Isn't taking American jobs overseas unpatriotic?

Big American corporations are taking manufacturing and other jobs overseas, robbing Americans of jobs.

Why isn't this considered the ultimate in unpatriotic actions?

In the big hoopla made recently regarding patriotism and the US flag being plastered everywhere, I started wondering about this...

Any thoughts about this? This really bothers me, especially after reading Howard Zinn.

I mentioned this to a RWer and he thought I was saying that I wanted America to be superior I said well shouldnt American corporations employ Americans. I try to tone myself down and it dont work. I think he thinks if some sleazy CEO can get richer because he goes overseas more power to him. Welcome to DU too and this is very wrong imo and is why I support Kucinich among other things.

This wholesale export of jobs to the lowest bidder will eventually turn America into nothing but a corporate tax shelter, where only the super-rich and the slave class servants live.

We are already moving toward that at a breakneck speed. Bush is cutting all the ropes off the ladders, education, health care, etc. They dont need a educated populace anymore, they just need slaves to carry heavy things and shine shoes.

Everything else can be outsourced.

Companies worry about the bottom line, not jobs for their countrymen. And thats fully justified. Why should private firm not use their capital in a profit-maximising manner?

Imposing "patriotic" obligations on capitalism is essentially no different from socialism. Not that Im agaisnt socialism, but in essence its the same principle: imposing upon capital social restictions and obligations.

And remember, whats sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. If its unpatriotic for American firms to ship jobs abroad, its likewise unpatriotic for foreign firms to create jobs in the US. Then youre on the road to protectionism and "begger thy neighbour" economic policies. The Japanese have been funding the US trade and federal deficits for years, they could crash the US economy if they suddenly decided to get all patriotic and move their money back to Japan.

I dont say that MNCs can do no wrong or are blameless, its just that why blame them for playing their annointed role in the capitalist system? Id rather focus not on the fact that some poor Indian or Chinese guy is getting a break because an American firm is giving him a job, Id focus on the US government giving the guy who lost his job in the US better welfare, health insurace and education for his kids by taxing the company that shipped his job away and having policies which encourage growth rather than enrich the already rich.

perhaps the answer is taxing the corporations more when they do take those jobs overseas. And making sure the $ goes to good causes and not just the military.

making sure they pay their workers fairly. thats why they do it and for lower taxes. Min wage is a lot lower in some countries especially ones that corporations work in. So basically they are getting 3 foriegn workers do the work for the price of 1 and thats one of the reasons I oppose corporations doing this.

I got a little side-tracked by RealityBoy's lesson in economics... thanks for waking me up!

If you look at American history, our struggle for the basics in labor: minimum wage, 8-hour work day, disability pay, etc., took us 100+ years of strikes, bloodshed etc. to achieve. People were miserable before these things became law!

As far as I know, there are no laws to protect foreign workers. Can we really allow American corporations to force this misery on them?

Yes my ancestors were those workers who had to suffer it was only at the middle of their working years when they were 45 that some change happened. This is why I support Kucinich he's big on workers rights.

Times move on and you can not stop it, and we never have been able to stop new things even if they are not better. Some how the many will over do the few. The slave workers will fight back but who knows how long it will take. We in this country must see the writing is on the wall for cheap labor any place they can find it. If they take down the middle class it will then take down the very rich. Ford was not rich, he found a way to produce an item all could buy and he made his wages do that. You see the middle class not producing children world wide and the poor do and will replace jobs and work for pennies.We are already working longer and two working at that for how my father lived working alone in the 30's and 40's and 50's.It gets to be this. Men do not become x-ray tec because it became a women job and they did not have to pay her much.Men do not become doctors because we can get cheap one in from India who will work for a third of the money ours do.It is new times and no one will stop it any more than the Indians stopped the white men and the RR moving to the great plains.

It's truly Unpatriotic!

please notice that we on the bottom rungs are not allowed to take advantage of the capitalist tactics you mention -- for example, we are not allowed to take a higher-paying job in Canada without the rigamarole of immigration, moving there physically, etc. Also, the drug companies are trying to shut down the prescription drug pipeline to Mexico and Canada, so we cannot take advantage of lower costs. Since taking advantage of lower costs is the reason for companies sending jobs overseas, I fail to see why it is such an outrage for me to mail a Mexican drugstore my prescription. Ah!! But capitalism in the US is reserved solely for corporations -- not the common folk. And therein lies the problem.

The more powerful can keep the less powerful from using the advantages that the more powerful use with abandon,all the while pretending that the less powerful have the same capitalist privileges. You can fool people in this manner for a while, at least until all their jobs are shipped overseas and drug prices become unaffordable. Then you will have riots. We are rapidly headed that way.

Not to recognize these grave problems with capitalism is a crime, IMHO.

They want to be able to use foreign workers cheaply, and deny Americans cheap foreign prescription drugs. Hypocrites.

I think it is unpatriotic to do this. I see patriotism as something that helps America. Does it help America to outsource jobs at the cheapest possible rate so that corporate profits are boosted? No. The same way it doesn't help America when American corporations set up shell operations offshore to avoid taxes.

It's also a short term way of thinking. Yes, you will save money by moving your tech support to India. But then the people who had decent living wage jobs as tech support will not be able to afford to buy your computers. Multiply this accross the country and it looks pretty bad.

Sacrificing the well being of America for short term corporate profits is unpatriotic. It is also stupid.

...say that the tax cut helped jumpstart the economy in the 80s, but that it wouldn't help this time around because so many of the manufacturing jobs that existed then were gone. Unemployed people will not buy anything extra even if given an extra $300.

:toast:

...but that doesn't mean it's bad. They don't rob Americans of jobs any more than corporations that don't outsource rob Indians and Chinamen of jobs.

A Repub never is wrong to hear them tell it! If they do have shortcommings it's a Democrat's fault somewhere along the line! IMO being a repub is unpatriotic and idiotic! I HATE em'!

Businesses should be allowed to take their jobs overseas. However, a law must be in place to guarantee fair wages to those people-perhaps an international law. The world's economy needs to be revitilized, and part of that is putting money into poor areas.
YAY! MY 900TH POST!

Kill them with their own "patriotism sword"

I wrote Howard Dean about mentioning this and suggested he start using this ammo on them.

It's disgusting that they should get away with this.

It is very unpatriotic, and joblessness and people forced to take lower paying jobs (assuming they exist) will not help the economy at all.

Republicans love outsourcing. That rather proves how patriotic they're not.

It's just not unpatriotic. It's anti-American.

I've known this for some time though.

Republicans love outsourcing. That rather proves how patriotic they're not.

It's just not unpatriotic. It's anti-American.


And craporations who outsource so they can pay workers slave wages in third-world countries are nothing less than traitors!

No company with a mailbox "corporate headquarters" on a tropical island with lax banking laws would be allowed to bid on government contracts, period. If no tax-paying U.S. company made a product that the government needed, I'd go with real foreign companies.

Furthermore, no company with more than 50% of its workforce located overseas would be allowed to bid. Keeping existing jobs in the U.S. would be a requirement of the contract. Shipping jobs overseas during the contract period would void the contract.

On the carrot side of the equation, government contractors that had 100% U.S. workforces would get to put a nifty little flag symbol next to their corporate logo with a saying such as "Made by the people of America for the people of America" or something similar. With all the flag-waving fervor, it would be a great advertising point.