Outsourcing Happens
Share this Article
Twitter
Facebook
Delicious
Digg
Stumble
RedditAuthor:
Harrison
Tags:
Bush cap and trade china Democrats japan Obama osaka outsourcing Pioneer Sakai manufacturing complex samsung Sharp sony south korea taiwan taxes Trade Unions
They won't be made in Japan much longer.
Liberals love to talk about how Republicans (mostly George W. Bush when he was president) want to outsource jobs. I guess they think that for every American job that goes overseas Republican politicians get $100.00 deposited into their bank accounts because they are in the “pocket” of all of those big companies… you know… “big” oil, etc… As if the skeptics needed convincing of this statement:
In his India trip, President Bush praised outsourcing of jobs. Outsourcing is part of free trade, he said, and therefore good; Americans can educate themselves into better jobs than the ones they lose. He never praised offshoring – tax havens for business – but he did precious little to stop it because he is in favor of the “free flow of capital.” Both outsourcing of jobs and offshoring of capital are forms of racketeering.
What Liberals (and many others) fail to point out is that the United States is not the center of the world. Ironic because Liberals always want to tie America into the “world” through the United Nations or citing the law of some foreign country to justify something here. But when it comes to outsourcing we are not alone and it is not only about Republicans.
Let’s take a look at a huge issue which has not even broken into the headlines in this country: Japan’s Sharp Corporation’s decision to outsource thousands of jobs from Japan to China.
Japan’s future as a leading exporter was thrown into doubt yesterday as Sharp, one of the country’s biggest manufacturers, warned it would have to shift core production offshore because of the cost of investment and the strength of the yen.
One model could be Sharp’s announcement in November that Enel, Italy’s largest energy company, would take a majority stake in a new Y100bn ($1bn) venture to produce solar panels in Europe.
- Japanese companies outsource, too.
Japan has traditionally been a country of “lifetime employment” meaning exactly what is sounds like: a worker gets his or her first job at a company and works there until they retire and never, during the intervening decades, has to worry about becoming unemployed. Not anymore.
Sharp recently announced that it is laying off 1,500 contract workers in Japan, a first. Not only has Sharp cut its workforce but it has other plans for saving money:
Sharp said it will cut jobs by not extending the contracts of some of its temporary workers, and the cuts will not affect the company’s full-time global work force, which currently numbers about 55,900.
It plans to slash expenses by 200 billion yen over the next two years, including cutting the salaries of executives and managers. The company will also reorganize its LCD factories and reassign some workers.
These moves were made so that Sharp can remain competitive in a tough field. In fact, Pioneer Electronics, another Japanese company, recently announced that it is ending production of all plasma screens and will now buy parts from other vendors. This move will result in the loss of 10,000 jobs:
Regarding the details of the planned layoffs, Pioneer said 6,000 full-time salaried workers, and 4,000 contract workers will be slashed at the company’s domestic and foreign plants.
It is likely that new jobs will be created in other countries which already produce such equipment such as Taiwan, Korea, and China.
To illustrate just how far and how fast outsourcing has hit Japan, Sharp recently completed a huge manufacturing plant in Sakai, Japan:
When Sharp’s new Sakai manufacturing complex comes on stream this year, it will be a model of Japan’s advanced production techniques.
Built on 314 waterfront acres in Sharp’s home city of Osaka, the complex will make solar panels and liquid crystal display panels from pieces of glass bigger than those used by any other plant in the world. Sharp’s total investment will be more than Y450bn ($4.4bn); investments by on-site component suppliers will make the numbers even higher.
Yet if Sharp is serious about its change of strategy – that in the future it will shift to “local production for local consumption” – then it may never build such a vast plant in Japan again.
Were we speaking about an American company making widgets and were a Republican in the White House undoubtedly we would be hearing protests from the Left and unions about how America is becoming a hostile country for the working man and how Republicans, in the pocket of “big business” are getting rich from sending jobs overseas. But we are not speaking about an American company we are speaking of Sharp and Pioneer, two Japanese companies. These two small examples show that outsourcing is not an American issue nor is it about Republicans or Democrats it is about businesses staying in business. Sharp had forcasted a loss of nearly $1.1 billion for their year which just ended, the first loss ever in the company’s 60 year history.
