Offshore Sweatshops.

[Dragonlipz]

The word "sweatshop" makes me laugh. If you've ever worked twelve hours at any machine, just standing all day with the heat of the machines around you, a couple fifteen minute breaks, you'll laugh at the word "sweatshop". There's no such thing as "sweatshop" it's called "working". Flip your wrist, change a spool, scour peanuts, solder the same part all fucking day for a few years. I'm sure there's a ton of people here who'd die to get that kind of job. Carpet bagger munchers.

I'm surprised that you haven't died from laughter......You're fairly obtuse and tin-eared when discussing the whole 'sweatshop' paradigm so I won't try to enlighten you as to why a 'sweatshop' benefits NO ONE....I don't give a fuck how many line up to take the job....It's not about dangling a banana on a string from a stick....you don't get that...
I have worked hours on end, without a break, without pause, to achieve a goal...on a machine....afterward, I drank a few beers and celebrated a job well done....

 

[Dragonlipz]

Stella?......Stella!?........

?????????????????

 

[LaRocha]

I'm surprised that you haven't died from laughter......You're fairly obtuse and tin-eared when discussing the whole 'sweatshop' paradigm so I won't try to enlighten you as to why a 'sweatshop' benefits NO ONE....I don't give a fuck how many line up to take the job....It's not about dangling a banana on a string from a stick....you don't get that...
I have worked hours on end, without a break, without pause, to achieve a goal...on a machine....afterward, I drank a few beers and celebrated a job well done....

Yep, as Stella knows, it's easier telling someone you know the answers but you'll just keep them to yourself. I agree, you're enlightened and I'm obtuse. I form and reply to arguments, you play the character of Sardonic Funnyman on Internet message boards.

 

[cloudy]

I form and reply to arguments

http://bestsmileys.com/lol/1.gif

I'm sure you won't get it, but use "Icarus" for your next alt, ok?

 

[LaRocha]

What makes me laugh is I'm just parroting Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman's arguments in favor of sweatshops. You know, the liberal Obama buddy in economics. That's right, no one here does know who Paul Krugman is.

"Paul Krugman, another Times columnist who is also right about almost every other issue, can't comprehend why any rational person would oppose miserable working conditions, so he takes refuge in pop psychology: women and children "are working at slave wages for our benefit-and this makes us feel unclean. And so there are self-righteous demands for international labor standards. . . ."

http://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/?article=245

"Comparative Advantage: refers to the ability of a party (an individual, a firm, or a country) to produce a particular good or service at a lower opportunity cost than another party. It is the ability to produce a product most efficiently given all the other products that could be produced. It can be contrasted with absolute advantage which refers to the ability of a party to produce a particular good at a lower absolute cost than another.

"Comparative advantage explains how trade can create value for both parties even when one can produce all goods with fewer resources than the other. The net benefits of such an outcome are called gains from trade. It is the main concept of the pure theory of international trade."

http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/smokey.html

"In Praise of Cheap Labor
Bad jobs at bad wages are better than no jobs at all."

"...After all, global poverty is not something recently invented for the benefit of multinational corporations. Let's turn the clock back to the Third World as it was only two decades ago (and still is, in many countries). In those days, although the rapid economic growth of a handful of small Asian nations had started to attract attention, developing countries like Indonesia or Bangladesh were still mainly what they had always been: exporters of raw materials, importers of manufactures. Inefficient manufacturing sectors served their domestic markets, sheltered behind import quotas, but generated few jobs. Meanwhile, population pressure pushed desperate peasants into cultivating ever more marginal land or seeking a livelihood in any way possible--such as homesteading on a mountain of garbage."

 

[LaRocha]

"Given this lack of other opportunities, you could hire workers in Jakarta or Manila for a pittance. But in the mid-'70s, cheap labor was not enough to allow a developing country to compete in world markets for manufactured goods. The entrenched advantages of advanced nations--their infrastructure and technical know-how, the vastly larger size of their markets and their proximity to suppliers of key components, their political stability and the subtle-but-crucial social adaptations that are necessary to operate an efficient economy--seemed to outweigh even a tenfold or twentyfold disparity in wage rates.

