Why the economy is still in shambles

[sportage]

This whole jobs and unemployment thing is really too simple to make so complicated.
When jobs are sent offshore, especially manufacturing, they never come back and are lost forever.
When unions are weakened and dismantled, the middle class wage earners suffer and that will never change. The less power unions have, the lower working wages drop.
But the first statement is the real issue here.
If a country is not making stuff, then you cannot create jobs magically.
When plants close and lay off workers, jobs are lost and unemployment rises.
Pretty simple.
Obama cannot create jobs.
Republicans cannot create jobs.
Small business cannot create sound jobs.
Large scale manufacturing created jobs, like the auto industry and steel industry,
for a large number of Americans once upon a time.
Those jobs have gone away. Forever.
Unless some super technology comes along where only Americans can manufacture some item, a type of super-car, or super-steel, or whatever, then its highly impossible unemployment will ever drop and middle class jobs will come out from nowhere.

As things stand now, we are hanging on by a very thin thread. The only jobs we soundly keep at home thus far are either with pushing money around, or in profiting off the sick healthcare system.
When the day they discover how to send all that offshore, look out.
When they figure out how to manufacture a McDonalds BigMac in China, and sell it in a vending machine in America, look out.

Where are the jobs? They were moved to other lands. No one can reverse what has happened or what will happen in the next years. I expect unemployment to hit 20% by 2015, or sooner.
And as healthcare providers raise costs higher and higher to hold onto profits, fewer will be able to afford that healthcare. Thus even healthcare industry will go bankrupt at some point. No buyers... no profits. No money to push around... no profits pushing money around.
Pretty simple.

 

[Nemesis 1]

I know pride can be a dangerious thing. But my wife made me so proud recently . She is at an age were she can take her401 K money or a good anount of it out of the fund . She asked if she could give it to the children in the spring , I cryed, I joyfully replied you most cerainly can do what ever you want with your money. I told here now is the time to shed that burden. She cried. I am so at peace. She about a month earlier asked what that bright star was she is seeing on clear mornings. I told here that not a star but the planet Venus. She said it can't be . I said it can be and is infact venus . She asked how that can be . I explained it to her and she actually understood. Bad times for some are good times for others. Ya just have to ask the question as she did to recieve a scientific and logical ans . Its fun teaching her about the semerians and enoch and the readings of the other gosphels. It fun showing her the lies and truths . She is a better person now. She was already good but now she has a twinkel in her eye.

 

[GodlessAstronomer]

I know pride can be a dangerious thing. But my wife made me so proud recently . She is at an age were she can take her401 K money or a good anount of it out of the fund . She asked if she could give it to the children in the spring , I cryed, I joyfully replied you most cerainly can do what ever you want with your money. I told here now is the time to shed that burden. She cried. I am so at peace. She about a month earlier asked what that bright star was she is seeing on clear mornings. I told here that not a star but the planet Venus. She said it can't be . I said it can be and is infact venus . She asked how that can be . I explained it to her and she actually understood. Bad times for some are good times for others. Ya just have to ask the question as she did to recieve a scientific and logical ans . Its fun teaching her about the semerians and enoch and the readings of the other gosphels. It fun showing her the lies and truths . She is a better person now. She was already good but now she has a twinkel in her eye.

Cocaine is a helluva drug.

 

[dmcowen674]

when quantitative easing fails the next step will be wage/price controls which will cause shortages thus rationing. your obama is doing great isn't he??

Rationing is the only way to reduce population.

Hope you are one of the first to leave.

Bye now

 

[DucatiMonster696]

The fact that more jobs were created overseas shouldn't surprise anyone that realizes the United States constitutes an extreme minority of the total world population as well as less than a quarter of its total energy demands. Since outsourcing began in earnest 30 years ago, it has (in part) contributed to an average unemployment rate south of 6.3% in the U.S., which is why the outsourcing bogeyman has never picked up any significant steam. You can't argue with hard numbers.

Your point is completely dismissive of what has actually happened only because it didn't happen fast enough in your mind to be a valid point. 30 years for the effect of off-shoring to come home to roost after living on funny money, deficit spending, and economic bubbles is about the correct amount of time for this effect on our labor market to be felt. Its also about how long it has taken nations like China and India to come into their own economically and with enough infrastructure and political security safe guards to become attract to major corporations beyond jobs that involve the process of simple mass assembly of consumer products.

