US Excecutives Talk Entuhsiastically of Moving Millions of High-Skill Jobs to Lower-Wage Countries

[Jcrowley]

Tuesday, April 17, 2007 - Page updated at 02:00 AM


Froma Harrop / Syndicated columnist
New threat to skilled U.S. workers

The master plan, it seems, is to move perhaps 40 million high-skill American jobs to other countries. U.S. workers have not been consulted.

Princeton economist Alan Blinder predicts that these choice jobs could be lost in a mere decade or two. We speak of computer programming, bookkeeping, graphic design and other careers once thought firmly planted in American soil. For perspective, 40 million is more than twice the total number of people now employed in manufacturing.

Blinder was taken aback when, sitting in at the business summit in Davos, Switzerland, he heard U.S. executives talk enthusiastically about all the professional jobs they could outsource to lower-wage countries. And he's a free trader.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2003668844_harrop17.html

[Gman]

1. If we don't want the US to be little more than a third world country

we must take the WH and keep Congress next year.

[antigop]

2. and we have to kick out the Dems who support "free trade"

the ones who vote for trade agreements that do not include worker protections and environmental protections.

[AzDar]

29. Absolutely VITAL in 2008. "Free trade" has been very costly to the

American worker.
No more.

[Ilsa]

3. Why do these executives hate America? The execs' children will

end up hating them as spending power and dollar velocity dries up in the United States. But then it will be too late unless the working poor like reading French 18th century history or literature like A Tale of Two Cities.

[depakid]

35. And don't think that there aren't Mme Defarges out there

If the economy collapses fast and hard, there are going to be a lot of people looking for scapegoats.

[blues90]

4. These Execs don't give a shit

They have all the money they will ever need . This seems to be an ongoing process that is already sucking away many americans lively hoods .

I don't have confidence that the government we have will have what it takes to change this , we are already owned by huge corporations and people will never begin a national strike which is about the only way to cripple these corps . Meantime in the next two years how many more people will end up in poverty and once you get there how do you get out .

Even if whatever government we have is in place in 2009 it will tkae many years to begin to turn this around , by then the 10 million jobs will be gone and then some . By then there will be millions of new workers joining the workforce and with less jobs created how is this going to work out .

[MikeNearMcChord]

5. I say quadruple the tariff on any American company

that uses outsourced products back into the country. Also an automatic 80% income tax on executive pay and benefits of these companies, plus a punative asset tax on these greedos. Sorry to sound like Karl Marx, but these bastages are the true threats to this country.

[calimary]

7. That's actually a shrewd plan (that I WISH some of our Congresscritters

had the balls to implement). DISincentives. Make it pay DEARLY for corporations to do that. Offer tax breaks and other incentives if they don't. Strongly suggest windfall profits taxes if they do. And DO AWAY WITH that damned loophole that lets 'em set up a front company in the Grand Caymans to avoid paying more taxes. If they benefit from OUR society (which they do, like kings and queens), they should chip in their fair share to help support it. Much blessed - much obligated.

[grannylib]

23. Amen amen amen. I am sick to DEATH of big business hiding assets

offshore to avoid paying their fair share.
I am sick to DEATH of the corporate meme that 'increasing productivity is the best way for the 'Murkin worker to improve her/his financial lot in life.'

Yeah, whatthefuckEVER...

[calimary]

24. Well, yeah, they do mean that, but the way they mean it is -

"increasing productivity" by union-busting and making the atmosphere inhospitable for union organizing, so they won't be held to account for employees taking regular breaks and taking paid vacation time. And if you slowly but surely remove the benefits that were won bit-by-bit over many years and a great deal of work, then the corporation's productivity WILL go up. If you don't have to pay for employee health care, pay them while they're on family leave or some personal emergency, heaven forbid you have to offer them maternity (or parental) leave and job security, cover their vacations, their disability, do away with their pensions, then OF COURSE your corporate productivity is gonna be increased. ASSHOLES. I'd like to see a few of these CEO bastards outsourced. Imagine how many hungry people we could feed, how much housing we could build, how many workers and their families could have health coverage, if even ONE of these fatcats had to cut back on one of those big-ticket golden parachutes, or yearly raises. CEO pay is utterly obscene, downright SINFUL, especially by comparison to the 'Murkin worker' who's shouldered all the cutbacks.

[ingac70]

6. That's why when I took my buyout from Ford....

I signed up for HVAC classes. No one sends their heat and air units overseas to get fixed!
The blue collar workers have had it stuck to them for years. Now maybe some hell will be raised since desk jobs are getting hit.

