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posted by martyb on Thursday July 27 2017, @08:26PM   Printer-friendly
from the exported-jobs dept.

The World Socialist Web Site reports

[July 20], 338 workers completed their final shifts at the Carrier gas furnace factory in Indianapolis, Indiana. They were the first wave of 640 workers who will lose their jobs by December 22 at the plant, which President Trump claimed he "saved" through negotiations with Carrier's parent company, United Technologies (UTC).

"People knew Trump was full of crap", 13-year Carrier veteran Taj Longino told the World Socialist Web Site. "But they hung on to the hope because most were too young to retire or too old to get another job. Where are they going to go now? They're stuck in limbo and uncertainty", Longino said.

The fan coil department is being shut down and moved to Mexico, the worker said. "Counting the maintenance department, press operators, forklift drivers, and production line workers, maybe there will be 600 workers left, out of way more than 1,000. The other Carrier plant in northern Indiana is gone."

[...] The fate of the Carrier workers was exploited by both Trump and then-Democratic primary candidate Bernie Sanders after UTC announced plans to shut the plant and move production to Monterrey, Mexico where workers are paid $3.90 an hour. Both sought to divert anger away from the corporations and their relentless drive for profit by blaming "unfair trade" and Mexican workers for the loss of jobs.

Just ahead of his inauguration, Trump triumphantly announced that a deal had been reached with UTC that would keep the Carrier plant in Indianapolis running and save 1,100 jobs. He and Vice President Pence--the former governor of Indiana--celebrated the deal with United Steelworkers representatives at the plant on December 1. The agreement promised UTC incentives from both the federal and state governments of up to $7 million in exchange for UTC's promise to employ at least 1,069 people at the Indianapolis plant for 10 years. Additionally, the company promised to invest $16 million in the facility.

The deal did not represent a victory, Pyrrhic or otherwise, for Carrier workers, though. Only 730 of the 1,069 jobs that UTC vowed to maintain are in manufacture. The remainder are engineering and technical positions, which had never been slated for outsourcing in the first place. Moreover, the $16 million in plant expenditures would not go towards increasing the workforce of the Indianapolis plant. Greg Hayes, UTC's CEO, stated publicly in December that the money had been earmarked for increasing automation at the plant, flatly stating that this would result in fewer workers over time.

According to an AP story in US News & World Report:

Carrier announced last year that it would close the Indianapolis plant and cut about 1,400 production jobs in a move expected to save $65 million annually.

Trump repeatedly criticized Carrier's Mexico outsourcing plan. Weeks after Trump won the election, Carrier announced an agreement to spare about 800 jobs in Indianapolis.

About 600 jobs are still being eliminated.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @08:34PM (39 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @08:34PM (#545411)

    Carrier has plans. Politicians ask them to change their plans in return for incentives. Carrier modifies plans, and then follows through on their modified plans.

    Wait, stop the presses! A business plan actually followed through? That's news!

    ... no, no, sorry, false alarm, still not news.

    It is however a prime opportunity for gewg_ to stroke his pole in public. Yup, grease it up and give it a big ol' rubdown.

    Keep on stroking.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @08:41PM (25 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @08:41PM (#545415)

    Guess you haven't gotten tired of winning yet. US workers don't need jobs, they can just pull themselves by their bootstraps right?

    • (Score: 2) by Sulla on Thursday July 27 2017, @08:46PM (23 children)

      by Sulla (5173) on Thursday July 27 2017, @08:46PM (#545419) Journal

      Taxing corporations more isn't going to fix the problem, taxing workers more isn't going to fix the problem, so what do you do?

      You could go full isolationist and do tariffs everywhere, thats pretty much it. I suppose deregulation might temporarily relieve some of the stress, but between the minimum wage/ss/healthcare/environment it is not possible to compete. It is not possible for workers from a high standard of living country to compete with workers from low standard of living countries.

      So you either do isolationist and try to protect yourself, or go full global and get rid of all of our progress and allow our standard of living to fall back to the late 1800s / early 1900s.

      --
      Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
      • (Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @09:43PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @09:43PM (#545460)

        Ah, it's a with us / against us thing. Nice and simple, I like that.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @03:04AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @03:04AM (#545582)

        You could let your dollar fall, make yourselves more competitive. You wouldn't be able to import all that Chinese junk, you'd have to make it at home. But thats what you want anyway, so win win. Oh except for all the rich people who like money and don't give a shit about anyone but themselves.

