Destroying American Jobs (ie Kodak)
 

Only a fool or business school graduate would think jobs are created (or lost) due to things that happen this year or last year. Everyone should be aware that Eastman Kodak is on the verge of bankruptcy. And should know why.

Kodak was created in the 19th Century by pioneering and advancing the film industry. By people who come from where the work get done. It could have continued if, well, 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management.

Kodak's innovations were image processing. But Kodak remained only in film. As others made better cameras, Kodak only made film. In 1975, Kodak developed the world's first digital camera. But Kodak remained in film. Then Kodak finally decided to make in the 1980s what was pioneered in the 1940s - instant photography. As any business school graduate would do, Kodak did not bother to innovate. In 1986, it was obvious in court that Kodak was simply violated Polaroid’s patents. Kodak withdrew from the instant photography market that was in 1980 another buggy whip business. Kodak remained only in film.

Obvious was that imagining was more than film. A 1960 technology - copiers was clearly innovative. But when Kodak decided to make copiers 20 years later - too little too late. More buggy whips.

Management was so dumb that Kodak president Kay Whitmore even feel asleep in a critical 1990 meeting with Bill Gates. After all, Kodak was only about film.

Others such as Fuji and Agfa were taking market share from Kodak. In a press conference, Kodak's president went down to talk to the photographers. To ask why news photographers were all using Fuji film. He was told that Fuji film did the more vibrant colors that the press wanted in photos. And still he did not get it. Kodak remained making conventional film.

Kodak once owned 90% of the film business and 85% of the camera business. So Kodak stopped innovating by doing what any business school graduate would do. Since every business school graduate is taught the purpose of a business is profit. Innovation costs money.

In 2003, Kodak hired a new president: Antonio Perez. A business and marketing graduate of Spanish and French business schools. Having surrendered the entire digital camera market to patriotic companies, by not even advancing their conventional film business, and after failing miserably in other 'too late to the market ventures' such as the copiers, then Kodak decided to innovate. They decided to make ink jet printers AFTER trends were moving from paper copies to electronic copies. According their 'innovator' Perez, Kodak was going to, "disrupt the industry’s business model and address consumers’ main dissatisfaction: the cost of ink”. My experience with Kodak printers - it eats ink quickly.

Kodak surrendered the conventional and digital camera markets in a fashion routinely seen when a company is lead by business school graduates. And protected by other business school graduates. Eventually Kodak stopped making films. Decided to innovate by moving into another 'buggy whip' business.

After six years of no accomplishment (thanks in part to a Board of Directors who are also business school geniuses), Kodak is burning through cash in scary numbers. Some Kodak credit lines were recently closed. Kodak's future products were obviously so defective for so long that even some on Wall Street see reality. While Perez still insists even last July that Kodak will disrupt what is beginning to become a buggy whip industry - paper printers.

Some of this is discussed by the NY Times of 20 Oct 2011 in Negative Exposure for Kodak

Eastman Kodak sold for $60 per share a decade ago. When Perez took over in 2005, Kodak was $30 per share. Recently the stock sold for about $0.60 per share before rising back up to $1. A stock that sells for less than $1 per share can be delisted on the stock market. The only thing keeping Kodak alive was the mental midgets on Wall Street who profit by doing so.

Why does Wall Street keep loaning money to a company that has decided to invest $billions in another buggy whip? Wall Street cannot see an innovation even it if was sucked up their nose. The reference to cocaine is far from accidental. Wall Street only understands investing in obsolete technologies. And takes $billions from America by doing so.

Kodak is another trophy of what is the most popular post-graduates of American schools create. Most are taught how to be as anti-American as Perez and George Jr (another business school graduate). Too enrich the top people while destroying American jobs. How many more thousands of Americans must be unemployed thanks to Kodak management in 2005 and decades earlier? More American jobs destroyed - surrendered to the Japan, China, and elsewhere, because 85% of all problems are directly traceable to those who enrich themselves at the expense of America.

He could not possibly innovate. Due to Board of Directors, Wall Street stock brokers, and investment bankers, then American simply wasted more $billion for the greater glory of business school management.

Only one question remains. When will the American economy stop harming itself by protecting Kodak? The sooner Kodak goes into bankruptcy, then the sooner future American jobs will stop be destroyed by more money games. It means Wall Street must stop screwing America to enrich themselves. And drive Kodak out of business.

