View Full Version : Why I love America
Platapus
11-11-10, 06:57 PM
http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/11/11/cruise.ship/index.html
Cruise ship goes out and has an accident. Passengers OK but vacation not what expected. Slow tow back to shore. And then...
One woman, who said she worked for the cruise line, was wearing a T-shirt that said, "I survived the 2010 Carnival Cruise Spamcation." Vendors met passengers at the port, selling the shirts for $20.
Vendors already waiting with the T-shirt. :woot::woot::woot:
That's entrepreneurship at its finest. :yeah::yeah:
Would this happen in another country, or is this only an American thing?
Happy Times
11-11-10, 07:18 PM
Would this happen in another country, or is this only an American thing?
It is originally but i would say it could happen here also.
Buddahaid
11-11-10, 07:32 PM
What's more incredible is the shirts were made in China. :shucks:
UnderseaLcpl
11-11-10, 07:36 PM
I love it. Capitalism lets nothing go to waste. No opportunity for progress or proseprity goes unrealized. :yeah:
The article doesn't mention the lengths to which Carnival Cruise lines went to reimburse the passengers - a full refund and a free cruise of comparable value, replete with a sincere apology! http://articles.latimes.com/2010/nov/10/local/la-me-1111-cruise-ship-20101110
Let's see socialism top that without stealing money from people:O:
UnderseaLcpl
11-11-10, 07:37 PM
What's more incredible is the shirts were made in China. :shucks:
So? Chinese people don't deserve the chance to earn a living and prosperity?
Ducimus
11-11-10, 07:44 PM
So? Chinese people don't deserve the chance to earn a living and prosperity?
Sure they do. However, I don't know about you, but personally, I draw the line where Chinese prosperity is taking jobs and industry away from America. China, is after all, a foreign country, and not the land that I love.
Buddahaid
11-11-10, 07:51 PM
So? Chinese people don't deserve the chance to earn a living and prosperity?
That was a joke even though it could be true.
UnderseaLcpl
11-12-10, 01:13 AM
Sure they do. However, I don't know about you, but personally, I draw the line where Chinese prosperity is taking jobs and industry away from America. China, is after all, a foreign country, and not the land that I love.
An understandable and popular sentiment, if not an entirely correct one.
China does not "take" jobs from the US. US jobs are given to or earned by China because the price of US goods is such that they are no longer desireable. At the end of the day, you have to be able to provide a product that people want at a price they are willing to pay if you want to have an industry.
Your apparent mindset is typical of people who have bought the protectionist propaganda of dying US industries. I can't say I blame you for your opinion, as the general argument is very persuasive and appeals to our sense of pride and self-reliance. I once thought the same way. It feels good to "Buy American", support domestic industry, help American families, fight against outsourcing, and all that other assorted nonsense. Who doesn't want to help fellow Americans? (provided it doesn't require any kind of significant sacrifice on the part of the people making the argument- typical of unions and politicians) Who likes the idea of a countryman losing his job (and, surprise, the potential of losing one's own job) to a foreign national interest?
The laws of supply and demand tell us that it simply is not possible to sustain an industry whose product is not desireable, no matter what policies we adopt. You've been had by people who have nothing more to offer than a tug at the heartstrings. No amount of national pride or dedication will ever bring back the US steel industry or auto industry or any other industry comprised of highly-paid workers making overpriced goods in an overly-restrictive state framework that charges an additional 36% or so (not including legal costs, permits, licensures, and lobbying). Economics do not work that way.
Your opinion is a product of indoctrination and personal appeal on the part of people who are fighting to keep their jobs, and are not above stealing your money and the opportunity of others to earn an income by competing. I'd know, I am a union employee; a member of one of the most powerful unions around: the BLET. I am not proud of what my union does to American consumers out of sheer self-interest, but I'd be a fool not to take advantage of the opportunity. Just because we're working Americans does not mean we are incapable of extorting consumers and manipulating legislators to our advantage at the expense of everyone else.
Again, you've been had, my friend. The nostalgic appeal of the American factory worker is not the way forward. It is only a product of lazy and unimaginitive jerks who are not above bilking consumers and taxpayers alike out of their hard-earned dollars for their own purposes.
The only way to national prosperity is full speed ahead and damn the torpedoes. We must have not only a free market, but the most free market. We must not just espouse the ideals of competition, we must be the most competitive. We must not linger in the past and burden our industries and consumers and importers and markets with taxes and state-supported unions and protectionism. The lazy ass who gets paid $25.00 per hour to fasten doors to automobiles isn't going to like it when he has to pursue an education and/or do some kind of skilled labor - hell, I'm not going to like it when I have to actually put some kind of effort into earning a decent living - but that is the only way to get ahead, no matter what crocodile tears we may cry.
