A wonderful post, Kevin. Very well said.

The destruction of the middle class is perhaps the single most notable result of the political success of conservatism since the rise of Nixon and, later, Reagan. Of course, conservatives just swear to high-heaven that they've done nothing of the sort. But the evidence is all around, the facts are staring at us in the face. And I agree: if it isn't stopped and reversed, our future IS Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and all the rest.

-- Roger

Posted by: Marsman at October 19, 2003 10:12 PM | PERMALINK

Exactly right. Income disparity is the enemy of economic progress. The great American achievement in the 20th century was the creation of the middle class.

The great Conservative achievment of the 21st looks to be the destruction of same. When the world is just divided into rich and poor, not even the rich are better off.

Posted by: craigie at October 19, 2003 10:19 PM | PERMALINK

"When the world is just divided into rich and poor, not even the rich are better off.

Particularly if all those poor folk have weapons. Roll the tumbrils.

Posted by: Linkmeister at October 19, 2003 10:26 PM | PERMALINK

I'm a member of a union (DGA), and overall I agree with with the article Ms. D'Arc links to. But in that article, it also notes that the jobs that the union is working so hard to protect are jobs that technology will likely phase out.

So what's the balance here? Can anyone imagine that within 5 years, checkout stands can't be entirely automated? And is there a good argument as to why they shouldn't be? Just to keep these jobs? History isn't kind to that approach. Besides, except for the pay those aren't great jobs--they are old style assembly line jobs that have hung on well past their usefulness and any inherent dignity.

I'm not trying to be heartless here. I would like those on strike to have good, middle class jobs. But I think unions need to rethink their global strategy. For years it has been retreat and defeat, where the only strategy seems to be to lose more slowly. No solid focus on new growth areas, no strategic focus on bridging the gap into organizing management itself. I've been a middle manager. Believe me, a 21st century approach to unionization could work in that environment.

Add to the ongoing trend, for the same reasons, to restrict more and more the addition of new members to unions and you don't have to be clairvoyant to see that the future looks troublesome.

I will not cross the line, I support the union members, but I worry that unions are not thinking ahead far enough. And so they will insist upon their own obsolesence. And that will be a damn shame.

Posted by: chris at October 19, 2003 10:31 PM | PERMALINK

Look at me! I'm a conservative!

"Unions are an old, tired, socialist idea. The fall of the Soviet Union proves that they should be abolished."

See? You can do it too! Get invited to nicer parties!

Posted by: MillionthMonkey at October 19, 2003 10:31 PM | PERMALINK

Chris: individual jobs can be automated. Some checkers will lose their jobs to automation, but stockers and others won't.

Unions aren't perfect, and they sometimes fight losing battles. Ditto for corporations. What's important is that when you look at the economy as a whole, workers have bargaining power that's roughly equivalent to corporations. It's the whole economy that's important, not individual companies or industries.

However, supporting individual strikes -- where we think they are justified -- is an important way that we as individuals can also support the bigger picture.

Posted by: Kevin Drum at October 19, 2003 11:00 PM | PERMALINK

It's also worth noting that unions come under constant attack from conservatives for their various shortcomings. I even agree with some of these attacks.

However, corporations have many shortcomings as well. But taken as a whole, both corporations and unions are good for the economy, and that's what's important. I'm all in favor of trying reform the bad elements of both, as long as we don't throw out the baby with the bathwater.

Posted by: Kevin Drum at October 19, 2003 11:02 PM | PERMALINK

Kevin:

I totally agree. I just feel that we are fighting a losing battle with the strategy unions have been pursuing since the days of Reagan. We need an approach that can grow union membership to include more industries, different job categories and new work arrangements.

I just don't see it yet, even in my own union. And it is bumming me out.

Posted by: chris at October 19, 2003 11:04 PM | PERMALINK

And while checkouts can be and have been automated, I refuse to go in those lines. There's one near me that's got the nastiest manager-type guy watching the "customers" like hawks, making sure they don't steal any goods.

All in all, I don't like going to that supermarket anymore.

Posted by: p mac at October 19, 2003 11:11 PM | PERMALINK

Unions are in real trouble. The people at the supermarket are the ones who have it easy. They can't be replaced with someone in Pakistan. (Unless, of course, they use some combination of the creepy "check yourself out" system with a TCP/IP videophone, with a subcontinenter on the other end appearing in a monitor where the existing checkout person now stands. Trained to understand American slang. That would make the "check yourself out" system even creepier. At least they can't do that with the security guard! That job is safe. But I digress.)

Programmers and technical people have been talking about unionizing for a long time, but now it's really too late. It's so easy to replace a computer geek that the only thing holding corporations back is inertia and the bad PR. And as more and more companies do it, the stigma goes away. If we formed a union, it would be just one more reason for them to outsource.

Pay off your debts. Soon you won't be able to get a job to save your life. And put all your money in gold. Once they start printing money to make the interest payments on the deficit, foreign investment will cease, rates will skyrocket, and your life savings will be worthless.

For more personal finance planning tips, see The Great Unraveling by Paul Krugman. The country really is headed toward a Latin American style fiscal crisis. Start planning for it now.

Posted by: MillionthMonkey at October 19, 2003 11:42 PM | PERMALINK

Well said. Good to see someone can say what I often find impossible to articulate.

Posted by: Anarch at October 19, 2003 11:48 PM | PERMALINK

Pay off your debts

well, if inflation is really coming, charge charge charger!

Here's some financials on Wal-Mart FY02:

Operating Income: $13.7B on $265B in sales
Income Tax: $4.4B
Net Income: $8B
Dividends ~$1.3B (10% of operating income)

Employees ~1.2M worldwide.
If Walmart paid its employees $2,000/yr more each:

Operating Income: $11.3B on $265B in sales
Income Tax: $3.6B
Net Income: $7.6B
Dividends ~$1.1B (10% of operating income)

Ain't capitalism grand.

Posted by: Troy at October 19, 2003 11:57 PM | PERMALINK

MillionthMonkey has given me an idea--I'm going to get a head start on this economic meltdown thing and move to Latin America.

Bolivia's looking good at the moment...

Posted by: chris at October 20, 2003 12:07 AM | PERMALINK

I've been telling people for several years now that we're turning into Brazil, and they usually look at me funny, but I think it's becoming very apparent that the danger is real. Europe has taken steps to protect its middle class; we haven't. Instead, we've given corporations free rein to pursue rush-to-the bottom policies, with predictable results.

Posted by: Rebecca Allen at October 20, 2003 12:12 AM | PERMALINK

"And I agree: if it isn't stopped and reversed, our future IS Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and all the rest."

Welllll, since I've been here in CA (1954), we've got government lotteries, movie actors (now one who dresses up in fantasy wrestling costumes) for governors, multicolored money, state-issued junk bonds, and the movement of wealthy suburbs right up to the old farmworker favelas. I'd say Latin America is US right now.

Posted by: Jim at October 20, 2003 12:22 AM | PERMALINK

There is really nothing incompatible about unions within a free market economy. In fact, unions are the best demonstration of the ability of the free market to efficiently allocate resources. Labor is a commodity, nothing more. One party needs it, and the other party needs the money which is paid in exchange. The problem arises when you have a huge surplus of labor and a shortage of demand for it. This is what Calpundit refers to as 'greater bargaining strength.' However, that is really nothing different that the 'greater bargaining strength' of gasoline consumers during off-seasons: the lower demand for gasoline results in a lower price.

What unions represent is the labor-supply equivalent of corporate consolidation. It becomes more efficient and the ability to bargain for a set price for a fixed commodity is improved, offering a standard product- ie 8 hour workday with employees possessing a given set of skills. It becomes easier for both the employee to bargain for a better price for labor, and better for the company because they know what they are getting as far as skills, experience and training.

The only problem I have with labor unions is that they are rigid in their fixation on discrete units of industry, and consequently resistant to change. This I attribute to their protected status as monopolies. A free market for labor unions, I think, would improve what they offer the membership: skills training, education, and other preparations for inevitable changes in economic and labor needs, instead of the current fare of generous campaign donations and graft, with little to nothing in return for their membership but moribund industry.