I could have run Kodak better.

Agree with everything except the claim that paper printing is on the way out. The paperless office just hasn't happened. We are printing more than ever. People prefer to hold a paper copy in their hand and mark it with a pen.

IMHO the problem is short term thinking caused by short term payment calculations. CEO can slash the development (or maintenance - see Qantas) budget, and get rosy profit figures for the next five years, and so get a nice fat bonus for those five years. Eventually, as well described by TW, the company falls behind and profits fall, but by this time the CEO has either moved on or been given a golden parachute to do so. The CEO trades long term survival for short term profitability, because his contract was written in a way to encourage this.

Once again, I have a simple easy effective solution, which is to mumble mumble mumblemumble...

Z, there you go again with your one-size-fits-all solution.

That is business school thinking. We know the paperless office (which means massive paper reduction; not zero paper) is inevitable. Recognizing when innovations exist is the real art of business (why did Palm not beat iPad to market dominance?). View massive paper reduction delivered by the Post Office in just the past year. This trend (promised decades ago) has started and is accelerating. Only one educated with a Masters Degree in Buggy Whip Technology could deny it.

According to spread sheets, the office has never had more paper. And they would be right. That proves it will continue? A fundamental difference exists between one trained to know everything from spread sheets verses one who learns by viewing products and innovation that do not yet appear on spread sheets.

As Sculley (who subverted Apple Computer) once said (because his predictions were only from spread sheets), "Everytime I had the computer industry figured out, it had already changed." Just because paper use has peaked does not mean (as Kodak and Wall Street bean counters would have us believe) that paper use will increase. That thinking is only found in what is taught in business schools and on Wall Street. Only found when the purpose of a business is profits.

Printer use (and copiers) will never disappear. But would you spend $billions to develop a “disruptive innovation” – a new lead pencil? Kodak is dong just that. Encouraged by Wall Street experts who only invest in obsolete technologies to enrich themselves and reduce American living standards.

NPR recently discussed a lady who had developed a new technology lithium battery. She had one problem. Wall Street refused to invest in her business - as it also refused to invest in Intel over 40 years ago. She has found investment money (about $250 million) from private and government investors in China. Wall Street would divert $billions into Kodak and cannot invest in future technologies such as Lithium batteries? Exactly.

Another example of why other Americans get brutally punished with poverty. Because the best paid people are corrupt and dumb as George Jr (also a business school graduate).

BTW, this post proves UG is a flaming liberal. He (like George Jr supporters) will dispute this.

There is no evidence that the paperless office is, as you say "inevitable". Paper use has not peaked - it is still increasing.

A paperless office is possible. It would probably be better, cheaper, greener.

Your analysis fails to allow for human irrationality. Humans want to hold the paper copy.

I can sure echo that.

We tried to get secretaries to use first one kind of "Appointments" software, then another.

The advantage was we could link to their medical record, etc., etc.
There was no way they were going down that road
They would not give up their "little black books", until...

The hospital implemented it's own multi-$K system, and told the staff
they "had to use it"... because it linked into the Billing Dept.

$ is power, and power is $

What people like is the physical possession and portability, I agree. But what about the proliferation of iPads and Kindle Fires and the like? I think soon a paper copy won't be necessary because everyone will have their flat little screen they carry around and it can be whatever document they want it to be.

I'd still say that isn't as good. With paper you can flip back and forth, make marks, do what you want, all much more easily and efficiently. Yes, I know you can do those things on an ipad or kindle, but not as well as you can on tree pulp.

As well as the physical possession, I think there is some cognitive psychological advantage to using paper, but I can't be any clearer than that.

Hmm, maybe I'll write a paper on this. No, a .doc.

Besides, it's really expensive to fill your bookshelves with iPads and Kindles.

Attrition always wins in the end. You may well feel this way until your dying day, but my children will feel differently long past your dying day. :)


Unless the apocalypse comes first, of course.

That is what so many thought five years ago. Then Amazon came out with the Kindle. Amazon now sells more books electronically than in paper.

Amazon saw the value of innovation long ago when others thought paper will remain the future. Kodak has the same buggy whip attitude.

To save American jobs, a Kodak bankruptcy should have happened ten years ago. Then maybe Kodak might have developed the next innovation in image processing - the Kindle. Kodak cannot do that when entrenched in a paper mentality. Curious. Those on Wall Street that protected Kodak also have a paper profits attitude.

