By Fareed Zakaria, CNN
I have been thinking a lot about America's economy and American jobs lately, and have an essay on the subject in this week’s TIME Magazine.
As we emerge from the financial crisis, we are witnessing the extraordinary tale of two economies.
For corporate America, the picture looks extremely good. The 500 largest companies in America have posted nine quarters of successive growth. Many of them are back to pre-crisis levels of profit. They’ve got lots of cash on their balance sheets – $2 trillion or more.
But if you look at the average American worker, it’s a very different picture. What you see is a really deep problem of structural unemployment.
The number of unemployed people in the United States right now is officially 7 million. But a large number of people have stopped looking for work. An even larger number of people have taken part-time work. The average wage of somebody working classic part-time jobs in a restaurant or in a shop is $19,000 a year. That’s less than half the median income.
If you add all these categories together - people who are unemployed, people who stopped looking for work but don’t have jobs and people who have part-time jobs - the number is 24 million Americans. That amounts to a huge systemic crisis and it’s a crisis that we're not facing up to.
What’s causing jobless growth?
The single largest cause of this jobless growth is technology. If you look at almost every industry over the last 10 years, technology has completely transformed it. It’s easiest to see this in manufacturing. You go into an auto plant today and it employs far fewer people than it used to. General Motors, Ford or any of these places are able to produce many more cars with many fewer people.
Technology is transforming industries beyond manufacturing. Look at law. "Discovery” - a process that used to be done by young paralegals and lawyers - can now apparently be done by computers. Across the board, technology is transforming industries and raising productivity, but lowering worker head count.
Then on top of technological change, you have globalization. There are ready pools of skilled labor around the world that are willing to do some of the jobs that used to be done by Americans for a tenth of the price. American labor can't compete.
Working concurrently, technology and globalization have created a pincer movement pressing the average American worker.
With the bad, comes the good
Now, economic globalization is also having many beneficial effects. It’s helping anyone who has specialized skills or has access to and works with capital or technology. It’s helping the very poor because it dramatically lowers the cost of goods.
Indeed, the net effect of having very low inflation and very cheap goods is something that has benefited everyone. Everyone who has taken out a loan in the last 20 years has benefited from the fact that you have almost no inflation in the world because China and India - two global deflation machines - are pumping out goods and services at very low prices.
But the downside is felt in concentrated form by the middle of the American employment spectrum - the classic American worker who would make around the median wage, which is about $50,000 to $75,000 per year. The downside is being felt by people who had skills, but not highly-specialized skills; by people who had some training and education but not advanced education; those are the people whose labor has been either made obsolete by technology or commoditized by foreign labor.
Advice for young Americans
If I were talking to a middle school classroom in the Midwest today, I'd say, "Don't despair. Focus on where the jobs are." America remains a huge, dynamic economy and there are jobs.
Jobs are being added in healthcare. If you look at nursing, for example, it’s not only increasing in terms of jobs, but wages are growing and will likely continue to grow.
Tourism is another huge boom industry. And America is a world-class producer of entertainment in every shape, level and form. We produce enormous amounts of entertainment, consume a lot of it and export huge amounts of it. We are the world’s leading exporter of entertainment.
Read: Fareed Zakaria’s article on American jobs and competitiveness in TIME Magazine.
So there are big bright spots in the economy. People should focus in on those and ask themselves what can they do within them.
Obviously, the single best way to ensure that you will have a secure job for the future is to have training in science and technology. If you are an electronics engineer or a computer science engineer, you’re going to have absolutely no trouble getting a job – not just in this country but anywhere in the world.
Advice for U.S. government officials
The U.S. government needs to focus very hard on the problem of creating jobs. U.S. officials need to recognize that we are in a unique situation where growth alone is not producing jobs. We can no longer say, "We’ll grow and somehow we’ll magically dispose of all our problems."
What we really need is a job creation policy. My cover story for TIME Magazine tries to detail exactly what such a policy should look like. Broadly speaking, the U.S. needs to hit job creation at five different levels.
1. Revitalize manufacturing in this country. Germany offers a powerful example of how to do this. They have managed to maintain high-end manufacturing in their country.
2. Focus on retraining workers. We have a generation of people whose skills are not going to provide them with employment in the current global economy.
3. Focus on the growth industries like entertainment, healthcare and tourism. One of the simplest things to do in life is double down on things that are succeeding.
4. Promote small business. Small business creates most of the new jobs in this country. The single biggest thing the U.S. government could do to help small businesses is allow more skilled immigrants into the country.
We train the world’s best and brightest - often at public expense since they go to state universities or they get grants from the U.S. government - and then just at the point at which they’re about to start filing patents, making inventions, creating jobs and paying taxes, we kick them out of the country. It’s an incredibly counterproductive policy.
5. Invest in infrastructure today. The crisis is now and we know that a large number of unemployed people in America come out of the construction and housing industry. We also know we have a huge crisis in infrastructure. We have bridges falling down, highways that need repair and airports that need building. We’ve got to come up with some way to finance infrastructure that will allow us to employ hundreds of thousands, if not millions of American workers.
There are ways to do this that are not as costly to the public. We can develop infrastructure banks and forge public-private partnerships. America is one of the few countries in the world that doesn’t allow the private sector to participate in building and financing public infrastructure. Why shouldn’t we open it up so that we can get the capital we need, which will in turn create more jobs?
In short, we need to do all of these things because America faces a huge structural problem – a jobless recovery – and no single action will be enough to help American workers recover and prosper.
Read my full essay on this topic over at TIME Magazine.
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"U.S. government needs to focus very hard on the problem of creating jobs". Not only the government, the private sector likewise. One can't always rely on governments to provide jobs. Many U.S. multi-national companies make huge profits abroad. The government should create an incentive for these companies to repatriate the money back to America. If the tax-rate looks reasonable , they might do it and invest in training programs for their employees.
True! The infrastructure needs to be improved and it creates job opportunities. Then again it increases public spending. How are you going to fund it?
@j. von hettlingen...What you dont understand is that its not the governments job to creat jobs but it is there responsibility to creat the opportunity that will help creat jobs. And this president and government & its polocies have ONLY hurt jobs since Obama has been president. Take the no drilling for oil... but for some reason its ok for us to loan Brazil money to drill in our waters for oil. How does that help the economy? Are we all of a sudden going to be driving electric cars tomorrow? Cmon...
Don't try to blame Obama. Let's not forget it was Bush who pushed for off-shoring as "good". He claimed by sending mundane work overseas, it frees up Americans for bigger and better things. Well.....half of it worked out. People are freed up for sure. Now...where's part two of the plan? In short, he catered to the rich and corporate America and enabled them to reap greater profits at the expense of the middle class. They don't care where their money comes from, and care even less that they have to hide it in Singapore now instead of Switzerland. They do care if any of it makes it back into the US economy because the profit margins are lower.
The president had nothing to do with the loan, which the Export-Import Bank approved for Brazil to buy U.S.-made equipment and services. The Ex-Im Bank states: "In fact, at the time the Bank’s Board consisted of three Republicans and two Democrats, all of whom were appointed by George W. Bush." In case you had not noticed, private sector job growth has been positive for over a year now.
No oil drilling? Really? Then why was they total US oil production in November of 2010 up from that of November of 2009?
You're right. It's not the government's job to create jobs. At the same time, it's not the government's job to tell companies it's okay to bring in guest workers for a fraction of the cost and push out Americans. It's not the government's job to sit idle while companies push out full-time employees only to hire part-time help to circumvent paying benefits. It's not the government's job to turn a blind eye to the plight of the middle class as it defends corporate America's practices and why the rich deserve to pay less taxes, and corporations deserve HUGE tax breaks. HOWEVER, it always seems the government in smack dab in the middle of the mess every step of the way and a major driving force......by catering to the lobbiests who are lining their pockets. "OH....my company is looking for a bright new executive making 7 figures. I hear you have a daughter graduating art school next year? Sounds like it might be a good fit. Have her talk to me. By the way, it sure would be nice if that legislation passed."
It may not be their job to create jobs, but it's not their job to save a bunch of bloated, insolvent fortune 500 companies either.... America needs an enema...
Too bad Bush trashed the global economy and ruined the lives of millions with his reckless spending on two unpaid wars, an unpaid TRILLION dollar prescription drug scam and historic tax cuts to billionaires. (Wasn't that supposed to create jobs?)...maybe if Bush hadn't blown the economy we might have some money for a real jobs bill and real investment in new technologies....
Maybe when the filth at the oil companies take advantage of the millions of acres they are currently sitting on and not developing we can give em more land...as it is they are just ignoring oil to keep profits high...and it has nothing to do with barack you racist pos.
bboyee, you're grossly misinformed and just spewing the nonsense that Fox News and Sarah Palin tell you. There is no ban on drilling for oil. Oil continues to flow out of the ground in the United States. it NEVER stopped. There is a moritorium on DEEP WATER drilling. I suggest you look up the meaning of the word moritorium and the difference between deep water and shallow water. Also, Obama did not give Brazil money to drill in US waters. A line of credit was extended by BUSH era bankers to Brazil which is only available for the purchase of US made goods and services. To date, that account has not been tapped.
Obama has not killed jobs in America. American greed has killed jobs in America. Why is GE or Ford or any other company going to hire employees when they are already making record profits and filling their orders with the employees they have? The capitalism you claim to love is what's driving this. Money first, people second. That's the republican way.
This is a liberal diatribe by Zakaria. Telling the fat middle-calls American to look to the entertainment or tourism industry for work and leave the high tech jobs to specially imported immigrants. Whenever government grows it is growing for one or more of these reasons: because it is paying entitlements, inefficient with the tax dollars it has, and it has failed to support the creation of manufacturing jobs. In the latter, it has cowtoed to China on its currency, allowed the financial industry to rape the middle-class, and has become Big Daddy to the illegal immigrant and the able-bodied poor. 80+ % of you are middle-class that are reading this and probably 75% will vote the Big Daddy spender back into office for 4 more. So believe the big fat old lazy middle-class american lie. These same big fat middle-class americans are small business owners, that have worked a good deal of their lifes and probably raised you (unless you were one of the millions that have crossed over illegally), fought wars that counted. And you a god-hating human secularist liberal strage-flesh supporting video-playing Hollywood-vampire loving morale decay of a person; you young Obama big-gov loving/entertainment loving, what can you do for me personas have set yourselves up for displacement by the ravishing hoards of hard-working illegals that do not kill their unborn and have a birthrate of 4.1. So don't worry liberal tattoed pierced freak, your number must decrease, your God Darwin told you so, survival of the fittest not the best dressed and baggiest panted.
@jake - dont leave your home pc too close to the meth lab - the fumes are bad for you.
Wow, Jake! How's that tall icy, glass of nutjob tasting?
What about all the help/money sent to Israel ? What about all the military sent to so many, many countries ? What about all the jobs that went outside because it's cheaper ? Why do people blame Obama for this ? Can he talk private business into keeping jobs in US ?
And the far right is as always in denial of the facts that the disaster have been the deregulation etc etc that have been like a gun shoot to the head for the middle class in this country
Jake, I noticed in your diatribe that you forgot to take a dump on feminists. Please read page 2 of your script more carefully.
If i read any more ignorant buffons spouting how Obama give Brazil billions to drill oil I'm going to vomit. Obama didn't do crap. The US Im-Ex bank made the decision to make the money available for Brazil to purchase American made drilling and exploration equipment in the hopes of generating business and jobs for American companies who export such equipment. The decision to do this was made 1 week before Obama's appointee joined the board of the US Im-Ex bank. But a lying conspiracy spreading buffon named Glen Beck gets on the radio and spouts an untruth and every kool-aid sipping ignorant conservative takes it as gospel.
OH has it right it is the govt. job to do their job.Safeguarding the rights and prosperity of it's citizens.It is not their job to sit idle while corps.rape the populace of their hard earned money. I personally will excel at any of those jobs in the upper office given the opportunity!!! How hard can it be to say" YOUR FIRED were outsourcing your position I'll have a martini with lunch today,I just saved the co.4 million $$'s.How's our bottom line now?oh and I'm taking a cut in pay AND declining my bonus so I just saved another 150 million$$'s now how's the bottom line?"That was just the first three minutes Give me a month and you'll sell more cars than you can make for 1/3 the cost. THAT IS WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE
@bboyee...A very ignorant and uniformed post. Stop listening to Beck and taking as gospel all the alternative "news" media. They are so anti-Obama opinionated that they have proven time and again they will say anything, regardless of truth, if it will put Obama in a bad light. Study up on what mainstream news media has to say (not their opinion pages). Mainstream media is somewhat biased one way or the other, too, but you'll get far more factual data there than anywhere else.
And if you want to be really sure about the facts before you post, try validating what you read and hear on factcheck.org, snopes.com and politifact.com. These sites take great pride in trying to present only the facts and screen out bias.
Last I heard that oil spill in the Gulf had something to do with drilling...
I used to be middle class. Bought a new car every couple of years, kid had braces, some kind of little vacation every year, nothing big, but something. Now I drive a '98 that is terminal, make less money, can't afford a dentist much less braces, and worry ALL THE TIME. I drive 60 miles one way to work and no, I'm not relocating. My credit is such that even if I were able to find a buyer for my house, I couldn't buy another. Yes, my credit is bad. That is what happens when you lose one job and have to find another. And no, I'm not a druggie or a low life. I just got hit and got hit hard. Get over it if you think otherwise. And now, our "esteemed Congress" is tallking about a milage tax. Pass it and I'm done. I can't make ends meet now and I will be damned before I will pay this government another effing penny. Looking forward to exploring the welfare system. I will eat better, have a better car and better insurance for my kid at least. OUr government is making it impossible for me to live.
I'm with you. All everyone is thinking about is the big CEO's and their bonuses or lending money to another country or defending why will killed Bin Laden. (Bin Laden should be self-explanitory) No one has ever cared about the middle class. I had to file BK myself because I was not able to get a job as soon as I needed to. Unemployment was way less than I was making while I was working (salaried at 60-70 hrs/week being paid for only 40) I applied for assistance to help since I have two kids, even though there was not enough money for the monthly bills I was told I made to much. All the while we are bailing everyone out so that these CEO's can get back to the life style they were use to living. The goventment wastes so much money on a lot of things that they have forgoten about the little people, the little people they want to keep increasing taxes on...This nation is no longer for THE people, just CERTAIN people.
But you still got enough $ for your internet bill?
Agree, my sister-in-law lost her job. Here comes the COBRA bill, $1200 a month ouch! She already is paying extremely high medical costs from pre-exisiting medical problems. Her daughter is in college and her savings is paying for that.
Matt, I guess it is inconvenient for people who are down on their luck to still have internet access. If they were around to comment, then everyone could write comments about how great life is for them...and still pi$$ on those who are down on their luck.
From Matts comment the last thing you need is the internet if you are trying to find a new job to improve your life.
Sorry Mildred, I hate to hear stories like yours, but its not the government's fault, without government you wouldn't have roads to drive 60 miles to work on. Without Governmet you wouldn't have welfare to explore. Your story is harsh but its not the govt's fault. There are rich and there are poor and they each take everything from the middle class. Put blame where it belongs, Corporations...yes, politicians...often, but not the government.
Matt-ever heard of a library?
Didn't think so.
Wow...I am totally in the same boat. This is so crazy. I was middle class about 2 years ago. I saw a slow decline of my our income and a increase of our bills. I didn't want to admit it but we were quickly headed to the poor house. We were able to go on small vacations, eat out, buy nice clothing for our children, save alittle, pay off credit cards and take our children to the dentist. Now I am negitive in our checking account as I type this. Received a bill in the mail yesterday stating if the electric company doesn't receive payment by Monday our electric will be turned off. Have at lease $800 worth of bill to pay by next week and I don't get paid until the end of the month. I'm always 2 weeks behind on our mortgage. Can not eat out and can not take my children to the dentist. Oh also dropped my husband and I off of the health insurace because we needed the extra 200 a month.......I can't hardly take it any more. Oh and if we needed to sell our house my credit is shot so we couldn't get a loan from the bank for the next one. Oh well....hopefully something will change soon. I'm just waiting to see. Good luck Milldred I hope we will see the light soon.
Just try looking for a job without the internet these days. Can't get anything done without it.
We used to be the middle class but I don't know what we are now. You described my family up until a few years ago. Then in 2009 my husband got laid off and I turned 65 in the same month. I had really thought that I would be able to quit working the following year when I turned 66. It didn't happen. He was out of work for a year, finally got a job as a laborer although he was 61 and worked for $6 an hour less than he was making before being laid off. At first, he was so tired after a 10 hour day that he couldn't cut the food on his dinner plate, but he got used to it and turned a 3 month temporary job into a 15 month job that just ended and now he's unemployed again. Of course, I'm still working full time and will never get to retire. Middle and lower income America has is to make their voices heard in Washington and the only way to do that is by voting and voting DEMOCRATIC! If the conservative right gets its way, Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security will be gone and there will be no jobs for our children and no future for any of us. So many people don't think they can make a difference, but we need to stand up together for the values that made this country great, not for the corporations and politicians that are ruining it for all of us.
@Matt. When you are out of work, keeping the internet is a priority. companies like manpower only list their open positions on their web site. Many companies do not even accept paper applications or resumes anymore. Norfolk Southern Railroad is a goo example. Are you also suggesting that anyone out of work should be condemned to a solitary room with no entertainment or little pleasures whatsoever? I'm so sick of people blaming the poor for their situation. I would love for one of those corporate big wigs to try to keep up with me at a hard days work. They would croak before lunch.
My story is similar to yours. My husband and I both came from humble beginnings, earned and saved, invested in real estate, graduated college ( I have a Masters) and lived the middle class dream for a few years. Then the economy took a nosedive, he lost his job, and it took two years for him to find a job paying half what his former job paid. I have a part-time job for $12 an hour in a location where there are now no jobs available paying more than $9 an hour, and nothing full-time. We are middle aged and underemployed, and our ambitious, hard working adult children are unemployed or underemployed. We now have no investments, no retirement savings, are paying rent, and drive beat up 20 year old vehicles. What happened to our American dream?
I am with you on all of that this country is f'd
Maybe people should not have been over extending themselves back in the 90's when the economy was booming. Vacations, eating out, all of the such was great then but were you saving in case of the down economy? most likely not... quit blaming the government for your poor spending/saving habits.
People shoudl realize that BOTH parties are screwing us. We need to sto pointing fingers at other party (dems or reps) becasue that is what politicians want, as they continue to push their collective agenda. When american people opposed BAILOUTs with 300:1 ratio, no CONgressmen listened. Banks looted TAX payers money outright and still are doing the same. No one is stopping all the looting operation as we are heading straight for disaster. Look at the debt ceiling debate recently. They just want to keep kicking the can down the road. It MUST stop and we need to address this now else it will be too late. Entire middle class will move to poor class soon. Only way the theft in D.C would stop when millions would show up to protest in D.C and refuse to leave untill all are punished/fired and jailed for their financial crimes.
You can thank the GOP and their middle class crushing policies..when they cut taxes for the rich, it shifts it to the middle...period. There is no free lunch. The GOP has done everything in its power to screw the working and middle class while enriching the wealthy...it is unsustainable
Really.?. Heard it all before. You must live in Washington State. Funny how I can tell that just from your post.
Here's one corporations use. Companies "A" and "B" have a close relationship. Company A wants to eliminate 2,000 jobs. They decide to send 2,000 people to company B. The employees are told they can resign, move, or try to find a job internally within 30 days...unless they have less than 2 years to retire and then they can retire early. So....2,000 people are moved to company B where they continue working doing the same "outsourced" job. Company B tells the 2,000 people that they are no longer needed and if they can't find a job internally within 2 weeks, they will be released. At the same time, if they refuse to accept a position requiring 100% travel for example, then it's deemed voluntary termination of employment. Of course there are plenty of jobs with brutal requirements that will destroy a family. So.... When people get the notice at "A", they know the economy is bad and they can't find a job internally so they're moved...often without even moving job locations. They work for a month or two and are faced with essentially quitting or traveling 5 days a week. In either case, the two companies work hard to get as many people to quit as possible, and yet, they don't report it as laying off employees because "they quit". Are those 2,000 jobs the low paid foreign national guest workers? Nope. They're employees who have been with the company for a long time and who the company would have to pay retirement benefits to, etc.
Maybe if you saved money rather than buying a new car every two years, you'd have enough invested now to continue supporting a middle class life-style...
Eight years of Republican economic policy and you expect something different? If you vote Democrat, I feel sorry for you. If you voted for Bush, too bad so sad.
Two comments – my family has has pay freezes and furlough days for the past year. We considered ourself lucky compared to others. But the bills slowly creep up. Hate to say it but my mom passed this year and the little bits from her estate we will get will help us. But geez my mom has to die for us to get a better footing>
On ceo's – I worked for a large corp and after 9/11 everyone's stock tanked and things were bad. The ceo was getting his bonus raised! Someone posted an article about it on a bulletin board and some mgmt person ripped it down. This ceo was getting like 10 million! So why doesn't the white house ask these guys to kick in a mil each and bail out the national debt and let us start over? Heck if my mom dies to help me surely these ceos can help out.
Milldred, you are so not alone. I was a librarian and I had a house, great credit and so on. Now, I'm ill, on welfare, dependent on my children (who are insured better being on welfare) and I've no job or hope for one, and I lost my house. At 53, what are my chances? I totally understand where you are coming from for what it's worth. I wish you the very best.
@ Matt
I'm pretty sure I did not say I was still unemployed and just for your ignorant and arrogant info I have a full time job, a part time job and take classes. For those who are not working you can always go this thing (maybe you have never heard of it) called the library to get on the internet. In case you didn't notice while we were busy bailing out the banks many , many, many normal, everyday barely getting by people that lost their jobs.
YOu are right PEOPLE ON WELFARE ARE SO LUCKY - where do you Republican liars come up with this garbage
for every penny that goes to a poor child in America Exon KBR tobacco farmers ADM get 1000 dollars
WELFARE IS TAX MONEY GIVEN TO THE RICH
Well nobody else is going to say it so I will. Matt, you're an F'n idiot.
To James: I did a great job of saving when the economy was good in the 90s. Then the economy tanked and the savings have slowly slipped away. It has been going downhill for the working class since well before the "crash" of 2008. The crash has been the last straw for many. My husband lost his job in 2005. He is working now, but not making half of what he did before. Fortunately my job is stable. Too bad for my kids whose folks have to work ridiculous hours to make ends meet. Quiz: Who was it who helped firmly ingrain the 40-hour-work week in our society? It was the unions, those bums were so anxious to get rid of today. And the 40-hour work week is going bye-bye with them.
@ Matt (in response to someone responding to Milldred): You mentioned to this man who was telling his story that he had enough money to still get the internet. So, Matt, how would YOU go about getting another job? You could go to the library and use theirs, but it shows how little the recession has hit you, but you are glad to hit up on someone who is obviously having some problems. This is my wish for you Matt – hope you lose your job and see how it is out there. Misery does love company. And you're already miserable.
Amen too that.
First leave the country then claim citizenship from lets say Cuba then move back here have a kid and then you will eat better and drive a new car and not pay taxes
@Steph
Matt never said you were unemployed, just that you were struggling to make ends meet but could still afford internet access when it could be better spent on necessities.
an old black told me slavery comes about one law at a time.not all at once. how prophetic
"How are you going to fund it?" Workfare – train the long-term unemployed to do the jobs at $10/hr, and require the able bodied to work for their public dole check in place of welfare. It would save millions off the rates we currently pay for that labor and save much more than it costs. Thus more work and more jobs could fit within the current budgets.
The jobs are coming! Soon Chinese companies will be setting up in the US. And they will be low-balling salaries, to erode the already dismal wages the private sector is currently earning.
finally low paid govt slaves to provide our corporate owners.
This wrong understatement, As long as there is debt and federal reserve notes then the usa is screwed and its people.
Correct!! Bankers did pretty good by disguising BANK as FEDRAL RESERVE. I bet 8 out 10 people think that it is a part of the government. It is a systemetic agenda that got pushed by giving money in hands of bankers/private bank (FedReserve), instead of keeping it with the people of this great nation. Over all these years bankers looted the nation and drowned us in debt. All the so called GROWTH in last 30 years is nothing but DEBT, no real production while real jobs left our country as outsourced.
The easiest way to fund it would be to read section 5 paragraph 2 under the heading "Advice for U.S. Government Officials". It states "There are ways to do this that are not as costly to the public. We can develop infrastructure banks and forge public-private partnerships. America is one of the few countries in the world that doesn’t allow the private sector to participate in building and financing public infrastructure. Why shouldn’t we open it up so that we can get the capital we need, which will in turn create more jobs?" Read the whole thing before you comment.
Yes look how well constructed the baracks and embassies that corporate america built for us in IRAQ...they killed troops to save money, why wouldn't they kill citizens to save a few bucks??
The only thing that has happened is the fact that companies laid off people, which put additional job responsibilities on the workforce that was left and now management, CEOs, executives can see that the same amount of work is being done with spending significantly less which posts better profits. They dont care that the employees are working 12-14 hour days and would LOVE if they could get those people back into those positions.
I also notice that the price of their product never came down. In fact it rose and so did corporate profits.
Exactly sameeker! That's the part of the article to which I took the most exception: globalization leads to the lower cost of goods. And where exactly is that happening? I only see the cost of everything going up, with maybe the exception of flat screen TV and blu ray players which I can't afford anyway. Other than that, clothing is up, food is up, gas is up, electricity is up. Everything is up, up, up. Do you know what hasn't gone up? My salary.
>:P
Good ideas but government doesn't create jobs. They take your tax dollars and spend it. Industry creates jobs by investing in industries that provide a return on investment. Governments receive no return on the dollars spent; they only run up debt like you see know $14.3T and climbing. The U. S. Government needs to cut spending by reducing programs they're funding and modernize the regulations to stimulate growth in the private sectors. Why are so many people confused between Socialism and Capitalism?
Thank you @gholliday
This comment refutes about 90% of the arguments here. It also seems to be the most rational and least emotional. Cheers.
Industry is not driven by job creation, it is driven by profits. Job creation is a byproduct. If the industry can achieve higher profits without job growth, it will. So it will reduce wages, require longer working hours, move jobs oversees, if it can. That's where the government comes. Without government regulation you would have no protection for the workers, for the environment etc. If you think that industry can police itself and make decisions that in the long term will benefit everybody, not just a small group of executives, you've been asleep for the last ten years.
And, please, stop this nonsense about socialism. You either do not have a clue what socialism is, or you like the social Darwinism idea: weak, poor, unfortuante must die, only the rich survive. Heve a heart, man (or a woman)
Maybe people are confused because it seems that its only capitalism on the way up. On the way down it becomes socialism (see bailouts).
If they spend it on troops or drs or road workers how is that not a job? Does society do better when there are no roads?
Socialism is when the government takes care of basic human needs like fire, police, health care. For any extras (which includes being able to eat), you have to work. This for the most part works (IE Canada, Sweden, Norway...)
Capitalism is you are on your own for all but the most basic services that the government has to pay for to keep order. You get hurt/sick, oh well... You should have saved more money... I guess you starve to death... (IE China, India, South America....)
Most of government spending is military and those corporations will not allow peace. Peace does not help US corporations. This is an evil country.
gholliday - good to see you read the back of an econ 101 book (or at least were able to skim it). Too bad corporations aren't going to do any of the things you said w/o a consumer base that will, in the end, pay for it all. And if you dont think large corporations are doing everything in their power to streamline the system (which means – yes – laying off as many people as they can and paying as many cheap laborers overseas as they can) then you're kidding yourself.
j. von hettlingen,
Repatriation of foreign earnings won't do a thing. In order for that to be a barrier to job creation in the US, one would have to assume that American companies are prevented from making investments in the US because they don't have access to sufficient capital to do so. Certainly, that is not the case- capital markets are vibrant and strong in the US for large firms. Investment is funded based on expectations for return, not the locale of cash. This argument is a complete red herring.
We cannot rely on the private sector to create jobs, mainly because the private sector is only interested in profits.
Jobs for the private sector is a consequence not a motivation.
In 2008 when the government lent money to the banks and expected the same banks to start lending to small business, what exactly happened? The banks took the money and kept it...
Therefore, bringing the economy out of recession will come only from the right government policies to stimulate the
this same economy.
Very true, everything the Repukes are trying to sell is is trickle down economics in another form, and trickle-down DOES NOT CREATE JOBS! It creates more wealth and actually strips more jobs. Also creates a viscous circle, because the less the middle and lower classes make, the less they spend and the more they have to rely on less readily available credit. More people declare personal BKs, and less money trickle's UP so the people at the top strong arm the politicians in their pockets to tilt more tax codes and legislation in their favor to make more money, usually off the backs of middle and lower class taxpayers. We need a REAL revolution at the polls in 2012, and maybe it would be possible if people would stop swigging the Kool-aid doled out by Faux News, Limbaugh, Beck, etc
Democrats tried to pass legislation in the past few years to give tax breaks to those companies that did not outsource jobs. Shot down by the Republicans. Democrats created the Build America bond program – hugely sucessful, got some much needed repairs done, got some people back to work – when they tried to continue the program the Republicans shot it down (even SIFMA -securities industry and financial markets association – lobbied to keep that going). When will those in the middle class who support the republicans realize that all they care about is big business and money? They care nothing for the average every day working stiff.
The problem is the US government does nothing to regulate WHERE jobs are going. Corporate America is subject to labor laws within the US, but when it comes to overseas, it's a free for all. All it will take is the government banning the export of jobs to any country that does not comply with US labor laws, and there would be a surplus of jobs in the US. Bar them from setting up sweat shops with child labor, only to sell the goods in the US for huge profits that they pocket. Even if they levy huge import taxes on goods arriving from those countries, it would go a long way to leveling the playing field. I guarantee you when the US market is made "off limits" to goods from China, Korea, Mexico, and any other country where child labor is the norm, then the world's economic balance would shift and jobs would be plenty. Don't worry.... The other countries will change when they lose the business and the world will be a better place.
As long as 80% of the workforce has jobs, the other 20% don't matter. There is NO way America is going back to a time when the average family could only afford one car, one TV, one phone, a radio, food and a home. That's the 1960's. Full employment, but mediocre buying-power. The Walmart's with their 90%+ cheap Chinese crap are going to get even stronger. Germany is a poor example. 60-70% real tax rates in order to sustain an ultra-expensive civilain infrastructure, the average 80%'r isn't going to live with that just so the unemployable 20% can have jobs. Cold? Yes, but it is reality.
You mean like the last time they gave an amnesty and CEO's made MILLIONS and didn't create a single job. Lying filth like you should be ashamed of yourself...I am sure you are a happy little kochsucker though.
If you want jobs, stop buying Made in China, or minimize your purchases of Chinese made goods. Contrary to popular belief, buying overseas made can benefit is as long as we have a good trade relationship (i.e. India, Japan, etc). So check some labels if you really care. And stop whining politics.
OUTSOURCING number 1 reason of unemployment, I don't want to believe that training people here will create more jobs, I worked for IBM, they layoff 10,000 highly skilled and experienced people every year and hire fresh college graduates in India,who are not even familiar with using keyboard leave alone technology. They have reduced the workforce in US from 150,000 to less than 100,000 in last few years, opened a offshore center in India and hired 100,000 freshers. They show huge profits in paper but this is the painful reality. College graduates in India don't even have to wait to get their degree in their hand before they land into a perfect 6figure jobs. They job hop in less than 2yrs since there r so many opportunities. The economy in India and China are growing in double digit. if anything needs to be done its STOPPING OUTSOURCING!!!! Economy will recover in no time
IF you look at it from a maximum benefit point of view, more people benefit from outsourcing and cheap prices than those who suffer for it. If the unemployment rate was 80% you might have a case. Otherwise, 80% of the workforce is doing fine, why fight it?
I disagree. Corporations are in the business of maximizing profits. Not benefits to employees. If you cut them a tax break they will not suddenly change their goal and decide to invest that savings into employee benfits. Maybe if we enact some laws to prevent those tax breaks from trickling down to other countries or mandating that corporation must invest the savings into US based assets/human resources. Maybe...
Comments.
1.) This is all good and gravy but how do you get the wealth to do so. The wealthy don't want to do this it cuts into their ability to buy the new G6 Private Plane, or the latest Ferrari on top of their 12 bedroom houses.
Otherwise they would have smartened up and invested in setting up the infastructure for hydrogen re-fueling stations to create competition against the Oil Industry. At $4.00 a gallon I am pretty sure people would'nt mind driving next to government vehicles, big rigs and public transportation that was all fueled by Hydrogen. This would lower fuel costs by at least a dollor or two out of fears of a new viable source of energy.
2.) Its not about America and being an American, its about greed and being on top of America and other Americans
3.) We are not other countries. We call ourselves the greatest country in the world. If we begin to start paying wages like other countries America won't be the great dream any more, the next country will.
4.) Capitalism is the problem. Well, not all the way. Capitalism without regulation is the problem. There needs to be a cut off point. Their needs to be a mathmatical equation to ensure that the lowest doesn't get left behind because they highest could care less about the lowest. A percentage factor.
5.) Their needs to be an annual review of corporate interests in the American economy to determine whether they have the best interest of the people as a whole in mind. A collapse in the economy as before is completely unexceptable for a country that calls itself the greatest.
6.) The lack of good paying jobs, creates less consumers, the less consumers the lower the revenue, the lower the revenue the lower the collective earning on taxes are. The lower the collective taxes the weaker the country.
7.) The country with the fewest of wealthy people is the weakest country. As you can see with the fall of many dictators.
8.) The reason for unequal taxes is simple. Unequal pay.
9.) By sending jobs overseas we create more imports then exports, At some point you import more then you export and you crash.
10.) Many of people have lived and died fighitng for equality over the years. For people to easily stand up and say ahh we dont need that is like a shot in the face of the families that they left behind. Collective bargaining rights, Martin Luther King Jr, Malcom X, UC Davis Riots, recently the Storming and take over of the State Capital in Wisconsin. Why we refight the same fights over and over I don't know but man we are dumb.
I can go on and on over the idiocracies we spout each and every day that in know way matches our morals or values. Especially if you compare our direction to that of the desires of a true Christian. Jesus Christ walk for days and years healing people without asking for one thing. The whole bible is riddled with stories of great men reaching out to do great things and always suggests the same. But today, we scream Me, Me, Me. People with the greatest of possessions screaming Me, Me, Me. I see these same people at church and I ask, why are they here, do they think god can only see them when they are in church. It just amazes me. Your gift was not given for you to bask in but it was given for you to share it with his people. For people of many faith are taught the same things, help eachother and share in the guidence of your god...As for non religious people there is just the right thing to do, and the right thing to do is to always help those weaker then yourself. Period.
