I'm gloomy on job prospects.

[chieftain]

I fear that there is very little to be done in the short term. The past 20-30 years have seen the de-industrialization of America. The combination of globalization, union-busting , off shoring and outsourcing have seriously eroded the underpinnings of middle class security. The natural by-products of trading a production economy for a consumer economy have been mounting family debt,the necessity of two earner families, fast food substituted for the family dinner, walmart clothes and Chinese tainted dog food. I don't know how we climb out of this predicament but I am pretty sure Geitner and Summers don't have a clue and the Republicans like the way things are.

[Gregorian]

1. Shipping and labor

Petroleum is relatively cheap. And our labor is relatively high. Combine that with a billion people strong in Asia, and you can see exactly what we're up against.

If we dropped our labor rates so that we were slaves, we would then be competitive with the slaves in Asia. If their labor rates rise, the same may happen.

If shipping costs prohibit this massive shuttling of products across the globe, then we would again be using our own workforce to produce.

It sucks. But who didn't see this clearly coming as far back as the 70's? I am not unusually bright. I saw it. It must have been obvious to many.

There may be other ways out of this. It's really disturbing to watch this. And not just from a human standpoint. We're killing the planet.

Posts regarding labor rates always get people riled up. Look, CEO's aren't the problem. I'm not talking about Exxon, Goldman Sachs. I'm talking about every little company in America. Every laborer in this country. I made huge wages as a roofer. Roofs cost too much. Cars, houses, milk, and everything else costs too much. The whole system is inflated. I am not blaming workers. They get the jobs done. But it's the same story as the frogs in warming water. If you can't jump out of the water, then it needs to cool down somehow.

[amandabeech]

2. Don't forget the cost of workplace safety and environmental regulations.

Those items, which we like, add a lot to the cost of good made here and in other modern countries.

One thing that people have become used to is having an incredible amount of cheap stuff. Go to Europe and see how expensive many items are there as compared to here, and it is not all VAT.

I was born in 1955 to a poor/working class family. We had enough, but we bought items that could be fixed, and I had to use my imagination more in my play because we couldn't afford lots of throw-away toys. We had a TV, a radio, a telephone and small stereo. I didn't get bunches of new clothes all the time, but nobody did.

On the other hand, there were jobs for all abilities, including folks who were offering only an honest days' labor for an honest days' pay, and if we had to go to war, we could build our weapons here, which is something that no one now seems to think is necessary.

I think that we should impose tarrifs to account for the lack of regulation in those areas, plus inspecting products to make sure that they are safe. We should also consider a tariff so that we have enough jobs to keep our social and political system from blowing up.

And we're ALL going to have to get used to having less unimportant stuff, and means the wealthy, too.

We also need to tax high wealth and income, and teach kids in ALL schools about the dignity of work--including the type that GWB went to.

I believe that we may actually then return to being a real society, not just a collection of economic actors and consumers of useless stuff.

[Gregorian]

4. We're the same age.

I was thinking tariffs when I wrote that. I cringe when I think about it. But considering the resources this country has, and I believe still has, we should be able to make our own world pretty nice on this continent.

I also grew up without much at all. Things don't bring happiness. And we've forgotten that. We're scared people. I'm not. But so many are. It's pathetic.

I should gather information on the factors involved in our decline. I am quite certain that wages have more to do with it than any other factor. The multiplicity is there. The big numbers are the workers. Not the blame, but the numbers.

I remember graduating as a machinist, all happy. A great experience. Learning how everything is manufactured. Shortly thereafter the entire machining program stopped, and all of the equipment was auctioned. It has been 25 years, and I still am in shock that it happened. It was like letting the drawbridge down. Come on in and take what you want.

And this is where one thing lead to another. The workers didn't do that. I later became an engineer. And when it came time to produce injection molds for the company, we thought about China. There were still capable machinists over here, but later on that company did go to China for their molds. Now that is due to the worker. And I suppose that is what protection could do for us. If we kept our workforce isolated from the super cheap labor of Asia, we wouldn't be feeling the competition. There are more than a billion people in Asia. That's absolutely huge. And no matter how we protect ourselves, if we can't sell our stuff to Europeans because it's so much more expensive than china's products, then protection would be damaging. It's pretty hard to isolate now.

We're in a mess.

[Born_A_Truman]

3. I sincerely wish you the best ...

I remember in the 60's when my X lost his job because the factory wanted to unionize and they just shut it down and moved out of state. Jobs were scare there and I scrambled to find a job (was a SAHM) so we could feed our family.

Please don't give up!