California Utility May Replace IT Workers with H-1B Workers 220
dcblogs writes: "Southern California Edison is preparing to offshore IT jobs, the second major U.S. utility in the last year to do so. It will be cutting its staff, but it hasn't said by how much. The utility is using at least two offshore outsourcing firms, according to government records. SCE's management culture may be particularly primed for firing its IT workers. Following a workplace shooting in SCE's IT offices in 2011, the utility conducted an independent audit of its organizational and management culture. One observation in this report, which was completed a year later, was that 'employees perceive managers to be more concerned about how they 'look' from above, and less concerned about how they are viewed by their subordinates. This fosters an unhealthy culture and climate by sending a message to employees that it is more important to focus on how things look from the top than how they actually are down below.'"
Not H1-Bs, offshore workers. (Score:5, Informative)
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It would be illegal for them to fire everyone then hire H1-Bs, and even if the off-shore companies place people that all happen to be H1-B, lawsuits will follow. How can the consulting company say they couldn't find competent employees when they know a bunch that got laid-off?
The article basically claims that with employees making 60K+, the rule of "cannot find competent employees" does not apply to H1-B, so they should be ok. Does anyone know more about this loophole that the article is talking about?
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"...who exactly is the H1-B police..." (Score:3)
And who exactly is the H1-B police who come arrest the violators?
That would be:
= U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
= U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services - Fraud Detection and National Security Division (FDNS)
= U.S. Department of Labor - Office of Inspector General
= U.S. Postal Inspection Service (USPIS)
= U.S. Department of State
= U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Iowa
At least that's who it was for this case: http://exbay.blogspot.com/2009... [blogspot.com]
So perhaps you are an idiot for implying that these laws are unenforced and unpoliced, and
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Re:Not H1-Bs, offshore workers. (Score:5, Insightful)
Similar to how national security jobs require a gov't clearance, should workers on critical infrastructure require similar concept of vetting?
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Combination of both (Score:5, Informative)
According to the article, they are outsourcing the work to an offshore IT firm. This IT firm, in turn, will give the work to a US location, which staffs itself with H-1B workers. The effect is that US-based workers are being laid off and indirectly replaced with H-1Bs.
Re:Combination of both (Score:5, Insightful)
Which is exactly why an Indian commerce minister referred to the H-1B as the "outsourcing visa". It's not an either/or situation - the H-1B visa helps enable outsourcing/offshoring.
Re:Combination of both (Score:5, Insightful)
Shouldn't that be illegal?
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Depends
If you are a college graduate who has invested tens of thousands of dollars into education and is expecting a return on that investment, if some businessman can get those skills cheaper overseas, its just good business.
If you are some business who has invested tens of thousands of dollars developing some product and is expecting a return on that investment and someone can bypass that and simply download the work from an overseas server, that is copyright violation, viol
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You set up a 100% US based firm to lobby for and sign off on US work, all the US legal needs, US contracting, US academic. State/federal US requirements are met.
At the back end is massive complex reality of a 24/7 cost saving outsourcing/offshoring service.
A massive reduction in US costs, a massive flow of long term cash out of the US for decades services all via a 100% Made in the USA success story.
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1) The government does not bother to enforce this law.
2) The law says you can not sue unless you are personally affected.
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2) The law says you can not sue unless you are personally affected.
Well yeah, that's how tort laws have always worked. If somebody wrongs you, you the victim have to initiate a lawsuit or press charges. Your neighbor can't do it for you.
IMPOSSIBLE (Score:4, Insightful)
H1B1 Visa's are only because there are not enough applicants to fill a position. Just ask any republican and they will tell you and set the facts straight in interest of protecting the workers.
It is illegal not to pay an H1B1 Visa worker less than a qualified worker. It is stated so it must be true!
Re:IMPOSSIBLE (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is that the race to the bottom has began, and I doubt it will end until we hit it. If it is cheaper to pay someone else to do the job, be it in another state, another country, or simply to ship in the workers they are going to do it, and if they can't do it, they will try to move the job itself to that other country or other state. Heck if they are just moving jobs to other states they can just call it a reorg and not even get any bad press about it, even though the key purpose was to surplus all those pesky highly paid workers who had devoted much of their lives to a particular company. The guys in charge are betting they can improve the balance sheet while they are there, then get a nice bonus for it, and if it all falls apart later, well they are likely gone or retired by then, so its not their problem.
