On Wed, 01 Oct 2014 21:21:55 -0400, F*O*A*D wrote:

On 10/1/14 9:06 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Mon, 29 Sep 2014 20:35:54 -0400, F*O*A*D wrote:

On 9/29/14 8:25 PM, amdx wrote:

Let's start with, I don't want all corporation to go offshore.
And, yes if they could cut 15% off their cost of doing business,
prices would generally drift down.

FOAD (Harry Krause) said:

I think those cuts in cost would simply slip over to the profit column,
and prices would remain the same.

===

That demonstrates a simplistic and inaccurate view of how the business
world really works, about what I'd expect from a naive college
freshman raised in an utra liberal family.

In actuality corporations and small business have the option to use
retained earnings (cash flow) in a number of ways depending on their
competitive environment and overall goals. In a tight labor market
businesses will try harder to recruit and retain the talent they need.
Offering better benefits and better overall compensation is one of the
ways they compete for workers. Corporate tradition and
stockholder/board of director goals also play into that equation. In
your particular example, the resulting short term increase in cash
flow would accrue equally to all businesses and some (many) would
choose lower prices to increase market share. Everyone else would be
forced to follow suit or accept a smaller market share.

Unfortunately for workers, today's labor market is not particularly
tight except for certain skills, and the global economic business
market is more competitive than it has ever been. No one can turn
back the clock just because they don't like how things have turned
out. Unskilled labor will never again see the compensation levels
that they came to take for granted in the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s. Those
days are over, time to accept it and move on. Everyone who has skills
which have become oboslete will need to reinvent themselves or be left
behind. That's the way it has always been.



His pontificateness speaketh... yawn.

Thanks for the high school "theory of how business works" lecture,
W'hine. That, couple with your compassion for displaced workers, is a
wonderful capper for the fairly interesting day I've had today over in
Virginia.


===

You're quite welcome for the encapsulated theory lesson. I'd have
given it at a more advanced level if I thought there was any chance
you'd understand it.

As far as compassion goes, it has always played well in "woe is us"
liberal circles. At the end of the day however you've still got a
bunch of workers on your hands who have been displaced by a changing
world. No amount of grieving will bring back the jobs of buggy whip
manufacturers or telephone operators. People have to accept reality,
move on, retrain, re-invent themselves, or pay the consequences.
Change is inevitable and it's no one's fault.