Keep Job, Lose Company
link Lefty Crackpot Theory: Chinese Dictators Funneling Cash into Campaigns for Overseas Jobs.
News for idiots like this guy Papantonio who are pushing this crackpot theory. Pay attention to the state of the currency and financial markets. The decline of the U.S. currency in world markets makes the notion that the Chinese need to steal jobs away from Americans moot. Why fiddle with jobs when their economic clout enables them to buy entire companies! If a tool and die manufacturer in Guangzhou province needed demand for their output, why not just raise some money and purchase Ford, Chrysler or even GM at these depressed prices? Voila, instant vertical integration. If he read something besides the Huffington Post, he’d realize that there’s a whole big world out there that is not plotting to get U.S. jobs.
There was a news item today that stated that the Chinese now claim the world’s most powerful supercomputer. Apart from political issues, what’s to stop them from buying Motorola, Advanced Micro Devices or perhaps even Intel to vertically integrate their operations? The low interest stimulative policies being pursued now by the U.S. Fed, amusingly labeled QE 2, are driving down the value of the U.S. dollar which makes all dollar assets cheaper relative to other world currencies. In addition, since few other nations are as indebted as the U.S., they can afford to take on huge debt to finance purchases.
At the moment, there is a literal gold rush occurring for not only that metal but all manner of industrial and commercial resources worldwide, principally by the Chinese to fuel their burgeoning domestic as well as regional economies of Asia. As these commodities get scarce, Western industries will find it harder and harder to compete for these industrial raw materials. Recently, some alarms were sounded over China’s hoarding of rare earth metals used in many of today’s hot consumer items. http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=125172
So the kind of scaremongering by Papantonio is expected for a partisan hack . At the very least he understands that in a global economy, money is very mobile. If people are insisting on buying IPAD’s and IPhones by the boatload, they’ll have to resign themselves to the fact that they cannot be made in the high cost environment of the US and even Canada. If that were not the case, all of Apple’s manufacturing and assembly would be in the U.S. With some of the politicking going on now by many candidates, you’d think that they actually have the ability to bring back lost jobs to their constituents. With some union jobs at GM commanding anywhere from $40 to $75 per hour including all benefits, these wage levels are as appealing to companies as hoop skirts at a bachelor party.
To illustrate the scale of wealth being created in Asian economies, a recent article noted in bloomberg noted that the Las Vegas Sands owned Marina Bay Casino recently openend in Singapore, pictured above, contributed over $260 million dollars to the bottom line of the parent company…in the last quarter! They didn’t steal any U.S. jobs. They made their own. According to Morgan Stanley, the Singaporean market could generate 7 to 10 BILLION dollars in cash flow by 2012. Does this sound like they want or need U.S. jobs? From the Wall Street Journal:
This will happen more and more with the emergence of Asian economies as they begin to vertically integrate basic manufacturing industries. Politicians had better worry more about keeping their domestic houses in order and figure out why the growth is over there, not over here.