- Does Lou know it happens everywhere?
The same issues are going on in France and Germany with automobile production moving to Eastern Europe as they are occurring everywhere in the First World. Currencies, regulations, healthcare, and taxes are just too high and consumers, thanks in large part to the Internet, view manufactured goods as mere comodities to be purchased based solely upon their price. This is how Sony fell into so much trouble when Samsung came from out of nowhere to steal their marketshare because Americans and others viewed the South Korean’s products to be as good as Sony’s but for much less money.
The lesson here is that outsourcing affects everyone. As much as Democrats and Liberals love to rant about outsourcing what they either don’t seem to understand or care about are that the more taxes and regulations they pile on companies the faster outsourcing will happen. Things such as President Obama’s “cap and trade” will only cause more misery among America’s workers because it will place an unfair tax against businesses that, in other countries, don’t have to pay such fees.
What is so ironic about the entire issue of outsourcing is that unions, who steadfastly support Democrats, don’t seem to realize or care that so many Democratic politices are, in fact, unfriendly to workers in the macro sense because they create hostile environments for businesses. What is even more ironic is that so many union members, listening to their co-workers and union bosses, vote Democratic because they think it is in their best interests when, in fact, it is not.
In the weird spin cycle of politics it is wise to not listen to politicians but instead to look at what the companies of the world are doing because if it’s happening down the street and across the globe for the same reasons there’s more to the story than a few simple soundbites on partisan websites or TV shows.
Did you like this article? Get new articles daily for free via RSS or Email.
9:13 AM
I do not fully support outsourcing jobs, but I think that we can learn and explore more and even obtain better jobs than we might be accustom too.
Salute’s last blog post..Military Child
10:31 AM
“Creating” jobs is a bit like gardening… you need to have the right conditions, a steady hand, and time and they will come.
admin’s last blog post..Outsourcing Happens
2:42 PM
I am a Democrat and I’m not totally against outsourcing jobs if that’s what the company needs to do to survive. But a lot of companies have outsourced jobs merely to raise there profit potential. They were not happy with making a 100 million dollar profit, they’d rather move there company to a third world country where they pay the workers 25 cents an hour instead of paying someone a living wage here in the USA and increase their profits. That is greed. Another thing is companies actually get tax incentives to move to China. Why are we rewarding companies who outsource are jobs. In order for American workers to compete for the jobs being outsourced, our wages would have to be so low that we would be forced to live in poverty. The unions are the only ones helping the workers to have a living wage so that they don’t have live poverty, that is why workers and unions support the Democrats.
Bob’s last blog post..Comment on a conservative’s blog
3:23 PM
Thanks for your comment but you miss a few things.
Let’s take unions… they run the show in Detroit as far as automakers go. When Honda, BMW, VW, and Mercedes-Benz decided to invest billions of dollars to build plants in the US do you think they went to Michigan? Makes sense that they would because of all of the infrastructure and workers but they didn’t… they picked states without unions because that was more efficient. All of that money could have poured into Michigan but didn’t. Since those plants have been there (over 20 years in the case of Honda) not one plant has voted to go union.
Unions hold back their workers in the longrun by increasing outsourcing. They are also at fault for driving the Big Three into bankruptcy.
If you are going to reference companies getting tax incentives to move to China please provide a link to that information.
Free trade works both ways. Companies like Caterpillar rely on exports for over 60% of their revenue. And during these economic times exports have remained one of the few bright spots in the U.S. economy. Take away free trade and you take away those advantages.
Creating a healthy, union-free environment with low taxes will help to stimulate jobs.
