Oh how the country has changed in the last 36 years. We were a nation of farmers, secretaries, and machine operators in 1978. The family farmer was still the backbone in the Northern Plains and Midwest. The internet didn’t exist, so letters needed to be typed, copies made, mail distributed, dictation taken, and coffee brewed. So every business was loaded with secretaries. The country still manufactured goods here in 1978. We sold them domestically and internationally. Globalization and NAFTA hadn’t become the buzz words of Ivy League educated MBA’s yet.
A look at the most common jobs today reveals how the country has changed.
Corporations bought up most of the family farms and older farmers died off. Independent farmers are now a dying breed. The internet all but eliminated the need for secretaries. They became the buggy whip of the 21st Century. There is no need for machine operators when all the machines and manufacturing plants are located in China, Vietnam, and the rest of Southeast Asia. The Ivy League MBAs gutted American manufacturing and sent all the jobs to Asia, where they could produce the same products 80% cheaper and drive their corporate profits sky high, along with their own stock based compensation. So we are left with a nation of truck drivers transporting cheap Chinese produced crap to the millions of retail outlets, where the low wage slaves borrow to buy the crap. The American Dream achieved in 36 short years.
This is how you turn a nation of producers into a nation of consumers. And it couldn’t have been accomplished without the prodigious amounts of debt aided, abetted and distributed by the Federal Reserve and their Wall Street owners.
Might not need truck drivers either.
Nary a peep of this of teeeveeeee or newspapers.
—————————————————————–
Things on the West Coast Ports are going from bad to worse (for those who missed it read “Catastrophic Shutdown Of America’s Supply Chain” Begins: Stunning Photos Of West Coast Port Congestion), and with no resolution in sight, it is now beginning to cripple the US economy. Here is a brief summary, courtesy of the WSJ, of how the near-strike is already impacting various businesses across the US.
rest here —
On the other hand … trucking may be G-R-R-R-R-REAT as a career if oil goes down to $20/barrel.
—————————
“The recent surge in oil prices is just a “head-fake,” and oil as cheap as $20 a barrel may soon be on the way, Citigroup said in a report on Monday as it lowered its forecast for crude.”
rest here —-> http://www.thedailysheeple.com/why-the-price-of-oil-is-more-likely-to-fall-to-20-rather-than-rise-to-80_022015
OTHER STUFF …
Pussy Riot” has released a new video called “I Can’t Breathe” to speak out against police brutality and show their support for the case of Eric Garner. In a statement issued this week through Buzzfeed, the group said,
“Illegal violence in the name of the state kills not only its victims, but those who are chosen to carry out these actions. Policemen, soldiers, agents, they become hostages and are buried with those they kill, both figuratively and literally. We really could not breathe for this whole last year. Our previous ideas did not speak to what was happening in the conflict zone in Ukraine as we were realizing that Russia is burying itself alive in terms of the rest of the world. Committing suicide. Daily.”
The game ends when other nations stop accepting our paper for their shit. We have a couple generations now who don’t know how to do shit and think the government is going to help them out with shit. Wealth without work is an impossibility in the long term.
I read about a new Mexican built port that would allow freight to be shipped by rail up to Kansas City.
This would kill the port in LA. Also would bypass union labor problems.
There’s already enough truckers sitting around going broke as it is.
Trucking,A really poor paying job that destroys your health and leaves you open to being preyed upon by every state you go through. It’s the last resort of every out of work person (many college grads) with an insane turn over rate as people figure out they never should have thought of it as a decent job.
From my vantage point, this country is grinding to a halt. In addition to what I do, dry van freight is showing signs of weakness as well. Cheap fuel only means weak demand, at least these days – though obviously the remedy isn’t expensive fuel either. I know about the long grind.
On the Ag side, most I know and speak with would LOVE to be a farmer. It isn’t the work, the hours, etc….frankly, I know for a damn fact that while my farmer friends work hard and at times put in crazy hours – over a year I gauren-damn-tee you most middle class folks put in a hell of a lot more for a hell of a lot less. I know for a fact I put in more hours than my farmer buddies. Its the capital to get into farming and obviously, the learning curve that applies to anything new. It’s the money. Period. ALL of my farmer friends children are getting into the farm operation. All of them. Now, when some tough years come along and the storm clouds are forming, we’ll see who loves agriculture and who loves the toys and rewards of a good ag economy. Do the math, 2,500 acres @$5,000/acre +/- depending on your area. Throw in another 1-3 million for equipment, money in the bank, bins….full of wheat/corn/beans/whatever worth another ?, investment accounts for them and their children. They can stash unbelievable amounts in their childrens accounts, tax free. Add in a more than likely absolutely beautiful home/vehicles/toys and not to be discounted these days, lake cabins with property. I could go on. Most of my farming friends are worth, after debt, $15 – 20 million or better. 2500 acres here is a small operation by the way…….and most haven’t taken loans for the last seven or eight years – it’s just been so damn good.
