#1 The United States has lost approximately 42,400 factories since 2001.
#2 Dell Inc., one of America’s largest manufacturers of computers, has announced plans to dramatically expand its operations in China with an investment of over $100 billion over the next decade.
#3 Dell has announced that it will be closing its last large U.S. manufacturing facility in Winston-Salem, North Carolina in November. Approximately 900 jobs will be lost.
#4 In 2008, 1.2 billion cellphones were sold worldwide. So how many of them were manufactured inside the United States? Zero.
#5 According to a new study conducted by the Economic Policy Institute, if the U.S. trade deficit with China continues to increase at its current rate, the U.S. economy will lose over half a million jobs this year alone.
#6 As of the end of July, the U.S. trade deficit with China had risen 18 percent compared to the same time period a year ago.
#7 The United States has lost a total of about 5.5 million manufacturing jobs since October 2000.
#8 According to Tax Notes, between 1999 and 2008 employment at the foreign affiliates of U.S. parent companies increased an astounding 30 percent to 10.1 million. During that exact same time period, U.S. employment at American multinational corporations declined 8 percent to 21.1 million.
#9 In 1959, manufacturing represented 28 percent of U.S. economic output. In 2008, it represented 11.5 percent.
#10 Ford Motor Company recently announced the closure of a factory that produces the Ford Ranger in St. Paul, Minnesota. Approximately 750 good paying middle class jobs are going to be lost because making Ford Rangers in Minnesota does not fit in with Ford's new "global" manufacturing strategy.
#11 As of the end of 2009, less than 12 million Americans worked in manufacturing. The last time less than 12 million Americans were employed in manufacturing was in 1941.
#12 In the United States today, consumption accounts for 70 percent of GDP. Of this 70 percent, over half is spent on services.
#13 The United States has lost a whopping 32 percent of its manufacturing jobs since the year 2000.
#14 In 2001, the United States ranked fourth in the world in per capita broadband Internet use. Today it ranks 15th.
#15 Manufacturing employment in the U.S. computer industry is actually lower in 2010 than it was in 1975.
#16 Printed circuit boards are used in tens of thousands of different products. Asia now produces 84 percent of them worldwide.
#17 The United States spends approximately $3.90 on Chinese goods for every $1 that the Chinese spend on goods from the United States.
#18 One prominent economist is projecting that the Chinese economy will be three times larger than the U.S. economy by the year 2040.
#19 The U.S. Census Bureau says that 43.6 million Americans are now living in poverty and according to them that is the highest number of poor Americans in the 51 years that records have been kept.
Outside View: Jobs drought confronts president and Republicans - UPI.com - 1/6/2011 - Peter Morici, professor at the Smith School of Business, University of Maryland School.
Since July 2009, spending by consumers, businesses and federal and state governments increased at a 3.8 percent annual pace but imports and the trade deficit have jumped 17 and 37 percent, respectively. Simply, too many stimulus dollars are being spent on goods from China and too few of those dollars return to purchase U.S. exports.
By the end of 2013, about 13 million private sector jobs must be added to move unemployment down to 6 percent and current policies aren't creating conditions for businesses to hire 350,000 workers each month.
... the undervalued yuan is responsible for about half the U.S. trade deficit and high unemployment in the United States.
Imposing a tax on the conversion of U.S. dollars into yuan in proportion to Beijing's currency market intervention -- either for the purpose of importing Chinese products or investing in China -- would offset the effects China's currency market intervention on the U.S. economy. Such a tax would significantly rebalance trade, instigate more investment and jobs creation in the United States, and reduce federal and state budget shortfalls.
Whatever the merits of free trade internationally and laissez faire domestically, trade with China is hardly free now. Chinese mercantilism and a U.S. government that hasn't answered it are victimizing too many unemployed Americans.
3 comments:
We do have problems with currency manipulation and unfair or unenforced trade laws. However, we are shooting ourselves in the foot by regulations. While the world is ignoring the Kyoto protocol and pursuing growth (while only giving lip service to environmental regulations) our gov't is regulating our companies to death. Since, we may not see cap and trade come about legislatively, the EPA has taken it upon themselves to regulate carbon. This affects many industries directly and all of us indirectly since we all use energy.
There are too many things to mention here, such as the fact that we may not be able to continue to dispose of coal ash in concrete anymore, and so on that may raise the cost of energy to manufacturers by 90%. Would you build a plant in the US knowing that this is coming at you if the gov't doesn't change course? When you add high rates of taxation and the cost of the health care bill that is now law, why wouldn't you go overseas? It's not only cheap labor and currency manipulation, and in some cases the better quality of the output of American worker outstrips the shoddy goods from abroad and would give us an edge. But we can't keep pushing companies to do what is beyond our technological capacity to do and expect that we can compete and turn a profit. If we stop shooting ourselves in the foot we can compete.
OK, I agree with a lot of what you say above and I agree, who elected the EPA and who do they represent? Who elected these Czars like Cass Sunstein and who does he represent?
Will the Republicans put these Agencies in their place or just use them for talking points and lip service?
AND... We do need regulations, because the Corporatocracy will do whatever they want with the way the government is currently set up. Much of these regulations are set up as barriers to entry to kill the chances of small start-ups to grow at the expense of the massive warbling corporations that are directing policy in our country right now and killing ingenuity and innovation.
These massive corporations, such as oil companies and car companies, have a history of buying up patents and controlling technologies, because in a Least Common Denominator mindset, it is easier to keep what is in place that to develop and utilize newer technologies.
You think this is bunk? Perfect Example, you ask for? BROADBAND... We know that there are newer technologies available and ready to implement. They have been implemented in other parts of the world, but the telecommunications companies here in the U.S. don't want to bring them to bare here in the U.S., because what we have is good enough? That is what we have been personally told isn't it? Isn't it? We don't need the newer technology according to the decision makers.
What we need to do is look towards a new way of chartering corporations. We do need to take a look at regulations and bring accountability into the process. We also need to look to Anti-Trust issues, because these companies aren't "Too Big to Fail," they are Too Big for the American People to Survive.
In 2004, North Carolina politicians were laughing giddily and slapping each other's backs proclaiiming "we won! we won!"
Won what? The national bidding war among various states to bribe Austin, TX computer giant Dell to build its new assembly plant in Winston Salem. With about $318 million in tax giveaways, cash, grants, and other freebies, NC officials "won," and in October 2006, there was a highly publicized ribbon cutting ceremony for the $7 million Dell plant in Winston-Salem. So much for the loss of RJ Reynolds and crash and burn of Wachovia!
But then the "unforeseeable" occurred a mere 4 years and 2 days after that glorious grand opening. Dell announced that it would have to take those jobs to Asia, close the plant, and fire the 905 people who worked there. Thanks for the memories!
The political honchos who so willingly threw NC tax revenue at Dell are claimed to suddenly be skinflints, insisting that they had driven a hard bargain with Dell. Gov. Bev Purdue assured Old North State citizens of the strict clawback provisions: "We made it very clear to (Dell) ... every red cent of incentives money had to come back."
However, Dell informed that some but not all of the money would be paid back. About $9 million of state money to widen roads and upgrade interchanges will not be repaid. Neither will $5 million of worker training and hiring services, nor $3 million in tax breaks that Dell pocketed.
In defending their reckless decisions, Politician reassured that while the jobs were gone, workers still benefited from the training they received! The unmentioned drawback was that these workers would need to take their training to China to get a job. Along with most other computer makers, Dell has moved all of its computer manufacturing offshore.
How much is the state offering Google?
Source: Austin American Statesman, Oct. 8-9, 2009
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