And when the systems went down and their nice lil programs weren't accessible?
Thats right, those old school paper things saved the day. :p:

Are Kindles made in the US? Cuz Kodak printers sure aren't. They're from China all the way and very poorly made at that. To my regret, I bought a Kodak printer some months back (coming from the time of papyrus, I still like to print things out). I had it for 2 or 3 months when it suddenly decided to stop printing in color.

I did all the trouble shooting I could on my own, and when I couldn't fix it, I got onto Kodak's help site which promised real chat with a Kodak help desk person. Who was very polite and from India. OK. Machine made in China, help desk staffed from the Indian sub-continent. (I would like to know in what way Kodak should still be called an "American" company).

Anyway, Deepchok asked me a bunch of questions and finally told me that my problem was due to a recent paper jam on my printer which had damaged the print head. The thing can be damaged by a single paper jam? What? At least Deepchok said he would send me a new print head for free, and that I should have no trouble installing it.

Right. Now, I am not a complete computer klutz. I'm not afraid to do simple stuff like add more memory or an external drive, etc. But that damn print head was impossible. On top of that, the thingy that holds the printer open - kind of like the thingy that holds the hood on your car open - is made of very brittle plastic and it snapped. Since the printer seems only to be able to run if the thingy is in the exact right spot, that Kodak printer STILL won't run, even though I did get the print head in correctly.

I have no idea why Wall Street or anyone else would throw money at Kodak printers. Mine is hands down the worst piece of computer equipment I have ever owned. :mad:

Our hospital finally installed a multimillion dollar electronic records system, but because there are now three, yes, I said THREE, different programs in the hospital system of electronic records none of which talk with each other, we now have to print the latest one to go into the patients in-patient record. Wasn't the idea of electronic records to not have paper? So who was it that campaigned on making all our medical records electronic so if you had care in Ohio and got hurt in Texas the doctor to get your records? Fat chance. But boy there sure are a few people making a lot of money off this plan.

That is a different product.

We were talking about office printers. No one prints a novel to read. Office printers are used to print things like meeting agendas, minutes, annual reports, contracts, things like that, which are not read passively like a novel but studied and marked with a pen.

The printing of these things is still increasing. See Merc's post.

Your "buggy whip" comments remind me of that (possibly mythical) quote that someone said to Henry Ford in about 1920, to stop messing about with gas engines because pretty soon everything will be electric. Maybe one day, but it's further off than you think.

AT&T pioneered the transistor, Telstar, laser, Unix OS, advanced programming languages, telecommunications, cell phones, submarine optical communication, digital switching, and even what is now a standard option for all homes - telephone, internet, and broadcasting all on one cable. The so called "Triple Play". Instead, AT&T management either stifled the innovation, refused to upgrade, or simply sold off a crown jewel so that a money losing operation could claim a few more years of profit. Even the Bell Labs are owned by people more innovative - the French. Eventually all that was left was their wireless business. To avert bankruptcy, AT&T sold itself to Southwest Bell. Purchased mostly for its name.

General Motors played the same game for over 30 years. Selling or mortgaging everything to claim profits that really did not exist. Then blamed the government, economy, unions, Japanese, taxes, and anything else they could rather than admit business school graduates design bad cars. The Volt and Camaro being latest examples.

As paper becomes less desirable and popular (in books, newspapers, Postal service, business records, financial transactions, currency, etc), some companies would rather reinvent the paper printing industry. Why are so many once American institutions simply mortgaging themselves over the past 20 and 35 years rather than innovate? Major changes in how American business works and the resulting diminished productivity take that long to finally appear on spread sheets.

A company that invented the digital camera - and could not bother to profit from it - now only has patents left. Meanwhile, it stupidly thinks it will become profitable by making paper printers. Nobody is offering to buy their only remaining assets - patents.

From the Washington Post of 4 Jan 2012: A company with management educated by the same people who educated George Jr will even deny they are harming America. Eventually, even Wall Street must stop denying reality. After all, any company foolishly turning to paper as its future can only be daft.

Kodak was kept alive by a Wall Street that will lend to buggy whip industries rather than to innovative ones. It is good for Kodak to sell its last remaining asset so that Kodak can claim a few more years of profits? Another money game so popular since 1980. A patriotic Wall Street would have demanded that Kodak get into some innovative business.