"And then something changed. Some combination of factors that we still don't fully understand--lower tariff barriers, improved telecommunications, cheaper air transport--reduced the disadvantages of producing in developing countries. (Other things being the same, it is still better to produce in the First World--stories of companies that moved production to Mexico or East Asia, then moved back after experiencing the disadvantages of the Third World environment, are common.) In a substantial number of industries, low wages allowed developing countries to break into world markets. And so countries that had previously made a living selling jute or coffee started producing shirts and sneakers instead."

 

[LaRocha]

"First of all, even if we could assure the workers in Third World export industries of higher wages and better working conditions, this would do nothing for the peasants, day laborers, scavengers, and so on who make up the bulk of these countries' populations. At best, forcing developing countries to adhere to our labor standards would create a privileged labor aristocracy, leaving the poor majority no better off.

"And it might not even do that. The advantages of established First World industries are still formidable. The only reason developing countries have been able to compete with those industries is their ability to offer employers cheap labor. Deny them that ability, and you might well deny them the prospect of continuing industrial growth, even reverse the growth that has been achieved. And since export-oriented growth, for all its injustice, has been a huge boon for the workers in those nations, anything that curtails that growth is very much against their interests. A policy of good jobs in principle, but no jobs in practice, might assuage our consciences, but it is no favor to its alleged beneficiaries."

http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/smokey.html

 

[LaRocha]

Anyone remember Mercantilism from Middle-School Social Studies?

Every country is fighting for positive trade balance, wants to build their money bins up like Scrooge McDuck. The Colonies were exporting raw materials and then buying back the manufactured good at a more expensive rate. That's really a core reason for the Revolution. It's not a coincidence the Revolution occurs as the Industrial Revolution takes off.

America was the most protectionist nation on the planet for about the first 150 years of its existence. Before income tax, America Fed made all its money on tariffs, and it could because of the massive amount of raw materials and manufactured goods it produced. The Europeans were already stagnant messes by the late 19th, early 20th century, they couldn't compete with American 'sweatshops' basically. That and the very efficient exploitation of our natural resources. China is just the United States Back to the Future Part III.

A country like China is now becoming a serious importer of goods, someday they'll have to worry about their people consuming too many imported goods from the factories they lost to Viet Nam, knocking that positive trade balance back. That's when you know China's entered the post-industrial world. That's the true payoff of sweatshops. The former sweatshop ridden country's workforce makes too much money for the sweatshops to exist in that country. You people are real mean, you want to keep Chin and Chang working in the rice paddy so you can visit them in their quaint little villages on vacation. That's what anthropologists want to do. They get jealous and try to keep their subjects from experiencing the benefits of trade, mild industry, they want to keep their subjects under glass as if human life is better in an egalitarian little bubble. White Man's Burden all over the place with you racist people.

 

[cloudy]

That's right, no one here does know who Paul Krugman is.

Oh, sure, 'cause everyone here is st-st-stoopid except for you.

I thought you'd flounced back to the poetry board and weren't ever coming back.

 

[LaRocha]

Oh, sure, 'cause everyone here is st-st-stoopid except for you.

I thought you'd flounced back to the poetry board and weren't ever coming back.

Dummy, we already had this discussion in your thread. Verdad/Pure tried to misquote me, but I set him and you straight. It's recorded in that shitty thread you started about the dramedy of message boards. You don't write stories, go to the general board or hang out with 3113 in her idiotic movie review threads. More than once you've said you were ignoring me and were an intellectual for doing so, I can quote you on that.

 

[cloudy]

Dummy, we already had this discussion in your thread. Verdad/Pure tried to misquote me, but I set him and you straight. It's recorded in that shitty thread you started about the dramedy of message boards. You don't write stories, go to the general board or hang out with 3113 in her idiotic movie review threads. More than once you've said you were ignoring me and wonderful for doing so, I can quote you on that.

Never said I was ignoring you. Go waste your time trying to find it.

Let me guess: they think you're an arrogant puppy on the poetry board, too, right?

(c'mon - froth at the mouth and spit some more. It's entertaining as hell)

 

[LaRocha]

"You" don't write stories, at least under this alt.

Never said I was ignoring you. Go waste your time trying to find it.

Let me guess: they think you're an arrogant puppy on the poetry board, too, right?

