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Do You Know What You Are?

by Open-Publishing - Tuesday 2 December 2008

Trade-Exchange Rates Economy-budget Daveparts

By David Glenn Cox

All of us, no matter who we are or what we are, have an inner belief that we have some redeeming value in our life. Or as John Kennedy once said, “We all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children’s future and we are all mortal.” I use this quote as a touchstone, a milepost, to remind me of a time when our political leadership valued us for our intrinsic human value.

I was doing some research on outsourcing and after just a few articles I wanted to shake my fists into the heavens and scream, “Just who the hell told you that you could do this to us! Who the hell is this fucking God, Outsourcing, of yours that I’m supposed to bow down to?”

With the smell and shine of a new car, outsourcing is sold to us as good for one and all. It brings innovation and lower cost goods that promote prosperity by making goods more affordable to one and all. But, then there is this opinion from the article “The World is Not Flat - Now What?

“Will some companies reverse the globalization of their supply chains? Does this introduce new innovation opportunities for companies and advisors who can envision ways to profit from these new market characteristics?

"Of course it will. Entire methods of production for different manufactured goods may be completely revised, only to be revised again if the price of oil and the dollar suddenly move in the opposite direction in a big way."

These insider trade journals, where the elites and profiteers discuss these issues amongst themselves, can be very enlightening. They explain in stark terms that lives and futures and even innovation are all dependent on the twin gods of oil and currency. Innovation is only a pseudonym for squeezing out profit regardless of the cost to those pesky humans.

“Creating the ability for a manufacturer to switch between multiple manufacturing scenarios depending on what is most cost-effective. For example:

USA (raw materials) -> Vietnam (raw material processing) -> China (bulk assembly) -> Mexico (final assembly) -> USA (retail)

to

USA (raw materials) -> China (all processing and assembly) -> USA (retail)

to

USA (raw materials) -> Mexico (raw material processing) -> China (all assembly) -> USA (retail)

to

USA (raw materials) -> Mexico (all processing and assembly) -> USA (retail)”

You’ll note that the starting point in all of these rosy scenarios is always the United States and the ending point is always the United States. Eliminating the American worker from the equation maximizes the profit. The innovation added is the flexibility to switch out third world slaves to minimize the effect of currency fluctuations and oil costs.

It’s hard to imagine a science fiction writer that could envision a colder, more calculating beast.

“Blame U.S. Consumers for Offshoring,” Business week Nov 18, 2008

"You want merchandise for less. Sending manufacturing jobs to Asia is the only way to give it to you," says BusinessWeek reader Rudy Vandenbelt

"I am a partner in a firm that designs and develops consumer appliances and electronics in North America, subcontracts their manufacture in Asia, and markets to retailers and distributors worldwide. We have, in fact, been doing manufacturing in China since we started our business 15 years ago. I can speak with understanding of the influences that cause Western-based companies to manufacture their goods in low-cost jurisdictions.

"One has to understand that we all live in a free-market economy. The ’free’ part of this equation relates directly to the freedom of individuals to make their own choices based on personal needs, goals, objectives, or whatever. The role of the big bad corporations in this free-market environment is simply to give you what you want. By doing this, corporations significantly increase the likelihood that you, the consumer, will buy their products. More sales, in turn, allow them to sustain their business and remain profitable."

Good ole Randy is a partner in a business that has never manufactured in North America. Randy reaches into his toolbox for the big hammer of “Free” free market economy (play national anthem wave flag here). Randy then ignores the central issue that while he personally profits from free market economy our domestic economy suffers from the downward wage pressure created by “Free” market third world wages. Then good old Randy blames us, the consumers, for twisting his arm to move to China. Randy forgets about those bad old tariffs that once protected the American workers while filling our treasury coffers, lightening the tax burden on us all.

"Need to know: Outsourcing" From The Sunday Times November 16, 2008

"Phanish Puranam, co-director of the Aditya Birla India Centre at London Business School: Outsourcing overseas has obvious difficulties due to the differences in culture and regulation. But there are compensating features. The first is scalability. Suppose you are a small business thinking of taking on two or three people to do the accounting or run a small call centre. Many offshore outsourcers can take on business of that size whereas onshore companies typically cannot because they have a larger fixed cost of setup.

"The second advantage is that the cost difference is dramatically large. If you net out all the costs of relocating, you are still left with a clear saving of 20%-25% over onshore outsourcing.

"The third advantage is that the level of sophistication of some offshore vendors in some areas is much higher than that of the onshore vendors. In IT it is clearly the case. Indian companies have been doing this for longer on a larger scale, so they often beat onshore companies in terms of efficiencies. If you need market research, for instance, an outsourcer in China or India will employ a bright MBA student to pull together the data."

They can do it cheaper overseas because they are already doing it on a large scale. You can save lots of money by eliminating your domestic employees that refuse to work for $5.00 dollars a day. If you need market research, why you can employ a bright MBA student to pull together the data. What would you call that, the Outsourcing of outsourcing? Saving money by using third world students when third world graduates become too expensive.

“Respite in Recession: Outsourcing

In today’s harsh economic environment, organizations are leaving no stone unturned to cut corporate waste and pull off enterprise agility. Obviously, outsourcing is being considered as a practical answer to cost cutting challenges confronting global organizations. To know the current state of affairs in the outsourcing market, Rakeesh Raman of MY Tech Box Online discusses an array of issues with Stan Lepeak, managing director of global research, Equa Terra, a leading market research firm specializing in business outsourcing Here’s the Q&A account of the discussion."

I’ll spare you the account but did you catch what it was that they said that you are? The sole purpose of outsourcing is to save the corporations money. To seek out ways to work cheaper, faster, longer and to make the corporations more money. Throughout all of these articles there was no interest in helping the economy as a whole or even their individual communities, only the corporations and themselves by eliminating you, the corporate waste.

“The rain ...falls upon the just and the unjust alike; a thing which would not happen if I were superintending the rain’s affairs. No, I would rain softly and sweetly on the just, but if I caught a sample of the unjust outdoors I would drown him.”
- Mark Twain