And another thing....
Not only do we sell our future to other country-organisms, we also place further burdens on the people of the United States: while the corporations outsource and manufacture abroad, often for marginal gains or tax benefits, fattening the corporate hog (meaning larger bonuses for the CEO), the redundant U.S. citizens are forced to "retrain."
But "retraining" is not the real issue, rather, it is that there are often no meaningful jobs at all for those made redundant. Or the jobs that are left -- within reach educationally or geographically -- are "McJobs." Jobs without benefits, jobs without prospect of advancement ... and THAT is where the loss of corporate benefits actually hits us, the taxpayer, heaviest. You see, the McJob person is also an American citizen, with one vote just as you or I might have. One person with health care needs -- or in fact a whole family to support, each member of which has the same health care and educational needs.
The support system which might meet those needs has been exported abroad where the corporation has no burden to meet any needs at all. How many U.S. clothing manufacturers have been caught running "sweat shops" in Latin America, or Thailand? That Toomy Hoolfiger knit shirt costing you $100, was made in some third world country where the worker is lucky to get a wage, let alone "benefits." His benefit is the ability to feed his children.... Oh, I walked into a "trap." Does this mean I advocate taking the bread out of his mouth, that poor Third World worker? Yes. His relative state of poverty, while pitiable, is of lesser concern to me than the state of poverty of an American and more importantly of negligible concern as compared to the common enterprise that is the United States. Meanwhile, Toomy buys another house in the Hamptons, and his accountant and tax lawyers will find a way to reduce his contribution to the greater whole. Irony is, Toomy votes Democrat.
When you think about it, does the extra $10 million really matter to someone that is already worth $100 million? If they don't like it here, they can just pack up and leave. It is not as though they are pulling their weight, anyway. And they won't leave the world's largest market in the end, either.
When that downsized American has to visit the Emergency Room ... who pays then? We all do. When an illegal immigrant, who doesn't pay taxes, needs emergency medical care, who pays? We all do. But the employer hiring the illegal under the table doesn't. The multi-national hiring phone-drones in India certainly doesn't. Thanks Comcast. Thanks Microsoft. Thanks Symantec. Thanks General Electric.
If America manages to balance its books, America can afford to be generous, America can afford to help those less fortunate. But it is simply Liberal narcotic smoke to think that America can provide wealth and comfort to all the underprivileged around the world: we can't even do that here in our own country. And the rest of the underprivileged world has fertility rates such that even if we were to grow at 5% annually with no debt to service, we could not even keep pace with additional burdens of the new underprivileged persons being born daily.
It is an extremely rational decision: since you can't take care of the whole world, take take of yourself and help who you can. But you have to be in a healthy enough position to help anyone in the first place, and with the current state of American hemorrhaging we can't even really help ourselves, let alone our neighbors. And since our neighbors seem perfectly contented to watch us "bleed out," we need to kick them in their privates to buy a bit of time.
And American have a duty to help themselves too: buy American. Where at all possible, buy goods and services made in our own country. This is not jingoistic, it is a matter of self-preservation.
Survival even.
But "retraining" is not the real issue, rather, it is that there are often no meaningful jobs at all for those made redundant. Or the jobs that are left -- within reach educationally or geographically -- are "McJobs." Jobs without benefits, jobs without prospect of advancement ... and THAT is where the loss of corporate benefits actually hits us, the taxpayer, heaviest. You see, the McJob person is also an American citizen, with one vote just as you or I might have. One person with health care needs -- or in fact a whole family to support, each member of which has the same health care and educational needs.
The support system which might meet those needs has been exported abroad where the corporation has no burden to meet any needs at all. How many U.S. clothing manufacturers have been caught running "sweat shops" in Latin America, or Thailand? That Toomy Hoolfiger knit shirt costing you $100, was made in some third world country where the worker is lucky to get a wage, let alone "benefits." His benefit is the ability to feed his children.... Oh, I walked into a "trap." Does this mean I advocate taking the bread out of his mouth, that poor Third World worker? Yes. His relative state of poverty, while pitiable, is of lesser concern to me than the state of poverty of an American and more importantly of negligible concern as compared to the common enterprise that is the United States. Meanwhile, Toomy buys another house in the Hamptons, and his accountant and tax lawyers will find a way to reduce his contribution to the greater whole. Irony is, Toomy votes Democrat.
When you think about it, does the extra $10 million really matter to someone that is already worth $100 million? If they don't like it here, they can just pack up and leave. It is not as though they are pulling their weight, anyway. And they won't leave the world's largest market in the end, either.
When that downsized American has to visit the Emergency Room ... who pays then? We all do. When an illegal immigrant, who doesn't pay taxes, needs emergency medical care, who pays? We all do. But the employer hiring the illegal under the table doesn't. The multi-national hiring phone-drones in India certainly doesn't. Thanks Comcast. Thanks Microsoft. Thanks Symantec. Thanks General Electric.
If America manages to balance its books, America can afford to be generous, America can afford to help those less fortunate. But it is simply Liberal narcotic smoke to think that America can provide wealth and comfort to all the underprivileged around the world: we can't even do that here in our own country. And the rest of the underprivileged world has fertility rates such that even if we were to grow at 5% annually with no debt to service, we could not even keep pace with additional burdens of the new underprivileged persons being born daily.
It is an extremely rational decision: since you can't take care of the whole world, take take of yourself and help who you can. But you have to be in a healthy enough position to help anyone in the first place, and with the current state of American hemorrhaging we can't even really help ourselves, let alone our neighbors. And since our neighbors seem perfectly contented to watch us "bleed out," we need to kick them in their privates to buy a bit of time.
And American have a duty to help themselves too: buy American. Where at all possible, buy goods and services made in our own country. This is not jingoistic, it is a matter of self-preservation.
Survival even.
posted by Zaphod at Tuesday, February 26, 2008
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