Show me more "recovery"

[andy158]

I can't for the life of me see where we are on the road to recovery. Maybe some isolated areas of the country are experiencing slight recovery, but here in the northern panhandle of West Virginia the recession is still alive with a vengance. For example the two biggest employers in the Ohio Valley, Sverstal (a Russian steel company formerly Wheeling Pittsburgh Steel) and Arcelor/Mittal (formerly Weirton Steel) have practically ground to a halt. These companies once employed a combined force of over 25,000 people at one time. Now they employ about 1,300. The biggest furniture store in town is bankrupt and selling everything. The biggest car dealer in town has announced a January 30 bankruptcy auction liquidating equipment, buildings and real estate. I have been laid off my job for two weeks. Several other manufactuing facilities within a 30 mile radius have either shut down or have people laid off. The small neighborhood of 75 homes where we live has seven bank repo homes for sale. That is almost 10% of forclosed properties. But the real kicker is Wal Mart is building a Super Store 1/2 mile down the road from the car dealer that went bankrupt advertising minimum wage jobs. Go figure!

[JRScott]

The rest of the country is basically suffering what the Southeast has suffered for the last 2 decades.

The various trade treaties of the the past 2 decades first robbed our nation of 'low skill' manufacturing primarily located in the southeast. Now it is taking the 'medium skill' manufacturing such as steel. It like most things is a result of the short sightedness of Washington.

The recovery will not be quick. Little bit worried about where I work we suffered some damage from the storms this winter.

[OhioFiler]

The area you live in Andy has been depressed for a long time. Those 2 steel companies have struggled since the 1980's.

The answer is simple but our pols are too afraid to solve it. Coal powered energy plants or nuclear energy plants would revitalize that area and create 1,000's of great paying jobs.

Why are the fools in Washington so afraid of creating jobs in a sector of the economy we NEED the product so badly? ENERGY is key to our economy.

[MSbklawyer]

The area you live in Andy has been depressed for a long time. Those 2 steel companies have struggled since the 1980's.

The answer is simple but our pols are too afraid to solve it. Coal powered energy plants or nuclear energy plants would revitalize that area and create 1,000's of great paying jobs.

Why are the fools in Washington so afraid of creating jobs in a sector of the economy we NEED the product so badly? ENERGY is key to our economy.

Jobs aren't created by fools in Washington, as much as those fools would like you to think that they are so that you'll vote for the slickest "job creator" on the ballot. A politician seeking votes in exchange for "creation of jobs" is only slightly better than the Southern politicians of old who bought votes with half pint bottles of cheap whiskey. I take that back. They're NOT slightly better, they're worse. At least they delivered on the whiskey promise.

Jobs are created when a person or a company perceives a demand out there and sets about to supply that demand for a profit. Then people are hired to help and paid a wage for their efforts. Behold: A job is created. In turn, the newly employed begins spending his wages on things he needs and wants, thereby creating further demand for services and products that someone else will hire people to meet, thereby creating even more jobs. And on and on it goes.

The problem isn't a lack of jobs. There are plenty of jobs. The problem is that the jobs are in third world or second world nations and pay what Americans would consider slave wages. You want a job? There are sewing factories in Bangladesh that are screaming for people. Bring your kids along too -- don't worry that they're only 9, they have jobs they can do too. And you needn't worry about their schooling either. School's not such a big thing there. You don't need to know much algebra to run a sewing machine. And the absence of so much schooling will free up more of their time and your time to work even more so you can earn even more! See how that works? What's the pay, you ask? Well, you can discuss that when you get there. And keep in mind that the cost of living there is MUCH lower, so you won't need to earn as much. Plus your kids will be earning too, so that will help.

I know it sounds harsh, but if I were going to set up a manufacturing facility of some sort, and I were motivated only by the bottom line (as big corporations are, despite what they say on TV) I wouldn't DREAM of doing it in the United States. I don't want to have to worry about getting sued for a million dollars every time someone makes a pass at a female coworker; I don't want to worry about having my hard earned money taken from me and given to someone else because I had the unmitigated gall to hire the most qualified person for the job instead of the affirmative action candidate; I don't want to worry about having my entire facility shut down because the endangered striped a$$ fruit bat might be nesting nearby; I don't want to have to worry about paying thousands in workers' compensation every time someone claims they are "hurt"; I don't want to worry about my work force unionizing and going on strike and having a government bureaucrat tell me that I have to pay the workers what they want or else be fined for not negotiating in good faith; I don't want to pay tax on top of tax on top of tax on top of tax. It may sound selfish, but I want to make a profit and keep some of it.

Thank you, but no. I'll open up my low/medium skill manufacturing facility in Indonesia or some such place. Where the people will be thankful for the job that they (and their kids) have. And should I need some highly skilled workers that only the West can supply, I'll import them, pay them an excellent salary, pay their rent at a nice house on the beach and still come out ahead.

I'm not an economist, but that's what I see happening to American jobs and American job creation.

[DeadManCrawling]

MSBKLawyer,

you sum it up nicely, in concise terms that are entirely accurate. Once the companies saw the benefits and cheap wages, there was no turning back. And there won't be.

No way to put this back the way it was decades ago. Wishful thinking.

[catleg]

Here is another outsourcing trend:

Personal Outsourcing

and this validates MSbklawyer's observations about free market economics:

Cigarette price spiral

[MSbklawyer]

But the real kicker is Wal Mart is building a Super Store 1/2 mile down the road from the car dealer that went bankrupt advertising minimum wage jobs.

No, the real kicker is that there will be three or four applicants for every one of those minimum-wage jobs.

[JRScott]

The real kicker is that there will be three or four applicants for every one of those minimum-wage jobs.

More than that probably. There were several hundred that applied for 1 position here at a grocery store couple months back.

