If you happen to shop at Walmart or drive a foriegn car, welcome to the world of supporting outsourcing.
Doesn't Bob Owens drive a 17 year old imported car?...
Despite the argument about safety, or the lack thereof, how do you feel about the outsourcing of American jobs (USA) to other countries.
Are you of the Corporate mentality that if I can outsource it to a foreign country for half (if not more) of my current labor cost, that is the right thing to do. And, if you think it is, is it because it is better for the consumer or because it benefits both our shareholders and Corporate heads much much more. Love to here your take and any other who defends the outsourcing of jobs to other countries, including communist China...
Here's my take... We are a nation that was built on trade, and it's foolish to think that we can suddenly try to be protectionist because the balance of trade has tilted in the opposite direction from where it was 50 years ago.
We apparently had no problem taking jobs away from local companies like British Aerospace, Hawker-Siddley, Mitsubishi, or Dornier when it came time to sell Boeing aircraft to BA, JL, or LH. And those Boeing airplanes are also sold to companies in China and Airbus's home countries.
There really isn't a legitimate competitor to Caterpillar when it comes to heavy equipment. There are a few who have tried, but Cat still wins contracts from around the globe, and does most of its assembly here in the US. Is anyone in Australia or Brasil complaining about the loss of manufacturing jobs?...
General Electric and EMD (now a Cat subsidiary) pretty much own the market for manufacturing heavy locomotives. I don't hear a lot of complaining in Australia or Saudi Arabia when they're importing locomotives made in Muncie, IN or Erie, PA...
The xenophopes probably don't think twice about Microsoft or Oracle products being the leader in corporations worldwide, yet openly complain about iPods and iPads being made in China....
We don't think twice about the fact that you can see CNN anywhere in the world, but some people get all whipped up when they realize that there isn't a single major TV manufacturing plant left in the United States. Even the few that exists are entirely dependent upon components made in Asia, and just about every person who complains about the lack of manufacturing here probably won't be willing to spend the extra $100 or so it would cost to source everything local for an imported TV currently being sold for $200 @ Walmart.
For every one example of corporate greed you guys can produce, there is likely at least one example of union greed. Choking the golden goose for every last leg has a tendancy to either kill the goose, or piss it off so much that it flies away.
In the case of the auto industry, they've all managed to move to RTW states for the most part. GM hasn't closed as much production in RTW states as they have closed-shop states.
EMD, Cat, and GE have been doing the same thing. EMD's plant in Muncie (newly minted RTW state) is replacing a plant in London, Ontario where the C-UAW has been locked out for six months in a contract dispute. GE opened a new locomotive plant in Fort Worth last year, and I'd expect it will be growing at the expense of Erie. Cat has expanded very little in its Illinois homestead, with a dozen or so new facilities opened in the past ten years in RTW states.
When you bring this back around to airlines, the one trick in the bag that major manufactures have been able to use and airlines haven't is the ability to move work to RTW states, thus lowering some of the cost.
In conclusion.... I do not support outsourcing, but you really can't blame companies for looking at every possible avenue to matching the costs of their leanest competitor.