Dead on and in case anyone missed it, "THERE IS NO AMERICA" to the wealthy. They care about one thing MONEY. Who owns corporations? The rich. Look at who sits on the boards. The same rich people sit on numerous boards. They don't care about their neighbor. They don't care about you. They only care about how they can turn $1 into $2 as quickly as possible. They don't care if it's in dollars, Euros, or any other currency. They just want more of it, but preferably a currency that has 'value'. They could care less if the poor are in Africa, Asia, or America. As long as they got the money and made them that way.
Well Said!!
Excellent points, on problem of course is too many zombies believe anything the rightwing echo chamber propaganda ministry tell them, and believe that anything that regulates capitalism is socialism, which of course they then tell you is one step from communism. These head-in-the-sand followers need to read up on the definitions of communism and socialism, and THEN check out the definition of a plutocracy and fascism. If they really took that to heart, maybe they would wise up and not vote for 99% of the republican candidates ever again (and yes, there are some dems that need to be shown the door as well)
I believe as Americans we must become more competitive. We have to adapt to the demands and needs of a growing economy. We can no longer depend on manual labor for decent wages and retirement. We have to pursue and obtain the skills and training that are needed by our economy.
I agree the government CAN create jobs if congress would let the president lead instead of impeding every single idea to help the American worker. My exampes are GM and Chrysler both with government monies were able to KEEP workers and pay the government back some of it at a profit to the government. Now they are HIREING MORE WORKERS!! imagine that all the GOP's out there say Government doesn't creat jobs it creats an atmosphere in which Business can create jobs. If that were the case we would not have lost 7 million jobs from 2001 -2008 because that is exactly why BUSH enacted the tax cuts to business and the upper 2% of America in 2001, 2003 , 2005. They LOST jobs, it is plain to see that corporate American Cares nothing for America. I say tax them at 1965 levels and make them pay usage charges when our military defends their industry to "stablize" it or defent them. The OIL industry, the PHARMAcuetical industry, the HMO's have all recorded record profits while the middle class dwindles and struggles to get by. I am lower middle class and I do have a job but I was one of the millions laid off by the BUSH economy in 2008 and I was out of work for 19 months. it sucks.....our country NEEDS infastructure those are good high paying jobs the Government can invest in our country which will employ many millions and save us money in the future. My example, if GWB would have followed the 2002. 2003 and 2005 advice to invest in the dikes around LA. (New Orleans) the levies would NEVER had breached and that allone would have been a 2 billion dollar investment which because it was not done cost us 30 billion in 2007....paaaaaleeeeease stop with your PRO BUSINESS crap people can barely survive while the KINGs of industry scoff at our unions, our wages, our health care etc......GO OBAMA GO Democrats...
I actually should of held my comment for this story as you have said everything that I am thinking. It is getting very ridiculous that our President is occupying all his efforts to bringing peace to the Middle East but all they want is Money. And President Obama forgives a debt of a billion dollars and give another billion dollars away like he's got our Economy in his personal Checking account with an unlimited balance. I just want to say that I am homeless as oh June 1st because the only job I can find is a Part-Time job making $10 an hour and can not afford to pay my rent and I have yrs. of Management Experience but I'm working as a cook.... While Oil Giants are posting biggest profits ever but their gripe is that we put billions back into our R&D for a greener Planet. Give me a F$$$ing break!!! Their CEO's get bonuses bigger then all of my combined salary since starting a Paper route when I was 8 yrs. old. I'm sick of the Rich keep getting Richer and the Poor keep getting Poorer and our own Government has it set up that way!!! Am I the only person who can see what is wrong with this picture?
This article is one of the biggest piles of horse crap I've seen...
a) The jobless rate was driven by the massive global recession...period. The economy has cyclical ups and downs with unemployment having a strong correlation to those cycles. Several years from now when we're close to full employment again, will the answer to how it happened be...technology went away, and we imported our jobs back to the U.S.? Obviously, the answer is 'no' just as the reason for high unemployment now is not from technology and exporting jobs.
b) Will gov't fix the problem. NO, the economic cycle will (and is already in the process of doing so). Should the gov't try to fix it? Probably not...waste of money, and by precedence we know the gov't usually exacerbates problems.
c) Revitalize manufacturing? Oh, you must mean the zero technology type manufacturing, since this is the cause of cont'd unemployment...uh yeah, that will make us competitive in the world today.
d) Retrain workers? Companies that need skilled labor do the vast majority of labor training. Not the gov't.
e) Promote small business? Sounds correct, except for Zakaria's explanation of this point was just a plug for immigration reform...not promoting small business.
Bottom line...The free market will create jobs with cyclical fluctuations just as it has decade after decade. Stop allowing the media, pundits, politicians, etc. convince you that they can solve the problem if you just agree to allow them to spend more money, bring in more immigrants, etc. More money and more immigrants gets them votes (which is what they really care about), and doesn't fix the problem.
A presidential hopeful who would not cater to the corporate America would not have the opportunity to run for the presidential election. Thats the way the system is. And thats good.. When corporate america succeeds, America does at the cost of the misery of the middle class Americans.
They need to really calculate the living wage before the under paid crysis hits america. Just because not everyone has a college degree doesnt mean they have to live in poverty. wages should be at least $12.00 an hour , but no the government lets the biggest corperations exploit american worker. There was a study recently said that wal-mart could pay there employees $12.00 and keep there profits and costs and it would costs each shopper an extra 6 cents. This alone would help the economy. At the rate wages are going up it will be 2047 before min wages get that high.
The Great Depression was ended by WW II. The US has been in a wartime economy since December 7, 1941. WW II, The Cold War (included two hot wars: Korea and Vietnam), The Persian Gulf War, The Yugoslavia War, The War on Terror, The Iraq War and The Afghanistan War. In that entire time only the time from 1992 to 1999 was might be called peaceful and that was the time of greatest prosperity for the average American. Why was that the time of greatest prosperity? Because the burden of war was at least partially lifted from Americans. Until a major decrease in war spending happens, no money will be available for any other government activity. The cost of the Iraq war is anywhere between 1 and 10 trillion dollars. Most of the cost of the Iraq war is in the future because it was fought with borrowed money. Some will say that cannot be true but the US is spending about 650 billion a year for Defense plus the cost of the Iraq War and Afghanistan War. The US is spending between $200 and $500 billion a year defending oil all around the world. This amounts to the largest subsidy to private industry that the world has ever seen.
How can the US get out of this mess? Set up an energy conversion fund to finance solar and wind power. Start by putting a 10 cent/gallon tax on all gasoline. Each year increase it by 10 cents/gallon. This will give the average consumer some time to adjust to paying more for gasoline. The current indirect subsidy for gasoline is between $2.00 and $5.00/gallon. Only by ending this subsidy and using the money to finance energy production in the US will it be possible to cut back on war spending. Republican Ron Paul has said that the US must cut back Defense spending and stop being the police of the world. Will any other Republican endorse this idea?
I've never understood why the Government is not taking a harder line with businesses that outsource their work. Why isn't there a "tax" in place to penalize this practice and to help fund retraining of all the unemployed? If we took away tax credits from these corporations, I bet we'd see a lot more jobs coming home in a hurry.
More TAX You must be a Dem, And You think the Gov. will give you the money?????
The problem is the government (both parties) cannot create equity where there is none. For too many years the economy relied on new home starts and home values as a measure of prosperity (where there was none). Too much borrowing from foreign governments (debt) .Our schools were not responding to global education gains. We rested on our laurels. Now we are way behind the eightball and probably will become a third world economy. Politicians are padding their pockets with bribes and books they write for profit. Better get used to $8 hr wages, as that will be the only jobs available, that are not government funded.
I completed a short-term contract and I am currently unemployed. I plan to utilize my time to contact the USAID and obtain a listing of all the countries that they provide funding. How can I get donation/funds to complete task.
How about we end subsidies to oil companies and use that money to finance infrastructure?
exactly. no shock that they look great and we look terrible...they robbed us...again.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THIS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Then we see gas prices hit $6.00/ gallon, and the recovery dies...
BS. The oil companies may try that but the bottom line is they sell most of their oil here. They can't afford to make it so expensive that Americans can't buy it. They also can't pick up and just move someplace cheaper. The oil is where it is and that is where they have to drill. It is ridiculous to pay a subsidy to get them to drill here when that is where the oil is and it is even more ridiculous to pay them a subsidy when we are their biggest market.
Jay.......I'm not sure where it is you are seeing recovery. It is not in the middle class....at least not in my neck of the woods. They keep on raising gas prices, then add a milage tax, and you're gonna have a bunch of rednecks telling you to work harder cuz we're going on welfare. Pee on it, I quit.
So Jay, are you saying without tax breaks and subsides oil companies can't make a buck? Speaking before Congress this week all the CEO's claimed they have no control over pricing. If that is the case, it doesn't matter how high taxes are or if subsides are cut, the price of gas is out of their hands. Can't have it both ways, although American corporations do since they own Congress. Look at Mexico, we are headed toward being a second world country like them. Next generation of workers will be head to Canada at this rate.
Brain dead... I'm just saying.
Better that than a milage tax which the government will NEVER get from me. EVER! Not even if I lose my home and eat in soup kitchens. They are getting all they are going to get and if they keep messing with me, they won't even get that. DONE.
Sure thing, Mighty Mouse.
Exactly, but not just that. How about the corporations that pay zero or very little tax start paying their fare share of taxes? They get my money via bailout, my money via subsidies, and pay little or no tax. The country is broke, and yet that revenue source is taken off the table... it's BS and it's choking the country (along with 2 wars, etc., not saying that's the only problem but it is a big one)
Oil compaines like GE who paid no taxes at all. And now we will have $50.00 LED lights to buy
How about we start funding education better, adding in more tech classes at higher levels and put more pressure on parents and students to stay in school. Creating a culture that values education will do a great deal to stimulate the economy as it provides more and more suitable adults to take on a technology based work culture. Make education a value and a priority again and things will all fall into place better.
Thats a great idea!! Too bad so many don't believe in education :/ I'm in WI and Gov. Walker is taking AWAY from education-900 MIL from the last reports-and a lot of teachers are forced into retirement even though the average age is in the 50's, not even close to retirement age, leaving new teachers in the dust, meaning no mentoring from experienced teachers. Good times :/
We don't show much concern for education by making it more and more for the sake of getting a job and making money. It really matters that students value education for it's own sake, for the joy of coming out of utter mental darkness, rather than for the Benjamins. It's this sort of higher purpose that distinguishes a gentle man or woman.
You are 100% correct. Well said.
Along the same vein..."it's" is a contraction of "it is" and "its" is the possessive neutral pronoun. I am hoping that you readily and humbly accept this little tidbit in light of your love of education and do not become indignant that I have corrected you. A true student of the world welcomes enlightenment in all forms.
HALLELUJAH! Someone ELSE finally said it! Thank you!
Education is NOT the answer. The belief that college increases the odds of getting a job is so widespread that no one even questions it anymore. The truth is most college grads are unable to find a jobs. They went into debt for nothing.
Everything is competitive. Education is important and used as a means of setting people apart from the "crowd". I don't agree getting a 'degree' is important. How much has anyone retained beyond what they use in their job? Sorry, but it doesn't sound too smart to spend all that money on knowledge I won't use or retain so they'll give me a piece of paper to hang on the wall. Wouldn't it be much smarter and more efficient to throw all that money in a cart and then push it down the street in a wind storm? Not to mention meeting plenty of "educated" "gentlemen" who have invested upwards of $100,000, yet they can't use simple tools to build a bird house.
Invest your money in those aspects that are going to make you competitive and more desireable than the competition. I'd rather have an employee who knows information specific to my business over one who will proudly hang their diploma and quote Shakespeare.
Incentive for student to study for the sake of education and not money?
How is this supposed to work if you pay thousands of dollars for that education and then end up with a degree that does not pay enough for you to pay off your debt?
Unless you change how education is treated here, this will not change.
The issue isn't so much better funding, we fund education quite well. The issue is how much of that money gets to the students before it's siphoned off by greedy administrators.
100% agree. My town just passed a ridiculous school budget in excess of 103 million $$... And let me tell you, the lockers in the high school are from 1960... Where is all this money going to? Sure they like to show you pie charts and graphs to illustrate where money is going but honestly its a bunch of boloney... That means each school (elementary, middle, HS) if split in thirds receives 34.5 million dollars... That is absurd and shame on people that say we need to FUND? education more? that is non-sense. Administrators in Education and Health Care are poisonous. If we cut out administration fees in both Education and Health Care we would be saving ourselves a lot of money and actually get more benefit for the money we put in. People don't realize that for every dollar you spend towards your health insurance administrators take 20 cents. I know this because I work in the health industry. I can only imagine what administrators take off the top in education.
I feel that people and society think of certain jobs as being necessary when they really are BS and a waste of our money... You walk into any administrative building for health care and it goes like this.... The office manager has a secretary that has a secretary that has a secretary... all to do the office managers job... its really sick and i feel bad for people who can't afford health care. The reason you can't afford it is because some lazy office manager needs to hire another person so she/he can take a second lunch break... thus raising rates to make up for increase salary of administrators. And guess what, the doctor usually makes crap for the procedures he/she bills out for... ask any of your physicians... they will all tell you the same thing.
If you want to see how much your administrators are making just look it up. It's public information that should not be hard to get. If you have a problem with it start getting active in your area. I can tell you right now though that paying a dozen people 6 figure salaries isn't what's spending that $100 mil and I'm sure they would love some insight from the community as to what is or is not important to cut.
But paying a dozen people for a job that could be done by say ten people is just a waste of 200,000 $$ i guess u can call me a nit picker but that is why we are in the fiscal crisis we are in today. It all adds up, wasteful spending. I just wonder when we will realize like in war; you can't throw money and bodies at it and expect to win.
Just to add to this conversation – I live in an Ohio school district that does well on those standardized tests (that the kids are prepped for before hand you bettter bet) and is a desirable place to live. The school district got a levy passed the second time and were saying how, if it did not pass, salaries would have to be frozen and people laid off. Guess what, my pay was frozen for 2 years and my husband had to take unpaid furlough days and no raises. cry me a river. How unrealistic can they be? That and after the levy passes I can't even get a teacher to return an email to me about issues concerning my child in school.
Ignoring/de-funding education is the biggest mistake we can make as a country, and we are doing it.
It's not a mistake. It's being done on purpose to make us ignorant, and easy to brainwash.
I think we should just give teachers a BLANK CHECK! That's a great idea...when they ask for more money every year, we should just give it to them...after all...it's for the kids.
If education is so important, let's raise your pay AND keep kids in school 12 months a year. More money for more work...now THERE'S a concept.
Unfortunately education really does not matter in this economy. I just graduated with my Master's degree and employers could care less. In fact they see it as a hindrance because they have to pay me a higher salary. I have applied for over a hundred jobs and only gotten a handful of interviews and still no job. The cost of living, especially in California where I live, far out weighs the average salary of a college grad. On top of everything the loans I have to start paying back even if I don't have a job is going will force me to start applying for food stamps. If I had known then what I know now I would have never gone back to school to get my degree and now I'm discouraging people to not go back to school – financially it's not worth it.
Leave your post-graduate degree off your resume. I did. De-funding education is all part of the Republican and Corporate America's plan to create an uneducated (illiterate, if they had their way) constituency and workforce. They would like to see us return to the old English days of feudalism. I say we sharpen the pitchforks and light the torches....metaphorically, of course.
You are so right. College is primarily a consumer activity these days. It has intrinsic value, but is worth nothing financially. Unless you get a full scholarship or your parents can afford to give you a college education as a gift it is not worth the debt.
As an employer, I see worthless graduates with Masters degrees all the time. For the most part, you are not really worth having around. You think I should pay you more even though you don't possess anything, not skill, not experience, that will improve my business? Your degree means little to me as American colleges are little more than day-care centers handing out participation trophies/diplomas. Graduates think they know so much but none of it applies to anything that really happens out in the real world. An MBA graduate is almost as valuable as a chair. They both sit and they take up space. Of course, the chair doesn't whine about how much they know but cannot apply to the real world, the chair provides a constant value to the company, the chair doesn't expect me to hold their hand while they try to figure out the job they went to college to learn but still cannot perform. I would rather purchase a chair than waste money on some person who thinks a masters degree marks them as intelligent and useful.
I got a Master's thinking it would give me more options, better job opportunities. Most of the jobs where I live require a high school diploma or GED. The Master's has not helped one bit, I am now over-educated and over the hill. When I was young, pretty, and uneducated I got every job I applied for, even those supposedly requiring a college degree. Now with a Master's I can't find a full-time job anywhere.
I also have a master's degree, which I received in 1992. The economy was bad back then, but not nearly as bad as it is now. It didn't seem to help me at the time but, with the recovery, it turned out to be a very smart move. I worked my way up to over $110K a year, and I do not have an MBA or a professional degree. I know legions of guys like Daryn who disparage education, are very envious of those who worked hard to attain it, and like to posture about how their "lack of" did not affect them. My guess is that Daryn's ego is way out of proportion to the crappy little business he is running somewhere in some pokey town, and his employees can't stand him. To all those with an education, hang in there, it will work out for you.
I see both sides. I have a lot of schooling, but no degree. They can use the lack of as a glass ceiling, and the possession of a degree as a hinderance. A lot depends on the company, position, degree, etc. I had a woman working for me who had 3 master's....Computer Science, Mechanical Engineering, and Chemistry. Despite the multiples, and being a great employee, her ability to apply all the knowledge was on par with any other graduate. At the same time, I was in a technical/leadership role without a piece of paper and continue to excel. I'm very fortunate. To be honest, I would focus on a vocational approach in today's market. Target a specific industry, with specific skills. These days, there are so many people who have degrees, they're the new high school diploma. I also see a lot of younger grads and job seekers who feel they deserve much bigger salaries than they're worth. Take what's offered and then prove you're worth more. If nothing else, you're gaining experience for your resume. Don't base your expectations on a previous position. What you used to earn doesn't pay the rent. I'm not directing this at you specifically, but to the general audience. Finally – Kids....get over it. You don't deserve a house like your parents have. They worked up to that house. Get out and let them enjoy it, and accept you have to start small and work up. You don't deserve everything out the gate and here's a secret.....you're not all about superlatives. Odds are, you're actually average at best.
I totally agree...good comment!
I'm in Florida and Teabagging Gov. Scott is gutting education (among other programs). Broward County just laid off 1400 teachers this week ... it's pathetic and stupid and short sighted and narrow minded. You CAN'T have a nation thrive on ignorance and survive. It just won't happen (as was proven by the election of so many tea bagging politicians who claim to want to "defend the Constitution" but who really want to create a class system, are segregationists at heart, who despise that a Black man with a funny name was overwhelmingly elected to the highest office in our country, and are only interested in handing this country over to corporations who already control DC). It's beyond the pale, and so many Americans really prefer living in ignorance, a land devoid of fact (Faux Snooze anyone) and who just want to cling to some unrealistic ideal of what American "should" be instead of the reality of what it IS and will continue to be.
Thank you Sarah! We have to focus on the root of the problem. Our government can't "create jobs." That's an empty promise and we should all recognize that isn't the way things work. Too many career politicians looking for short-term, shallow "results" to get re-elected. We need to invest in educating our kids so they're prepared to innovate and the jobs will follow.
Right. I think he misses a huge point, although he sees it, in a round-about way. Europe isn't having the same problems, or at least not to anywhere near the same extent. Technology and globalization don't happen only here. But, he DOES mention Germany as an example of how we could do things better.
In Europe, labor is a MUCH more powerful force than it is here. The biggest reason for that is that, starting in the 70s, business interests in the United States joined together in a way they had not before, with the aim of becoming a much more powerful force and influence on elections and policy. Thus, we have witnessed the rise of lobbying influence and K Street, the revolving door between business and the government agencies that regulate them, of policies actually written by the very people they are aimed at regulating, along with the whole move to paint regulations as being harmful to all of us – even though every one of them was created to right a wrong on the part of business interests, – and the concerted effort to weaken and destroy unions – even though most Americans support them. Now that the right-selected Supreme Court has opened the floodgates to unlimited donations by corporations, that will get worse. I truly believe that democracy has become purely propaganda, devoid of any practical reality.
Obviously, I lean more to the left. It IS very hard to see past our own prejudices and blind spots. Check out Winner Take All Politics, by Jakob Hacker and Paul Pierson. It may not be the complete, balanced picture, but it is VERY worthwhile as part of an information diet aimed at creating one.
Florida ia a right to work state so left and right don't matter much. It's constituionalized.
Well written article.
I'm so tired of hearing blame placed on one political party or another and on businesses.
The reality is that the world is going through a technology revolution. It is indeed structural change, and it's happening faster than many workers have been able to keep up with, which is difficult.
You can tariff imported goods all you like. It won' t matter. Technology will supplant the offshored workers as well, and soon. Places like China will have their own displaced workers at some point in the near future. A lot of jobs are gone that will never come back...not here, and not in other countries.
Instead of fighting it, embrace it. Yes, jobs are gone. But all sorts of new jobs exist now that didn't 30 years ago. It's time to focus on those.
We can adapt. But not by by blame, anger,complaints and mud-slinging. It takes creativity, imagination, education and initiative. All things Americans have historically been good at, but which I worry are being lost in a tidal wave of negativity.
Well said!
You are so right Kate, however, that requires personal responsibility, and that is seriously lacking in this country. I remember watching my dad, so tired, staying up late to learn new stuff about his job to stay competitive. He didn't like it, he would rather play, but there was time for play after he educated himself. A lot of people just want things handed to them on a silver platter, and the world doesn't work that way. You have to take the first steps, you have to make the sacrifices, not the companies, not the government, you. Until people learn that fact of life, nothing much will change.
Kate....uhhhhhh no. Humans are still in charge. Please stop watching the SCYFY channel.
Very well said – way to go Kate!
So Kate do you have a trust fund that you live off of that allows you to make such innane comments?
Kate: Very very well said, and very very true, thank you for the positive note. Seems these days we are somewhat lacking in the glass half full arena.
I don't know, many people see greedy bankers, businesses, and Wall Street cry for bailouts and get them due to THEIR investments not panning out. AND now most are making HUGE profits while the average American is still very much struggling to figure out how to manage an underwater mortgage and other investments still tanking it, or the loss of their job, but get told you shouldn't have done it that way, or get a better education so you can get a better job, or quit playing the blame game and move forward. THAT is complete BS in my opinion when it is obvious some of these same people that got bailouts broke the law but aren't being held accountable for whatever reason. It's easy to sit there and preach when your situation isn't all that bad
Kate; love the bravado,and go girls go. But were you raised in a closet or a place of no reality.
The United States has turned into a Plutonomy: Economic growth that is powered and consumed by the wealthiest upper class of society. Plutonomy refers to a society where the majority of the wealth is controlled by an ever-shrinking minority; as such, the economic growth of that society becomes dependent on the fortunes of that same wealthy minority.
Basically they can manipulate the economy and stock markets. It all comes down to the bottom line for them, and when they arent gonna make "x" profit anymore they will pull their fortunes out and sit back to live the good life while watching the rest of us fight over the crumbs. This is happening because of the revolving door between corporations and the government. We need to get the representatives that voted for deregulation out of office.
The United States has turned into a Plutonomy: Economic growth that is powered and consumed by the wealthiest upper class of society. Plutonomy refers to a society where the majority of the wealth is controlled by an ever-shrinking minority; as such, the economic growth of that society becomes dependent on the fortunes of that same wealthy minority.
Basically they can manipulate the economy and stock markets. It all comes down to the bottom line for them, and when they arent gonna make "x" profit anymore they will pull their fortunes out and sit back to live the good life while watching the rest of us fight over the crumbs. This is happening because of the revolving door between corporations and the government. We need to get the representatives that voted for deregulation out of office.
Well said. Many Americans really don't appreciate where the power lies in this country, and just exactly who makes policy. And with the Citizens United ruling by the SCOTUS, you are so right about the floodgates opening and the power concentration getting even worse. It's truly frightening, and Americans are complicit every time they elect someone (like my teabagging Gov here in FL) whose main goal is to further the concentration of wealth and power ... I mean, Scott spent something like $32M of his own money on his campaign, that, after being found guilty of the largest Medicare fraud in US History. How does someone like that amass that kind of fortune? And worse, get elected (by a very slim margin, but still) as Gov of the state of Florida? Of course, Bush served two terms so I really shouldn't be all that surprised I guess....
Fareed,
Healthcare or Entertanment does not create wealth. For ensuring sustainable job growth US has to find ways to drastically reduce trade deficit. A country has good job growth only if there is wealth growth, where as US's wealth is deteriorating. Service industry alone can not creat wealth (unless services are exported), it's enabler for creating wealth. Real wealth is created thru manufacturing. US has to find out ways to seriously reduce impors from China
So called entitlements have to be cut. Problem is that they are practically exempt from criticism. A sacred cow.
Single greatest harm to our economy is our dependence (addiction) to oil. But clearly you would rather go after the groups of individuals (poor) who can't defend themselves.
Agree, we also need to correct spend equation (entitlements etc) and correct earn side of the equation thru more domestic production that generates real product rather than just rely on services. Most of the services such as insurance, healthcare are just circulation of money – consumer pays to provider and gets something, if at all, in return but that does not create new wealth, that's just rotation of money from one to other.
We cant just on quantitative GDP value, we have to understand qualitative aspects of various components of GDP
omg Mehta. You are so right! I have been saying this for years. We need to find a way to bring manufacturing and industry back to the US. A country cannot survive/thrive on a service economy alone.
Sure Julie from la-la-land... Everyone has been thinking of this. Wouldn't it be great to bring all manufacturing jobs back to America?
Have you thought that the American worker will be glad to get paid $1-2 a day for their hard labor just like their fellow China and Indian workers. OR maybe would you rather pay $600 for a TV made in the good ol'USA rather than buy a $300 Chinese import. Ya'know.... as long as Every USA consummer is willing to pay more for manufacturing goods made in USA (to accomodate for the USA worker's health benefits, pension plans, Federal wages, union dues, cigarette and coffee breaks, etc) there will be with no doubt an abundance of these jobs in USA!
I totally agree with you. We cannot move the U.S. in just one direction of highly skilled engineers, math majors, science majors, entertainment and health care. We also need manufacturing. I recall the days when I was out of school for the summer and my summer job was in a manufacturing factory. There was always a factory job when nothing else was available. We need to stop buying cheap crap from China. It's a myth to think that Americans wont pay more for better products. I recalled the days when labels said Made in the USA. Now it's all Made in China and it's killing us in more ways than one.
Just because a product doesn't take up much three-dimensional space doesn't mean it isn't manufactured, or real wealth. Government and most financial services (including, as you pointed out, insurance) only pass wealth around but most services are real industries. That's why there are intellectual property laws as well as patent laws and why illegal downloading is considered theft. Concepts and activities are real things, things that improve our lives and add value. In fact, nothing made in a factory has any value at all unless someone thinks it does.
Again, getting back to automobiles- if tomorrow people decided they were fine with a simple machine that just gets them where they want to go, the whole industry would collapse. But marketing- a purely conceptual industry if there every was one- has enticed us Americans into wanting a lot more than that. People wanting free time to devote to entertainment and recreation created the entire household appliance and entertainment manufacturing industry. Unless you want to go back to the stone age, goods and services are inextricably entwined.
$19,000 per year for classic part time work? I doubt it. more like 10 or 12K per year.
I'm glad you didn't blame pride for our unemployment. Alot of people keep saying that Americans are too proud to take this or that job. There is a glut of college degrees. Instead of spending 4 or 6 years in school, maybe a few more folks should start looking for work right after high school.
JL –
I'm a high tech recruiter and I can verify for you that many, many high tech college grads who are native US Citizens have a rather arrogant approach to what they will do or not do, will learn or not learn. It's the immigrants who roll up their sleeves and do the hands on work. It's a pretty classic scenario, really, historically. The people who have grown up and can see what real poverty is, are ambitious and humble and willing. The ones who grew up with a comfy middle class living are the ones losing right now because they don't have the same drive. I suspect this applies to college grad or not, really. Anyway nice posts here! Interesting points.
I see what you mean Pamela, but I came from a middle class family, and was taught that all work is good, strive for better, but take what you can get. I've mowed lawns, dug ditches, shoveled manure (actually not the worst job ever lol), worked mindless jobs that bored me to tears, all to survive, always striving for better though. I have a comfy job right now sitting in front of a computer, but if I lose this job, I'll go right back to digging ditches again if need be. That is why I don't feel sorry for the poor people, if you are willing, you can work and live well, it's all a matter of attitude. I always find it interesting, when I'm gaming online, to hear a lot of gamers complain about not finding a job, as I watch them play all day, day after day. Complain about not being able to afford the bills, or feed their kids, as they excuse themselves to go buy some beer and cigeretts. Again, it is all about attitude, priorities, and a willingness to work for what you want.
I think the work ethic is all but gone from the younger people. They grew up on Video games and easy life, Soccer Mom syndrome where there are no winners or losers. Well Where is the drive come from to do better ? All gone !
In response to J. von Hettlingen: this problem of technology displacing jobs is as old as the Gutenberg press putting scribes out of business. But the problem governments faced during the last two centuries is that big business and the public have different interests, so that if (for example) good jobs were to be available, the government was going to have to manage the situation. It is instructive to recall that in 1848, Karl Marx assumed that the government would simply do what big business wanted, and projected a revolution: Marx's revolution (which he predicted would happen in the most industrialized nations) never occurred because conservatives (!) like Bismark and Disraeli managed government interventions. Roosevelt's New Deal and the post-WW2 European socialism were modeled after the Bismark-Disraeli alternative to Marxism.
The point is: we still face essentially the same choice. Marx versus Bismark-Disraeli. There are lots of options for details, e.g., shall we have government hire businesses to do specific projects or shall the government have an industrial policy? And additional tax loopholes does not an industrial policy make.
JL
I agree with you, more people should start work right out of high school...and public K-12 education should probably change a little at the high school level to help in that.
President Obama's assertion that everyone should be able to go to college I think is a little off... everyone should have the opportunity, but not everyone should be going to college. There will always be a lot of jobs that don't require the skills that are learned in those additional years of school. In Germany, and many other countries, high school is more 'tracked' where if you aren't college bound – it better helps you for professions you are likely to go into – like trades schools... why is it that in suburban school districts it's College or Bust?
We still need electricians, plumbers, mechanics, etc, and I think it's a disservice to not start training for such Professions/Careers until after you're 18. Half of a community college program could be incorporated as Junior/Senior years of high school for those who know that's where they want to go.
It is incorporated in the senior year (and occasionally the junior year) in many school districts/states; however, opportunities vary substantially between different ones.
That's a good point because the country I came from start training the kids in trades from the age of 11 or 12. They get this training even if they are college bound. This way, if you make it to college great! If you don't, you can go on to a trade school with some beginning skills. I started baking, cooking, and woodwork at 11 yrs old and these are skills that could have taken me to a trade school or around the house. Today, I'm a college grad, highly skilled in technology and still have these basic skills with me.
What a crazy article...this smacks of nothing but propaganda.
HOW-TO save the AMERICAN WORKER? Easy...let US start by stopping FORD from opening their new transmission building plant in China!
That might be a good start.
And this crock about all the millions of people that have 'stopped looking for work' is just that, a crock. Those people have run out of Unemployment INSURANCE payments so the gub'mint stops counting them as seeking employment?
You people that believe anything on the media web sites are insane, this is nothing more then PRAVDA USA version.
Opps, how Un-American of me to criticize the gub'mint. The anti-terror squad will be kicking down my door any moment.
Government can't tell corporations where to hire or construct factories.
No, but Governments can give breaks to businesses who hire/build in this country or tariff/tax American companies who bypass American workers to produce goods with dirt-cheap labor of exploited workers.
The sooner we put a stop to labor exploitation worldwide, the sooner prices level off and the differences between hiring Americans and other workers will be on merit, not bypassing labor rights to get the cheapest labor possible.
All this does is raise inflation and make things more expensive for everyone. Sure you may retain a few jobs, but when the price of goods skyrockets, who can afford to buy anything?
Government can't tell corporations where to hire or construct factories, but they can certainly allow those corporations to take a tax write-off for building offshore plants and transferring their manufacturing elsewhere. It's a legitimate business expense. And in offering these write-offs, our government is actually encouraging corporations go offshore.
The inverse should be true: Corporations moving assets to other countries at the expense of American jobs should be pushed into a much higher tax bracket. We can't continue to give freedom and opportunity to individuals who abuse it at the expense of the very country that provided the opportunity. If you challenge the notion that our country provides unique opportunities for people to succeed, then why are you still here?
The problem is that instead of the gov't giving the tax breaks to companies for staying in the US, companies actually receive tax breaks from the US gov't for exporting jobs. Keep the working class desperate, hungry and without the money for an education (or jobs that will pay enough to reimburse this cost once you are finished) and this way corporations can dictate what kind of job, conditions and reimbursement you will be willing to put up with out of sheer desperation to just land said employment. The gov't can't tell corporations where to do business? The gov't is corporations. Corporate America owns the gov't and wants to own you too, they are just trying to lower the price by increasing your hunger.
Wang Dang Doodle, that's exactly my point in my earlier comment! I'm sick and tired seeing "Made in China" products. Bringing the jobs back in the US will create job for the jobless, reduces if not eliminate un-emloyment claims etc...
And increase prices wholesale across the board. If you know anyone who shops at WallMart, then they are part of the problem.
Actually, I do think that we should pay more. Americans rely on cheap goods and a very materialistic life style. The vast majority of people would do well going back to be more like their parents (or grandparents). Come on...how many tennis shoes, hat, TVs, phones, dinners out does a person need? If we were willing to pay a FAIR price for things, a FAIR wage could go along with it...if companies would also pay a FAIR salary to their execs and shareholders. Because we're not willing to pay a fair price and the execs and the like take too much, the American workers are often not getting a fair wage. I do wish that there was some way to control the last half of the equation, but we've certainly done it to ourselves in always looking for more for less. You might have gotten more shoes, CDs, beef, but now, you might not have a good job with a fair wage.
yeah Nick, I went to college but I work in a factory. I'm happy and lucky enough. But I could have done it sooner.
The most valuable thing from college is wisdom– apart from a potential job.
Want to bring the companies that moved overseas back to the states? Then bring back tariffs on all imported goods. That will make the cost to produce goods overseas the same as here. And since we have the best workforce in the world, why wouldn't they come back then?
Do we have the best workforce in the world?
We are statistically among the most productive workers in the world, by a wide margin. And our productivity has continued to increase, not decrease.
Why bother hiring new employees, when you can work the ones you have a lot harder with the threat of getting fired for not doing so hanging over their heads? This is what capitalism is all about.
Exactly!! That's one of the reasons there's a jobless recovery!!
Businesses also used the economy to push the workers to produce more. If they were able to do it, why should they hire more? Who cares if it was done as well or the toll it took on the employees? Their profits have been great for 9 quarters!