You ignorant , sorry ,no good lazy fuckers know nothing about the trucking industry. It’s the only industry I know where you can come right out of high school and make 50000 a year. There are owner operators I know that make in the mid 90s after taxes. Some of these guys work here at FedEx .They have their routes and are during very well.If you like working for a company with benefits you got if .UPS ,Yellow ,Old Dominion have some of the best benefits you will find in any industry.
Truth is most people like many of you are just to Damn lazy to work in trucking. You want to stay home and watch TV ,play videos , play on internet or masturbate to pictures of Michelle Obama.
bb
Are you as good a truck driver as you are a good Christian?
“You want to stay home and watch TV ,play videos , play on internet or masturbate to pictures of Michelle Obama.” ———— bb
Unbelievable. There is soooo much wrong with that comment. I will recopy the comment with my comment in brackets.
You want to stay home [no] and watch TV [no] ,play videos [no] , play on internet [no] or masturbate [yes] to pictures of Michelle Obama [no] .
bb, I sure hope you’re not referring to my post.
Judging by my experience at work, we’re a nation of secretaries. All those secretaries from 1978?? They’ve been replaced by middle managers having to do their OWN goddamn typing (badly) thanks to WORD, and bringing their productivity to a grinding halt.
Young folks will have to set their sights higher. Airlines are going to be scrambling for pilots.
I love truck drivers. A lot of my business is for the trucking industry.
BTW – Admin’s narrative re Ivy League MBA’s gutting manufacturing is bullshit. Automation is reason #1, globalization is #2. Very few MBAs involved with either of those things.
Manufacturing gets 2.5 per cent more efficient each year. Look at the charts, do the math. Start with 100, and reduce it by 2.5 percent per year. After 40 years, tell me how much is left. Thake that number as a percentage, multiply it by the percentage of employees who worked in manufacturing forty years ago, and then compare it to the percentage that works in manufacturing today.
That Ivy MBA stuff is bullshit in this case.
Come on llpoh, what kind of college degrees do you think wall street hires? Black studies? I’d say outsourcing, big number one, if automation were such a game changer, we wouldn’t need to send factories overseas. I get sales guys trying to sell me machines all the time, and relentlessly. I register at the trade shows under a psuedonym so I don’t get cold called and spammed and junk mailed every day for the next six months.
A big part of the efficiency gains in manufacturing are exactly like the cost advantages the south had over the north, no wages. Tommy, great comment. When a farm is paid off, it is a money machine. And so is a mine, or a factory. Value added, that’s where real money is made. Service economy has always been a lie. Look at the bullshit on the amex commercials. Doggy day care. Cupcakes. Please
You remember the 70s very differently than I do, and I have to be amused by the misty-eyed nostalgia for the very decade in which this country’s economy began to fail and that I remember as a time of great anxiety, and as the time when this country lost its place as the world’s premier manufacturing economy and creditor nation… and became a debtor nation rapidly bleeding manufacturing and jobs.
We were scarcely a nation of farmers in 1978, by which time only 3% of the population was engaged in agriculture. This post makes 1978 sound like 1926.
By 1978, we were rapidly losing jobs to offshore locations, mainly Japan. Baby boomers just out of the gate confronted an economy in recession, and vets returning from Vietnam were especially hard hit. The 70s era was an economically moribund decade characterized by double digit inflation, skyrocketing energy costs, oil shortages, massive and permanent blue collar job losses, and, of course, the loss of manufacturing to other nations, notably Japan. It was also, not coincidentally, the decade in which American car manufacturers began to lose market share rapidly and in which American made products steeply deteriorated in quality.
The economy entered recession in 1970, and it seemed that we were never completely out of it throughout the decade. Well I remember the bumper stickers that appeared on aging American autos all over town, that said things like HUNGRY? EAT YOUR JAPANESE CAR.
I remember going out at 7 am on Sat morning with a coat thrown over my nightgown to get in line to gas up the car in 1973, during the embargo, and finding a line around the block already formed.
It was the decade in which violent crime in this country skyrocketed. Violent crime in our cities peaked in the 70s and 80s.
This was also the period in which Americans began to see debt as their salvation, and became dependent on consumer credit in a way they had never been before. It was also the period during which it became difficult to support a family with one paycheck.
Looks like the ports are re-opening http://news.yahoo.com/u-west-coast-ports-reopen-labor-secretary-arrives-172558276–finance.html
Tom ,you need to get a job(truck Driving).
Starfucker – seriously, and I shit you not, I have forgotten more about manufacturing than you could ever know.
Efficiency has nothing, zero, nada to do with wages. MIT has to do with how many widgets a person can make.
Each year I need 2.5% fewer man-hours to make the same number of widgets as I did last year. Next year wll be the same. EACH of the past forty years has the same.
You have no idea whatsoever what the fuck you are talking about. You should shut up and listen.
