to work or are the jobs for Americans?
Offshoring the work to other countries is what is taking jobs away from Americans. That's a slightly different issue from the original post.
A separate issue that the OP seemed to raise indirectly is that there are many H1B visa holders that are coming onto the shores of the United States to work. They are here for months or years. They are competing against Americans for jobs within the Unitet States. This year, the GOP already expressed interest in increasing the volume of H1B visa holders that are allowed to come into the United States. There is a set limit of these that are allowed and the GOP wants to allow more.
So the jobs issues in the United States is twofold: 1) jobs being sent offshore and 2) H1B visa holders coming into the USA to work.
You have the global elites on both sides of the isle, pushing this death to the USA.
Outsourcing work to companies within the United States is not a bad thing, IMO. Because the work is staying in the country.
Offshoring the work to other countries is what is taking jobs away from Americans.
A separate issue that the OP seemed to raise is that there are many H1B visa holders that are coming onto the shores of the United States to work. They are here for months or years. They are competing against Americans for jobs within the Unite States. This year, the GOP already expressed interest in increasing the volume of H1B visa holders that are allowed to come into the United States. There is a set limit of these that are allowed and the GOP wants to allow more.
Both the GOP and Dems. The CEO's have been to DC a few times already this year as they have already filled their 2013 quota and want more. They claim there's not enough skilled Americans to fill the jobs.
Raising the quota has to get the approval of Congress..both sides here.
It's 65K but did you know that there are countries exempt from that cap ? Did you know that there are other avenues to bring in workers besides H1-B ?
Well. It's one thing to read about how companies have outsourced all our jobs, but quite another to see it up close and personal. I was so concerned about being late for my interview that I left way too soon and wound up sitting in the parking lot for half an hour to while away the time until my appointment. First thing I noticed? Almost every person who passed through the parking lot (people seemed to be returning from lunch) appeared to be from India. I wondered what business in the complex employed these people. Silly me. During the interview, which was with a large, name-brand insurance company (you know the name, but it won't be said here), I asked, casually, how many employees there were in that particular department. About 1500 the HR person said, and then stopped to clarify: " But we outsource all but about 300 of those jobs". He pointed to the vast room behind us and said that was where the 300 'in-house' employees worked. A sea of people from India, as far as the eye could see. These were people managing the tech side of the company business -- programmers, software analysts, god knows. Their relatives (who actually live in India) were doing the rest. Management looked to me (I checked their website) to be typical all American and mostly caucasian.
It was just a very weird sight. Corporate colonialism? Neo-slave trade? Wow.
I wasn't interviewing for one of the tech jobs. But don't kid yourself if you are in that field and looking for work. This is what you are up against.
Maybe the school systems in India turn out a better product than our education system does? Our schools are a joke and employers want the best not some spoiled brat that has been spoon fed political correctness crapola by unionized teachers.
GL2
The quip about "relatives in India" was just that, a quip. It was not meant to be taken literally.
I have no illusions about why that insurance company has staffed an entire department with people from India -- 1,500 jobs. Do you?
Yes, I am well aware that outsourcing is common, some would say rampant. It's why President Obama proposed, in the past few weeks if memory serves, tax incentives for businesses to 'bring the jobs home'.
It speaks to the profit motive in Corporate America, and how that trumps any other allegiance.
Obama is the problem.
The guy's been in office over three years and now, and just weeks before an election he decides outsourcing is a problem.
Let me explain this in simpler terms.
GE is the Democrat's corporate model.
They will steal some money form the next generation to appease their union voters, but in reality they couldn't care less how many foreigners come here legally or illegally to take a job away from you.
They want you desperate and on unemployment.
That way they can threaten you that Republicans are going to take away the only source of income you have.
FDR had to die to lose the White house because so many Americans were dependent on the hand of government.
Democrats haven't forgotten that and continue to sell FDR's reforms as magic economic policies that ended the Depression when every objective measure of these policies is that they failed.
The only thing that stopped the cycle of growing dependency was WW2.
Jeff Immelt the "JOBS CZAR"?
Gimme a f**king break!
This company outsources in mass, has H1B workers all over the place and pays no US taxes even though they are seeing huge profits.
"Despite getting $24.9 million from U.S. taxpayers, GE decreased its U.S.-based employees by 18,000 in 2009, according to the company’s 2009 annual report."
"the fact that I'd like GE to work in concert with where government policy is in the U.S. doesn't mean that I'm a traitor or a bad guy. I think it's just being practical that that's gotta happen."
"The company did not initially qualify for the program, under which the government sought to unfreeze credit markets by guaranteeing debt sold by banking firms. But regulators soon loosened the eligibility requirements, in part because of behind-the-scenes appeals from GE."
Maybe the school systems in India turn out a better product than our education system does? Our schools are a joke and employers want the best not some spoiled brat that has been spoon fed political correctness crapola by unionized teachers.
GL2
The driving force behind offshoring is ultra cheap labor, not lack of Americans' skill set. That's not to say there isn't room for improvement in our educational system (no argument there).
My OP referenced both offshoring, H1B workers, and outsourcing, IMO. At least that is my impression of what was going on at that company after the HR person 'clarified'. And to the person who asked for the name of the insurance company, I said I will not post it here. But you may well have an auto, life, or other policy with them. Doesn't matter who it is, really, since they all do it.
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