I noticed someone mentioned supermarkets. There is a trend among some supermarkets to speed the service that the stores offer to the customers that allows them to ring up their items as they are shopping, using wireless technology. Is this a bad thing? It certainly isn't for the customer who would rather get in and get out instead of waiting 45 minutes in a line. But I can imangine the unions are against it. Why? Because they do not offer their membership the ability to move into other areas of work through training or education. Once you are in the auto workers union you can never be anything but. The unions need to be demonopolized so that they can modernize and abandon their odd attachment to particular narrowly defined industries as though they are as permanant and fixed in nature as rocks.

The idea of unions is perfectly rational, and accords perfectly with the free market system. After all, a system that holds private property as a right must recognize that one also has property in oneself. It is the unions as they are currently constituted that needs to change.

Posted by: Brian at October 20, 2003 01:59 AM | PERMALINK

There is a trend among some supermarkets to speed the service that the stores offer to the customers that allows them to ring up their items as they are shopping, using wireless technology. Is this a bad thing? It certainly isn't for the customer who would rather get in and get out instead of waiting 45 minutes in a line. But I can imangine the unions are against it.

Privacy advocates are also against it. Stores want to put those damn RFID tags in everything you buy- food, clothes, everything. They don't know that they're supposed to stop working once you leave the store.
In the future, we will all have invisible barcodes on our foreheads.

Posted by: MillionthMonkey at October 20, 2003 02:20 AM | PERMALINK

I do agree with the more reasonable posts on this thread. Unions can be corrupt, vicious, and bullying. Their management can sell out their members for their own advantage. They can render a company uncompetitive and run it into the ground.
But thank God they exist.
Firstly, management is often worse than the unions. I can testify to this personally.
Second, my life has been much better because of unions, even though I've never belonged to one, and have often cursed them when I'm trying to get something done (if you've ever worked in a company with hostile union/management relations, you'll know what I mean). BUT, in the present world, companies are terrified of unionization, and will bend over backwards to make their employees happy in order to prevent it from happening. I can't possibly see how this is bad for anyone. It gives the working stiff some leverage. If you don't think that's important, study Henry Ford and his relationship with organized labor. Yeesh.
I dislike unions, but I'm damn glad they exist.

Posted by: rhinoman at October 20, 2003 03:49 AM | PERMALINK

I wasn't addressing the particulars of RFIDs. I have some concerns about that myself, but I am sure there is a way around that problem. My main point was that innovation and change will occur, and it is not to anyones benefit for unions to cling to the rusting vestiges of obsolete industries, whether that is grocery-bagging or wrench-turning.

Posted by: Brian at October 20, 2003 03:49 AM | PERMALINK

Excellent post, and frightening too. Our current President couldn't seem to care less about these trends.

Posted by: Dave at October 20, 2003 04:03 AM | PERMALINK

Marsman, it's unskilled immigration - not political conservatism per se - that has contributed to the harshening of income inequality. I agree that is a bad thing for the republic, but the people who are working those low wage jobs in Southern California are generally illegal immigrants or unskilled recent Mexican immigrants.

We're taking in about 1.5 million immigrants per year, and the vast majority are unskilled with less than a high school education. So clearly they're going to start at the bottom of the income ladder. Stopping the growth of income inequality means imposing skills-based immigration reform and/or ending the current nepotistic family reunification scheme.

(Disclaimer: my parents were immigrants, and I have nothing against immigrants, but immigration is the x-factor here that should be discussed)

Posted by: DLCdem at October 20, 2003 04:22 AM | PERMALINK

PS -

I was converted on this issue after I read the National Academy of Sciences study on immigration. That's where all the stats on growing income inequality and so on can be found.

Also, re: programmers and unions

The reason programmers don't organize into unions is because they're not proles. Programmers are fully capable of starting their own business and rising through the ranks. The distinctions between workers, managers, executives, and entrepreneurs are much less stable than when employees are unskilled/illiterate.

Posted by: DLCdem at October 20, 2003 04:26 AM | PERMALINK

The real problem that grocery workers have is that there is a large number of unemployed people who are able and willing to do their job for the wage they are turning down. Thats why I don't have any sympathy for striking grocery workers. Even in most unskilled jobs, your experience will still give you a large advantage. For grocery workers that just isn't the case and being replaced enmasse is a realistic option for the grocers. I do not beleive that you are being treated unfairly when legal workers who have the same competency at your profession is willing to do your job for less than you are.

Posted by: Damon at October 20, 2003 05:29 AM | PERMALINK

DLCdem: "The reason programmers don't organize into unions is because they're not proles." What you don't understand is that almost no one in America thinks of themselves as 'proles'. That kind of thinking is far more prevalent in Europe than here. IMO, this is largely a good thing. But it means that unions will need to adapt if they want a place in the economy. Many, many programmers feel they're being screwed over, and often they are. But if there is going to be a programmers' union, it will be more like the Screen Actors' Guild or the MLBPA than like the Teamsters or UAW. Programmers aren't going to put up with pay and promotions based on strict seniority and certifications, or with Big Tony's idiot cousin getting promoted because he's family.

What Damon said is spot on. Personally, I feel much more sympathy for programmers thrown out of work due to offshoring than I do for grocery clerks who aren't getting an offer as generous as they wanted. Grocery clerks are largely unskilled workers; it doesn't take any education or special training to stock shelves or bag groceries. On the other hand, it takes a great deal of time and effort to become a competent programmer, and I can understand the anger of those who are thrown out of work because they can't compete with some hack in India or China making $6 an hour cranking out spaghetti code. I think that, going forward, the best career fields will be those that require skill to perform _and_ require a physical preference. There are a lot of good, skilled blue-collar jobs that aren't going away: plumber, electrician, and construction worker for starters. Although I had hoped to be a coder, I'm currently considering apprenticeship as an electrician because I think it will hold far more job security, and the pay is quite good.

Posted by: Firebug at October 20, 2003 06:05 AM | PERMALINK

Firebug:

I feel much more sympathy for programmers thrown out of work due to offshoring than I do for grocery clerks who aren't getting an offer as generous as they wanted

Programmers are smart enough/educated enough to retrain. And they can start their own businesses. I have no sympathy for programmers who whine about "jobs" or who diss the code written in China or India. If it's crap code, and they think they can do better, they should start their own company and compete on quality.

Grocery clerks can only compete on price, and their lives are pretty poor as it is. Outsourcing is only getting press because it affects people who can write letters and who have friends in the media. But unskilled immigration has a tremendous impact on the labor supply, and forces down the wages of people who find it very hard to retrain.

Posted by: DLCdem at October 20, 2003 06:11 AM | PERMALINK

Damon- sometimes cheapness isn't an admirable goal, and sometimes the long-term costs are actually higher. The best example is in health care, where studies have shown that RN's, while more expensive, prevent morbidity and mortality in inpatients.

No, grocery clerks aren't RN's. But in upstate NY, where the stores aren't unionizes, most of the clerks are part-time high school kids with the attention span of a fruit fly. They may be cheap, but the service sucks.

Posted by: JKC at October 20, 2003 06:24 AM | PERMALINK

As a classical liberal, I see nothing about unions intrinsically incompatible with the free market. Rather, I think unions show the power of collective bargaining against large corporations.

The problem comes when unions use the coercive powers of the state rather than collective bargaining to try to get what they want. When a law gets passed (rather than a mutually agreed upon contract between the union and the employer) that says that union members get X wages and Y benefits, that effectively screws over non-union members. It gives them a privileged position over non-union members and sets up a monopoly network by which employees cannot compete against each other for jobs.

The people unions hurt most when they use coercive power to pursue their ends are the truely little guy - the non-union worker who tries to make a living but cannot due to barriers enacted by the union. That has nothing to do with the free market. Coercion is not the free market.