No one around here knows more about manufacturing than I do, and it is not even close.
a nantion of truck drivers lorded over by a gang of banksters , homos and emoting harpies….how special.
One confused about their gender will most likey confused about every damn thing else as well.
You Won’t Believe What New Defense Secretary Ashton Carter Did As His 1st Official Act
http://universalfreepress.com/wont-believe-new-defense-secretary-ashton-carter-1st-official-act/#
Just when you think things within the Obama administration can’t get any more wacky than they already are….something like this happens.
It seems as if the new Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has chosen former acting Air Force Secretary Eric Fanning to become his chief of staff and the first openly gay man to hold the post. Fanning, currently the Air Force undersecretary, was a key member of the transition team along with Army Maj. Gen. Ron Davis that guided Carter through his Senate confirmation hearings to replace outgoing Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel.
Read more at http://universalfreepress.com/wont-believe-new-defense-secretary-ashton-carter-1st-official-act/
2015-02-20 07:00 by Karl Denninger
Free Trade Is a Scam
If you read Leverage you know my view on trade: The United States must impose wage-and-environmental parity tariffs on goods and services produced for sale in the United States and which (1) are not produced in compliance with US wage and working condition laws and/or (2) arbitrage environmental regulations so to evade cost by imposing environmental expense on those in other nations.
It is trivial to become the “lowest cost” producer of any good or service by simply ignoring environmental responsibility (e.g. dumping your expensive-to-treat toxic waste in the nearest river) or abusing employees through either extraordinarily low wages that are only acceptable due to either generally-terrible economic conditions or worse, effective slave labor.
An example of the latter is destroying an agricultural society’s ability to continue to farm for their subsistence, effectively forcing them into factories to survive. Examples of both can be found in nations like Vietnam and China — for openers.
There is utterly no reason for our nation to allow this other than intentional destruction of our middle class workforce and, ultimately, our economy for the benefit of a very few at the very top of large, multi-national corporations.
Now Reuters is weighing in:
Twenty-one years after NAFTA and four years after Obama’s 2011 U.S.-South Korea Free Trade Agreement, there is abundant data documenting how this trade model has been disastrous for most U.S. businesses, farmers and workers.
Since the pacts were implemented, U.S. trade deficits, which drag down economic growth, have soared more than 430 percent with our free-trade partners. In the same period, they’ve declined 11 percent with countries that are not free-trade partners. Since fast-track trade authority was used to pass NAFTA and the U.S. entrance into the World Trade Organization, the overall annual U.S. trade deficit in goods has more than quadrupled, from $218 billion to $912 billion.
Yep.
The only real answer to this is to cut the crap with the so-called “free trade” paradigm and instead implement a tariff system that recognizes the differences in production cost that are driven by what amounts to arbitrage against people and the environment.
Neither the Republican or Democrat party is interested in this issue, and the reason is simple: The various business interests have only one thing they’re concerned about: their bottom line.
This is not surprising, of course; the point of running a company is to make a profit. But the government is supposed to represent people; corporations can lobby but they cannot vote.
The bottom line on this issue is that the failure is ours as citizens — we refuse to put this issue front-and-center and demand that this rank giveaway to the 0.1% of Americans (never mind foreigners!) at the gross expense of American citizens be stopped.
@ Chicago
I graduated HS in SE Michigan in ’78 and THAT is the way I remembered the 70’s.
Clueless adults floundering around – the world changing beneath their feet, unannounced paradigm shifts – the 60’s were over and apparently the people in power thought things would just revert back to the 50’s but the too much of the genie had been released.
The very jobs that had allowed HS graduates to have second homes at the lake were disappearing at an incredible rate and the next generation who EXPECTED to roll into those same jobs were confused, bitter and hostile.
It took a VERY long time for the folks who managed to hang on to their fat union jobs to appreciate and admit that this wasn’t a “the business cycle” – that this was a real paradigm shift and those right behind them were screwed eight ways to Sunday.
People were in denial. Teachers were at a loss on how to counsel kids.
Younger parents were struggling with their own ‘60’s experience, job loss and economic uncertainty, older parents [the silents] – more economically secure – just pretended things would all get better and went about their lives as if nothing needed to be addressed, they had theirs and perhaps those right behind were floundering for personal reasons.
I remember my mother, a silent, exclaiming “why don’t people make things anymore – we used to be a nation that made things” – absolutely clueless to both the off-shoring that made her portfolio worth more and the devastation left in the wake.
Bumper sticker of the day – Will the last one to leave Michigan, please turn off the lights.
“Free Trade Is a Scam
The United States must impose wage-and-environmental parity tariffs on goods and services produced for sale in the United States and which (1) are not produced in compliance with US wage and working condition laws and/or (2) arbitrage environmental regulations so to evade cost by imposing environmental expense on those in other nations. ” Karl Denninger
Oh noze, doesn’t KD know that the Smoot -Hawley tariffs created the Great Depression v 1?