[flyinbroke]

No, the real kicker is that there will be three or four applicants for every one of those minimum-wage jobs.

And if you have any degrees above a HS diploma you won't get a call back.

[OhioFiler]

Jobs aren't created by fools in Washington, as much as those fools would like you to think that they are so that you'll vote for the slickest "job creator" on the ballot.

I'm not an economist, but that's what I see happening to American jobs and American job creation.

Government doesn't create jobs at all. What they do is PROHIBIT the creation of jobs through arcane ridiculous regulations and laws. Therefore, politicians can "create jobs" by getting the hell out of the way of the American entrepreneur via deregulation. I for one could not care less when a stupid toad is on some imaginary endangered list.

"Drill baby, drill" was almost a universal political mantra when gasoline was over $4 per gallon. Even the foolish libs were willing to allow offshore exploration. Once oil prices dropped deregulation became an afterthought.

[OhioFiler]

Here is another outsourcing trend:

Personal Outsourcing

and this validates MSbklawyer's observations about free market economics:

Cigarette price spiral

ROFL. Too good!

[lrprn]

So when *all* American government controls and restrictions are removed and the market (and the primarily American corporations who control it ) are allowed to go wherever and do whatever they please, here's what resulted before - American sweatshops, some using child labor. Think it didn't already happen here? Take a look at http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/145 and at the photos at http://www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/childlabor/

We have American government regulation to make it as hard as possible for this corporate-led horror to ever happen again. If you want to discuss having *less* regulation, then I'm right there with you. However, if you believe that *no* regulation at all is the right answer, then pull up those photos of what's already happened right here in the good old USA and take a hard look again.

Thinking that we can somehow return to the past and recreate American manufacturing jobs if we just deregulate and let the market have free rein means one of two things - you either don't understand the now-global marketplace that will now never go away, or you don't care if many innocent people in America and elsewhere around the world are hurt by the need to drive corporate earnings ever higher, as long as your beliefs in a failed economic ideology are followed.

[helpmeout]

Government doesn't create jobs at all. What they do is PROHIBIT the creation of jobs through arcane ridiculous regulations and laws. Therefore, politicians can "create jobs" by getting the hell out of the way of the American entrepreneur via deregulation. I for one could not care less when a stupid toad is on some imaginary endangered list.

"Drill baby, drill" was almost a universal political mantra when gasoline was over $4 per gallon. Even the foolish libs were willing to allow offshore exploration. Once oil prices dropped deregulation became an afterthought.

Deregulation? The Banks need MORE regulation, not deregulation. Between the S&L crisis when I was in college and what recently happened, I think it's safe to say that deregulation is not the way to go.

And rather than destroy our planet by drilling in protected areas, why not work on ELIMINATING the need for oil? That's a far better plan that will last a whole lot longer than destroying protected areas will.

As for the government being unable to create jobs, well, it can. The depression started getting a little better with the New Deal. But it recovered when the government went to war and started spending even more money. President Obama wasn't too far off with his "stimulus" idea. The only problem is that we don't have the money for it. Why? Because nobody wanted to pay higher taxes to pay back the borrowed money for the spending that got us out of the depression. So here we are, in a mess. One that isn't going to go away.

[DeadManCrawling]

So here we are, in a mess. One that isn't going to go away.

Argue about what brought us here all you want, and about the futile ways of fixing it. This statement above, I think is something we all feel if we pause long enough to listen to the hairs on the back of our necks, or to sniff a little of the stench of war and disaster that may loom in the near future.

Since we are unwilling to "voluntarily" pay through cuts or taxes, war it may be. It has worked in the past, at least in as far as shuffling the time of reckoning years or decades down the line.

[JRScott]

Argue about what brought us here all you want, and about the futile ways of fixing it. This statement above, I think is something we all feel if we pause long enough to listen to the hairs on the back of our necks, or to sniff a little of the stench of war and disaster that may loom in the near future.

Since we are unwilling to "voluntarily" pay through cuts or taxes, war it may be. It has worked in the past, at least in as far as shuffling the time of reckoning years or decades down the line.

The solution is something most Americans and our politicians are not willing to accept.

Fiscally we have to cut spending and we have to raise taxes to pay for the programs we have, there is no other way. We could avoid tax increases only by fairly drastic cuts to government provided services (around 30% across the board).

We could save social security by changing the age at which benefits are received. If we changed it to where those born after 1959 received partial benefits at the life expectancy determined by their birth year with full benefits 3 years thereafter we could easily sustain it. For example someone born in 2004 has a life expectancy of 77.8 years. So you'd set the benefits currently gotten at 62 to 77.8 and at 65 to 80.8. It would make the system self sustaining but it would be highly unpopular and why our populist Congress and Presidents don't ever suggest it.

Medicare, in essence you need to double the tax and raise the age at which benefits can be received to make it match the above for Social Security. That would sustain it for a couple more decades, once again it would be a highly unpopular solution. To sustain beyond that you'd have to adopt a more European criteria, years remaining to care received. Another highly unpopular solution (remember seniors make up the largest block of active voters.).

To rebuild our manufacturing base we have to break or renegotiate the trade treaties of the last few decades. In essence we need the ability to charge tariffs at least equal to that charged on our exports. Ideally we'd need tariffs sufficiently high that it becomes cheaper to build it in the USA rather than ship it here from elsewhere. This would mean everyone would pay higher prices for everything they get, it means a lower standard of living. (But heh you already have a lower standard of living in most cases than your parents had in the 1970s. Don't confuse making more money with a higher standard of living.....your money is worth far less today. For example your dollar today is worth about a third of what it was in 1980...which means to have the same standard of living you had then you'd need to make 3 times what you did then). Another key would be lowering corporate taxes. Ideally if import tariffs were high enough you could eliminate corporate tax entirely.