So, your two main sources of jobs are basically nursing and related health care jobs along with service workers in the entertainment industry. Lots of luck with that plan. Try living and raising a family on the wages these jobs provide–can't be done.
Technology has a nasty habit of displacing far more workers than it requires to implement and use the technology. A case in point–at a small (<50 employees) midwestern manufacturing plant we employed six full-time welders assembling various items used to tow trailers (heavy-duty bumpers, receiver style hitches, hitch ball mounts and the like). Then the owner installed one automated MIG welding robot. Within a few months the six welders were gone; replaced by one welding robot technician and two 'parts loaders,' (low-skill workers who loaded and unloaded the welding workstation). Oh, and by the way, production increased about 20% and unit costs dropped by 8-15%, depending on the thing being produced.
The results were obviously great for the owner. He was able to lower his pricing and gain market share. Unfortunately, six fellows that had been making $40-47K per year were kicking horse puckies down the road.
It is a terrible shame for the displaced workers. But isn't this happening everywhere, and as technology advances, will it not be the case that 50% fewer workers can produce 50% greater output. Yes we can focus on areas that are in demand, but if the population searching for the employment is growing and the population of available jobs is shrinking, then is the issue not plain 'oversupply'? Don't have any solutions but this concept doesn't appear to get discussed.
While that may be sad for the 6 welders who were displaced, you've also got to take into account the jobs added at the company that manufactures the robotic welder. It likely took a few dozen people to design and manfacture that product alone. Keep in mind that while technological improvements do make certain jobs obsolete, they also create many others.
Without competitive manufacturing – our 40 year old economic decline continues, and continues, and ...
Bring home the jobs that US sent abroad to save American workers.
The problem is globalization. Technology allows us to both produce and consume more. Giving our jobs to impoverished nations where workers are abused doesn't do that. It causes us to produce and consume less. The only answer that makes any sense is to bring back the tariffs that used to work so well for us. China has huge tariffs. So does India. Germany, Brazil, they all have either huge tariffs or artificially devalued currencies, or both.
We need to get back to charging tariffs for imported goods to compensate for the differences in value among currencies. Do that, and US jobs will return to US workers within a year.
Completely agree. US consumer spending and other economies taking benefits can't continue. US has to increase import duties. WTO has put restrictions on that but it also requires all countires to let their currency value be market driven. we cant follow WTO while countries like China continues to not honor WTO
The redistribution of wealth from the Middle Class to the top 1% (24% of all income now, 9% pre-Reagan) has robbed the lower 99% of an average $1 out of every $6. We need to end the unconscionable disparity in wealth, unheard of in other advanced nations.
...except certain parts of the oil-rich Middle East. We see how that turned out...
Incorporate the worker as a business entity to provide a particular service at a particular time within a particular form. Service fees to be immediately transferred into their business account at the end of the particular time frame (8-hours maximum).
The extreme wealthy can not re-invest their gains outside of the US because of the strict monetary policies set up by the global growing countries (BRIC).
Their only chance for future growth an American possibility is to evolve their current operation process (employee/management concept) into a program driven technology to coordinate the activities of services to maintain the trade and utilities industries, etc..
In a nutshell, eliminate the excessive overhead and inflationary cost to align with a global unilateral leverage.
Dependency on growth has been a big part of the problem. We need to focus on sustaining practices instead.
Your proposition about accelerating the time period when compensation is given for services rendered is very intriguing. It is not uncommon for companies to wait 30 days before payment is made, and some push it out even more. The fact that this is pervasive creates a sluggishness in the pace of business, and creates a need to borrow to cover expenses.Your idea opens up a whole nes avenue for providing a business friendly environment that benefits everyone. Unlike the subsidies and tax-favorable exemptions typically given to larger corporation, this is something that will benefit large and small businesses alike, and small businesses, which are often cash strapped, should welcome such a move.
Okay you say "The downside is being felt by people who had skills, but not highly-specialized skills; by people who had some training and education but not advanced education"
Fine, then you say "Focus on retraining workers. We have a generation of people whose skills are not going to provide them with employment in the current global economy."
Great, that is something most of us agree on but then you say "The single biggest thing the U.S. government could do to help small businesses is allow more skilled immigrants into the country."
So, even if we retrain the American worker for skills that we need we then need to import skilled workers from other countries and then the American worker must now compete against these same imported workers who are willing to work for no benefits??? I can understand keeping the ones that came to universities here but we have been importing way more H1B temporary IT workers to displace, not replace, the American IT workers for over 20 years and this has not solved any problems. Now you want to import more foreign workers to flood our job markets??? How will that solve our employment problem? How will the American worker find a career that they can work at beyond the age of 40 or 50? If it takes $100,000 to enter a career in your 20's then how can the American worker get retrained after 10 years and find a career that won't lose them their house and drive their family into poverty when that career path is destroyed by the changing global economy?
Face it, the careers and jobs ar being destroyed left and right. Less long term viable careers are being left intact. Your suggestion for the young people is "going to where the jobs are now" will leave them unemployed by the time they reach 40. Then they will have to retrain for whatever jobs are left and they will have to pay for retraining themselves and they are to do it with no insurance, no means of support except for their savings, and no help from anyone save the private student loan sharks.
It is time we learned from other Industrialized countries on how to deal with long term structural unemployment. We never had to deal with this problem before on this scale. We watch our world crumble to dust and yet we hire no one to fix it or we import workers to do it. We need to educate our people better for skills needed in our economy so we don't have to import skilled workers and for making a wiser society that will do what is needed to foster prosperity again.
Very well said Bob.
Time to fire the current crop of politicians, Democrat, Republican or whatever, and get new blood in. People who have been affected by the malfeasance of corporatism and irresponsible government– not those benefiting from it.
So, we build this beautiful economy, then we destroy it with globalization. Now it isn't so beautiful. And the young people will suffer for this. And you didn't do anything to stop it.
It's globalisation that has given us all the cheap goods that we desire. The problem lies in that fact that America want its cake and to eat to too, and all the talk of taffifs show it. You want to buy cheap goods but you want them all to be made in America. We want other nations to buy our overpriced goods, but will accept none of their cheaper ones in trade. The world doesn't owe the US a living and the sooner we all learn it, the better off we'll be.
Zakaria makes more sense than our elected leaders.... Maybe we (America) should be listening to him and maybe our illustrious politicians should shut up and listen to him as well.
It's time for these now-stateless corporations to be held accountable. They reaped the benefits this country had to offer and then raped the workers. Where is our representation? Oh yeah: in their pockets.
The way to save the American worker, the American people, and the human race, is to stop the rampant corporatism that has made the First American "Republic", on both sides of the aisle, the flailing, dull-witted minion of big business, which refers to PEOPLE openly as its, "human resources". PEOPLE must always be the paramount concern of the state NOT big business, which has managed to usurp that priority for over a century. Until humankind is back on top, the forces of war, anti-labor, anti-"third world", anti-health-care, anti-PEOPLE, etc., will defeat all of those things that are important to PEOPLE, who are subjugated to the whims of one-tenth of one-percent of the American population, which owns most of the wealth and power of this, "Republic". The source of this evil is corporatism, and we CAN’T progress before that is eliminated.
Big business has always sought to devalue and dehumanize people as, "its", labor and they have been very successful, especially after they tanked the global economy (see FCIC and Levin-Coburn reports). Labor is now cheap, plentiful, docile, desperate and obedient. Corporate F-People America doesn't want to increase jobs, which is completely s counter-productive to them and precisely why THEY are getting so much more filthy rich while jobs are stagnant. This isn't, "Democrats v. Republicans", folks; it's, "The People v. Big Business", and the later OWNS all of "our" government, which serves THEIR interests, not yours.
Your comment is right on the money! But no one was brave enough to tell that or they simply don't understand. Not yet...
Thanx pc. There are corporatists out there that often react very petulantly to my comments, but I really don't think that they understand either; they're just following the corporate herd off the cliff.
The real question concerning point 4 is: Why are we training the competition? Over half the advanced degrees in the US go to foreigners. Why aren't more US citizens getting PhDs? Perhaps most Americans don't want to live in poverty while studying for 6+ years while their countrymen get a head start in the job market. Of course, foriegners will take those PhD positions because low grad school stipends are better than their opportunities back home. Also note that there is no limit on the number of education visas. Universities tremendously benefit from low paid workers. Corporations get thier low paid H1Bs. Who stands up for American students?
As a PhD in a hard science that is very commercially useful, I can tell you that there are not many jobs even for people that do get phds. Many times the "poverty" period is extended to 10+ years with no job security and few benefits.
1. Revitalize manufacturing in this country.
- Then stop making it so difficult to manufacture in this country. Taxes, Testing, Liabilities, Insurance, Unions, etc are adding up to make the cost of manufacturing in the USA less cost effective then manufacturing elsewhere. We shouldn't do without those safeguards, but they don't have to be so expensive that it's prohibitive to manufacture here. Let's face it, in this economy, if you see the same thing on the shelf and one price tag is for $2 (Made in China), and the other price tag says $5 (Made in the USA), which one are you HONESTLY going to choose?
2. Focus on retraining workers.
- Who's going to pick up the tab? More taxes to cover education costs? As stated in the article, the amount of jobs available is shrinking due to increasing technology. We already have record numbers of people applying to job openings. Companies already have the pick of the litter so to speak, and can accept the best candidate for the lowest bid. Increasing that pool will only drive salaries down lower, as everyone gets desperate to accept that job offer, even if it's underpaid. Unfortunately, the cost of becoming educated, getting a degree, etc is fast outstripping what is being offered to those same people due to the lack of jobs and lower pay scales being offered now for educated workers.
3. Focus on the growth industries like entertainment, healthcare and tourism. One of the simplest things to do in life is double down on things that are succeeding.
- Can't agree more. I'm tired of hearing how everyone should be in finance, etc. I joined a mortgage company out of college. Where is it now? Gone bust. And the next company that picked us up? Failed as well. Switched career tracks and joined an entertainment firm? 200% growth in the last two years. In bad times, people want to 'escape'. Entertainment, Tourism, etc will always boom in that market if presented for a reasonable price.
4. Promote small business. Small business creates most of the new jobs in this country. The single biggest thing the U.S. government could do to help small businesses is allow more skilled immigrants into the country.
- Totally agree. Problem is that the large companies are getting such huge tax breaks and incentives, that they can beat the little guy's price every time. Stop giving the large companies all the perks.
5. Invest in infrastructure today.
- Then stop letting people refuse to build. States have been offered infrastructure money, which they refused for flimsy reasons that were basically a cover for refusing to accept an offer from the opposing political party. This should NOT be about politics. It should be about common sense. We need infrastructure, both building and transportation wise. This country is too large to exist without a decent and cheap system. Flying is being prohibitive, and now there's talk of taxing people based on how many miles they drive? Ludicrous. People need to go to where the jobs are. Not get taxed to poverty just to get there.
Nothing accounts for the 1 million plus immigrants every year or the yearly accounting for foreign workers replacing Legal workers. First focus on decreasing these numbers.....join numbersusa.com your job could be next....
The biggest problem we have is the loss of manufacturing jobs, and the decline of the middle class that goes along with that. The reasons are complex (such as foreign competition and technology) but much can be traced to a few factors that 'we' caused. The big 3 are taxation, regulation, and, unfortunately, unions. US companies are taxed at such rates, and at various levels (from income tax to local property and sales taxes) that foreign locations often look inviting. Even the cost of filing all the tax forms is a huge burden on many companies. On top of that the enormous burden of regulation – from EPA, OSHA, EEOC, to local zoning laws, costs businesses large amounts of money, and jobs. For example, a recent CNN article noted that it is now cheaper to build refineries in China or India and ship refined gasoline here. That says a LOT about the burden of regulations in this country (and I recognize that reasonable regulation is necessary). Finally, unions, largely because of work rules, have made it very difficult for companies to run plants here. Fortunately some unions have seen the light and actually try to work with the companies, but too many still think they own the companies. Until we ease the tax burden, get some common sense regulations, and convince the unions to work with companies, manufacturing will continue to leave the US and our standard of living will continue to fall.
This whole tax on corporate profits being a bad thing is curious. Corporations should not make profits. They exist as a legal entity for one reason, a shield against liability for the shareholders and executives. That is why the corporation was created! It was not created to make a profit. "Profits" that a corporation makes need to be taxed at 100% that would force them to put that money back into the company by increasing capacity, hiring new workers, buying new equipment (which also creates jobs in other sectors), in other words the cost of doing business. That is money that has never been taxed. If they are motivated to put that money back into the system then we go a long way to solving many of the problems we have now.
Profits that a corporation makes are either re-invested in the corporation, and therefore should NOT be taxed, or they are passed on to the shareholders, who pay taxes on that income. The whole idea of an income tax on a corporation is just an excuse to double-tax the same dollars. If corporations didn't have to pay 15-?% of their net income in taxes, that money could be re-invested or passed on to the shareholders (who might invest it in other interests, or spend it). But then the government might have to spend less (an awful concept) or raise someone else's taxes to make up the difference.
"Corporations should not make profits".
Nice thought – it worked out so well for most of the global economy prior to 1980.....
How does an insurance company, for example, "put its profits back into the company" without it looking like it is hoarding money? (Of course, if it doesn't have some surplus, then one major disaster pretty much wipes it out.)
Maybe what needs to be done is to have a strict definition of what "reinvesting" is tax deductible. For example, something that would not be exempt would be investing in gold to make sure the CEOs' retirement funds will be there when they leave the company.
Excuse me, but are you sick?...
So we get rid of the unions and regulatory laws and that's the solution. The middle class will become even poorer and we will have all these factories spewing out even greater pollution. Of course it is cheaper to build a factory in China – they have no pollution controls and probably other safety standards and the workers make extremely low wages. By getting rid of unions, a corporation won't pass of the savings to consumers, it will go in the shareholders pockets. God help us if Help Us! is a policymaker.
I said reasonable regulations and cooperative unions. I didn't say no unions and no regulations. But do we really need the EEOC suing companies for requiring their workers to speak English on the job so their supervisors can communicate safety regulations to the workers? In a recent case before the EEOC, Linda Chavez (who is no right-wing corporate hack) testified in favor of the company!!! (The company lost the case, by the way.) Companies are in business to make a profit, and shareholders invest in those businesses to make a profit. I go to work to make an income. If a company cannot make a profit, I cannot make an income. If we continue to make it more difficult for companies to do business in the US they will continue to leave and the jobs which, traditionally, have supported a middle class (manufacturing jobs) will continue to go with them. There are only two places to work – for private sector or the government. You might not want to work for one of those greedy businesses, but without them the only source of employment will be the government.
how is it that a country like Germany (and many other north european coutries) have unions social medicine and close to free education and have a better middle class then us?
Maybe because they understand that middle class what keeps a nation going not a handful of CEO's?
i hope this passes the liberal screening process. The only way bring back American Jobs, is to follow the Conservative pass. End Unions, like the Obama Admin forces Private Boeing to use Union workers. Reduce the Corp tax rate. Eastern Europe is half, of the American rate and you talk about ending Oil subisidies. Drill baby drill, would create 500,000 ro 1 million high paying jobs and oil would drop at least two dollars per gallon and would stop handing 700 billion a year to Arab Countries that want to destroy America and it way of life
There is no more United States of America. It's gone. Now it's United Multinational Corporate Collaborators, and there's nothing we can do about it. Welcome to your Brave New World.
Why r u a socialist? America is the greatest Country in the last 250 years. Why is everyone jealous of us, because Capitalism, crearted Nassau, best Health care in the world, send a man to Moon. The former Marget Thratcher, said, the problem with Socialism, is you eventually run out of, everyones else money. Ronald Reagan said, Govt is not the solution, but the Problem
When will your delusions ever end?
Hi, Be positive, believe in G-d and you will have faith the World is great. It doesnt bother you, that we murder 1 million babies a year, most with our tax dollars. Where are there rights? I am sure you oppose the dealth penalty of Murders and rapist and feel fit to support abortion and Plan Parenthood? Take up a better cause, adopt a Baby, give to charity and dont worry about the Global Warming, it does not exist. G-d controls the environment.
I agree with everything in this article except the suggestion that job growth in the entertainment or tourism industries is promising. Remember, these industries provide goods and services which the average person, American or otherwise, will not consume during an economic crisis. So if people get jobs in those sectors they'll be at a very high risk of losing them once the next recession comes around. They may be good for younger people, but I doubt they are sustainable for middle-aged workers or workers with families to support.
If USA stop giving billions of dollars to Pakistan who use that money to kill Americans then certain thing can change. Our own people need to stay alive and stay good. That should be the first priority.
And they use US money to buy defense equipements from China.
How come this guy is not president? He is really smart. His advice for government officials is exactly what we need to do to bring back our economy.
Corporate America has abandoned American workers.
Time for workers to abandon Corporate America, and stop buying any and all products made off shore.
I noticed my son was reading a blog and I asked him about it and he said his teacher told the class to read the blog. My son has never been interested in what is going on in today's world so I was thrilled. I started reading the blog and understand why kids enjoy it......makes sense. This guy is so far ahead of the news media and he really makes you think. TAKE A LOOK.....www.thebigturds.com
Hahaha! Capitalism is about to eat itself by killing off demand.
Media need to stop lying about unemployment rates. Professionals who worked economists and balance sheet over saw real estate busts. If Media start lying about unemployment rates during recession. it could trigger both hyperinflation and stagflation. America will be broke. And Gas prices will be like 10 dollars.
Many college graduates have hard time find job with higher application degree. Corporations have no room have 100 million collage drop out and college graduates. Years ago, baby boomers should've finished school before getting real job. They took higher position and not creating much of America jobs. Most jobs went to overseas. Is AMERICA BROKE? YES... AMERICAN DREAM IS DEAD.... We are doing?
Printing more money supply for union workers until American turn into hyper inflation and emergency debt service.
You mention healthcare and nursing jobs in particular. Not sure about the rest of the country, but in the Tri-state area nursing jobs are really hard to come by for any newer graduate. just google it and you will find lots of blogs of even the top newly grads finding it very hard to find a job. If hospitals are under budget constraints, even if nurses are needed – there is no room on the budget to pay for them – hence they aren't getting hired.
Then move somewhere else.
"The single largest cause of this jobless growth is technology."
Sorry, but no. The single largest cause of jobless growth is: corporations stated sole purpose (nowadays; not originally) is – PROFIT. That's all they have to maximize; and all they report to their shareholders. A little study of the history of corporations will show you that they were originally formed and authorized because – they provided some sort of benefit to the public- in addition to the profits. Like, you know- employment for the masses.
We should start requiring corporations to report- quarterly – their entire societal impact. "Profits up! Because we found ways to fire 20% of our workers!" tells more useful truth than just "we're making you rich!"
actually, corporations were formed to share financial risk with governments, primarily for the purpose of exploration. the reward to the corporation was profit from expanded trade potential, the reward to government was increased taxes from said expanded trade.
What he's saying here is OUTSOURCING IS KILLING THE AMERICAN WORKER. Be prepared for massive demonstrations and people flocking to the streets. If you think things are bad now just wait. It's only going to get worse.
Someone will have to explain how allowing more skilled immigrants into the country is going to reduce existing structural unemployment among Americans. It simply means Americans will have to compete with the very people who are taking the jobs, just do it right here at home. I guess you'd call that "domestic offshoring".
I have a great respect for Fareed Zahkaria....but why does the unemployment and technology issue always have to start with GM, Chrysler or Ford.
Most Americans aren't driving their vehicles so why are they always the standard when it comes to the discussion of jobs?
Let's move the discussion away from this industry.
Fareed never ceases to amaze me; he's an expert at stating the blatantly obvious....although, before he goes around preaching about workers, large corporations...perhaps he should get a real job, where he had to actually compete for it, instead of working for a liberal propaganda machine that seemingly hired him for his ethnicity....
Well said...
FOLLOW THE EXPORTS AND THEY WILL LEAD TO PROSPERITY. Exports solve everything. Exports lower taxes. Exports improve budgets. Export provide money for schools which, in turn, creates more exports. Without exports a country dies just like a business dies without sales. Look throughout history and you will see exports solve everything.
It is technology on a way but mostly it is we have high labor cost here so most new hires are in India and other countries where wages are much less. Much of the reduced cost by the big companies have come from these hires while the US worker cannot find anything that pays a living wage anymore. If I like IBM could cut my payroll cost by 60% my bottom line would look much better too. While hard to believe with a democrat president we have done more to help the wealthy and punish the middle class these last few years than any other time in history. Now thanks to the federal reserve we have the hardest tax of all on the poor and middle class, inflation.
"If you are an electronics engineer or a computer science engineer, you’re going to have absolutely no trouble getting a job"
Right... then why is every single programmer I know looking for work? H1B visas, that why. This author has not kept up with the latest: even graduates in the sciences from Ivy League schools can't get jobs. Wasn't that an article on CNN a couple of days ago?
A programmer is NOT the same thing as a computer science engineer. The latter requires an engineering degree while the former requires (at best) a bachelors or (at worst) something from a vocational institution.
absolutely right, I have a degree in Chemical Engineering and a Master's in Biological Engineering. Yeah I'm working but on a temporary basis for 11 bucks and hour. This after being told that I would be making sixty thousand a year with those degrees. So having a degree in science or technology doesn't guarantee that you would have no trouble getting a job. Fareed is very much mistaken on that point.
Too bad american workers have been conditioned to associate worker organization movements as scary 'communist' plots to destroy 'merica.
We don't have Globalisation, we simply have eliminated tariffs on things made in other countries. That only benefits businesses. True Globalisation, that would benefit everyone, would also eliminate caps on immigrants and guest workers coming here, which would also lower prices of goods. If we don't want restrictions on where goods are made, it is hypocritical to tell someone where they can and can't live and work.
And it's not as if Americans wouldn't do the same job for less, they HAVE been, for 3 decades running. They simply CAN'T do the same job for so little money that it doesn't even pay the rent. You average Mexican peasant can live, albeit poorly, on $1/hour, but there isn't a place in America you could rent a studio apartment for $60/month and pay for insurance, food, tuition, and all the other bills with the remaining $100/month. As for jobs in the US, plenty of Americans work for as little as migrant workers as an alternative to being unemployed, but that's simply not good enough; we need to pay everyone fairly, not only for moral reasons, but also to create a stable long term economy and political system.
"But if you look at the average American worker, it’s a very different picture. What you see is a really deep problem of structural unemployment."
or, what you see is a corporate, and in many cases local and state government, realization that they had become "labor fat" in the years preceeding the economic downturn. the ditch still gets dug by one worker in the hole with a shovel digging – but employers have now realized they don't need as many above the hole leaning on a shovel.
I can't wait until stockholders and Boards realize that they're paying too high of a price for the executive class of corporations and cut that fat with a big old knife. Start with the vast wasteland known as corporate VPs - usually cronies of the boss who are there to say "yes" and little else. When these oft besotted pencil pushers get shoved out the door, I'm sure you will hear a cry go out across the land that it's so "unfair". Maybe one of them will remember the ditch digger then.
College graduate unemployment. Rich kids will suffer. They will start blaming BABY BOOMER'S economy.
Because one has a college degree does not make one a rich kid. Maybe it did 150 years ago, but it doesn't now.
Do you really think our incompetent government can solve these problems? These are the same idiots whose policies led to the greatest economic collapse since the Great Depression, costing all of us a loss in equity of 15.5 TRILLION dollars. Have you looked at the value of your home and 401K lately? Government deregulation of the financial industry, billions/trillions spent on unnecessary wars, military bases in 100 foreign countries, billions in subsidies to wealthy farmers and oil companies, tax breaks for campaign donors, massive waste of taxpayer dollars at every level. Wake up Americans–the corrupt leadership in Washington created this abysmal mess and they have neither the ability or will to correct it.
It is not that our elected officials are corrupted, it is that the whole system has been gradually pushed more and more to take care of the rich. It does that very well, and the rich take care of those who take care of them. Even the Supreme Court takes care of the rich. The only question is whether the coming "correction" will be peaceful or not, and democratic or not.
This is a great promotion for 'stay in school'! The more skilled you are the better your chances are in life. If you drop out of high school, don't expect any sympathy.
Believe it or not Generation X and Y hold the highest degree in U.S history. Back in 1900s there's millions of high school and junior high school drop out. They went to war and working labor jobs. oliver twist had children working labor jobs.
I was in special ed back in 1990s. I have two high school degrees: Regents and Regular diploma . Regents exam was pain in azz. It's IQ supremacy high school examination. I know for sure. It does not help you get a job. They want to see smart you are.
When I got into college they teach me basic material. I was like what the heck?!? They didn't teach how to get a job or prepare for career. I become the lost generation. I'm unemployment I'm not looking for a job. Not because I'm lazy. I'm discouraged. I can't move myself forward.
As usual, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer
Fareed Zakaria is New World Order scum
Who happens to provide a thoughtful analysis of everything he writes about. Care to offer up your own insights into America's role and priorities in the evolving global economy, or is your level of intellect limited to hurling insults?
To put is more accurately, Mike, Zakaria is very smart, very well educated, very well read, and most of the stuff he says goes right over your head. All you want to read or hear is the Daily Talking Points of the Right-Wing Propaganda Machine. You remind me of the Muslims who belive that 9/11 was a Jewish Conspiracy to Make Muslims Look Bad. The pilots were, according to fanatical Muslim propaganda, Jews in disguise as Arabs.
Globalism=global neo feudalism=New Word Order
Capitalism is dead. It has morphed into Corporatism, which plays by very different rules. The worker who makes the gizmo, provides the service, writes the program, or keeps the accounts no longer has a share in the nation's prosperity. What is happening is that the average American income is going up but the median American income is going down.
When Bill Gates and Steve Jobs are driving through a small town, that town suddenly has the highest average income in the world. It could be a poor town where there is a lot of unemployment. The millionaires and billionaires among us have learned how to increase profits by lowering wages. Think about that. That is not how a capitalistic economy behaves. That is how a Corporatist economy behaves.
No surprise that corporate America looks great they took all our money gambled it away and got bailed out. It won't last long.
This is just temporary there is no tax payer money to bail them out anymore.
This country is turningn 3rd world sooner than we think!
Thanks for sending all the jobs over to CHINA!!!!
I have an idea for government job creation: Get the h*ll out of the way. Stop passing 2,000 page laws, writing mountains of new regulations, setting up and funding new agencies and czars, and taxing everything that moves. The only consistent job creation under Obama's watch has been government jobs. Listen to Harry Alford, the president of the National Black Chamber of Commerce, who deems Obama the most anti-business president we have had in decades. (He voted for the big O, but now calls it the worst decision in his life.)
Uh no, it's actually the exact opposite. While public sector jobs have been decreasing private sector jobs are increasingly hiring new employees.
Okay. Why don't you tell that to the 9% unemployed and additional 10% underemployed who might have a different view of things?
When the Dutch controlled the economic world they used wind – in sail and in industry. When England controlled the economic world they used coal to power industry and ships. When America was the world leader in industry we used oil and readily available resources. I suspect the next world leader will use alternative energy sources coupled with a labor force strong in relevant technologies. As long as we stay mired in an oil-based economy with a declining educational system, we'll be relegated to the hind teat of economic prowess.
Hello:
The one way to immediately make a dent in high unemployment will be to level the playing field. The customs duty in US is on average zero to less than 2% which encourages the US companies to outsource manufacturing jobs overseas especially to China, If you ship any item to China you are looking at 6% to 35% in customs duty plus other taxes which makes it very expensive thus discouraging imports and boosting local manufacturing.
For example: If you look at the back of the of Apple's iphone, ipad, it will say "Designed in California, Assembled in China.” Apple posted record profits as a result of record sales of these gadgets and one would like to think that the increased sales would boost the employment and the economy. Well it is happening not in USA but in China. Increasing manufacturing jobs is the key and one way to do that will be to increase the cost of imports into United States by increasing customs duty rates on par with China and Mexico. This can be done without going to congress. The increased cost of importation should discourage imports by US companies as it reduces the cost benefit. This will help in forcing the US companies to manufacture the goods in United States. US corporations have trillions of dollars in cash now but as time goes by and the people’s ability to buy diminishes over time, the companies will no longer be able to sell the goods and maintain a profitable existence.
Exaclty this is the smartest thing I have heard so far. Notice China IS 6 to 35% I did not know that although someone said that before other countries protect themselves not the US. Look at Japan?
If you raise tariffs on goods coming from outside the US, it will immediately cause the price of goods and services in this country to increase. As the price of goods increases, the demand will go down. As demand goes down, inventories go up which then drives cuts in manufacturing. So ultimately, tariffs will NOT create more manufacturing jobs in this country. All it will do is make goods and services less affordable than they are now for everyone.
You can point the finger of blame at the corporations all you want for outsourcing, but consider this... if you had the choice between buying clothes made in China for $10 or the exact same article of clothing made in the USA for $20, which would you choose. Be honest. Would you even take the time to check the tag to see where it was made? Or would you look at the price and pick the cheaper option? Until the US consumer makes a conscious effort to buy American despite the increased cost, they are as much to blame for outsourcing as the corporations.
Actually, I'll buy the shirt made here. Why? Because I know that if it was made in this country it does not contain toxic chemicals. I know that if it was made in this country a five-year-old did not do the embroidery. I know that if it was made in this country it doesn't contain aebestos, lead, cadmium or anything else proven to be deadly.
Sorry, but there have just been too many products coming out of China recently that have killed people.
The solution to American socio-economic issues is surprisingly simple; do away with every single social program, and provide every american with two entitlements: Universal Health Care & much education as they care to obtain.
The government needs to rethink its foreign and military policies; we need to quit trying to impose democracy abroad, and realize it in its truest form here at home. We waste billions, and in doing so, have created a government that has zero transparency. This has lead to an epidemic of corporate malfeasance that is so intertwined within our bloated pseudo-democratic political structure. We need to realize that the ONLY way we can change things at home is with our TRUE vote; the dollar vote.
Do not purchase things that are unnecessary. Do not contribute to the banking system. Do not pay the standard tax; itemize. Take responsibility for your consumption, and try to be mindful of the fact that this planet is finite in its resources, so use them wisely. Hold the elected officials accountable, and force them to get back in touch with their constituents, not just have the best interests of their corporate contributors at heart. This is and always will be the nation of the people, for the people..we just have been redirected to think it is a nation of what can the people get away with.
We need to own up as a nation. We need to start now.
very well stated. you need to run for office.
Believe it or not, the economy will create jobs when it creates jobs. It will happen in its own time, and there's very little government or business can do about it. Our economy–an abstract term that we so often forget means little more than all goods and services made, provided, bought and sold–has undergone massive structural changes over the last decade. Zakaria is right that technology has been the principal driver, along with globalization. And this last economic downturn made businesses realize that they can achieve the same or even greater economic output from fewer employees (which means lower costs and higher margins). The changes to our economy will take time to play through. In the meantime, if government wants to generate jobs, then it must reduce the penalties on and structural impediments to investment and innovation. Investors today have a world of choices, literally, and the U.S. no longer has exclusive claims to "premiere" status that it once had (that's not a bad thing, we actually deliberately created that result). So reducing the cost of doing business and reforming our tax code are priorities. Retraining programs will help, but only in a limited way, especially if there are no positions available for all these freshly retrained workers. It'll take time. But in the end the economy will do what it does best, as the collective, aggregate choices of 350 million people sets the course (and as such vast, aggregate data, better than the limited decision making assumptions our politician rely upon, which more often than not result is serious, unforeseen consequences). Economies aren't, of course, perfect. And there is an important role for government. It's just not the "savior" function people increasingly ascribed to capabilities of government. Government can't do it. And in trying to do it, will divert private resources that will, left to their own devices, create new industries and niches that will result in more employment.
The average American does not make $50,000 to $75,000 a year, but the average (median) American household does. Big difference Fareed. If Fareed had this point straight for the entre article, it wouldn't sound as dire, nice omission.
Whatever this guy is drinking I want some of it too. He doesn't know what in the world he's talking about but he sure makes it sound like he does. I'll tell you one thing – he is clueless about economics. Just think for a moment what he is saying. Today we are able to produce more goods, cheaper, and with less labor than ever before. BUT, most of us are poorer as a result. This is what he is saying and it makes no sense, UNLESS you assume that there is a wealthy class of people who own and run the government and then take their share out of the wealth produced first and take MORE THAN their share, leaving the masses to divide up the little that is left. It's called macroeconomics, Mr. Zakaria, and it involves looking at the big picture instead of all the little details. You're fixated on the little details. So you think that we are all going to become super-rich by entering the entertainment business, i.e. we'll all be casino dealers, motel clerks, tour guides, and waitresses, AND we'll have nice middle class incomes complete with benefits. Yeah! Right. There are certain keys to wealth that all successful societies in the past have learned and these rules will never change.
1. You save and invest, you do not spend and borrow.
2. You get the government OUT OF free enterprise.
3. Wealth depends on production and you develop and protect your productive capacity through tariffs and trade
restrictions – you do not outsource, and you do not follow the charade of free trade, especially with third world countries.
4. When the wealth is produced, you distribute it fairly (I did not say equally), knowing that production means nothing if
the worker is not able to purchase the goods produced. About this point, I would take the advice of George Westinghouse and Henry Ford over Fareed Zakaria who, to the best of my knowledge never produced or invented
anything.
5. You do not allow a permanent class of aristocrats to develop, aka the Kennedy's, Bushes, Rockefellers, Mellons,
etc. who never had to work a day in their lives and benefit from what daddy or grand-daddy achieved. This group then figures that it is their destiny and their duty to become our leaders, when in reality they are becoming our rulers and act in such a way as to guarantee their position in society forever.
Conservatives have been spouting those economic fairy tales since 1932. No economy like you describe has ever existed or ever will exist. What countries learned those principles from experience? Why are employee salaries going down while employer income is going up. Don't we have a share in the prosperity we are creating. Worker productivity is up 85% since 1970. Worker income has increased zero percent since 1970 in real dollars.
The problem is not laziness. The problem is that we are being swindled by our business leadership and suckers like you continue to believe in Libertarian fairy tales.
Whatever are you talking about?
fareed zakaria has no technical degree nor any scientific knowledge of any kind.
He is just a little weasel that sneaked in to C N N and has stuck there with subservient manner and his sycophantic attitude.
Was "kicked off" from Newsweek.
Has grandiose plans for himself but his midget frame and stooped shoulders wont allow him to progress beyond these articles.
He is a third rate politician. NO MORE.
Be nice. Never attack the person, just their ideas.
What? He has a master's from Yale and a PhD from Harvard. Can I assume based on your other comments that you've never stepped foot on a college campus, let alone have a degree of any sort?