We have provide a US market for cheap salve labor manufactured foreign goods whether ‘Muricans have jobs to buy those good or not , because Adam saw this invisible hand after ingesting some fungus infested wheat most likey.
a nation of warehouse transfer terminals full of cheap Chinese crap…Yeah , that’s the ticket.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTW0y6kazWM
Guys, if truck drivers ever wake up and realize how powerful they really are, like the Ents in LOTR, by refusing to deliver to the Big Shitties for 2 weeks, most of those Big Shitties would be going nuclear Katrina big time.
And BTW, the West Coast Port slow down proceeds apace. [img]https://tse1.mm.bing.net/th?&id=HN.608049799154172773&w=300&h=300&c=0&pid=1.9&rs=0&p=0[/img]
OTOH, if the S really hits TF, this might be a great place to relocate – literally tons of stuff just handing around!
[img
[/img]
Olga, well said. I was just reading and nodding. Its funny how those bitter and disenchanted are told by others to just work harder and be positive. Because there are some success stories you’re supposed to believe anyone can make it if they really want to. Probably the most used tool on the debate team. Then the charts get trotted out clearly showing the body of macro stats in every and any way make it clear, this is a greasy upward climb at best. The comment by your Mother sounds exactly like something mine would say. When faced with some truly daunting realities at work a few years back, serious dilemma stuff with no good choices, she said….and she really meant it…..’isn’t there someone you could call?’. I still remember being awestruck. Right there, right then is when like Seger’s song says, you’re too far from home.
Olga, we were getting broad hints in the 60s that the party might soon end, but nobody was paying much attention.
My mother worked for a small machining and metal-plating company in St Louis, which was bought out by a New Jersey outfit called M&T Chemicals, which told the employees, either relocate to Jersey or be unemployed. The salesmen were, of course, promptly let go, and M&T discontinued the metal-plating so quickly that you have to wonder just why they bought this tiny company with its outdated plant and equipment. One of the top salesmen, and the former vice-president of the company, together formed another company to continue the old line of business with the intention of raising money with a public stock offering, and invited my mother in as the company treasurer. She invested $5,000, a nice chunk of change for 1966. However, no brokerage firm would touch the deal, because, they told the principals, the metal plating business was rapidly moving offshore for lower wages, and a local concern could not hope to compete on cost. My mother’s money was returned to her and the corporation disbanded. The two men went on to another local concern, which also folded a few years later- many small, local manufacturers were shuttering in that era, something that should have been a warning, but was seen by most as “progress” towards greater “efficiency”.
By the 80s, it was becoming extremely difficult for these smallish companies to stay in business on any terms, and as they died, the dense local networks of suppliers and subcontractors and jobbers, with their many different types of jobs calling for varied skill sets, died with them. I had a customer who owned a small die casting plant here in Chicago, who was clinging to his business in hopes of better times, and who told me that he hated letting go of his senior machinists in recessions because good machinists were rare and in great demand, and if you let them go in a recession, you might not get them back… and no young people were training as machinists. Now, there is no demand for these skilled people.
Llpoh
Are you honestly contending that the entire reduction in manufacturing employment is due to efficiency?
Are you actually contending that multi-national conglomerates such as Apple, P&G, GE, Cisco, Intel, etc. did not move their manufacturing to SE Asia?
If manufacturing efficiency improved so much, than manufacturing should still make up a level of our overall GDP on par before the efficiency gains began.
Please explain this chart big guy. You always make the extreme case, without taking into account other aspects of the situation. So solly. You are not correct.
Ok folks, once again here is the math. It takes approx. one third as many man hours to make a widget today as it did in 1975.
In 1975 approx. 22 percent of people worked in manufacturing.
On third of 22 percent is 7 per cent. Guess what per cent currently work in manufacturing?
It is a miracle! Hallelujah!
The answer is around 8 per cent. Around 8 per cent of current employees work in manufacturing – almost exactly what I said would be needed owing to manufacturing steadily becoming more efficient.
You guys seeing the truth yet?
It is the same as what happened to agriculture. Farming became more efficient. No longer do fifty percent of people need to farm. 1.5 percent can do what 50% used to, plus grow feed for animals plus export food.
So why is there a trade deficit I can hear you shriek! Umm, that would largely because of DEBT. We are consuming more than we produce. The excess is being provided from overseas.
Yes, there are cost pressures, etc.
But it is automation and ever increasing efficiency that is at the core of the issue.
The only way manufacturing employment could have remained at previous levels would be by trebling exports, or more. We are not cost competitive enough to do that, and we do not have Germany’s captive market – ie the recent EU additions and the ex-Eastern Euro countries.
The crap re exporting jobs overseas is largely, but not entirely, a myth.
Chicago – with modern CNC machines I do not need machinists. One guy overseeing machines can now do the work of tens, if not hundreds, of machinists.
What used to take a skilled toolmaker 6 months to do can be accomplished in a day.