By simply cutting the corporate tax rate to an efficient 0.0% rather than the 30-something percent it is now (which we pay, btw), and reducing government entitlements for idiots to the point where they no longer threaten the viability of the dollar, we could catapult this nation's economy into the dominant role for the next century or so. There would be an unprecedented surge in the growth of new industries and technologies, much as there was before the state got around to shackling consumer electronics. Incidentally, given the current state of affairs, watch for silicon valley to become the new Pittsburgh in the next decade because of the aforementioned reasons. Trade protectionism and government have a habit of making the goose lay lead eggs.
Maybe you're convinced, and maybe you aren't, but I would like you to take another look at the wall of text I just had to post to explain my viewpoint. I didn't even really go in-depth on this one, but it takes that amount of explanation to even try to override the commonly-held opinion that outsourcing is bad, and the result of corporate greed, or that keeping unproductive industries is good. Common sense dictates that the economy should be more fluid and competitive, but there are legions of people who believe as you do for no better reason than that they have been swayed by compassion and pride, neither of which are the keys to making a nation's industry worth either.
the_tyrant
11-12-10, 08:22 AM
Sure they do. However, I don't know about you, but personally, I draw the line where Chinese prosperity is taking jobs and industry away from America. China, is after all, a foreign country, and not the land that I love.
Even if I offered you the job, you would refuse
No health-care, no pension, a salary of $1 an hour, no safely, 10 hour work day
Even being a paper boy is better
SteamWake
11-12-10, 10:49 AM
A little off topic but...
I listened to a news report yesterday they interviewed some of the passangers of the cruise.
One said something that just made me laugh/cry and want to toss my radio through the wall.
"Thank god we made it home alive !!" :o
But then they interviewed someone that made it all better.
"It was a little uncomfortable but we had a good time. We will definatly take the free cruise !"
Its funny how two pepole whom experience the same inconvience can have two largely differing opinions.
Buddahaid
11-12-10, 12:42 PM
It was God's punishment for gay tolerance and they were soooo lucky. I mean the Champaign got warm for Pete's sake! How did they survive.
frau kaleun
11-12-10, 01:03 PM
They have been following this on the local news (of course) and yesterday I actually heard an anchorman say "... the Carnival Splendor is twice the size of the Titanic and sharing the same bad luck..."
:hmmm:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3471/3389665829_e81db9eef5_m.jpg
:nope:
Uh, no, I don't think being (relatively) safely adrift for a couple days off the Mexican Riviera and then being towed into San Diego by tugboats while the military airlifts you food and supplies, is quite the same kind of "bad luck" as watching the ship you were on sink with over half of its passengers and crew dead or dying while you, as one of the lucky ones, freeze your butt off in an open lifeboat in the middle of the freakin' north Atlantic and pray all night that some passing ship picked up your distress signals or maybe just happens to see you as it goes by.
But most of our morning/noon local news anchors appear to be high-functioning morons, so I suppose it's not that surprising.
SteamWake
11-12-10, 01:21 PM
Not to mention the fact that they were never more than 40 some miles offshore and uh... not sinking?
Penguin
11-12-10, 02:11 PM
Nothing against the people who sell these shirts, they are just into a quick buck. I have no respect for the people who wear them however. Damned pussies! Wow, you had no electricity and had to eat COLD sandwiches. Yes right, Titanic and Gilligans island 2.0.
If the people - soldiers and civilians - who made it through WW2 had written everything they survived onto their shirts - they would need XXXL shirts in 5pt fonts. You know why you don't see these people in shirts? This was a generation who had freaking balls and saw humbleness not as a sin. People who saw real brown sauce hitting the fan don't brag about it. It's only the loudmouths and sissies who think they know what it's like to look into Death's eyes.
...rants the angry Penguin, who would propably be the only one who would have died from starvation on the cruise - as I would never take anything from Ronald Reagan! ;)
Platapus
11-12-10, 05:02 PM
China does not "take" jobs from the US. US jobs are given to or earned by China because the price of US goods is such that they are no longer desireable.
Can we put this in big honkin font that flashes red?
I always shake my head ruefully when I hear that China is "taking" jobs.
This whole thing started post WWII when the American people made a choice:
Made in America for X price
Made in Japan for Y price
Americans, being good capitalists, chose the option that gave them the mostest for the leastest. :yeah:
No one stole any jobs, no one took any jobs. The customers (us) chose.
Don't blame the government, don't blame "big business", blame the customers for choosing to buy foreign goods.
Well, now it is probably too late. America can't rebuild our manufacturing factories and even if we did, the price of the goods would not be attractive to the customer.
I believe you will find few American customers willing to pay American wages, to buy at American prices, what can be obtained from overseas.
Sure Americans "care" about the lost jobs... but do Americans care enough to pay much more for the same product? Probably not.
Most Americans seem satisfied buying a smarmy magnet from a Chinese company that states "buy American products" :yep:
No one took anything. We choose to give it away. :yep:
As Porky Pig would say "We buttered our bridges, now we can sleep on it"
Even if I offered you the job, you would refuse
No health-care, no pension, a salary of $1 an hour, no safely, 10 hour work day
Even being a paper boy is better$1 an hour! :o Man you'd have a queue of willing workers longer than the Great Wall, paying those rates.:har::har:
Try between $0.28 and $0.63 per hour for the minimum wage in China. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_48/b4011001.htm And that's if your employer is paying the "official" minimum wage set by local authorities. Good luck with that if you're working on the black.