Sure you could setup sane rules to minimize it, but it is not easy, or at least the politicians make it more difficult than it needs to be. For instance, if the country that your buying all this stuff from has poor environmental laws, well then that country is basically not charging what is required to clean up their own mess, so the logical thing to do is to tarrif it in a measured way so at least society can somewhat deal with the mess later, or at the very least make the playing field a touch more level. At any rate, the reason the United States can't compete with manufacturing/labor/etc is as much as anything about the unlevel playing field. We find rules about safe working conditions and pollution to be a good thing, but hapilly ignore that others are less concerned with such things if we can buy a $200 television.
The other common thing about jobs these days is companies have little loyalty to their employees, so of course their employees have little loyalty to the company either. This leads to companies always asking for employees that are tailor fit for a very obscure job, which of course they often can't find, since that job may be brand new and short term. So the company does a token search, fails to find the non existent expert on widget series 12 when combined with gear series 13 and 20 years experience with the new fad computer language that has only been out five, and of course concludes that it is H-1B time. Sure the employee may be even less skilled than those that were actually available, but hey he or she is cheap and leashed directly to the company of interest so they will spend some effort training him or her. Perhaps in the end they saved no actual money due to all the project delays, but they did save money on paper initially, and that is what is most important.
Re:IMPOSSIBLE (Score:5, Insightful)
If only there were organized groups of laborers that were able to band together to protect each others rights.
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If only there were organized groups of laborers that were able to band together to protect each others rights.
Socialisms! Evil! Burn the commie witch! Only corporations are allowed to work as bands to protect their rights!
Fuck that (Score:2)
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The race to the bottom started long ago.
The destruction of the worker-employer bond even longer - back in the 1980s.
Tarrifs weren't primarily about environmental responsibility, although indirectly they worked in that direction by favoring local production with its more stringent environmental regulations. But Free Trade has pretty much killed that.
1950's Republicans would probably die of apoplexy. We gave Most Favored trade status to one of the world's biggest Communist countries.
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If you're going to bring politics in, at least get them right. It's the Democrats that have supported H1Bs more, probably because they get all the tech money (Google, Microsoft, etc.)
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I suspect this is because the Democrats get most of the tech (Google, Microsoft, etc.) donations. But just because you're socially liberally (presumably, given your post and bias) doesn't mean you have to believe the Democrats never do wrong. Everybody does wrong
Re:IMPOSSIBLE (Score:4, Interesting)
Go a few miles outside the cities and it is mostly Republican.
Nevertheless CA is primarily a blue state. I'm not sticking up for the R's here - just pointing out that with many issues the D's are also busy screwing Americans. The D's whore for money too, and much of theirs comes from the tech industry. One of the few people in congress to oppose some of this H-1B crap is Chuck Grassley, who's an R.
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Cost of living also tends to be higher in those Blue states. So this is a nice double whammy from states that are supposed to have more intrusive and effective governance.
So much for that idea...
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yes, the red states don't bother with the visas at all...
BSABSVR (Score:3)
Deportations have continued apace under Obama.
Of course we'll never get them all, because the Vaterlandssicherheitsdepartment doesn't have enough manpower. So if you want to round up that last illegal, fine.
Increase the size and funding of the Vaterlandssicherheitsdepartment about tenfold.
Swarm this land with goons to grab hold of anyone who looks a little brown, ask him "Sus papeles, por favor", and beat the mierda out of him when he answers in English.
And you can STFU about Big Government and you can STF
Tech workers only? (Score:2, Insightful)
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Are the management jobs safe because they provide such incredible expertise and knowledge that can only come from white people?
No, there is a growing move to outsource Lawyer jobs too.
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I should also say that, predictably, the Indian workers for the contract companies tended to rarely stay in their jobs longer than a year, so quality tended to be poor and training was a constant battle. And with a 15%+ pay increase every year (vs 2-3% in the US, in the few years they actually gave any pay increases at all), they were going to catch up eventually. But even at the time, other managers admitted privately that management and other costs ate up the difference and they weren't actually saving an
H-1B or offshore? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you offshore a position, it is in India (for example) and you don't need an H1-B visa.
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Good point. It is probably easier for people who are culturally Indian to manage workers in India from the US.
hey, check out Yemen Systems Associates (Score:2)
they're offshore, they're cheaper than dust, and they're all religious fanatics. can't offshore more thoroughly than that for life-critical, society-critical infrastructure.
you guys, really, your ties are way, way too tight.
Outsourcing! Management Sux! What?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
This is an outrage! Companies outsourcing jobs overseas! Management is concerned about perception rather than substance!
What fucking decade are we living in here folks?!? This isn't news but it is confirmation that US companies are full of douche bags.
Re:Outsourcing! Management Sux! What?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
The labor market is a market. They have labor to supply.
Borders don't keep the jobs in any more than they keep people out.