(c'mon - froth at the mouth and spit some more. It's entertaining as hell)

I have stories under this alt as I do with every name I've ever used. Stories with 100k views on each name. And since you know every breath I take, you should know I posted about ten stories last year under the newer name.

 

[cloudy]

I have stories under this alt as I do with every name I've ever used. Stories with 100k reads on each name. And since you know every breath I take, you should know I posted about ten stories last year under the newer name.

Don't flatter yourself, hun. I'm hardly here anymore.

Keep going, though. You really are entertaining...for a few minutes. I have some things to do in a sec, but post some more spitting for me to laugh at later, ok?

 

[LaRocha]

"First of all, even if we could assure the workers in Third World export industries of higher wages and better working conditions, this would do nothing for the peasants, day laborers, scavengers, and so on who make up the bulk of these countries' populations. At best, forcing developing countries to adhere to our labor standards would create a privileged labor aristocracy, leaving the poor majority no better off.

"And it might not even do that. The advantages of established First World industries are still formidable. The only reason developing countries have been able to compete with those industries is their ability to offer employers cheap labor. Deny them that ability, and you might well deny them the prospect of continuing industrial growth, even reverse the growth that has been achieved. And since export-oriented growth, for all its injustice, has been a huge boon for the workers in those nations, anything that curtails that growth is very much against their interests. A policy of good jobs in principle, but no jobs in practice, might assuage our consciences, but it is no favor to its alleged beneficiaries."

http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/smokey.html

I had to quote this because Cloudy's trying to obfuscate another excellent bit of information I provide to the dumdums who'd rather call me a dumdum than discuss what's being discussed. I'm really fucking smart, I graduated from a better school than any of you. In the United States it's really irrelevant where you went to college unless you went to one of these fifteen or twenty schools.

 

[xssve]

Anyone remember Mercantilism from Middle-School Social Studies?

Every country is fighting for positive trade balance, wants to build their money bins up like Scrooge McDuck. The Colonies were exporting raw materials and then buying back the manufactured good at a more expensive rate. That's really a core reason for the Revolution. It's not a coincidence the Revolution occurs as the Industrial Revolution takes off.

America was the most protectionist nation on the planet for about the first 150 years of its existence. Before income tax, America Fed made all its money on tariffs, and it could because of the massive amount of raw materials and manufactured goods it produced. The Europeans were already stagnant messes by the late 19th, early 20th century, they couldn't compete with American 'sweatshops' basically. That and the very efficient exploitation of our natural resources. China is just the United States Back to the Future Part III.

A country like China is now becoming a serious importer of goods, someday they'll have to worry about their people consuming too many imported goods from the factories they lost to Viet Nam, knocking that positive trade balance back. That's when you know China's entered the post-industrial world. That's the true payoff of sweatshops. The former sweatshop ridden country's workforce makes too much money for the sweatshops to exist in that country. You people are real mean, you want to keep Chin and Chang working in the rice paddy so you can visit them in their quaint little villages on vacation. That's what anthropologists want to do. They get jealous and try to keep their subjects from experiencing the benefits of trade, mild industry, they want to keep their subjects under glass as if human life is better in an egalitarian little bubble. White Man's Burden all over the place with you racist people.

I've heard the argument, I heard long before anybody had even heard of outsourcing, and it's true the problem really isn't sweatshops, per se: all the thing syou said about rising incomes and rising standards is true, it's been the argument since the beginning, i.e., it's a "natural functioning of the market" - production continually seeks to lower costs as consumers continually seek better quality good at lower prices, it's the entire justification for capitalism to begin with, its stated goal.

What it fails to take into account, is that all of this only applies if you make some effort to preserve the market - al of these things occur only if competition is preserved - China, in order to compete with lower labor costs will have to spend more on educating workers, smarter workers are usually more productive, but you also get a spin-off from that, namely that in being smarter and more creative, they also tend to generate new businesses,and ways of doing business.

But as Even Adam Smith carefully notes, capitalism, self interest in competition is by design, biased towards consumers - through competition quality improves and prices lower - it's not as benign towards producers, who have to continually improve in order to stay competitive, they have to re-organize, invest in capital improvements, continually streamline and find ways to control costs - and that comes out of the margin.