Check it out:
http://harrisonprice.com/2009/03/30/when-will-the-unions-be-fired/
admin’s last blog post..Outsourcing Happens
7:09 PM
One reason foreign automakers chose to locate in southern states was because they were offered land for practically nothing and tax incentives that Michigan could not match or didn’t want to match. Also there was a higher number of unemployed and desperate people in the south willing to work for less without a union. Unions don’t cause outsourcing, greedy corporations do. Unions give workers a fair chance at a living wage. Even people without unions owe there fair wages they receive to unions. In reference to companies getting tax incentives to locate in other countries, here is a link for you. http://news.in.msn.com/international/article.aspx?cp-documentid=1854658. Free trade is fine as long as it is fair trade. Unions didn’t drive the automakers into bankruptcy, we all know that he reason the auto companies are in trouble is because most people can’t get a loan to buy a car because the banks aren’t giving loans. The reason only the Detroit automakers are having more trouble is because they have higher pension cost as a result of being business much longer than the Japanese which means they have higher retiree base to support.
Bob’s last blog post..Comment on a conservative’s blog
9:25 PM
I looked at the link, which was pretty short on information and hard facts. MSN.com refers to part of the tax code that allows U.S. companies to invest money in overseas operations and, as long as that money is kept overseas, not pay taxes on it in the U.S. From what I found, this prevents the U.S. government from collecting taxes on about $800 billion. This is the real reason… to get more taxes from companies. Companies often use this money to support operations in other countries which allows them to compete worldwide:
You can read this analysis of it if you want:
http://advice.cio.com/david_poole/outsourcing_creates_jobs_in_the_u_s
As far as unions go… yes… at one time they did help all workers to increase pay and raise the standard of living. That was before there was a minimum wage, before there were laws against child labor, etc… Times have changed.
The facts are the Sourthern states gave credits to the automakers to set up shop but they also gained tens of thousands of jobs directly not to mention many, many more in companies that supply those automakers with parts, housing for workers, etc… And the workers at those plants can still form a union but life is good for them and the UAW has not managed to break into even one of those plants.
If you looked at the graph in the my article linked to above you will see that those workers still make nearly 100% more than the average private employee does.
10:40 PM
They make nearly100% more thanks to the standard in pay the union has established and because the companies want to keep the unions out in order to avoid paying there employees even more. When the union disappear those southern workers will watch there wages drop to minimum wage. By the way, there is no way anyone can support a family or themselves on minimum wages.
Bob’s last blog post..Comment on a conservative’s blog
11:59 PM
The unions lost ALL jobs at Winchester Firearms. And they’re in danger of losing ALL jobs at the Big 3. Pretty good average.
Those auto employees in the South do just fine actually. They make good money and see no reason to unionize.
My point about the minimum wage was that things like that (along with child labor laws which you ignored) weren’t around when unions started. Their time has passed and their membership is on the decline while the standard of living has increased along with worker productivity.
Car companies invest a lot of money into each employee so they can build a good product… they are not going to throw that investment away, particularly when you have Toyota, VW, BMW, Honda, and Mercedes all within driving distance of one another.
10:17 AM
Every time I think of outsourcing jobs I think of John F. Kerry (who served in Vietnam) ranting about the outsourcing of jobs by the Evil Republicans while his wife’s condiment empire has more factories overseas than in America. A typical “Demostandard by the Doublecrats.”
And then there is Dr.O spewing about what France and Spain and Iran are doing and ignoring the massive protests that occurred in America. We clearly are not the Center of the World in their eyes…… unless its convenient for them.
Cracked World’s last blog post..CNN Crashes the Tea Party
2:05 PM
Harrison,
It seems odd that any real American, even a right wing conservative, would actually try to make us believe that out-sourcing American jobs overseas is a good thing. Let me see if I’ve got this straight; the outsourcing of jobs by American companies helps to keep them in business so they are able to hire lots more overseas workers and pay higher dividends to their investors. The investors, in turn, can invest their new found wealth in more companies that create more overseas jobs.
As long as America is a country based on “one man, one vote” the middle class still have a chance to take back this country. The election of Barack Obama is only the beginning.
askcherlock’s last blog post..Pakistan’s Al Qaeda Alliance
3:57 PM
Free trade is what has produced such a large growth in living standards, created jobs, and created peace through better economies.
One of the biggest reasons the Great Depression was so deep was because of trade barriers that were erected.
As I said… Caterpillar Construction earns over 60% of its income from exports… they are not the only ones. You only consider jobs “lost” you do not consider the other side.