And that's if it isn't fined away from you for various infractions, like taking too long in the bathroom: http://www.businessweek.com/2000/00_40/b3701119.htm
Ducimus
11-12-10, 05:56 PM
^
How executives get their huge salaries and bonuses: Outsource the jobs, and get these poor schmucks to do the same for pennies.
The original job holder ends up as a walmart greeter, in a McJob, or in an unemployment line. Dreams of retirement and the American dream gone up in a blaze. The new job holder overseas, gets to live as the next best thing to slave labor in a sweatshop somewhere. The executive, enjoys life on his yacht when he's not cutting you off on the freeway with his mercedes or jaguar, while laughing at everyone all the way to the bank.
What country is the biggest manufacturer on earth?
Take a RL example. ANyone here ever buy a die-cast model? I have some 1:72 scale WW2 aircraft. F4Fs, Zeros, etc. They were ~$25.
$25.
I used to make models for a living—not "build" models, but actually manufacture anatomical models (for biological supply companies, etc). $25 retail would mean I'd have to wholesale for $12.50. As my accountant kept telling me, that meant that my direct cost to make the product would need to be $6.25.
Those models are PAINTED, plus decals. You have to cast the metal, injection mold the plastic (canopies, control surfaces, etc), then clean/deburr the casts, assemble, paint, decals, then package it for $6.25. Labor is gonna be over 50% of your cost. That means the metal/plastic needs to cost you ~$3 a pop (packaging alone is probably $0.50+), leaving ~$3 in labor. What's a decent, skilled wage? I used to pay people ~$10-$15 an hour for the most part (~20-30k a year). Most were 20-somethings, many were students. In the middle, at $12/hr, that means <15 minutes total labor to build a nice, 1:72 scale model and package it for sale. The more you think these workers should be paid, the faster they need to crank them out to keep our $25 price point. Even at $25, it's not like Dragon Models sells millions of these (maybe thousands), it's a niche, and they are "expensive" as toys go.
You simply cannot make something like that in the US for $25 retail. It's impossible unless you think there is a mass market for $50+ die cast models.
So, this is a case of outsourcing production or not having the product available at a cost regular people can afford.
I think in general, the relationship between what gets made abroad, and standard of living at home is pretty complex. It's not a simple"outsourcing is bad, m'kay." Nor is it "outsourcing is great!"
Looking at how people live now, vs when I was a kid, I think people have more "stuff" now—and better stuff—than we did growing up, and we were absolutely "upper middle class." Still, my parents didn't spend like people do now. Probably because decent stuff cost more.
Platapus
11-12-10, 08:14 PM
Always interesting to see the real numbers. Thanks for posting them
I investigated hiring a company here in town that does finishing for various tourist items do some painting for me on some fossil replicas. They would generate a mask that they would then spray paint over. It was a charge per step, and it was some fraction of a buck per paint pass. Their QC was not meant for fine detail like the airplane models you can buy, but was suitable for "random" patterned fossil replicas (we ended up doing it ourselves).
That said, with 5-6 colors per model on a few sides, having that painting done here in ABQ (*assuming that outfit could make tight masks to do it right) would eat up the bulk of that $3 budget for labor, if not all of it.
I actually do this in my head constantly. I see cool stuff at the museum gift shop, etc, then think how the HELL can they sell that so cheap! I was looking to buy a ship model a year or so ago—a sailing vessel, a 5th or 6th rate. I was stunned how cheap they were. You can get a 3 ft long model of a real frigate, or the HMS Surprise from O'Brian's books for ~$400. $400. Those models, even built from kits must take 10s of hours to build—very skilled labor. Blows me away. They must be making those in china or india, etc. A model that takes 20 hours of labor or more in the US? Call it $30/hr. 60k a year. There would be $600 just in labor. Assume $100 in materials, and the thing would wholesale for $1400, retail for $2800. If they only sell online and avoid wholesale, it would be closer to the $1400. Still...
There's a guy in Seattle making perfect replica WW2 A-2 flight jackets. They are over a grand each, based on the current wait time for a jacket, he has to crank out a jacket (it's just him) every 3 days or so (the leather and proper parts he buys are rare and quite expensive, so there is a few hundred in cost right there). When I buy an A-2, it's gonna be from him though, I like the idea of supporting a local (to the US) craftsman who is compulsive about accuracy.
Ducimus
11-12-10, 09:45 PM
Part of the reason why labor is more expensive here, is because the cost of living keeps going up. A great example is renting an apartment in California. IT GOES UP EVERY YEAR. And keeps going up, never relenting. Rent does not stay the same, it does not go down. It ONLY GOES UP. 1100 to 1200 dollars a month for a 1 bedroom apartment is a deal. Sometimes they go for 1400 or more.
