"Carl Byrns" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 12 Oct 2003 20:14:25 GMT, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:

The US currently is the most productive manufacturing country in the
world,
according to the World Bank. We have a tremendous growth rate in
productivity. There's no room there to open the gap, because the Chinese
are
becoming more productive at a rate even faster than ours. And they're
paying
their workers peanuts.

You're contradicting yourself- how can the US be the most productive
manufacturing country in the world if the Chinese are becoming more
productive at a rate even faster than ours?

Because they have a lot of catching up to do. Overall, according to the IMF,
the Chinese productivity is 6% that of the US. But that's a bogus figure,
because it includes swarms of peasants tilling soil with sticks, etc.

Their manufacturing productivity in *export* industries is probably half of
ours overall, with some categories, especially those in which exporting
companies are foreign-owned, coming quite close to our productivity levels.


Does that mean China will become more productive than the US, despite
having a 80 cent an hour peasant work force?

Probably not. Expect their export industries to challenge ours, however, in
one category after another. The car industry is now running at about 50% of
our productivity, but with much larger improvements each year than our rate
(just under 4% for the car industry).


If so, why _are_ we paying US factory workers $25.63 an hour? It's
pretty obvious US manufacturing is not getting it's money worth.

On what basis? Compared to what? Chinese workers? Most factory workers in
the developed world are being paid something like what our workers make.
When you add in benefits, most of Europe is paying more.

If you want to compare our workers with those in low-wage countries, you can
say that we aren't getting as much for our dollar as we would if we employed
people who have no plumbing and no cars. Is that what you're comparing us
with?

Wages have declined because they were too high!

Says who? By what standard? The Chinese standard? Yes, they're high by
the
Chinese standard. How far down are you willing to see wages go?

Ed, look at your own numbers. 80 cents an hour vs. $25.63 an hour for
what have to be similar jobs. How much value added does $24.83 buy?
I mean if a former rice farmer can work on assembly line screwing
together V8 engines for 80 cents an hour, what qualities does an
illiterate drunk US worker possess that makes him worth that extra
$24.83? Not to mention other bennies that push his true wages closer
to $50. How can you justify a $48.20 labor gap?

How can you justify what *you* make? What makes you think you're worth, say,
$5/hour?

If you read my first article on China, you saw an example of a Hong Kong
moldmaking/molding company that moved to mainland China because their
design- and manufacturing engineers were making too much in Hong Kong. They
were up to almost $5/hour. Selfish *******s, those Hong Kong engineers...

It's all relative, Carl. Which way do you want the US to head? Toward two
rice balls per day, with all of us commuting to work on bicycles?


And when GM starts closing US plants and those poor, underpaid, UAW
workers start sucking at the welfare tit- are you ready for your taxes
to go up again?

Who will be left to pay them? Whose rates are you going to raise?

Yours, Ed. You'll still have a job writing editorials on how US unions
took the high road and didn't back down in front of those godless
commies.

Not likely. US manufacturing magazines depend on a healthy base of US
manufacturing. Without that, I don't have a job, you don't have a job, and
we all wind up shining each other's shoes.

Ed Huntress