If you are referring to me, I have 2 degrees from 2 different universities and course work from 3 additional universities and institutions of higher learning, for a grand total of 7 years of college. Not that it means much. Knowledge without wisdom is useless. And may I remind you that George Bush has a degree from Yale and John F. Kennedy has a degree that his daddy purchased for him from Harvard. My schools were not the bastions of privilege and nepotism and past glory as the two you mentioned. Most college rating agencies today agree that such institutions as Harvard, Yale, and Princeton have become so diluted in brainpower because most of the seats are taken up by the 'sons of' and the 'grandsons of' that the best education in America today will be found in your second tier colleges and universities.
Swin
It is the person that makes the ideas. This is the reason I gave my view of zakaria as a person. for ideas to be real good the person has to be without the character traits that zakaria displays.
I just heard a report on NPR that said nursing has slowed and won't truly pick up for the next 15 years. Also, those with engineering degrees are having a hard time because technology is replacing them. I think the article has some flawed "facts" that traditionally held true but are no more.
Hey, at least the lawyers are diminishing. Although the current administration has laid the groundwork for an even slimier generation of ambulance chasers. Just wait until the crackheads come looking for even more free treatment of their self-inflicted ailments while the rest of us try to work yet another premium into our shrinking budgets. Btw, if we had a dollar for every time we heard the term 'infrastructure' thrown about, I wouldn't need to find a more lucrative position. The gov't holds the purse strings, Fareed. Nothing stopping them... Apparently, the interest or need(s) weren't as genuine as the campaign promises. I'll continue to give the current administration the benefit that they're heading down the paths you've outlined. Doubt is beginning to develop
We perhaps have the best infrastructure of any country in the world.
Any real spending there would be a waste like most govt projects.
Best instrastructure? Based on what criteria? Our power grid is on the verge of collapse. Most of the Pacific Rim and half of Europe have vastly superier telecommunications systems. Inter-continental transportation is pathetic compared to nearly all other industrialized nations. Our education system sucks. What part of our infrastructure is best in the world?
dancinginpdx Just travel outside the US if you ever do and come back and see and compare which airports you like the best.
I have traveled to most West European Asian and North American airports and ours in the US are the most well laid out and organized.
considering that we have had air travel perhaps for longer than most of the world some of our airports maybe older but no less upto date. SO AGAIN THERE IS NO NEED TO SPEND ON INFRASTRUCTURE. If the power grids are dated they can be repaired but this admin will never do it.
As for my education I am well educated with college educations and business experiences far beyond zakarias.
In short we have become a knowledge based economy it is what you know, not what you can do with your hands or build. There is no changing that.
What about population control? How about we make it illegal for anyone to have more than one child for like a generation, seemed to work great for china, decreasing the workforce is one way to solve unemployment, it would also decrease poverty whihc would also decrease crime.
You depopulation idea is stupid than HIGH SCHOOL REGENTS.
China had Ghost town. You think depopulation will solve the problem? Why don't you go to AFRICA or DETROIT during recession.
What's causing INFLATION and Economic Turmoil?
Well, kids working internship without getting paid. Next day, they become unemployed. The owner makes twice as more than non-paid internships - That's socialism. Yes, this country is 100% broke. Generation Kids can't afford to buy food and support their parent after senior retirement. Who going to provide the support?Kids had made their parents die earlier. Because they can't save themselves from economic despair.
It's unions fault.
This article proves Fareed Zakaria is the greatest intellectual thinker in America today. Dr. Robert Reich in his book " Aftershock " also lays bare the country's problem. In the 21st Century nations will be judged not by how much military power they possess or even how high GDP they have but how well the average citizen lives. I am 45 yrs old and in my lifetime have seen the standard of living for the middle class in this nation drop and we must reverse this trend if we want to see a prosperous and optimistic America again.
maybe you and zakaria can for a think tank that has some water. for just by himself the tank is empty.
I'm the same age and can't help thinking this problem began roughly 30 years ago with the systematic annihilation of our education system, to the point now where we are ranked far below nearly every industrialized nation in math and science. The rest of the world is raising the bar on education and competitiveness, yet we still feel entitled to our high-paying low-skilled jobs.
yet we spend more per pupil than nearly every other industrialized nation.
zakaria has answers to everything !!
HE IS THE ORIGINAL ALIEN FROM AREA 51 THAT SURVIVED. THO' HE SHOULD NOT HAVE. NOW HE IS TOO SENILE AND KEEPS ADVISING EVERYONE ABOUT EVERYTHING.
HE HAS THE CRYSTAL BALL THAT SEES INTO THE FUTURE AND THE PAST AND CAN SEE EVENTS BEFORE THEY UNFOLD.
MAYBE HE CAN SEE HIMSELF BEING FIRED FROM C N N EVENTUALLY FOR PROPAGATING B.S.
You know, I kind of agree with you. He does seem to like to get his hands on every single thing that happens. Most of his articles are 100% false and wrong. I think I remember only reading one article that was somewhat decent. I don't remember exactly what it was about, but probably Charlie Sheen.
Remember what Harry Truman said – 'If you can't convince them, confuse them'. Zakaria cloaks his nonsense in good rhetoric, but it is nonsense nevertheless. George Will is another – although he often makes a good point, his writing is so confusing that you can't disagree with that which you did not understand. I'm not saying I agree with Truman on this point, but old Harry did not care for Martin Luther King. When Harry was reminded that King had won a Nobel Prize, did he respond with a Fareed Zakaria-type rhetorical round of jibberish? Nope. He simply said – "I didn't give it to him." Point made. When President Lincoln was fed up with General McClellan after the Battle of Antietam, did he go into a long military explanation of McClellan's failings? Nope, he simply said that McClellan 'had the slows.' Again, point made. Read Lincoln's Gettysburg address. He was done before most people knew he had stepped up to the platform. Compare Lincoln's second inaugural address with that of Bill Clinton's. We were coming through a civil war, hundreds of thousands of soldiers lay dead, the nation had changed forever and Lincoln explained it all for posterity in a couple of pages. Bill Clinton's biggest travails were his wife's health car takeover and keeping his zipper zipped and he needed a small book to explain it to us.
"entertainment, healthcare and tourism"
Sing, dance, sight-seeing, and giving out medication. Is this the best we can do as Americans? This is a damn shame.
Well I'll be darned. You mean to tell me that my tax money paid to bale these farkers out, now they are making more money than ever, and some how I'm even more farked and bankrupt than if we had just let them fail miserably? Hmmm. How can that be? Could it have to do with outsourcing of jobs to other countries to save the big guys a few bucks while unemployment at home is soaring? Or tax breaks for the filthy rich corporations while the little guy pays the same amount they've always paid with even smaller, or non-existent, paychecks? Or could it possibly be the unwillingness to post a loss due to stock prices that keep the swine flush in mud from their shares, even if it means saving the company and giving the REAL workers a hand? No, it can't be any of THOSE things.
These CEOs maintained there million dollar bonuses even after they drove their companies into financial ruin. Don't give me your bs about how it was a contractual obligation to continue to dole out these payouts. Your contract for a mega bonus/million dollar paycheck was null and void the second your company failed and had to be bailed out by US citizens. Just one CEO's bonus spread amongst the REAL workers in each company could make a significant difference in their quality of life. And what does it mean to the CEO? He can't buy his yacht until next Christmas. They are robbing this country blind and laughing all the way to the bank.
I'd like to string each of them up by their precious golden parachutes.
"...OF the People, BY the 'Corporate Legal Eagles", FOR the CORPORATIONS..."
The U. S. of A. has been CO-OPTED out from under the American PEOPLE !
REFORM of the EXECUTIVE, Legislative, and JUDICIAL Branches' Statutes and Regulations REQUIRED:
1.) STRIP Federal AND State CORPORATIONS of "PERSONHOOD"
2.) RE-AFFIRM "HUMAN" Rights – for PEOPLE ONLY!
3.) BAN Corporate "LOBBYING" Perquisites
4.) BAN Political Action Committees for CORPORATIONS
5.) RESTRICT Corporations to SOLELY "ECONOMIC Entities" – their ORIGINAL Purpose
6.) TAX ALL Corporations – FLAT Rate for Economic Activity in the U. S. of A.
7.) REFORM the U. S. Tax Code
8.) BAN Corporate SUBSIDY.
I could not agree more. Is there such a legislator out there to define what a person is? Corruption and cowardice. Good points.
Love your plan. Do you want to run for office? Maybe we can get someone with a plan and some brains in there to do the right thing with out being tempted by the corporate payoffs so many of our reps enjoy.
Viewatthetop; 2:11 pm U S A has a Pres: and if he had the house and senate he would have done great things. Obama has to many Dems. IN Repub suites or traitors to the Dems.
Great plan. Just convince candidates for office to stand behind such a policy, then vote for them.
#9 Repeal law giving corporations human status. #10 Write a law that any gov.worker or person misrepresents the people or lies receives 10 yr jail sentence for first time offenders. That would go a long way in Senators or Congressional folk to prove that what they are doing for the people is just and for the community at large. The onus would be on them and facts would have to be checked. #11Judges would receive there appointments based on Knowledge and at least 20 year history of lower courts and with a clean record with just verdicts.{ For the people }. Reply to Inupaaq
I would add to the advice section for students:
Be prepared to go outside of the U.S. to find a job. If the jobs are elsewhere you have to have the skills to be able to communicte and live in a very fast paced and changing world.
Uh, its Called capitalism people, this is how it works. Big corporations make money at the expense of the worker who is paid a mere fraction of profit made on the finished product. Thats why in America 1% (834,000 households) own more then 90% (84 MILLION households.) Get involved with a velvet revolution or get used to it.
Under capitalism, the chief means of production—the factories, the railroads, the mines, the banks, the public utilities, the offices, and all of the related technology—are privately owned by a super-rich minority, the capitalist class. The capitalists then compete with each other in the marketplace and run production on the basis of what will bring them the biggest profit.
This drive to successfully compete and to maximize profit leads big business to exploit workers, to pay their employees as little as possible, a mere fraction of the actual value that they produce. It also leads big business to resist the efforts of workers to unionize and to obtain increased pay, reduced working hours, and improved working conditions.
Are you serious? We are emerging from this financial disaster? Oh, by the way, why does everything in the news have to have the word "crisis" attached to it? Sounds like fear pushing to me. We are definitely not even close to emerging from financial disaster. I believe we are teetering on a cliff and Sylvester Stallone from Cliffhanger won't be able to help us up. Things are only going to get worse I believe. Talk to the average American. It's only a matter of time before something gives.
Has anyone in the media read books such as Jeremy Rifkin's The End of Work: The Decline of the Global Labor Force and the Dawn of the Post-Market Era? Right now all we hearing from the mainstream media what are mainly traditional solutions to what could be radically new problems. If others, such as Ray Kurzweil, are correct, then looking into a rear-view mirror as we progress into the future will not be a recipee for success, but disaster. We may need, instead, to radically reevaluate all of our basic assumptions and even be ready to slaughter some sacred cows to save ourselves.
The statement "Look at law. "Discovery” – a process that used to be done by young paralegals and lawyers – can now apparently be done by computers." is erroneous. Having worked for attys my entire life, I can assure you that discovery is not being "done by computers!" Discovery (which includes Interrogatories, Requests for Production, Requests for Admissions) is created by attorneys with specific requests determined by the specific case. These requested are then keyed/typed into a document (e.g., First Set of Interrogatories to Defendant, etc.). They can be served by eservice through various companies created for purposes of efiling or they can be served electronically, as in email. Computers DO NOT do discovery. Wonder how many other erroneous statements are in this article – several noted in various comments.
Yea, I am an attorney, and I spend 4 hours a day on discovery. I would love to see a computer draft discovery demands and responses. It would need to be a robot.
I forgot a point:
6. You make it possible for EVERYONE to work and receive a decent income. Notice that I said both 'POSSIBLE' and 'WORK'. The person on welfare should work harder for their benefits than the typical wager-earner and their benefits should provide for the necessities only – this provides every incentive for them to get off of welfare as soon as possible while at the same time protecting us all from those unforeseen circumstances that can happen to any of us and that can ruin any of us through no fault of our own. AND, if the welfare recipient is not willing to work, they simply don't eat. And if they try to take, they are arrested, convicted, and executed.
No s@#$ the corporations are booming while the American worker is busting. Corporations moaned about all the restrictions and regulations they were under were causing them to keep prices high, keep new hires low, and retrain them from expanding. Well, regulations were lifted and their response was to move everything off shore, including all new jobs. That wasn't enough so they then began to bring off shore resources into the US and displace even more American workers. Who cares about ownership and quality – we can get 2 off shore workers for the price of one American worker! That still wasn't enough profit so they get subsidies and tax breaks even in the face of record profits! How do you pay for that? Rob those poor people that were still suffering from the first wave of corporate greed. THAT was not enough so now they're attacking retirement benefits, destroying public education, and eliminating the ability for collective bargaining – top that off with deregulation of the broadcast media and you've got our current status in the Corporate States of America!!! The corporations goal is to keep the endless supply of worker drones coming!!! Take away every single ability to question and have choices as to your career and financial situation. Make you so poor, so stupid, and so desperate that regardless of how crappy the job, the pay, and the no benefits, you will be THRILLED to do it without complaint or question!
Globalization reduces prices which is good for the poor. But globalization is what may have put them out of work in the first place. Also, tech savy is no guarantee of a job in this country. It is the tech jobs that are outsourced at 30 cents on the dollar. Until the average American worker can abandon kith and kin, pull up stakes and move overseas to follow the jobs as easily as corporate America ships the jobs overseas, don't talk about a global economy
What we call the USA gov't has become nothing but a bad, BAD, bad JOKE.
We the PEOPLE are the 'butt' of the joke. Our national gov't is nothing more than a corporate lobby/military industrial complex that's completely out of control and it's only a matter of time until these Fat, ugly, greedy, and OLD people completely rape ever 'average' citizen of every right, liberty, and justice that this country was founded upon.
Will the 'dinosaurs' die off before our YOUNG saviors take office? Only time will tell...
Take heed you bastions of capitalism...this is the same scenario that led to the French Revolution. All we need is for one of you Wall Street, oil company or other large corporation execs to spew "let them eat cake," and it will all be over with. It didn't end well for those folks at the top the last time.
The only difference I see in the economy is that more clients are looking at my product, but the same number (0) are buying it. They are all just tire-kickers...ad nauseum.
We through our machines have made people obsolete. The future is arriving just as read and seen in so many Si-Fi stories of the past 50 or more years.
The solution undoubtedly is fewer people as the old ideas of population growth for survival don't fit the computerized, automated world.
Jack
NO
More like, we(the USA), through our greed, have made AMERICAN workers obsolete.
Problem is it is impossible now to find a full-tim job with benefits making at least $12/hr. Employers get away with giving employees part-time work, pay & no benefits while illegal immigrants continue to work full time without paying any taxes and getting paid cash. i know plenty of good families working hard 2 jobs & can not live. yet, i know a illegals driving brand new trucks, new clothes & homes while we pay for their healthcare, their child's education, etc. PROBLEM IS THE US GOVERNMENT NEEDS TO ENFORCE THE CURRENT IMMIGRATION LAW. In California alone there are over 2million illegal immigrants working here... & we wonder why American citizens can't find jobs?
I'm kind of surprised to see a news story mentioning the fact that we actually have two economies. We're constantly hearing about how well the economy is looking or that things are looking up. For the big business/financial economy that is evidently true, for the rest of the country nothing could be further from the truth. Just about every news story seems to disregard the everyday workers economy. One of the main topics daily is how the market is doing, like the stock market is the only thing that matters. The stock market and its push to maximize companies profits at all cost is what has helped drive business overseas to take advantage of slave labor. The big business/financial industry are also the ones promoting and pushing the "Global Economy" scam. There has always been international commerce, all this "Global Economy" crap does is allow our businesses to get out of paying workers here the wages they used to, while exploiting poor people in other countries. US companies used to hire US workers and pay them decent, livable wages, wages with which those same workers paid taxes on to fund our government. But now due to the greed driven desire to increase profit margins into the stratosphere and the ability to buy off the government so they can be allowed to exploit foreign workers they're living the good life. Of course Wall Street has their hand in there as well taking their nice cut of the action and providing a guiding hand. Sadly too many everyday people have bought hook, line, and sinker, into the investment world, and it's easy money, get rich quick attitude. More and more are willing to sell the country down the river if it'll increase their investment returns, regardless of the consequences.
ALL jobs are important and until everyone realizes that we're in trouble as a nation. With all the outsourcing and automation going on does anyone realistically believe we can continue to exist the way we're headed? Even with a service based economy someone has to have money to buy those services. The small group of wealthy that is being created now, especially the super wealthy due to all the tech baloney, are only going to spend there wealth in certain areas, they surely can't keep businesses afloat everywhere. And healthcare? Without jobs, or ones that pay anything, or provide healthcare, who is going to be able to afford health insurance and at the same time so many are screaming to eliminate government healthcare plans. If anyone truly wants Socialism we're headed in the right direction. When people have no jobs, or ones that pay them enough to survive, they need assistance. To think and do otherwise we will truly be headed for a civil uprising. With the insane, idiotic amounts of wealth some people are getting, mainly in the big business, stock market, hedge fund arena, while millions are unemployed and so many others are struggling, we're starting to look more and more like France did before their revolution. Just by looking at the way things are headed that might unfortunately be the only answer because no one with power or money is doing anything about correcting the problems and unfortunately they're the ones who pull the strings. Of course why would they do anything, to do anything would be going against what made them rich and powerful.
No nation can function with such high unemployment numbers for long. These corporations will go down too just look what happened to Germany in the 1930's. There is no more money to steal from us.
i absolutely respect how you understand the crisis.I am an immigrant coming from Nepal as a student.I cant call myself a brilliant one but i will judge myself as an average people.I loved and got married with a girl from here and its been a year.Yes, i had to take loans backhome to come down here for the study.I left the college after i got married and still hoping to get done with it after i get my papers done and dont forget i have been paid off backhome.I am working 80 hrs a week in a check cashing place where the owner says cant hire a local employee coz where we work have to play with lot of money and he cannot trust most of the locals coz almost everyone has been bad output of the drugs in the market and marijuana of-course.there are few people who are really trustworthy but they dont even know theres 100 pennies in a dollar(need education reform).i started working on my papers and my wife started using me coz i needed the papers.she wants to live a very high profile making me work which i reject coz i want to start my business within couple years and m sure i can.i am ready to payback taxes which i havent paid till now but i dont even have a social security on me and also i cant always give all the money i make to my wife just to get the papers.We have been arguing but we havent divorced yet n m still hoping things will work out even when i am staying in a motel paying 700 just for the accomodation.now in this case if my wife is not ready to workout with me i dont have no option hide myself until the immigration official find me and kick me out of the country on the governments expense.Who is the looser? me, unfair immigration system or the government?
My family has been here since 1680's.
We are screwed. Get rich quick(LEGALLY). In a few years, you WILL NOT have a chance....
Complaining won't work it is up to the people to take the Government back. The middle East is doing it.
You all got it wrong, particulary the writer of the article. We can't compete because we as a country do not embrace the metric system. The US economy is the only place WE sell. IF you do only the suggestions the writer says, we will go deeper into the problems. He doesn't know or really understand the problem. Thanks congress.
Metric, REALLY.
The whole world has different values of currency.
It's you that can't do math.
Zakaria: "Promote small business. Small business creates most of the new jobs in this country. The single biggest thing the U.S. government could do to help small businesses is allow more skilled immigrants into the country."
I am a small business owner, and this theory is absolutely wrong. Employers like McDonald's and Wal-Mart want cheap, foreign labor to drive down labor costs, whereas [small] business leaders realize it's our responsibility to improve the lives of everyone vested in the company via respectable living wages, and we want nothing to do with cheap foreign labor. That's the fundemental difference between employers and business leaders.
McDonald's is an employer. Nothing more. It's the same with Wal-Mart. They get lots of people to perform some mindless task and pay them far less than they produce–that's their profit margin, which has little or nothing to do with their products. In other words, they're not striving to build the better mouse trap. They strive to provide a lower quality mouse trap at the same price, manufactured by cheap labor, determine what they can afford to pay their laborers, and then they simply pay them less–that's their profit margin. There's no honor in that. There's no innovation whatsoever involved. And if that's America's future, we're as screwed as Dixie (Right to Work states).
I, for one, will never hire anyone based on a willingness to work cheap. I hire professionals only, and a long time ago I realized that paying them a respectable living wage costs LESS than the damage and theft claims I'd face if I chose to hire cheap foreign laborers that simply couldn't care less about the quality of service they delivered. In other words, it's not idealism, it's good business.
George H. Bush can cram his "New World Order" and "Free Trade Agreements" straight up his Nazi-loving...You got it.
You make some good points. The Republicans would have us all believe that give big business and the wealthy class even more money and they will be out there investing and creating jobs. WRONG!
They are not in business to create jobs or to strengthen America or the economy. They are in business to generate more wealth for themselves and their investments will be in more yachts, mansions, overseas vacation homes, private jets, and country club memberships.
I spent 35 years in a profession and since retirement I have worked for a non-profit corporation and have come in contact with a number of small businessmen. The small businessman gets it. He knows that he needs a worker who is hard-working, dedicated, skilled, and honest and in return he knows he needs to pay that worker a fair and honorable wage. Fail to do the one and you won't get the other. The mega-wealthy businessman, however, treats his workers like property. More so, he treats his worker like a machine – if his machine breaks or slows down, throw it out and bring in another one that will cost you less to run. The best business leader in this country's history was George Westinghouse. In his time, labor leaders said that there would never be a need for a labor union if all businessmen were like Westinghouse. Even Henry Ford got it – he knew that the workers who built his cars had to make a wage that would allow them to buy the car. Unfortunately,
our business model today is more like that like of Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and John Rockefeller, men who's path to wealth was covered in blood, body parts, and dead bodies. Today, our business leaders don't have a clue about how to make anything – they just move money around, make acquisitions, and treat people like they are nothing more than spare parts and commodities.
Think about it. This nation's greatest period of prosperity was the 20 year period after World War II.
We had an enormous productive capacity, unrivaled know-how, and a strong labor movement that could give the working man at least some power against the businessmen and guarantee a decent and fair share of the wealth being produced. Then came LBJ with his war and his great society and his unwillingness to raise taxes and pay for them. Then came a series of presidents, especially
Ronald Reagan (and not Jimmy Carter), who would go on a tremendous borrowing binge. Then the wealthy class and business leaders forget what was making the system work and they upset the apple cart. They got Reagan, Bush, Clinton, and Bush II to declare war on the unions, to outsource jobs (and technology and know-how) to third world countries, and the end result was an enormous ability to produce and nobody making enough money to buy the goods. In short, exactly what Henry Ford would say not to do. How many people know that Ford actually raised wages at the beginning of the Great Depression to try to offset the disaster?
I will say this much. If China ever reads about George Westinghouse and Henry Ford. If China ever realizes that they don't need America as a market and that all they have to do is keep raising the wages of their workers, then they will embark on a road to prosperity unheard of in the world's history. AND, America will be left with nothing – no factories, no skilled workers, no know-how, no productive capacity or infrastructure. All we will have left is an enormous debt and a citizenry that will be either unable or unwilling to work but will still expect the country to provide for them. God help us then.
Swin, I agree with almost everything you say. I'd like to comment on just one thing, about the rich taking their money and "investing" in yachts, mansions, etc. I think that would actually be a good thing if they would only do enough of that. In order to buy a yacht or mansion, someone would have to build that yacht or mansion, and that would mean jobs, lots of jobs, and very skilled jobs. They could also invest in long shot inventions that may not pay off until the economy improves. They could invest in social programs that could make their neighborhoods and cities safer, and thereby raise their own standard of living.
I think if only the wealthy would convert a lot of their wealth to non-monetary assets, the economy would recover. The wealthy would be just as rich, but their wealth would be measured in other ways than cash, and the cash would have been released into the economy letting the rest of us have jobs. The problem is that with the trillions that corporations and hedge fund managers and such people have sucked out of the economy, they would have to spend a significant portion of their wealth to get the economy moving again.
How does allowing more skilled immigrants into the country create jobs for Americans? We can't ALL work in the health care industry. The author is obviously misinformed about the travel industry. Tourism is down. WAY down.
I retired in 2005 and one of my goals was to travel around the country – by car. I've traveled 75,000 since then and have seen every state except Alaska, Hawaii, Florida, and Rhode Island. To save money I stay at Motel 6's whenever possible – I average around $40 to $45 a night. When a '6' is not around, I move up to a Super 8 (moving up means in price, I still prefer '6'). Super 8's cost me from $50 to $65 a night. Well on my trip last month to Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Texas, two things surprised me. 1. I was given a 25% discount at a private motel in Texas – after
the room was booked and after the first night had already been paid for on my credit card. 2. I came across two Super 8's that had posted rates of $29.95 – unheard of. I was the only person in the tour 'group' at a plantation along River Road in Louisiana and at Sonora Caverns in Texas. At another Texas cavern, I was in a group of five. The Alamo was busy – of course, the Alamo was also free. I was the only member of the tour group at Old Washington in Arkansas. I believe there were only four of us at Blanchard Caverns in northern Arkansas. Even the Shiloh and Stones River Battlefields in Tennessee were kinda empty. Maybe I'm wrong and Fareed is right but it seems to me that a strong tourist and entertainment industry is the result of a strong economy and a wealthy society and not the cause of each.
Question – what do you call a Chinese tourist in America today?
Answer – A shopper – he's looking for what he is going to lay claim to when it comes time for America to pay off its debt. Who knows – that bridge in New York City may actually eventually go up for sale.
I salute you !! You and millions of us know more about this country than zakaria ever will.
And you are not wrong. Or I should say you are right.
Tourism flourishes only in a good economy. And the tourist industry jobs are usually temporary and the well educated may not be satisfied with such a job.
Blame the UNIONS for creating non-paid internship. You are lazy...You make kids to work for you and while earning more than your pocket wages. Next day, you will see COLLEGE BUBBLE CRISIS.
College graduate unemployment. The next tunisian riot...
Unions are hardly to blame. Educated people with common sense know that.
Clearly you're retarded.
Move back to your crappy, third-world, right to work state and enjoy live in your trailer park.
Non-paid internship = NO FUTURE....
Non-paid internship = LOST GENERATION
Non-paid internship = AMERICAN IDOL job application. One gets hired and other doesn't.
Non-paid internship = SOCIALIST OF USA
Non-paid internship = INNOVATION SLOW DOWN
Non-paid internship = FUTURE GENERATION SLOW DOWN
Non-oaid internship = KIDS WORK FOR LAZY UNIONS AT RETIREMENT AGE 48 YEAR OLD.
So Kate do you have a trust fund that you live off of?
yes, there are two economies, the globalized corporates' and the slaves' while governments withdrawing
The PURSUIT of happiness. Not the PROMISE of happiness. Have to make your own luck people, no one is going to do it for you.
Sorry to inject more politics into this situation, but I've seen this comming for some time, and have plenty of time to think about what needs to be done to stabalize Americas Working situation. I find myself in agreement with Ron Paul. We protect US financial interests with Tariffs for goods coming into the US, and for businesses who have their HQ's outside of the country. This is the only way I can see protecting the US labor market from the rock bottom wages of the third world. We cut taxes on the working, by cutting welfare programs, and cutting the military budget that is supporting all those countries who are stealing US jobs for $1 a day labor. Businesses will start moving back into the US, and out of areas that were only stable because of the costly military pressence there.
Scale back the size of Government, eliminating the income tax, and strengthening our currency would snap this country back into an upright position. Jobs would be pouring back into this country, and the American people would have 25% more money in their pockets every payday to buy new (US made goods.) You can see how this perpetuates itself. The rest is up to hard work and innovation. If we are truly the best and the brightest, we will prevail.
Ron Paul 2012 -No more politicians, we need patriots. -
Typical Fareed Zakaria article – a bunch of half baked, nebulous ideas countered by his own "but on the other side of the coin....". While he is obviously knowledgeable, he also rarely says much. Furthermore, his knowledge of economics is lacking, as evidenced by this statement...."Everyone who has taken out a loan in the last 20 years has benefited from the fact that you have almost no inflation..." . As it relates to loans, you don't benefit from no inflation – it is to your detriment, as you would rather pay back a loan with dollars that are worth less because of inflation. During inflation it is good to borrow money and pay it back when a dollar is worth less than when you borrowed it. Fareed doesn't appear to understand that....
Stick to foreign policy, Fareed.
I agree with you, his foreign policy articles are fantastic.
The solution is very simple. We MUST give more money to the rich. Obviously the tax cuts they have aren't big enough, otherwise the working class wouldn't be in this situation. (read: sarcasm)
I love all these comments about the evil corporations. I guess that makes me evil, because I have been investing in the Corporations for the last 20 years. The money that goes to their pockets actually goes to my pockets. Friends used to give me crap for not driving a nicer car or living in a bigger house, but my extra money got invested. I love Chinese goods. They cost less. I love high gas prices. I own stock in Exxon and BP. I ride a bicycle to work. Record oil profits just give me more money. I hope the corporations just keep on profitting, because it just helps those of us who were willing to live within our means for the last 20 years instead of buying big houses, big SUVs , and big flatscreen TVs. I can't wait until the end of this quarter when my dividends come it. It's pay raise time.
The disaster of the Great Moderation (a.k.a. the 2008 Financial Crisis) was salvaged by heroic government efforts to reward the perpetrators. Neil Barofsky, stepping down on March 30 as special inspector general of the bailout program, wrote a revelatory New York Times op-ed about how the bailout worked.
In theory, the legislative act that authorized the bailout was a bargain: The financial institutions would be saved by the taxpayer, and the victims of their misdeeds would be somewhat compensated by measures to protect home values and preserve home-ownership.
Part of the bargain was kept: The financial institutions were rewarded lavishly for causing the crisis, and forgiven for outright crimes. But the rest of the program floundered.
As Barofsky writes: "Foreclosures continue to mount, with 8 million to 13 million filings forecast over the program's lifetime" while "the biggest banks are 20 percent larger than they were before the crisis and control a larger part of our economy than ever. They reasonably assume that the government will rescue them again, if necessary. Indeed, credit rating agencies incorporate future government bailouts into their assessments of the largest banks, exaggerating market distortions that provide them with an unfair advantage over smaller institutions, which continue to struggle."
In short, President Obama's programs were "a giveaway to Wall Street executives" and a blow in the solar plexus to their defenseless victims.
The outcome should surprise only those who insist on hopeless naivete about the design and implementation of policy, particularly when economic power is highly concentrated and state capitalism has entered into a new stage of "creative destruction," to borrow Joseph Schumpeter's famous phrase, but with a twist: creative in ways to enrich and empower the rich and powerful, while the rest are free to survive as they may, while celebrating Loyalty and Law Day.
- Prof. Noam Chomsky, “The 'Great Moderation' and the International Assault on Labor”
How can you point out the obvious issue, and then dismiss it? Technology will take the place of 50% of the workforce over the next 20 years. There will be NO new jobs. This is the new world that Big business is intent on creating.
A few high end jobs with perks and lots of cash, and a huge pool of unemployed, unskilled workers that can be pulled from when needed for min wage jobs.
Welcome to the Brave New World....
Mike makes a very good point. Lobbying has has had a huge influence on the wealth distribution in this country. Regardless of what government officials tell you, the federal government is a puppet and the lobbyists are the puppet masters. Think about. If you're a Government official from Texas are you going to vote against tax incentives for the oil industry. Of course not, it would be political suicide and ruin you're chances of getting a job with them when your term ends. Plain and simple: the government is run by big business and we as American citizens need to break the incidious bond of deception.
There is not single, simple answer to this issue. Some contributing factors that must be considered are how employee pay has been held artificially low for decades while executive pay continues to grow at an unreasonable and indefensible rate. US corporations are given tax breaks for moving jobs overseas. This must stop. The continuing defunding of public education is only going to exacerbate the problem. With changing times and technology, education has to be a top priority for our country. Instead of yelling about teachers pensions, take a look at golden parachutes and compensations that at times can only be described as obscene.
According to Fortune magazine, the CEO of the company I work for makes over 500X what the average worker gets. All who work hard and have contributed to the record productivity and profitability of the company should share in the rewards. This isn't about freebies, it's about pay for performance. Many American workers get paid far less than they earn while many execs are paid much more than they earn.
We are overpopulated! There is no demand for American workers at their current skill levels while the supply of jobs for those workers is shrinking daily. Nursing, service industry, and minimum wage jobs will no rescue the American worker. Whereas the American people sustain the American economy through purchases there is a danger that the products designed will soon go unpurchased and yet more jobs will be lost. The problem is that we are overpopulated. A decrease in population will drive prices down, whole increasing the earnings of workers.
Wow. Another class warfare hit piece by CNN. How incredibly shocking.
Learn something, fellow Americans, and wake up from your spoon-fed stupor developed in "public education" : it is not the government's job to "create" ANYTHING, much less "jobs". It CANNOT create anything. It DOES NOT create anything. It is the government's job to PROTECT people from attack and fraud. THAT'S IT. The Constitution is a CONTRACT, because the Founders understood the problem with centralized government power...precisely what we have had since 1933. The Founders would be HORRIFIED at what this nation has become in the last 80 years. Republican, Democrat, it doesn't matter. The contract has been violated, and it either needs to be stopped, or we will all end up slaves. Equal, sure. Slaves all have the same equal rights: none.
Hey Fareed, Why don't you just tell this to the president in your next "advice meeting". No need to explain it to us. We get it. Your socialist partner "O" doesn't. Get Soros and have tea with the Pres. He needs more of your "global economy" advice.
I wish the borders of other countries were more porous. I'd immigrate if I could.
emmigrate
No... emigrate.
Globalization, outsourcing and not caring for the edge is what is doing us in. Also stop those H-1B VISAs. All those trade agreements have killed the American Worker. No wonder we are falling behind. The Country is being sacrificed for quick profits.
yeah buddy, the following events would never (re)occur, if outsourcing/immigration is banned:
1. Startup of giants like Intel, Microsoft
2. USA being a leader in science and technology
3. Being a world leader (no technology means a big loser).
Have you ever seen the quality of american graduates (advanced degrees). They are the "bu**" of all jokes for their counterparts from China, India.
You really nailed the issues with our economy now and how we have to change in order for American workers to prosper. Now, if we can only get the policticans and corporate america on this track.
Wait...did anyone read "As the U.S. emerges from the financial crisis.." and laugh? I don't get how everyone just looks at the now when in reality you need to foresee the future. As it stands now I am very troubled with the way our government works and the way we prioritize future investments. The single most important factor in this economy is the value of the American dollar, until that is strong again I will not believe these kinds of stories.
Employed people are taxpayers. Employed people are consumers. Governments and companies cannot exist without either. Local governments are starting to get the picture but not the companies. Eliminate the "greed" factor in business (which the government can do) and we'll get back to a stable economy. I suspect in time, people will kill the companies by not buying from them (boycott!) or they'll simply revolt and start burning malls and banks to the ground.