Even digital cameras (first developed and then all but abandoned by Kodak) are no longer a growth industry. Eastman Kodak was selling on 4 Jan 'after hours' for $0.44 per share. Less than half of what the stock sold for over 100 years ago.

Of course, someone might fire their president. It took Obama to fire GM's only problem. But Wall Street, that could, will only enrich themselves at the expense of workers and the nation. Money can be made by prolonging existing decay. It is how Wall Street now works. Massive profits at the expense of workers and all other Americans.

Kodak's only future is in a business that has now started a slow decline. Is no longer a growth industry. What was clearly a growth industry 30 years ago is now following telegraphs, tape recorders, and vacuum tubes.

I was talking with my solidly Republican, big business, small government, brother at Christmas. We were talking about the state of the nation and politics, when out of the blue he says, "The trouble with this country is MBAs". He couldn't understand why I laughed.:)

J's daughter decided not to go to law school and to go for an MBA instead. I regard this as a slight improvement, from terrible to just very bad.

No, MBAs are worse. They're the lawyers' bosses.

From The Economist of 31 Dec 2011 entitled "Take five": Today's results are dependent of what was in the innovation pipeline seven and twelve years ago. But cost controls - what MBAs do - means innovation is gleefully stifled. Management that 'does not come from where the work gets done' means research and innovation cannot be productive. When MBAs became CEOs of Big Pharma, then blockbuster drugs were not being developed in the 1990s. With stifled research in the 1990s, the blockbuster drugs in 2000s could not exist. So Big Pharma did after 2000 what any MBA would do. As AT&T, GM, and Eastman Kodak had also done. They played money games. And went running to wacko extremists in government for protection. Rather than fire the number one problem (as Obama did to Wagoner in GM), American wacko extremists (George Jr et al) created Federal laws to keep American drug prices 40% higher. The Economist summarizes the problem.


Merck is a perfect example of why America must surrender jobs to foreigners (ie China). Why under 35 year olds that once made $45K in 1992 and $47K in 1999 (when America had an educated president) were only making $32K in 2007 (when America had an MBA president).

Merck was once one of the best Big Pharma companies with new and innovative drugs. Then Raymond V. Gilmartin took over in 1994. A 1968 Harvard Business School graduate. In the 2000s Merck was crying because it had no blockbuster drugs in the pipeline. Gilmartin did what MBAs do – stifle innovation to increase profits. He even lied about health problems created by a profit center - Vioxx. Under Gilmartin, the problem was known. As an MBA, he quashed honesty to make profits. Rather than do what made Merck great, the MBA hired lawyers and cost controllers. While stifling the innovation pipeline.

Gilmartin is now doing the only thing he understands. He a business management professor in Harvard. Teaching more students how to stifle innovation in the name of profits. To enrich the rich while destroying American jobs.

Merck's previous CEO was Roy Vagelos. Educated in Chemistry at U of Penn. Became a medical doctor in Columbia U in 1954. Spent time as a research doctor in places such as National Institute of Health. Authored over 100 scientific papers. Was the Chief Scientist at Merck before becoming CEO. Came from where the work gets done. Which is a definition of an American patriot.

Vagelos is the reason why Merck was the Big Pharma benchmark for innovation. Could develop so many blockbuster anti-cholesterol and statin drugs including Zocor. Merck did much of the research (ie the 4S study) that proved how cholesterol caused deaths and how the problem could be averted with drugs. Ten years after Vagelos retired, Merck was still earning profits because that CEO was an American patriot. He was not a dumb and evil business school graduate - Gilmartin.

Merck no longer has blockbuster drugs in their innovation pipeline. Like any anti-American company (such as Fiorina at HP), Merck's lackluster future is directly traceable to doing what is taught in business schools. We can even quantify how bad their MBA CEO Gilmartin was. He was paid $37million annually. While productive and patriotic companies such as Google pay their CEO Eric Schmidt $500thousand annually.

Reality is so obvious - ie Wall Street - that only a wacko extremist could deny it.

The Economist says why American Big Pharma was running to government for protection. And got it from another MBA named George Jr. (Same wackos who loved George Jr also called Sen John McCain a liberal.)

Thanks to wacko extremists, Federal law keeps American drug prices 40% higher compared to the same drug sold elsewhere in the world. Another trophy to an MBA education. Money games and lawyers (ie Vioxx) to mask innovations and honesty that MBAs stifle. An MBA who was running Merck into the ground ten plus years ago demonstrates why The Economist says Big Pharma is now becoming a welfare case. As anti-American as the heart attack of America: Chevy.