Posted by: Jonathan Wilde at October 20, 2003 06:36 AM | PERMALINK

DLCdem: "Programmers are smart enough/educated enough to retrain. And they can start their own businesses. I have no sympathy for programmers who whine about "jobs" or who diss the code written in China or India." OK, but then why expect educated workers to have any sympathy for _your_ favored constituencies? Why does "worker solidarity" only go one way? Nothing a union asks for is ever unreasonable, but if white-collar workers start bringing up grievances about working conditions, job security, and pay, it's "whining"? "Worker solidarity" was always a sham; the first unions were virulently racist (in the Homestead strike, the strikers fired a cannon at black replacement workers). Not all, but far too many, unions are about creating an aristocracy of labor: the favored few who will be allowed to work at above-market rates in often obsolete or unneeded jobs, and the unfortunate masses who are shut out and left to work either at other, far less well compensated, jobs or to act as the feared and hated 'strikebreakers' and 'scabs'. Bottom line: If you don't give a rat's ass about educated, white collar workers, why do you expect them to give a rat's ass about you in return?

Posted by: Firebug at October 20, 2003 06:41 AM | PERMALINK

Everybody should read Lind's "Made in Texas". The key points are about like this: George W. Bush is really a Texan, but he's an East Texan, not a West Texan. East Texas has the values of the Old South. The Old South's model of society consisted of a small, very comfortable elite controlling resource economy a low-skilled, low-paid, uneducated, superstitious work force which was mostly disenfranchised (including poor whites). If the Confederacy had won the Civil war, it would have moved South militarily to become the dominant southern oligarchy.

When oil was discovered in Texas, the old oligarchy had its chance, and now the global oil oligarchy is Texan. These people work very well with the Saudis, for reasons which are not mysterious.

My summary is pretty bold, and the book is bold all by itself itself. But whenever you think about "American values", ask yourself how many of your fellow Americans share those values. This is an alternative vision of America to ours, and it might end up being the dominant one.

Posted by: Zizka at October 20, 2003 06:43 AM | PERMALINK

JKC- I don't understand what you think we disagree on. For jobs where experience matters and replacement workers at the same competancy level are harder to find the union has more leverage. In healthcare experience matters a ton. Service might suffer a little having a part time worker as a grocery clerk instead of a full time 20 year veteran, but not enough to make a shopper go somewhere else. Its simply a job where after one week you are nearly as competant as someone who has been there 20 years. Because of that, the 20 year clerk just doesn't have much more value than a part time worker and they shouldn't expect to get paid a great deal more as far as I am concerned.

Posted by: Damon at October 20, 2003 06:50 AM | PERMALINK

I think someone on the right has actually sat down and read Bakunin and Marx and taken it as a dare.

Posted by: Harry Tuttle at October 20, 2003 07:00 AM | PERMALINK

This is going to sound a little cold-blooded, but hey, I'm conservative so I can do that :)

Grocery store checkers and stockers are fairly unskilled jobs. Where I come from, nobody takes these jobs expecting to receive a middle class wage from that job. They are mostly part time because they need to be part time (students, live at home, etc.)

So how is having a job which you know won't pay a middle class wage destroying middle class America? Middle class America does not work as checkers in a grocery store.

Posted by: Ron at October 20, 2003 07:14 AM | PERMALINK

Firebug:

It's not that I "don't give a rat's ass about white collar workers". It's more that the interests of white collar workers are *not* served by unionization and protectionism.

You want the Silicon Valley spirit, not the Teamsters spirit. The great thing about America is that anyone can be an entrepreneur. Even someone new to this country can start a motel, a convenience store, a laundromat - or an Exodus, a Hotmail, or a Google.

I can understand white collar workers who are angry about losing their jobs. And I can even understand the desire to lash out at "hacks" in other countries, or greedy bosses (who gave them the job in the first place), and so on. But if they're angry, it's a heck of a lot more constructive to grow the economic pie by starting their own business or retraining. Without retraining & new business, our standard of living doesn't improve.

As for whether I'm in solidarity with the blue collar unions...well, I wouldn't say *solidarity*, but I'm somewhat more sympathetic to them because they really are poor, uneducated people who find it difficult to retrain. They are unlikely to be able to start their own business. And so their standard of living is *guaranteed* to decrease.

But I do think that blue collar unions generally try to artificially collude to push up the price of labor, often through violence or implied violence against "scabs". I don't think that's a good thing. As someone said above, that creates an aristocracy of workers.

I'm not sure how I feel about minimum wage laws - I think there is a convincing case that they raise unemployment, while others think that they just redistribute wealth.

Anyway, my main point is that unionizing is (IMO) much more legitimate for people who can *only* compete on price, rather than those educated enough to retrain/start their own company/travel/etc.

Posted by: DLCdem at October 20, 2003 07:22 AM | PERMALINK

Damon-

I'm not sure we disagree either. I would say, though, as valuable as experience is in health care, especially nursing, hospitals (and other institutions) haven't always valued it when the bottom line was adversely affected. Part of the reason there's a nursing shortage today is that a lot of the furloughed nurses went into other careers.

As for clerks and stockers in a supermarket, they may not be as skilled as a nurse, or a good electrician, but I sure miss the days when the checkout clerk knew not to pack the canned goods on top of the eggs and bread.

Posted by: JKC at October 20, 2003 07:43 AM | PERMALINK

Unions have some serious problems, but so do corporations (Enron et al.). It's hard to get organizations to work right, but they still are important and often useful. Business Week has reported that companies with active unions are, generally speaking, more profitable than those without unions. For an interesting look at unions and their necessity, strengths, and weaknesses: Which Side Are You On?: Trying to Be for Labor When It's Flat on Its Back, by Thomas Geoghegan. Amazon has some used copies at $5 & below.

Posted by: BayMike at October 20, 2003 07:57 AM | PERMALINK

I do not beleive that you are being treated unfairly when legal workers who have the same competency at your profession is willing to do your job for less than you are.
Posted by Damon at October 20, 2003 05:29 AM

Well, I know how to spell "believe", and I believe that when workers are willing to take your job at a lower wage because thirty years of Republican economics has reduced them to desperation, they you and they alike are being treated unfairly.

Posted by: SqueakyRat at October 20, 2003 08:27 AM | PERMALINK

Well,

At least now illegals in California are going to be getting drivers licenses so they can get to the grocery store easier to cross the picket line and do the job for less than the "Walmart" wage.

Posted by: mark at October 20, 2003 08:35 AM | PERMALINK

As someone who's had lots of low-paid jobs, including one in a non-union movie crew, my own experience with the "craft" unions of IATSE and the Teamsters has been overwhelmingly negative--blatant corruption and featherbedding, constant harassment and physical intimidation of non-union crews (including 19-year-old female college student interns), proud redoubts of racism and sexism, where almost all jobs are bequeathed to the sons of union members themselves--truly one of the most reactionary and blatantly prejudiced and benighted "worlds" I've ever had the displeasure of interacting with. We're not talking about the UAW's support for black workers here--not by a longshot.

Posted by: Daniel Calto at October 20, 2003 09:07 AM | PERMALINK

wow squeakyrat. In a comments section that doesn't allow editing you nailed me in a typo. I bow to your supreme ability to mentally repeat "I before E except after C". Even though the typo you found was completely devestating to the case I was making, I will grudgingly trudge along against impossible odds.

Posted by: Damon at October 20, 2003 09:10 AM | PERMALINK

I keep wondering who is going to be able to buy all the stuff? How can "the consumer" hold up the economy when more and more are falling into, as you say, the working poor? A society with such disparities in incomes is inherently unstable, and contains the seeds of its own destruction. Plus, whaty happens now that more and more high salary jobs are disappearing too?

Posted by: Mimikatz at October 20, 2003 10:25 AM | PERMALINK

I don't think the analogies to Latin America are particularly good ones, given that a very large contributing factor to economic problems in Brazil and Argentina is very rigid pension policies for public sector workers in particular.

In Brazil, Lula (hardly a Republican!) is working desperately to cut back on the excessively generous perks for public-sector Brazilian workers in order to obtain funds for primary education and something approaching a basic safety net for Brazil's poor. To say that the income disparities in the U.S. are similar to those in Latin America is simply not true.

To hold Germany up as a model, as Rebecca does, is similarly not to the point, especially as Germany and France are desperately trying to introduce economic reforms to increase the flexibility of their economies, reduce taxes, etc. Both countries have very strong union movements. Germany does "protect its middle classes" but at the cost of long-term impoverishment of future generations and loss of economic competitiveness. If you think the U.S. is challenged by globalization, study the EU economies.

