Image by SS&SS via FlickrNow that Big Biz has helped stall the economy because they’re not adding new workers, and in fact, laying workers off, they’re cutting and running overseas to invest in growth over there.
Warning: Do not ingest any food byproducts before reading this.
Today from the Los Angeles Times:
Newell Rubbermaid Inc., one of the biggest marketers of children’s car seats, for example, is expanding in Brazil instead of the United States. While young Americans are putting off having children, in part because of the poor economy, Brazil’s middle class is growing, and many more young couples are starting families.
So more Brazilians have the money to buy new, upscale car seats while more U.S. parents are making do with cheaper brands or hand-me-downs.
It also helps Brazil that it recently mandated car seats for infants, says David Doolittle, a spokesman for Newell, which sells Graco baby gear, Parker pens and Sharpie markers. While Newell’s employment and operations in the U.S. are stable, he said, “We’re just not doing a lot of new investment. We’re putting it all behind emerging countries.”
Screw the American consumer stuck in a pile of Big Biz droppings. It appears that BB has given up on job creation at home and the middle class and is taking their business overseas to consumers in Asia and Latin America where people can purchase their products because they have their jobs.
Big Biz is killing the American economy and Congress won’t do anything about it because Big Biz is their sugar daddy.
So, in honor of Big Biz and Congress’ desire to blow them instead of represent the people that voted them into office, I give you my adaptation of the 1917 song “Over There.”
Over There
Over there, over there,
They send the jobs, send the jobs over there
Big Biz is coming, Big Biz is coming
The cash flow-flowing everywhere
So prepare, they don’t care,
They send the jobs, send the jobs over there
We’ll be over, they’re going over,
And they won’t come back ’cause their money’s over there
Ummm – Oprah just laid off 20% of her staff.
It is good for American when goods are delivered to us more efficiently and cost effectively. We get more for our money. It leaves extra money freed up to pursue business investment, economic expansion and lifestyle pursuits. If those goods happen to be overseas, then good for us – and for them. International trade in both consumption and production increases wealth in each country that participates. “Buy American” is a dumb economic argument made by the right to gin up mis-placed patriotism and job loss fears. But “Buy American” is also a made-up ghost used by the left to convince their followers that business is “evil” and needs to be “watched/regulated” by bigger and bigger gov’t oversight.
Both arguments are self-serving, dumb, and in the eyes of any economist – just plain wrong.
I’m not against business. I’m against businesses that invest in other countries at the expense of our country and people.
Companies that leave towns in a financial hole after they shut down. Companies that received financial incentives to open a business in a town, promised they would stay for a designated period then left before that time.
Companies with CEOs that receive bloated salaries, disproportionate to their employees’ earnings, drive a company into the ground, get their golden parachutes and then jettison, landing on their feet. Companies that don’t pay their fair share of taxes, which contributes to the deficit (as does the Bush tax cuts).
Instead of cutting a CEO’s salary for running a company into the ground, they lay off thousands of employees.
Companies that move their business from the US to a country like Brazil, which has a thriving economy because companies moved there and provided jobs to Brazilians instead of Americans, a vicious cycle.
The problem is that businesses don’t invest in America, or at least they haven’t until recently. Starbuck’s is bringing a portion of its operations
back to the states. I’ve read that other businesses are, too.
Free enterprise is wonderful when it works and salaries rise with the cost
of living and a company’s profits.
Oprah shouldn’t be held to a higher standard.
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