Wal-Mart, China, and The Bill Clinton Lie

[Rey C.]

To be honest, Philbert was close to being onto something in his initial post in this thread... before he soiled himself by trying to be cute and hurling childish insults. It's curious that he always has that tendency. But anyway... though what's done is done (with respect to NAFTA and other trade agreements), the U.S. is once again moving up the scale by embracing advanced manufacturing techniques, that some of the countries that took our low skilled jobs haven't gotten on board with yet. And recently, the cheap natural gas prices and stable, growing domestic economy have made a good many multi-nationals relocate some of their operations back here.

And MustBeGood was correct in the OP, in that Clinton was the President who opened the floodgates by getting behind NAFTA and other free trade agreements. Several other prominent Democrats also got behind NAFTA. But almost all Republicans got behind it, along with most conservative business groups and think tanks: the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Assoc. of Manufacturers and the Heritage Foundation, to name just a few.

Here's a blurb from the Heritage Foundation just before the vote on NAFTA:

Create American jobs

Economists are virtually unanimous in their conclusion that the NAFTA will have a strongly positive impact on job growth throughout the U.S., with most estimates in the hundreds of thousands. Opponents' predictions of a net job loss are backed by no evidence whatsoever.

Based on the decimation of the American textile, clothing and furniture industries, I guess we all now know their prediction was about 180 degrees off. They (including the Clintons - Hillary backed NAFTA too) were all wrong and Ross Perot was all right (at least on this). Though I can't give Obama very high marks on trade, he is a world better than his predecessor. In 8 years, W. Bush launched only 7 cases before the WTO against China for unfair trade practices. In his first 3 years, Obama had already launched 8. I understand Bush's sad record is a pretty low bar to compare one to. But (IMO) both Clinton and Bush were weak on making and enforcing trade agreements and Obama has done a bit (though maybe not much) better. But as Perot said many times, you cannot have free trade unless it's also fair trade. One of the best cases supported by Obama (that Bush sat on his hands over and slow-walked) was to do with China's unfair and illegal tariffs on U.S. made auto parts. This WTO victory led to the repeal of Chinese import tariffs on American made auto parts and I have seen firsthand how that has helped stabilize (especially) 2nd and 3rd tier U.S. based auto parts suppliers - even after the recession and GM & Chrysler bankruptcies almost wiped them out totally. But a lot more could be done. I also give Obama some credit for leaning on the Chinese for their tendency to manipulate their currency - although I feel a LOT more could be done in that area. I don't believe those who say that the Chinese could retaliate by no longer buying our debt. Ours remains the safest currency and economy in the world. If they did anything to destabilize our economy, they would be devaluing the hundreds of billions they already have invested here. IMO, it's time to lean on them about their currency and call their bluff.

But it's not just on the Administration (any Administration) to make things better. We also have to look out for ourselves - which fewer and fewer of us are willing to do these days. Most American workers probably realize by now that the purpose of a corporation (whether it be Walmart, GM or Apple) is not to provide them with a fair shake, it's to maximize shareholder returns. And Philbert is roughly correct, in that we shouldn't expect generic multi-nationals to seek out a higher cost area of production just based on patriotism. Labor cost for those types of companies is their highest expenditure. That's why any industry that relies on high volume/low skill labor (that's left the U.S.) probably won't be back anytime soon. But companies that rely on heavy design and engineering or higher skill levels for employees, now they will move to areas that maybe cost more, but have the educated talent pool that they must have. This is the leg-up that Americans can have if they prepare themselves for that opportunity. And increasingly, it's already happening. While Apple employs FoxConn to assemble their pricey gadgets in China, Apple engineers design and develop the products, and even design and develop the machines and processes that FoxConn uses, right here in the good ol' USA. Other companies tend to design a product here and then toss it to the Chinese to figure out how to make it for them. Apple is different in that way, and that's one reason for the level of quality and fit/finish that you tend to see in their products, irrespective of cost. But unless more American kids/younger people bite the bullet and stop being babies, wanting the easy way out, they're going to lose out on these growing opportunities. They don't have to all get 4 year math or engineering degrees (although that's a way to write your own check for life), they could get 2 year technical degrees in CNC programming, robotics, advanced manufacturing, automotive technology, etc. This is from a couple of years back. But the last time I checked, the situation was still about the same: over 3 million jobs are going unfilled because companies can't find enough qualified people to fill them. That is our fault! It's not Obama's or anybody else's.