Merck was once patriotic under Roy Vagelos - who came from where the work gets done. The Economist describes what happens when top management is dumb – is educated in business schools.

The current CEO of Merck is Kenneth C Frazier. A Poly Sci graduate (from Penn State who is also on their pedophile board) who then graduated from Harvard Law. In a company dominated by MBAs, Frazier was their choice because he was the lawyer responsible for covering up and subverting lawsuits for Vioxx. A drug that Merck knew causes heart disease and strokes.

So they made him president of their global health unit. Since as a lawyer or MBA in America, he must be smarter. He is not Merck's CEO because he knows so much about research, innovation, and things that advance mankind. After all, he even spun lies and a coverup in court so that Merck would be not guilty for harming people with Vioxx. Reality: Merck withheld information about Vioxx for over five years, resulting in between 88,000 and 140,000 cases of serious heart disease. No problem. A lawyer’s job is to lie and protect profits at the expense of human life. He will make a fine CEO - according to MBA school concepts.

When a new drug (vorapaxar) was rejected by a safety panel, Frazier said, "Scientific innovation is hard." H-h-h-a-a-r-d was also a problem for George Jr. Anything is hard when not educated in how get the work done.

Why would anyone put a lawyer as head of a drug company? Because winning lawsuits is more important than developing new drugs and advancing mankind?

Welcome to why so many American jobs must be shipped overseas. Then the Tea Party blames liberals, illegal immigrants, evil foreigners, and Obama. Rather than CEOs so corrupt as to say, "the purpose of a business is profits".

Decades previous paper has moved on to smart phones, electronic calendars, tablets, and products yet to be developed. Companies such as Kodak hoped to profit by reinventing old technology products. Kodak is now bankrupt and delisted from the NY Stock exchange.

FujiFilm also had Kodak's problem. So it moved from buggy whip products to new technologies. For example, flat LCD screens (new technologies) have a wider viewing angle because FujiFilm innovated. Fujifilm also shifted into high tech chemicals.

An innovative Kodak would be making 3D printers. Or tablets. Or 3D movie technology. Or advanced optics and masks necessary for producting seminconductor and MEMs devices. Not possible in many American companies (not just Kodak) with a buggy whip mentality. As a result, America now another problem. A shortage of people with technical abilities necessary to innovate.

NY Times discusses a larger problem created by so many big American companies with Kodak’s attitude. Apple management defines the problem with examples.

From the NY Times of 21 Jan 2012:

:borg:

:vomit:

I don't know about MBAs and Lawyers. I think that we build iPhones in China for the same reason we don't see blond heads in a tomato field in California.

Buck fifty an hour, live at the company dorm, 72-hour work week. Yes, these do not sound like "American" jobs... post labor movement that is.

The article states bluntly that labor is only a tiny part of costs. For example, iMacs (and other PCs) that cost $22 in America cost $6 in China. And both sell for $thousands with $hundreds in profits. Labor costs are virtually zero in both countries. But in America, technological abilities no longer exist. Shenzhen, China does innovation no longer possible in America.

Wall Street Journal was blunt about this. A CT coil manufacturer foolishly thought as UT posted. At $2 per hour, he would make a fortune in Mexico. Then learned costs were less when using $10 per hour labor in CT. Completely opposite of what UT repeatedly said. He returned to CT years later to save his company. Because labor costs are relevant when myths replace facts. When spread sheets and other myths replace industrial knowledge. American labor that costs five times more money means lower costs. Contrary to sound bytes.

Same myth was promoted by GM. GM's higher costs were not due to unions. That myth was also called brainwashing. Labor is a tiny part of each car - as has been posted with numbers at least five times previously. GM's cars cost more to build than a Mercedes Benz because GM cars were that poorly designed. Took almost twice as much labor to assemble due to insufficient technical knowledge in GM's management.

Apple executives were blunt about something we who do this stuff have been seeing and saying for decades. America has less and less technical abilities every decade. Most of an Apple cannot be done in America. Labor costs are irrelevant. How blunt must the NY Times article be?

