Those unions watching out for their workers...

[Jeffwhosoever]

You are woefully behind on this subject:

The rise of engineers in China is leaving the US behind - Jul. 29, 2010

LOL. No, I am not. I don't know about today, but a few years back, less than 5 years ago, Chinese electrical engineers were studying vacuum tubes. We outsource blue collar work to China, white collar work to India.

 

[Vylo]

LOL. No, I am not. I don't know about today, but a few years back, less than 5 years ago, Chinese electrical engineers were studying vacuum tubes. We outsource blue collar work to China, white collar work to India.

It isn't just blue collar work. Read the article. There is another one by Forbes. China is now the top exporter of High-end technology. They outpace our engineering programs several fold. Those engineers are at work in factories competing with America. They are moving into more and more advanced fields, and at the current rate with their graduates and our lack thereof, they could soon start taking our last 2 major beacons of high tech manufacturing; chemicals and pharmaceuticals.

Education is a huge factor for employment. If it weren't you could hire cavemen for labor.

Say my plant did that. We would be shut down within a week, fined millions of dollars and probably hundreds would die from contamination, because the workers didn't know any better.

Education gives power to the workers and resources to the employer.

 

[TeddyReceptus]

Lots of complaining. No solutions.

Got any?

Yeah: let's get back to a time when CEO's weren't making hundreds of times more than the workers, when executive boards weren't busy just lining each others pockets and provide ethical leadership for the entire company...not just their own self-interests.

Let's also, as a nation, remember that if we are willing to pay a few cents more for our tube socks we might be able to ensure our FELLOW AMERICAN CITIZENS can have jobs!

And when the corporations say that that extra few cents shouldn't go to wages for the workers but should go to the shareholders and the executive boards we should stand up and say THIS IS WRONG:

Look at the orange line of CORPORATE PROFITS and look a the line of WORKER PAY.

You want some "answers"? THERE'S YOUR ANSWER.

It's as clear as day.

 

[TeddyReceptus]

China isn't booming because they have more educated workers. They are booming because labor costs are much less than the US. Any idea how much labor goes into a new Iphone?

$8

This is a recipe for the race to the bottom. Some companies are even finding Chinese labor rates too high! And so they are moving the jobs to Indonesia and elsewhere.

Again, let's look at the data:

Can anyone explain to me what the PROBLEM is here?

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

It isn't just blue collar work. Read the article. There is another one by Forbes. China is now the top exporter of High-end technology. They outpace our engineering programs several fold. Those engineers are at work in factories competing with America. They are moving into more and more advanced fields, and at the current rate with their graduates and our lack thereof, they could soon start taking our last 2 major beacons of high tech manufacturing; chemicals and pharmaceuticals.

Education is a huge factor for employment. If it weren't you could hire cavemen for labor.

Say my plant did that. We would be shut down within a week, fined millions of dollars and probably hundreds would die from contamination, because the workers didn't know any better.

Education gives power to the workers and resources to the employer.

China steals our IP. Name a major Chinese technological invention that compares to an Iphone.

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

This is a recipe for the race to the bottom. Some companies are even finding Chinese labor rates too high! And so they are moving the jobs to Indonesia and elsewhere.

Again, let's look at the data:

Can anyone explain to me what the PROBLEM is here?

Corporate profits are declining.

 

[Steve Petersen]

Yeah: let's get back to a time when CEO's weren't making hundreds of times more than the workers, when executive boards weren't busy just lining each others pockets and provide ethical leadership for the entire company...not just their own self-interests.

Let's also, as a nation, remember that if we are willing to pay a few cents more for our tube socks we might be able to ensure our FELLOW AMERICAN CITIZENS can have jobs!

And when the corporations say that that extra few cents shouldn't go to wages for the workers but should go to the shareholders and the executive boards we should stand up and say THIS IS WRONG:

Look at the orange line of CORPORATE PROFITS and look a the line of WORKER PAY.

You want some "answers"? THERE'S YOUR ANSWER.

It's as clear as day.

ANYONE who own a mutual funds or stock in their Roth or 401k or taxable accounts are shareholders too. Employees are also shareholders.

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

Gotta love the undefined y axis too. Clear as mud.

 

[Vylo]

China steals our IP. Name a major Chinese technological invention that compares to an Iphone.

Gunpowder .

But more recently:

Calling Out Apple: The iPhone 5 is NOT “The World's Thinnest Smartphone"

There are actually several chinese smartphones that compete with the iphone. Also Iphones are made in China, lest you forget. Made by their engineers too. It isn't all simply manual labor. If you think that, you have never worked in a factory.

 

[TeddyReceptus]

LOL. No, I am not. I don't know about today, but a few years back, less than 5 years ago, Chinese electrical engineers were studying vacuum tubes. We outsource blue collar work to China, white collar work to India.

Then you are behind the curve on the story.

GE R&D Center: Shanghai
Covidien Opens R&D Facility in China

Lilly opens diabetes R&D centre in Shanghai

General Motors sign deal with SAIC, open R&D center in China

Palm Opens Research and Development Center in China (obviously not an ongoing interest now, an old story)


PepsiCo opens R&D center in China

Frankly I'm somewhat scared because I do R&D for a living. The fact that companies are now shifting R&D to China is a troubling change.

Because it means that those of us who have about the highest degrees of education available in America are now "outsourceable".

There are even contract R&D labs opening up in China now!

One Chinese guy I work with is getting ready to go back home and visit family there. I was asking him why China doesn't just go forward and take over industry and he pointed out that right now their main focus is primarily making money quickly. R&D and development of new technologies requires more long term investment. But by the same token I noted that US corporations are cutting their R&D often in that same game of "short term" profits.

One of the industries we work with closely has basically eliminated all of it's US R&D across the board. So we fill in that role. Meanwhile our European counterparts are not slashing it so much.