Here's a company that is near and dear to my heart (though I don't work for them... yet ). It's all American. It's high tech. It's the largest machine tool maker in the western world. The owner wants to do right by American workers and he pays people VERY well... yet he's still a billionaire. He's going F1 racing in a year or so. Haas Automation What he needs though is for more American kids to get off their fragile, tender asses and get a STEM degree or some technical training. And then he'll give them a job making $50K a year+ starting out! Obama can't help them with that and Romney sure as hell wouldn't help them. Get out there and do it!!!

As for what to do about the workers who have been displaced from 20+ year jobs, and are at or above middle age now... I don't really know the best answer. I've seen people working at Walmart who I've known from other jobs I've had. It sucks. The only answer I have is retraining. But let's be honest, it's damn hard to start over when you're knocking on 50 or maybe even 60.

 

[MustBeGood]

Still laughing on the advice for FOs

Stoled it from Busta Rhymes on Wung Tang's "The Monument" where he starts out the dissing of House of Pain lead rapper Everlast after he started the dissing fight talking stupid like the way Phil posts on this boards topics.

"Your whole show wack and I'mma cancel your sitcom"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjkfRlF9t6E

Everlast later will say FU ni66as and change his style with this well known song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCZ1YteCv5M

 

[MustBeGood]

From last year.

Striking Fast-Food and Walmart Workers As Stimulus
Posted: 05/30/2013 1:11 pm

Peter S. Goodman
Executive Business Editor, The Huffington Post


Workers striking at fast-food restaurants and Walmart stores around the country are seeking more than better wages and working conditions for themselves. Their mission could yield benefits that would flow to virtually everyone in the American economy, which, despite modest improvements, still suffers from a critical shortage of decent paychecks.

We ought to be cheering on these striking workers, because they are pressing to secure what would amount to a dose of private-sector economic stimulus at a time when the government has proven wholly incapable of delivering a meaningful jolt. If these workers earn more money, they will spend it and spur economic growth.

Ever since President Barack Obama took office, Republicans have been monkey-wrenching the economy in a failed effort to parlay American pain into angry votes for Mitt Romney. With next year's midterm elections in its sights, the GOP is now redoubling on this cynical strategy, serving up a traditional offering of filibuster threats alongside a newly fortified helping of scandal-mongering to ensure that Washington is so dysfunctional that it can't agree on any spending -- not to hire teachers and cops, not to pay for social safety net programs, not for practically anything.

On its surface, the broadening labor movement among the lowest-paid ranks of the American workplace is a narrow development. People who make as little as $7.25 an hour are merely seeking to better their lot. Many of these people stocking aisles at big-box retail stores and squeezing ketchup onto hamburger patties at fast-food restaurants work full time, yet earn so little that they are poor by any official or commonsense standard. They cannot afford groceries or car payments, let alone pay for health care or support families.

My colleague Saki Knafo recently profiled a 22-year-old man whose job at a KFC in New York City pays so little that he relies on infusions of cash from a grandmother in Ecuador who earns her living operating a roadside restaurant in that country. Here is a potent challenge to the much-mythologized American Dream: The people who have stayed behind in a poor Latin American country sustaining those who left to better themselves in the supposed land of unlimited opportunity.

That grandmother in Ecuador has a good deal of company on the list of those whose sweat equity is being siphoned off as a subsidy for billion-dollar mega-corporations paying poverty-level wages. American taxpayers enable Walmart, Target, McDonald's and KFC to continue to find ample numbers of people willing to labor in their stores despite paying wages too low to finance nourishment or health care. These subsidies come via food stamps and Medicaid, the government health insurance for the poor.

These realities alone are enough to fuel hopes that the strikers get a bump in their earnings big enough to relieve them from the desperation that colors many of their lives. But a more self-interested reason ought to prompt virtually everyone to see their fortunes as aligned with those of the striking workers: Given the poisonous dynamic entrenched in Washington, the prospect that government will marshal a meaningful effort to spur economic growth is approximately as likely as mayoral aspirant Anthony Weiner posing naked in Playgirl Magazine.

Not only does the obstructionist GOP continue to embrace wrong-headed austerity as the curative for economic weakness, now Republicans are intent on ensuring that Obamacare winds up as a disaster, hoping to harvest the bitter votes that failed to materialize in large enough numbers for Romney. This is not only immoral -- depriving health care from tens of millions of people who would otherwise receive it under Obamacare -- but also bad economic policy: When poor people worry about their access to health care, they cut back on spending in other areas, further weakening the economy.