[Morgana LaFey]

14. Good plan. Good luck with your new career. nt

[bonito]

8. This is the root of many of our problems

I posted this today but it doesn't seem like many make the connection.http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=677703&mesg_id=677703

[Peace Patriot]

9. Pull their corporate charters. Seize their assets for the common good. It's time.

But how?

For a long time now, I've toyed with a theory that everything that has happened in the last six years--the Supreme Court crowning of Bush in '00, the War, the Patriot Act, the installation of "trade secret," proprietary vote counting code, owned and controlled by rightwing Bushite corporations, the "unitary executive, all of it--goes back to Seattle '99, when 50,000 well-informed Americans (labor unions, humanitarian groups, environmentalists and others) shut down the WTO meeting in the most awesome and well organized civil disobedience protest that I have ever witnessed, or have been privileged to participate in.

It was the alarm bell for the Corporate Rulers. Better get these people under control, cuz there is nothing more dangerous to the Corporate Rulers than aroused, rebellious, well-informed American voters.

I continue to think there's something to this theory. Look what is happening in South America--partly in reaction to corporate misrule and oppression, but also as the result of years of hard work on transparent elections and grass roots organization: the utter transformation of South America by the election of leftist (majorityist) governments in Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador, with victory also in Nicaragua, and big leftist movements in Peru, Paraguay and Mexico (likely to win future elections--also possibly Guatemala). The common themes: Latin American independence, sovereignty, and self-determination against US-based global corporate predators and violent interference by the predators' puppets in the White House; social justice; Latin American regional cooperation and strength (creation of the Bank of the South--started by Venezuela--to bail So. American countries out of onerous World Bank/IMF debt; creation of Mercosur--So. American trade group, to counter NAFTA/CAFTA et al, and a probable precursor of a So. American "Common Market").

All of it based on TRANSPARENT elections, fueled by anger and rebellion at years of oppression inflicted in various ways by one White House regime after another (the only exception being Jimmy Carter), in collusion with local fascists and rich elites.

Democracy can happen here, too. The South Americans are showing the way. But we do need to know that the Corporate Rulers are well aware of the powers WE have, as a sovereign people, to dismantle, or at least, severely curtail them and bust up their monopolies. That is WHY they have taken away our right to vote. Restoring transparent elections here is not going to be easy or quick. For one thing, there are too many Corporate Democrats protecting the "trade secret" vote counting (and/or, corrupted by it, or afraid of it). But it is something that we must do, if we want our country back. It needs to be Priority #1.

Here are the lessons that I've gleaned from study of the Latin American revolution:

1. Transparent elections.
2. Grass roots organization.
3. Think big.

Viva la revolución!

[bonito]

10. Excellent

This needs to be a main post in itself.

[Jcrowley]

11. You really hit a nerve there

"all of it--goes back to Seattle '99,"

November 30, 1999 is seen as a turning point for capital, the media, activists of all stripes and millions of ordinary people around the world who had previously not thoughtof the global economy as a matter which was relevant to their lives or, more importantly, alterable by their actions.

That seemingly obscure point is in fact very relevant and critical to what we see all around us today. Seattle was the hot point or culmination in the anti-globalization protests here in the US but as you know, I'm sure, there were massive well-organized protests everywhere in the world preceding that day in Seattle. And they were damn effective not only at the point of the actual dissent but also in changing the entire political landscape across the globe. The radical political space which had been opened up by the anti-globalization movement was instantly pulverized (especially in the US) after 9/11.

"It is not only by shooting bullets in the battlefields that tyranny is overthrown, but also by hurling ideas of redemption, words of freedom and terrible anathemas against the hangmen that people people bring down dictators and empires..."
-- Emiliano Zapata

[no_hypocrisy]

12. Why bother going to college if there aren't going to be any jobs after grauduation?

[0rganism]

13. the failure is ours, unfortunately

We "1st-world" liberals let this happen.

Some say "the problem" lies in NAFTA, CAFTA, GATT, et al, that open access to this cheap and under-regulated labor pool brings down wages for Americans and makes it harder for us to find work.

I disagree -- that is not in itself "the problem" but rather a symptom and side-effect of "the problem." This wage imbalance exists because we enabled it, through our collective inaction.

The low-wage labor magnets exist in the first place because we failed to stand up for economic freedoms and environmental regulations in the "3rd-world." We looked the other way while our government worked with local dictatorships to murder union organizers and loot the natural wealth of other nations. We rested on our laurels while their countries were raped by our richest and most arrogant corporate leaders. When the last family-wage office jobs leave our shores, we will begin to understand the grinding poverty and hopelessness to which we subjected 2/3 of the world's population.