A million dollar machine can do the work of dozens of toolmakers. All you need is a computer geek or two to program it.
Llpoh, you didn’t answer my question. Then why did they move the factories overseas? I am protected from foreign undercutting by a very thin set of laws, and they get lobbied all the time. Those laws change, I’ll retire. Fuck it. I don’t want to internationalize. One of my pals makes gas furnaces. He’s second generation, so he has always done well. The difference for him to move his shop to china was a G4. Had nothing to do with automation.
Apparently with enough “efficiency” and “automation” none of us will have jobs.
And then there was that petrodollar thingy that required countries that wanted oil to pay in dollars and NOT their own currency – and what better way to get dollars than to sell America shit – cheaper – than it used to make itself.
I’m guessing some people were laughing all the way to the bank as all that “efficiency” and “automation” allowed a certain small segment of financial geniuses – with the politicians assistance – to garner more and more of the wealth of America and killing that pesky middle class that actually expected the government to work FOR them and not the other way around.
What is the purpose of civilization when societal evolution manifests as an infinitesimal segment of the population owning everything and the rest just there to harvest?
“What is the purpose of civilization when societal evolution manifests as an infinitesimal segment of the population owning everything and the rest just there to harvest?”
That’s the million dollar question.
A bit dated but still relevant:
http://www.manufacturingnews.com/news/TAA0731131.html
“Despite a lot of talk and articles written about reshoring — bringing production back to the United States — offshore outsourcing of manufacturing and service-sector jobs to foreign nations continues to plague the American economy.
Hundreds of major American corporations are shipping thousands of jobs overseas, according to an analysis of Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) filings made to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration on behalf of the displaced workers.
While the trend is down from its peak, it has not fully abated, and there are many times more outsourcing events — as per the TAA petitions filed with the Labor Department — than there are reshoring (or “insourcing” or “onshoring”) announcements, as per searches of media stories on http://www.news.google.com and http://www.news.yahoo.com.
A survey of petitions filed on behalf of workers to receive generous TAA benefits and training during the first three weeks of July, 2013, indicates that offshoring of American production and jobs — as well as import substitution — remains a fixture of the largest and most well known American companies. Seventy-seven petitions were filed on behalf of American workers, from companies such as IBM, Walgreens, International Paper, Sanmina Corp., Chicago Bridge and Iron, NCR, AT&T, Tenneco Automotive, Micron Technology and Honeywell, among others”
It seems the trend is slowing as manufacturing costs rise in China. Not that Lloph is wrong manufacturing efficiencies have driven away any growth in manufacturing jobs, but still many factories have been moved wholesale to China and other countries and companies considering expanding their capacity have been more likely to do so off shore. That is not to say there has not been enormous growth in automated manufacturing. It looks like robotics will drive future manufacturing efficiencies.
http://www.mmsonline.com/news/robotics-will-power-the-next-productivity-surge-in-manufacturing
Bob.
Manufacturing efficiency could only be achieved through investment in machinery, technology, and modern plants.
Hmm. Capital investment in the US at record lows. I wonder why China capital investment has soared to astounding levels. It couldn’t be American companies off shoring their manufacturing to China. That’s crazy talk.
Llpoh
In 1978 “goods imported” as a percentage of GDP was 7.5%.
In 2014 “goods imported” as a percentage of GDP was 13.7%.
Is that an efficiency story?
Uh oh llpoh, jimmy’s woken up. Better put your helmet on.
admin, you complain so much about our country that i’ve had to stoop to your level to complain about you.
to put it as nicely as I can, you may tout yourself as an intellectual genius with your economic, political,, and societal theory about our country, but all I see is a man full of fear.
you are fearful, so you spread fear. which really does nothing to help our fellow citizens, you are angry and hateful, so you spread anger and hatred, which does nothing to help us.
if the purpose of this website is to help “awaken” our population to become better citizens for our country, then, i’m sorry, but you are failing in doing so. the best way to better our country is to report on the goodness that is happening around us, then encouraging us to capitalize on that.
spreading fear, hatred, anger, jealousy, and grief only perpetuates the cycle of those negative emotions. it’s like our country going to war every decade, we only create more enemies by trying to connive and manipulate others into bending to our will.
it’s time to stop fighting everything and everyone.
optimist
Let me guess. You live in the socialist paradise of California and voted for Moonbeam Jerry. You fear losing your free shit when a financial system you don’t understand, because you are a graduate of the California public school system, implodes and leaves you wondering how all the debt based promises made by people of your intellect to the ignorant masses will never be fulfilled.
My website is failing to awaken low IQ troglodytes like yourself because you are infected with a disease called liberalism. You and the rest of the Obamanistas actually believe you can control our economy, redistribute wealth from the productive to the parasites like yourself, control every aspect of people’s lives, borrow $2.5 billion per day, and wage wars of choice around the globe.