But I agree that it'll take a while for the U.S. to recover the several million jobs necessary to get back to that average. Maybe there's a new average for unemployment, closer to 7%-8%, tough to tell without knowing what the context of those numbers are (better wages, benefits, technology, etc.). Of course, it's hard to ignore that outsourcing has been instrumental in improving technology, support, and services for all U.S. firms as well as significantly raising the labor skills standards of U.S. labor above any other nation. There's plenty of proof of that.

Yes at the expense of the average US worker who is now feeling the effects of "Global Free Trade" job loss. Furthermore this effect is going to be even greater in the years to come when the ball gets rolling with more technical, higher paying jobs that will be the next on the chopping block of jobs to be shipped out in mass.

 

[chucky2]

To be clear, I'm talking about the reality of the job market, not the made-up job market swirling in your head.

Mmmmm...when thousands of people are applying for one job, or an extremely limited amount of jobs, I don't think it's me that's got a swirling head. You must be in a different Reality than all the rest of us...

It's ridiculously easy to confirm that wages and hours have stayed the same with a simple Google search.

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/history/realer_12152000.txt <-- 2000
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/realer_11192008.pdf <--- 2008
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/realer_12162009.pdf <--- 2009
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/realer_11172010.pdf <--- 2010
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/realer.nr0.htm

Lets just make the BLS data more simple, here you go:

http://innovationandgrowth.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/statelocal_3819_image0011.png?w=557&h=527

WOWSERS!!!!!!! We're lower - not much, but negative is not a direction one wants to go in - than in 2009. Wait? Aren't wages supposed to go up, not down???? Here's the boner, er, bonus for you: That's after injecting hundreds of Billions of $$$,$$$,$$$,$$$.$$ into the economy...all borrowed and/or printed of course... Why didn't we just print out the money and give it to everyone that paid taxes? Sounds like a much more effective way of propping up the economy to me... When all that money runs out, exactly what is going to happen to all those magical jobs that were created? Hmmmmmmmmm.....O'Bummer!!!!!!!!!

Yeah, just not in the way you think.

Rofl.

You must be in the same "super smart political/economic guy" group as some of the other "esteemed' posters here. Glad you think it's funny, the rest of Unemployed America though isn't laughing quite so hard...

Oh right, you're that dude that couldn't reconcile his small gov't ideology with wanting to add billions to the deficit for trash cleanup for the unemployed by ignoring logistics like distance, coordination, and administration of 5-7M unemployed persons while simultaneously ignoring that this sort of insanity would simply delay people getting back into the skilled labor workforce. That deserves one more rofl.

No, I reconciled it just fine...here, let me break it down for you:

1.) We pay shittons of people - some skilled in Admin, some skilled in project management, some skilled in picking shit out their ass - to sit around and "do nothing". Do nothing for some is actually doing everything they can to find a job. In this market, that means they likely will find something months to years later. The rest of the folks either give up or just want the "free" money in the first place.

2.) Since we're already paying all these people to essentially do nothing, my insane idea is to, and I know, I know, this will be very very very hard for you to grasp, contribute a little to the society that is paying them to do nothing, by working a little. ZOMG!!!!!!!!!!!!! That's INSANE!!!!!!11!!!!!!111!!

3.) Somehow you've blown this into some liberal wet dream scenario where Billions need to be spent to tell Unemployed how to pick up trash, sit with the elderly, perform menial public service projects, etc. I'm not understanding how you need than a few (comparitvely) already Unemployed (who you bump up to pay more than their current Unemployed rate but less than full salary (and if they don't like it cool, they can either labor or get off Unemployment)) to administer each towns Unemployment reporting and management...if we don't already have said such people to perform those tasks.

4.) I know you're dumbfounded by this, but, people DO NOT need to be trained to pick up trash, sit and talk to an elderly person, or perform small projects for their community. People already know where the local post office is, or the local town hall, etc. So they already know where to go to assemble at. Why you believe people would need training to a.) bend over b.) pick up $50 bill c.) put in their pocket, I'm not sure. Now just substitute the $50 for a piece of garbage, and their pocket for a trashbag. I know, I know.....exceedingly hard.

At this point, we can just agree to disagree:

1.) You are in favor of spending hundreds of Billions, borrowed/printed, for - at best (and it's not even that at 2009 levels) - flat job growth.

2.) You are in favor or perpetually paying people Unemployment to say they're looking for jobs - that aren't there - or while they just "look" for jobs, all while getting nothing out of them.

I'm of a different mind...maybe I'm just alone in that regard, who knows....

Chuck

 

[chucky2]

I don't know about not getting jobs as I have got two of them in the last 8.5 months (after my company offshored tooling to Korea) and both of them have been higher pay than the previous.