Another part of the reason why labor is more expensive here, is because theirs alot of self important asshats with a sense of entitlement in our society. I don't know how it occured, I just know it has.
Suffice to say though, the cost of living must be lowered if the cost of labor is to be lowered.
Despite that, i categorically refuse to believe that outsourcing our JOBS AND INDUSTRY is a good thing. Maybe short term, which seems to be the norm way of thinking these days. Exeuctives going for high profits and short term gain. In the LONG term, it screws us over. The upper 1% profit, while selling the country out from under us. Theres a reason why the middle class is shrinking, and the class gap is widening.
We need to start building things HERE again, and stop buying everything from China. How things SHOULD be, is products Made in the USA are wanted by the world over. Known for craftsmanship, quality, and built to last. We need to get that back, and stop selling the country out from under us to god damn china.
the_tyrant
11-12-10, 10:12 PM
Part of the reason why labor is more expensive here, is because the cost of living keeps going up. A great example is renting an apartment in California. IT GOES UP EVERY YEAR. And keeps going up, never relenting. Rent does not stay the same, it does not go down. It ONLY GOES UP. 1100 to 1200 dollars a month for a 1 bedroom apartment is a deal. Sometimes they go for 1400 or more.
Another part of the reason why labor is more expensive here, is because theirs alot of self important asshats with a sense of entitlement in our society. I don't know how it occured, I just know it has.
Suffice to say though, the cost of living must be lowered if the cost of labor is to be lowered.
Despite that, i categorically refuse to believe that outsourcing our JOBS AND INDUSTRY is a good thing. Maybe short term, which seems to be the norm way of thinking these days. Exeuctives going for high profits and short term gain. In the LONG term, it screws us over. The upper 1% profit, while selling the country out from under us. Theres a reason why the middle class is shrinking, and the class gap is widening.
We need to start building things HERE again, and stop buying everything from China. How things SHOULD be, is products Made in the USA are wanted by the world over. Known for craftsmanship, quality, and built to last. We need to get that back, and stop selling the country out from under us to god damn china.
Well the only reason that stuff made in China is so cheap is that the labor costs are low, and that they have low environmental standards.
And most of the manufacturing is made by robots anyways, so quality is not an issue.
My lifestyle back in china:
I went to the best middle school(people are willing to pay 1 million rmb just to get in)
My family lived in a 160 square meter apartment (20000 RMB per square meter)
My dad drove a Nissan X-trail and my mom drove a Hyundai(the two cars costs around 700000 rmb)
food in china is around the same price as it is in the US (good pork is around 20 rmb per 500g)
without any mortgage, my family spends 30000rmb in china per month + 200000 rmb per year for one time purchases)
oh, in china a young university graduate is lucky to have an job that pays 3000 rmb a month
And if you want to be married, most decent girls have the following criteria:
at least an undergrad degree
at least a 20000 rmb car
at least a 100 square feet apartment
so come on, average Chinese employees get payed low wages not because their cost of living is low, its because their quality of life is S**t
No reason for rent to increase in CA when the housing market is in freefall. (not saying it isn't, I believe you, but that it's really weird)
BTW, the answer to my question above is "the USA." We are the biggest manufacturer on earth.
That said, manufacturing jobs are not great jobs unless they are artificially high in pay. The height of this would be unionized American auto workers. Which car you want, the chevy, or the toyota (both made in the US)? It's not like paying auto-workers almost as much as family practice docs has resulted in world-winning craftsmanship. In fact, exactly the opposite.
Im not exactly sure what would magically improve if we had more cheap consumer goods made here. The choice is to charge WAY more (then the goods are no longer cheap), or to pay WAY less. Which do you prefer? Those are the only two choices. Strike that, a 3d choice. Manufacturing so automated, it employs almost no one. That doesn't create any jobs, obviously.
If we pay the US factory workers the good wage you'd presumably like, which is some multiple of the labor costs in china (tyrant has a university grad making $450/month ($2.81/hr)), then the goods become more expensive. Say a factory worker makes $1/hr in china (guess), we'd say a minimum of $20/hr? 20X labor cost. That makes wholesale 40X, and retail 80X. So the $20 thing at walmart from china has $1 in labor in is now almost $100. Too bad, even lower income people used to buy the $20 product... not so much at $100, they do without.
It's not simple. Really. Making stuff here paying what we'd like to pay—heck, even a small amount above min wage—grossly increases the price of consumer goods. Having a few more not so great factory jobs isn't really gonna help people afford this.
The better type of mfg for the US, is low volume, high-quality. Still like the leather jackets. A luxury market, but a nice income for a family, even on an expensive coast.
Bottom line is that the only people who ever did really well with manufacturing in the US were those running the business. The jobs have always been marginal, or unionized to absurdity, and then the only choice is to move offshore or die.
UnderseaLcpl
11-12-10, 11:02 PM
Can we put this in big honkin font that flashes red?
Yes, you may.
I always shake my head ruefully when I hear that China is "taking" jobs.
I wish I could be so tactful. I usually launch into a tirade like the one I posted above when the subject comes up.