Despite the instability of the U.S. economy, and its occasional harshness towards displaced workers, I wouldn't want to change economies with France or Germany, where unemployment is close to or exceeding 10%, populations are aging rapidly (which means a demographic crisis re pensions), and economic growth is close to nil.

Two more things: I'm tired of hearing that low wages are caused by the relatively open U.S. immigration policy. Should we have one like Canada's, (Master's or better preferred) where only well-educated people can immigrate? Or like Switzerland's or Sweden's, where immigration is close to impossible?

In the short term, immigration can impose significant costs on localities (CA, NY) due to the increased cost of services. In the long run, more workers means more funds for a safety net for retirees. One reason that California is still an economic dynamo (despite recent setbacks) is that it has the diverse population and expertise to do business worldwide--with China, India, Europe, even (with luck) with Iraq and Iran. If you want to live in a perfect "bubble world" country like Switzerland or Sweden, fine--I don't.

It's important to remember that even the poor in the U.S. would hardly be classified as poor in a global context. The U.S. has incredibly deep resources of wealth, talent, and ability, and is not likely to become a failed economy anytime soon. Firebug hints at the huge benefits of a flexible economy when he states casually that he's considering becoming an electrician apprentice (because the pay and job security are good).

This kind of job mobility is hardly universal, and is one reason for the U.S. economy's continuing ability to reinvent itself, albeit sometimes painfully. Be careful what you wish for--you just might end up with a bureaucratic, badly managed, money-wasting nanny state which protects certain classes of privileged workers to the detriment of the society as a whole. (see under E.U., California state government)

Posted by: Daniel Calto at October 20, 2003 10:29 AM | PERMALINK

I was wondering when contempt and hostility toward unskilled workers would creep in.

About 5:30 in the AM.

Thanks Damon and Firebug for reinforcing my beliefs: most modern conservatives are just spiteful, self-absorbed jerks who order their world according to the severities of their contempt.

Keep on truckin'!

Posted by: Tim at October 20, 2003 11:17 AM | PERMALINK

At least now illegals in California are going to be getting drivers licenses so they can get to the grocery store easier to cross the picket line and do the job for less than the "Walmart" wage.

Mark- Read a newspaper for once.

Illegals already drive but because they can't get a license they never get any driver training which makes them terrible drivers, causing something like 20% of all accidents in CA.

Lots sell brand-new cars to illegal immigrants, how hard do you think it is for one of them to buy a car off a private party?

A few months ago a woman killed herself and her 2 kids in a brand-new Nissan XTerra by just driving off the road for no reason except being a shitty driver. She and her husband were both recent, illegal arrivals from Columbia, I believe, and he bought the car just a week before.

Not having a license isn't keeping any illegals off the road, it's just keeping them from learning how to drive properly.

It's a thorny issue but it's not black and white. You want to keep it illegal? Fine. If you ever get in a wreck in CA you've got a 20% chance of that person being a shitty damn driver (I live with these people, I know) and having no insurance. Yeah, the status quo is perfect.

Posted by: Tim at October 20, 2003 11:27 AM | PERMALINK

Good post. Why should workers continue to accept wage and benefit cuts while fat cat corporate officers continue to make more and more obscene amounts of money. The fact that most people are honoring the picket lines is indicative that people are sensing the injustice in the pay disparity. This could be a start of something monumental and corporate officers should take note.

Posted by: Miles at October 20, 2003 11:33 AM | PERMALINK

The whole flap over driver's licenses for illegal immigrants in California is caused by our country confusing a license to drive a motor vehicle with a residency permit and a citizenship document. If we didn't equate a driver's license with a residency permit we wouldn't be having this discussion: it would be like denying illegal immigrants Blockbuster video cards.

I'm an IT systems engineer, and although my job isn't in any jeopary from foreign competition (think defense), there are a lot of problems with foreign outsourcing. First of all is that most of the outsourcing is sold by hacks who return piss-poor product years late and badly designed because the idiots who outsourced the stuff want cheap and got it. You want it done right by foreign labor or domestic, it will cost a lot more because of the customer interaction needed to really design the product and the requirements definition and testing that gets glossed over by the cheapos. Of course, by the time this is obvious the domestic workers have been out of work for a year, the company is on the skids because their product is late crap, and good luck suing the outsourcing company in foreign court. It hurts the workers, it hurts the company, and it hurts the US.

The second problem is the mobility of the work versus the mobility of the workforce. Let's say that your work got outsourced to India. However, you've looked into it, and decided that you can live in India for peanuts and wouldn't mind moving there to resume your job for Indian wages. Good luck, because you're not an Indian citizen. The company can move and you can't.

This also works the other way through H1B visas. H1B visa holders are only allowed to work at the company that sponsored them, and in return the company is supposed to pay them prevailing wages. However, prevailing wage is a slippery thing, and once the H1B visa worker is in the US he/she can't change jobs without a long and costly process, making them basically indentured servants. Even in the crappy job market of the last three years a lot of H1B visas have still been issued, and three guesses why.

Posted by: RichK at October 20, 2003 12:03 PM | PERMALINK

Tim- thanks for the great imitation of a classic knee jerk liberal. Conservatives don't agree with you so they must be EEEEVIL! I didn't say anything contemptuous, hostile, or spiteful. Perhaps I was self absorbed but its really hard to be on here with people like you and not get a little giddy over how out of touch the liberal movement is with reality.

Posted by: Damon at October 20, 2003 12:06 PM | PERMALINK

RichK:

If the outsourced coding is really as bad as you say it is this problem will be self-correcting--nobody will send any significant work abroad.

The truth is that there are excellent Indian and Chinese engineers who will work for one-eighth of what an American engineer will work for and this is going to continue. I've known and worked with a lot of IIT graduates and they are uniformly highly intelligent, hard-working, and excellent almost to a person. Admittedly, they are the cream of the crop, but they are world-class talents who can compete with anyone. Would you deny them thier right to use their talents on the open market? They worked hard to educate themselves. Shouldn't they enjoy the fruits of their labors? Or is it only Americans who deserve such a chance?

Global competition has long been a reality in most sectors of the economy, from autos to airplanes and now most recently to professional jobs like software coders. I don't see why I am under any obligation to make sure that Silicon Valley engineers' jobs are protected from foreign competition. If anything, as a number of posters have pointed out, highly educated workers will generally have a far easier time getting employment or coming up with an alternative than less skilled workers will.

In general, a lot of these posts demonstrate a strong undercurrent of hostility to foreign labor, immigrant workers and illegal immigrants in particular. Where is the progressive part of the labor movement on this one? This seems like protectionist sentiment and "keep your hands off my job" rejectionism more than any kind of deep committment to worker rights, which are far more substantial here than in developing countries by anyone's reckoning. New York City has survived and prospered despite 300 years of a continuous influx of "cheap" foreign workers "taking real Americans' jobs away"--so will California's economy.

If none of you can stand California, with all of its immigrants, why don't you move to Utah or Idaho--they have dynamic economies with a lot of opportunities, right?

Posted by: Daniel Calto at October 20, 2003 12:22 PM | PERMALINK

Not evil, just jerks.

(and not the "of Steve Martin fame" funny kind)

Posted by: Tim at October 20, 2003 12:51 PM | PERMALINK

DLCdem --

As the name suggests, you don't have even an inkling of a hint of a clue. Flip over any commodity near you. What does it say? Made in China. Made in Malaysia. Made in Indonesia. Made in Mexico. Clothing labels get even more exotic. How did all this crap wind up in your United States? NAFTA, GATT, WTO -- in short, globalisation. And guess what? It happened on your watch. Globalisatioun & DLC fit together like hand and glove.

Posted by: che at October 20, 2003 01:03 PM | PERMALINK

che:

I'm generally pro-globalization. Free trade means cheap goods for us and jobs for them. Comparative advantage is one of the least understood principles of economics - and all the economies (India, North Korea, etc.) that have tried to shut themselves off in the name of "self reliance" have suffered.

btw, is "che" after Che Guevara, the Communist?