Not many jobs but from September 2008 to about December of 2009, there were ZERO jobs listed in my field. Around Jan. 2010, a few started to trickle in. Lately, I've seen as many as 5 a week (and have received 4 calls in one month from various headhunters). Maybe I'm just in a more in demand field but when controls engineering jobs pick up, means more systems are being ordered for business automation and new assembly systems.

That's great news for your field - I truly mean that.

All those tooling people, what are they doing now?

 

[Zebo]

It's just gonna get worser and worser. That's why I'm bunkered up. I can live without any services just fine and be happy I have enough money and property. But if I were young and w/o baggage I'd seriously look at moving. To EU Oceania someplace else.

FYI - I have bascially been retired since 2003. I got lucky and would hate looking for a job these days.

Here is the problem

Which have been hidden by this:

Which is unsustainable.

 

[chucky2]

I was thinking Southern Illinois for me. Probably could get a 4 acres there or so if I bought correctly. With the amount of game down there, ought to be able to survive at minimum without much problem (of course if it ever got that bad, everyone else would be hunting as well).

Other thought was Indiana...more deer in SI though...

Chuck

 

[First]

Your point is completely dismissive of what has actually happened only because it didn't happen fast enough in your mind to be a valid point. 30 years for the effect of off-shoring to come home to roost after living on funny money, deficit spending, and economic bubbles is about the correct amount of time for this effect on our labor market to be felt. Its also about how long it has taken nations like China and India to come into their own economically and with enough infrastructure and political security safe guards to become attract to major corporations beyond jobs that involve the process of simple mass assembly of consumer products.

I see your point on the deficit spending front, of course we were still able to maintain tremendous growth with years of minor budget deficits or none at all during the 90's, so being able to ride another bubble as the U.S. consistently has since its founding wouldn't really surprise me. Economic bubbles are a fact of life in every country, it's not a manufactured phenomenon by and large. And what else would India and China do to take jobs away from Americans besides what they've already done? To be fair, we've been outsourcing with China and India even longer than 1980 - 2010.

Yes at the expense of the average US worker who is now feeling the effects of "Global Free Trade" job loss. Furthermore this effect is going to be even greater in the years to come when the ball gets rolling with more technical, higher paying jobs that will be the next on the chopping block of jobs to be shipped out in mass.

Luckily you can't ship out technical higher paying jobs because American businesses will always need the physical presence of a skilled employee, especially one that can actually speak English.

 

[Zebo]

Pretty good read here and follow speigel article if you want the truth

America in Decline: Why Germans Think We're Insane
A look at our empire in decline through the eyes of the European media.
December 26, 2010 |



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Petitions by Change.org|Start a Petition &#65533;


As an American expat living in the European Union, I&#8217;ve started to see America from a different perspective.

The European Union has a larger economy and more people than America does. Though it spends less -- right around 9 percent of GNP on medical, whereas we in the U.S. spend close to between 15 to 16 percent of GNP on medical -- the EU pretty much insures 100 percent of its population.

The U.S. has 59 million people medically uninsured; 132 million without dental insurance; 60 million without paid sick leave; 40 million on food stamps. Everybody in the European Union has cradle-to-grave access to universal m

http://www.alternet.org/world/149324/america_in_decline&#37;3A_why_germans_think_we're_insane/

 

[First]

Mmmmm...when thousands of people are applying for one job, or an extremely limited amount of jobs, I don't think it's me that's got a swirling head. You must be in a different Reality than all the rest of us...

Again, what you hear from friends, family or co-workers is entirely irrelevant to the reality that over a million net people will have found jobs this year in the private sector. Deal with that reality however you want.

Lets just make the BLS data more simple, here you go:

http://innovationandgrowth.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/statelocal_3819_image0011.png?w=557&h=527

WOWSERS!!!!!!! We're lower - not much, but negative is not a direction one wants to go in - than in 2009. Wait? Aren't wages supposed to go up, not down???? Here's the boner, er, bonus for you: That's after injecting hundreds of Billions of $$$,$$$,$$$,$$$.$$ into the economy...all borrowed and/or printed of course... Why didn't we just print out the money and give it to everyone that paid taxes? Sounds like a much more effective way of propping up the economy to me... When all that money runs out, exactly what is going to happen to all those magical jobs that were created? Hmmmmmmmmm.....O'Bummer!!!!!!!!!

lol, dude, wtf are you babbling about? You show me a graph, unsourced no less, that does not show wages were negative in all of 2009 like you're claiming, but which is irrelevant from my original point and statement anyway, which was that wages (and hours) have increased in the last 2 years, since late 2008. This fact is unequivocally proven in the BLS data I posted. I'm not sure you really understand what you're saying WRT borrowed money spurring all this private sector growth, as you apparently keep forgetting you're supposed to be a fiscally conservative small gov't guy who doesn't believe deficit spending can spur private sector growth. Remember?

