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REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS
What's the Point of Jobs in China?
Tuesday, May 31, 2016 12:01 PM
SIGNYM
I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.
Tuesday, May 31, 2016 12:15 PM
SECOND
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: So we get back to my question ... what's the point of jobs ANYWHERE? It's an interesting question. I hope someone tries to answer it besides me. -------------- You can't build a nation with bombs. You can't create a society with guns.
Tuesday, May 31, 2016 10:31 PM
1KIKI
Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.
Thursday, June 2, 2016 10:51 AM
Quote:Originally posted by 1kiki: If we COULD get machines to do everything for us, and assuming that we could fix the economic system so that people could avail themselves of the products, we'd probably be like the very wealthy of any era: bereft of meaningful problems to solve and accomplishments to be proud of, we'd be swimming in an endless sea of physical gratifications and shallow interactions.
Thursday, June 2, 2016 12:40 PM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: Quote:Originally posted by 1kiki: If we COULD get machines to do everything for us, and assuming that we could fix the economic system so that people could avail themselves of the products, we'd probably be like the very wealthy of any era: bereft of meaningful problems to solve and accomplishments to be proud of, we'd be swimming in an endless sea of physical gratifications and shallow interactions. Kind of like the Eloi in The Time Machine SECOND, I can't see the point of answering a question about the point of jobs in any particular place, because in this globalized economy one place can be substituted for another. Also, it depends on WHOSE purpose you're asking about. Jobs mean different things to financialist (who sees them as a source of profit), to the worker, and to the consumer. And jobs have a greater meaning in general than either of those.
Thursday, June 2, 2016 5:24 PM
Friday, June 3, 2016 8:41 AM
Quote:Does work have to be Americans’ primary source of status? Should it organize their lives?
Quote:...'It is not so obvious that the USA needs to bully China into moving factory production to the USA to create new jobs: Unemployment Claims in 2016 Have Set a New Record Low
Quote:Partly because we're better at designing these limited AI systems, some experts predict that high-skilled workers will adapt to the technology as a tool, while lower-skill jobs are the ones that will see the most disruption. When the Obama administration studied the issue, it found that as many as 80 percent of jobs currently paying less than $20 an hour might someday be replaced by AI.
Quote:Policymakers will need to come up with inventive ways to meet this looming jobs problem. But the same estimates also hint at a way out: Higher-earning jobs stand to be less negatively affected by automation. Compared to the low-wage jobs, roughly a third of those who earn between $20 and $40 an hour are expected to fall out of work due to robots, according to Furman. And only a sliver of high-paying jobs, about 5 percent, may be subject to robot replacement.
Friday, June 3, 2016 2:45 PM
JAYNEZTOWN
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: And now you're wondering about the cost of bringing those jobs back to the USA. So, tell me, SECOND, what is the cost of NOT having those jobs?
Friday, June 3, 2016 5:32 PM
JEWELSTAITEFAN
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: SECOND, first of all, I generally don't look at "unemployment" rates because those are subject to the "discouraged worker" phenomenon. As far as manufacturing jobs, the manufacturing sector has clearly decreased since about 2000, the Fed reading the tea leaves is irrelevant. The real question is "What's the point of jobs ANYWHERE"? I'd rather engage JSF on this first, if possible.
Friday, June 3, 2016 5:36 PM
Quote:Originally posted by 1kiki: Do you suppose you could actually address a topic - any topic at all - with facts and logic, and avoid the personal attacks, sgg?
Friday, June 3, 2016 5:50 PM
Quote:Originally posted by SHINYGOODGUY: Quote:Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN: Apparently this thread about jobs in China for American products and the trade and tariff laws enacted by current and prior administrations has been hijacked because it is all the fault of Trump - who has never held public office. Denial, much? Reality impaired? Okay. Then explain to me.....where do tariffs come from?
Quote:Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN: Apparently this thread about jobs in China for American products and the trade and tariff laws enacted by current and prior administrations has been hijacked because it is all the fault of Trump - who has never held public office. Denial, much? Reality impaired?
Quote: If they are so bad for the American worker, whom everyone seems to care about, they why oh why are they in place? Really, can't American workers make American products better than anyone else? Then why are American businesses fleeing the country to do their business overseas?
Quote: Why aren't businesses and manufacturers rejecting the notion of taking their companies to foreign lands? Is the president forcing them to leave and we don't know about it. Wouldn't that make it an impeachable offense?