Barack Obama is the beginning… but of what..?
3:58 PM
Askcerlock,
Why don’t you buy stock in these companies? Who is stopping you from being an investor?
Burro’s last blog post..Being popular is the most important thing in the world
6:06 PM
Free trade may have created a large growth in living standards for a limited time only. Then the Bush era started and we’ve been going down hill ever since. The republican’s are totally at fault for the recession were in now.Those higher living standards you are talking about are now gone for the middle class anyway, the rich people’s living standard never goes down. Give Obama a chance, he can turn things around.
Burro-maybe Askerlock doesn’t have enough money to buy stock in these companies and what does your comment have to do with outsourcing?
Bob’s last blog post..Comment on a conservative’s blog
6:36 PM
By your logic then technology increases unemployment as we don’t have any more printers or book copiers. Rising living standards create more consumers able to afford more goods and services in other countries, which in turn grows the worldwide economy. Free trade is essential to this. Were it not for the exports this country generates the economy would be in much worse shape and unemployment would be far higher.
I suppose Bush caused the recessions in Russia, China, France, Germany, England, Italy, etc. Your grasp of economics is shaky at best here.
Again, you view 100 jobs “outsourced” without considering the other opportunities which open up. It’s called macro-economics not micro-economics.
9:49 PM
Bob – Asksherlock was demonizing investors for receiving dividends from companies that outsource. My suggestion implied that Asksherlock could become part of this investor class that he seems to loath, and he too could receive these dividends. If he is so smart as to recognize that these companies will make a lot of profit from the way they run their business, why not do whatever it takes to be the one that benefits from this. It is really hard to tolerate people who whine about rich people, who in the same breath criticize others who are giving them advice on how they too might become rich.
To simply blame the recession on Republicans illustrates your narrow-mindedness more than it illustrates an accurate representation of Republicans. The economy was doing fine while the Republicans controlled the House, the Senate, and the White House. Democrats took the House and Senate in 2006, and a lot has gone downhill since. An astute economist with a basic knowledge of history could probably trace this economic crisis back to the founding of the country. To claim that Bush singlehandedly engineered this crisis in 8 short years is silly. Fortunately, the American economy is too strong and dynamic for any single person or party to destroy it. However, hundreds of millions of people making billions of wrong decisions can certainly create problems – and this seems to be what happened in this crisis. Barack Obama can’t fix this. Time will fix it. Barack Obama could possibly accelerate or prolong the recovery but he can’t fix it. The way things are looking, he will probably prolong it.
Burro’s last blog post..Being popular is the most important thing in the world
7:17 AM
It wasn’t only Bush – it was 28 years of Raygun’s voodoo economics. Most people don’t realize that Repugnants have been in charge of either the Whitehouse, Congress or both for the last 28 years. And supply side economic is their forte. Despite it’s huge failure, they still promote it. It is their only option.
As for outsourcing, you might want to ask all those non-union auto workers in the South where their daddies and mommies used to work. In the textile mills. That no longer exist. Due to outsourcing by clothing manufacturers who are now almost all completely gone from the American economy themselves. Not a great loss since non-union textile mills were not a fun place to work but southern workers have always allowed their massahs to run their lives. Now their sons and daughters can work in the non-union auto factories owned by foreigners.
But my biggest complaint about outsourcing against Bush was his outsourcing of American defense and military security. I frankly cannot see how the so-called party of Patriotism and the American Way can allow our military needs to be outsourced to foreign companies and the security of some or all of our diplomatic corps and military leaders to be placed in the hand of private companies. It just boggles the mind.
8:32 AM
You Republicans wonder why I get upset and call you names sometimes. In one comment you managed to insult me by calling me narrow-minded and referring to my notion as silly. You’re the one who is narrow minded if can’t remember that President Clinton left office with a budget surplus and Bush left office with a 2.5 trillion dollar deficit. Don’t try to blame that on the fact that Democrats took control of the house in the later part of 2006. That is a mute point, especially with all the filibustering going on and Bush’s veto power. I think your grasp of economics is shaky at best. If you don’t think the world’s economy doesn’t depend on the USA’s economic condition then you are not facing reality. The USA is the world’s number one consumer of goods and if we aren’t buying, nobody is making money. and when I say Bush is the one to blame for the USA’s economic downturn, it’s not to far fetched to assume he is the cause of the recession in Russia, China France, Germany, England, Italy and the rest of the world as well. Use your common sense if have any.