Daniel Calto:

I'm in favor of a skilled immigration policy like Canada's or Singapore's. Bear with me for a second - I used to be an open borders type - and hear me out. I'm not anti-immigrant. Heck, I'm of Indian ancestry if that means anything. Anyway, here's the step-by-step case:

1) We agree that totally open borders are a bad thing, yes? We need some screening of who comes into the country both temporarily and permanently. We can estimate the demand for immigration berths by looking at the diversity lottery; in 2000, there were 8 million applications for only 50000 spots. Source:

http://econ.ucsc.edu/faculty/lkletzer/borjas_postdec01.htm

That's a LOT. If we had open borders, we would get tens of millions of immigrants in a few months, many of whom would have no interest in assimilating or becoming American. Any country that wanted to could invade us. And so on.

We need some kind of rational screening procedure.

2) So that means we're letting in N immigrants per year, where N is less than infinity. We need some criteria to determine who gets in to those N, because the number of applicants is much greater than N. There are many possible methods of allocating visas, but the most obvious are:

-market-based
-lottery
-nepotism
-merit

Our current immigration system allocates about 70% of its spots on the basis of nepotism, i.e., chain "family reunification". Source:

http://www.bcis.gov/graphics/shared/aboutus/statistics/IMM2001.pdf

Once you immigrate, you can bring over your brother, your sister, your parents, and grown children. That's not what family reunification was intended to be - it was supposed to be to stop at your spouse and kids.

The other 20-30% is allocated on the basis of merit and lottery.

Personally, I'm in favor of swinging the balance back towards merit and away from nepotism. I also think we can do without the lottery - is immigration supposed to be charity?

3) Basic point: We can have the pick of the world. Tens of millions of people want to enter each year. Why don't we pick people who will hit the ground running? This wouldn't be "racist" - it'd mean African doctors, Chinese engineers, Indian programmers, and Russian physicists.

The thing is, unskilled immigrants take longer to assimilate and require more in tax receipts than they pay. That's a statistical fact, established by both the National Academy of Sciences and George Borjas (Harvard prof). Sources:

http://www.nap.edu/books/0309063566/html/index.html

http://econ.ucsc.edu/faculty/lkletzer/borjas_postdec01.htm

4) All that would really be needed to change would be:

a) enforcing our borders
b) restricting family reunification to wife and children
c) eliminating the diversity lottery

Enforcing our borders is not "inhumane" or racist. No one suffers more from downward wage pressure than low income American workers, particularly black and Hispanic Americans. Look at the outcry accompanying the outsourcing of tech sector jobs; yet those guys *can* retrain, but the guys at the bottom of the ladder find it a lot harder and in practice can only compete on price.

They don't even benefit from the overall capitalism, because unskilled workers demand more in tax receipts than they pay in (viz the NAS and Borjas reports above). So why should we continue with our current immigration policy?

Posted by: DLCdem at October 20, 2003 02:14 PM | PERMALINK

DLCDem wrote: "Marsman, it's unskilled immigration - not political conservatism per se - that has contributed to the harshening of income inequality."

As a very active environmentalist, I have for many, many years been alarmed about the flood of immigration into the U.S. At one time, I (hesitantly) joined a group called FAIR -- Federation for Immigration Reform. I did so only after actually calling the executive director and asking some pointed questions. I learned the group had split years earlier from Zero Population Growth. They had some notable liberals and progressives -- leastways, folks I thought of that way -- associated with them.

I later dropped from the group, in a burst of anger, when it became evident that there was a lot of thinly-disguised racism going on there. They supported some of the slimy anti-immigrant initiatives in California, for example. I felt I'd been lied to, and so have little good to say about the group.

BUT, my concern about immigration remains. Strictly from an environmental view, there is too much immigration. The carrying capacity of the continental U.S. has very likely been exceeded, and the bills for that will be coming due for many years to come. From an economic point of view, it is true that when immigration turns into a veritable flood -- and it really has been that -- it tends to swamp the labor supply, forcing down everyone's income. And wherever land was already a bit in short supply -- say, ALL of coastal California -- having additional millions of people bidding for properties invariably results in absurdly higher prices. Coastal houses in Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz, Pismo, and elsewhere, that could have been had for less than $40K in the early 1970s, now run $400K to $2 million. Talk about a hopeless situation for anyone born and raised in California, who always lived near or at least dreamed of living near the ocean!

(Of course, it's the social aspects of immigration that actually upsets most natives here ... often to the point of racism. In my case, culture shock does occur too, but in general I -- and most liberals -- are more comfortable with, and even enthusiastic about, the wonderful contributions immigrants bring to American culture).

Having said all of that, I think you are wrong. Trying to pin the vast demolition of the middle class on immigration is almost certainly a fool's errand. The down-turn for America's middle class, I believe, began with many of the policies implemented by Richard Nixon. But it really got going under Reagan and -- after a brief hiatus by Clinton -- has resumed with a vengeance under Shrub.

These trends are occurring nationwide, EVERYWHERE, as much in places with large immigrant populations as not. I'm not an economist, and can't whip out the magic appeal to advanced mathematical models, but I would bet dollars for doughnuts that careful analysis would show that immigration cannot explain more than a fraction of the great split now occurring: a few moving ever upward, and vast numbers struggling ever more valiently to keep from falling downward.

-- Roger

Posted by: Marsman at October 20, 2003 02:25 PM | PERMALINK

Calto says:

a lot of these posts demonstrate a strong undercurrent of hostility to foreign labor, immigrant workers and illegal immigrants in particular.

Pro-union doesn't mean anti-immigrant. You run the risk of playing the race card a bit, which clouds the issue. I think your best question is:

Where is the progressive part of the labor movement on this one?

As I posted above, unions are on the path to obsolesence because they are not expanding the number and type of jobs that can be organized and members that can join. I think that means worldwide and across borders.

In the long run, eroding the middle class in America by busting unions or shipping jobs oversees is the most anti-immigrant/anti-foriegn labor approach one can take. How long do you think middle class American incomes can fall before some Pat Buchanan-type will stir middle class rage into onerous immigration and protectionist policy? I'd bet 2008. And it probably would've been this election but for 9/11.

Posted by: chris at October 20, 2003 02:30 PM | PERMALINK

Where do wages come from, folks?

Why it's an operating expense. And, that means you just can't go to work (participate in shrinkage, which is KNOWN to occur mostly from the inside), get paid a wage that's a bit above minimum (not because the unions are 'good,' but because there's too much rollover when wages are low; and help ignores showing up.)

Sometimes, to avoid unionization a company will pay 50-cents more an hour than a unionized shop. (And, being non-union means you're salary isn't subject to union deductions.)

Unions have lost strength because where they were strong the businesses ran away. Like Detroit.

When big companies come into town they bargain for lots of goodies. Workers rules that don't destroy the company's profits (which is why companies are in business in the first place.) And, they look for all sorts of tax abatements, etc.

Being that there are only so many companies, and lots of cities that were competing for providing sites, it's no wonder the union mentality proved harmful. Just ask people who've moved to the South for jobs; if they're union supporters or company supporters? People like paychecks. In a competitive world, the company gets to select its personnel. This only changes when there's not enough people out there willing to do the work.

If at one time WELFARE CHECKS reduced the supply of workers (heck, why work?) ... Then, you get to see how some of the social support fabric unravelled. Today, people don't want to pay taxes. Everyone wants to pay less. So, follow the money.

Here, in California, when VONS was the only shop the unions were striking against, both RALPHS and SAFEWAY closed their doors to the union help! (To make it more expensive to the union to support their own strikers.) Even if the supermarkers hurt short-term, they still need to turn a profit. Basically, they exist on a 2% margin. Workers, true, stand at cash registers and count money all day long. It gives workers ideas that its "all profits." And, how can you educate ignoramouses anyway?

Right now I hear there are no negotiations planned. And, the strike is in its 8th day.

Let's say that some supermarkets will have to close, because it's been noted many aren't all that busy, anyway. You think this is because of the strike? Did you know most supermarkets are open till midnight. And, some never close? So that whenever you go it's hardly ever busy?

Maybe, there are just too many stores? But what happens to the mini-malls when stores close? Fewer workers, wouldn't you think?

Corporations judge their success by making profits. Anytime the profits disappear you can expect there will be fewer jobs. Will the unions notice?

By the way, why should corporations be faced with escalating health care costs? IF YOU WANT TO SEE A REDUCTION TO THESE COSTS WHAT BETTER WAY THAN TO MAKE THE USERS RESPONSIBLE?