China is a sleeping giant in this matter and they will one day wake up and say "Huh, you guys don't have an edge on us."

We in tech console ourselves by repeatedly saying "Oh the Chinese don't innovate" but that's a joke. They will. They are humans just like us and they have some really good engineers and our major corporations have helped set them up with a lot tech sufficient to get a move on.

If you are thinking 5 years ago in regards to China you are missing the big story.

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

What kind of R&D do you do? My company has an R&D group in India and China as well as the US, and it ain't cutting edge.

 

[variant]

Corporate profits are declining.

Nope Nope.

 

[dies-l]

OK, then why come so many new college graduates cannot find jobs? The answer is more college graduates???

A variety of reasons, I'm sure. In some cases, people choose to major in disciplines that have no applications with any meaningful benefit. In some cases, people choose disciplines that are applicable in industries that are already over saturated. In some cases, I'm sure it comes down to laziness and an entitlement mentality ("I got me a college degree so you got to give me a job").

The answer is not just "college graduates" as you incorrectly accused me of claiming. The answer is increased college graduation combined with a strong work ethic and innovative spirit. Any one or two of the above by themselves are not going to be competitive in global market place where there is an abundance of hard working people who are willing to work for less than a dollar or two per day and where there are well educated people who are willing to work for a fraction of what our best minds demand.

Well, if those additional new graduates are engineers and scientists, you might have a point.

Engineering and science are not the only under saturated professions, and that is what it all comes down to, saturation. If a person diligently learns a skill that lots of people already have, then that person had better be pretty creative in how they use that skill, or else it is a rather worthless asset. There was a time when being willing to work hard on a factory floor was a valuable asset. This was a time when it was more expensive to ship goods around than world than it was to pay premium wages to American workers. Those days are gone, and there are literally billions of people in the world that are used to scraping by on $1-2/day or less. For them, a job that pays $.50 an hour is a godsend. So, if an employer would have to pay non-union American workers $10/hour or Union workers $20/hour to do the same job, they can generate a lot of shipping options with the money saved from 3rd world labor. So, in short, a warm body and a willingness to work is no longer a competitive asset. So, something needs to fill that gap. Do you disagree?

 

[TeddyReceptus]

What kind of R&D do you do? My company has an R&D group in India and China as well as the US, and it ain't cutting edge.

I'm chem R&D, coatings. And it's not high tech either.

But the point being that China has almost everything it needs (short of a healthy intellectual property culture) to eat our lunch.

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

Nope Nope.

I was addressing his chart, though I'm skeptical of yours.

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

I'm chem R&D, coatings. And it's not high tech either.

But the point being that China has almost everything it needs (short of a healthy intellectual property culture) to eat our lunch.

Which is why I worry about "four more years".

 

[TeddyReceptus]

Which is why I worry about "four more years".

And presumably why you've worried about the last 30? Because all during the Reagan hightimes years of supply side-o-rama and during the non-supply side years of Clinton and during the supply-side years of BushI and Bush II we saw steady increase in offshoring American jobs.

They started at the bottom then moved up.

And in every case a 'business case' was made. You GOTS to increase that profit margin. Cut, cut cut cut. Snip, snip snip.

Sooner or later the execs are all that's left. Can't possibly outsource them eh?

Four more years of Obama will not increase or decrease human greed. That's up to us.

So we should always keep in mind that CEO's are making money hand over fist, corporate profits are going up, the DOW is still >12K and the middle class wages have stagnated for a couple decades now.

If this doesn't set off some alarm bells then I honestly don't know what will.

 

[TeddyReceptus]

China steals our IP. Name a major Chinese technological invention that compares to an Iphone.

China has some serious problems with IP. This is the cornerstone of innovation and drives much of what makes the West quite special. We wish to reward the people who come up with the ideas.

BUT, on the other hand, what's to stop China from taking the keys and the entire car we've provided them with and not just driving over us?

We treat China as a big "factory" for "our" goods, but we do that at our peril

I suspect that China will start itching for more durable positions in the market and IP will become a much more important issue to them. It's a small piece in the puzzle, but it can most easily be filled in.

Right now the Chinese and India have a vested interest to convince us that they will not steal our IP (even though that's not always the case), because they want to keep the manufacturing jobs there. But as manufacturing grows and as we plow more R&D into their hands we will have an IP-generating machine soon enough.

Once China recognizes that they can put a "Chinese brand" out there at high margins they will want protection in other countries. That's when we need to start worrying.

 

[TeddyReceptus]

Corporate profits are declining.

Business Insider June 2012 begs to differ:

Corporate Profits Just Hit An All-Time High, Wages Just Hit An All-Time Low

Read more: Corporate Profits Just Hit An All-Time High, Wages Just Hit An All-Time Low - Business Insider
​

Corporate Profits Just Hit an All -Time High, Wages just hit an all-time low

Or are corporate profits declining since June of this year?

Well, according to Motley Fool Obama is one of the best presidents for Business (LINKY)

(A word here: Corporate profits were incredibly depressed from the financial crisis in January 2009, when President Obama entered office. That low starting point makes growth through today look massive. If, instead of January 2009, you use January 2008 profit levels as a starting base, average annual corporate profit growth under President Obama is 6.8%.)

But even using the lower estimate of 6.8% he does almost 3-4times better than REAGAN!!!

So please explain how corporate profits are falling. Do you mean like in the last 3 days or something?

Cuz from everything I'm seeing corporate profits look to be going up pretty well.

​

 

[Jeffwhosoever]

I was commenting on your chart. But, the latest quarter is showing lower profit, lower revenue, and downward forecasts in upcoming quarters.

Yeah, everyone is afraid to hire with Obama as President, so productivity soars and profits with it.