No, I reconciled it just fine...here, let me break it down for you:

1.) We pay shittons of people - some skilled in Admin, some skilled in project management, some skilled in picking shit out their ass - to sit around and "do nothing". Do nothing for some is actually doing everything they can to find a job. In this market, that means they likely will find something months to years later. The rest of the folks either give up or just want the "free" money in the first place.

2.) Since we're already paying all these people to essentially do nothing, my insane idea is to, and I know, I know, this will be very very very hard for you to grasp, contribute a little to the society that is paying them to do nothing, by working a little. ZOMG!!!!!!!!!!!!! That's INSANE!!!!!!11!!!!!!111!!

3.) Somehow you've blown this into some liberal wet dream scenario where Billions need to be spent to tell Unemployed how to pick up trash, sit with the elderly, perform menial public service projects, etc. I'm not understanding how you need than a few (comparitvely) already Unemployed (who you bump up to pay more than their current Unemployed rate but less than full salary (and if they don't like it cool, they can either labor or get off Unemployment)) to administer each towns Unemployment reporting and management...if we don't already have said such people to perform those tasks.

4.) I know you're dumbfounded by this, but, people DO NOT need to be trained to pick up trash, sit and talk to an elderly person, or perform small projects for their community. People already know where the local post office is, or the local town hall, etc. So they already know where to go to assemble at. Why you believe people would need training to a.) bend over b.) pick up $50 bill c.) put in their pocket, I'm not sure. Now just substitute the $50 for a piece of garbage, and their pocket for a trashbag. I know, I know.....exceedingly hard.

Hilarious you're still arguing that making unemployed people pick up trash wouldn't be giant time-consuming waste of time for them, delaying them from getting back into skilled labor jobs. It's also hilarious you still think that administrative costs wouldn't soar into the billions when we're talking about forcing people to do trash pickup as a condition of unemployment, yet how the hell are you supposed to enforce said rule without gov't workers overseeing millions of unemployed people? Anyone can lie and say they did trash pickup if no one is there to track it and administer it buddy. Nor do you consider physical limitations of asking people to do manual labor they may not be capable of, not unheard of for a population that is 20&#37; obese.

All of these things you still can't come to grips with, so the fact that you still pretend these things wouldn't exist or happen the way I'm telling you it would is irrelevant to the conversation just as you claiming the job market sucks and that the million jobs created this year weren't the same type of high-paying, high hrs jobs of the past; your comments are irrelevant because they're alll easily debunked with verifiable reality.

At this point, we can just agree to disagree:

1.) You are in favor of spending hundreds of Billions, borrowed/printed, for - at best (and it's not even that at 2009 levels) - flat job growth.

One, I'm not for borrowing hundreds of billions to spur job growth and you couldn't prove otherwise if your life depended on it. Two, job growth (as in unemployment figures) are only flat this year because hundreds of thousands of people have been added back into the BLS' definition of those looking for work. That changes over time, and since that number is almost back to normal (those looking for work), it won't really surprise anyone when unemployment is back under 8% in 2 years.

2.) You are in favor or perpetually paying people Unemployment to say they're looking for jobs - that aren't there - or while they just "look" for jobs, all while getting nothing out of them.

One, I've never said I've been in favor of perpetually paying people unemployment and, yet again, you couldn't prove otherwise if your life depended on it. Two, are you honestly pretending that people on unemployment aren't looking for jobs while unemployed? How come over half of them eventually find work while on unemployment? You seriously didn't know this or something?

I'm of a different mind...

Unintentionally funny.

 

[Engineer]

That's great news for your field - I truly mean that.

All those tooling people, what are they doing now?

About half of them retired. 4 of them transferred to other plants to finish their retirement requirements (from 8 months to 5 years for the 4). Others like myself have gotten other jobs. About 4 or 5 of the younger (i.e. 30's down) have gone back to school.

 

[Zebo]

I know a lot of unemployed post docs in science and engineering. Ugly truth is that design, research, etc, follows manufacturing eventually for logistical reasons for anything else. But more accurately once the market making the goods has gotten capital via value added manufacturing they prefer to employ their own. HTC and the taiwan semiconductor firms are good examples of this. Both started as outsourcees for US corps and now are forces to be reckoned with. Hope these kids are not taking on debt for the fail that will result due to our poor policy. Or they better learn Mandarin while they are at it. China is not idiots like we are and will have jobs for them on the mainland.

