MSNBC: "The next wave of significant job creation will occur abroad, where labor is cheaper"

[Amerigo Vespucci]

The Great Recession has reshaped the American workplace and work force in ways that will last years, if not longer.

Perhaps the most enduring change is the permanent loss of millions of jobs across the manufacturing, services and retail sectors.

For textile factories and service sector employers like customer service call centers, the next wave of significant job creation will occur abroad, where labor is cheaper. That trend was under way before the recession and will accelerate, according to labor economists. Americans who would have held these jobs will have to retrain themselves for other jobs, such as assembling microchips and medical devices.

For retailers, growth will be limited by more cautious consumer spending, in part because the days of easy credit are over. That means fewer retail clerks milling about stores around the holidays, and fewer merchandise buyers and other staff jobs at headquarters.

"We're in a very deep jobs crisis, and we're not coming out of it," says William George, professor of management at Harvard Business School. "It's too glib to say that jobs are a lagging indicator" and that hiring will return to normal once the economy does, he says.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33020534/ns/business-reinventing_america/

[Skittles]

1. cheap overseas crap

:puke:

[Kievan Rus]

32. They wouldn't make it if we didn't want it

[amandabeech]

34. A lot of would rather that it be made here even if it costs more. n/t

[Skittles]

38. don't say WE

say SOME PEOPLE because I am definitely not one of them

[soverywendy]

45. And what the criminals in power never hear is:

You don't make it here, you don't sell it here.

[Bobbieo]

41. Bush's Global Gag Order is coming to play,, now - It's been 9 years!!!!

[Nikki Stone1]

2. They're killing us

We are being turned into a 3rd world country

[wroberts189]

6. Aye.. If we are not already there. nt

[Initech]

3. Our economy is never gonna get better if crap like this keeps happening.

KEEP JOBS IN AMERICA GOD DAMN IT!!!!

[Romulox]

4. Just remember: Outsourcing hasn't gone too far just because YOUR job has been sent overseas.

:hi:

[CoffeeCat]

5. The handwriting is on the wall..

The corporations are in charge now. Through paid-off politicians--the corporations
and their profits are tantamount.

We PAY corporations to fire American workers and take those jobs overseas.

American people don't matter any more. Corporate profits matter. How are corporations
supposed to make money if they're paying workers decent salaries, giving them benefits,
complying with environmental regulations and paying their fair share of taxes?

Corporations are only about profits, and our political system has decided that
corporate profits take precedence over the American people and the future of this
country.

So...what are WE going to do about it?

[thunder rising]

21. Well for starters we're going to allow 65K into the US as H1-B guests and train them to replace us

[Rosa Luxemburg]

7. the big fat cats should give their profits to American workers

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. When most of the wealth is controlled by 1% of the population

ugly things happen in most societies.

Perhaps this is a lesson that needs to be learned anew. Or perhaps Americans will finally realize the power of organizing in a peaceful way.

I will not hold my breath on either of these happening... but sooner or later a population will react in ways that elites should be able to predict, but never do.

Oh and on edit, this is not capitalism, but fascism, American style...

[w4rma]

13. If things go too far, peaceful organizing will no longer be a choice.

Peaceful organizing can only go on while it's allowed to by those in power. Luckily were not close to being there yet.

[Kievan Rus]

33. Au contraire...we're already there

There's any number of good threads on the G-20 in Pittsburgh.

[imdjh]

14. Any idea what it was in Tsarist Russia?

Your post just made me think, "Well, America's a big country. One percent is millions of people. I wonder how that would compare to a feudal society."

I'm think that the wealth is more spread around now than it was in Tsarist Russia, for instance. And isn't that a wonderful claim to fame on our part?

[nadinbrzezinski]

23. What period of Tsarist Russia

before the Sefts were emancipated it was about there, after they were emancipated well wealth started to rise as the country became industrialized.

Realize revolutions usually happen in either accelerating changes for the good or in the case of the US, a middle class that is quickly disappearing.

Most people do not realize this, but the 1905 Duma passed legislation that started the rapid industrialization of Russia, as well as quite a bit of distribution of wealth.

Nor do people realize that the US is at the highest concentration of wealth in its modern history. It got this close in the Gilded Age, but during the Gilded Age the US had an escape hatch, go West young man.