This whole thing started post WWII when the American people made a choice:
Made in America for X price
Made in Japan for Y price
Americans, being good capitalists, chose the option that gave them the mostest for the leastest. :yeah:
I see your point, but that isn't exactly how it works. We'd all love to believe that there is some kind of logical course of action we can take to strengthen our nation. It is that very desire that interested parties love to prey upon, particularly when their jobs are at stake.
In reality, there is no easy way out. Buying American does nothing to perpetuate the US economy. No amount of national pride will ever rebuild the manufacturing sector because you cannot override the inviolable law that people will always end up purchasing whatever is the most economical. Societal visions mean little or nothing to a family that is simply trying to make its wat in the world. They will always opt for the most economical product, to the best of their ability.
No one stole any jobs, no one took any jobs. The customers (us) chose.
And we always choose what is most efficient. Well, most of the time, anyway.
Don't blame the government, don't blame "big business", blame the customers for choosing to buy foreign goods.
Oh, but I do blame the government. In fact, I blame the government for at least 37% of the failure of US industry, which is equal to the corporate tax rate; read 37% increase in the prices of goods. I also blame it for additional increases in the prices of goods through tariffs, superfluous licensures, and the ridiculously expensive legal fees that must be paid just to buy or sell something in this damn place.
There is no point in blaming US customers, or any customers for that matter. They are a known factor. They will always buy the mostest for the leastest. Even if they didn't, they could not support the US economy on their own. You must either be competitive or innovative to be prosperous. The world does not pay for mediocrity.
You've been suckered into believing something that isn't true by people who don't give a rat's ass about you or anyone else. They simply proffer the argument that buying American is better because they want to keep their jobs and charge you extra for their own gain. You would not believe the lengths they will go to achieve their goal, either. Read ten pages of US trade law and you will see the ludicrous lengths people will go to to preserve their jobs at the expense of prosperity for everyone else.
As with most things in life, you have to earn prosperity, which means that you have to be competitive. Being competitive in a capitalist society means giving people things they actually want and not manipulating them, or worse, forcing them into paying more.
Well, now it is probably too late. America can't rebuild our manufacturing factories and even if we did, the price of the goods would not be attractive to the customer.
You are correct. The American manufacturing industry is dead, more or less. Nobody is going to pay the wages we demand.
But who cares? Our economy is not a modern manufacturing economy anymore, just as it wasn't a sweatshop economy 150 years ago, or an agrarian economy before that. Thank God we didn't listen to the whining of people who wanted to keep their jobs then. Whay should we do so now?
I believe you will find few American customers willing to pay American wages, to buy at American prices, what can be obtained from overseas.
Correct. But you will find more than enough investors willing to pay poor overseas wages for cheap goods. That's the wave of the future, and most American companies have already realized this.
Sure Americans "care" about the lost jobs... but do Americans care enough to pay much more for the same product? Probably not.
Does anyone care enough to pay more - no matter where their loyalty lies?
Most Americans seem satisfied buying a smarmy magnet from a Chinese company that states "buy American products" :yep:
And you judge them for this?
No one took anything. We choose to give it away. :yep:
Indeed, but not in the way you imagine.
As Porky Pig would say "We buttered our bridges, now we can sleep on it
Bbde bde bbde- that's all, folks :DL
Ducimus
11-12-10, 11:22 PM
BTW, the answer to my question above is "the USA." We are the biggest manufacturer on earth.
Do you know how incredibly hard that is to believe when everything you run across in day to day life is made in China?
I think there are two items in my life that i'm pretty sure were made here.. actually.... 3.
1.) The Ford ranger i have the title to.
2.) My dogs collar ( I s**t you not, i actually saw made in the USA on the packaging when i bought it, which floored me)
3.) Mr Mossberg 500.
Everything else in my possession, is made in China or elsewhere. If we really are the worlds biggest manufacturer, surely there would be more items that say Made in USa - but they're aren't. I know, at least i think i would, because i look for domestically made items and buy them specifically over chinese made items when i can.
edit:
My bottom line is this: I love my country. I HATE .. yes.. HATE, with a fervent passion seeing jobs being lossed, and our industry being exported overseas. I DO NOT CARE about ANY foreign country. Not china, not india, certainly not Korea, nobody. They can all go to hell for all i care. I only care, about my country. If we do not take care of ourselves first, then NOBODY will.
Ducimus
11-12-10, 11:37 PM
See, this is the type of crap that ROYALLY pisses me off.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2lDIHyqo7Q
( Also the only poltiical attack ad that has ever worked to sway my opinion
IMO, People like Fiona, are nothing short of traitors to our country and our people. I sincerely mean that. That is how strongly i feel about this subject. ( Edit: Also my only political hot button now that i think of it)
Again, what's the big picture. Certain jobs end up overseas. In return, the consumer gets more for less. What of all that chinese stuff are you willing to part with? The choice is to pay more for everything and pay high wages (ie: you taking a hit so that some guy can have a marginal factory job—or a GREAT factory job and you take a bigger hit), or perhaps automated production that keeps the factory in the US, but hires almost no one. The latter also more than China because of US regulations.