Workers want insurance, but they don't want to pay a penny. And, as the costs escalates somebody thought they'd pressure the big companies to swallow the extra costs associated with these benefits.

I'm not betting that the unions win. Nor, am I betting that a single democratic voter will figure out reality.

Of course, day by day, there seems to be fewer democratic voters. (And, even in California, the numbers showing fleeing democrats were there to see in the recent recall election.)

Maybe, you just can't keep on doing business like you did business in 1930?

Posted by: Carol in California at October 20, 2003 03:40 PM | PERMALINK

Old information.

We went through the poverty report in detail a few threads ago, and the data shows that the biggest cause of income inequality is over spending by government, and Kevin is the main cause.

Posted by: Matt Young at October 20, 2003 08:12 PM | PERMALINK

I don't know anything about unions (although I used to enjoy reading Carpenter magazine when I was a kid - I especially enjoyed "Plane Gossip").

But as a suburban mother, I HATE those automated checkouts. I can already see what's going to happen - we'll get rid of the checkers, and I'll be paying at least as much as I pay right now to check my damn groceries myself! Then the special grocery stores will open with real human checkers, but they'll charge you even more for the privilege of having an actual human being check your groceries for you.

I already have my hands full with 2 kids, a full-time job and a part-time job. I promise right now that I will go out of my way to avoid any grocery store that has those horrible automated checkers, I don't care how fancy or fast they get, I will not spend my money in that store.

Posted by: Maureen at October 20, 2003 09:54 PM | PERMALINK

Marsman--

"The carrying capacity of the North American continent...", etc.

I'm not sure how anyone can come up with such an absurd justification for strict immigration regimes. How can you argue against immigration from an environmental standpoint? It may be true that the carrying capacity (whatever that means) of North America has been met, but surely the situation is much worse in most of the nations from which immigrants come. An exodus of population from India or Brazil to the United States could only be a good thing for the global environment.

I am a maximalist here. Scrap all immigration restrictions. Work to internationalize unions. Lets see how well our republican friends like a true free market, without the "Great Wall" of the INS causing such massive distortions in labor markets. Match and meet capital's great "spatial fix"...watch the system of nations go down in flames. And good riddance.

Posted by: kokblok at October 20, 2003 10:32 PM | PERMALINK

Kokblok wrote: "I'm not sure how anyone can come up with such an absurd justification for strict immigration regimes."

Usually the problem here is rightwing trolls. But today we've got what looks like an extremist LEFTIST whacko ... an anarchist, perhaps, sputtering confused drivel and thinking it adds up to an argument.

I can take each sentence, of course, and deal with it individually. But at the end, I still don't know exactly what it is you think you are arguing. The one sure conclusion I can make is that you know absolutely nothing about matters environmental ... a level of ignorance you guilelessly advertise with your admission that you have no idea what the quite elementary term "carrying capacity" means.

Let me assure you that there is nothing "absurd" about environmental concerns over immigration. The United States (as either nation or landmass) is not some bottomless pot into which tens and hundreds of millions of souls can be poured without consequence. Virtually all of the nation's major environmental organizations -- and certainly the environmental sciences community -- are concerned about over-population here. One of the reasons they haven't been more outspoken about immigration (and, indeed, have engaged in some bitter internal debates) is the reason I alluded to in my previous posting: the fear that racists and immigrant bashers will use environmental concerns as a fig leaf for their own disgusting agendas.

Nonetheless, the fact is we are rapidly running out of numerous vital natural resources because of population pressures. Potable water, for example, has long been a major economic and political issue in the west. But now there are terrible fault lines developing in Utah, Colorado, Arizona -- even oh-so-wet Oregon -- over water allocation because, for the first time, ALL of the sources are being tapped and there is simply not enough to go around. To cite one result, wilderness areas and wildlife preserves in the Rocky Mountains and throughout the Great Basin are being significantly degraded as limited water supplies continue to be siphoned away for use in the ever-growing urban sprawls of Las Vegas, Denver, Albuquerque, and elsewhere.

You don't think immigration plays ANY role in this? Despite the fact that U.S. domestic population growth is virtually flat ... that ALL of our actual population growth is now the result of immigration?

Then you come up with a genuinely absurd argument that it can "only be good" for the global environment to -- what? -- have 8 or 10 million people a year move from India, China and elsewhere to the U.S.? No, that would not improve their environments noticably (most of which are already in desperate condition) ... but it would pull us down to their level of misery in astonishingly short order.

You then make the incredibly extremist suggestion that the U.S. should not exercise any control over its borders whatsoever, but should allow as many immigrants to come here as wish to. That -- you say -- would somehow "show" the Republicans a thing or two. Here is where your logic, if there ever was any, completely leaves the realm of the real.

The reality is this: if the U.S. were to simply throw open its borders, our total population could conceivably be TRIPLED in just three or four years. The annual number of births in China, India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Africa, and South America is so enormous that -- quite easily -- they could collectively dispatch 100 million people off to the U.S. each year, and never even miss them. And don't doubt for a minute that there are easily that many people around the world with both the wish and the means to come here, if they but could be assured of a legal welcome.

Of course, at some point the flood would drop to a trickle ... because word would spread that the U.S. had turned into a gargantuan cesspool overnight, its environment in free-fall, not much different from the shantytown suburbs of Delhi and Peking and Rio the would-be immigrants would like to escape. In a heartbeat, we would all be living at just exactly the same wonderful level as the teeming hundreds of millions in those countries.

Boy, that sure would "show" those Republicans, wouldn't it? (Or ... maybe they'd just retreat further into their gated communities and chuckle over the vast armies of near-slave-labor now available just down the block).

-- Roger

Posted by: Marsman at October 21, 2003 12:56 AM | PERMALINK

DLCdem: "You want the Silicon Valley spirit, not the Teamsters spirit. The great thing about America is that anyone can be an entrepreneur. Even someone new to this country can start a motel, a convenience store, a laundromat - or an Exodus, a Hotmail, or a Google."

All true. But it is worth pointing out that this is not limited to white-collar occupations. Plenty of plumbers, electricians, and HVAC techs are self-employed. But the rest are often still unionized. Not all coders *want* to be enterpreneurs. Many technical people want to leave the running of the business to someone else and concentrate on their technical specialty. These are the coders who might benefit from unionization. I pointed out in my previous post that for a wide variety of reasons, such a union would probably not resemble the Teamsters in most ways.

DLCDem: "I can understand white collar workers who are angry about losing their jobs. And I can even understand the desire to lash out at "hacks" in other countries, or greedy bosses (who gave them the job in the first place), and so on."

Actually, most techie complaints I hear aren't about _greedy_ bosses, but _stupid_ bosses. Few programmers, in my experience, complain about poor pay. Rather, the following complaints are recurrent:

* Technical/engineering decisions made by unqualified nontechnical personnel
* Excessive (often uncompensated) overtime
* Lack of professional respect
* Pushing incomplete, buggy crap out the door due to underestimating schedules (this ties in with professional respect)
* Job scarcity and lack of security
* Excessive bureaucracy/unnecessary rules (i.e. dress codes)

Many of these can be addressed without any adverse impact on the company's bottom line. In fact, some of them have the potential to improve it. Most programmers don't want to recreate the worst abuses of industrial unionism like forcing people into fixed job descriptions, nepotism, or paying and promoting people based on strict seniority. In fact, most of them would be strongly opposed to all these practices. As I said, a programmers union would probably be more akin to the SAG or the MLBPA.

DLCdem: "But if they're angry, it's a heck of a lot more constructive to grow the economic pie by starting their own business or retraining. Without retraining & new business, our standard of living doesn't improve."

Perhaps so. But this is small consolation to people who spent several years and went thousands of dollars into debt to get a degree in the IT field, lured by industry claims that there was a 'worker shortage', now to find that there is nothing left. Grocery clerks didn't pay for expensive training, and certainly not on their own dime. Another important difference is that grocery jobs are generic jobs; their only real importance is income. (Who ever said 'I want to be a bagger when I grow up?') On the other hand, programming is a genuine profession that many take pride in. It's a lot harder to see that go away, since it means that many people will never have career fulfillment even if they do manage to get another job.