It's a more ideal situation for the producer if they can avoid narrowing their margins for capital improvements, by suppressing competition and control variable costs by keeping wages stagnant - it's the essence of a slave economy, a form of rent seeking, and they do it whenever they can, usually in was that distort the market - monetarist policy deliberately distorts the market - throw in corruption and bribery, these pockets and reservoirs where market dynamics don't apply, and "natural" market dynamics becomes a sort of quaint abstraction that has no relevance in empirical reality.

Much of the reason American firms were dismantled and sold off to begin with was little more than sheer petulance: tired of unions eating into their margins, money that could otherwise be distributed to stockholders, driving up stock prices, i.e., quite often, when you hear the word "profitability", they are talking about competitiveness, market share, or any other traditional measure of profitability, including profit itself - they're talking about how these profits are being distributed, how and to whom.

It's why I shake me head every time I hear those "natural market" arguments - the ideal position for any firm is a protected monopoly with virtually no variable costs, why then does everybody go around pretending that producers have any incentive to seek anything but, and there will always be some who will leave no stone unturned, or politician unbought to that end?

That is how the "natural" market works, that's human behavior - regulation is capitalism, because free markets are not, strictly speaking, "natural" at all - it's risky, you have to stay on your toes, while in reality, almost everybody want's a sure thing.

True capitalism exists in defiance of "reversion to the norm", it's very hard on the complacent.

 

[xssve]

You do realize that perhaps the most significant distortions here come from the stock market, which has very little to do with competitiveness, productivity, profitability or anything other than profit redistribution?

It's why investment nuts like Trysail sputter every time you the concept of labor value is mentioned: for them the stock market is the market, which the brick and mortar economy only exists to support.

The reality, is, the stock market is a whole separate market that deals in one good only, stocks, and it's utterly superfluous: capitalism works perfectly without it.

All you do when you buy a stock is purchase a theoretical portion of potential profits of a firm without having to do any work.

You're buying the surplus labor of others from the board of directors.

 

[LaRocha]

I've heard the argument, I heard long before anybody had even heard of outsourcing, and it's true the problem really isn't sweatshops, per se: all the thing syou said about rising incomes and rising standards is true, it's been the argument since the beginning, i.e., it's a "natural functioning of the market" - production continually seeks to lower costs as consumers continually seek better quality good at lower prices, it's the entire justification for capitalism to begin with, its stated goal.

What it fails to take into account, is that all of this only applies if you make some effort to preserve the market - al of these things occur only if competition is preserved - China, in order to compete with lower labor costs will have to spend more on educating workers, smarter workers are usually more productive, but you also get a spin-off from that, namely that in being smarter and more creative, they also tend to generate new businesses,and ways of doing business.

But as Even Adam Smith carefully notes, capitalism, self interest in competition is by design, biased towards consumers - through competition quality improves and prices lower - it's not as benign towards producers, who have to continually improve in order to stay competitive, they have to re-organize, invest in capital improvements, continually streamline and find ways to control costs - and that comes out of the margin.

It's a more ideal situation for the producer if they can avoid narrowing their margins for capital improvements, by suppressing competition and control variable costs by keeping wages stagnant - it's the essence of a slave economy, a form of rent seeking, and they do it whenever they can, usually in was that distort the market - monetarist policy deliberately distorts the market - throw in corruption and bribery, these pockets and reservoirs where market dynamics don't apply, and "natural" market dynamics becomes a sort of quaint abstraction that has no relevance in empirical reality.

Much of the reason American firms were dismantled and sold off to begin with was little more than sheer petulance: tired of unions eating into their margins, money that could otherwise be distributed to stockholders, driving up stock prices, i.e., quite often, when you hear the word "profitability", they are talking about competitiveness, market share, or any other traditional measure of profitability, including profit itself - they're talking about how these profits are being distributed, how and to whom.

It's why I shake me head every time I hear those "natural market" arguments - the ideal position for any firm is a protected monopoly with virtually no variable costs, why then does everybody go around pretending that producers have any incentive to seek anything but, and there will always be some who will leave no stone unturned, or politician unbought to that end?

That is how the "natural" market works, that's human behavior - regulation is capitalism, because free markets are not, strictly speaking, "natural" at all - it's risky, you have to stay on your toes, while in reality, almost everybody want's a sure thing.