What the NY Times did not say. The Silicon Valley discusses ICs. Not integrated circuits. Indians and Chinese who are now more than 50% of new employees. And paid same wages. Why? Because the Silicon Valley has trouble finding Americans with sufficient education and knowledge. Those educated by sound byte myths claim those ICs are hired because they cost less. Nonsense. They are paid same.

A problem so severe that most of what makes an iPhone can no longer be manufactured in America. Apple executives were blunt about it. And still, some ignore facts to instead blame labor cost.

Examples have been posted for years. Many educated by MBA myths blame labor costs rather than insufficient technical knowledge. Too many Americans are educated in communication, finance, law, or business schools. Educated in how to sell off America's wealth while doing nothing productive. Labor costs explain none of this. As Apple executives were so blunt about.

He had to go to Shenzhen, China to find a solution not possible in America. How could a fact made so often and so obvious be ignored?

So I think we may agree on the problem, if there is a problem. If I have you correct you want more Americans to work in the goods producing industries, and there are not enough Americans qualified to work in goods producing industries?

Americans do not want to work in goods producing industries unless they have to. Americans would rather work at an AT&T store and sell the Iphone and service plan then in a factory making the phone.

You are going to have to show me the numbers on how labor at $2 per hour costs more in Mexico then labor at $10 per hour in CT.

I've been slacking at holding up the crunchy-idealist dept, sorry.


Grace Lee Boggs on the MLK Day celebration in Detroit:

Emphasis added. The bolded sentences particularly resonate with me -- I work as a fabricator (electric signs) in the suburbs making some fairly soulless dreck. The days when I make a sign with a tiny bit of character to it are markedly better days.

Two points:

1) Here in PDX, it's remarkable to me how many "professional" acquaintances
are making efforts towards local produce, re-cycling, and various degrees of self-reliance.
Sometimes it depends on the kind of work they do and whether their job allow them freedom to wander.
Sometimes it's just a hobby...but software programmers seem to do well at it :rolleyes:

2) Would like to see pic's of your work... please

My buddy took his '56 Chevy Sedan Delivery (station wagon without side windows or rear seat) to a custom upholsterer to have the whole interior done. When my buddy told the guy, because of the large expanses in the rear section he could use his own imagination to add inserts or stitched patterns to break it up, the guy took $500 off the price.

Economics 101. In the real world, a worker gets paid $2 per hour when only productive enough to earn $2 per hour. 'The World is Flat' is a classic example.

A bean counter will use spread sheets to invent a massive profit. A product oriented person will learn a reality cited by Daniel Oks of the World Bank. "US wages are 5.25 times higher than Mexico's, but that Mexican workers are about one-fifth as productive ... because of much outdated machinery, clogged transportation, ineffective management, and poor education. The result: US wages are just 2.6% higher than Mexico's, on average, after factoring in productivity."

Well, Mr Gibson was only doing what stock brokers, accountants, MBAs, and other less informed people do. Exact same reason why GM cars cost more to build than Mercedes Benz when labor was not the reason. Why Eastman Kodak would see its future in a commodity quickly becoming a buggy whip industry. And why Apple must go overseas (Shenzhen, China) to find more productive workers in more productive (innovative) industries. In every case, a bean counter invents myths to avert a reality: his ignorance is the problem.

A bean counter would judge based in payroll numbers and profits. Because spread sheets do not measure what is more important - productivity. And a reason for many contentious posts ten years identified Wall Street as the problem - long before everyone recently learned that reality the hard way.

The greatest Americans and their companies judge based upon the product; what productive people do. Innovation is top of a list that determines who is #1. Innovation determines who deserves to have jobs. Dollar per hour, the mistake he made in CT, is mostly hyped by those who invent reality on a spread sheet - MBAs, stock brokers, accountants, finance people, investment bankers, etc.

Fortunately for Mr Gibson, he learned his foolishness and reversed it in only four years. He saved his company by paying employees $10 per hour in CT.

At this point, everyone should have understood why Ross Perot's "Great sucking sound" was obviously a myth based in bean counter rationalization.

I put that through the TW--> human translator. Roughly:

A worker in Mexico on $2 per hour is more expensive than one in CT on $10 per hour, because the Mexican worker is less efficient/productive by a factor of at least 5. So while the CT guy gets paid five times as much, he does more than five times as much productive work in that time.

I think.

Sufficient for anyone who only needs one supporting fact to know something.

Meanwhile, an extremists is an expert only from a soundbyte, "A worker in Mexico on $2 per hour is more expensive than one in CT on $10 per hour".