      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by khallow on Friday July 28 2017, @05:31AM (17 children)

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday July 28 2017, @05:31AM (#545616) Journal

        So you either do isolationist and try to protect yourself, or go full global and get rid of all of our progress and allow our standard of living to fall back to the late 1800s / early 1900s.

        The entire developed world got where it is through global trade. Isolationism can work for relatively short periods (a generation or two) of time if workers make a lot of sacrifices to build up competitive businesses and infrastructure. But we don't have historical examples of isolationism to protect workers that actually worked and did that.

        And even if we did suffer a current reversal of regulation and wages, why would that mean "getting rid of all our progress"? For example, China has a rapidly growing economy and a standard of living well above early 1900s standards. A lot of people complain that globalism is a "race to the bottom". But the bottom is not that bad. There isn't an infinite pool of cheap labor and zero regulations to drag down the US and the rest of the developed world forever.

        My view is that the countries with the better environments for business creation and employers in general and solid rule of law are going to rise to the top just as they have for the past few centuries.

        • (Score: 1, Troll) by sjames on Friday July 28 2017, @10:59AM (16 children)

          by sjames (2882) on Friday July 28 2017, @10:59AM (#545711) Journal

          Global free trade hasn't even existed for more than that generation or two you speak of. More likely, it is the blip on the radar that can provide a momentary boost followed by decades of suffering.

          There is a pool of cheap labor big enough to drag the developed world down for longer than anyone currently living will be around. There is no good reason not to temper things by "impedance matching" different economies through tariffs. In other words, as is typical, the extremes have a poor outcome but there exists a middle way that works.

          Not sure why you get off so hard on falling standards of living and the U.S. turning into a 3rd world country, but there's simply no need for that to happen if we act rationally and put a few brakes on globalism until things equalize a bit.

          As for your Claims about the standard of living in China, sure they're so happy they have to put up anti-suicide nets for people who simply cannot stand another moment of ecstasy.

          • (Score: 1) by khallow on Friday July 28 2017, @03:42PM (12 children)

            by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday July 28 2017, @03:42PM (#545809) Journal

            Global free trade hasn't even existed for more than that generation or two you speak of.

            Global trade is a bit older [wikipedia.org] than that. The Spice Road predates civilization itself. And the US was engaged in global trade before it became the US.

            There is a pool of cheap labor big enough to drag the developed world down for longer than anyone currently living will be around.

            By 2050, you will be shown wrong.

            There is no good reason not to temper things by "impedance matching" different economies through tariffs.

            I agree. I just think zero impedance is about the right spot.

            Not sure why you get off so hard on falling standards of living and the U.S. turning into a 3rd world country, but there's simply no need for that to happen if we act rationally and put a few brakes on globalism until things equalize a bit.

            Just because the US has failed to adapt to globalism in the last decade and a half doesn't mean globalism is to blame. A whole bunch of other countries are doing amazingly well by globalism. Maybe it's time to look at what is working rather than what isn't.

            • (Score: 2) by sjames on Friday July 28 2017, @10:13PM (11 children)

              by sjames (2882) on Friday July 28 2017, @10:13PM (#546002) Journal

              Sure, international trade has gone on for some time, and usually had the built-in brake that the journey was long and generally not without danger. But that wasn't global trade and it wasn't free trade (often tariffs were involved as well). That's why it worked so well.

              There's still plenty of rural Chinese and when they run out, most of Africa is there to provide cheap labor.

              The countries doing well with globalism apply tariffs and other methods to impedance match.

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:03AM (3 children)

                by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:03AM (#546079)

                China has plenty of rural Chinese, yet the wages in the cities keep on rising. Why aren't they dragging down the cities into third world status?

                • (Score: 1, Troll) by sjames on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:19AM (2 children)

                  by sjames (2882) on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:19AM (#546082) Journal

                  The cities aren't out of third world status yet. Don't worry, they'll rope in some more rural people as soon as that becomes the cheaper option.

                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @09:57AM (1 child)

                    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @09:57AM (#546199)

                    Wow, you really don't know anything about China do you. Google is your friend. You think it's a new idea to rope in more rural people? They have been doing it for decades. Guess what, the wages are still going up and the cities are getting better at the same time.