True capitalism exists in defiance of "reversion to the norm", it's very hard on the complacent.

Paul Krugman isn't working under the assumption of free and fair markets, most of his work is actually in describing how trade imbalance and monetary policy can build a positive protectionist trade policy for certain countries at certain times.

The fact that sweatshops exist shows the market is consumer driven, that there is actually a Global Marketplace, that sweatshops are undeniably the cheapest way to make cheap goods.

The United States doesn't only gain from manufacturers going overseas, obviously with that cheap shirt comes a loss in a textile factory somewhere in North America. In the 80s and 90s our economy adapted, accepted the cheap shirts and the new tech and service sectors. It wasn't an easy transition, the Rust Belt is probably never going to recover in any meaningful way. Some of these areas have been in a depressionary environment since the late 70s.

CAFTA and NAFTA are about American greed, everyone knew that. They were about America enforcing free-trade on countries that couldn't possibly compete in the realm of free-trade with an economic superpower like America. The United States doesn't want free-trade with other economic superpowers, that's obvious from our dealings with China, we even resort to claiming they're 'manipulating' their currency in an underhanded way as opposed to the way every other country does it.

Unionism is an important part of late stage capitalism. Unions really did destroy industry. They built industry, got people real wages and benefits to match the increases in production, and because of union efficiency business was unable to continually increase margins. As we know, capitalism doesn't work unless there's a constant increase in profit. It's not good enough that a corporation is profitable, it has to grow its profit quarter by quarter or face dismantling. Unions have always been the most important free-market force after consumer driven demand.

 

[LaRocha]

You do realize that perhaps the most significant distortions here come from the stock market, which has very little to do with competitiveness, productivity, profitability or anything other than profit redistribution?

It's why investment nuts like Trysail sputter every time you the concept of labor value is mentioned: for them the stock market is the market, which the brick and mortar economy only exists to support.

The reality, is, the stock market is a whole separate market that deals in one good only, stocks, and it's utterly superfluous: capitalism works perfectly without it.

All you do when you buy a stock is purchase a theoretical portion of potential profits of a firm without having to do any work.

You're buying the surplus labor of others from the board of directors.

And the stock market is inefficient at redistributing profit, doesn't allot capital where it would be best exploited. The board of directors are often the same as the executives who run the company. So the executives profit before the 'owners', because the owners have no voice. Carl Icahn has been losing his mind over this for decades. He can own 10% of the stock of a company and have no say in what goes on at that company.

Capitalism needs investors, obviously a stock investor is in some way an investor in a company. Visa went public, raised billions of dollars and then used that money to fight Mastercard. Capitalism doesn't work well without a continual stream of new capital. The stock market is a constant stream of new capital in and out of businesses. Companies can do all sorts of tricks with their stock. If you're a common person owning a stock is pointless, you can't beat the market because the market is made up of common people, mutual funds. Stocks aren't predictable, companies are, and the two rarely meet up in any way you can game. Warren Buffet can wait ten years for the railroads to be important again, no one else can.

I see owning a stock more like owning a company's debt, but that's a whole other discussion. Labor Theory of Value is my favorite thing in economics. Someday someone will improve on Marx's idea in a meaningful way.

 

[xssve]

And the stock market is inefficient at redistributing profit, doesn't allot capital where it would be best exploited. The board of directors are often the same as the executives who run the company. So the executives profit before the 'owners', because the owners have no voice. Carl Icahn has been losing his mind over this for decades. He can own 10% of the stock of a company and have no say in what goes on at that company.

Capitalism needs investors, obviously a stock investor is in some way an investor in a company. Visa went public, raised billions of dollars and then used that money to fight Mastercard. Capitalism doesn't work well without a continual stream of new capital. The stock market is a constant stream of new capital in and out of businesses. Companies can do all sorts of tricks with their stock. If you're a common person owning a stock is pointless, you can't beat the market because the market is made up of common people, mutual funds. Stocks aren't predictable, companies are, and the two rarely meet up in any way you can game. Warren Buffet can wait ten years for the railroads to be important again, no one else can.

I see owning a stock more like owning a company's debt, but that's a whole other discussion. Labor Theory of Value is my favorite thing in economics. Someday someone will improve on Marx's idea in a meaningful way.