Against this sorry backdrop, the fast-food and Walmart workers angling for better wages present a potentially important element. For better or worse, they are the face of an increasingly enormous slice of the American labor market.

More than half of the jobs wiped out in the course of the Great Recession were concentrated within so-called mid-wage jobs, which pay anywhere between $14 and $21 an hour, according to a report from the National Employment Law Project, an advocacy and research organization. Fewer than 1 in 4 of the new jobs created since have been within those ranks. Low-wage jobs -- those paying $7 to $13 an hour -- saw far smaller losses during the recession, and have accounted for more than half of the job growth as of last summer.

If workers now earning $8 an hour inside warehouses or at fast-food counters manage to get more pay, they are not going to hide the extra money in the Cayman Islands or leave it to their heirs via elaborate trusts. They will go out and spend it almost immediately, boosting their local economies.

They will distribute their dollars at grocery stores, generating additional demand for agribusiness and the truck drivers who haul the crop to stores. They will leave their funds at hardware stores, as they address long-ignored problems in their homes; or they will perhaps hire carpenters and plumbers and electricians to do the work, enabling these professionals to buy trucks and add more workers. This additional commerce will shore up state and city coffers, enabling hard-hit school districts to add teachers to alleviate crowding.

In short, lifting the fortunes of the lowest-paid workers will improve the economy for virtually everyone.

The government is effectively on strike. The public sector has become almost irrelevant in the search for an economic fix. Enter the striking workers, seeking to get their hands on additional private-sector dollars -- a success that would ripple out in every direction.

Follow Peter S. Goodman on Twitter: www.twitter.com/petersgoodman

 

[Mayhem]

If workers now earning $8 an hour inside warehouses or at fast-food counters manage to get more pay, they are not going to hide the extra money in the Cayman Islands or leave it to their heirs via elaborate trusts. They will go out and spend it almost immediately, boosting their local economies.

They will distribute their dollars at grocery stores, generating additional demand for agribusiness and the truck drivers who haul the crop to stores. They will leave their funds at hardware stores, as they address long-ignored problems in their homes; or they will perhaps hire carpenters and plumbers and electricians to do the work, enabling these professionals to buy trucks and add more workers. This additional commerce will shore up state and city coffers, enabling hard-hit school districts to add teachers to alleviate crowding.

I always add the auto parts and tire stores to this very same argument. Giving these folks an increased wage means they can keep their cars running better so they can get to work. Y'know, the issues affecting REAL AMERICANS that you hear a certain Party claiming to give two shits about. Not to mention keeping their internet bill paid so they can viably search for work and educational opportunities.

 

[Philbert]

Idiotic Kumbaya nonsense.
As usual.
Once all those workers get $15 an hour, they become ineligible to receive Welfare, Medicaid, and Food Stamps.
They now have to cover all those expenses out of pocket, so now they would REALLY be poor and have less money to raise a family on...
Just the cost of insurance on OtramaCare would wipe out their gain from the raise in salary.
These high school drop outs with no marketable skills will never get wages at a high enough level to live the "American Dream", which is why illiterate unskilled workers illegally flooding the country is a recipe for...well, what we have today.
Widespread poverty ...Mexico's No. 1 export.
We already have plenty of low wage Americans to support, but with the frantic inclusion of uneducated low level wage earners who speak little or no English and who have no idea how to handle the American way of life...they live on fake ID and SS numbers, use welfare and Medicaid to live a Mexican lifestyle and strike for higher wages.
We got lots of poor Americans who have no use for education, work for $10-$12 and hour, and all have HD tvs, and nice rims.
Kids eat shit food, govt cheese is their only benefit, and the Lottery is their financial planning.

 

[MustBeGood]

From page 2

When you see those Latino kids romping in the WalMart store playing with toys and opening packages those suppliers get nothing for those damaged goods...they get paid when the cash register says sale.
It always took a few minutes to open and untie a Barbie doll from it's packaging at Walmart, their suppliers have gone serious with loss prevention.

Today



Idiotic Kumbaya nonsense.
As usual.


These high school drop outs with no marketable skills will never get wages at a high enough level to live the "American Dream", which is why illiterate unskilled workers illegally flooding the country is a recipe for...well, what we have today.
Widespread poverty ...Mexico's No. 1 export.
We already have plenty of low wage Americans to support, but with the frantic inclusion of uneducated low level wage earners who speak little or no English and who have no idea how to handle the American way of life...they live on fake ID and SS numbers, use welfare and Medicaid to live a Mexican lifestyle and strike for higher wages.
We got lots of poor Americans who have no use for education, work for $10-$12 and hour, and all have HD tvs, and nice rims.
Kids eat shit food, govt cheese is their only benefit, and the Lottery is their financial planning.

