Hyerdahl wrote:

> Dagger wrote:
>
>>The elites who are engineering the transformation of the USA
>>into another Brazil, or worse, need to be HANGED.
>
>
> I agree with you, but perhaps the "elites" are not who you think they
> are.  The Republican party, George Bush and his daddy have vested
> interests in making sure their "fellow Americans" become servants to
> the rich.

My god! Hymendung just said something sensible!
Let us pray.

D.

>
>>------------------------
>>
>>Outsourcing Innovation...And Everything Else
>>
>>America's Has-Been Economy
>>
>> By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
>>
>>http://www.counterpunch.org/
>>
>>A country cannot be a superpower without a high tech economy, and
>>America's high tech economy is eroding as I write.
>>
>>The erosion began when US corporations outsourced manufacturing.
>
> Today
>
>>many US companies are little more than a brand name selling goods
>
> made
>
>>in Asia.
>>
>>Corporate outsourcers and their apologists presented the loss of
>>manufacturing capability as a positive development. Manufacturing,
>>they said, was the "old economy," whose loss to Asia ensured
>
> Americans
>
>>lower consumer prices and greater shareholder returns. The American
>>future was in the "new economy" of high tech knowledge jobs.
>>
>>This assertion became an article of faith. Few considered how a
>>country could maintain a technological lead when it did not
>>manufacture.
>>
>>So far in the 21st century there is scant sign of the American "new
>>economy." The promised knowledge-based jobs have not appeared. To the
>>contrary, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports a net loss of
>
> 221,000
>
>>jobs in six major engineering job classifications.
>>
>>Today many computer, electrical and electronics engineers, who were
>>well paid at the end of the 20th century, are unemployed and cannot
>>find work. A country that doesn't manufacture doesn't need as many
>>engineers, and much of the work that remains is being outsourced or
>>filled with cheaper foreigners brought into the country on H-lb and
>>L-1 work visas.
>>
>>Confronted with inconvenient facts, outsourcing's apologists moved to
>>the next level of fantasy. Many technical and engineering jobs, they
>>said, have become "commodity jobs," routine work that can be
>
> performed
>
>>cheaper offshore. America will stay in the lead, they promised,
>>because it will keep the research and development work and be
>>responsible for design and innovation.
>>
>>Alas, now it is design and innovation that are being outsourced.
>>Business Week reports ("Outsourcing Innovation," March 21) that the
>>pledge of First World corporations to keep research and development
>>in-house "is now passe."
>>
>>Corporations such as Dell, Motorola, and Philips, which are regarded
>>as manufacturers based in proprietary design and core intellectual
>>property originating in R&D departments, now put their brand names on
>>complete products that are designed, engineered, and manufactured in
>>Asia by "original-design manufacturers" (ODM).
>>
>>Business Week reports that practically overnight large percentages of
>>cell phones, notebook PCs, digital cameras, MP3 players, and personal
>>digital assistants are produced by original-design manufacturers.
>>Business Week quotes an executive of a Taiwanese ODM: "Customers used
>>to participate in design two or three years back. But starting last
>>year, many just take our product."
>>
>>Another offshore ODM executive says: "What has changed is that more
>>customers need us to design the whole product. It's now difficult to
>>get good ideas from our customers. We have to innovate ourselves."
>>Another says: "We know this kind of product category a lot better
>
> than
>
>>our customers do. We have the capability to integrate all the latest
>>technologies." The customers are America's premier high tech names.
>>
>>The design and engineering teams of Asian ODMs are expanding rapidly,
>>while those of major US corporations are shrinking. Business Week
>>reports that R&D budgets at such technology companies as Hewlett
>>Packard, Cisco, Motorola, Lucent Technologies, Ericsson, and Nokia
>
> are
>
>>being scaled back.
>>
>>Outsourcing is rapidly converting US corporations into a brand name
>>with a sales force selling foreign designed, engineered, and
>>manufactured goods. Whether or not they realize it, US corporations
>>have written off the US consumer market. People who do not
>
> participate
>
>>in the innovation, design, engineering and manufacture of the
>
> products
>
>>that they consume lack the incomes to support the sales
>
> infrastructure
>
>>of the job diverse "old economy."
>>
>>"Free market" economists and US politicians are blind to the rapid
>>transformation of America into a third world economy, but college
>>bound American students and heads of engineering schools are acutely
>>aware of declining career opportunities and enrollments. While "free
>>trade" economists and corporate publicists prattle on about America's
>>glorious future, heads of prestigious engineering schools ponder the
>>future of engineering education in America.
>>
>>Once US firms complete their loss of proprietary architecture, how
>>much intrinsic value resides in a brand name? What is to keep the
>
> all-
>
>>powerful ODMs from undercutting the American brand names?
>>
>>The outsourcing of manufacturing, design and innovation has dire
>>consequences for US higher education. The advantages of a college
>>degree are erased when the only source of employment is domestic
>>nontradable services.
>>
>>According to the Los Angeles Times (March 11), the percentage of
>>college graduates among the long-term chronically unemployed has
>
> risen
>
>>sharply in the 21st century.
>>
>>Misled by propagandistic "free trade" claims, Americans
will be at a
>>loss to understand the increasing career frustrations of the college
>>educated. Falling pay and rising prices of foreign made goods will
>>squeeze US living standards as the declining dollar heralds America's
>>descent into a has-been economy.
>>
>>Meanwhile the Grand Old Party has passed a bankruptcy "reform" that
>
> is
>
>>certain to turn unemployed Americans living on debt and beset with
>>unpayable medical bills into the indentured servants of credit card
>>companies. The steely-faced Bush administration is making certain
>
> that
>
>>Americans will experience to the full their counry's fall.
>>
>>-----------------
>>
>>Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the
>>Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street
>>Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review.
>>
>>
>>
>>.............
>>
>>-=-
>>This message was sent via two or more anonymous remailing services.
>
>


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