Quote: Inquiring minds want to know. SGG
Friday, June 3, 2016 5:55 PM
Quote:Originally posted by second: Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: SECOND, first of all, I generally don't look at "unemployment" rates because those are subject to the "discouraged worker" phenomenon. As far as manufacturing jobs, the manufacturing sector has clearly decreased since about 2000, the Fed reading the tea leaves is irrelevant. The real question is "What's the point of jobs ANYWHERE"? I'd rather engage JSF on this first, if possible. I saw an article called Why Has Manufacturing Employment Declined? It is from 30 years ago, back when Trump, Hillary and Obama were unimportant. It begins: “United States manufacturing employment grew little in 1986. Currently at about 19 million workers, it is below the 21 million employed at its peak in 1979. This disappointing performance often is attributed to-” Read it to find out how the sentence ends. https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/review/86/12/Manufacturing_Dec1986.pdf I can show you the future story of manufacturing employment with another story that has almost reached its end: farming employment. The USA had 21 million farm workers in 1916, the very same number as 1979’s manufacturing employment. There are now only 1 million farmers and yet we are not starving. www.ers.usda.gov/topics/farm-economy/farm-labor/background.aspx Twenty million farmers have tragically lost their jobs. A way of life is gone. How will farmers support their families now that they are unemployed? President Trump says he can increase the number of hardworking farmers back to 21 million with high tariffs on imported food. But, just maybe, Trump should not. https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/review/86/12/Manufacturing_Dec1986.pdf
Friday, June 3, 2016 8:18 PM
Quote:Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN: 20 million farmers from 1916 did not lose their jobs, down to the 1 million jobs today. They are dead or resting in bed today. You forgot to mention all of the computer and software jobs from 1916 that have been exported.
Saturday, June 4, 2016 12:21 PM
Saturday, June 4, 2016 2:54 PM
Saturday, June 4, 2016 3:11 PM
Saturday, June 4, 2016 4:10 PM
Saturday, June 4, 2016 4:23 PM
Quote:Originally posted by 1kiki: But to get back to the question of jobs - I suggest you read U K Le Guin's 'The Dispossessed' for one imagining of a world where the basics are met by common effort while your 'job' - your calling, that task you are drawn to do - is something discovered individually.
Sunday, June 5, 2016 10:34 AM
Sunday, June 5, 2016 3:44 PM
Sunday, June 5, 2016 4:26 PM
Sunday, June 5, 2016 4:45 PM
Sunday, June 5, 2016 4:51 PM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: SECOND, what's your point? It seems to be that automation is inevitable and good, and that the economy (and people) will adjust to the level of automation in their lifetime. Is that your point?
Sunday, June 5, 2016 6:51 PM
Quote:Originally posted by 1kiki: The global economy is still jobs-based. As a member of the global economy, Switzerland still exists in competition with that economy, which demands maximizing profits. Also, Switzerland has a long-standing Protestant work-ethic of industriousness, even tho only about 25% of their GDP is due to manufacturing. (An astounding 11% of their GDP is due just to banking, which doesn't require work per se.) If the vote were to take place in some other culture with less of that mindset, I wonder how it would turn out.
Sunday, June 5, 2016 7:06 PM
Sunday, June 5, 2016 11:22 PM
Quote:Originally posted by 1kiki: It'll be harder than you think. The entire economy is based on the transfer of money in return for work performed. Unless that money is transferred in some other way, there'll be no money moved away from the corporations that own the means of production back to the people (or the government that might act as an intermediary). Hence, they'll be no money to pay the stipend.
Quote:I see economics as a subdiscipline of the social sciences, alongside history, sociology, anthropology, and political science. I hope that this book has given the reader an idea of what I mean by that. I dislike the expression “economic science,” which strikes me as terribly arrogant because it suggests that economics has attained a higher scientific status than the other social sciences. I much prefer the expression “political economy,” which may seem rather old-fashioned but to my mind conveys the only thing that sets economics apart from the other social sciences: its political, normative, and moral purpose. From the outset, political economy sought to study scientifically, or at any rate rationally, systematically, and methodically, the ideal role of the state in the economic and social organization of a country. The question it asked was: What public policies and institutions bring us closer to an ideal society? This unabashed aspiration to study good and evil, about which every citizen is an expert, may make some readers smile. To be sure, it is an aspiration that often goes unfulfilled. But it is also a necessary, indeed indispensable, goal, because it is all too easy for social scientists to remove themselves from public debate and political confrontation and content themselves with the role of commentators on or demolishers of the views and data of others. Social scientists, like all intellectuals and all citizens, ought to participate in public debate. They cannot be content to invoke grand but abstract principles such as justice, democracy, and world peace. They must make choices and take stands in regard to specific institutions and policies, whether it be the social state, the tax system, or the public debt. Everyone is political in his or her own way. The world is not divided between a political elite on one side and, on the other, an army of commentators and spectators whose only responsibility is to drop a ballot in a ballot box once every four or five years.