 

[MustBeGood]

And just in case Willi is reading this thread bitching on a sports thread comparing the NBA to the WWE. bitching about Magic Johnson and Larry Johnson for their remarks while he is supporting a lifetime bigot owner that has to sell his team. With a short memory about Riley Cooper's racist remarks last fall in Philly.

If Sterling keeps his team this is the new name:

 

[MustBeGood]

Phil wishes he could choose one of these everyday to wear and walk solo in a major city and talk Tea Party racist based bull shit:

Phil you should really take your whack sitcom and find a forum full of Tea Party faithful. You Might enjoy your weed high instead of your bull shit that is not moving anyone here. Then you can make your points with smileys!

 

[Philbert]

You've gone Full Retard...:homer:

 

[xfire]

You've gone Full Retard

If any motherfucker would recognize full retard, it would be Failbert, he sees it in the mirror every morning.

 

[MustBeGood]

I think we should blame OTrama for the whole mess, after Slick Willie got done.
MustBeStupid has a good cut n paste going, but rarely has an actual opinion one can actually understand.

Raise your hand...do you shop at WalMart?
Millionaires and richer don't participate, please.
Secondly, does anyone think with vast Asian factories (and China especially) producing like quality goods for cheaper wholesale that anyone is going to insist on paying the USA more for the same product? Really?
One must deal with reality; no one in general is going to choose higher cost goods over much cheaper ones from a sense of loyalty...we'd all have adopted children and homeless living in every American household, every Euro chalrt and apt; we'd all sing Kumbaya on conference calls from Timbuktu to Munchen.
The solution to trade problems is to...well...solve them.
Produce goods in a different way...put automation where it's neded, negotiate foe things we do have cheaper or better for crap we don't need to compete for the existing market.
Umbrellas have no American parts...anywhere.
Not our area of expertise.
Tech is a good source to mass produce and compete, foodstuffs, lots of manufacturing is cheaper in the USA for overseas companies than importing to here...all GoldWings are made HERE for us and the world, at least until recently.
All we need is to replace the anti (successful) Capitalist gov we have and get some gung ho Americans in office to reduce onerous burdens placed on most small businesses and many larger ones...
Dems have lots of successful business persons in the party, but they have to work within a system that requires contacts and cronyism to work.
Incompetence is the Dems most important product.
Well, that and Libtards , who are flourishing like rats at the City Dump.

Dah.

They don't drive the economy for manufacturing products like pillows, soap, clothes, toothpaste.............add your own on your daily tour to stop wetbacks kids from destroying toys. They buy boats, cars, houses in Europe.........and more as they have you believing that you can be rich like them as the fools for support on their stack dough, buy congress mother fuck the minorities and the whites that have copassion for them.

Fool, they are trying to share shit or pay taxes for not their kind, glad you show up as a redneck on here. That's your whack sitcom on here with smileys.

Later Phil. You are something else just like your thumb sucking Tea Party playing my way or the highway politics in The House.

Or, I'm saying, since I took off of ignore to read your whack ass sitcom, I'm done dealing with you. Will just read and laugh and hope I'm not drinking a soda, otherwise I might be have to take a trip to Wal-Mart for a cheap Chinese made keyboard.

Ni66ers, Chinks and Wetbacks are the problem! That is the jists of your sitcom or your creed handle here on FOs. What a weed smoking loser. Remember I smoke weed to from that one thread when I called you out why can't you see compassion which is what the drug is for. You know, the happy drug! And sorry for any grammar errors. I hit post when I finish typing unlike you trying to be witty with perfection vocabulary posts.

You must of won a spelling bee as a kid witch was most likely the highlight of your life. .

