3 ms·

The investor class being those that have significant political influence. I sure don't recall any large boomer political movements demanding more offshoring. In

The investor class being those that have significant political influence. I sure don't recall any large boomer political movements demanding more offshoring. In fact, a politician promising the exact opposite was quite popular. But because they reap some minor, incidental payoff from a policy they did not choose, you're going to claim that means they were in favor of it??

photochemsyn 5y ago
People want money, in my experience. Cut their money flow and they get upset. Any effort to rebuild manufacturing in the USA will require corporations - major blue-chip outfits that pension funds invest heavily in - to spend billions of dollars building new factories and hiring employees at wages a good deal higher than what it costs in mainland China, Indonesia, Mexico, etc. This will cut dividend payouts to pension funds. Boomers riding their 401Ks off into the cruise ship sunset will get upset about that I imagine.
- jevoten 5y ago
  You imagine incorrectly - most Americans believe outsourcing hurts the economy: On the one hand, the polls largely confirm that most Americans are mercantilists at heart. The Ipsos poll shows that 69% of Americans believe that outsourcing hurts the country -- and only 17% think it helps the economy. --https://foreignpolicy.com/2004/06/09/public-opinion-about-offshore-outsourcing/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2004/06/09/public-opinion-about-of... I don't understand where you get your certainty from. I've hardly ever seen offshoring referred to positively, the attitudes towards globalization itself are lukewarm at best, politicians ride into office on rhetoric of tariffs and bringing back jobs, but you just know, because some economists claimed stock yields would be 30% lower in the short-term if the US doesn't massively export its hard-won technological and manufacturing know-how, that all this outsourcing was driven by popular sentiment, and that people will revolt against any attempts to stop or reverse it? Based on what? Widespread pro-outsourcing protests and grassroots activism? As for rebuilding manufacturing - it wouldn't need to be rebuilt if it hadn't been exported in the first place. What kind of argument is that? "We did something unpopular, but undoing it would be painful, and pain is unpopular, therefore what we did was popular"?

photochemsyn 5y ago

People want money, in my experience. Cut their money flow and they get upset. Any effort to rebuild manufacturing in the USA will require corporations - major blue-chip outfits that pension funds invest heavily in - to spend billions of dollars building new factories and hiring employees at wages a good deal higher than what it costs in mainland China, Indonesia, Mexico, etc. This will cut dividend payouts to pension funds. Boomers riding their 401Ks off into the cruise ship sunset will get upset about that I imagine.

jevoten 5y ago
You imagine incorrectly - most Americans believe outsourcing hurts the economy: On the one hand, the polls largely confirm that most Americans are mercantilists at heart. The Ipsos poll shows that 69% of Americans believe that outsourcing hurts the country -- and only 17% think it helps the economy. --https://foreignpolicy.com/2004/06/09/public-opinion-about-offshore-outsourcing/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2004/06/09/public-opinion-about-of... I don't understand where you get your certainty from. I've hardly ever seen offshoring referred to positively, the attitudes towards globalization itself are lukewarm at best, politicians ride into office on rhetoric of tariffs and bringing back jobs, but you just know, because some economists claimed stock yields would be 30% lower in the short-term if the US doesn't massively export its hard-won technological and manufacturing know-how, that all this outsourcing was driven by popular sentiment, and that people will revolt against any attempts to stop or reverse it? Based on what? Widespread pro-outsourcing protests and grassroots activism? As for rebuilding manufacturing - it wouldn't need to be rebuilt if it hadn't been exported in the first place. What kind of argument is that? "We did something unpopular, but undoing it would be painful, and pain is unpopular, therefore what we did was popular"?