Good luck with that (Score:5, Interesting)
Has anyone, anywhere, seen an instance where a move like this actually works out well? I sure haven't. Communication issues, poor worker training and expertise, high turnover. The 'savings' look good on paper, but in the end it's a disaster.
Re:Good luck with that (Score:5, Interesting)
Not a plan I'd recommend obviously, but hey
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Yes. For a company that was really badly managed I have seen off-shoring chunks of work to India work. Basically because the Indian project management was better than the American project management.
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Think of the banana republic model and the way the USA looked after South and Central America over many decades.
Experts arrived, products and services where imported, the raw materials where exported and local wages kept down.
Shareholders in the US got to enjoy generational wealth and their `"trust" funds grew.
The system works great, you just have to adjust to the role of seasonal shanty town worker or at best an
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Yes. A government department near me fired everyone to be immediately hired by the contracting company they outsourced to, work was not disrupted, the contracting company made a mint, and they were so happy with it that they gave very expensive gifts to the people in government that signed off on it. So it worked out well for some.
The taxpayers funding it out course are screwed and the employees transferred over effec
Tata! (Score:5, Funny)
I'm sure they were the breast candidate for the task.
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Anectdote:
I was in Kandahar and I saw this large breasted Army girl leaning on a new pickup. It was a Tata, and sitting right next to an identical one.
I could not resist.
"Nice tatas!"
they couldn't have just read Dilbert? (Score:2)
'employees perceive managers to be more concerned about how they 'look' from above, and less concerned about how they are viewed by their subordinates. This fosters an unhealthy culture and climate by sending a message to employees that it is more important to focus on how things look from the top than how they actually are down below.'
You don't need to commission an expensive report to find out stuff like this. It's so universal it's seen everywhere.
Heck, Scott Adams who writes Dilbert was employed by Paci
So what they're really saying. (Score:5, Insightful)
so they'll be needing to import some workers who are better suited to the type of shop they run:
Work the hands like a rented mule.
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note that the 'workplace shooting' citation... (Score:2)
What is an H-1B worker? (Score:2)
? :)
We germans have no idea
Re:What is an H-1B worker? (Score:5, Informative)
Company bring them in claiming they cannot find 'qualified' U.S. worker but really do it just to hire cheaper foreign labor.
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I think it'd help to mention that temporary means 3-6 years, and that losing your job means losing your legal immigration status in the US. It's also very difficult for H-1B's to change jobs. They're wonderfully captive labor.
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It's also worth mentioning that they are paid a lot more here than wherever they come from. And they are going to work in IT either way. If we don't bring them here, they are going to compete with us from abroad, pay taxes abroad, work cheaper, and help build competing industries elsewhere.
Furthermore, it is not that difficult for H-1B's to change jobs or get green cards these days, and many of them immigrate. Conversely, for employment based immigration, almost everybody starts off as an H-1B, so killing o
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I think it'd help to mention that temporary means 3-6 years, and that losing your job means losing your legal immigration status in the US. It's also very difficult for H-1B's to change jobs. They're wonderfully captive labor.
H1Bs are not temporary visa. They are visa meant for immigration and has a path leading to a green card. The only problem is that getting the green card for Indian and Chinese nationals is hard because 95% of H1B applicants are from India and China and the US has a 9% limit on the number of immigrants granted from one single country. If you are from say a country like England, you can get H1B to green card under 1 year. India and China can be as long as 5-10 years.
Also, losing your job part has been fixed
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So it's local outsourcing. They're still taking away your job so that they can give it to someone that isn't in as good of a bargaining position. It doesn't matter if it's some guy in a 3rd world country, or some guy that's visiting from a 3rd world country who gets to be treated like dirt.
Both "illegals" and H1-B's fall into this sort of 3rd world underclass.
As if we didn't already have enough pockets of 3rd world fester...
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Gastarbeiter
Talk of creating an H-1B program in Germany a while back created a backlash phrase: "Leiber Kinder statt Inder!"
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Translation?
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Gast = Guest, Arbeiter = Worker . . . so Gastarbeiter = Guest-worker. If you liked playing with Lego, you'll love German.
"Lieber Kinder statt Inder!" means, Rather children instead of Indians! Which meant that the government should pay more attention to social programs encouraging working women to have children, and investing more in tech training for German students . . . instead of importing (cheap) foreign talent.
Of course, the whole plan was a ruse by companies who wanted to drive down the wages of
Ahh Yes the trend continues.. (Score:4, Insightful)
First, we lost manufacturing jobs.... Then the engineering jobs started going off shore. So why are we surprised when the IT jobs do too?