DLCdem: "As for whether I'm in solidarity with the blue collar unions...well, I wouldn't say *solidarity*, but I'm somewhat more sympathetic to them because they really are poor, uneducated people who find it difficult to retrain. They are unlikely to be able to start their own business. And so their standard of living is *guaranteed* to decrease."

What about skilled blue-collar occupations? They generally don't require a college degree, and many of them have paid apprenticeships, so the workers don't need to go broke while they're learning the profession. Plumbers, electricians, and HVAC techs (to name just three I could think of right away) all make good money because they have much higher barriers to entry than bagging groceries, and they can't be outsourced to bumfuck India. It seems to me that rather than fight a losing battle to pay unskilled, easily replaceable laborers a king's ransom, that effort should be channeled into getting these workers the job skills that will allow them to command higher rates of pay without having to compete with guys who just snuck over the border from Mexico.

DLCdem: "Anyway, my main point is that unionizing is (IMO) much more legitimate for people who can *only* compete on price, rather than those educated enough to retrain/start their own company/travel/etc."

The problem is that even highly skilled IT workers can't compete on price with hellholes where the cost of living is a dollar a day. We could compete on quality, but far too many companies are focused on the short term alone and don't care about quality. This is *especially* the case in IT, where the end customer often doesn't see the results. (Slow, clumsy, poorly written in-house software, for instance, will make the business less efficient, but usually not in a way that the end user sees directly.) There are a *lot* of unemployed techies out there praying for a nuclear war between India and Pakistan. Personally, I'd rather see a return to long-term thinking in American business.

Posted by: Firebug at October 21, 2003 07:25 AM | PERMALINK

Roger:

One of the problems is with the concept of "carrying capacity" - it is essentially meaningless in and of itself, because it doesn't address patterns of consumption and waste. And your model also doesn't address why people move from one place to another.

For the first issue: I think most anyone will grant your basic point that no place can hold limitless inhabitants. However, the environmental drain depends largely on *how* they live in that place. For example, 8 people with no car crammed into a 2bedroom apartment vs. a couple with 2 houses, 3 cars, etc, don't have the same impact on the environment.

For the second - lifting or tightening border restrictions don't happen in a vacuum. There are underlying causes for immigration and emigration. Those causes can be addressed without penalizing the people who immigrate because they feel thye have no choice. They are coming because they have more oportunities here than in their home countries. So investing in the development (and security and general well-being of our neighbors (or wherever immigrants are coming from)) makes good sense in that it builds more wealthy populations one which will buy our products, and helps create places people feel they can afford to live in (from a quality of life perspective) - including people from other countries like the US.

And back to the original issue - was it a strike or a lockout?

Posted by: trouble at October 21, 2003 08:07 AM | PERMALINK

trouble asks
And back to the original issue - was it a strike or a lockout?

I'm not siding with anyone here, just passing along some of what I have seen.

Companies sometimes lockout during strikes (keeps company assets from being damaged by overzealous strikers). If a strike is imminent I could see a company going into a preventative lockout. I can't see a company doing a lockout unless a strike was imminent since profits would be reduced.

Posted by: Ron at October 21, 2003 03:30 PM | PERMALINK

Trouble:

Thanks for the thoughtful reply. I wasn't trying to make an elaborate argument about carrying capacity (which, after all, is a term for a complex set of measurements and ideas). Suffice it to say that most environmental scientists today feel that the North American continent's population is probably at or beyond the sustainable carrying capacity of the natural environment IF the majority of the people here are to continue enjoying anything like the standard of living we've known in the past. You can contest that if you wish, but that does reflect the majority opinion of the environmental community.

I came back to it in my second post only because the reply from Kokblok made it clear he hadn't ever even heard of the term. Sort of like someone trying to argue about professional football, yet letting it be known he was unfamiliar with the term "field goal."

Second, I'm not an absolutist about immigration. I was merely responding to the previous postings trying to pin all our economic problems on immigration, which I think is clearly wrong.

-- Roger

Posted by: Marsman at October 21, 2003 03:50 PM | PERMALINK

Marsman:

I pretty much agree with you on the environmental issue. And on the difficult of addressing this question without being branded a "racist". It's really kinda annoying, especially because millions of recent immigrants and children of immigrants think immigration should be reformed.

NumbersUSA is pretty good, as is the Center for Immigration Studies. As far as I know, neither of them have any crypto-racism going on (I'm pretty brown skinned, and I've been to their meetings without incident).

Firebug:

I guess the difference between us is that I see the current resistance to outsourcing as being very similar to the resistance to Japanese cars in the 80's. If they really *were* worse on quality, it would show up at some stage; as it is, the global supply line for information is rather tenuous, and it takes a lot of startup capital to make outsourcing work (in terms of teleconferencing, coordination, etc.).

If outsourcing is oversold, there will be a market shakeout of firms that do it. If not, then it will be like the 80's, where competition from Japanese manufacturers forced the big three to get their act together - and benefited the consumer more than anyone else.

Also, I am of Indian ancestry, but I don't think I'm biased - I have a lot of friends who've lost their jobs to outsourcing to India, and I've seen the bitching about it, and I do sympathize to an extent.

And yeah - it does kind of suck if someone was told about a coding shortage, spent the time to train, and then felt the ground fall out from underneath them once the bubble burst.

But let's put it in perspective. Most coding jobs are pretty new - easy come, easy go. The expectation of life employment as a programmer at the same company is pretty unrealistic.

Furthermore, it doesn't take *that much* expertise to go and read a Java book or C++ book or otherwise retrain to get a new job. And while not every coder wants to start his own company, we should be encouraging as many as possible to do just that. Startup capital in the software industry is a lot lower than in other fields, as you know.

Anyway, my point is that it's futile to blame the managers. Managers and entrepreneurs gave the coders the jobs in the first place, and they can and will take them away if cost pressures so dictate.

The only constructive solution is to either retrain, start your own company, find a related field (e.g. robotics, bioinformatics, whatever) in which coding is useful, travel to a region in which a new job is available, or suck it up and keep looking at craig's list.

One major point: If managers were prevented from responding to a downturn by slashing jobs and/or outsourcing, they would be much more reluctant about hiring in the first place. This is the situation in France, and why they have 10% structural unemployment.

Posted by: DLCdem at October 21, 2003 05:17 PM | PERMALINK

A couple of perceptions...

I don't get why everyone knocks Wal-mart. OK, so they are non-union, but that is because they have done a decent job of taking care of their folks and haven't given their workers ENOUGH cause to Unionize (sure there are other ancilliary reasons, but on the whole I think their workers are relatively happy). In addition to that, they have done a great job of helping the avg. consumer keep more money in their pocket for their family. I mean, given their scale and massive buying power, they have the ability to force producers of goods to cut the best deal possible (lets not be lulled into thinking that Wal-mart's suppliers aren't also doing right well. The scale that Wal-mart brings to their business is amazing and allows them to lower their cost structure). Some could argue (and have), that Wal-mart hurts the local Mom and Pop store. I am sure they do. But compare that to the benefit they generate for shoppers (the working poor included) who can purchase more for his/her family (whether it be food, toiletries, etc.)? Why is that benefit always overlooked. Does anyone hear actually want to pay more for goods than they have to (well maybe Troy. He seems to think that Wal-mart should pay their people more money for the heck of it)? Sure, some would say that they are willing to pay a premium. But how much and for what items? I don't see lots of stories of people paying extra for gas because they want to! Extra for cars because they want to! Extra for clothes, music, shoes, etc. out of the goodness of their hearts!!