[RKP5637]

17. Exactly, we have runaway capitalism now moving into facism...

I think the upheaval in this country as this continues will be significant. The gov. needs to get ahead of this, but the politicians for the most part are bought and paid for by the corporations... and the ignorant portion of the country that is proud of being ignorant is bought and paid for by the republicans and the religious right. It is a nasty set of circumstances all the way around. One can be sure those holding the wealth of the country will do little to jeopardize their holdings, consequently, America will descend into a third world country. All hell will probably break out eventually. And democracy has been out the window for awhile now. The society will become very unstable. Those holding wealth may well decide to leave the country and manage what's left from afar leaving a once great country in shambles in their wake, There are many things that could be done, but our country has been sold out to fascism.

[imdjh]

9. When you think about it, a lot of this has happened since fair trade laws were repealed.

I don't know enough about it to make a case for it, just noting the timing. Fair Trade Laws were repealed in 1975. They were started during the Great Depression.

[MindPilot]

10. It can't last forever

Just this past week, I bought two items, a clock and a blender. I had to correct manufacturing defects in both of them before they would work. I hope at some point people will get tired of buying broken made-in-china shit.

[nadinbrzezinski]

11. Today I bough a few free weights

even those were made in China...

[imdjh]

20. That's sick. It makes you wonder if it isn't a habit rather than a business plan at this point.

But we also need to consider that things have changed. Twenty years ago, you were buying American corporate goods made at American contracted Chinese factories. And you still are when you buy many things. But now China is also selling their own designs and products to American merchants without even the illusion of Huffy, RCA, etc.. They have their own brands, and we're actually getting to know them and to prefer one over the other.

[DJ13]

12. I think its time to outsource MSNBC

I bet we could hire english speaking Chinese people to read the news a lot cheaper.

[Double T]

15. So why don't we all just do nothing while the economic terrorists of............

wall street, corporate america, our congress and the WH continue to dismantle the Corporate Republic of Greed (formerly known as the USA). Vote out every incumbent politician at every level of government; that's the first step toward real change. America is doomed if WE THE PEOPLE don't start doing something about it!

[Jkid]

16. What is this. I don't even.

assembling microchips and medical devices

I thought we shipped those jobs to China?!

[Amerigo Vespucci]

25. I know...that was my first thought upon reading it, too. n/t

[TreasonousBastard]

18. I guess nobody remembers when the Northeast lost...

all those manufacturing jobs to the South with the cheap non-union labor down there. The mills were the first to go, with J.P. Stevens leading the charge. Then everyone else followed with little left up here but small machine shops servicing military contractors.

We did it to ourselves, first, long before China and India were players.

(Since WWII we have consumed about 25% of the world's resources annually and thew world has finally gotten tired of it.)

[anonymous171]

24. What? They aren't tiring at all. They love selling us shit to consume.

[HughMoran]

19. duh

this is "new"s?

[Amerigo Vespucci]

28. News to "some" people...

...here's an example. Because I am a sole proprietor and own my business, I am also my "sales force." Even in the best of economies, many clients "shut down mentally" around Halloween, and the words "Let's talk about this after the first of the year" become some of the most commonly heard words in a salesperson's day.

Three weeks ago I mentioned this to a friend, and old-school "sales dog" who cold called decades ago and has had to resume doing so in the current economy. He agreed that the "Let's talk about it after the first of the year" rhetoric will probably start sooner, last longer, and go deeper than in recent years.

Last week I received the new issue of a sales newsletter I subscribe to, and it had an article on "Wht the next 30 days will be critical"...basically everything I just wrote above, and I thought...as you did..."THIS IS NEWS?"

In the MSNBC article, "That means fewer retail clerks milling about stores around the holidays, and fewer merchandise buyers and other staff jobs at headquarters" is the line that WILL be news to some people. Remember, last year at this time we were not calling the recession "the recession." We've lost several "big box" retailers like Circuit City, which were mainstays of holiday shopping.

So even though you and I and most of the people on DU can look backward and look forward and do the math on what's coming in the final months of 2009, I guarantee that it will be "news" to some. How, I don't know. Maybe people are in denial. Maybe people are dancing in the streets over Ben Bernake's pronouncement that "the recession is over."

We shall see.

[Hardrada]

22. I caught this in the business section of the Des Moines Register

as an AP release I think. My reaction is the same. This type of release is a signal of what the elites plan to do unless they can be somehow stopped. A society with such inequities is a society that should disappear from history.

[Romulox]

26. President Obama has taken a stand, demands that AMERICAN tires be supplied with all Kias!

:eyes:

[Larkspur]

27. This is how the elites will kill social security and entitlements

foreign labor doesn't pay into social security or medicare.