The US Corp. tax rate is certainly an issue, but no one pays the full %. It would make far more sense to have a far lower rate with no loopholes. Encourage business to move here instead of encouraging it to leave (what our high Corp rate does).
The US is <5% of world population, and we do ~36% of manufacturing.
How much more do you demand? We used to do ~50%. Do you think the US doing 50% is sustainable forever? We'd literally have to bomb China and India out of the industrial age. Nothing else we would do would stop it.
kiwi_2005
11-13-10, 12:21 AM
Just curious how much does meat go for in the USA. Over here I remeber and not long ago 8-9 years a leg of mutton cost $8, a leg of lamb $12. Now its $33 and $40. A leg of lamb $40! Pork is cheaper a good fat roast pork is around $18-25. Still I reckon meat is overpriced here.
That ad is pretty dumb, IMO. What business has Boxer run?
The ad falsely makes it look like there was a choice. HP needed to evolve, or DIE.
Pick one.
Better for HP to have a pyrrhic victory and die, but keep 30k people employed for some indeterminate time before everyone at HP is pounding the pavement?
That's the choice that had to be made. An intact business, with part in China, or no business (in which case the jobs STILL move to China, but with no US part at all).
Or you can believe Boxer. Presumably her opponent planned her entire life to send jobs overseas. that was her real goal, after all. Right? What did Boxer do to change the rules of the game? A business can lobby to change the way things are in the future, but right now, they have to play with what they are given rules wise. HP, Dell, etc, are competing with companies from all over the world (mostly China). That's reality. Fail to keep up on price, etc, and that's it, you're toast.
Meat is by the pound.
Beef varies from maybe ~$5-6/lb to $20/lb depending on the quality/cut. (at a regular grocery store, ~$10/lb would be very expensive, $20 would be places like Whole Foods, or other "fancy" stores)
Pork is considerably cheaper, as is chicken.
the_tyrant
11-13-10, 08:55 AM
Why do companies want to sent jobs to China, Mexico, Vietnam etc?
Everything is made by big machines that are idiot proof
Also, at companies like foxconn ( the company that manufactures apple products) they take away like 30% of your monthly pay if you have a defective product
therefore, the quality of products made there isn't really worse
but the costs are so much lower
its really just like early 20th century america
when management treated employees like s**t
Why do companies want to sent jobs to China, Mexico, Vietnam etc?
Everything is made by big machines that are idiot proof
Also, at companies like foxconn ( the company that manufactures apple products) they take away like 30% of your monthly pay if you have a defective product
therefore, the quality of products made there isn't really worse
but the costs are so much lower
its really just like early 20th century america
when management treated employees like s**t
Yeah, sounds like it in a nutshell. I agree quality is no longer an issue. Like those model planes I talked about. they are great quality, and so incredibly cheap (though in the case of these I know most finishing is by hand since the runs are small, and the finish varies a lot (different paint jobs) making tooling up non-trivila for automation).
I think China is bound to become more expensive as their standard of living increases.
The US needs to hold a sustainable amount of manufacturing. Dunno what that % of the world market is, but it's below 50%, that's for sure :)
AdeptCharge
11-13-10, 10:39 AM
My bottom line is this: I love my country. I HATE .. yes.. HATE, with a fervent passion seeing jobs being lossed, and our industry being exported overseas. I DO NOT CARE about ANY foreign country. Not china, not india, certainly not Korea, nobody. They can all go to hell for all i care. I only care, about my country. If we do not take care of ourselves first, then NOBODY will. :o :haha:
...
I DO NOT CARE about ANY foreign country.
...
But ... but ... but... we are friends ... :cry:
No? :hmmm:
Anyway, you should always "care" about potential customers ...
The Chinese seem to do ... Link (http://www.bjreview.com.cn/headline/txt/2010-09/29/content_301036.htm)
.
While I disagree with ducimus entirely (least if that dumb Boxer video is any indication, I don't even consider it mildly compelling) on some points, I do pretty much agree with the "I DO NOT CARE about ANY foreign country."
I don't, either, except to the extent they are useful to promote American interests.
BTW, did anyone not find it amusing that Boxer—a proponent of virtually any deficit spending you'd care to name (except maybe defense)—is attacking business moving to China. Who, pray tell, Senator Boxer, will be paying for all your socialist government spending ideas? Certainly not the taxpayer since she spends more than is collected (and if she had her way, we'd spend even more in the red). China, that's who. Any increase in the Chinese bottom line is exactly what someone like Boxer must want, else how will they afford to be our creditors?
Takeda Shingen
11-13-10, 01:27 PM
I know that this is off topic, but I love America because I can buy whiskey on Sundays.
Back to topic.
I know that this is off topic, but I love America because I can buy whiskey on Sundays.
Back to topic.