You might say, isn't this the neo-conservatives' policy failure? Again, I disagree -- it's their success. They wanted this, it's their moment of cheap-labor triumph, their policies are paying off for them. They kept the pressure on, they propped up dictators and suppressed dissent, they pushed the disparity of wealth as high as it could go. We may have objected at times, even protested and occasionally put our lives on the line, but by and large we went along for the ride. Spreading democracy at home and abroad, doncha know?

Well, the worm has turned and the flood gates are about to open in a big way. I see it every day -- companies relocating their key equipment and technologies to India, China, Malaysia, Indonesia... and who can blame them? The CEOs are obligated by law to make the most money possible for their shareholders, and that means economic profits -- not just competitive profits, but economic profits. They're merely relocating their economic turbines to the part of the capital river where the current flows at its fastest.

In another century or so, one way or another, the world's median benefits (be they in wages or services) will have reached something of a parity. At that time, American workers will once again have an equal shot at getting a job. Thanks to our negligence, that time will be much delayed and the point of equality much lower than it could have been in terms of quality of life, and the wealthy will rejoice at our reliable stupidity.

[Morgana LaFey]

15. You're right, even if I don't like the way you frame it.

"Our fault."

There's no escaping this now, and there's no turning back. I'm reminded of when the labor unions were all in a tizzy about the coming computer and robotics age because it would take away union jobs. They wanted to fight it, but that wasn't going to happen. It wouldn't / couldn't work. The best they could have done was to find ways to align with the inevitably coming changes (by retraining their workers), which they didn't really do all that well tho I think some of them did.

Same thing now. We are in the midst of a tsunami of gargantuan proportions. There is no stopping it. I was astonished, along with Lou Dobbs, why corporatists coudln't see that killing off the middle class was a BAD idea. But then someone on DU posted about the emerging markets that are China and India. China alone will more than make up for a decimated middle class here in the U.S.

Translation: we are royally, totally, utterly, irreversibly screwn.

[0rganism]

33. not our fault alone, but definitely our failure

I'm not saying we get all the blame. We've got to give the lion's share to the neo-cons and corporate imperialists but they'd call it "credit", whereas we (that is, our "side" collectively) did fail.

In our defense, I can only say we really didn't see it coming -- partially because we were looking in all the wrong places. The vast majority of us saw (and probably still see) the goal of MLK's struggle as fundamentally different from that of Cesar Chavez or Nelson Mandella or Oscar Romero or, even, Ho Chi Minh and Fidel Castro. Towards the end of his tragically-shortened life, I think MLK tried to tell us the truth about that, by speaking against the war in Vietnam and marching with the sanitation workers of Memphis, but his voice was cut off. Our project was to unify these causes, the automotive workers of Michagan with the campesinos of Mexico, the national women's rights movement with the anti-Apartheid revolution in South Africa, human rights concerns in Warsaw Pact Poland with human rights concerns in the ghettos of Philadelphia, the wildlife conservation movement with the GLBT rights movement, and we couldn't do it -- maybe in part because we didn't know what the goal was. These days, you'll often hear people refer to the Democratic party as one of many disparate special interest groups. It is our collective failure to unite and cross-organize that makes these words ring true.

We had a chance to avoid this phase entirely through political leadership about 40 years ago, but honestly, looking back on it now, that chance died with Bobby Kennedy.

Now we have to prepare to reap the whirlwind sewn by those much wealthier than most of us. The politicians we elect in the next 6 years will be the ones who determine the new face of American mass-unemployment in the face of unprecedented outsourcing, trade imbalances, and increasingly rapid global climate change.

I hope we can get it right this time.

[Vincardog]

20. The CEOs are obligated by law to make the most money possible for their shareholders,???

What LAW is that?
Do you have a link?

[hang a left]

21. Try this for starters

How Corporate Law Inhibits Social Responsibility
A Corporate Attorney Proposes a ‘Code for Corporate Citizenship’ in State Law
by Robert Hinkley

After 23 years as a corporate securities attorney–advising large corporations on securities offerings and mergers and acquisitions–I left my position as partner at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom because I was disturbed by the game. I realized that the many social ills created by corporations stem directly from corporate law. It dawned on me that the law, in its current form, actually inhibits executives and corporations from being socially responsible. So in June 2000 I quit my job and decided to devote the next phase of my life to making people aware of this problem. My goal is to build consensus to change the law so it encourages good corporate citizenship, rather than inhibiting it.

The provision in the law I am talking about is the one that says the purpose of the corporation is simply to make money for shareholders. Every jurisdiction where corporations operate has its own law of corporate governance. But remarkably, the corporate design contained in hundreds of corporate laws throughout the world is nearly identical. That design creates a governing body to manage the corporation–usually a board of directors–and dictates the duties of those directors. In short, the law creates corporate purpose. That purpose is to operate in the interests of shareholders. In Maine, where I live, this duty of directors is in Section 716 of the business corporation act, which reads:

...the directors and officers of a corporation shall exercise their powers and discharge their duties with a view to the interests of the corporation and of the shareholders....