Bob’s last blog post..I need to lighten up a little bit
8:56 AM
Former President George W. Bush did not once, in 8 years, ever use his “veto power.” Becoming educated as to the facts is useful should you desire to engage in an intelligent conversation with somebody else.
And I’m sure the textile mills did not pay the $42 to $47 per hour now earned in the auto plants in the South, either.
1:46 PM
Bush’s threat to use his veto power was almost as good as using it. You said nothing about the filibustering by the Republicans.
Bob’s last blog post..I need to lighten up a little bit
2:49 PM
Harrison, I think YOU need the history lesson. Bush never needed to use his veto power in the first 6 years of his residency. Because he had no opposition. With Republican majorities in Congress, oversight of the Bush administration was negligible at best. But when the Democrats took control in 2006, Bush remembered where he left his veto powers.
From About.com:
As of December 2008, President George W. Bush had vetoed only 12 bills since taking office in January 2001. Only one Presidential veto occurred before Democrats took control of Congress in January 2007. This is the fewest Presidential vetoes of any modern President; in March 2006 Bush set a 200-year veto record. Source: US Senate.
1. Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2005
2. US Troop Readiness, Veterans’ Care, Katrina Recovery, and Iraq Accountability
3. Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007
4. Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007
5. Water Resources Development Act of 2007
6. Appropriations: Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, 2008
7. Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007
8. National Defense Authorization Act for FY2008
9. Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008
10. Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008
11. Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 (twice, apparently)
12. Medicare Improvement for Patients and Providers Act of 2008
I have no idea how much the laborers in foreign auto factories make in the South. Somehow I suspect, since you had no idea that Bush vetoed bills, you also have no idea how much they make.
During the Raygun era the purpose of much of the outsourcing of jobs was to (1) reduce costs and (2) bust unions. I worked as a yardmaster on a railroad at that time and I also did side jobs as a programmer. On a new programming job I was surprised to find clerks I had known in the steel mills from the railroad. Their jobs had been eliminated and they were working as outside contractors for minimum wages and no benefits doing the same jobs.
The fact of the matter is that corporations have their own agendas, morals and natural history. By nature they require a profit or they die. As corporate entities they owe loyalty to no one though they demand loyalty from their employees. They are not American nor are they any other nationality. They hate unions who are the only ones strong enough to stand up to them and they discount their employees as “cost centers”. Their dream in life is to run their corporation without any of those nasty employee people. But they can’t so they put up with it. However, first chance they get, they dump their employees and, while they have no nationality, they do not hesitate to use shills like you to scream about marxism and socialism and big government and regulations whenever anybody wants to get their excesses under control. A little like the NRA, ya know? “They wanna take our guns” becomes “They wanna take our profits”. “They wanna tax our guns” becomes “They wanna bankrupt us with taxes”. Which is all bullshit because Clinton raised taxes and the economy went boom! Raygun, Bush and Bush cut taxes and services and everything went bust! Because you can’t gift rich people with money and hope they will invest in the economy. Repubtards make fun of Obama and hope – well what about Raygun and Bush and Bush hoping that rich people, out of the goodness of their hearts, would create more jobs. The rich only create jobs when they see a market. And a market only occurs when people have money to spend. Millions of people. Not hundreds. During Raygun’s time, rich people used the extra money to buy out their competitors and eliminate jobs. You see where that went. They also raped retirement funds and health plans. Without conscience. Good Americans all, eh? Ayn Rand and the theory of greed ruled the day. And, in Republican circles, still does. They are a bankrupt group of people – without answers. Their song has ended.
2:56 PM
My mistake on the veto. Thank you.
2:29 PM
Wow, I can’t believe I agree with the old fart
Bob’s last blog post..New Blog Template