I feel for the youngsters coming out of college with a STEM degree these days. Huge student loan debt and fewer and fewer prospects..
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the discrepancy is too great between what the rich nation's populace is willing to work for vis a vis what the poor nation's people will accept.
Also, too, and neither should we discount the perceived value to a big company of another work force's local climate for labor laws and litigiousness.
Re:Ahh Yes the trend continues.. (Score:4, Informative)
It's a myth that manufacturing in the US is on the decline; it simply has become smaller relative to other sectors, but in absolute terms, it's been growing.
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Manufacturing may be, but what about manufacturing EMPLOYMENT? When you use robots and automation, there aren't so many employees.
And it may look large because US manufacturing is focused on large-ticket items, like aircraft and rockets and tanks. It's still the case that 99% of the routine goods that you buy (whether clothes or household items or toys or electronics) are made in China.
This needs to be Illegal (Score:4, Insightful)
Under no circumstances should any Utility in the US be allowed to Off-Shore IT operations of it's Infrastructure to Foreign Entities -- doing so opens up the possibility of access being given to enemies of the US or US-based interests by employees of the IT company or by the IT company itself if it comes under the influence or control of enemies of the US.
The ability to fuck with the infrastructure providing power to all of Southern California is a capability no one should be able to hand over to foreign nationals. The Federal Government needs to shove their foot right up the collective asses of Cal Eds Senior Management and Board.
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" Under no circumstances should any Utility in the US be allowed to Off-Shore IT operations"
They aren't. I know this from first-hand experience as a Sr Engineer for a major phone company, that is to remain nameless. I was responsible for the audit, after the DoJ specifically told us we needed to ensure anybody who wan't *physically* in the US at the time, would not have access to ANY production data.
Despite the idiotic headline, this has to be about H1Bs who reside in the US, NOT off-shoring. The Fed wou
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Re:This needs to be Illegal (Score:4, Insightful)
Nice try at a slur. There is nothing new, unusual, un-Constitutional or unreasonable about requiring that vital functions in the US be performed by US based entities.
Unions (Score:4, Insightful)
Un-Organized workers are too weak to demand or get better wages or a better way of life. Life basically stunk for everyone but a few kings thousands of years. It still stinks if you're not in one of the countries with a strong, well organized pool of labor that has solidarity. Sure, a few on
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You can force companies to pay higher wages, but you can't force them to exist. If they can't compete with overseas manufacturers at those higher wages, they are going to go out of business. And that's the reason companies outsource in the first place and why some key industries have disappeared from the US. So, high labor costs are the reason jobs are moving overseas, even to Europe; US wages are some of the highest in the world, and the only way we can pay those wages is by focusing on highly productive
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Poor deluded you!
A union's goal is to improve working conditions and remuneration is one of them.
Increasing the number of jobs and their quality are fundamental to the success of the union, both in the eyes of their members and of the employers.
At times a union runs into an unresponsive employer who sabotages the balance between work and rewards, just like that employer they can sabotage the company until it sees the light.
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Unions require the leverage of work stoppage causing production blockage, but this doesn't work when the employer can pick up shop and move to cheaper labor. Combine this with the lack of import tariffs and there is no leverage for a labor union to wield. For unions to work now, you'd have to have the workers of the world unite, which was a Socialist rallying call if I remember my history. We all know what Americans think of Socialism, especially the sneering libertarians found in IT departments.
Unions will
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hey fuck-wad, it WORKED about 100 yrs ago...
This isn't 100 years ago - the companies have gotten smarter (and far more PR-savvy) since then.
Let me tell you how a certain progressive German company [solarworld.de] handled their union troubles here in the US...
They bought an oil-company spin-off called Shell Solar. In their Washington (state) site, the Machinists' Union decided that it would be a great time to ask for a raise, since things had been stagnant there for awhile wage-wise. The company said no. The Union threatened to strike, and it made a bit of noise in t [oregonlive.com]
So H-1B or offshore??? (Score:3)
That would be completely different things with very different consequences. H-1B is a Visa to work in US, so jobs would not be offshored, just outsourced to a contractor (article mentions Infosys). Employees will be still paying taxes, and salaries can not be that low as they incur living expenses similar to US citizens. Added difficulty of changing jobs while on a visa does depress wages to some degree, but IT workers generally expect to live well.
Offshoring of course means no tax revenue for US and much lower living standards and expenses, so low salaries that US residents can not accept without starving.
It's unfortunate that the article doesn't make clear exactly what is happening.
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I was confused as well, see note above.
Apparently they are sending it to an offshore company who will subcontract and use H1-B employees here to fill the roles.
message to you globalization scum: (Score:2)
I'll support globalization the day I'm free to move to and work in any country I choose.