Yes REPUBLICANS, give Exxon a HUGE tax break, while my father, who retired from Exxon-Mobil and still works building decks and mowing lawns because his retirement from E/M sucks, has to pay out the A on his taxes. Any middle class person who would vote republican is an IDIOT
Let's see.........who funds politicians' campaigns? The little guy or the corporate overlords? Answer this and you know WHY corporate America is in such good shape and is getting exponentially more help than the rest of us. Term limits would limit the amount of scumbaggery we have to put up with from pocket-lining politicos, but since we allow them to make the rules it will never happen. I guarantee you there is not a single member of the House or Senate who gives a rat's behind about Middle America. It's all about how they can get the few dollars we have left for themselves and their cronies.
The ideas expressed here and ones that republicans will NEVER understand.
We should surrender. Lets face it the American people have lost against corporate America. There is nothing to fight about anymore, we lost it all. Corporations, power lobby and corrupt politicians are stronger then we are. There is nothing left to fight for. We are bankrupt, there are no jobs, $ is worthless we have been sold out.
wow, I love reading those articles that find excuses on why companies don't want to hire. there are a ton of skilled people out there with computer skills that work on low paid jobs, because companies got used to paying low wages to workers around the world and they treat US workers the same way.
this is unbelievable, that after 10 years of oppression by giant corporations, people write such articles to make us comply and submissive to the reality: the rich does not want to distribute the money they stole from us.
wow!
Firstly, I like how the article begins by the two economies: those of the rich, and those of middle class America.
But then, really, you blame technology???! Clearly, improvement in technology do make some jobs superfluous. But being married to a manufacturing engineer, and hearing the complaints on a day-to-day basis... the problem is not technology eliminating jobs, but rather, MANAGEMENT SEES THAT LESS WORKERS = MORE PAY OFF. Well, that's the problem isn't it?! It's the greed up top! This also easily explains the discrepancy about companies making more money and middle class not = the rich at the top are making more money at the expense of the lives of the middle class. Come on people! Why do you think they outsource things too?! It's so that the rich can be richer! Please. The real problem? UNCONTROLLED CAPITALISM.
Promising start, weak conclusion. Yes, it's technology! But when is anyone, from the right or the left, going to admit: Technology has left us with a dearth of tasks remaining that are sufficient to employ us all. Say all you want against the welfare state, but "spreading the wealth" is the only way the vast majority are going to get their fair share.
Gosh, you'd almost think it was PLANNED that way...
Another aspect which was completely overlooked are the intermediaries between the worker(s) searching for jobs and the companies buttering the bread. Who am I referring to? The greasy, truly non-skilled (or they wouldn't be headhunters would they) placement firms, ESPECIALLY in I.T. Why, in freaking 2011, do we get filtered through the racketeers in placement firms in order to locate employment? What part of the equation do we NOT need? The company which pays the bills, the worker who is needed by said company, or some ditzy skirt / suit with ZERO experience in ANY career screening the prospective candidates? It speaks volumes to how companies use and abuse contract employment and how an entire industry exists off of this skim. Why do those fact always evade the authors of like articles?
"We train the world’s best and brightest – often at public expense since they go to state universities or they get grants from the U.S. government " lets stop training the rest of the world. USA spends billions on foriegn countries and refuses to take care of its own. Why? i'm not for isolationism but we need to look inward more and become a healthy nation b4 nursing the rest of the world. there are plenty of bright and intelligent people right here in the USA. many just need to be retrained / educated. lets spend those billions at home! THOSE BILLIONS WOULD PAY FOR THE EDUCATION OF THE 24 MILLION.
I agree that manufacturing in the United States needs to be revitalized, but NOT by allowing every skilled (or unskilled) worker from other countries to immigrate to the United States and take away jobs from people who already live here. We simply have to stop the bleeding. Refugee resettlement programs are brining in unskilled workers who then take away jobs from those who are already here and need the jobs. Further, we need to stop pushing out older workers in favor of younger workers. Employer policies are forcing people who do not yet want to retire to do just that, putting further strain on the Social Security program. How can American workers ever regain our stature in the world when companies hire foreign labor to work on big projects in the U.S. or for U.S. companies. Companies such as Shell Oil, which on March 31, 2010 brought online the largest deepwater oil production platform in the Gulf of Mexico (the Perdido Spar Project), are hiring fewer American workers all the time, yet are selling much of their products to other countries. I believe it is not the government's job to create jobs; it IS the responsibility of American companies to create jobs, and they are not doing it. They are pocketing the profits instead. Don't look to Congress or the President to do this. Look to American companies and demand they produce the jobs.
Don't you LOVE ILLEGAL take over high paid America jobs and College educated kids working low level jobs like McDonalds, Walmart,etc. They have high school or college degree. LOL.
Gonna LOVE UNIONS ruined US ECONOMY. AMERICA IS BROKE..... ILLEGAL is EVERYWHERE AND SCATTERING. MORE AMERICA JOBS MOVE TO CHINA. hahahahha. funny unions... Kids paid college tuition ten times more than working wages. They get nothing back. But college graduate unemployment.
This assessment is bang on. If you don't have superior skills or education then you are in trouble. There are lots of available jobs in America, you just have to educated & skilled enought to have them. Instead of whining about the government, why don't these people better themselves and go back to school. The trouble is America is getting dumber by the year. !6 percent of American high school students take advanced math – that is terrible. You have a lazy society where people want to do well with as little effort as possible. Then when things don't work out they blame everyone else but themselves and talk to themselves (I mean prey) to make things better. Take the initiave yourself, a better life is a good education away.
I told my mom that I can't get college degree because I could end up COLLEGE GRADUATE UNEMPLOYMENT.
There's less job opening in AMERICA and most of them are low level jobs
GOOGLE are already finished its technology. There's nothing else to do in GOOGLE but draw picture on frontpage; program same internet browser, and use linux os code.
There is no job creation in AMERICA.
Though what you say is true, I wouldn't blame anyone for people forgoing college. The tuition rates are rapidly increasing (3% each year at University of Maryland!), but the potential income for college graduates have not increased. 200k debt can take 15-16 years to pay off. That's if you land a solid job. With our current job market, unless you have very specialized degrees, it's very hard to get a job. Even with engineering degree it can be hard to find a job, if the market is not growing. This problem is everywhere, not just the USA.
You are only partially correct – many colleges, well known ones, are trying to ensure that grads come out debt-free. They've tried to replace Pell grants that were handy in the past and cut with scholarships they've gotten from their wealthy donors. You have to look but it can be done. You just need to make the grades to be desired by one of these institutions
Jeremy, c'mon. This country lost it's manufacturing because companies realized they could pay a foreign worker a 10th of what they pay an American worker, thus increasing the bottom line, which makes the stockholder wealthier, keep in mind 90 percent of the stock in this country is owned by the top 10 percent of the wealthiest people in this country . America was a manufacturing giant in the mid – late 20th century. We were thriving. When we lost our manufacturing it had a huge impact on our country. Look at at the wealth distribution now. The rich are getting richer, the middle class is shrinking and the poor are getting poorer. I'm all for better education, but manufacturing is a huge part of any economy and America has lost it, Mainly due to corporate greed and Bill Clinton' stupid NAFTA.
The increasing gap between the rich and the rest of us that is devastating the middle class of the US. Assuming the US has a fixed amount of money, if the upper 1% keep increasing their wealth, the less the lower 99%will have. The system will implode when the middle class can no longer support the wealthy.
Jeremy you are out of your mind. I am highly educated. I have a trade, an AS degree, a BA degree and speak two languages and I am unemployed thanks to free trade.
Observe countries that are still prosperous that have been around way before America became a country. Maybe we should pattern some of our economy after them. America uses up so much material, we don't need everything packaged and wrapped three times. We don't need three or four times the food we consume. If we cut back on the little things, it will help us in the long run.
I agree, not everyone needs to attend college. If students were able to aim for a career choice they'd like to pursue, then maybe school systems could point them to the studies they need for that profession earlier in life, instead of making them feel required to attend unneccessary classes in college to make something of themselves. Don't get me wrong, education is essential, but the system doesn't work the same for everybody's lifestyle and vocational skills. There are great vocational colleges and training, but that doesn't give you a "masters degree".
Just wish you wouldn't just make up a statement that "If you are an electronics engineer or a computer science engineer, you’re going to have absolutely no trouble getting a job – not just in this country but anywhere in the world".
Nothing could be further from the truth, there are hundreds of thousands of qualified engineers right here in the USA unable to find work in their profession. Check your facts Farid!
I have teenagers and after this last recession, I'm actively trying to dissuade them from attending college or university. I'd rather see them go to a trade school and learn to actually DO something–they'll learn what they need to know to get a good, stable job. They might not make a ton of money (which is what college grads think they're entitled to, after all) but they would make a decent living and probably have some job security. They can work for a few years, and then if they decide they want to go to college, fine. Let's not forget that in this recession, advanced degrees have been a hindrance, not a help. There is simply no point in having one.
College and universities have become nothing more than very expensive 4+ years of on-the-job training that don't teach these kids anything. They still have to be trained when they graduate–they have to be coddled for 3 or 4 years into their careers. The kids do not learn any viable skills and have massive amounts of debt on top of it. It's not a good trade in my opinion. (The exception would be engineering, and even that field was hit hard in this recession.)
We need to get back to our manufacturing roots. Get rid of NAFTA, for starters. Then impose such high tariffs and customs that it simply wouldn't be profitable for companies to leave the US or import cheap goods. A service economy does nothing for us as a country; it puts our people into poverty. Get rid of the H1B's as well, and give American children a chance at a good education instead of foreign students.
Just my two cents.
Maura,
While my kids are still young, my wife discussed this with me and Im not so sure. What you learn in college is key to mature intellectual growth. Not sure whats worse no job or half an intellect. I have time, good luck to your family.
Maura – your point is a good one, but I would urge you not to preclude a college education, just a worthless one. It's all about supply and demand. Often times our universities (and our parents if we're being honest) do a terrible job of making students aware of the market value of their chosen fields. Art, history, communications, psychology...fields such as these are no less worthy in their own right and there is certainly nothing wrong with taking an interest in them. However, universities graduate tens of thousands of students in these areas each year and the simple fact is that they are orders of magnitude less marketable than majors in technical fields like engineering, chemistry, computer science or mathematics – especially at the undergraduate level. When I entered college, I made the hard choice between my great love (music) and my marketable abilities (math and sciences) – I do not regret choosing engineering. Graduating into a horrible job market, I was still able to find employment quickly and am able to enjoy a good quality of life. Though job security is never guaranteed, I have peace of mind knowing that I'll always be able to add value (and earn a good wage) somewhere with my engineering skill set.
This us the umpteeth time that an incorrect social analysis was done in fear of a less that free-for-all capitalist model could not work.
In reality we now know, and most economists have agreed, that the goal is not correct. If the goals is profit thats the goal end of story.
If the goal is a content well taken care of society thats a very different goal.
The goal is for CEOs, and Corps to make as much as they can, regardless.
The way out is to put rules around incorporation and not be afraid. Wheer will these companie incorporate in Europe? Too socialist. In middle east, too much political disruption, in Africa and lose American military support?
Yes for years all we knew was trickle down, now we know more. The goal is wrong.
BTW how the %^%^& did Vikram Pundit get paid so much this year, he destroyed that company and reverse the stock. This is the issue that both dems and repubs support. More for one less for all. We are barely a society, unless of course we go to war.
Easy problem to fix but as long as the Gov is afraid the issue will not be fixed.
There's many variables to the problems today, but the most basic core to our problems is that our social and economic structures are based on 'growth'. We seek higher profits ever year, or expect population growth, etc.
I disagree there is low inflation. Inflation is certainly present in those thing that cannot be mass produced. They will dramatically start rising in areas such as food and clothing too.
We cannot keep going with the notion that there is endless growth. The quality of everything is getting worse and worse.
More spin.
It's really simple.
1. Illegal labor. Flooding the country with illegals alone causes the unemployment problem. If there weren't illegals, there'd be no unemployment. People won't do those jobs? At those wages. But if there's no one to do those jobs at those wages, those wages go UP.
2. The outsourcing scam. Sure it's "Cheaper" to have a barefoot 6 year old girl chained to a post in the floor sew shoes in a ramshackle factory that might collapse/burn any week, and that's "Cheaper" in wages than the well paid American who used to work in a semi-automated shoe factory run lawfully in the USA. Except is is NOT "Cheaper" that's the bold faced LIE they tell you again and again and again to make it the truth. They have additional expenses. Losses by poor quality, piracy, bribes at dozens of levels and the cost of transport alone. It usually costs the same or MORE to make things overseas. So, why do it? They get tax breaks and subsidies, debts in our name to make it cheaper. It ain't "Business" it's FRAUD, perhaps TREASON.
We need to get RID of illegals, then go after outsourcing. The rich elite would bleed like geysers if we did that. Just ignore or take with a grain of salt this media, it's their lie machine.
This article uncovers some of the issues that face the American worker but doesn't honestly address those problems. Help small business? All I see on CNN Webpages is "Tax the Rich" First that's class warfare, second the highest 10% of wage earners pay 60% of taxes, 50% of the lowest wage earners pay none at all. Small business is run by the so called "The Rich". Another thing the artlcle accurately poinits out is the future for good jobs in "Science and Technology" I agree. There's 14 million illegal invaders in this country and growning by the hour. Note to people, these nor their numerous off spring will be involved in "Science and Technology". So go figure.
I think this challenge for people will create innovation in a time of tribulation. Find uses for yourself. I used to do general marketing / data entry for a company but I invested in graphic design / web software ~$2000 on my credit card 3 years ago. I used the internet and trial and error to learn the software, paid $125 for a certification exam which I barely scraped by passing, and now it's what I do full time, as well as on the side. Solid job during recession just got a 20% pay raise as well. I think we need to re-train our brains and realize that technology is going to keep getting better, and we ourselves have to improve with technology to prove our worth. Maybe this is the exception, but true story.
Our knowledge with technology is growing dramatically. Educating ourselves with it is essential, but we should keep in mind to learn the old school hands-on jobs as well. If someday we face a natural or finacial crisis and we can't rely on our computers, we can fall back on old school procedures. This is all common sense, but some people are totally wrapped up in technology, without a plan b.
I am sick of "retraining". I am a part of the forgotten generation that graduated in 1981. At that time, you could not even buy a job under Reagan's' trickle down economics. I have spent half my life "retraining" to try to keep up with where the jobs are. I am just as broke and even in debt. I just want a decent JOB.
Re-training a euphemism for sebnding your job overseas. Hey, once they got to computer science what else is there and how does a fifty year old make this change. A cop out, send worthless, i didnt know, i couldnt help it, CEO jobs overseas. Or better yet computerize them.
The Superintendent in Austin, Texas was hired at a salary topping $250K + a hiring and annual bonus!!!!
and the school will probably cut loose the cafeteria lady who makes 18,550 per year to save money
The youth will get angry, through out all the old (over 50 that helped create the problems) and then maybe America will stand a chance to recover. They just need to organize, and get rid of the old.
Try getting rid of the progressive machine that grew a giant government, filled with unfunded entitlement and fight captialists at every turn.
When you support a large and entitlement driven government whom thinks its is fine to grow government jobs such that now they are more prevalent than manufacturing, suggest that we work at Starbucks or a restuarant or the Entertainment industry (Obama's major supporters), then you are being baby setted with your own tax dollars by bid dady government.
We need less government, less taxation, a directed eye at the corrupt financial industry, and a return to manufacturing. Not cheap plastic stuff, CHina can have tha. But in all things metal and electronic.
oops "throw them out" I ment
armed insurrection for the lulz
Mr. Zakaria should understand that business is about money. If you have to pay more to set up shop here than another country, the jobs will not be generated here. Small business has been mostly shut out of borrowing by this administration, and the constant tax threats, massive regulation costs, massive new health care costs, and other impediments are costing millions of jobs. Big business survives because it generates wealth overseas. Small business has to do it here. Tax and regulation policy makers should focus on this.
Way to tell only half the story. You're basically saying the only way for us to lure businesses is to allow ourselves to knowingly get screwed because at least you get a free dinner out of it. Top-level corporate workers make billions while regular workers get shut out. Income inequality levels increasing to its largest discrepancy since the Depression. Where is the outrage for this? Where is the blame for unregulated business under Bush? This doesn't bother you? Why is it that people always associate corporate regulations with trying to hamper business. Why can it never be called what it actually is, putting protections in place to make sure workers and consumers don't get screwed. The 2000s was as purely unregulated as it gets (save for pre-Industrial Revolution days) and CLEARLY that is not a policy that worked. And raising tax levels to WHAT THEY WERE DURING THE BUSINESS BOOM OF THE 1990'S is not a threat to businesses, small or large. That is a lie told by people who don't want to pay their fair share.
Recall, however, Kevin, that the enabling regulations which led to the default credit swaps, mortgage bundling and other shenanigans, as well as Federal regulations which REQUIRED lenders to reduce their demands for credit-worthiness by borrowers came from the Clinton Administration. Yeah, Bush was asleep at the wheel, as were Chris Dodd and Barney Frank of the legislative committees that oversee banking. There are no good guys, only fools.
I don't plan on working for a corporation ever again. Companies in America are set up like pyramid schemes now – only the people at the top succeed. Now all I do is invest in solid companies because their profits are better than ever. I'm livin' the new American Dream – just sitting back and enjoying fat returns on investments in companies whose profits are great because of the money they save by paying slave labor wages. I didn't make the rules, in fact these new rules led to my job being cut due to "global restructuring". It's a new game and if you want to succeed, you better learn these newly modified rules.
Look people. It is hard enough to compete with labor in nations where people will work for a cup of grain. But our government punishes companies that make money over seas and then bring that money home to America to employ people here. If you bring the money here, you pay 35% corp tax on it. Well guess what, it means that the money stays over seas and employs people there. This idea that corporation have to pay their share in taxes is killing the labor market. Do you want 35% of nothing, and have no jobs, or would you rather have 5% of something and lots of jobs? Man this is frustrating. But as long as people are suckers for the 'blame the corporations' game, politicians will use it and will continue to drive this country into the ditch.
What are talking about? You don't make any sense. The Government didn't force the corporations to outsource. The corporations took it upon themselves to do it. They did it so they could cut labor costs and drive up shareholder wealth. Can you deny this? It has zero to do with taxes and all to do with labor costs.
everybody shut the fuck up we can create more jobs if we stop this bull shit out sourcing company want cheap but we want jobs government step in and make out sourcing illegal that way we get jobs and were not getting in more fucked up debt long live america fuck you china
Really, man, I'm with you on the outsourcing thing, but if you want to bring people around to your way of thinking, consider the way you express yourself.
The problem starts from the top. We have politicians in Washington ON BOTH SIDES that are just flat out uninterested in doing the real things that could get this country back on track, because often times those things clash with the interest groups that are in their pockets, or with their base who just care about themselves or their own limited perspective. Green energy, for example, is a perfect way to not only create jobs, but get us ahead of the curve in this new-age technology. But with oil lobbyists in Washington, this obvious source of job creation is overlooked. Fareed makes a great point about using immigration to our advantage in helping us turn out the best and brightest, but because the Repub base is filled with xenophobes, they are unwilling to budge on this critical issue. Until or unless we have a politician (or a number of them) rise above the fray and do what's best FOR THE NATION, we will continue to struggle. Changing Washington first will then allow us to change the rest of the nation.
Ha! Every waking minute with a sense of urgency I look at what I can do to make MY situation better. I have multiple irons in the fire and I am making it happen. I am creating tangible things and that is creating more ideas... So stop whistling in the wind, pull up your little American sockies and get busy gettin' on the solution train!
Everyone seems to have forgotten what has led us here in the first place–banking deregulation in the 90s. Ever since they killed Glass Steagall the whole economy has gone to hell. It is only a matter of time before the next financial crisis hits again. Our economy is bulit upon smoke and mirrors and nothing but a casino on wall street. Much of America's debt from credit cards to student loans is securitized into financial derivatives which can be bet on by investors. Now that investment banks are allowed to merge with commercial lending banks, we've created asystem geared towards debt and making more money off of people acquiring more debt. Look at what has happened since they killed Glass Steagall–a .com bubble, a housing crisis, ourageously artificialy inflated oil prices, and soon a student loan crisis. NOTHING will improve unil we reform Wall Street, break up these banks, and reinstate a modern version of Glass Steagall. It will be a never ending wave after wave of bubbles until Wall Street's greed is put in check.
Too many things wrong with this – I'll just focus one absurd upside mentioned – cheaper goods do not help the very poor when they still don't have a job or pot to piss in. The only people that win in a global economy are corporations they can hold hostage any country by promising jobs if they get enormous tax breaks...etc.
What good are cheaper goods when you can't afford basic necessaties?
The next big economic bubble to burst will be the "Education Bubble" – and when that thing pops all hell will break lose. People selling their future off to get a college education only to find no decent jobs. The cost vs. ROI is totally out of whack with reality.
There does need to be promotion of other options – vocational schools etc. so we can maintain a strong in-house manufacturering base for our own goods. A country that can't build or manufacturer is a weak country. If companies want to build factories elsewhere – creating jobs elsewhere only to come back and try to sell their wares in America – they should be turned away or made to create jobs here as well – how do you think China has been doing it? They force any foreign companies to partner with homegrown companies.
"The single biggest thing the U.S. government could do to help small businesses is allow more skilled immigrants into the country."
This is a trash statement suggesting that Americans are less able to start small businesses themselves. I started my own business 8 years ago and many of you Americans have to and/or will soon. High unemployment and American ingenuity has fueled much. We do not need to subsidize more foriegners. The government needs to get their inefficient greedy hands out of our pockets: Fed income, self-employment, etc, etc. tax; State franchise and property taxes, etc. etc. The American small businessman (from the middle class) will always succeed if we are not having to prop up our government so they can important more immigrants and then use our tax dollars to pay for their services or to give countries like Egypt billions!
The real economic problem in America is the greed and neediness of it's individuals. Learn to live within your means. If you were barely making it BEFORE you lost your 100k a year job, it's time to reevaluate what you're buying, what services you use and where you decide to live. Stop using credit and start saving. Shop as second hand stores. Chekc craigslist. Join a CSA. By reusable items instead of throwaways. Use cloth diapers and make your own baby food.
It's not hard, we're just spoiled rotten and we refuse to not be treated like princes and princesses.
I agree. Living in America is a blessing, but we're so spoiled. Many of my friends buy expensive clothing, junk food and unneccessary things, then complain about being broke. It's nice they treat themselves, they deserve it for working hard, but cutting back would help them out in the long run.
The modern world tells us we need to buy name brand foods, clothes and everything to be something. We need to have a doctors degree and a big home that uses up energy.
Life is simple, work hard, love much and enjoy the little things in life.
Another problem is everything is so expensive, even buying a small home and owning one or two cars. We work hard and save our dimes, nickels and pennies to pay for bills, even after stretching our dollars by shopping at thrift stores, making our own clothes, living a simpler less expensive life.
I guess the key to any situation is to be thankful and content with what we have already, but to keep our sleeves rolled up for hard work and our minds open as our world changes around us vocationally and educationally.
What am I leaving out????
Well Fareed your statement about electrical engineers and computer science engineers is absolutely wrong unless you are under 40 years old and maybe even now down to 35 and willing to work a 60 hour week for a 40 hour paycheck as most engineers are salaried employees. I’m in my 50s working in the defense industry and I’ve worked in the medical and telecom industries as well and most of these engineering jobs are going to China and India just like everything else. Only defense is left for US engineers and I have a masters in both electrical and computer engineering with many awards over my career. However, if I would need to find a new job I will need to take a massive pay cut to compete with much younger works and foreign labor if I can even find a job. So I both laugh and cry when I hear that the US needs more engineers as I know this means more low cost engineers for big companies. Cheap well educated labor is everywhere and when you have a 7 to 1 currency advantage as China does it is hard to compete. Every time I’m told look at what American engineers are doing with Apple’s Iphone and Ipods I have to laugh as this was all designed and build in China. Our political elites have no idea what is really going on and we are going to pay for it big time soon enough.
I'm an engineer in the defense industry. My company is laying people off, so send no resumes. The Obama administration has slowed or stopped much of our work. The healthy backlog and bright future we had 2 years ago is gone, and our once full building now has a third of its offices empty.
Not that I'm a fan of Dick Cheney but he had a point when he was Secretary of Defense years ago and he said ' the purpose of the Department of Defense is not to be a jobs program, it is to defend the country.'
And I have a question – why do we still call it the Defense Department? The way I see it, we haven't really defended our country since 1945. Every skirmish since then, as Eisenhower warned us, was to keep the military-industrial complex humming and to transfer taxpayer wealth to corporate moguls. I propose that the Defense Department be renamed the Department Of The Military.
Mr. Zakaria's comments on small business contradict his main thesis – that we have structural unemployment because productivity allows us to do more with fewer workers. Why, then, do we need to import immigrant workers? Wouldn't we do better to re-train the workers we already have?
Immigrants, as we have seen, come here for opportunity but often leave family behind, and send them money. This is money that leaves the country, and can no longer contribute to our economy. When an American worker gets his paycheck, part of it is spent locally and goes to support other workers. The rest can be saved or invested, and that money is used by banks or corporations to support further economic growth. By filling American jobs with immigrants, we both take jobs away from our own citizens and take money out of our economy when we need to spend it here.
Bush thinks bringing in guest workers is great! He encouraged it because it cuts costs and companies can do more which means more jobs!! Just ask him!!! I work in IT and can only pronounce 1/3 of the names of people I work with. Half of them aren't even in this country and the rest are guest workers.
Don't forget the illegals sending money out of country as well. How about building a wall as part of the job creation program and banning immigration into the US if the unemployment rate reaches a certain threshold? Take the money the illegals are costing us to fund training programs. Institute strict drug testing and require independent evaluation before welfare benefits are paid out. Create food pantries where those on welfare use a photo ID to pick up food and basic needs versus vouchers that can be sold for pennies on the dollar to buy smokes, alcohol, and gamble.
Fareed, good topic, but some of your numbers are off. These words by you:
"Then on top of technological change, you have globalization. There are ready pools of skilled labor around the world that are willing to do some of the jobs that used to be done by Americans for a tenth of the price. American labor can't compete."
You should do your homework. A tenth of the price is incorrect. I've been in technology globalization for a decade involving India, Eastern Europe and China. Technology worker compensation in India and China, the two countries you use, compared to similar U.S. job compensation rates is more in the 20% – 50% less range.
"The single biggest thing the U.S. government could do to help small businesses is allow more skilled immigrants into the country."
Excuse me? Skilled or unskilled, you're saying with the huge number of un- and under-employed people in the US, it makes sense to allow MORE immigrants in, to take jobs many of us Americans are practically begging for??
I have degrees in two different disciplines but would be willing to dig fenceposts right now. But go ahead and let immigrants have both our skilled and unskilled jobs, that make much more sense...
CNN liberal commentators such as Zakaria believe they have it all figured out. How to transform the uneducated fat stupid American middleclass by putting them into service industries like entertainment and travel. The middle and upper-middle class American men and women business owners I know are very capable. Do not believe that since most convenience stores are manned by foreigners that they are America's hope. And foriegners brought over to wotk in computer science are no better trained than Americans its just that they will accept lower wages, longer hours and who would not to escape places like Pak and India. We have more than enough American's with qualifications but Big Business is cutting their bottom line anyway they like. THey would cut their mother's throat for a profit. I trade with small businesses as much as possible and try to stay away from WalMart and similar locusts that come into communities to steal, kill, and destroy. I do not need their cheap plastic crap.
Global Capitalism is killing us! The system has changed, and it now greatly favors seeking out cheap labor anywhere. Much of our wealth has been exported to other countries.
Zakaria don't forget you're an immigrant. You're not an American.
Unemployment consists of people who are ABLE and WILLING to work that cannot find a job. The 24 million Fareed comes up with is a very skewed way of looking of unemp a large group of those people do not meet the definition of unemp. People that have stopped looking for job are not willing to work. People that have jobs even at lower pay are not unemployed either. Paint a grim picture and create a story where there isn't one? Journalism de jour!
I stopped at technology. As an IT person, I can tell you that my job at another company was outsourced to India. And the corp I worked for outsourced manufacturing to Mexico, Hungary, China and India to name a few. Technology did not put those folks out of work (including me eventually). It was the greedy corp that goes unwatched and unpunished for what they are doing to the economy overall. Free Market economy is fine as long as everyone in that economy can manage to exist at a min level. But that's not so. And having the likes of Jeff Immelt (Yes I was outsourced from GE!) in bed with the white house will never help things. This article was superficial and the issue is very complex. I don't have the answer but I can first hand tell you some issues.
It's obvious that large-scale immigration of unskilled workers has destroyed our middle class. I see it everyday because I'm remodeling a house. The Mexicans will undercut the Americans in price everytime. There are 13 million illegal immigrants in the US right now who are taking jobs that would have gone to Americans. If you include the children of those illegal immigrants, the numbers are staggering. Our middle class has been kicked in the teeth by the federal government's failure to secure our southern border.
Steve, seriously?
The illegal immigrants had nothing to do with the millions of jobs that were outsourced while our government were paid to turn their backs. It's all about big profits and the bottom line. Did you know that the Bush admin were giving Tax incentives to companies that outsourced our jobs? We could get
Exactly, I've had work (remodeling, etc.) perfomed over the past few years and noticed that the workers do not speak English anymore, have a dubious skill level, and the total cost of the project is not different than previous years. The persons employing them are no doubt making more money, but I do not believe consumer prices in this area have changed. The misconception is that all illegals are agricultural workers. That's funny, they are highway construction men, heavy equipment operators, carpenters, masons, plumbers, etc.. Their numbers and willingness to accept more cash has caused skilled trades and labor to shift toward lower quality and slightly lower cost. At the same time our taxes went up to pay for providing them social services and paying for the unemployment of the Americans displaced. SO we redistributed the income to the rich businessman and to the illegal immigrant. Do we really have a net positive? I don't think so.
The only jobs left in America is mostly service related. In fact, in the next 10 years, the majority of jobs will be ONLY service related part-time jobs. The American dream is dead.
We can vote for politicians but have no control over what they do or how they spend our money. we should have a system where we can allocate our tax dollars the way we want. There should be 2 pools of our tax dollars – one for things like medical & education, and one where we have the say in how the money is used. That way, if we don't want our money to go to wars, we can put it to use to develop green technologies instead.
Why do we need the politicans to spend our money without any consequences, when all they care about is how to enrich themselves and their political contributors?
Great idea!!
We could "check" the areas we want our tax dollars to cover when doing our paperwork once hired for a job, such as education, certain medical areas (personally, if America wants to legalize abortion[which I'm against, but I'll keep this directed towards taxes], the people wanting an abortion should use their own money from their pocket instead of my tax dollars), and so on.
If America is weak in an area, it would be because of the American peoples' choice and not the greedy top dogs. At least we'd know where our money is going and have a say in it, and at least we'd be able to fix our finacial if need be. If any other problems came up, there would be solutions, but the greedy peramid of a system that we live in wouldn't want the average American people to have that much control over money.
What else is there to add??
If this was an option, maybe things would change for our economy.
Maybe it's not a good idea, maybe it is.
If the peons of the country do not have jobs to buy what corporate America is making, they lose also.
If the U.S. continues in this track, it is just a matter of time before it will be engulfed by all the problems of other countries like Mexico, Guatemala, etc. The inequalities in wealth are the main cause of violence, crime, drug trafficking, kidnapping, etc. If we don't do nothing this will be our faith.
Our healthcare system is bankrupting many American families. Healthcare is unaffordable anymore. Even if you are lucky to have healthcare insurance, these health insurance crooks keep raising yearly premium rates by double digits, which force many families to 'fall through the cracks', and drop their rapaciously expensive health insurance and become uncovered. The 'death panels' here in 'Scamerica' are the health insurance companies, providers, and doctors/hospitals, who charge insane prices!
Wow. This article is very simplistic, and neglects to realize that the United States is the greatest industrial power in the world. Germany has managed to maintain "high-end" manufacturing in their country? That's what WE do. High end. We do highly-productive, high-margin manufacturing. The private sector doesn't fund public projects? WHAT THE &$^%#@% are federal, state, and municipal BONDS??!!?!? Really, technology is making people more productive and fewer people are needed? Really? Like travel agents, Realtors, financial advisors et al didn't see THAT coming for 15 years? And the rest of this stuff one could recommend after taking a high school business class. Really? Science and technology degrees? Engineering? Healthcare? Robotics? Quick, someone pull up some advice from 1990. It hasn't changed. Comedians have been joking about art-history majors forever. How many decades has a college education been a requisite for a good job? From how far away did union jobs see globalization coming? Since the 60's? If you want to give some advice to young folks about about financially planning for a re-education sabbatical at least once in your life, in ADDITION to retirement. And, how about, you have to work harder in school no matter how little it seems to be important when you are there. Globalization means competition. And corporate America has the government in it's pocket. They're not just shipping jobs oversees, they're shipping talent over. It's why S&T may get you job security, but it doesn't mean you're not going to get stuck in a dead-end post doc position just because you were rubber-stamping your education rather than challenging yourself. I mean seriously. Is CNN's target audience sixth graders now? This is a totally rudimentary article with almost no meat in it.
It is simple... 40 years ago it only took 1 person to pay a car payment, mortgage, etc. The middle class is turning into a poor class. Companies need to let their billions of dollars of profits trickle down (Capitalism ONLY works if this happens) to the middle class (not the top 3%) so that we can spend again. If the bread winner made enough to support their family then the mother, child, who also have to work to pay the bills could be without jobs, thus freeing jobs up for others. it is funny how no one on the right or left really want to address the significant wage decrease for the middle class. The right says it is the Rich's "Right" to keep all of the money and steal from the middle class (redistribution) and the left says the Middle Class should be taxed to death to pay for the poor. We need a Government that represent the Middle Class and NOT representing an idea that conveiniently lines their pockets. Not sure WHY Americans do not oppose this and continue to allow the GOP and the DEMS to manipulate them with a bunch of BS just to keep them in check.
Our healthcare system is bankrupting many American families. Healthcare is unaffordable anymore. Even if you are lucky to have healthcare insurance, these health insurance crooks keep raising yearly premium rates by double digits, which force many families to 'fall through the cracks', and drop their rapaciously expensive health insurance and become uncovered. The 'death panels' here in 'Scamerica' are the health insurance companies, providers, and doctors/hospitals, who charge insane prices!
I heard this clueless,idiot Zakaria freak talking about economic issues on disgrace Eliot spritzer show ...
This is exactly what was being said in the newly realized document from the corrupt Federal Reserve through a court order seek by Bloomberg,in which the Fed governors stating clearly that American citizens are too stupid to understand their financial system...And Zakaria is one those who have no clue of the reality and how the American financial works and is set up....
