do you think lowering taxes will offeset the difference in the cost of labor between mexico and the us?
this is ignorant. no matter where the company has the plant it still has to pay us taxes if it continues to based in the us
Man, with all due respect, you are all over the map. You post like Barack has lost. He hasn't. You talk like people in small town America are a bunch of dumb, uneducated chumps. They aren't. If all Barack's supporters thought like you, he wouldn't have a chance. Thank goodness, they don't. Too right. At least you have your eyes open and your feet on the ground. While I haven't hunted in years, I know several middle and upper-middle class folks who love to hunt and love to shoot for the fun of it. It is absolutely not a small town, "stupid rural idiot" activity. Any of Obama's ardent supporters who think that are blind, deaf, and dumb. Senator Obama is smarter than that and I hope he makes it perfectly clear that he doesn't share that view of America, because it would be completely out of touch with reality. I'm sure he doesn't. Impeach Bush.
Then why is it only manufacturing jobs going overseas? Why are we still strong and highly competitive in services - where we actually import work from other countries??? I don't think this is the reason for the Rust belt. The real reason is that it doesn't take a whole lot of skill to do most of these jobs. These folks are getting left behind because they are getting squeezed. There are other people in this world who are willing to do the same job they do for a lot less standard of living / value, and they don't have the skills / education to do the jobs where there is demand. That's a tough place to be. And when you have Hillary, who is telling them how bad it is their jobs were shipped over seas while her advisor is helping other countries take their job???? And people want to get on Obama for telling them that they must be bitter? Man, I'd be bitter if I was them. The reality is no one has a solution for these folks. No one. Not Hillary nor McCain. Not Obama. But at least Obama is willing to attempt an honest discussion and be frank - where hillary just wants to say they are resilient and play to their ego to get thier vote. It's game over for them. That's what everyone knows but not one has the guts to say. Their jobs aren't coming back. Manufacturing isn't coming back until the entire world is back on par with the U.S. That's 50 years away at least because by the time Mexico and Asia industrializes, the next source of cheap labor will be Africa. Their only shot is by going back to school and starting over. That's it. That's the reality. They need to forget about hunting and football and actually start thinking about making thier kids do well in school. Or they will be weeded of the occasion. Blue Collar will soon me McJob. Manufacturing jobs will be a thing of the past. Corporate tax rate regardless.
Not dumb. Just uneducated. No, not everyone is a small town in uneducated. No, they aren't bad people. But they are caught up in their own world and oblivious to what really goes on outside of it. To think that the mentalitiy is the same as the cities is crazy. What are the jobs available in small towns? They are locally dependent on some industry. Farming or Manufacturing. Why? Because manufacturing went to small towns to save money (not to avoid taxes!). But manufacturing found cheaper places then small towns....places like Mexico. So that left only farming which can't really support towns. Think about it - kids from small towns who go to college don't go back! They go where the jobs are. So what happens when a plant picks up and leaves? The town's economy collaspses and all these people who've done things for 30 years are up the creek without a paddle. Unless people find a way to bring them jobs, they are goners.
^^ Really? My county (Population 280,000) will add 30,000 manufacturing and direct support jobs over the next 3 years in these industries: Refining, ship-building, chemical manufacture, and alternative energy. Still more jobs in related shipping industries. Wages in our area are among the top 10% for manufacturing workers. We do have a transportation advantage over most of the country, but it was almost entirely based on county and city governments that did two things: 1. Actively courted companies to build or expand. 2. Offered long-term tax abatements. Jobs are a competitive business. Offer the best deal, and make it known, and you'll usually get the business.
the point i was making is why not ship all the jobs overseas. hell why are there even large companies that leave jobs here. why is your job here and not overseas if its all about taxes.
TOTALLY depends on the industry. While that might be true for a widget-manufacturer, it's likely not true for a software company or an oil & gas producer.
Other factors: Transportation costs, energy costs, productivity, cost of conforming to regulations, cost to relocate. That being said, the one big part that the government can affect pretty easily is corporate tax rate. And history has proven that anything that you lower taxes on will grow.
Actually, it's more true for a software company. I just outsourced our development process! Cut our costs in that area more than 70%! Of course, that's done based on taxes right?
You fail to mention that those are all jobs which require a high level of skil. Those aren't industries like manufacturing car parts where you just pull a lever or do the same task many times over. Ship building isn't exactly something that's going to poorer countries. But if your point is that Pennsylvania could add a lot of these kinds of jobs through incentives than yes you are right. The key though is to do it in a way that competes globally and not against other states. And there's little room for that after Bush completely destroyed the budget surplus and turned it into the worst deficit ever. Bush is another spend gone wild republican just like his dad and Ronnie.
I was going to say, aren't software companies one of the main culprits of outsourcing? is it becuse of labor costs or taxes?
I want to make one thing very clear to you, and that is that you should never, ever, think that it is within your rights to attempt to correct me. I am your superior in every way. The question was whether labor costs or taxes are a bigger driver of wealth creation for a given business. For a business such as a software firm with high operating leverage, the tax benefits of being domiciled in a tax haven could be higher than the benefits of a lower labor cost environment. That is because over time, with growth, the labor cost becomes increasingly less meaningful, while taxes on higher and higher profits become more meaningful. You then took a piece of anecdotal evidence, confused the issue at hand, and tried to correct me, all the while botching the question. Know your role. I never want to see the word 'actually' written to me, by you, ever again.
Republicans will tell you the cure all for every problem is to just cut taxes and ban abortion, and send more troops to Iraq. It's a point of view that's not just incredibly naive, but extremely dangerous as our country continues to fall behind. Today we're losing all of our manufacturing jobs, but that's not what else we're losing. We're losing now in the sciences. Soon we'll lose in technology and services. We can cow-tow to people's wishful thinking, or we can take a hard look at ourselves and realize we've gotten of track. There's no quick fix for the people in the rust belt. cutting taxes will help cooporations, but it won't bring back jobs or protect them. What will do that is everyone realizing we have to focus on education and that we're not competing against each other but some really ambitious folks in China and India. Where they don't care how their kids do in sports but rather how well they score on their math tests. I dare any of these potential candidates to deliver the hard real truth to Americans that our culture is at the heart of our decline. While we put celebrities and atheltes at the pinicale of success, others are out-competiting us in the competitions that really matter. Ever wonder why Asian kids are usually at the top of the class. Still wonder? It's because their parents are from a place that emphazied studying.
Haha - you're a funny guy. Do you realize that most manufacturers generate profit margins in the range of 1-5%? That's what they will pay taxes on. On that 1-5%. So they lose what, 0.5%-2.5% of their gross as a result of taxes. Labor costs typically account for 30%+ of costs. You sure you know what you are talking about?