Several thoughts. When times are bad enough, Americans will do the equivalent of staying overnight at the company. Look at my coworker, terrified of losing her crummy job, staying overnight at the motel for weeks on end so the owner won't fire her. She is not alone.

As far as Americans preferring to sell I-phones than make them, I feel that is a reflection of the lack of manufacturing jobs rather than a matter of worker preference. Look at Detroit. They have no shortage of workers when the production lines get rolling again. I strongly suspect that given a higher rate of pay to manufacture I-phones, people would enthusiastically work at making them rather than selling them for a lower wage.

Most of these Detroit auto workers (and other production line workers) don't have college degrees, so what people choose to major in at university is not the main problem. As I have stated repeatedly here, the problem is the quality of K - 12 education available to our children. We give kids who are functional illiterates and don't even know the multiplication tables, a high school diploma despite these deficiencies. These kids get placed in "special classes" where they are baby sat, not taught. Thus, the pool of qualified American workers has dwindled.

But that's far from the only reason we have lost much of our manufacturing capacity. I used to live in Colorado Springs which was once dubbed "silicon mountain." HP, United Technologies, Intel and the other big chip manufacturers once had a very strong presence in that town. I knew several people who worked on their production lines. They may not have loved the repetitious nature of the work, but they did like the wages which allowed them to live a comfortable middle class life. Then out-sourcing began. I remember one friend in particular who had worked at HP and ended up working for a call center at half his old pay. He did not end up there because he was too lazy to work at HP. HP and the others abandoned him just as the rest of the electronics industry abandoned their American workers all over the country.


Everybody wants to blame the American worker. I must admit that I agree with tw - I blame the CEO's.

Through the tw --> human translator: "Don't paraphrase me, bitch."



"There are just as many notes as I require. Neither more nor less!"

What's missing is, productive at what? With all the productivity factors making labor unproductive in Mexico, all those companies with massive factories just across the border for the last 20 years are out of business? No they have chosen Mexican labor correctly, if they need that particular type of labor!

If you need grunt labor for hard-to-ship items sold to the US market go to MX... smart labor involving choices go to CT... quickly adapting labor where there are no labor or environmental laws, China!

My buddies company, which had shifted all production to Mexico, forcing him into a daily border crossing is coming back to the States because of the violence and corruption. Just another blessing of the War on Drugs.®

What did Mr Gibson do? He made a decision based in what any MBA would do. Some mythical spread sheet numbers while ignoring what was relevant. Why did he save his company? Instead of downsizing, cost controls, blaming the employees and other lies from business schools. He stopped thinking like an MBA. He suddenly realized that the product was only important. Therefore learned employees at five times more per hour costs less money.

This American Life has highlighted the work of Mike Daisey telling the story of Foxconn and the Chinese people who work there building Apple stuff. Including preteen workers, chemicals that cause neurological damage, nets erected to catch suicide jumpers at the plant. CBS Sunday Morning included a piece on it yesterday, which you can read.

Foxconn has had some issues, but they also raised wages not just for their workers but for the whole local area, when the local party boss was trying to incite further problems from the workers. It backfired when Foxconn - a Taiwan company - raised their wages, forcing the party boss's factories and his buddies' factories to raise theirs in turn.

What I'd like to see is more companies demanding better conditions in China. Mike Daisey was on Up with Chris Hayes on MSNBC both mornings this past weekend, and his pitch is that Apple should use some of their billions of rainy-day money to insist upon Foxconn reforms. I think not only would that be great for foxconn's employees, I think it would have a profound affect on the entire region.

My impression of the CBS piece was along the lines of bashing Apple,
and and it's new CEO - making the number of suicides seem outrageous.

Mike Daisey is a "performance artist", who has a one-man show.
CBS used it as an introduction: The dark side of shiny Apple products

China has finally reported some more-or-less believable numbers for their annual rate of suicides,
China is listed as # 10, about the same as some other countries (23/100,000)

FoxConn employs 400,000 and had 18 suicides in this one city - well below the national average.
A Google search reveals that others have taken issue, and facetiously said
it's safer to work at FoxConn than to live elsewhere in China.

The CBS segment did say that Apple is only one of FoxConn's contractors,
including other computer and cell phone mgfr's.

I'm not dismissing the nets and the suicides. Maybe they saved a few lives.
The interior scenes were of clean, open, and orderly production lines.