The fact that green span in his interviews repeatedly stated ,that this Jobs situation and economy is going no where in the near term,and I believe that is to be correct,as long as the united states is in Afghanistan and Iraq with debt of 14 to 15 trillion dollars Americas declined is inevitable....
This 2008 financial crisis was orchestrated by the corrupt Federal Reserve with the blessing of the corrupt congress,senate and their proxy of the evil extensions of the Goldman Sachs,J.P Morgan,and Morgan Stanley...
Since the bankers excessive greedy in this financial crisis has done irreparable damage to American financial system,at the expense of people who have lost their Jobs,homes and retirement savings plans....
I totally agree with Fareed.Fareed articke is an excellent aobservation and resommendations.
We need to create jobs whatever may be and it would be nice jobs that lead to reduce air pollution and eco friendly, such as Solar, Wind , Water, Hydrogene energy systems.
I agree with the article, and its something I have been telling people for a while now. I work in IT, and the entire team is just 6 people. We support the Network, the Datacenter, phones, various applications, system support and more. Some days it seems like we could use another guy to help out, but for the most part 6 works well. The point being is that just a few years ago we had and needed about 14 people, and go back 15 years and it took 30+ people to do the support.
Look for more loses with the emergance of "the cloud." Coming. Not too far off the only it guy in house needed is going to be the network guy who makes sure people can get ot the could. PCs are going to be swappable with no set needed. As all the info and apps will exist on the cloud.
I say penalize these "U.S." companies exploiting foreign labor markets for the sake of the almighty bottom line. As in penalize, I mean a tariff on the goods. Bring these jobs back to America.
Why doesn't the the US Govt. get back to subsidizing companies that do in-house training of new hires. Anymore, businesses want new staff that ALREADY has experience. How are new college or High School grads to get that experience other than OJT. Maybe a tax rebate to businesses, AFTER new hires on the job 2 yrs or more.
What we need is a fair tax system. Go to a flat tax. 10%for personal income and 5% corporate tax. With no loopholes.
What need to do is have protest rallys at every city hall in America on the fourth of July. And start a drive to make a third party, the AMERICAN party. Dems and Repubs don't work for you anymore. But who do you vote for? We need a third party. One for the people. A party of the people, for the people, by the people. Sound familiar?
Fareed, as always. A fantastic Article
http://socialmoderatefiscalconservative.blogspot.com/
I'm a fan of Mr. Zakaria, but this statement of his is just ridiculous, "If you are an electronics engineer or a computer science engineer, you’re going to have absolutely no trouble getting a job – not just in this country but anywhere in the world." There are lots of computer science engineers in Austin that have been laid off and have not been able to get an equivalent job. I hate to say it, but now I'm wondering if Mr. Zakaria is too detached from the real world to make any predictions. I rely on him for opinion on the Middle East, but now I have to call this reliance into question. I hope Mr. Zakaria shows a bit more ground level exposure to the world in his future prognostications. I will continue to read you column, though, especially for Middle East commentary. I wish I just didn't have this question in the back of my mind now.
US Govt took tax payers money to bail out Wall Street, and left average worker out to dry.
What else is new?
I dont get it...can we look subjectivly once???
we hear alot of nations having economical issues but hardly hear anything about socialist countries I mean socialist not dictatorships:
have any of you heard people from Sweden Norway or Germany complain about the downturn?
Guess what people they are socialist politics, pay alot of taxes but do not have to worry about medical, schools, or even housing heck some of these nations get internet from their government.
we pay a lot in taxes even fiddling with the idea of a mileage tax because "cars are more fuel efficient"
really now>?
Sweden and Norway, for now, have small, well-educated, homogeneous populations. They have low birthrates, and aren't spending large amounts on military systems, thanks to the "American Umbrella" of protection. Germany, however, is already feeling the pinch of immigration from Islamic countries, along with the bad population-growth demographics. France will be majority non-French by 2050 if current trends continue. When you can balance the demand for social services with a motivated and productive society, it can work. But, when the majority of workers pay no taxes, as we have reached in the US, then something is wrong and we can't expect the rest of us to carry them all on our backs.
Sweden and Norway(Holland,Belgium ,Austria) most of these are neutral countries (lets stop patting ourselves on the back) also you know what they have? OIL.
Shell pays 80% back when they drill on their shores and SHELL is north euorpean (anglo-norweigien?)
and Germany has always had the migration they have a lot of Africans and arabs since the 80's
Those great careers in the health care industry are about to come crashing down, too, as Obamacare and Pelosicare put the squeeze on health care providers while continuing to reward insurance companies and malpractice lawyers. The "individual mandate" to buy into the system, by the way, makes it even harder to climb into the middle class, while making dependence on government handouts even more attractive.
Fareed Zakaria has a history of false prophecy, first in his blind support of Bush's invasion of Iraq, something he defended for years as a TV pundit and "expert." Now Mr. Zakaria turns his inconsistent diligence on the US economy, citing a phenomenon in my profession as the apparent new normal. Technology is a constant and certainly not this "good thing bad thing" nebulous and uncontrollable phenomenon Zakaria creates almost as a free pass for a failed President.
Barack Obama was portrayed on the front page of TIME magazine as the next FDR, yet this President faced with a bigger jobs and economic crisis than FDR had in the 1930's chose to save his own political skin and do nothing to address what has been a jobs crisis of epic proportion from day one. As expected with any danger, when nothing is done it gets worse. Where was the bold, innovative thinking of the political messiah? Where was the dramatic New Deal legislation and executive orders that could have kept tens of millions of ordinary Americans afloat? Obama failed to produce it because he has no clue or inclination to do what he was elected to do...help people in need. That is the real story and the real tragedy. Zakaria misses this badly.
The reason why the American worker is at a severe disadvantage with no end in sight is (drumroll please):
1. American consumers continue to support the practice of buying imported goods. Simple. If Americans HAD kept some interest into our country's future and buying OTHER PEOPLES S***, we would not be facing the problem we do today.
2. A US government which does very little to penalize imported goods through taxes, tariffs, and nothing to penalize corporations that conduct 'one-way' business with other markets.
3. US corporations whose CEO's, directors, and stockholders will stoop to any level to basically sell-out our own country and prop up someone else's.
While I am no fan of the government, the thing that always boggles my mind is those who are unemployed blaming the big bad Corporations. Question for you: You want a job. Jobs are created businesses. Businesses are started by people with ideas and guts. You want a job, but you criticize those who actually create the jobs or product. If you don't like those who are giving out jobs, why not start your own business, and compete against them if you are so smart?
I'm also no fan of Republicans, but to the Democrats, I pose this question: You get upset that American Corporations send labor outside the US and some of them leave the US. Most of the reason, as CEO's have stated, is the tax rate. The tax rate, mind you, that was rallied for by Democrats. So essentially, you sealed your own fate. Think about it from a business owners point of view. Let's say I start a business, and I make a few million. Because I make over 250k, most of the population hates me out of the gate. Secondly, most of the population wants me to pay more taxes for services I don't receive. Third, you demand jobs from me, but crap on me at the same time. What do I do? If I'm a tech savvy person in this mobile economy, I just leave. Now, you can find somebody else to give you a job, pay astronomical tax rates, and clean up the mess.
Here's the problem.
I can't get a loan to start a business because I was laid off, lost my moderate house, lost my moderate car and can't pay my health insurance bills.
I can't compete, because the big corporations are paying off our government in order to protect their monopolies and big profits.
I can't sustain because the big corporations have the power to undercut my small business ten fold.
I can't afford to hire anyone full-time because I can't afford to pay Health insurance.
I could go on, and on.
Soon, Americans will be moving to other countries and working illegally in order to make ends meet.
CEO's are not job creaters they are lets cut and make a profit.
second thats how taxes work we all have to pay so teh couintry can survive.
if the rich would pay a little more the end scope would be the governmnet have more money. with that should be able to give out more small business loans that would create more jobs hopefully be succesfull and opay teh loan and taxes which those taxes would help seniors to live a decent health life and our kids to go to college without worrying how to pay. its a circle
They say it isn't fair for rich people to have more taxes, but the majority of rich people are using lower class people to stay rich, is that fair, as well???
I know it's one thing to use your brains and prosper, but to do it corruptly is another. Sadly, the majority of the time, u have to walk on people to prosper in America now. Hard working, high ly educated people are still stuck in middle class because they don't want to use people for their profit.
Why is everything so expensive?? Because eveything is a peramid, the chain of people want their share of your money, all the way up to the top. It can be medical or whatever, there is someone getting a piece of your money.
Who cares about a job the world will end Saturday anyway
morning or evening? need to know if I should cut my lawn on friday
My advice to kids is. Drop out of school and get a service related job right now. Find a few room-mates and live as cheaply as possible. Save money, in case you need to go to the doctor (because you're never going to have health insurance), buy a cheap old car or ride a bike Because this is what the rest of your life is going to be. This is what the future is for America.
Simply stated, I need a job. I have skills, experience, education and desire to work. I'll take anything.
All this pontificating, theorizing and political posing is entertaining, but not very helpful.
How about some concrete advice and help. At the end of the day, that's all I need-a little help.
No Bill. In my opinion, if getting a "job" is in the least bit annoying, all options should be on the table. Your right to a family is being compromised by what politicians call an "economy" but is in reality a human rights violation. Appeasement is the wrong response.
The ongoing batle between corporate greed and the people with government sometimes in our corner, at other times in the corporate pocket..... like now.
Read a little about the election of 1912 and you will be astounded by how 100 years has made litle difference, except today, we have no leaders in our corner.
Good for Corp America, bad for workers. That's called Capitalism. It's a CANCER in this country, and it needs to be wiped out. Peacefully would be nice, but if not, the other choice will do.
100% agree.
Did you think the New World Order was going to benefit you? Keep on re-electing them!
Keep electing republicans and this will just keep getting worse. With republicans it's"Government of the corporation by the corporation for the corporation", and as far as they are concerned the American worker be damned.
Who told you discovery can be completed by a computer? Have you ever spoken to a lawyer? Isn't your expertise on the Middle East or immigrants? As a lawyer I can assure you that discovery cannot be done by a computer and never will be. A few aspects have been brought up to speed with technology, such as the electronic filing of documents, but that is a minute part of an attorney's job. Research leads to more accurate articles.
Totally agree with Paul, and find myself astonished at how little Mr. Zakaria puts into writing articles. Paul and I see no future where our job will be done by robots. This is a people-driven profession and always will be. I've had judges who insist on paper documents despite technology capable of authentication.
It's all about stock price. Senior Management is compensated based on stock price, and Wall Street raises the value of the stock when they lay people off....making them more efficient. Pretty soon their efficiency will ruin this country.
Why do the fortune 500 have 2 trillion in profit reserves and aren't hiring. We'll if they have record profits with the workers they already have why would they possibly add more workers. Corporations don't exist to create jobs they exist to make profits. They have a fiduciary obligation to their stock holders to maximize profits. They have no fiduciary obligation to maximize hiring. On the contrary, payroll are corporations' biggest expense they want to trim hires to the bare bone where feasible..
I have yet to read anything about the disconnect that exists between our elected officials and the public. A large part of the problem is that those in congress have passed laws that benifit only them and exempt themselves from those laws that are inconvient. We need a tidal wave of rage from the public to force the "gentlemen" to experience the same exposure to the rules the rest of us have to live by. A full retirement salary after one term in office, GIVE ME A BREAK!!
Welcome to the Feudal Corporate State.. you all are disposable serfs that are jettisoned at will.. Germany doesn't have this problem, because corporate capitalism was not allowed to export all the manufacturing. The only thing the government can do is to legislate laws and tax breaks that get american's employed again.. and a massive re-education bill. That won't happen as long as we let corporations and their republican stooges run the country for their benefit.. The only shadow puppet show to distract the american people allowed to be debated are social issues.. Real financial and economic reform are not on the table.. We have the best government corporations can buy!
P.S. to anyone says the government needs to focus on Jobs at home.
1ST. THE GOVERNMENT CAN NOT FORCE PRIVATE INDUSTRY TO HIRE. THIS IS CAPITALISM. THEIR MONEY OR YOUR JOB THATS WHAT CAPITALISM IS. ITS NOT PATRIOTIC, ITS NOT EMOTIONAL, IT HAS NO HEART, ITS A DOLLAR BILL TIMES AS MANY AS YOU CAN GET REGARDLESS OF WHO YOU STEP ON OR HURT. THATS CAPITALISM.
1.) YOU WANT SMALLER GOVERNMENT THAT MEANS THE GOVERNMENT LAYS OFF. NO JOBS THERE.
2.) YOU WANT LESS TAXES THAT MEANS THE GOVERNMENT CANT HIRE.
3.) THE GOVERNMENT GAVE THE WEALTHY THEIR TAX BREAKS. THEY DID NOT HIRE.
4.) A MACHINE WILL ALWAYS WIN BECAUSE ITS FASTER AND HAS NO EMOTIONS
5.) A MACHINE JUST FOLLOWS COMMANDS SO ITS EASIER TO WORK WITH
6.) WE THE PEOPLE ARE THE ONLY THING STANDING IN OUR WAY OF GROWTH
7.) OUR WANTS SUPERCEDED THAT IN WHICH IS INTELLEGENT.
8.) REGARDLESS OF WHAT YOU DO, WEALTH WILL RUN THIS COUNTRY AS LONG AS BROKE PEOPLE CONTINUE TO THINK DEBT IS WEALTH
9.) THE GOVERNMENTS DEBTS ARE OUR OWN, THEY SAVED OUR DEBT DRIVEN LIFESTYLES.
Again I could go on and on. But I have work to do.
P.S. Our debt driven lifestyles are as such because the low wages the wealthy pays keeps you and me borrowing from other wealthy people in turn providing them not only with the money they paid you but with interest until the day you can turn debt into wealth of which in an ever changing environment of new wants is almost impossible. Especially in a society that in all reality is way Socialistic. Our way of dressing, based on whats cool, (Social), our marriages, based on whats impressive (Social), or education choices, (Social) our very lifestyles revolve around what. Social Media. Regardless of what anyone thinks we are already a socialist society. Duh, What the heck do you think the terms Democrat and Republican are for, social exceptance in a particular group. Look at them all, they all represent something different. Something thats fit for thier social area.
One thing sorely lacking in this story is the fact that there are more people in the world and the number is only growing. What we need is some population control otherwise not only will the jobs situation worsen, but so will many other problems.
The issue is that we as a nation are numb, dead to the obvious fact that we gradually selling off or trasfering our nations wealth to other countries, then acting as if it was stolen. I am tired of hearing people talk about job growth in medicine and technology because there is a high demand, simply because few people have the abilities and intellgence to be successful in these fields. Its not like you or me can easily just go back to school and become the next bill gates.The fact is, there are too many people and too few jobs. You can't triple the population, divert all industrial jobs overseas, Walmartize every store, and then expect everyone to maintain a high standard of living. Stop acting like sheep and simply follow the money, the bulk of our nations wealth is going overseas vs. being produced and used in the US. We are a Walmart generation, happy to spend and send money out of our community to save a buck, now we can't figure out where all the small businesses have gone and why new ones are'nt starting up! Its ok that 24 million are out of work, because its not me or my kids.
Although I agree with the ideas in the paper, I must disagree that our government should be the actor spending billions and billions of dollars. The real problem is government inefficiency, waste, and continuos overpaying for goods and/or resources in the military sector, the public entitlement system, and countless others. I suggest that our government starts to do a better job of leveraging their purchasing power as a private business entity would do. For instance, if the government were to negotiate an exclusivity agreement for up to 80% of food card recipients at the top ten largest retailers in the industry, they would be in a position to receive a discount under the theory of leverage of purchasing power. We pay retail every day for 44 million peoples food, and this is just the beginning.
The real reason jobs are disappearing it not technology but free trade laws. This was sold to the US as the best way to save money on imported goods, but the real result is simple: jobs are created outside of the US. Period.
Since the day free trade was signed, job creation declined and the balance of import/export which was in favor of the US and made the country rich is now in the negative. Only the corporations benefit, which is demontrated in this article.
The US is just a play ground for corporations. Once the country is ruinned, they will go play elsewhere.
Note that this is not a republican or democrat thing. Just big money. The US will never resolve this and will go down, because the solution to this involves things that they will never do, like: protect the people and not the rich, create social laws that protect the consumer, and so on.
Who owns this country?
The corporations? The wealthy?
No. But they live like kings while you poor slobs struggle from check-to-check.
Do you want your country back?
Then VOTE THE POLITICIAN OUT OF OFFICE.
Then legislate TERM LIMITS and never allow career politicians to be bribed by the corporations and the wealthy.
Then get the LOBBYIST OUT OF WASHINGTON so they cannot influence the legislation that should benefit US and not THEM.
Or...continue to live like slaves. And if you listen closely...you will hear the rich laughing at you.
Rich people own all of the politicians.
Money talks, bs walks.
Why so many people are confused about charity and business? Charity is for helping people, business is for making profits. The vast majority of jobs are associated with businesses. Giving somebody a job is to fulfill a need to make profit. Giving somebody a job is not for the purpose of helping somebody. If you destroy all the businesses, you will have no job. If you want to create jobs, you have to create and support businesses. Please don't blame corporations for lack of jobs. They don't exist for the purpose of creating jobs. They are for profit. They are not charity.
while it is true what you state, it is also unlawful/inhumane to make money on other peoples dispair. offering lower wages and half a$$ benefits while the guys on top make tons of money is not right. and to take a government bailout and then take a bonus for job well done (our tax dollars)
when i think of these it makes me sick to my stomach
Corporations would be even doing better if they employed slaves. Why pay workers at all? if we just got rid of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution states could create slave classes again. And since big business is a benevolent force for good we have nothing to worry about. Double Plus Good!
Scott,
There are plenty of laws to protect workers today. We are not talking about worker's rights. We are talking about economics. You cannot demand corporations to give people jobs at a loss. When you get rid of the businesses, there will be no jobs. Those who still have jobs will lose their jobs.
I agree with some of what he states.. WE (the people) do need to bring manufacturing back here. We do need to support small businesses that do build and remain on US soil. Some of this IS the governments fault, as the opened the doors wider for off-shoring. You look at other countries, such as Italy, Germany.. etc. they have much stronger pride in what they do. Yet here, we let others lead us, vs leading ourselves. Sure, the price of some things have gone down. People can go out and buy a home computer which is pretty 'standard' today. Yet other prices haven't.. You have companies manufacturing in China and such and those prices AREN'T always passed to the consumer. The 'middle-class' is vanishing.. You are going to have those with.. and those without.. 30 years ago.. you could have a single income for a family.. a car.. pay your bills.. go on vacations. etc. Today that isn't possible.. According to the IRS.. The average income in 2008 was $33,000. The average income for 1988 was $33,400. We have actually gone DOWN.. yet look at the prices of things we need in every day life. From food.. to utilities.. to vehicles.. etc. all these have gone UP. The middle-class will be squeezed out. Yet we allow corporations, backed by the government officials, to continue this decline. In other countries, they would protest.. they would strike.. Here. here. we are sheep.. This isn't a conservative or liberal point of view.. just look around at what is happening.. Look at the real numbers and real lives.. People on both sides need to stop putting spin on everything to fit their agenda, and need to actually start looking at how to fix the problem. They talk about tax cuts.. they talk about tax hikes.. yet... no one talks about incentives or such to have businesses here in the states. Here in MA, the Governor, gave a company millions to setup shop provide jobs.. What happened? Sure.. they setup shop.. then they closed shop.. because it was cheaper to manufacture in China.. Now the state wants to reclaim the money.. Good luck.. Once again the tax payers get the shaft....
About 20 years ago I was looking to buy my first pick-up truck. I looked at all three brands. The Dodge Ram was made entirely in Mexico. The Chevy was built mostly in the USA. The price of both truck was about the same. Now what does this tell you? Where was the money that was saved going? Was the Dodge cheaper? No – so the consumer didn't get the money. Was the Dodge better quality? I know, that was a stupid question. Then NAFTA allowed the truck to come over the border without tariffs so even more money was disappearing somewhere. But of course, it never went to the American worker or the American consumer (actually they're the same), But what did change during that 20 years is that more of the nation's wealth is in the hands of a smaller portion of the American population than at any time in the country's history. I think I get it now. I think I know where all that money is going. And by the way, where do you think that Chevy truck is being made today? And who's money was used to bail out General Motors? And who's money is being used to pay the pensions GM promised and walked away from and transferred to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation? Yeah, I think I get it now – and I don't like it.
Oh, what did you say? You asked about the banks? You wonder how they charge you 20%+ on your credit card but then pay you 0.01% interest on your savings account. And you wonder who's money was used to bail them out? And weren't they supposed to use that bailout money to make loans to get the economy moving again? Well there were no loans and the banks have made record profits and now they are even 'too bigger to fail'. What's going on here?
Minimum wage in 1968 – the year of my first job – $1.70 an hour. Minimum wage today if adjusted for inflation – nearly $12 an hour.
SWin, you hit it on the nose...
THE AMERICAN WORKER AND THE AMERICAM CONSUMER ARE THE SAME!!!
if we don't make the money we can't spend it if we can't spend it corporations are still going to make their share by cutting workforce and benifits and wages for those that remain.
Guys remember when the airlines made a profit by cutting pilots wages..but yet teh CEO's got their bonuses?
lets all strike..imagine if all of us didn't go to work didn't pay tolls or buy gas and food for just one day?
no trucks delivering, no trash collectors
just picture this (even you right wingers)
Swin, you are right on the money. Preach on. The question now becomes: what do we do about it? Time to take it to the streets, Cairo style, or Madison style, and let them roll out the National Guard and let's find out who's really American.
This is a liberal diatribe by Zakaria. Telling the fat middle-calls American to look to the entertainment or tourism industry for work and leave the high tech jobs to specially imported immigrants. Whenever government grows it is growing for one or more of these reasons: because it is paying entitlements, inefficient with the tax dollars it has, and it has failed to support the creation of manufacturing jobs. In the latter, it has cow toed to China on its currency, allowed the financial industry to rape the middle-class, and has become Big Daddy to the illegal immigrant and the able-bodied poor. 80+ % of you are middle-class that is reading this and probably 75% will vote the Big Daddy spender back into office for 4 more. So believe the big fat old lazy middle-class American lie. These same big fat middle-class Americans are small business owners, that have worked a good deal of their life’s and probably raised you (unless you were one of the millions that have crossed over illegally), fought wars that counted. And you a god-hating human secularist liberal strange-flesh supporting video-playing Hollywood-vampire loving morale decay of a person; you young Obama big-go loving/entertainment loving, what can you do for me personas have set yourselves up for displacement by the ravishing hoards of hard-working illegals that do not kill their unborn and have a birthrate of 4.1. So don't worry liberal tattooed pierced freak, your number must decrease, your God Darwin told you so, survival of the fittest not the best dressed and baggiest panted
make no sense
Because English is not your forte sir. "Makes no Sense" Did you mean, "this does not make any sense"?, or maybe, "I makes me no cents, I want my $7000 back and out of this truckee"?
How many of these fortune 500 companies like Goldman sachs, jp Morgan, etc were responsible for this economic mess in the first place and why aren't their CEOs in jail rather than collecting $100,000,000 bonuses at the taxpayer's expense? There should be tons of civil unrest over the screwing most of us have gotten while our government does nothing about it.
I was hoping someone would mention this. Did you watch the documentary Inside Job too? When you have the likes of Tim Geithner who made a huge profit off Goldman Sachs, working as Treasury Secretary. Washington is run by Wall Street, no matter which party it is IMHO. So everyone needs to stop pointing fingers at each other, while Wall St. laughs at us and not taking any blame at all.
Geee-awd does anybody *actually* think the U.S. economy is "emerging" from this? Gas prices are going sky-high; inflation is gonna hit this fall; they're cooking the books on unemployment figures to prop up the stock market; Japan, Greece, Ireland and many other countries are in serious trouble; the national debt is too high; medical expenses are skyrocketing and we don't currently have a sufficient power grid to support a growing economy. i.m.o. this is gonna be the biggest crash since 1929 – I would say, if you're in the stock market, get out NOW.
Frankly I think they should just get their hands off the damn thing. It goes through natural cycles and they keep artificially propping it up. Sometimes the best way to let a plane recover from a stall is to get your hands off the stick and do nothing – maybe the stock market is the same here – they should stop interfering with it's natural "ebb and flow." Unfortunately, those controlling it have a strong self-interest in propping it up this way. Betcha they get out while the gettin's good though.....
I'm tired of people complaining about the "rich" and the Bush tax cuts. I paid $350,000 in taxes last year. Yes, I made a lot. But with 51% of people paying no income taxes last year we will never pay off national debt. I would be happy to pay higher taxes if all that Money went towards the debt. But we know the government will spend it and borrow even more. So, yes I say no more taxes.
I work for a college and have two college degrees but I am not a prof. I'm in a support function. I have moved in and out of corp jobs and academic jobs. I'm glad I'm here – college rarely go broke or move. Our college weathered the recent economic times well but did not expand pay. It is important to education these kids. They need to experience living away from their parents, taking care of themselves and having their eyes and minds opened so they can think critically. We need to keep looking to the future. But, I think that we need a few CEO's to step out of their element and finally concede that they are living lifestyles that are ridiculously higher than most people and offer some of their savings to help things out. We need heroes. Ok, it's corny but we need some heroes. And the definition of that is someone who is willing to sacrifice for the greater good.
OMG – sorry for the bad typing!
"If you are an electronics engineer or a computer science engineer, you’re going to have absolutely no trouble getting a job – not just in this country but anywhere in the world."
What the h are you smokin dude? You don't have a clue. There are so many unemployed/underemployed Electronic engineers I know of... some we can thank our politicos for cranking up the importation of thousands of foreign engineers... some from the "globalization".. i.e. export jobs where labor is cheaper, such as India.
There is no way I would recommend any jobs in the Electronic Engineering fields. I have a daughter that is graduating high school with excellent grades in mathjand science, but am pushing her towards a career in healthcare or some other field where there is a future.
Poor Fareed is clueless...
I would be wary of advising anyone to get a computer science or any IT degree. Those jobs are heading to India at a huge rate. Our company is constantly cutting IT positions in favor of Indian Consultants – either H1B Visa people that sit in our facility or people located overseas. It is heartbreaking – so many of us that began our IT careers in the late 80s and early 90s and worked hard to develop a solid skill set are becoming less able to find work. I am debating whether to spend any money to finish my Masters degree now.
I started out in that timeframe – in and out of corp and academic jobs and now in academia. pay is lower, more vacation than standard jobs(around 4 weeks) but you don't get let go and unless you work for a huge univ you don't get paged in the middle of the night. I'm not getting rich but we are eating regularly.
Hola Amigos:
Yes it's tough and yes I fault this President and Congress because they now have the "ball" and are refusing to act in a positive way (in fact much has been in a negative way).
The USA needs to REDUCE the cost of living to make investment and business a "better deal" in the USA than any other place in the world. Infrastructure is fine but stop mandating the use of the highest labor cost in the area (a nice Union benefit). Citizens should not be forced to pay the highest price for roads, bridges, airports, etc. And while you are at it, don't pass any more "laws" that require the hiring of 200 lawyers to interpret – 10 pages MAX for new laws! And how about cutting some of the other "red tape" in the EPA, IRS, OSHA, NLRB, EEOC.
Make the USA THE PLACE TO BE in business and you will have to give VISAS to every country because there won't be enough workers. Social Security and Medicare problems will go away. Housing foreclosures will disappear and so will the deficit.
Forget blaming past presidents – every President and Congress for the past 50 years bears some blame. THIS President and Congress are not running with the "ball" they have been given.
Bingo! Government regulation and spending have been growing steadily under every White House and Congress since FDR. I get so frustrated over people trying to pin the blame on Bush 43 or Obama. Get a clue! The ruling class is made up of R's and D's and they all support growing government to benefit themselves and their donors (corporations, unions, community organizations, whatever). To unleash real economic growth, we need a return to the limited government ideal as set forth in the Constitution. The problem is that we have nearly 50% of the people in this country receiving some type of government handout (read: wealth transfer from us to them). Those people could care less what the Constitution says, and they are still allowed to vote . . .
I find it extremely hard to believe that the Wall Street people had a hand in tanking our country's economy yet no CEO or executives have been arrested for this criminal action. This country would not be in the mess that we are in if it wasn't for their greedy, lying and cheating ways. They lied and cheated a lot of hard working citizens out of their money and our stupid government turned around and used taxpayers money to bail them out!!! Now they're making millions of dollars in profit but they continue to send jobs overseas. Those corporate people need to be held accountable!!
I might be wrong but at my company, staff is shrinking and complex computers are running everything. Where are lower cost? Middle and lower class will not get jobs. Technology is automating everything. You must have a college degree and great computer skills to run the complex program that now sorts papers which takes away 5 lower class jobs.
So after reading most of these comments I would challenge the reporter/columnist to go interview some folks about what we do to turn things around. We all complain and things are bad but geez, put some ceos on the got seat and ask what they plan to do. and offer some suggestions of what we can do at our level. where do we start?
This is a liberal diatribe by Zakaria. Telling the fat middle-class American to look to the entertainment or tourism industry for work and leave the high tech jobs to especially intelligent imported immigrants. Whenever government grows it is growing for one or more of these reasons: paying large entitlements, inefficient use of the tax dollars it has, and/or has failed to support the creation of manufacturing jobs. This government has cow toed to China on its currency, allowed the financial industry to rape the middle-class, and has become Big Daddy to the illegal immigrant and able-bodied poor. 80+ % of you are middle-class that is reading this and probably 75% will vote the Big Daddy spender back into office for 4 more. His policies are redistributing cash to the rich, able-bodied poor, and legal and illegal immigrant because you are just not worth it anymore. You are dumb, fat and lazy.
So believe the big fat old lazy middle-class American lie. These same big fat middle-class Americans are small (10 people or less not the 100+ employee ones that get tax breaks) business owners that have worked a good deal of their life’s and probably raised you (unless you were one of the millions that have crossed over illegally), and fought wars that counted. And you, a god-hating human secularist liberal strange-flesh loving and supporting video-playing Hollywood-vampire loving moral decay of a person; you young Obama big-government entertainment loving fool, with your “what-can-you-do-for-me persona, have set yourselves up for displacement by the ravishing hoards of hard-working illegals that do not kill their unborn and have a birthrate of 4.1. So don't worry you liberal tattooed pierced freak, your number must decrease, your god Darwin told you so, survival of the fittest not the best dressed and baggiest panted. You my skinny pierced and painted friend are decreasing in number through displacement, low birth-rate, embrace of abortion, and same-sex relationships. In the end the Gog loving real American land-owner will once more have many brown-skinned peasants that are better cooks, managing their estates and fortunes. And I mean all of this in a good way. Good Luck and Good Night crybabies.
The government or the president really can't do much when it comes to creating jobs. They can't just pull jobs out of no where. The trillion dollar corps who are cutting out the middle man is whats making the average american jobless! They don't think of the long term effect when they replace people with machines or use cheap labor out of the country and ship it in. When the corps stop being so greedy and start thinking on the same level as the average american. We will see better days.
I completely agree that corporations and those with massive individual wealth should be paying more in taxes. The problem is that many in the lower and middle class feel that by those groups paying more taxes, it will be improve their situation. It will not. Every additional dollar the government raises has to go to reducing our multi-trillion dollar debt. Obama's own fiscal commission stated that by 2025 (not that far away), every dollar the government takes in will be used solely for the debt, Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Wealthy groups and individuals paying more taxes will certainly help our bottom line, but it will do nothing for the bottom lines of the majority of Americans.
You're missing the source of the problem, Fareed. Yes, the thinkgs you outlined – technology, competition – have placed pressure on the American workforce, but that workforce should have adapted as those changes occurred. Why didn't it? What happened was that the overall Amercan workforce was distorted by government intervention in the economy, so jobs that were becoming uncompetitive and unproductive persisted until they were a drag on the economy, and when everything eventually fell apart you had millions of inefficiently deployed workers. Yes, technology and competition caused this problem, but it was government manipulation of the construction, manufacturing, and resource sectors that made it a problem at all.
I'm moving to Singapore. Yet another highly trained engineer this country will lose. Hey at least the weather is nice and I can put food on the table because there are high quality jobs in Singapore.
If wages are "stagnant" and tenure uncertain, why spend time working at a "job"? In my opinion, if working at a "job" is in the least bit annoying, all options should be on the table. Look at the brave people in the Middle East fighting for their rights. What academics call an "economy", others call a human rights violation. WAKE UP AMERICA.
I agree with everything he said except the last part about the government footing a "GI" type bill as he called it for middle aged factory workers so we can re-train them. If someone is determined to work and provide for themselves and their family that is motivation enough and most people will take it upon them selves to figure that out on their own, if not, they're lazy. It's not the government's job to train people and put them into a field that they feel is best for them, that's a socialist/communist mentality and not what America was built on. Let the free market take care of it, deregulate and cut taxes at the federal and state level to promote small business. Then you'll see things change. Deregulation will also bring back all these overseas businesses too, because that's why they left in the first place. They were so over regulated and taxed to death they had no other choice. Get rid of min. wage too, that's stupid. Let the free market take care of itself. I could go on and on, but I won't because its' such a conversation with so many levels to it.
"Obviously, the single best way to ensure that you will have a secure job for the future is to have training in science and technology. If you are an electronics engineer or a computer science engineer, you’re going to have absolutely no trouble getting a job – not just in this country but anywhere in the world."
Obviously Fareed Zakaria did not do enough research into corporate American companies that use technology. If he did, he would find that 50% or more of the jobs are being done overseas by India, with more and more going there all the time.
How did he think that corporate America was making these record profits? By firing their tech people, and hiring companies in India.
Don't get a degree in technology unless you want to both live and work in India.
Quit voting for the GOP for starters.
I see a couple of issues in the ideas here.
#1 We can't all go into healthcare. Competition for jobs in health care is already tough. In my area you cannot get a nursing, radiologist, etc.. position unless you want to move to a rural town where you will be paid far less. You can't have 10 people traininf for health care positions when there is only one spot available.
#2 Why do we need to bring in more "skilled" immigrants into this country. We already have plenty of skilled Americans that are already out of work. How does it help to bring even more people into this country? In my opinion it is completely irresponsible to even allow any immigration into the US when we are at 10% unemployment already.
How about this as a starting point? STOP VOTING REPUBLICAN.
The unemployment rate is up 2% above its normal rate and we start crying third world country.
For those of you that lost a lot when the housing bubble popped and you had to pay back all of that credit you decided to borrow against – tough luck. Try to spend within your means.
I'm a student, who has not been directly affected by the recession (so far), but even I can see how foolish your statement it. You discount the millions of Americans who did everything right but still saw their 401Ks vanish into thin air, lost their jobs because the companies/businesses they worked for had to tighten their belts, had to close their customer base dried up overnight, and so on. I encourage you to examine the facts.