Although the wording of this provision differs from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, its legal effect does not. This provision is the motive behind all corporate actions everywhere in the world. Distilled to its essence, it says that the people who run corporations have a legal duty to shareholders, and that duty is to make money. Failing this duty can leave directors and officers open to being sued by shareholders.

Section 716 dedicates the corporation to the pursuit of its own self-interest (and equates corporate self-interest with shareholder self-interest). No mention is made of responsibility to the public interest. Section 716 and its counterparts explain two things. First, they explain why corporations find social issues like human rights irrelevant--because they fall outside the corporation’s legal mandate. Second, these provisions explain why executives behave differently than they might as individual citizens, because the law says their only obligation in business is to make money.


snip>

http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0119-04.htm

[Blue_Tires]

31. thanks for that link

great stuff

[0rganism]

25. one major reference is from caselaw: Dodge v. Ford Motor, 1920?s

a little googling shows it to be 204 Mich. 459, 170 N.W. 668 (1919)
wikipedia summary: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Company
(partial) text of decision: http://www.lapres.net/dodge.html

in which Henry Ford attempted to use some of his corporation's immense profits to lower costs, hire more people, and build up employee infrastructure, to the objection of minority shareholders John and Horace Dodge (yes, the same ones went on to found Dodge Brothers Inc., which was eventually purchased by Chrysler after their deaths), who wanted more dividends for investors (aka themselves).

"A business corporation is organized and carried on primarily for the profit of the stockholders. The powers of the directors are to be employed for that end. The discretion of directors is to be exercised in the choice of means to attain that end, and does not extend to a change in the end itself, to the reduction of profits, or to the nondistribution of profits among shareholders in order to devote them to other purposes." (Ostrander)

Note that this wouldn't apply to non-profit corporations, at least not in the same way, but it's reflected in a lot of corporate charters, and as such would be subject to the same principles that resulted in Ostrander's decision -- which, AFAIK, hasn't been overturned. Nor does it alleviate corporations from their other legal obligations such as they are, e.g. with the SEC or various other oversight agencies. The implications are that a company cannot re-invest in its infrastructure or engage in acts of social responsibility until the shareholders have what is deemed to be an equitable cut of the profits.

[moondust]

16. Whistling past the graveyard?

Aren't shareholders bound to eventually wake up to the fact that their companies can save millions or even billions simply by outsourcing those executive jobs along with the rest?

[bonito]

17. I'd ask ,but long distance charges apply.

:(

[Leopolds Ghost]

18. Good. I'm glad they're doing this

It's time for upper middle class Democratic free-traders who supported
Clinton, welfare "reform" and free trade -- an entire apparatus dedicated
to the construction of a two-tiered jobs system in the United States with
the off-shoring of high-wage low-skilled jobs -- to get a taste of their
own medicine.

[populistdriven]

19. A friend of mine left IBM they gutted the place - shipped all jobs overseas

And this was high level IT support for their famous research lab.

Only 2 IT jobs left in entire lab and those are low-skilled.

For hardware and network support you get someone in Brazil. For everything else you get India.

[Daedelus76]

22. I'm all for it

my white-collar brothers sat around for years and did nothing but buy up stuff at the Big Box Mart and laugh their butts off at high-school grads. What is good for the goose is good for the gander. Join me in the unemployment lines, perhaps we can flip burgers together.

Really, no sympathy from me. Let the chaos begin.

[tkmorris]

26. Well then.........

Thanks for your support mate. My wife and I have busted our butts for every working American but hey, if we lose everything that's just fine by you? Computer programming was our path out of poverty, I'd sure as hell hate to see it all get shipped to India and Vietnam.

[JVS]

27. Cold-war peace dividend. They wouldn't dare gut our jobs so badly if the USSR were still around

[NuttyFluffers]

28. one day even the executives will be 'just another high-skill job'

i'm sure we can find a CEO for most of the fortune 500 somewhere in india. there's a lot of talented folk there. the company would save millions upon millions just in outsourcing a mere handful of chief executive jobs. think of the savings.

[Ilsa]

36. BAsed on the performance of many of them lately, I think they are

overrated. I don't think it takes much education to lose billions. I would have done for Ford for a lot less than the millions they spent on their last CEO.

[donheld]

30. The company I work for is bragging about doing it

They brag about how much it's saving them. They don't care about our jobs.

[Jcrowley]

32. Excellent comments

throughout this thread.

Leopold's Ghost and Peace Patriot's bear repeating.

[lovuian]

34. Well I guess our kids will have to leave the country for jobs

brain drain coming