The child labor was the issue that bothered me the most,
and Apple and other corp's and and should become aggressive in addressing that issue.
(Maybe Gingrich needs some attention too !) :rolleyes:

I have it on... un-citable but quite trustworthy authority that at least some of the Foxconn suicides were dead before they ever left the roof.

Can you believe American job-killing regulators sent all that to China with the jobs?;)

Near-sighted Zombi's or victims ?

Like i said - the local party boss had his gaze set on the Foxconn plant. I can't prove this, obviously, but like I said, I definitely trust my source and the context under which it was related to me.

Whether in self-defense or prevention mode, Apple is doing the right thing
by demonstrating corporate responsibility and leadership. Now, will/can MS et al. follow suite ?

NY Times
By CHARLES DUHIGG and NICK WINGFIELD
|February 13, 2012

Apple Asks Outside Group to Inspect Factories

The bigger question is will China let them in and to do so without minders? I doubt that.

Merc, too many of your glasses are half-empty

They are all reality based. None of my glasses are half-empty.

Wait! I see a half empty one over there! Here. I'll just drink that down for you. Ooooh, nasty!

As a matter of fact (someone please note this down in the Cellar Book of Improbable Events), I am actually in agreement with Merc on this one. I am highly skeptical of any Chinese so called co-operation. China hates the West and rightly so since long before the opium wars of the 19th century.

They must laugh at how cleverly they have switched the tables on us. Can we say "industrial mercantilism" boys and girls? China is delighted to help us disassemble our manufacturing base and ship it off to Peking where the Chinese use it to spew out shoddy consumer goods and create a nasty trade imbalance - especially with the US.

Sure, the Chinese may smile and act co-operative on the surface, but in reality, they couldn't care less and will get away with every atrocity they possibly can.

One Word: Polaroid

From the IEEE Spectrum of Jan 2012: Noted earlier in “ Technology - see the future from history ” is why that number has so kept the IT industry innovative. It is not based in spread sheets and other lies. Instead, that parameter is based in the purpose of every business – its product.

It’s no accident that a lawyer (Kenneth C Frazier – see second of Destroying American Jobs (ie Kodak) ) is Merck’s chief executive because he subverted laws (discovery) to protect Merck from a disaster created by its previous enemy. Raymond V. Gilmartin, a business school graduate, started in 1994 (see first of Destroying American Jobs (ie Kodak)). Its no accident that this same lawyer also was complicit in the firing of Joe Paterno (see "Hail to the Lion" - Philly Inquirer) by making decisions without first learning facts. And it’s no accident that this drug company therefore is using money games to create profits rather than innovate new drugs.

Big Pharma is not driven by a product oriented parameter such as Moore’s law. Executive get massive bonuses by buying other companies and other money games. Promote a myth that money games make higher profits (as Fiorina foolishly claimed to waste HP money buying Compaq). Big Pharma may even (or intentionally) create some drug shortages to get protection from government. Big Pharma is more and more driven by profits – not the product. They even successfully got George Jr to keep domestic drug prices 40% higher – also called corporate welfare. Got a business school graduate (George Jr) to subvert the free market and innovation to protect profits.

The only source of economic growth, wealth, strength, jobs, and products is innovation. That means the boss must come from where the work gets done. One of many requirements necessary so that innovation can happen.

According to spread sheets, more profitable is to let Chinese do the innovation. Which makes job growth more difficult. But sure does enrich the elite top 1%.

Meanwhile, Kodak's buggy whip innovations created bankruptcy. Only a fool or business school graduate would think innovation, market dominance, and profits can be achieved by developing products for a declining industry. But then look who got richer by subverting even more American jobs.

Polaroid - once Dr Land died, then innovation stopped. Another trophy for the MBA Hall of Fame.

This American Life is retracting the episode.

:cool: I'm feeling vindicated...

It's too bad. People will read of the retraction and think the entire story is false. That Foxconn is just fine. When the only false thing is that he claimed to meet all these real people and talk to them, when he never did. But those people (with the exception of crippled hand guy) are all real people with legitimate stories.

There really were a few underage workers. (But it's pretty rare.) There really were people hurt by chemical exposure (in a different Apple factory.)There really are nets around the dorms. (even I've seen that one.)

Daisey screwed up, and I won't defend him. But there is still a story there.