                    • (Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday July 29 2017, @05:30PM

                      by sjames (2882) on Saturday July 29 2017, @05:30PM (#546341) Journal

                      Apparently you don't understand economic decisions. It costs X to bring people in from rural areas and accommodate and acclimate them. It costs Y to pay higher wages instead. Whenever X < Y, they bring in rural people. X is rising because pollution makes it harder to talk people into living with it and because the easiest to recruit rural people are already recruited, so that means they let Y increase until the balance is reached. Yes, I simplified a bit. That's because it's just a posting to a forum, not a dissertation or a book.

              • (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:20AM (6 children)

                by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:20AM (#546084) Journal

                Sure, international trade has gone on for some time, and usually had the built-in brake that the journey was long and generally not without danger. But that wasn't global trade and it wasn't free trade (often tariffs were involved as well). That's why it worked so well. Worked so well? It worked best when it was the freest. For example, there's been only a few times that the Spice Road functioned well. Those times were also when it was the freest trade. For example, around 0AD when four empires controlled the route from China to the Roman Empire, the time under the Mongolians (who controlled the route from China right up to Palestine around 1250), and modern times when products can fairly efficiently be whisked by rail from China to European markets.

                There's still plenty of rural Chinese and when they run out, most of Africa is there to provide cheap labor.

                2050. There aren't that many Africans even by 2050.

                The countries doing well with globalism apply tariffs and other methods to impedance match.

                What countries would those be?

                • (Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday July 29 2017, @02:59AM (5 children)

                  by sjames (2882) on Saturday July 29 2017, @02:59AM (#546126) Journal

                  Germany is an example. They do a a lot of trade with China, but they do it sensibly [globaltrade.net].

                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @10:28AM

                    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @10:28AM (#546206)

                    So having a trade surplus is bad when China does it, but good if Germany does it.

                    Are you sure you're not just a teensy tiny bit biased...

                  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday July 30 2017, @01:09PM (3 children)

                    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Sunday July 30 2017, @01:09PM (#546666) Journal

                    Germany is an example. They do a a lot of trade with China, but they do it sensibly

                    To the contrary, Germany would still be a bombed out wreck split between two superpowers, if it weren't for global relatively free trade. Germany got the way it is because West Germany had the US and Europe as its trading partners with very free trade - while East Germany and the USSR went the other way. It's quite clear which approach won.

                    • (Score: 2) by sjames on Sunday July 30 2017, @04:33PM (2 children)

                      by sjames (2882) on Sunday July 30 2017, @04:33PM (#546723) Journal

                      Sorry no. The USSR and East Germany went the no trade route. I have never advocated that. In fact I was quite clear that neither extreme was likely to produce a good result.

                      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:53PM (1 child)

                        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:53PM (#546893) Journal

                        In fact I was quite clear that neither extreme was likely to produce a good result.

                        My point is that West Germany went the extreme free trade route.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @05:18PM (2 children)

            by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @05:18PM (#545871)

            You can try putting the brakes on in America, but the rest of the world will carry on without you. You will just be putting yourselves further behind and helping China to overtake you faster.

            You must know by now that the suicide rates werent much higher than other similar sized populations in other first world countries, people in the cities are much less suicidal than the poor farmers. So you are talking nonsense. China's standard of living has been rising sharply an continuously for 30 years. How about the US?

            Don't like your chances of America acting rationally.

            • (Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:39AM (1 child)

              by sjames (2882) on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:39AM (#546093) Journal

              Further behind in what? The race to the bottom? Pollution so thick that smoking might purify the air?

              But yes, China's standard of living is increasing. That's to be expected since they're on the developing side. I don't have a problem with that, as long as we don't regress the U.S. in the process (as we have been). Slowing it down a bit would still allow China to make progress while not harming the U.S.

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @10:49AM

                by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @10:49AM (#546208)

                Further behind in leading the world and having the biggest economy, setting the global agenda/rules.

                China is already slowing down, maybe you missed the news about the slowest growth there in decades and fears of hard landings a few years back. Didn't happen but they are growing slower and moving up the value chain relying less and less on exports and more on domestic services. The air has been getting measurably cleaner as well, still bad but improving.