 

[ebaycj]

1. Obama/McCain made no pledge to cut spending.

2. Obama/McCain don't support cessation of occupying Iraq.

3. Obama wants to continue to inflate the dollar.

4. Obama/McCain/Palin supported TARP.

Y'know what we really needed rather than those two retarded (unless they're fucking things up on purpose then they're not retarded)dipshits?

We needed spending to be slashed and higher interest rates, as well as separation of investment and commercial banking. People who had saved while established businesses were failing could've started new businesses with all the cash they had saved.

Seperation of investment and commercial banking sounds very anti-anarchist and very pro-regulation.

 

[1prophet]

I see your point on the deficit spending front, of course we were still able to maintain tremendous growth with years of minor budget deficits or none at all during the 90's, so being able to ride another bubble as the U.S. consistently has since its founding wouldn't really surprise me. Economic bubbles are a fact of life in every country, it's not a manufactured phenomenon by and large. And what else would India and China do to take jobs away from Americans besides what they've already done? To be fair, we've been outsourcing with China and India even longer than 1980 - 2010.



Luckily you can't ship out technical higher paying jobs because American businesses will always need the physical presence of a skilled employee, especially one that can actually speak English.

Why ship out when you can ship in.

How not to hire an overpriced American.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCbFEgFajGU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gi1R4iDx3Lg&feature=related

 

[Siddhartha]

Deflation is always better than inflation. And yes, we do need to start a massive bust, so the market can correct itself from there.

Is this a popular liberarian\tea party\GOP idea that the US needs a massive economic bust?

 

[bamacre]

Is this a popular liberarian\tea party\GOP idea that the US needs a massive economic bust?

I would say it is a belief that we will inevitably have another, and the longer we wait, the worse it will be. We are not on a sustainable path.

 

[First]

Why ship out when you can ship in.

How not to hire an overpriced American.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCbFEgFajGU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gi1R4iDx3Lg&feature=related

H1B's with citizenship contingencies aren't really that big a deal, especially since most businesses don't take them as seriously due to language and culture barriers. Besides, they account for an extraordinarily small part of the U.S. labor force, something like 0.0001% of all hired employees.

 

[iGas]

Canada economy seems to be better in 2010 than 2009, and words on the street is that things are a bit better for construction starting spring of 2011. And Canada economy tend to follow/echo the US economy.

 

[Engineer]

Canada economy seems to be better in 2010 than 2009, and words on the street is that things are a bit better for construction starting spring of 2011. And Canada economy tend to follow/echo the US economy.

Now way the socialists up there can be doing well...no way! :sneaky:

 

[Fenixgoon]

Pretty good read here and follow speigel article if you want the truth

http://www.alternet.org/world/149324/america_in_decline:_why_germans_think_we're_insane/

while much of that is true, quite simply put, the united states still is on the forefront of medical care. it costs quite a lot to do that, and one of the many reasons our system is so expensive.

for 23 of the past 30 years, the nobel prize in medicine has been awarded to, or shared by, americans.

european lifestyles are also much different than ours, and i would not be surprised if that made a significant contribution to the lack of medical costs.

 

[Tom]

I would say it is a belief that we will inevitably have another, and the longer we wait, the worse it will be. We are not on a sustainable path.

sure we are. first of all the US economy is not in shambles, it's growing. 2nd there will be global economic growth, the issue for us is will we keep getting more than our share of it, I think we will, or will our role diminish.

The only real threat is if American youth suddenly stops being American, which I don't see happening.

Old people, meaning anyone who fears the future, never can see that the future that is coming and it's full of young people who arent afraid to go for it. That's why America is always sustainable.

 

[dmcowen674]

sure we are. first of all the US economy is not in shambles, it's growing. 2nd there will be global economic growth, the issue for us is will we keep getting more than our share of it, I think we will, or will our role diminish.

The only real threat is if American youth suddenly stops being American, which I don't see happening.

Old people, meaning anyone who fears the future, never can see that the future that is coming and it's full of young people who arent afraid to go for it. That's why America is always sustainable.

You are on some serious drugs and that will bite you in the ass very soon.

You really think the economy will survive $5 and $6 gas in the U.S?

 

[Tom]

You are on some serious drugs and that will bite you in the ass very soon.

You really think the economy will survive $5 and $6 gas in the U.S?

Gas isn't going there any time soon, if ever.

And I'm talking big picture. Looking at one example..

The price of gas is irrelevant, what matters is the cost of transportation versus alternatives to transportation.

That equation determines the price of gas, and also determines the level of innovation which is what my point about American youth is.