Re:message to you globalization scum: (Score:4, Insightful)
Until that day comes, I will refer to globalization with a more accurate name: "neo-feudalism".
Dilbert is Real (Score:5, Funny)
PHB1: "This survey shows our employees think we in management are clueless superficial jerks. What do we do about it?"
PHB2: "I got it! Fire them all and outsource their work to new people who don't yet know we are clueless superficial jerks."
PHB1: "Brilliant! Let's vote ourselves a raise for this plan!"
Replace manangement first.... (Score:3)
H1B's can do the managements job a Lot better and a lot cheaper. There is far more savings in replacing everyone at the manager level and up.
we need basic income and Medicare for All (Score:2)
we need basic income and Medicare for All and then we can be ok with outsourcing.
Typical (Score:2)
And yet, ratepayers haven't seen a dime of all of these savings.
How it is done (Score:2)
LOL. Lessons from target not learned (Score:3)
Yet, the one thing that amazes me, is that they totally ignore the fact that not only did Target offshore a great deal, but esp. their production was offshored.
And this was the group that is paying their Indian software engineers, about $7-9K/year (India, like china, plays games with their money against the dollar). How easy is it to offer somebody say 70K to simply open a port, or to leave a back door, etc, and NOT have it be found? Keep in mind that $70K in India, with the current rupee money, is a 10 year salary. You can quietly leave target, get another job elsewhere and have your retirement fully taken care of.
Yes, one group said that something was going on, but the group in India that was dealing with Production IGNORED IT. More importantly, the idiots in target that offshored this, were the ones that ignored the warnings.
And now, utilities are being stupid and following suite. It is time for shareholders to SUE the day lights out of Target and companies like this that offshore.
For those of you losing your job, sue them. (Score:2)
Security? (Score:2)
How do they offshore IT jobs and address security concerns [slashdot.org] at the same time?
Outsourcing is definition of "view from the top" (Score:3)
> This fosters an unhealthy culture and climate by sending a message to employees that it is more important to focus on how things look from the top than how they actually are down below.
In what world is outsourcing not the same culture in spades? Specifically, a few suits and a few lucky fourth or fifth level professionals selling the idea that a bunch of farmers with three hours of training can take over IT? This only works when the people making the decisions have a fundamental misunderstanding of the problem they're trying to solve.
As if Californians didn't have enough power problems... I'm glad I don't live there.
The very HEIGHT of irresponsibility! (Score:2)
Re:The King of 18th Century England Called (Score:5, Insightful)
I have to pay my mortgage now. I can't afford to wait for your utopia.
What benefits? (Score:3, Insightful)
Karl Marx predicted that capital flowing to where labor was cheapest would result in a race to the bottom, but all anyone can remember about him is that a couple famous dictators
Re:What benefits? (Score:4, Insightful)
Karl Marx predicted that capital flowing to where labor was cheapest would result in a race to the bottom
One of the many things he missed is that it raises the bottom greatly in the process.
A rising tide (Score:3)
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A rising tide doesn't raise all ships, it swamps all but the biggest boats.
At least you've vaguely heard of the saying. The real saying is "A rising tide raises all boats". It basically sums up the general outcome of positive sum games. It amazes me how many people just don't get what a positive sum game is.
And the great irony here is that the largest ships, the developed world countries, are the ones being swamped. That's because they choose not to adapt. It's easier to blame the consequences of actions on the rich or whatever and just keep doing the same stupid things you dec
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Karl Marx predicted that capital flowing to where labor was cheapest would result in a race to the bottom
Which is not all that different from the famous capitalist David Ricardo talking about the "iron law of wages". It's interesting what the two sides agree on.
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There are winners and losers. I don't mean to be callous towards the losers, but the baseball analogy stands. Integration of the negro league with the white league cost a lot of white and black baseball players their jobs in the short run, and most of the anger at the integration was from players that couldn't compete.
And sorry but what are you talking about with NAFTA? With the exception of the drug economy (which is by no means free and transparent trade), Mexico has made tremendous progress since 19
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Oh they remember a lot more than that about him... https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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Let's be honest here... you want to work 8am - 5pm with an hour lunch, get paid over $60k a year (more in higher standard states), get bonuses and have a nice cushy job? That's absurd.
Absurd? It describes my current work situation closely. Well, if you exclude the pay and hours; my pay is in the ballpark of yours, and my hours aren't as rigid as "8-5 with an hour lunch". Still, there's always something better and always something worse. It's important to be able to find satisfaction in whatever job you're doing, and you seem to have done that just fine.
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