Jake you must be an oxford graduate...
actually you sound like an angry old man with no prospective in life. you are an uneducated right winger that has a car on cinder blocks and a house on wheels,
get the duct tape and fix your lazyboy chair
Thank you. I love you too!
pleasure is mine
Is Zakaria just the resident CNN smart guy? I thought he was a foreign policy expert. Now he's telling us about the US economic future?
Mr. Zakaria is absolutely right about the need to retrain workers who are becoming obsolete. The former middle class was in income only. With an abundance of skilled workers in today's technology oriented jobs, the only ones who will be middle class will be those with appropriate skills, either through college or technical schools. The old days will never come back and only those willing to retrain will survive comfortably.
Zakaria is missing the only thing that can help create jobs. Neither governments nor corporations nor supply side investments create jobs. Only markets can create jobs, and markets come from only one place: demand. Without money flowing through the economy there is no demand. Retraining and focusing on small business will not have any effect unless there is money flowing to the retrained workers or to the small businesses.
Money flowing in the economy is like blood in the body. It feeds all the parts of the body, and if one part starts keeping all the blood, the other parts starve. It is as if all the fat tissue sucked up all the blood and the muscles and brains can't work anymore, and the fingers and toes and arms and legs start getting gangrene. So in order for the body to survive, the blood has to start moving into the rest of the body again.
To put this in economic terms, the wealthy and the large corporations have slowly sucked the money out of the economy, and are sitting on huge piles of cash. They won't hire until they can make money by hiring, and as soon as there is a demand, they'll start hiring even if they have to borrow to do it. All that cash they're sitting on makes no difference to them, because they're not going to just start hiring for no reason. One way to create demand is for the rich to start spending in ways that the money somehow gets to poor people, such as by buying consumer goods, or building yachts, or renovating their houses, or buying artwork, or donating to places that hire a lot of low income people. They could invest in a lot of different independent inventors and subsidize their patents for a payoff when the economy recovers. They could start converting their money into valuable assets so that the money can be released into the "bloodstream" again. But that probably won't work, because they would have to spend enormous amounts of money to make a difference to the economy. They could donate it, like Warren Buffett and his friends do. That would work really well, but is not very likely to be big enough.
The other way is through taxes. Taxes have the benefit that the money taxed goes into circulation immediately, even if some people disapprove of what the taxes are spent on. Say what you like about earmarks, but the had the very important effect of spreading money into parts of the country where it is needed (as well as where it isn't needed). Taxes should be high enough to keep enough blood flowing through all the parts of the economy, instead of it pooling in the stock market or corporate savings accounts. It would remove it from the hedge fund managers and CEOs with obscene bonuses and spread it to people who may be deserving or not, but it would keep the economy moving.
I have nothing against the wealthy having money. It really doesn't really matter how much money the corporations and the wealthy have, as long as there is still enough money circulating to prevent the rest of the economy from getting gangrene.
Bloomberg just needs to get assassinated and things will go back to normal.
But wait, this whole story must be a fabrication of the east-coast liberal elite media. It couldn't possibly be true that the lives of working Americans are going to hell in a hand basket, along with their children's futures. After all, we've been following the Milton Friedman, prescription of deregulation and tax cuts for the rich, for the past 30 years now. Sunny days are just around the corner. They HAVE to be!!!
While the author of this story makes a couple of good points. I think he is also out of touch with the average American. Examples in point. Look at the number of young college grads from good schools who cannot get a job. I think they ran a story on this yesterday. As for training in health care wake up! Have you not heard they are out sourcing many activities like X-Ray diags and lab test out over seas because it's cheaper. I remember when Information Technology was going to be our savior. Where has that gone? Overseas as well! Take Germnany the reason why they have a strong manufacturing base is becuase they have tariffs to make fair competition with the other countries unlike us. Don't blame one political party because we let it happen! Only we the people can make the change and its not voting in a crap two party system. Rise up America make your voice heard. Over 236 years ago we did just that. Wake up!
Where do we make our voices heard and taken seriously? Rallies? Boycotts? Where to begin? Who's to lead?? What's the American vision for the average finacially struggling American citizen? What's our goal and how do we make it happen?? Someone, who knows the first step, what do we do first?? We already work hard, we already pay taxes, and still we are broke, we live from paycheck to paycheck. We stretch our dollars. Finding technical jobs or a career in entertainment won't fix our financial vocational problems.
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GOP Plan – Make the Old, Poor, and Sick people slaves. Then whip them until they are Young, Rich, and Healthy. Or until they are dead. Then turn them into Soylent Green to feed the soldiers. A self sustaining system.
I have to give credit where credit is due. This is one of Zakaria's better written articles. Many of his articles are overly ambitious in scope and lack logical cohesion. But this one makes some sense if you don't ask too many questions like how are we going to revitalize manufacturing in the current political climate? I get the impression that Zakaria is trying to gloss over the fact that the current White House Administration is a big part of the problem. Yeah, Obama inherited a mess that was in the making for years. But Keynesian economics and closet socialism have only made things worse. Like most of Zakaria's work, this article is a diversion tactic. We do indeed need to address many of the things he mentions in the article. But the first step that the faithful Zakaria will never admit is that we need to impale Obama in 2012. He and his leftist/idealist minions constitute the single biggest obstacle and source of negative externalities in the economy. Like William himslf might have aptly put it, their utopian vision is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
If America had not given (and cont.to give) that HUGE amount of foregin aid to countries all over the world to help them out, but whose most of the people hate the American people, America would not be now in this situation! I hope that things will turn better for the American people who have helped others so much, just that i think it's now time to end that help!
Mike, I realize that foreign aid may stick in your craw for any number of reasons, but it represents a small portion of our total national production. We're not going bankrupt or losing our place as a world leader because we gave it all away as foreign aid.
Not to say that we shouldn't examine and re examine the money we're spending in this area, as we should examine everything we spend, but we'd be in the same situation with or without the foreign aid spending.
does this count for useless wars?
Fact is the US is a big scam with its American Dream, get a $40000 college degree to be job less, everyone should have a house which the banks will take and invest for retirement so the banks can gamble it away, with its $700 billion a year military to protect our freedom against illegal border crossers. The USA is the biggest scam in world history, the British are nothing against this scam machine.
Are we really in that bad a shape as is made out to be?
Everyone needs to watch Oscar Winning Documentary 'Inside Job'. Get educated instead of putting blame on each other and realize who the real criminals are. Here's a hint, they worked during the Bush Administration and still work for the Obama administration. Wall St. runs Washington and this country....
I disagree with one aspect of Mr Zakaria's article, and I wish he had thought (or maybe researched) a little more before he talked about this subject. Technology is NOT making things cheaper for poor people. The real cost of living is increasing at a dramatic and accelerating pace.
Over the past 30 years, technology has NOT made medicine cheaper. It has NOT made the cost of housing cheaper. It has NOT made food cheaper (the cost of food has gone crazy in the past two years), it has NOT made fuel cheaper. It has NOT made education cheaper (although it's made information a lot cheaper).
All of the things that poor people spend their money on, which they need in order to survive and even to adapt to today's world, are outpacing the general rate of inflation and the general rate of salary growth. Poor people can get cheaper cars, TVs, and computers than ever before (if they can afford any of the above at all) but the daily necessities are NOT cheaper and they're not going to be made cheaper by technology.
Also, add another point to the general point about technology and labor: technology is far past the point where it obsoletes mere manual labor. It's reaching the point where it even obsoletes a lot of skilled labor. It's at the point now where almost as fast as a human being can learn a new trade or a new skill, a program or machine can be designed to make that skill or trade irrelevant.
None of this would necessarily be a bad thing if all of this progress and productivity meant that we could all work shorter hours for the same pay, or be paid more, but ultimately, the ones who are actually benefiting from all of this change are an elite few. It seems as if we can look forward to a future where 98.9% of the earth's population toils as replaceable, menial labor, 1% live a comfortable lifestyle based on extraordinary talent, and the remaining .1% live as the future equivalent of Pharaohs, based on their inherited access to the levers of power and wealth.
@Randy: Duh your statement if you have a computer science degree you will always have a job. Oh my god. I have a degree in programming ever heard what happened of silicon valley? Bust all went to India. You can retrain people all you want for jobs that are no longer there.
Similar story here. I have a Comp Sci degree, and just about the time I got it, all the jobs were being sent to India. There are still plenty of programmers in the USA, but they're largely either worker for small firms that work hand in hand with local business, or they're acting as localization experts to take software that's being written in India and putting an English face on it. This industry continues to shrink in the USA.
After all, a machine does not care what language you write the program in, all it sees are 1s and 0s.
I've since gone back to technical school and gotten an education in diesel mechanics. Ironically, this much less cerebral field has a much better future in it, because it's work that can't simply be outsourced to another nation. Until our vehicles are fully electric, at which point I suppose they'll be disposable and not worth repairing, like everything else.
If you have a CS degree 10-12 years ago, you would land a good job (with very good starting salary), and you get to ride the wave of that tech boom that ends in 2000. With globalization, just having a CS degree in these days is not enough anymore. In fact, dollar for dollar, a fresh grad in CS in US could have a harder time to land an entry-level IT or software dev job than his/her counterpart in India or Romania, since the salary expectation here is so much higher. Without an entry level job, you won't get the necessary experience to stay in the IT field, let alone move up the ladder. You should do a double-major in CS and something else (eg. CS and EE, or CS and medicine). That would give you an edge and a different perspective on how to use CS, rather than just hoping to land a job as a coder after you graduate.
Ummmm....@Mark....maybe you should (1) re-read the story, and then (2) re-read my post and note the double quotes around the statement that I was quoting from the article, then (3) re-read the rest of my post that says DONT get a job in techology unless you want to live in India.
In other words – you and I are on the same side of the argument.
The day when America stops "making" and inventing things, that's why America loses its edge. Look at our traditions of great industrials, like GE, IBM, HP, even Google and Apple. Those are where innovations come from, that lend America its competitive advantage. Tourism is great, but we can't be focusing on that. Just look what happens to Greece. Hollywood and entertainment are cool, but how big an employment impact does it have? America can't cut back on R&D and education. Otherwise, we'll just be borrowing from our future generations who would go on to work to pay off the debts that the present-day spender generation incur.
The basic reason is government restrictions, regulations and reporting requirements. These increase costs of doing any business in the U.S. When anyone can move business offshore and avoid these costs, they will do so. It only makes sense. One cannot have free trade AND costly restrictions, regulations and reporting. One can have one OR the other....but not both. Of course if one chooses the route of protectionism, retaining the government imposed costs by imposing import restrictions and tariffs to account for the artificially imposed cost differentials, then one implicitly chooses a far less affluent outcome. The only way to insure lots of good jobs is to end as much as possible all government imposed restrictions, regulations and reporting burdens on business, of all kinds, environmental, labor, social, what have you. That's the way the 'developing economies' are developing...and the way we have to compete, IF we want to compete, that is. Of course we could just be unemployed and poor and feel righteous and cheated...which is politically useful to some, but completely unproductive.
I'd love to know which business you're in that compliance paperwork and accounting is truly one of your major costs of doing business.
There are only two major advantages to off shoring:
1) Cheaper labor. Self explanatory.
2) Less environmental regulation. Heavy industry can avoid a lot of costs by simply dumping toxic materials into the ground, the water, the air, or the product itself. It's cheaper, and therefore better for the business in question.
However, before you demonize our "harsh" environmental standards (which are laughable compared to most other developed nations) you should take a trip and spend some time in one of these Chinese or Indian manufacturing towns. The best of them make the worst smog and pollution in the USA look normal, and the worst of them are like hell on earth. I spent some time in Shangai about 15 years ago, before it was "bad" and it was worse than anything I've ever seen or heard of in the US. I have friends who live in that area now who say it's far worse in just the past decade. There are certain places they simply will not go, with or without a respirator.
I can only imagine the cancer clusters that are going to emerge in wide swaths of China due to all the carcinogens being dumped into the water and air, and the loose regard for product safety in general.
The environmental impact of what's happening in some of these places is even worse than the economic impact of losing those jobs here. If that's the cost of doing business, then our priority should be to find some other business.
In any case, it's not the cost of paperwork that makes off shoring attractive, it's the low cost of everything else.
It's certainly not just environmental related regulation, restrictions and reporting costs...although that is a very significant burden on U.S. businesses, some more than others of course....but the costs get passed along to everything here too...it's also work rules, amenities, special treatment requirements for just about everyone who thinks they have a special burden to carry, all kinds of labor rules, insurance rules, zoning restrictions and oodles and oodles of tort costs and potential tort costs....all this stuff isn't free, it adds up and what it adds up to is very good reason to do anything possible somewhere else it's cheaper. Yes, labor costs are a major advantage, but accounting for productivity they aren't as great as you suggest...it's everything...which can mean, on a case by case basis, 10%, 50% 100% etc....and that's why all the 'work' goes off shore, the owner get richer and richer and the workers become fewer and fewer and more people struggle and will have to accept less in the future. I pity the young folks these days....we have created a real Utopian nightmare for them!
One thing is for sure, Mr. Obama is not getting my vote in 2012 until he cuts the spending in Washington this include the first lady vacation trip to Europe with friends and family that costed millions in tax payers.
Mr. Zakaria, after reading your opinions on subjects like Acquisition of European military hardware by India and this analysis of US Economy/Employment situation, it seems like that you are opining way over your pay grade.
Absolutely.
One thing you glossed over, and I have my theories as to why, is immigration. Every time an illegal immigrant takes a job for super cheap pay, the overall demand for workers across the board is lowered, and the pay expectations of workers in America is lowered. You may think it's a great thing to let more immigrants come to this country and take jobs, but I see it along with shipping jobs oversees as the driving forces of unemployment in America. I'm lucky, I'm a senior systems engineer of over 16 years now, but if I was a factory worker or other type of laborer I would be in bad straights. There are tons of lazy people in America, but there are also tons of people willing and able to work, who can't find a job because of the effects of illegal immigrants in the country, and cheap labor overseas.
totally true!
AMerican family man can't work at those wages
Actually that's not true. When immigrants take work at a lower rate, in the U.S. they actually CREATE more work for others here than would otherwise have existed.... All-in-all it would be best if immigrants were entirely legal and provided the same protections and work rules of citizens...which would 'level' the playing field so that only willingness to work hard and skill were the issue (in which case my guess would be a lot of U.S. citizens with an awful sense of 'entitlement' would wind up on the 'outside looking in'.....)
BTW, he stated during campaign that he will regulate Wall Street, yes, but where is the regulation?
The same people he said he would regulate, he hired them in the White House. Seems like some thing never change in Washington. See Oscar Winning Documentary 'Inside Job' and how our Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner profited millions off Goldman Sach's-the same people who put this country into a recession.
People have to get use to it and suffer the slow change .....there were too many duplicate business before and as long as the economy was growing it didn't matter much.... now many of the duplicate business were squeezed out.... and different kinds of businesses will in time take their place.
I felt god's voice that shook like earthquake while was at sleep. I had to tweet message from iPod at bed. God had to send me message that earthquake will be arrive in countries with earthquake magitiude 8.7- 15.4 scale. Location will hit at las Vegas, Japan Tokoyo, london, Poland, turkey , west toronto, china, moscow, indonesia, there will be tsumnai also target hawaii And west California. the earthquake is big said the god's voice. That' about it . The time has come. Starting tomorrow at 3:47 -4:27 and earthquake will appear scarier said the God's voice. That's it.
Well we had a tale of two economies in this country when W was in office, over eight years he awarded Texa*s 1.2 Trillion Dollars in federal monies more than any other state. He did this at the expense of everyone other state in America, Texa*s thrived while the other states denied federal monies struggled badly.
The Left was hijacked by Socialist "Progressives" and most have no idea. The main tenants of the Communist Manifesto are eliminate the ultra-rich (bourgeois) and give it to the verking people (proletarians). Sounds like Democracks to me. It's good though because they are so extreme and transparent, most people are starting to realize it is pure Socialism and nothing else. They all hate America, it seems.
Either way, they world is ending Saturday so, its a moot point.
This article highlights a *major* point that conservative America hasn't grasped, and Democrats are terrible at driving home: helping corporate America does little to help middle-class America. We've continued tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, bailed out corporate America with TARP, and pumped hundreds of billions into American business, because the GOP insisted they would create American jobs. Now corporate America has seen 9 quarters of successive growth. The richest amongst us are make *record* profits. SO WHERE ARE THE F**KING JOBS!!
That's what happens when Wall Street runs Washington...
Although I don't agree with his every point, I do think the essential point of Fareed's article has not been refuted by a single one of these comments; that while large American corporate profits are growing, job opportunities and income for average Americans are not reflecting this growth and may in fact be shrinking.
All those commenting seem to also know this cannot go on without painful consequences (although a few seem to look forward to those painful consequences as long as they are not the ones who suffer them ). But I don't think the nation has yet to reach a point of urgency that will result in much more than this "internet lip service".
Voter Turnout in local elections, let alone presidential ones, clearly demonstrates a lack of urgency for change on the part of most Americans. For those who feel the major parties have sold out, the lack of viable alternative political options also demonstrates a lack of real urgency (although the Tea Party has growing viability as a populist movement it is still perceived as an off-shoot of the Republican party and has not yet fielded a branded presidential candidate)
Our national energy and resource consumption, as well as ballooning obesity rates, clearly demonstrate that Americans are still enjoying a quality of life which, at least in a material sense, is envied around the world.
Once a majority of Americans reach a point of true crisis in their personal lives, I believe Democracy will be reinvigorated in ways we cannot imagine. Perhaps we will become unified as we were after 9/11 or perhaps we will divide and vilify one another (Reminder: Hitler was democratically elected).
But... like it or hate it, the problems we face are global in nature – not uniquely "American" problems. Overextended Government, Corporate Dominance, Population growth, Diminishing resources, and Worker displacement due to technology are common symptoms amongst developed nations. The few exceptions to these rules, are poor countries who's governments and corporate guests currently profit from their citizens own desperation for employment and basic necessities at any cost (us in the future?).
So, I agree with F.Z. and I think all of those commenting – The fact that American Corporate growth is not a reflected in our citizens economic well being is a problem regardless of what you or I think the solution is.
I just fear that as a nation we will continue to dither and point fingers until things get a lot more painful.
If Toyota wants (and does) produce cars here then they should be able to sell here with no tarifs BUT, anyone that produces abroad to sell here (even American Businesses) ought to pay a tarif to sell here! Period!
"The single largest cause of this jobless growth is technology." You are officially an idiot. Never mind the trillions Bernanke and Timmy G. have handed out to international bankers, making goods more expensive for the average American as their dollars compete at the grocery store and the gas pump with all the "free" dollars that no banker worked for.
Not to mention TARP, predatory loans, subprime mortgages. Brokers with huge bonuses and no penalties if those loans default, promising dream homes to people who could never afford them. All the while knowing they will get bailed out by our tax dollars because they are so cocky they were to big to fail.
Try to make more sense. You need to separate what you feel about Obama and Geithner from the fact that technology and overpopulation together have created the problems that these people, as you see it, are ineffectively dealing with.
Technology offered hope to the world for a long time... but there was a point where it stopped creating advantages and instead just added to the problems that we now have to face. I'd say that your willingness to ignore this fact makes YOU the official idiot.
Great article. Only one problem... none of this will ever happen. Greed is a disease, one which has no cure. Most people who are benefitting from the growth of corporate values live in an island universe, unwilling or unable to see what suffering 'technology' has brought us. Everyday technology takes jobs and gives none back, save those jobs which involve high levels of education which many people are never in a position to get. It's a causality loop, and only a massive die off of the populace can ever effect meaningful change, no matter what the optimists say. We have long passed the tipping point on our path to societal destruction. All that is left now is the long path down to the bottom as the corporate overlords devise new ways to forget about the rest of us. There's been a bumper sticker around for a long time... 'EAT THE RICH'. Although they won't taste very good it's about all we have at this point.
Excellent point. I would only add that it is time to set the island on fire.
I am all for that. I've got a match.
Zakaria:
"Obviously, the single best way to ensure that you will have a secure job for the future is to have training in science and technology. If you are an electronics engineer or a computer science engineer, you’re going to have absolutely no trouble getting a job – not just in this country but anywhere in the world."
I read an article YESTERDAY on CNN that said the average American now believes that a college education isn't worth the price. As I browsed the comments below that article I noticed that a number of people agreed. As long as Americans are stupid enough believe that we don't need education to succeed then we will continue to have a serious problem.
Our priorities are so silly. When the average American DOES pursue a degree and they opt to do it in the liberal arts, they then complain that their education didn't advance their career. I should probably ammend this to say "white people", because if I visit my local university I notice that the asians seem to have a clear understanding of eduation and the importance of the sciences.
I work in a company with a huge department of I.T. administrators and computer programmers. In my weekly meetings I am one of 2 caucasians in a room of 18 developers. We have about 10 people working here on visas from China and India! That is probably close to a million dollars of annual salary going to non-Americans because math and science are "nerdy" and no-fun.
So people, before you can complain and moan that Wall Street is holding you back, or that the government is trying to hose the middle class, look in the mirror... ask yourself why you didn't do better in school. Ask yourself where you might be if you had decided to study math, science, computers, etc. Chances are if you stopped complaining and took steps to better yourself you would suddenly find that you have a lot less to complain about.
Ah yes, your quaint solution to the problem requires everyone to become a computer scientist. Not logical. Not everyone is destined for math and science jobs.
Agreed. Not everybody can be engineers. Not seeking a degree in science or technology doesn't mean you didn't try hard enough. These are very math heavy degrees, and not everyone excels at that subject. Would you really want someone who busted their tail just to get a C average in math courses designing the bridge you drive on to get to work?
There's two economies, all right, one for the haves, and one for the have nots. Conservatives start to wail about class wars but these are facts–the rich are getting richer, but the avg American's income has remained flat. And not because of laziness, or fair competition. The game is rigged. Time to knock the card table over.
It does not matter who caused it. It needs to be fixed and the people , need to start rattleing the cages of their elected
officials.
When will people realize this isn't a war against Republicans or Democrats?? Wall Street needs to be regulated. While they took all those risky predatory subprime loans, ran our country into the ground. Took bonuses without penalties. All while WE THE PEOPLE bailed their asses out. What about us? Where's our bailout? The American people deserve a refund.
Fareed,
As a University Professor I want to ask you to write an essay on the young aged 22-28 group who have been left out of the economy. This group will be a lost generation if something is not done. Many graduated during the recession and never ever got that first job. Once the depression is over the younger ones coming out will get those jobs and we will have a 10 year age group of lost youth who will never be able to make up that loss. Please write about the "Lost Gen Y's"
I have a nephew who this describes exactly. He is extremely intelligent and talented artistically and musically. Despite his good qualities, he has been without a "real" job since he graduated three years ago. No one will hire him in his chosen field (or any other for that matter) because he has apparently unforgivable gaps in his resume. Many of his age are in the same boat and it seems like we've simply abandoned an entire generation to mediocrity. They will never have the opportunities I had just a few year previous.
Riddle me this. Why does every job out there seem to require 2-5 years experience and how is a graduate going to obtain that? It infuriates me to see job listings that all require experience. Internships might provide 6 months to a year's experience. I feel college provides skills necessary to work and be successful in a place of business, but a employer fine tunes the skills people go to college for. Every day it seems like a new article is coming out about student loan debt and young people defaulting on loans. That translates to credit problems and then a domino effect starts before life even really begins. Something has got to give or we're in big trouble later down the road.
As the developing economies grow, and their citizens get more and more stuff, and want more and more stuff, and want to work less, and jobs become more plentiful and they have some choice as to working conditions, wages, etc., then the tide will start to turn and we'll begin to see those good, steady, call-center jobs come back to the U.S. We'll just have to know Chinese and Indian (sorry, don't know what language they speak) to get them.
Fareed,
I am heartened by your willingness to address the issue, but I fear half of your solutions are wrong. Allowing more highly trained immigrants into the country helps immigrants, but it does not employ Americans who already don't have jobs. I'm not against the suggestion, but it does nothing to help the plight of Americans already living here, just the opposite. Also, it is true that technology has cost many middle class Americans their jobs over the last sixty years, but instead of reinvesting the savings produced by technology into new ventures, developing a more robust workforce or spreading the opportunities to the workers who made the technological transition possible, the owners and operators of these corporations have pocketed the profits. This is great for them in the short term, but they have built their fortunes on the backs of other people. That is not justice. Real solutions to this systemic unemployment problem don't include re-educating factory workers or trying to teach machinists to become nurses. I'm sorry, but that is asinine. Also, the technology sector is NOT immune to this crisis. Educated computer scientists, developers and engineers are much more plentiful and cheap outside the US. Any American engineer who has a job is benefiting from a bias in favor or Americans, which is short-lived and unreliable. They will be replaced as soon as the CFOs realize they can get two Indians for the price of one American.
As a republican, congrats fared, you finnally get it.
However, I would add as globalization increases, indians and Chinese will in turn try to find new customers outside their home countries, especially in the innovative sector in india...
And that will mean more jobs here.... additionally, American companies are again building manufacturing plants here due to underestimated costs overseas (such a shipping), creating in turn, American jobs.
By getting the government overly involved, you risk these innovative vectors from ever playing out, and you risk a perpetual self fulfilling prophecy: the government having to be the agent that creates jobs by crowding out the natural processes that make it happen in the economy, by trying to be the agent thy creates jobs. Necessity is the mother of invention. Once you get the government involved, there is no guarantee the private sector will step up thereafter. So just keep that in mind.
However, I don't disagree on investment in infrastructure, because thatcalways increase the maximum utility over time. But I would wait at least till 2016 to declare this systemic and do what you have mentioned in governebt intervntion.
The problem or interfering with the grid is that here are unintended consequences. You focus on healthcare and entertainment and so you crowd out they industries that might have been more productive...
Such as a robotics plant...that would benefit from a lot of desperate workers...of a new pla t to make health care technology...bringing down costs and creating jobs..
At these times, the natural impulse is to help those who appear to be in a systemic free fall...that it's a problem instead of an opportunity...you bow have more workers looking bs you are I a creative destruction periods, you interfere now, the creation part of creative destruction, as per economic philosophy, will not take place...
The best strategy fared, is instead to wait a couple years...and then if political forces become strong enough, implement what you describe...
Otherwise you just create another monopoly, and a weak one at that (that debt...) it's much better to let the natural forces rake care of it.
Concentration should not be o industries fared, but on training programs, infrastructure, and education...
Not picking winners, that is not an American philosophy not a european one..yea sure, Germany has been able to get by by catering to complex engineering and luxur items..but trust me, they are all going to have problems..Europe is collapsing...
The future is about mobility, adaptinbilty snd a government that invests in infrastructure, re education programs, education, and allows small business to thrive with lower taxes (get higher revenue some other way, like, exxon), that's the way of the future, and efficiency.
Pcking winners will only fail. This may have been a good strategy for the late 90s..thing is we see the problems we were supposed to solve 10 years ago..the current problem is our competetiveness due to the emergence d. Global middle class, and that's not going to be solved by picking winners. You see you see solving the old problem. We need to solve that problem and the new ones overthr horizon and I think what I proposed is tw solution...
There is a midpoint btw..but I'm always afraid lefists might abuse it.
Have heavy investing by the us government in research and development, technology, like DARPA ...then give all the scientists that come from overseas visas and only allow then patents in the states..this would be a constant creation sector in the USA that would mean more jobs over time for the middle class.
We are experiencing the slow emergence of a global perfect market, ala socialism..this benefits the world as a whole..very utilitarian...but to keep America competitive you either follow my strategy, or you lefty, like you, but most of the 'job incestment' is in technology..once the patents are owed by everyone in the united states then competition with these techs will increase and new industries will appear sooner, helping the middle class face the global competition wave we are now facing.
Your so-called perfect global market creates one king and 7 billion slaves. The absolute free market leads only to absolute tyranny.
Uh, that's patently and mathematically inaccurate (study economics). But I understand your frustration due to a confusion of concepts.
The perfect market is more akin to socialism than capitalism, if you are taking a systemic point of view. It is more akin to a laboratory and evolution than a class system based capitalism.' think more along the lines of a meritocracy. The Internet was the first wave, then increased logistics and automation, now we are going into a global middle class and shutting down of establishments..horizontal world...we need a stable energy source, water, and a sustainable agriculture, you know, more decentralized living Which started with the internet. This will continue to happen due to information technology and nanotechnology, which will complement each other. After that you'll likely have, concurrently, the accelerating benefits of robotics and decreased health care costs (making everything cheaper , standardized and customized, a la 3d printer, breaking monopolies and establishments with raw speed, cable having being destroyed 15 years prior due to a content based ip system)and a
Global horizontal market. Then 7 years we wil be in the perfect market. But it's 30 years away.
You are wrong about tyranny. Technology is inherently self empowering..it empowers individuals to me masters of their own fate. Even the psychological set up primes up individuals along these lines, although altruistc elements in many cultures are lost. You look at India however, and you see that tech there complements the culture, doesn't undermine it into a self obsessed materialism like in the states...so it's about the culture, not the free market..technology allows people to be more capable and male the choices necessary to be better off. This allows for in turn, increased competition and better products. Kings can only justify themselves with their worth, not morality...or entitlement...now this world does not yet exist because you still have monopolies. The federal governebt as currently constituted, the federal reserve and the American banking system are All examples of monopolies. The free market is tnot the tyranny or the innovation vector that drives it, but monopolies. That's what creates slaves. It's always been that way. Trade, 'free' markets, competition, free thought and innovation have always had the opposite effect, emancipation. To break monopolies you have innovation...for the federal reserve, eventually we will have money automaicly adjusted online through quantum cryptogrAphy and an only credit card system...gettig rid of the needto raise Interest rates when the money supply is out of control...an algorithm will simply adjust based on the totality of all transactions...which is yet to happen but we will get there soon, my bet is plasmonics..once inflation is a thing of the past, there will be no use for the federal reserve , the interest rate bonds from governments will be seen as a as a monopoly, creativ asymmetries through the enormous clout they have in the money supply to pa for heir spending, so then debt will be prohibited (perhaps after a collapse of all western governments..leadingto their insolvency) you pay what you spend only through taxes..this will make lending competitive..people will invest in things of worth,'not jus park their money. Hence, the monopoly of the government to control the money supply will cease to exist...it all all be set electronically by algorithms. The. The financial sector will be destroyed through micro financing and a global network of lending, the customer choosing from a multitude of programs trillions of 'banks'...once the financial sector and federal reserve monopoly is blown...then the only thing left will be public works, welfare and national security..
With more automation and robotics, costs go down, robots can be outsourced for security to the point that crime and war is nearly impossible, the major national players of the world canceling their acggressive natures b raising the stakes, early and inexpensive screening can take place in health care, and more autonomous systems for assisted living and security can protect people from crime through surveillance. With people arming themselves eith video, photo identification and robots..it becomes increasingly difficult to commit a crime...either by mob or individually...the fire department can be outsource with robots...housing can become amusingly cheap..
In time, the cost of public works goes down, and outsourced. slowly but surely, things become embedded in the grid, done by everyone and no one..the check and balances of the system ensure autonomy and security. things go the wAy of meritocracy...
The elites? Their money will buy even more in thefuture, but they will increasingly be faced with more competition from abroad...hence the path of least resistance will be a life of leisure...as they relinguish their power and control...for the increasing prosperity their money can buy due to an awesome productive world...
In time, nations protect wildlife and nature due to surging demand..to prevent them from going extinct...and grow food wit new technology while outlawing open fishing and hunting..the prime resources only accessed by political and money elites..the price of their allegiance...while the population decreases in number naturally due to better standards of living, and a stasis is acheiced where we perhaps merge with machines. It's been well studied that people do not react to slow moving problems that snowball. What better way to help the environment than to have global demand for the worlds resources go up, pressing for preservation thereafter?
Any questions?
The illuminati are with you. But it's never been about the free market. It has always been about monopolies. Monopolies create the 'kings' that you speak of. From the catholic church to socialism, it has never changed.
It's about destroying monopolies and ensuring security, prosperity and needs satisfied through a meritocratic grid. Free Market was never the problem. Just a totalitarian trick orflanguage, similar to 'captal-ism' and 'race-ism'. Capitalism is just an emerging property of trade, far easier to trade in money than to barter. That wS never the problem, in fact, that was the engine of innovation. The real problem is a security threat due to such technology, such as a virus, or a nuclear bomb. This could lead to a totalitarian order for security, but only temporarily. Technology is hard to tame once you let it out of the box. So in time, the real way to protect against security threats will be self protection...special suits, robots for self, and better Antivirusds as well as laws that outlaw certain security equipment...we don't think both are mutually exclusive...
A network, eventually oursourcrd, made
Of millions of individuals, would update people on security threats, and people would 'update' with programs or special devices for protection.
Governmets are essential in bringing about this world uworver. Because their instances And tendencies will fuel the strategies that will allow them to pursue technology for their own interests, to protect themselves and the sterility of the world...and in time..this function will be outsourced to the gird through the work of individuals. In essence, this is the slow dismantling of the state, step by step, as the need arises. We could not do it now, obviously, but as technolog advances this will be the natural progression, with more be
Also, civilizaktion is terribly vulnerable right now. we do not yet have a source of energy that is sustainable. We need to find that it in order to make civilization sustainable. And I am told,'on good authority, that due to nanotechnology, that day is close at hand.
It was never about reforming man. Any way man is, a system exists to lead to a progress and a stasis by which mans natural instances will become obsolete. We found that self interest and empowerment also has a system that leads to this. And that's capitalism. You can try to endlessly reform man and his ways, much of which is programmed hi
. Or you can work with man as is, and let him choose to evolve, upon the fateful day, naturally.
People, when they buy technology, it's more than just the material, they are psychologically acknowledging a higher self..something more, that they will desire to merge with in time...and lead to this 'selfless man' all the leftist so aspire.
It seems only natural we take this route and do it at the end with technology, than trying to reform him now, and endlessly fail.
I'd this trial run fails.'I'm sure in 500 years humanity can come back and we can try totalitarianism, over and over again, to no avail. The planet will recover, if we fail, we will perish (civilizaton rather) the planet will e just fine.
All we need is a shelter underground and we have planned for that contigency also. No, your interests should be in space, our cutter project. Marxism seems far more stable in space than on earth. It even seems like it could be naturally selected as the best fit system.
We are putting money in the skylon, laser rocketry, marketing (virgin galactic), the space elevator tether, and scramjets (as well as laser fusion...we happen to think an all fusion explosive would make the old project Orion feasible again...) to ensure that we kick start the industry into gear for the 2030-2040 timeframe. The future will be institutions and individuals. Corporations, not governments..
Get on board friend, a bright future awaits you. If we fail here, we can try something else somewhere else. As we had predicted.. There are so many planets out there..