I'm not american, but I sure do love the cheap booze you guys have (comparatively to Canada). Can't wait for my vacation in December :O:
the_tyrant
11-13-10, 01:33 PM
Its people like Ducimus that ruin the US
Globalization is a trend that can't be stopped
and maybe we can even see further political consolidation (the united states of earth maybe?) in the future
I think the trend of globalization can be stopped, but I don't think nationalism is the solution to it tbh. If anything, it's a cure worse than the disease. Like it or not, the "I love america, screw everyone else" thinking is part of the problem; in practice that supports the flagrant hoarding of consumer goods by Americans in an effort to sustain an unsustainable lifestyle, which can only happen with the use of cheap foreign labour, i.e. through economic globalization. I don't think any amount of love for the American dream is gonna save America, unless Americans reconsider what it actually means. The US public is, however, by and large drunk on the immediate benefits of economic globalism. Simply trying to bring jobs back or snapping at the Chinese for stealing them won't help anyone anywhere. The fact is that people are more or less the same everywhere, and only by recognizing that can you begin to act fairly and to set realistic lifestyle goals for your country. Otherwise the "we're better" or "I love America, I don't love others" mentality leads to the sense of entitlement to a better lifestyle than China and everyone else, at the expense of both yourself and others.
krashkart
11-13-10, 01:38 PM
Globalization is a trend that can't be stopped
and maybe we can even see further political consolidation (the united states of earth maybe?) in the future
It might eventually pave the way for the United Federation of Planets. :haha:
Takeda Shingen
11-13-10, 02:07 PM
Its people like Ducimus that ruin the US
Globalization is a trend that can't be stopped
and maybe we can even see further political consolidation (the united states of earth maybe?) in the future
It is not people like Ducimus that have ruined the United States, quite the opposite. It is those who support globalism that have brought about the ruin of the nation. I find Ducimus' dissent to be wholly patriotic.
I find the anti-globalization argument to be sort of odd. I just don't "get it."
We've always had "globalization," the only difference is that it used to be "owned" only by the few big players, and was either real colonialism, or "market" colonialism—extract from someplace else, and ship home.
Was the old china trade (clipper ships) not "globalization? Was it OK simply because we made loads of cash on the deal?
The notion that the loss of some US industry is wrong is crazy, IMHO. Do you really think it was sustainable for the US to be more than 50% of world manufacturing forever, when we are such a small % of the world's population? Before, the US (and the West in general) was at a huge technological advantage vs the East. They could not possibly make the stuff we did. that was bound to change. Once the process of production is able to be replicated anywhere, the only blocks to "globalization" would be what? Currency devaluation? Crippling tariffs? Simply banning foreign goods? Look at US cars before there was serious foreign competition. 1970s POS American cars. That's what you'll get.
Enlighten me, I just don't buy the anti-globalization (gotta be screwy when morons like Pat Buchannan and unbathed, leftist students (who've never had a real job) are against it (that constellation is a major "pro" argument to my mind).).
Takeda Shingen
11-13-10, 02:28 PM
As a moron, I can't think that anything I could type in this box would possibly serve as enlightenment.
Platapus
11-13-10, 02:29 PM
I know that this is off topic, but I love America because I can buy whiskey on Sundays.
Back to topic.
Then you only love parts of America. There are still places where you can't buy alcohol on Sunday. :damn::damn::damn::damn::damn:
Wow, you're Pat Buchanan?
I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt and assuming you bathe ;)
the_tyrant
11-13-10, 02:36 PM
Well all that I can say is that Marx was half right
his analysis of capitalism was right
He has predicted the creation of people like Ducimus
"With the exploitation of the working class in the colonies, the economies of the home countries would collapse, allowing a working class revolution to take place"
Takeda Shingen
11-13-10, 02:41 PM
Wow, you're Pat Buchanan?
No, but I happen to agree with his stance on the matter, which makes me, in your own words, a moron like Pat Buchanan. Pro tanto.
AdeptCharge
11-13-10, 02:54 PM
I'm not american, but I sure do love the cheap booze you guys have (comparatively to Canada). Ahem -The cheap or cheapest, (and I am assuming by using a coloquial term as booze, you mean alcohol beverage) is not necessarily the one requiring the nominal fiscal outlay on your behalf, moreover due to the varying nature of trade discounts and profit margins , the cheapest product when purchased wholesale is not ipso-facto the least expensive when retailed to the public. :hmmm:
Penguin
11-13-10, 02:54 PM
There is a reason my Chinese mass products are considered as throwaway products, cheap in any meaning of the word. The manufaction process - robots, machines, manual labour - doesn't say anything about the quality of the product. Substandard materials and unsophisticated technology is what you'll find when you perform an autopsy on any Chinese (electronic) device.
Also there is a reason for the success of Japanese, Taiwanese or Korean products. They have an affordable price combined with a reasonable technic standards and often innovations behind.
The consumer of today only looks for the price tag. Quality and duration don't seem to play a role anymore in purchase decision process. The folks seem to have accepted the fact that devices kick the bucket after two dozen months.