 

[Philbert]

Actually you are just stupid; no other reason your posts use no logic or facts, just made up bullshit; and wrong most of the time.
Your posts are not comprehensible ^^^^ (when you don't cut and paste), but they work well for losers like Mongo, Misfire, Mayhem, and zeeblowschickens.
But by now there isn't a FOs member who hasn't noticed what a dingleberry you are, so I like you posting more lame crap...serves them right for letting you post so much pure crap.
And actually encouraging you...Misfire even quotes you on the Koch bros hysteria...twin sons of DMs, as it were.
The fact that many people here can not only spell but actually know how to construct a coherent sentence seems to confuse you
I never won a Spelling Bee, but I was 99th percentile in the non-math part of the SAT college boards...and you are the Number 1 most ignorant poster on FOs today.
But keep trying to find something wrong with spelling and grammar skills, you may impress Misfire or Mayhem and they'll let you asslick some more.
You have no clue when it comes to Cannibus Culture; but keep on trying to figure out how to get that fluffy stuff into the syringe...

 

[MustBeGood]

Actually you are just stupid; no other reason your posts use no logic or facts, just made up bullshit; and wrong most of the time.
Your posts are not comprehensible ^^^^ (when you don't cut and paste), but they work well for losers like Mongo, Misfire, Mayhem, and zeeblowschickens.
But by now there isn't a FOs member who hasn't noticed what a dingleberry you are, so I like you posting more lame crap...serves them right for letting you post so much pure crap.
And actually encouraging you...Misfire even quotes you on the Koch bros hysteria...twin sons of DMs, as it were.
The fact that many people here can not only spell but actually know how to construct a coherent sentence seems to confuse you
I never won a Spelling Bee, but I was 99th percentile in the non-math part of the SAT college boards...and you are the Number 1 most ignorant poster on FOs today.
But keep trying to find something wrong with spelling and grammar skills, you may impress Misfire or Mayhem and they'll let you asslick some more.
You have no clue when it comes to Cannibus Culture; but keep on trying to figure out how to get that fluffy stuff into the syringe...

That is where you are wrong.

Back read and see where I said I was a night assistant manager that was more of a baby sitter on 3rd shift for Jewel-Osco to white kids, not minorities, that were to lazy to earn their $14-16/hour pay to stock shelves because they felt I'm here for a check, and/or in school and this is just school/fun money. Of course I had to try to teach these privilege seeking idiots a work ethic, but I was wrong as I was just stressed out with the store condition right before for opening with these lazy ass racist standing around talking about shit and force to do double duty helping and making sure I got the dry grocery and diary order type in on the telzon in a eight hour shift.

All with a degree in economic.

See fool, call me stupid all you want, but I study economics and know the right theories that make the economy works instead of BS modern day theories like trickle down economics and free trade that are bias and invented as a farse for the rich to exploit and stack dough using stupid Americans like you for support with their advertised rhetoric that is the same like a SUV commercial that shows hardcore off road but the I NEED IT to keep up with the Jones crowd buys for prestige just to guzzle gas on there way on the highway to a major city downtown, that way they avoids the minorities! And to the sports stadiums and arenas!

That is why Sterling told his GF to not bring them to his games. He is the mouth piece for the crowd that pay over flatted prices for sports so no longer a family of four can afford to attend like I remember growing up.

Not in your last word game so keep up your Glen Beck style on FOs that is a whack ass sitcom with insults and simely on others.

Fool, you live in a blue state that allows you to buy the happy drug legally so your weed money doesn't help Mexican Mafia kill for the illegal trade.

have fun everyone with this single minded Tea Party supporting fool with a lame ass sitcom going on.

 

[MustBeGood]

Untold Stories

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l3Q9npaJIQ

 

[Philbert]

Untold Stories

Here's your song...

 

[Philbert]

Untold Stories

Here's your song...

 

[Philbert]

If any motherfucker would recognize full retard, it would be Failbert, he sees it in the mirror every morning.

Don't forget that I've read your posts before, I am thus an expert on what a full retard sounds like.
Misfire the Clown...trying to sound almost smart in 6,982 posts...and still working on that little thing.
:rofl2:

 

[xfire]

I am an expert on what a full retard sounds like.

Of course you are, the proof is there every time you make a post. MBG nailed you like a cheap hooker, lame ass sitcom. Being as dumb as you are you don't understand what he said, pitiful and stupid motherfucker.

 

[Philbert]

Of course you are, the proof is there every time you make a post. MBG nailed you like a cheap hooker, lame ass sitcom. Being as dumb as you are you don't understand what he said, pitiful and stupid motherfucker.

(And don't forget the stupid...oh, good...you didn't!)

:rofl2::rofl2::rofl2:

 

[xfire]

http://board.freeones.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=362885&d=1399382677

Admitting you have a problem is just the first step, Failbert, you're off to a good start but I don't have any expectation that you'll be able to follow through.