It’s time for you to wake up and be a man. Stand for something, you lowly excuse for a citizen. Try using your pea brain to try and understand what is happening in this country. Or you can go back to watching the Kardashians and working yourself into a tizzy over the Oscar fashions on Sunday.
optimist is;
A) a libtard cocfuk
B) a lonely masturbator
C) a wannabe psychologist
D) lives in mommie’s basement
E) licks live possum pussy for fun
F) ALL OF THE ABOVE
Long time ago after personally witnessing 911 I decided to produce everyday products on my own, after 15 years I have finally started sharing these products with the public.
http://palemoonfarm.com/home/general-store/
The only way out of this mess is to buy locally, here in Maine we have a marvelous cottage community and we support each other by buying the artisan products we produce.
Hand forage herbs we use in our soaps, real birch oil in our salve, and while supplies last grass fed Maine meats.
Buy local and support your patriot brothers.
Made in Maine!
” ……. you are fearful, so you spread fear.” ——— optimist, the self-righteous hypocritical prick
Healthy fear is necessary for human survival.
It is fear that keeps a child from putting their hand on a hot stove … a second time. It is the gung-ho have-no-fear soldier who is most likely to be killed in battle … not the soldier with a healthy fear of the enemy. Fear of seeing their families starve or become homeless, is the driving force why most people work. It is the brave antelope who gets eaten by the lion.
We ALL have fears. Even you. So why the fuck do you criticize our Admin … you low life piece of shit with your bullshit sermon?
My greatest fear is that you’ll post more bullshit on TBP.
========================================================
I didn’t watch the president’s State of the Union address, and I haven’t read it. Even so, I can state confidently that Union is strong! We need only to consider what happened to the 13 sovereign states that tried to extricate themselves from it to see just how strong it is: almost 800,000 people dead! Today we hear tantalizing talk of secession in several states, which is encouraging; but if the rumors result in concrete activity in the direction of freedom, we’ll see again just how strong the “Union” is.
But I’m also able to state quite confidently that the president’s address had little to do with the “union,” per se, as in his mind, there is only one nation–his–with political subdivisions of little power and importance, slavishly doing his will.
Here in Missouri, we also had a State of the State address by the governor—to which I also gave no attention. I’m sure that, like the president, he outlined his plans for Missouri, all splendid and grandiose, to be financed by compulsion, of course.
Inspired by the “state of–” addresses, I found myself pondering the State of Civilization, modestly limiting myself to civilization in the Western hemisphere. It doesn’t look good.
Decades ago, I decided that historians of the future would term these days “the decline of the middle class.” I think that is an accurate description of our times. There are, in addition, other aspects of the crumbling of our civilization that impress me.
There is, for example, a sort of pervasive fear. I don’t mean a fear of venturing outdoors, although in some neighborhoods that could be dangerous. I don’t mean a fear of earthquakes, tidal waves, or tornados, although such things are indeed fearful. I’m thinking of a more subtle fear, almost never expressed, and seldom given specific thought. Call it a fear of doing something wrong, something that might result in unpleasant, or worse, consequences. For the most part, it’s fear of doing something that might offend our fearsome rulers, whose wishes are “law.” A better word might be “dread.” Or perhaps “apprehension,” or “worry.” Regardless, it’s well founded.
As a result, when a company advertises a (mostly unnecessary and undesirable) new drug on TV, for example, it must accompany it with a litany of possible side effects more dire than the treatment for which it’s prescribed. It does this out of fear, of course, because there are rules regarding what can be said, and it dare not ignore them.
Dare you construct a gazebo in your back yard? Sure, if you can get the necessary permits from the Rulers. It’s your yard, your materials, your labor, and you have the approval of your neighbors (they’ve said, “Sure, why not?”) but you’d better be afraid if you don’t get the approval of those strangers who count. Better to abandon the project than run the gauntlet of bureaucratic obstacles.
It doesn’t have to be so specific. You consider whether you should hold stocks, or sell them. You fear a possible—maybe even probable–stock market collapse, but you also fear the tax consequences of liquidating them, even though that is merely a transfer of your property from one form to another.
If you take a trip by automobile, will you be stopped for a warrantless search by the police? Dare you resist? If you plan to fly, dare you purchase your ticket with cash, or object to the “security” check at the gate? Dare you ignore a stop sign at a deserted intersection at 5:00 AM? Not if there’s a camera at the scene.
If, in a fit of temper, you describe someone with an epithet which is considered “hateful,” you better be afraid! You live with a vague dread of doing something wrong, or not doing something right–as dictated by nameless rulers. There are so many things to fear that you fear NOT fearing, lest you overlook some threat or another.
Anger accompanies the ever-present fears, and that, in itself, can lead you to do something of which you should be afraid! Give vent to your frustrations and lo! you could be a terrorist! That’s something to be afraid of!