That's such a bunch of shit, companies don't use stock issues to raise capital, that's what the bond market is for.

Stocks have become the predominant form of management compensation in the form of options, and that's pretty much all they represent anymore.

Not surprisingly, as I mentioned, no few firms treat their "core" businesses as a front for their primary product, stocks.

And everybody is baffled how and why executives can pocket these enormous bonuses when the company is losing money.

 

[LaRocha]

That's such a bunch of shit, companies don't use stock issues to raise capital, that's what the bond market is for.

Stocks have become the predominant form of management compensation in the form of options, and that's pretty much all they represent anymore.

Not surprisingly, as I mentioned, no few firms treat their "core" businesses as a front for their primary product, stocks.

And everybody is baffled how and why executives can pocket these enormous bonuses when the company is losing money.

The travesty that is citigroup raised what, almost 20 billion last year through new stock issuance? The bond market is a long term investment that most companies have to pay back. Companies issue new stock because they know they'll never have to pay it back.

I own C right here, so I'm betting I have a better chance to make money where the picture is uber murky.

 

[xssve]

It's just herd behavior - the low hanging fruit is stripped before everything else - let somebody else stick their neck out to get to the stuff that's harder to reach.

 

[Dragonlipz]

Yep, as Stella knows, it's easier telling someone you know the answers but you'll just keep them to yourself. I agree, you're enlightened and I'm obtuse. I form and reply to arguments, you play the character of Sardonic Funnyman on Internet message boards.

WOW - words of wonder?!?! I'm the 'Sardonic Funnyman on Internet' ? DA-YUMN! That's rare praise coming from someone as educated, erudite and accomplished as yourself......That's like an A-WARD for someone like me who didn't graduate from an overrated diploma mill like yourself.....Shucks! I'm all wet an' runny now.....
I guess mayhaps I should call my self something new? Naaaaaa.........
but thanks anyway, who evah ya are, for enlightening us wicha superior de-gree and ed-u-mo-ca-shun....................

 

[xssve]

Perverse incentives are the hallmark of a distorted market, it's those feedback loops again - if you are relying on personal ethics, statistically speaking, some percentage is going to bite anyway, if that turns out to be profitable, more people are going to bite, suddenly ethical business practices not only place you at a short term disadvantage, they may become economic suicide, depending on the industry.

If I offered to tell you when Citigroup stock is going to drop would you do the ethical thing and not listen?

Fat fucking chance, you have to change the system; perverse incentives multiply exponentially in unregulated markets.

 

[xssve]

Naked short selling is a prime example - these guys might as well have been running off bills on the company printer, but because it's all financial voodoo, they're just laying low, waiting for it to blow over instead of lying awake waiting for the Treasury department to kick the door in.

 

[LaRocha]

Naked short selling is a prime example - these guys might as well have been running off bills on the company printer, but because it's all financial voodoo, they're just laying low, waiting for it to blow over instead of lying awake waiting for the Treasury department to kick the door in.

People don't differentiate between Naked short sellers and short sellers. Naked SS isn't responsible for the economic collapse. In your view stocks aren't important right, bond world funds the running of operations at companies? Banks weren't dealing in new bond issuance, GE had trouble issuing new 10 and 20 year bonds. Naked SS are just a sideshow, most people want to blame all short sellers for causing the actual collapse, something that would have been dealt with if people weren't gunning the stocks of the companies down. The short sellers revealed the house of cards, they were the efficiencies in a mostly inefficient marketplace. I don't think the naked short sellers are so terrible. What they did was illegal, but I think it's a real minor issue in the scheme of things.

It's really safe assuming derivatives cast against the housing bubble are the main reason why the credit markets froze. Money thought to exist but it doesn't. Without the panic in bond world, the pseudo run on banks, they're saying the housing market would have been dealt with. I don't follow the newest argument for the crisis, I think it's still a matter of worthless derivatives and insufficient insurance on those MB securities. It wasn't just fear, the actual money to fund operations didn't exist.

Placing any blame on naked SS or legal SS is just a way of pinning down a guy stealing a TV during a riot instead of blaming all of the fixed-income operations at every major bank. Blaming a culture that leads to violence or a culture that leads to financial Armageddon doesn't sit well with the people who created that culture.