Monday, June 6, 2016 8:02 PM
Tuesday, June 7, 2016 7:24 PM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: So we get back to my question ... what's the point of jobs ANYWHERE? It's an interesting question. I hope someone tries to answer it besides me.
Wednesday, June 8, 2016 2:31 AM
Wednesday, June 8, 2016 7:41 AM
Wednesday, June 8, 2016 9:41 AM
Wednesday, June 8, 2016 1:28 PM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: As you say, SECOND, nothing happens until somebody MAKES it happen. But where is it in the national interest that we should do what corporations desire?
Thursday, June 9, 2016 8:56 AM
Quote:Congress looks after the interests of whichever of the 50 states that have banded together to look after their states' interests.
Friday, June 10, 2016 7:51 AM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: Unfortunately, the Presidency has been bought and paid for by the 0.01%. So the President looks after the interests of the 0.01%. Congress SHOULD be looking after the interests of its various member states, but Congress has ALSO been bought and paid for by the 0.01% so it's really looking after the interests of the wealthy.
Friday, June 10, 2016 8:35 AM
Quote:Here is an excellent example about how the "National Interest" is decided by government from today's Houston Chronicle article about rocket engines manufactured in Russia. It is a very unstable decision making process. SpaceX (actually Elon Musk, multi-billionaire ) says he can build those engines in the USA. NASA says let's not get hasty about destroying our relationship with Russia just to please Musk and move a few jobs to Musk's factory. So which side is looking after the "national interest"? Is the multi-billionaire looking after the best interests of America by banning import of the RD-180? Or is NASA and the Pentagon looking after the best interests by continuing to buy the RD-180?
Friday, June 10, 2016 9:14 AM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: The conundrum that you presented (and there was just an article in the WSJ about chip-making and the Pentagon, which was exactly the same) is the result of decades of wealthy businessmen successfully representing THEIR interests, and this policy coming home to roost.
Wednesday, June 22, 2016 8:01 PM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: As you say, SECOND, nothing happens until somebody MAKES it happen. Given the huge profit incentive to manufacture abroad, in cheap-labor locations, manufacturing in the USA won't happen unless somebody MAKES it happen. The only difficulty in the way of manufacturing at home is the one that you keep pointing out... corporations which are used to making huge profits don't want to give that up. But where is it in the national interest that we should do what corporations desire?
Friday, June 24, 2016 8:08 AM
Quote:Not strictly in the way you are stating it, but in general terms supporting Free Enterprise and a Free Economy allows the economy to strengthen, thereby producing economic power for the nation's leaders to wield (or pretend to).
Sunday, June 26, 2016 2:23 AM
Quote:Not strictly in the way you are stating it, but in general terms supporting Free Enterprise and a Free Economy allows the economy to strengthen, thereby producing economic power for the nation's leaders to wield (or pretend to). - JSF What is "Free Enterprise"? What is a "Free Economy"? How do they produce economic power? ... and while we're at it .... What is economic power?- SIGNY
Thursday, June 30, 2016 7:16 AM
Quote:Not strictly in the way you are stating it, but in general terms supporting Free Enterprise and a Free Economy allows the economy to strengthen, thereby producing economic power for the nation's leaders to wield (or pretend to). - JSF What is "Free Enterprise"? What is a "Free Economy"? How do they produce economic power? ... and while we're at it .... What is economic power?- SIGNY Ok, let me sharpen the question. Some people believe that "free enterprise" means that ONLY MONEY should determine policy, since "markets" achieve the best outcomes. In other words, people with money, making strictly financial decisions, should do whatever they want. Is that what you mean by "free": Free of all constraint?- SIGNY
Tuesday, July 5, 2016 8:24 PM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: Quote:Not strictly in the way you are stating it, but in general terms supporting Free Enterprise and a Free Economy allows the economy to strengthen, thereby producing economic power for the nation's leaders to wield (or pretend to). - JSF What is "Free Enterprise"? What is a "Free Economy"? How do they produce economic power? ... and while we're at it .... What is economic power?- SIGNY Ok, let me sharpen the question. Some people believe that "free enterprise" means that ONLY MONEY should determine policy, since "markets" achieve the best outcomes. In other words, people with money, making strictly financial decisions, should do whatever they want. Is that what you mean by "free": Free of all constraint?- SIGNY Or, if not free of ALL constraint, what constraints would you keep?
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