A corollary to an almost subconscious dread is another concern–a concern about money. I don’t mean greed, but rather, a reasonable worry about your financial future. As you see your assets shrivel, and as you fear–rightly–that your retirement funds may be seized (they’ll call it a “tax” of some sort), you must give thought to protecting what wealth you’ve accumulated. Maybe you get a second job, or your wife goes to work, if she isn’t working already. The kids look for summer jobs.
Or maybe you figure to spend your money while it’s still worth something–a new car, a boat, a really big TV, a vacation home–whatever. In that case, you’re living well, but drowning in debt. What’s the safe path? How can you be sure that a lifetime of work isn’t going to leave you with little to show for it, except, perhaps, massive debts, or savings that have lost most of their buying power? That’s something to be afraid of, in the richest country on earth! So what is the state of civilization today, at least here in America?
We live in a state of inchoate fear, and constant concern about money, and there’s precious little we, as individuals, can do about it. Or perhaps there’s a great deal we can do about it, but we’re afraid to try it!
http://www.strike-the-root.com/state-of-civilization
I think it’s instructive to look at the average American Middle Class budget to analyze what percentage of goods come from where.
Housing, Food, Transportation and most folks three largest expenditures. They are mostly made in the states with US Labor. However, wages are very stagnant. To me, that’s due to global wage arbitrage. The more free trade, the more that’s only going to get worse unless you start imposing tarriffs to even the playing field. Global labor is in massive oversupply. So whoever owns the means of production (a small percentage) will do extremely well. Everyone else will have their wages and working conditions dictated to them. At least in the US there is still some legal protection.
Look for the average wage (inflation adjusted) and economy to continue to decline as Globalization marches on and the water level equalizes between the first and third worlds. It will take something like WW I to reset the system (which is what ended the most recent age of Globalization). Today instead of opium wars, it’s currency wars and we’re losing because we’re not even smart enough to play.
Optimist, I mistakenly voted you up. So actually no one liked your post. Please spread your wisdom here. What exactly are you optimistic about? Tens of millions more illegal brown aliens in merika? Another trillion dollars of debt? World wide IQ dropping below 80? Obamacare bankrupting the middle class? Marxist studies, already a staple in the universities, being taught to kindergarteners? I can think of a whole lot you may be optimistic about.
Ah, I know what you’re salivating over: The legalization of man on animal sex. What a victory for you! You can’t wait! Think carefully before you slobber over your keyboard and respond douchebag.
Hey farmer john, best of luck. I moved to Maine (on the coast downeast) six years ago and have never regretted it. Plenty of local farmers here and I support them whenever I can. God bless!
Per Loopey the All Knowing (cough), our loss of manufacturing jobs is due to efficiency?????
He needs to go to any Walmart, Target etc. and start in isle #1 working his way over to last isle and read the country of origin printed on the box of almost every item they sell.
Betcha it says CHINA.
Admin – your narrative is full of holes.
Everyone has ignored that foreign goods are being bought with borrowed money.
There has been some change in capital expenditure, but the drop is related to many factors – overall economy, etc.
Very importantly, efficiency is not a direct link to capital expenditure. As an example, I was brought in to turn around failing plants. My capital budget was zero. I made efficiency improvements of 20,40,50 per cent with no capital expenditure.
A lot of current improvements are info related, not heavy equipment related, thus one reason less capital expenditure is required.
The price of robotics and such has plummeted, as has the cost of tooling development – thus less capital expenditure is required.
Admin does not define “goods”? Does it include oil, for instance? And again. Debt is ignored.
His chart of goods versus services as a percent of GDP is bullshit as well. Cost of goods has plummeted as a result of continued manufacturing gains in real terms. And the need for as many folks to do the task has as well.
No where did I say jobs had not been transferred – I said that efficiency gains is the main reason manufacturing jobs have been lost. And it is an absolute truth.
Admin does not like this fact – it conflicts with his narrative. Too bad for him – I can destroy his smoke and mirrors argument. He is a flyweight in this particular field.
I do not challenge him when he talks about bankers and such – that is his area of expertise.
This is mine. I have spent a lifetime in this field, and have an advanced degree specializing in it. I have ben responsible for saving many factories, and have run a very successful small manufacturing company for decades when those were under extraordinary market attack.
He is dead wrong about this. I used the example of agriculture. Manufacturing is the modern agriculture. It will steadily dwindle as an employer until a relative equilibrium is met.
Re the question about what folks will do for work when automation has taken all the jobs – how the hell would I know.
But, what I am describing is re the past.
If you want to talk about the future, that is something else again.
The future of manufacturing will be much like what Admin has described, for many of the same reasons.
Continued legislation, rules, and laws will make local manufacturing increasingly uncompetitive. Think EPA, Obamacare, etc.
The highest tax rate in the world will drive more corps and jobs away.
The push to increase minimum wage will not be positive.
But a huge issue lies in the graph showing China’s capital investment. Other countries are becoming more efficient, have a lower cost base, few rules and regs, and are rapidly stopping making junk and are making much higher quality product.