                The fundamental problem America has, is that it's prosperity for most people, relies on being able to buy cheap things from overseas. It relies on the fact you are exploiting foreigners. There is no way for you to have cheap stuff without other places making cheap stuff, it's just not possible. Your only choice is to ride the wave of global growth, try to stay on top innovate and invest for the future. Because once they catch up to your standards / wages / conditions etc, they will beat you with numbers, practical experience, infrastructure.

                Trying to stop the US from regressing by bringing back shitty jobs and making everything more expensive seems like cutting off ones nose to spite ones face.

      • (Score: 2) by srobert on Friday July 28 2017, @03:55PM (2 children)

        by srobert (4803) on Friday July 28 2017, @03:55PM (#545819)

        Or you push to have trade agreements contingent on improving living conditions in the countries with low living standards. Dynamic tarrifs that are triggered by abusive labor conditions and non-compliance with environmental requirements is a way to assure that the benefits of trade accrue to the masses.

        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:42AM

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday July 29 2017, @01:42AM (#546095) Journal

          Or you push to have trade agreements contingent on improving living conditions in the countries with low living standards.

          There's two things to note here. First, low living standards means that these countries can't meet developed world standards now no matter what trade threats you make. Second, living conditions are improving world-wide.

          Sorry, but I think the problem here is historical and economic ignorance. Every developed world country has gone through the troublesome phases that we currently see the developing world go through. They've gone through a sweat shop phase. They've gone through a heavy pollution phase. They've gone through mercantilism phases. They've gone through corruption and authoritarianism phases. And the developed world has resulted. I think rather than threaten poor countries for doing all the things you claim you want them to do, like improve the lot of their citizens, perhaps you should look at where the problems lie in the developed world?

          Everyone has their protected, decadent industries, construction, agriculture, and military-industrial complex in particular. Perhaps these industries would do a lot better with less protection? Everyone panders to their citizens with universally horrible results. Perhaps citizens need less coddling and more empowerment instead? And of course, the scapegoating is getting ridiculous with now even the poor people of the world getting blamed for developed world flaws and misdeeds. Perhaps, we should learn from experience instead?

          Finally, there's a huge train wreck of bad economic ideas out there. Economic activity is valued more than value (the broken window fallacy). The welfare state results in zero sum thinking (you can only get entitlements by taking from someone else). There is a profound lack of accountability (particularly, of accounting itself where all the bits and pieces of a $400 billion plane design must be accounted for with forms, but no one, controlling the money checks to see if the $400 billion expenditure actually does the job it is tasked with).

          My view is that globalism is one of the greatest positive aspects of our civilization today. We are doing so much for billions of people. But a consequence is that you can't screw around. You're not going to get massively overpaid for work anymore. I think it would be far better to adapt to these temporary problems rather than impoverish developed world countries merely because you think you have a right to various entitlements.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @10:55AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @10:55AM (#546209)

          So slap a tariff on the US because they are leaving the Paris accord. Sounds fair.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by captain normal on Friday July 28 2017, @02:06AM

      by captain normal (2205) on Friday July 28 2017, @02:06AM (#545569)

      Are you sure you didn't mean whining yet?
      http://www.politicalcartoons.com/cartoon/422a210e-0896-4639-a880-69567ecb7d3e.html [politicalcartoons.com]

      --
      When life isn't going right, go left.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @08:50PM (11 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @08:50PM (#545423)

    A man walks into a crowded bank.

    A second man walks into a crowded bank, pulls out a gun as part of a robbery, and during his shots, happens to hit the first man in the shoulder. The first man was the only person injured during the robbery.

    Was the first man fortunate or unfortunate?
    - The pessimist says he was unfortunate; after all, there were so many other people who could have been hit. Why was *he* the unlucky one?
    - The optimist says he was fortunate; after all, it was only a shoulder wound and could easily have been a head or chest/heart wound.

    Okay, here's another scenario...
    (Read the summary)

    Is this a good thing or a bad thing? The company was going to lay off a bunch of people but only laid off some people.

    If my job was saved, I'd say it's a good thing. If my job was outsourced, I'd say it's a bad thing.

    But either way, we all know this is Trump's fault, of course. Hurry up and post the next Trump's-fault story, please.

    • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @09:09PM (7 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @09:09PM (#545435)

      You apologists can't seem to get reality straight, but hey you don't mind Trump apparently so you're already on shaky ground sanity-wise.

      This isn't Trump's fault, but failing on his MAGA promises is 100% on him.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @10:00PM (6 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @10:00PM (#545473)

        Assuming someone who doesn't hate $current_president is an apologist for $current_president is quite a leap. Implicitly calling said person insane is quite another leap yet.

        Also, you missed the original point, so I'll assume I didn't lay it out logically enough (the bank robbery scenario was probably a little too abstract; sorry for that). Here's a simpler layout:

        - The company was going to lay off 1400 American workers.
        - Trump won, largely by promising that Americans would get to keep their jobs.
        - After Trump won, the company decided to only outsource 600 American workers.
        - In the end, 800 jobs that would have been outsourced will instead be kept in the US.
        - (...And you suggest that this is somehow a failure of Trump's campaign promise...?)

        The pessimist thinks this is terrible, because there are still 600 jobs being outsourced. The optimist thinks this is great, because there are 800 jobs that were going to be outsourced, but thanks to various political (and possibly financial) motivators, those jobs will stay in the US.

        Either way, the outcome is better for the US than it otherwise would have been if Trump had not been elected. And yet people STILL twist this to say that it's a bad thing and that Trump is somehow the root cause.

        • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @10:22PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @10:22PM (#545488)

          Heh, assuming I missed your point because you couldn't see mine.

          But either way, we all know this is Trump's fault, of course. Hurry up and post the next Trump's-fault story, please.

          No one in their right mind would say such things, so by extension you are out of your mind or commonly known as "insane".

        • (Score: 4, Interesting) by PartTimeZombie on Friday July 28 2017, @12:50AM (1 child)

          by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Friday July 28 2017, @12:50AM (#545547)

          Or, without directly blaming the President, you could wonder why taxpayers are giving Carrier $7 million at all.

          From what I can see they made something like $2.9 billion profit in 2015.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @03:17PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @03:17PM (#545792)

            Assuming for a second that this is true, 7 million dollars for 800 jobs = approximately $10k per job. Spending $10k per job (which pays... say... $45k a year) isn't a terrible deal. Not a great deal, but not terrible.

            Even if it is a decent deal, though, it has other problems... "socialist," silly, planned economy, government picking winners and losers, etc...

        • (Score: 2) by EETech1 on Friday July 28 2017, @01:31AM (1 child)

          by EETech1 (957) on Friday July 28 2017, @01:31AM (#545558)

          Too bad those 800 jobs took 7 million dollars in incentives to keep here!

          • (Score: 1) by khallow on Friday July 28 2017, @05:21PM

            by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday July 28 2017, @05:21PM (#545872) Journal
            I guess it depends on your standards. It'd be better than some of the recession era efforts which often bragged about several hundred thousand spent per job "created or saved" (and often for jobs that lasted a year or two).
        • (Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @01:50AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @01:50AM (#545565)

          Translation: “If you like your job, you can keep your job.”

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @09:46PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 27 2017, @09:46PM (#545463)

      Trump claims credit for a win but at best it was a 2-sides of the coin, shades of gray, pluses and minuses outcome.

    • (Score: 2) by mhajicek on Thursday July 27 2017, @11:16PM

      by mhajicek (51) on Thursday July 27 2017, @11:16PM (#545513)

      What really matters is if he can sue the bank for insufficient security and go home rich.

      --
      The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
    • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday July 28 2017, @06:46PM

      by tangomargarine (667) on Friday July 28 2017, @06:46PM (#545909)

      A man walks into a crowded bank.
      A second man walks into a crowded bank, pulls out a gun as part of a robbery, and during his shots, happens to hit the first man in the shoulder. The first man was the only person injured during the robbery.
      Was the first man fortunate or unfortunate?
      - The pessimist says he was unfortunate; after all, there were so many other people who could have been hit. Why was *he* the unlucky one?
      - The optimist says he was fortunate; after all, it was only a shoulder wound and could easily have been a head or chest/heart wound.

      The real joke is when he sees the number on the hospital bill. #hahaonlyserious

      --
      "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @01:26PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @01:26PM (#545747)

    "The World Socialist Web Site"?

    Clearly, this will be a balanced and even-handed piece full of rich expository to aid public discourse.