Electronics is a commodity product now. We would regularly outsource development to India. Few people actually develop electronics in the US that isn't defense related. All things defense related can't be outsourced. Defense related is what is carrying the computer/electronics industry in the U.S. Almost everyone in my graduating class a 8 yrs ago, 99% of them are in defense. The remaining 1% decided they didn't want to do defense and ended up in support sales. We gave it all away literally.
This is why firms like apple dive head first into copyright law. The software side of anything embedded is the only thing you can really patent. Just partially encrypting it gives you insane undefined rights due to the DMCA. In essence you can can claim a competing product illegally reverse engineered your product. You may have 2 different source codes to get around it but they'll get you for dmca violations and sue you till you run out of money or settle. The real future is rehashing everything we know. The only problem with that as long as the youth now are heavily in debt. They won't go into business for themselves. We are trying to revert to a pre ww2 economy where people compete against each other. The problem is biz models cant be patented and you have more super corps then you have today. Remind you a huge chunk of those small biz were farming related. Every farmer was his own biz. Our problem is fewer and fewer can afford your products other then those from the big W store. Because they believe they need to maintain a standard of living and can't fathom otherwise. They'll continue to seek alternative (credit) funding. The think tanks need to launch a competition to fix the economy. The pres tried to give us the space race but called the green race. The space race benefited us so well however mega corps lose out in the green race. While people debate that its too expensive compared to 200 years of continual industrial improvement/logistics on something that is uncertain.
If people had to actually generate the kw to power their house. They'll realize they waste so much. Imagine riding on a bike to generate 100W to power the clfs in your house. Now if you pedal your butt off for 1 hr, you generated .1khw. How much is your elec bill for? 800kWh. Why and how. Your house acts like the equivalent of a tent. Where was the progress. Progress essentially stopped for all of society when people got addicted to cheap energy. Its almost like a mini dark ages. See how ridiculous this sounds. Why are we wasting it away and exporting all our remaining wealth? A post war german style economy would make a difference. We recycled all our materials and reprocessed them without sending it 1000 miles away each direction. We should be doing what we are good at, taking on the insane problems. Like redefining how barges work, using our computing power to something useful. Instead of wasting it on perpetual online entertainment. ... Entertain me god damn it and put it on my card.. I want to escape my reality instead of facing it. Enough said... I believe oil is renewable because it came from algae.
Why is the media only counting the number of jobs (new, lost). Pay has gone down in almost all industries because there are so many people willing to take less money to get a job, employers can pick the cream of the crop for less. Large numbers of companies are now only hiring temps or part time to avoid paying benefits. Many of us are forced to do so much more, in a stressful environment where only the bottom line counts, and are afraid to speak up because we don’t want to lose our jobs (and the people who replace us will surely make less). My beliefs have been capitalist republican for decades, but I am angry because Corporate America has ruined our economy for short term profit. This is America – immediate gratification at all costs – damn the future and consequences.
What about putting money into green jobs?
I am so glad corporate America is doing well! We have known since Ronald Reagan was President that if American Corporations and their wealthy stockholders do well, the benefits will trickle down to the middle and lower classes. I expect that they will distribute some of the wealth to their employees any day now. Maybe more time off, more affordable health care, maybe even a raise. Le's face it, when the top 2 percent of the country do well, everybody wins! Just ask a conservative. Oh, here comes that trickle now...too bad it is urine. Coming from a worker corporate America has just hired in China. Thanks free market (unregulated, unchecked) capitalism!
... lol too bad its urine... that's the best line in a long time.
There is a whole section that needs to be added to this article. Where is the advice to older americans? I'm talking about people in their 40's up to retirement. Some have lost their jobs. Some sweat every time another bad news story comes out that they will be next to loose their jobs. What options do they have?
Take that unemployment money. File for gov retraining. Take a few classes on biz in community. With the overall goal of how to do book keeping, how to break down your financials. You won't learn it in some 20 dollar rich dad or any book that isn't a textbook. Those are just shame jobs. This will teach you how to run and start your own biz. You can be a mid level manager at some fast food place. If you can swallow your pride for a little while and try and learn how to use a computer.
Government involvement to create jobs mAy solve the current problem, but it does nothing to solve next problem. You may create more jobs, but you may crowd out innovation that would have come About through necessity, and hence won't solve the compeition wave that will put ever more pressure on your hired workers and your government debt.
Once you prop up an industry through government, it is very hard to disentagle it, and once workers find a job, they'll be less anxious about creating new industries fr the benefit of society, and much more interested in protecting the failing one that is hiring them. Well at Least until it collapses, like gm
What Zakaria is failing to realize is that there are plenty of technically qualified people to do these jobs. The only problem is that they are over 40 and companies will do anything to not hire them. Until we get past this age bias problem, workers are going continue to be under/unemployed.
this WHOLE article is a farse crock of $h!t!! They cite NURSING as a comback job, well I am an RN and this is no answer to our economic job woes. Nursing is a thankless job anymore with a high turnover, LOW PAY, NOT GROWING like this article says. New grads cannot even find a job, they do and find out they got in it for the wrong reasons, then go back to school to do what they REALLY wanted to do. The REAL problem is our government with it nose in everything in a CAPITLIST country. Example, thanks to the NLRB Boeing cannot open a new plant in South Carolina because the unions seem to think this is retaliation, 1100 plus jobs down the crapper thanks to the union, NLRB, and Big Brother!!
3. "Focus on the growth industries like entertainment, healthcare and tourism. One of the simplest things to do in life is double down on things that are succeeding."
I have several friends in healthcare across varying roles and states. The one thing that remains the same in their interpretation of jobs is this- Yes, people are getting older and some jobs are out there. However, healthcare systems (which let's not forget is a business) are refusing to hire more people to take care of the patient load. For me and you this means less face time with our doctors (yes, I know insurance companies are at fault too), a higher staff load for employees, less beds in the hospital, etc. So yes, there is a need for people, but are the jobs there? No.
I work in health care and am a doctor. I have had a 3 percent raise in 3 years. My health insurance has continued to go up. I feel like the system I work for is actually above average. I don't understand why health care premiums are going up so fast. The insurance companies still take every opportunity to deny or limit care. I have to see more and more patients just to make what I made 3 years ago. I'm not complaining, I really am glad I have a job and make decent money (but for how long). What I don't understand is where that 7 to 10 percent health care premium increase goes. It doesn't go to the providers, I PROMISE. Do we really need for profit health care in this country at all? If there was a single payor system, at least everything would be consistent and you wouldn't have to have an army of clerical and administrative types to process the billing, try to stop procedures to be authorized, etc. To those of you that think it is a terrible idea to take the free enterprise out of health care insurance, ask yourself a simple question; are you satisfied with how the free market has provided healthcare in the US? Why is it we spend many times more per capita for health care than any other industrialized nation, but are as sick as ever and can't even provide 100 percent coverage to the population. What a scam!
Hey, I agree with you. I'm truly appalled how insurance companies think they know what they're doing when it comes to patient care. It's all about the money, honey.
People will dance around this issue until the end of our time... it's OVERPOPULATION that is creating the woes our world faces. On all fronts, the massive growth of our world population dooms people to a life that has fewer and fewer choices. You can only cut a pizza into so many slices. Eventually there won't be any slices left. If there were fewer people the corporations wouldn't be able to exploit the workforce in such a cavalier manner. But we will never be able to see beyond this. I know many people who have five kids or more. And they complain about the worlds problems with everyone else, the lack of opportunities, bla bla bla, without ever noticing the fact that they, themselves, have been one of the main contributors to planetary misery. Humans are doomed and we are going to take as many animals and as much of the planet with us as we can as we proceed on our journey towards self destruction.
You are correct, people don't see opportunities because their opportunity cost is too high. If you could regularly make 25% on an item. Everyone else will jump in on it and drive margins to mass production levels. People need to reduce their opportunity cost, the issue is few people tell you how. You downsize the smart way and realize that downsizing from alot of cheap shit to nice things is actually moving up.
All we really need to do is abolish free trade and use tariffs to raise prices on overseas goods, then you will see the manufacturing jobs come back to the USA, remember all the jobs left due to free trade. The only ones that benefit from free trade are the wealthy and no one else.
You'll never be more affordable compared to someone who lives in a mud house with 15 others. Manufacturing will come back for people who don't want their patents stolen and sold in asia or are tired of the crap quality they get. The manufacturing that will come back will be part cnc related and more about quality. Everything you get from china is not durable. When people get tired of buying the same crap every 3 months. Is where you can come into play. I'd buy american made silverware and glass ware. The secret to germany's economy is everything is made locally. I couldn't find a single plate, spoon, fork, knife or glass that wasn't made in germany. Someone tried to import and sell chinese made lederhosen. People protested to bad on the street. The owner was afraid his store would get damaged and issued a statement that he sent them back. If germans find out you have an import, they go crazy on you.
I agree 100 percent. The average person sees price, and only price. The crap we import is an illusion of value. There is a difference between thrift (sometimes spending more for something durable or of greater quality) and just getting the cheapest price. Unfortunately, many people don't know the difference.
A tariff is the only solution. At that point china will threaten they'll stop buying t bills. So until we cut the spending, bite the bullet and say FU we won't be able to do it.
The corporate America enjoys the prosperity because they got rid of the 24 million less productive workers during the recession, and they found out they don't really need them now that the business is picking up.
There is always dead weight. Too bad we can't shed it in the gov. Anyone who is unemployed and thinks they can do a better job, run for local office (mayor, board, etc.).
I agree with Fareed's general goals but he must give us specific recommendations. For example, he states "we must revitalize manufacturing" like what Germany has done. Well, give us some tips. Propose something. How about: tariffs on cheap goods coming into our country; stop importing products produced by children; stop trading with tyranical regimes; curtail immigration; expand unions. Come on Fareed, give us some specific advice.
I could care less. I'm sitting on $1.5 milllion in stocks, bonds and cash.
Your fault for sitting on cash and bonds. Interest rates have only one way of going and that's up meaning your bonds. Go down. As long as inflation is manipulated into telling you its 3.25% you'll lose cause the CPI " basket of goods" includes chinese goods. That's why inflation was low. I wouldn't hold all that in dollars. The fed is making you invest your money or lose out to inflation. Look at the exchange rates, that's your true indicator. So i hope you got a good money guy.
I hope you don't plan to live on that. Considering where current yields are and the fact that real inflation (you know, the one that includes food and fuel) is probably pushing 8%, your meager income from the 1.5MM won't last that long.
Props though for getting it though.
A prudent investor will have at least 10 percent of his or her assets in precious metals. They have intrinsic value as "money." The stock and bond markets have always been risky, but going forward have to contend with the not so unlikely scenario of a US default on its debt obligations in 10 to 15 years. It doesn't matter if you have international bond and stock exposure, if the US defaults or get close, the world economy will tank. Its just the way it is, the rise of China notwithstanding. If you don't think its possible, look at how close our debt to GDP ratios are to some of the European PIGS (Greece, etc.)
The dichotomy of recovery is due to the "social engineering" of the right. They successfully managed a large scale redistribution of wealth into the hands of a privileged few, and then with amazing flare, convinced those who were victimized by these policies that the people who were actually on their side - the political left, labor unions, and teachers - were their worst enemies.
Yea you got sucked into cheap goods and thinking you were living the high life all that time.
First of all the goverment allowed all our companies to move over seas. There is a ton of jobs right there . Second of all ,this country allows people to come here to work on a vista because people from other countries come here and will work for $5.00 dollars an hour so now the cost of living is not mopving for us but yet all the other things like gas and food keeps on rising and there are so many people not eating because they make too much money fior snap and so this country is screwed because goverment keeps spending our money and pay raises well someday there will be no money then what?????
Oh and I have no debt and I'm only 45 years old.
I'm not impressed. And I doubt anyone here cares. Thanks for trolling, moron.
That foregin aid given to countries whose people aren't thankful is HUGE and X.......that for many decades!!
Add to that all the money that was gambled away from the regular investors,retirees by the greedy Wall Street companies and their employees who made a killing for little work they did!
America (People) must get the money back because it was taken by fraud, and then invest it all to America
Are you suggesting that the people on Wall Street don't work? Talk to any grunt at Goldman Sachs and ask how many hours they work in an average week. (The answer is about 80.) I love the hatred of Wall Street propoagated by the uneducated and misinformed.
If you want to complain about the higher ups – those are generally people with money at risk. When you take a position and invest your own capital or defer 90% of your compensation as bonus, then tell me about how easy it is.
Get a clue.
You are right about the hours. Most people think it all comes from working a cozy job with bankers hrs 9-5. Alot of the people who made alot worked alot.
Yeah, right. The folks at Goldman Sachs are all hardworking saints. That's why they screwed so many people. Why do you assume the system rewards those who deserve it?
I know a few people in other firms and not in ny. They have a base of like 32k but work like 60 hrs a week. At the end of the year they get a year end bonus. News people just look at the bonus and not the fact you went on a 32k or 39k salary all year. Then you get like a 20k bonus. Sometimes more and sometimes less.
Here is the reality. Not everyone can be a a great baseball player; and not everyone is suitable for a college degree. That does not make the people who can't be a great baseball players any less people. In other words, it is a fallacy to say that people lost their jobs because people in China are better at that. Country needs to provide whole spectrum of jobs for its population. Here is an analogy. A. Companies do not care how much air pollution they generate because in their cost matrix there is no line item "cost of treating lung cancer of the 6,000 people living in the next town". But somebody has to pay for that. And that is US government, state government, or people taxes. Companies will continue generating air pollution until we measure it and charge them for it. B. Companies do not care how much unemployment they generate by outsourcing because in their cost matrix there is no line item "cost of outsourcing of jobs of the 6,000 people living in the next town". But somebody has to pay for that. And that is US government, state government, or people taxes. Companies will continue generating outsourcing of jobs until we measure it and charge them for it. That is the job of the US government.
People vote every time they have an item rung up at the cash register. Start making a suggestion to company's that you would prefer they don't use... and tell your store you want an alternative. If people listened it would make sense. Watch Food Inc or something. When was the last time you saw a documentary? 60 mintues doesn't count.
I don't believe that European countries are making outsourcing as easy as in US. In fact there is nice article in TIME how a private engineering company in Germany is keeping the jobs in Germany.
"There are ready pools of skilled labor around the world that are willing to do some of the jobs that used to be done by Americans for a tenth of the price. American labor can't compete."
And why is it that foreign labor is so much less expensive? It's because their cost of living is lower.
And what is the single largest contributor to the average American's cost of living? The roof over their head.
Most people still think that things will get better when the housing market "recovers". Actually, the opposite is true. Increasing home prices will only drive more labor out of the USA. Housing needs to fall, HARD (along with our other basic costs of living, to a lesser degree.)
You are correct, ideally you want to use cheap labor against themselves. The other thing is as long as there are high demands for high returns on the market. Companies will lay off and outsource as best they can to meet those earnings. It doesn't help things when the thing holding up markets are people's retirements. As long as people keep thinking they'll actually retire and they need that 10%. They'll be as ruthless as it takes. Ideally companies will become nike. Make nothing other then a logo. Own nothing except your HQ and license everything out. Sub contractor everything to the point that only upper management stays. That's the ultimate efficiency. Kinda depressing eh? Demand your retirement go to social/eco conscious biz.
If you think that the employment crisis is bad now, just wait 10 years ... Read "As China goes so goes the world". That book is an eye opener. It vividly shows how millions of Chinese are racing into the middle class. As they do, they want the same things we have, cars, air conditioners, travel. Things we take for granted in the West.
The problem is that as the former third world joins the rest of the developer world in consuming the world resources, the price of Oil and food for us will be double or triple what it is today ...
I believe that the changes between now and 2020 will be a bigger paradigm shift than the changes from 1970 to today.
So, my advice, keep reinventing yourself. If you're smart enough, at all cost, start your own business. Do not depend on other companies to give you employment as many current companies will not survive the exponential rate of change for life in the world. And forget working for the Government. Those days are gone. The country is broke!
All good themes for action but no real action plan, just bullet points. I do believe the government is currently trying to follow through on some of these themes although the methods may differ that what most of us desire. Its not up to government policies to fix this – it's us. We have managed our households as irresponsibly as banks have managed their risks.
Yea we are also insanely ignorant. I tried to tell my family for years. They called my crazy and now try and act like they know because they want to save face. You're only making it worse. Why is it people give up learning after hs, especially union people. I don't know how people can be content with not knowing and sit and do nothing all day and not have an original thought.
One idea that I strongly disagree with in this article is the idea that technology is making things cheaper for poor people. Maybe you could talk to some poor people some time and get their perspective. Energy, Food, Health Care and Education are all increasing at dramatic rates, far above the supposed rate of inflation. Poor people survive in America by pooling their resources, sharing living space, caring for each others children during "leisure" time, etc. The situation in this regard has steadily gotten worse over the past 30 years, not better.
Great comment Peter and who made China what it is today? Corrupt US corporations by outsourcing and incompetent politicians.
I had a small business, but I had to pay the credit card company even if i had 0 sales. Plus the only search engine that would list my site is Google, and since they're like the monopoly search engine, they want their piece of every click that goes your way. and to get listed on google is a science in itself. In the end of the day I refused to pay a credit card proccessing system for money I didn't make, I couldn't afford to get listed on Google and my business tanked.
Heh, alot of business is lost when your cash only. Look at the food trucks and all. People pull out the card like its money. It isn't money. They act all offended cause you don't take card. I find it funny when I eat my pizza and watch people try and use card when it says cash only. Sucks for you, get a marketing book and see if there are other ways to get noticed. Like guerilla advertising is what you need. Research that topic in biz/marketing textbooks.
We have always had three economies: The super rich, the have-a-littles, and the have-nothings. Corporate America is a sick joke and our faux capitalism is a blight on the vast majority of the population. We must fight to change these things at every turn.
http://adrianzupp.blogspot.com/2011/04/read-this-and-tell-me-we-arent-being.html
There would be plenty of work here if we would fine outsourcers and stop cheap work visas.
Go to your store and demand us made products. Until you bitch to the store owner, nothing will change. You vote every time you ring up. If it means going to another store then do it, don't be lazy.
So basically, we are becoming the global proletariat, and the means of production, in the hands of the few, are slowly making our existence unnecessary as goods become overabundant.
So... Zakaria is saying here that Marx was right?
We are too busy giving billions of dollars to Egypt and spending the rest of the budget on wars in the Miiddle East to help our own people. Instead, we have made American workers too expensive to hire with healthcare premiums that go through the roof thanks to Obamacare. No small business will hire anyone that isn't essential. I should know, I am a small business owner.
Many Americans work hard and long hours for normal or less money, those Wall Street employees all the way to the top have made a killing, when you divide that pile of cash with hours they've put in it's simply enormous amount per hour, and everyone knows money don't grow on trees, many hard working, long hours, 2 jobs good folks have paid for all that in a form of reduced retirement etc!
When was it decided that the manager, the guy who oversaw the workers, but didn't possess any of their skills, who only coordinated things between the different functions of an organization, was worth more than those who actually did the work? Why should this be so? If it were left to the manager, the company would go bankrupt, as the only thing they know how to do is move people around, tell them to work harder, lay them off, cut their wages, take their pensions, and then outsource their jobs. But because they oversee the operation, someone decided they were worth more. They're not. They don't produce $hit. Oh wait, they do produce lots of that. Why do people always assume the rich "earned" their money? The game is rigged. Time to go back to the guild system.
Study small biz managment, read the text effective small biz management. If you think you can do all that an specialize in a certain field and realize that relating to people is 80% of the job, while keeping track of the numbers. That's the job.
There is a alot of dead weight in management, the worker only sees management as the do nothing. They never realize what goes into keeping a biz running. When they realize its alot of hard work, they go i'll just be the employee. Its easier that way and that's why I get paid less. However most employees were trained to be employees so they don't know how hard it is.
Imagine how difficult it is to keep people motivated without saying if you don't do this i'll fire you without it appearing to be a prison. Why is it everything thinks they deserve more. Why do you deserve more then the other people? Then you'll get the raise.
Got laid off in 2008 after the company went belly up. Ended up taking a lower position job than the one I had, probably set my career back 3 or 4 years. Now I work harder for less money and am suffering from stress induced seizures which has never happened before. Meanwhile the corp rakes in the profits. What we need is a good ol' fashion work stoppage...
Take a vacation. If you can't cut your expenses. If your break is short enough, maybe someone will realize how important you are. If your gone for too long I would cross train another person to take your spot should you leave. So if you become essential or traditionally the close to the money you are, the more you make. I would suggest that you hire a private online helper in india. Give them some things to do while you're doing something else. They'll be like 5 dollars an hr out of your pay but your stress will decrease. Think how you can do your job more effectively and remain essential.
You forgot one thing, our infrastructure needs REPLACED!
That takes MONEY!
That takes SKILLED workers!
We aren't training people in our High Schools to be welders, electricians, concrete workers, mechanics. We are SPENDING BILLIONS to get people to school, and forgetting that there are TRADES jobs out there not taught at COLLEGES!
Just as any Utility how old their Electrical Linemen are, and you will find out the are upper 40's and higher and retiring fast! These are jobs that start out paying $50,000 to $70,000 after 12 or 18 months of training!
Stop forcing our public schools to ONLY train kids for College!
You are right, most schools don't even have home ec anymore because they cut it. You have generations of people who dont know how to cook. They eat out, eat pre packaged food and wonder why they are overweight, diabetic, etc. Schools cut these because they say its non essential. You should teach your kid how to cook, sew, replace a receptacle, how to build a shed, etc. Then let them decide what they want to do. If your a decent carpenter and you do awesome work, you'll always be employed after you get your name out there and been in biz for a year or so. Everything you can't oursource to overseas product is decent. Roofers, mechanics that actually know something other then let me plug in the computer, some machinists who can do autocad and run a cnc machine (make specialty parts, and make your own cnc machine, dont buy it). Common sense, you can make anything you want, you don't need 100k.
He points out that technology has made the fortune 500 more efficient and therefore requires fewer employees. What hurts even more is that this technology comes from paying companies in India and China to build and implement it.
The economy has lost its ability to sustain itself!!
Ideally fortune 500 companies want to sub out for everything. In a super efficient model, you would sub out all work except for book keeping, inventory management and strategic management. Lower level could be outsourced. That is efficient biz but sucks for everyone who isn't a stock holder.
Fareed is nothing more than a filthy globalist. He cares not for the 'average' American worker. He only cares about the 'total' benefit from globalization. To him, it's better for average American's to receive lower wages so that others, outside the US, can have higher wages. This article is nothing more than globalist propaganda...
If you have a little land, it's time to buy some vegetable seeds, and some chickens. Maybe a milk cow and a draft horse. It's time to pull ourselves out of the economy. Quit buying Ipods. Quit buying tvs. Quit buying anything you don't really need. It's time for an Industrial Devolution.
I suggest you read walden and run for local office if your unemployed. I haven't owned a TV in over 9 years.
Right on!!! Michael Moore couldn't have said it any better.
We need to look at the Universal Annuity System.
Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power. Benito Mussolini ... We need investment in infrastructure – education – renewable energy – alternative fuels. Create jobs from innovation. If we would have spent half the money on a "space race" for alternative / renewable energy and ending our dependence on foreign oil – as we spent 3 Trillion on stupid wars chasing bogeymen – we would be much further ahead as a nation.
We are pretty close to the most facist place on earth literally. We have a 2 party system, that's 1 party above facist (single party). It also implies you delegate power to that 1 party to solve your problems. Just the party never receeds the power. So a 2 party system and the structuring so that 2 party get federal funds and 3rd party needs x% of the vote for an election means you put them off for 3 elections until you can be put in all 50 states without suing to be put on the ballot. A two party system plays off on each other like the roman empire. The parties are having problems because people realize its just a game to them. We aren't just 1 or the other. We are a bit of this and that. We had multi parties for years. It kept gov efficient and all. They merged because they realized that they wouldn't need to have concessions. So both went on a merging rampage went from 6 when we founded, to two. As long as independents can't vote in most primaries, is bs. So i hope the parties continue to get split apart because party politics isn't good for the country.
When you have a 2 party system. One side will blame the other forever on why nothing gets done and you have polar opposite extremes. You can never have a real middle with a 2 party system. The middle is an illusion. So i hope candidates run just to steal the election monies. Then when elected renounce their party just to make a statement.
What you have been witnessing over the past 25 years is the robbing and pillaging of the middle class by multinational corporations who have NO loyalty or allegiance to America. If America falls because the middle class falls–as it is getting ready to do right now before our very apathetic eyes–they could care less because they know the world economy will support them as they continue to live in their 300 room castles on 1,000 acres of pristine mountain-view or ocean front estates and continue to drive their million dollar Aston Martins. The scumbags on this comment section deriding the unemployed and those FORCED to live off of government subsidies are nothing more than paid mouth pieces–corporate marks–who think they will get rich by being loyal puppets to their rich masters.
The true radicals are the special interest lobbyists, multinational bankers, military-industrial bigwigs, the oil bigwigs, the Wall Street big wigs, the Banking big wigs, and their puppet politicians and judges. They are conservative when it comes to the government policies and the businesses that control the hiring and local economy in the collapsing middle classes world, but, they become very liberal when it comes to corporate welfare–NAFTA, public-private no-bid government infrastructure contracts, public lands, oil drilling, pollution, court cases against them, banking rules TARP, the SEC, military industrial contracts, bailouts, etc..– Isn't it amazing that if one lone person crying in the wilderness, thrown out of his or her home because of rampant, corporate greed-based unemployment, starts begging their Congressmen for more fair laws to enable them equality in court access, freedom from highway tolls, jobs, bankruptcy, property rights, taxation, insurance, etc..these same scumbag billionaires and their paid grass roots lap dog marks scream "NO MORE ENTITLEMENTS! TORT REFORM!! NO FED BUDGET FOR PUBLIC WORKS!! NO MONEY FOR SCHOOLS!! SLASH $12 TRILLION FROM ALL PROGRAMS THAT BENEFIT THE MIDDLE CLASS!! NO MONEY FOR THE SEC!! NO MONEY FOR THE FDA!! NO MONEY FOR EEOC!! ABOLISH THE ACLU!! ABOLISH UNIONS!! ABOLISH THE NAACP!! ABOLISH HUD!! etc..!!
Yet on the other side of that coin these same scumbags want liberal policies when it concerns their interests– no windfall taxation, no government oversight on our food, drugs, and energy, no limits on oil drilling, no public recourse on the murders their toxic dumps cause, transform all publicly funded government activities into public-private partnerships where $2 trillion of the formerly tax generated public funding's $12 trillion yearly pie is magically transformed into corporate profit (corporate waste), and of course, the biggest big-wig liberal/radical demand of them all-limitless corporate welfare and bailouts and no jail time for big wig criminals who deposit trillions of stolen middle class dollars in Asian and Swiss banks.
The underlying root of the problem in my opinion is that we are just not asking the right questions and we constantly are thinking along the same old lines that we have for decades. The mantra of "we have to focus on creating jobs" is hollow unless we really asl ourselves what jobs we need. There are so many people out there that are working in useless non-productive jobs that help no one while we complain about our inability to educate, our children, provide health care to seniors, and maintain our roads and bridges. If the job is not productive to society then what do we need it for? Job sharing, more vacation time, and working less hours has to be the answer. We have to realize that the most valuable commodity in the world is time. Time spent with our kids, our families, our friends, ourselves. We place more importance on things. This is the more difficult road to travel but the only one that makes sense when you consider environmental factors such as limited resources and pollution. We can come up with a solution and we have the answers that combines wealth, prosperity, health, education, energy, and environment. The only thing we can't seem to do is agree on anything and or cooperate.
The other real question and real solution to it all is asking what exactly is cost? What is money? If we answer these questions correctly we will figure out we have all the money we need to do whatever we need. This is where the game is really rigged. The middle class and the American worker have all the power but they just don't realize it and they can't get together to make things better for themselves. Cooperation is better than competition but coperation is a lot harder to achieve.
"The single biggest thing the U.S. government could do to help small businesses is allow more skilled immigrants into the country."
Fareed, this will in no way help the 24 million Americans who are working. Not to mention the fact that small businesses make up alot of the "part-time" work you included to get the "24 million" figure.
You also forgot to mention that we must CLOSE WALL STREET !! Allowing the wealthy to make more money off the backs of workers here in America, and around the world !! The only way a company can "focus on profits for our investors", is to under-pay their workers. Those who actually "work" to make money for the company!
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Well this is what the last 30 years of trickle down economic philosophy has done for this country. We have established a system where about all we can do as the American middle class is grab our ankles for our corporate overlords as we continually throw every cent we have to the rich and pray that they decide to help us. Any rights we have as workers (Scott Walker anyone?) or any ability to stop corporate interests from doing whatever they want have disappeared. Lobbyists are now the most powerful people in this country after Citizen's United. Democratic or Republican philosophies don't truly matter anymore as they will both screw you for the benefit of corporations with the only difference being that the Democrats will kinda feel guilty about it. Manufacturing was once the base of the American middle class and we have allowed globalization and corporate profits to pull that foundation from under us. America has possibly even lost its classification as a capitalistic society with the prevalence of blatant monopolies and the philosophy of privatizing success and nationalizing failure. America is going to wind up looking like a third world country soon unless something drastically changes.
"The single largest cause of this jobless growth is technology." I stopped reading here because it demonstrated an astounding ignorance that didn't deserve reading further. Jobless growth is due to one thing, government meddling through the monetary system, bailouts, regulation, etc and so forth. New technology means new jobs in a free economy. But we don't have a free economy. We have one where government picks winners and losers.
This concentrates new technology, what smaller amount of it that comes about, in the businesses government has declared to be winners. The businesses that have an inside track. So much of today's technology should be liberating people to have their own businesses like never before. But instead the regulators, the courts, and so on are there to stifle it. To keep the old order intact artificially. To prop it up, to bail it out, to restrict the growth of the new.
Government meddling in the monetary system, various uncertainties about new taxes and regulations, plus all the government induced complications of hiring/firing people makes hiring new people very risky until the existing employees are simply buried in work to the point they can no longer cope. Hiring is a risk and government makes hiring more risky and thus less likely. If overworked employees can't cope and can't get help, they want machines to increase what they can get done in a day. A machine is easier to justify and far less risky.
Sometimes the government just exterminates existing jobs that would continue well into the future. Case in point: Incandescent light bulbs have essentially been banned from our future, all that automated equipment turned to junk by government edict. All the jobs running it and maintaining it? Gone. Where are the new CFL bulbs made? China.
Fareed, you are a smart guy, but you appear to have some economic blind spots.
For example, you refer to US companies having lots of cash as a good thing. I assure you, it is not. If they could find a way to invest the cash for a good return they would do so. The fact that they haven't means they can't. I can also tell you they are scared of this facade recovery turning (as indications are starting to show) and/or another liquidity crisis, so they are quite content to sit on the cash if they can't find ways to grow their businesses. Expect to hear news of more hiring freezes in the coming weeks.
Also, you repeat the oft stated mantra that we are emerging from the financial crisis. Nothing could be further from the truth. GDP is indeed positive, but this is absolutely meaningless in context. As you know, government spending counts toward GDP and what you probably know is that it is almost entirely government spending that is preventing GDP from dropping to what economists would otherwise recognize as depression levels. The part that you either do not know or are just neglecting to mention is that gaming the GDP higher with government spending may make for positive sounding headlines, but it does not necessarily improve the economy. In fact, since the government tends to be worse at allocating resources than individuals, the higher the percentage of government spending that makes up GDP, the less confidence you can have that a positive GDP number actually means the economy is improving.
Further, the toxic mortgage debt is still toxic and still hidden, but rising to the surface slowly but surely. The economy does indeed depend on confidence, not the least because it is currently a con, built upon fraud on fraud, with regulators still looking the other way. Nothing has been fixed, and in fact the leverage and fraud problems that caused the financial crisis have grown even worse.
It is nice to see you using your intellect to offer solutions on how to help workers, but I would trust your advice a bit more if you demonstrated a better understanding of the economic reality first.
I certainly agree with your last point on investing in infrastructure. It can work well for the third world countries as well if their governments are not corrupt. A very good example again could be Germany between thr two world wars. They got the economy growing by their thorough investment in infrastructure. A great deal of Dubai's success was their focus on this issue. It needs lots of laborers with limited skills wgich is good for the very current economic problems and the rate of unemployment. Also, it boosts the economy and provides the means for training new skilled workers. This is undoubtably a grat idea.
Yours
Mahsheed
richardrohrer66@yahoo.com
"There's class warfare, all right, Mr. (Warren) Buffett said, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war, and we're winning."
We're going to slide into becoming a second or even third world nation if we don't watch out. Education? I've got two bachelors' degrees, one in tech. Experience? I've got years of tech experience. But after being unemployed most of last year I'm now UNDERemployed, making 40% less than I was, barely covering my bills. And I'm not living extravagantly. I've gone back for more training and school, but that costs money also. And there's nothing good in my future that I can see, other than years of scrabbling for work. I'll never be able to afford to retire.
KICK THEM OUT OF THE COUNTRY? No – we deny them citizenship Faruz / Fareed or whatever your name is. And while we're at it – why don't you go back to Pakistan. You're not the "brightest" – and we can take someone of similar caliber and have him pontificate on the news. A real American.
Fareed.....now that you have been exposed for the fraud that you are !!!
You can give your boy Barack aid and comfort after a TRUE statesman like Netanyahu, made him look, well.......SMALL !
Government needs to invest in small business more than it has been. That will create more jobs.
I wish Mr. Zakaria wouldn't be so intentionally vague about certain issues. He describes the cause of unemployment to be structural unemployment, when a lot of respected economists and statesmen have stated that the problem is a lack of demand in the economy. Many of the solutions outlined in the article are about bolstering demand in the economy, like investing in infrastructure to stimulate construction jobs, have nothing to do with structural unemployment. I agree that we have a long-term structural problem in our economy. However, to say that the reason our middle class is suffering right now is because of structural unemployment is to ignore that real problem of low demand. This is extremely disingenuous and the type of thing that Mr. Zakaria does often to avoid appearing too liberal. Another example of this is constantly interviewing conservative economists about tax cuts and government spending, and also when he encourages America to become more like Europe, only without the higher taxes that make the whole thing possible.
So, it's beneficial to send our jobs to China so the poor can afford enough plastic things that nobody needs. That's a good reason for taking jobs away from Americans, killing the middle class, and supporting repressive regimes? Try again.
I think that our government's unemployment system is hurting our economy in jobs as well. People ride on unemployment as long as they can and this is a waste of government funds. The government could be using this money to create more jobs and at the same time this would force unemployed people to actually try to get out there and find a job (referring to those on this income for over a year). THe government shouldn't give people unemployment income for such a long time. People might actually try to create those small businesses that were discussed in the article if it wasn't so beneficial to ride on unemployment income for 5 years.
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