We have the phenomen here, that the brand names of good companies are sold to cheap manufacturers who buy them to sell their chinese **** under a label which once stood for quality. Mostly older folks fall for this, they used to have a Grundig or Telefunken product for 40 years and wonder when their new tv blows to pieces after 2 years :nope:.
I work in an industry where we pay top dollars for state-of-the-art technology. The price is secondary compared to innovative and clever technology. None of our devices was manufactured in China, except for some LAN cables, lol. Personally I do the same, I am willing to pay good money for good products and I expext quality. In terms of food I try to buy local when possible.
One thing hasn't even brought into this discussion:
When buying chinese you support a dictatorship with a state-capitalistic type of Manchester capitalism under the guise of a communist agenda.
He might be right on things here and there, but he's none the less an idiot. I don't bother following the economic theories of holocaust deniers. Yep, poisoning the well, but guess what, there are others who are not idiots who can likely articulate an anti-globalization mindset better than he can, anyway.
If he's the best spokesperson for that POV, the POV must be pretty devoid of merit.
I should add that while I do buy stuff made in China, I try hard to buy local goods whenever I can. My kitchen... local cabinet maker (not local installer, but the stuff started as wood in his shop). Tiles? Local artist. New skylights? Entirely made here in NM. Ditto will be my replacement windows (have to do that soon, ugh). Oh, I'm plastering walls now myself. americanclay.com (here in ABQ). Heck, I'm not even looking at Volvos since China bought them from Ford.
The reality is that I think the arguments against it are simplistic, and wrong. Can trade be improved? Sure. I'd need to see counter-arguments, but I could see setting up US tariffs to be reciprocal (we'll tax your imports exactly as you tax ours).
Sailor Steve
11-13-10, 08:49 PM
I'm not sure how I feel about the question of globalization. Here in America there is a large liberal trendiness to hate Wal-Mart. The main reason given is that they "buy a lot of stuff from China". Yet when I look at packaging I see that most televisions you can buy today say "Made in China" on the package. Just recently someone touted Philips Electronics as a shining example of home-grown business (in this case from The Netherlands). But guess what? "Made in China". Also look at the box a PS3 comes in: "May be made in Japan, Korea, Malaysia or China".
I looked at a couple different websites and found differing definitions of the term "Globalization", and I'm not sure who here is arguing for which term. It's like "Multiculturalism". The term gets a bad rap, but I like Italian, Mexican and Japanese food equally. I guess I'm just to dim to understand.
Ships-R-Us
11-13-10, 11:19 PM
I'm only posting to pay tribute to Americas largest export, "AIR" evidenced by the empty cargo containers on the west coat shipping ports headed back in order to help Asia amass more wealth. China already rules, owns and governs the US leveraged with its money.
The one thing the Chineese deserve the most credit for is simply that they choose currently not to fly their flag atop the Capitol bldg, as they know that the Americans in no way would tolerate such a takeover.
Ships-R-Us
11-15-10, 02:02 PM
This was one hot and going thread until I brought up one of the most noteworthy truths. I guess most people are in denial and would rather walk away than face the truth.......My post sure got the views but.......
We know we have a trade imbalance with China, that's no surprise. China can be a large manufacturer, and China can be a large economy, but their per capita income is weak. They can't afford American products. The US still makes more stuff than china (in dollars), but it, like the chinese stuff, is bought by americans.
If the cost of mfg in the US is so high that Americans can't afford it, and it's cheaper to make something halfway around the world and ship it here, then there is no way US stuff will be a mass market product someplace with a fraction of the disposable income per household. Not to mention the trade imbalance is basically what China loans us for our insane spending.
Step one to fixing the problem is to stop gov from spending the way it does.
What can we do? "Hey, China, you bastards! We'll show you, we're gonna massively increase tariffs on your goods! BTW, on your way out, please remember to stop and buy some T-bills! Thanks, come again!"
Ducimus
11-15-10, 03:58 PM
Its people like greedy executives that ruin the US
Fixed.
Ships-R-Us
11-15-10, 04:33 PM
We know we have a trade imbalance with China, that's no surprise. China can be a large manufacturer, and China can be a large economy, but their per capita income is weak. They can't afford American products. The US still makes more stuff than china (in dollars), but it, like the chinese stuff, is bought by americans.
If the cost of mfg in the US is so high that Americans can't afford it, and it's cheaper to make something halfway around the world and ship it here, then there is no way US stuff will be a mass market product someplace with a fraction of the disposable income per household. Not to mention the trade imbalance is basically what China loans us for our insane spending.
Step one to fixing the problem is to stop gov from spending the way it does.
What can we do? "Hey, China, you bastards! We'll show you, we're gonna massively increase tariffs on your goods! BTW, on your way out, please remember to stop and buy some T-bills! Thanks, come again!"
Thanks for renewing the thread Tater. It really is a good thread. Maybe I should not have posted so boldly, and all you said is true. It kills me the way the economy is and to see the empty shipping containers heading west into the sunset is bothersome......I'm done posting here and thanks again...
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