The other issue I see is that there are some who address the problem from an academic perspective such as Brian who had this...'What unions represent is the labor-supply equivalent of corporate consolidation. It becomes more efficient and the ability to bargain for a set price for a fixed commodity is improved, offering a standard product- ie 8 hour workday with employees possessing a given set of skills. It becomes easier for both the employee to bargain for a better price for labor, and better for the company because they know what they are getting as far as skills, experience and training.' Well thought out and shows his line of reasoning. Then there are folks like Millionth Monkey who provide these gems, 'Look at me! I'm a conservative!
Unions are an old, tired, socialist idea. The fall of the Soviet Union proves that they should be abolished.' (Not trying to insinuate that he is anti-Union, just copying one of his posts. His post was meant to be satirical - I think) and '...They can't be replaced with someone in Pakistan. (Unless, of course, they use some combination of the creepy "check yourself out" system with a TCP/IP videophone, with a subcontinenter on the other end appearing in a monitor where the existing checkout person now stands. Trained to understand American slang...' (Nice slam! Sounds as though you really care about people in other parts of the world.) And finally, '...Pay off your debts. Soon you won't be able to get a job to save your life. And put all your money in gold. Once they start printing money to make the interest payments on the deficit, foreign investment will cease, rates will skyrocket, and your life savings will be worthless.' Nice original thought. Why don't you just copy and paste PK's book right here. Besides the fact that PK has almost no credibility anymore (for good reasons), I am glad to see there are folks such as yourself I an rely upon to always scream 'the sky is falling!' Thereby, immediately discrediting you and your insane, illogical arguements.

Posted by: Chris at October 22, 2003 01:57 PM | PERMALINK

The story doesn't have legs. Lines of protestors have gotten smaller. And, coverage? Where? Go to a site that lists the latest news stories. This one's old.

Never good news when your story is 'old' and doesn't get coverage.

A strike works only when the momentum GROWS. This board didn't cut it. It didn't stop people from buying groceries.

And, the people are strike? Well, they were only supposed to be Von Stores. When Ralphs and Safeway locked the union out.

Whose most surprised today?

People who went on strike feeling they'd win, but are now in for the long haul?

The people who pass the supermarkets now like they're accident sites? Slowing down to watch foot traffic going in and out the door?

If you're gonna strike it's good to have your ear to the PUBLIC. Not just what the representatives tell you.

Some day the real story will be the individual losses family with jobs had to incur at the expense of following union leaders like the Pied Piper. And, you know what happened to all those kids, don't you?

The next question, if this were a crisis to the stores, why aren't they sending in management representive to talk to the union yokels? Ah. That wouldn't be a smart idea, now would it?

By definition strikes, like wars, mean winners and losers. The side that can hold out WINS.

Maybe, there's a better lesson to teach kids: Don't aim to sit on your duff and hope that semi-skilled (to really stupid hamberger flipping jobs) are going to save you in a competitive world.

How many strikers read books? Now, might be a good time to open one or two.

Posted by: Carol in California at October 22, 2003 03:13 PM | PERMALINK

Frankly, I think Kevin's analysis is superficially plausible but fundamentally flawed.

First, Kevin's argument that the poor low-skilled worker is up against some big corporation when they're bargaining over wages is simply wrong. Perhaps the only advantage of being a low-skilled labor is that you can work in a variety of jobs. A shelf stocker at Vons could be a janitor in an office building, could be a busboy in a restuarant, could stock shelves in a drugstore, could do certain tasks at a construction site, etc. etc. That means that Vons is competing with all sorts of other firms, not just grocery stores, for low-skill workers. In that situation, the wages we see on an even union-free market don't reflect some unfair bargaining outcome that results from Vons's size; they reflect the market outcome of workers competing for jobs and firms competing for workers. If Vons offered a lower wage than the market wage, then Vons wouldn't have any workers, and Vons is too small a part of the overall labor market too be able to change the market wage. Like it or not, the decline in unionism is not a cause, but rather a symptom of the wage disparity growth we've seen over the last 30 years. Unions are less powerful BECAUSE the demand for low-skill labor has declined precipitously over the last 30 years, and any attempt to engineer a union comeback will only serve to benefit some groups of workers at the expense of other workers and consumers, and the losses will outweigh the gains.

At the end of the day, unions are just price-fixing cartels, attempting to fix the price of labor. This may have been socially desirable back when you had small towns with one dominant employer and zero worker mobility. In many small towns in the South and Industrial Midwest, if you didn't work for the local steel company/coal mine/paper mill, then you didn't work. In that situation, firms really could pay workers less than the marginal value of their labor, and unions actually increased economic efficiency by moving wages closer to what they would be on a free and competitive labor market.

But today, in urban Southern California, no firm has the power to unilaterally decide what they will pay low-skilled workers. Too many other firms exist as substitutes for the worker. If Von's offered $2.00 an hour (even if that were legal), then Vons wouldn't get any workers, or certainly not enough to run a grocery store. In this case, unions really don't do much to advance society's interests (although they may still benefit some small group of workers), and may cause some marginal harm.

Posted by: Keith at October 22, 2003 05:48 PM | PERMALINK

Keith, that's exactly it. Competition sets the price structure. And, you're right about the low-skilled.

Now, I remember seeing that hiring at the bottom also has an unusually high turn over rate. Which is very, very expensive. (I've even heard stories at Disney were workers start a shift and then just leave.)

Workers don't think of the paper trail, but every hire is expensive 'to load.' In that the person usually has some sort of a reference check going. A health/drug type of a check. I can't imagine you just walk in and they hand you a jacket.

Then, new hires are put through some sort of training program. So, it's expensive to start a human hire. Then, if the stores, (and your example is Vons), isn't competitive and better jobs open up there goes the worker. And, you're back to step one. Including having to advertise and recruit help.

The best system is that the worker stays.

So the problem here isn't an employer who is exploiting workers(if that was happening the worker wouldn't pass the probationary period). Not only do workers leave. But the stores are finding replacement workers. The union, itself, can't stop this.

Once, crossing a picket line was a very big deal. Seems it would work better if there was one big plant where traffic could be blocked ... but what you have now is very piecemeal.

And, since violence is already breaking out it will cost more. If the violence increases then our police will respond at a cost to taxpayers, eventually. It's just another chore the taxpayers have to provide 'to keep the peace.'

The violence doesn't help the unions. But it does put the story back up on page one. (And, the longer the strike drags on the more annoyed the average shopper will become.)

What's really funny, if the workers didn't have union expenses peeled off of their wages, they'd have the money to help defray their health insurance costs.

Meanwhile, when the stike ends (and I'm sure it would), there's going to be a lot more familiar faces to management on the workers who have come through during the strike, incrasing, not decreasing the pool of employees. And, what may happen is that hours will be shifted. So, that some workers will become 'part-timers.'

This stupid strike isn't going to hurt anyone but the semi-skilled workers, themselves. You see a different victory ahead? Where's the pressure on the grocery chains? Up and open for business is a pretty good indication that there's no rush to solve this one.

And, after the strike is over a major concern for the supermarkets may be that they won't want back some of the workers who are on strike, now.

Marginal 'middle-class' workers can be real nasty when they get back to work. If they're going to go back holding grudges.

You see other outcomes?

I'd be more interested to know how welfare rolls into place, and what some of these workers thought they'd get if they went on strike? Unemployment insurance? Doesn't that have a six week wait when you pull up stakes and haven't been fired?

Does anyone know those rules?

Posted by: Carol in California at October 22, 2003 10:28 PM | PERMALINK

Here's a test. People who don't earn a lot of money, go on strike over $5.

But they weren't told exactly what they'd get if they won their 'strike,' only that the union wanted them to do it.

When a strike is on par with calling a party expect HANGOVERS.

Wait till these blooming 'middle-class' idiots wake up.

Anyway, for the 'unions, themselves,' they've just shot another wad.

You CAN strike against sources that are localized. Just as you can probably remove cancers that are localized.

But this 'strike' is over a broad area. No matter what you read in the liberal press, it's gonna be like the Schwartzenegger victory when it ends. No one will be sure they can explain JUST HOW WIDE THE SUPPORT FOR THE OTHER SIDE REALLY WAS ... until the numbers got counted. And, it was a rout.

Why did the union strike here? On this issue? They don't have a bigger, brighter, crew of hopefuls anyplace else.

The bigger question, when this is over, since we're talking semi-skilled workers, here; how many of them will be semi-skilled workers elsewhere?

And, what is the go-mint going to do about the 'uninsured?' Since more and more people are now uninsured across the board.

Let alone, the trick of Medicare. Did you know there were lots of people who had 'union' plans; and worker's plans ... who lose them when they reach 65? They get Medicare, instead. (And, so far, Medicare doesn't cover drugs.)

You think the go-mint can cure this by taxation?

What about belly up?

When a system goes 'belly up' what stops?

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