[KakistocracyHater]

35. It should. Quietly slip it in a bill last minute.

I've been thinking for several years, about laws, watching stories with women being held as slaves-whether a cook in a kitchen or a sex "worker".....about Kosovo having this as normal. I wonder if American laws should extend wherever an American citizen is located; it's a variation of holding to your families expectations, minding your manners. Penalties could be waiting for those who've gone abroad & broken American laws. Thoughts?

[KT2000]

29. Wes Clark told us

about this in the 2004 election.
The US is no longer the consumer capital - it has moved to India and China. Corporate america could care less about this country and will gear its resources to the conumer growth - not the declining countries.

And we will subsidize them while they are doing it.

[leveymg]

30. The next wave will be outsourcing of highly-skilled positions and professional services

The gutting of the American middle-class will move upmarket, eliminating jobs previously held in the U.S. by persons with advanced degrees that were once viewed as recession-proof.

That will leave two classes in America: a few very rich, and a lot of poor people. Just like every other third-world country.

[girl gone mad]

40. That's unavoidable at this point.

Most white collar jobs are in service to the manufacturing sector. Most accountants, marketers, engineers, lawyers, researchers, sales people, etc. work on behalf of product manufacturers so of course these jobs will end up overseas, too. A service sector that only services the service sector simply doesn't make sense in the context of an economic system which was designed to derive income by taking raw goods and making a finished product out of them.

[shireen]

31. time to bring back tariffs and/or fix trade imbalances

free trade only works on a level playing field.

[amandabeech]

36. Obama will do nothing about this and neither will congress.

They are bought and paid for.

The only dems in the primary who were willing to talk about this were Kucinich and Edwards (and a lot of people thought that Edwards was totally insincere).

Look where it got them. Neither one of them got decent media coverage. It was all Obama and Hillary, neither of whom was going to do anything about this.

I'm with the Dems because they're much, much better on other issues but I have given up on them when it comes to jobs. They're much too happy with those huge donations from Wall Street, Big Pharma and multinational corporations of all stripes.

Dennis is still around, but he doesn't inspire enough people to follow him.

I'm afraid that this situation will get so bad that instead of a progressive leader like FDR taking on the big corps we will have some sort of Peron or Mussolini right-wing type.

[Skittles]

39. CORRECT

[amandabeech]

42. Thanks! n/t

[tXr]

47. They are all bought and paid for,

and it would be unsurprising if the bribery and corruption leads to the rise of a right-wing cornpone dictator.

[Triana]

37. This COULD be fixed with "green" jobs and returning manufacturing to the US

but. . . don't hold your breath waiting.

[Anakin Skywalker]

43. "The Economy is Strong" DimSon (G.W.) Said

not too long ago. A shame somebody didn't yell out "YOU LIE!" back then!

[Hannah Bell]

44. such bullshit it is. they report this as though it's a law of nature, when in fact

it's a deliberately manufactured state of affairs to produce super-profits.

[Matariki]

46. How does that go again...oh yeah...time to eat the rich...

news executives first on the menu...

[olegramps]

48. Isn't part of the blame for loss of jobs the responsibility of workers?

Millions of workers bought the corporate line of crap that unions were their enemy and that management would take good care of them. Many of the workers who received decent pay and benefits that were solely won by the unions were more than glad to accept the benefits but refused to support organized labor. Well, the workers lost their most powerful advocate for responsible legislation when they abandoned the unions to the corporate lobbyists who now control congress.

The workers were sold a bill of goods that tariffs were evil devices and the free trade was an utopian worker's paradise. Now they are crying about how their jobs got shipped to a third world country where the corporations can exploit the desperate masses at will. Their jobs are gone,their pensions cut and health insurance canceled or made so damn expensive they can't afford it even with its high deductibles and co-pays. The situation if even more ludicrous since I see that many of these same workers are now buying into the corporate propaganda and blaming the unions for their plight. As long as corporations can out-source jobs without any consequences and even with the assistance of government, the situation can only continue to deteriorate. The workers will find themselves in the same situation that was the plight of workers prior to the New Deal legislation.

[Romulox]

50. More than "part".

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to drive my Hyundai down to the anti H1b demonstration.

[SoCalDem]

49. The "growth" industry for the near future?

Care & feeding of decaying Boomers:(..

can't you just see the youngsters lining up for those jobs:(