Before, they were inefficient, made poor quality, but had cheap labor.
They are becoming efficient, will have good quality, and cheap labor, plus no regulatory burdens relative to the US, plus a much more favorable tax regime.
NOW you will start to see a serious impact of jobs leaving for foreign shores. And not just in manufacturing.
Admin, using his dishonest tricks to try to win an argument where he is outmatched, says that imports were 7.5 per cent of Gdp in 1975, and 13.7 percent now.
He fails to mention that the 13.7 includes services. Oops.
He also fails to mention that the US export numbers went from 7.5 per cent to about 11.5 per cent in the same period.
That little factoid clouds his message, so he left it out.
Again, the pure and simple fact is that I am right about this.
TBP prides itself on trading in facts. We do not trade in smoke and mirrors.
I have laid out the facts. But for some reason folks do not like the picture those facts paint, so choose instead to cheer a false premise. Go figure.
The narrative folks want to believe has not yet happened to a major degree. It has been secondary. It appears to have been a bigger issue than it was because debt was used to buy imported crap by the trillions of dollars.
But what was not true in the past is actually going to come true soon enough. A great hunk of the remaining manufacturing jobs will be exported for the reasons mentioned above.
Even without the export of jobs, the days of manufacturing as a major employer is coming to an end due to the steady advancement of tech and the resultant efficiency gains.
Wrong llpoh.
I purposely excluded services. Those percentages are strictly goods. Do some research big guy. It’s right on the BEA GDP website. Do you want me to provide the link or can you do it yourself.
1978 – (GOODS imported 177 bil) (GDP 2.4 tril) (% of GDP 7.4%)
2014 – (GOODS imported 2.872 tril) (GDP 17.4 tril) (%of GDP 16.5%)
1978 – (GOODS exported 150 bil) (GDP 2.4 tril) (% of GDP 6.3%)
2014 – (GOODS exported 1.614 tril) (GDP 17.4 tril) (%of GDP 9.3%)
So our imported goods went up by a factor of 16, while our exported goods went up by a factor of 11. In 1978 goods imported and goods exported were only 18% apart. Now they are 78% apart. Those be the facts.
I never said manufacturing hasn’t gotten more efficient. You completely ignore the multinational companies gutting US manufacturing and off-shoring their manufacturing to Asia. You need some balance to your analysis and I provided it.
You’re welcome.
@Archie, cool I wanted to buy where your located but circumstances brought us here. I love Maine and Maine has a lot to offer, everybody coming up here on vacation. We both made good choices 😉
Admin’s narrative conveniently ignores the drop in manufacturing from 35% of employees in 1955 to 22% in 1975. Jobs were not being exported then.
It was a result of never ending efficiency gain.
If you look at a chart of mfg employment, there is a straight line drop in per cent employed from 1955 until today.
Ever year manufacturing gets more efficient. Every year. Year after year decade after decade.
A couple Maine jokes for farmer john:
(Overheard on the town dock)
New Yorker: “You know, when it was in Rhode Island I noticed the lobster traps were round. Yours are square. ”
Mainer: “That’s because they don’t know what the fuck they’re doing down theah!”
And:
(Overheard in the farmer’s market in October)
George: “Clem, good to see ya. How was your summah?”
Clem: “You mean the two weeks we had in Septembah?”
Hey Admin – tell me again why manufacturing jobs went from 35% to 22% from 1955 to 1975.
That does not suit your narrative now does it, Mr Beancounter.
Tell me again why there has been a straight line drop in manufacturing jobs as a percent of the workforce from 1955 until today.
From 1955 to 1975 it was because of efficiency gains, but Admin would have you believe that magically it changed in 1975 to being because we were exporting jobs overseas.
Seriously, that is some kinda stoopid. Anyone who believes that is a total idiot.
Notice the only thing he tried to correct was one chart my source was different. Oh well.
What about US exports climbing at same time imports climbed? What about the impact on private debt on that import number? Hmmmm?
Sound of crickets.
Man, what a beat down I have put on the Admin’s ass. He needs to stick to banking, because I rule the manufacturing roost. He knows it, and I know it.
This is an epic slaughter. Best I can tell, I am the only one commenting who has a clue about how manufacturing works. The rest want to blame those Chinese for taking our damn jobs!
They have taken some, but you ain’t seen nothing yet. It is going to be a mass exodus over coming years.
The future is the exportation of food. Book it, Dano.
Admin – they have indeed moved some jobs overseas. Other manufacturing jobs in varied fields replaced it. I openly admit jobs have been transferred. It is probably something like 80% lost to efficiency gains and 20% lost to exported.
But that situation will reverse, I think.
Capital expenditure in the US I forecast to plummet. That will slow US efficiency gains. There is no mfg future here given regs, Obamacare, EPA, wages, and tax rate. Corps will seek greener pastures in ever increasing numbers.
In ten years, I will 100% agree with the storyline.