[widebody911]

Originally posted by dd74
The economy, obviously, is global.
Spending billions on dubious wars while the tax base at home is shrinking is a local problem.

As for jobs going to India and wherever: that's what free enterprise does. It goes to where the labor is more free, or closer to free.
Free enterprise is one thing, but the administration is actually aiding and abetting the loss of jobs - http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=10595

There's also a misconception that it's only computer jobs that are going offshore, so people shrug their shoulders and say "eh, so we have some unemployed nerds" They think their own jobs are safe from exportation or the importation of cheap labor. In reality, hundreds of different types of jobs are going over, including accounting, tax preparation, customer support - in short, many of the semi-skilled jobs.

In addition to that, the rampant abuse of the H1 and L1 visas continues; despite huge unemployment numbers in the tech sector, the government is still letting them in. This is something GW could influence, but is being paid-off to look the other way.

Still think you're safe? Think again. There's a trade agreement being worked out with India which would grant 'equivalence' in many new professions, including medical and legal.

The free market is not a perfect system; there have to be some checks and balances regulated into it, or it becomes a race to the bottom in search of the dollar. Without such checks and balances, it would be more profitable for a chemical company to dump their waste in your drinking water (and they used to); the free market purist would say 'well, that's what the market wants, who am I to question it?'

If you think the massive outsourcing is good for the country & economy - 'free market' or not, you're sadly mistaken.

As to real estate, I know price escalation out here has slowed. Prices elsewhere are going up because people are fleeing the more expensive areas. Commerical vacancy out here is at an all-time high.

Car sales have been fueled by insanely low or zerio interest rates, both from the dealers and by refis. How long do you think that can last? Now that interest rates are on the way back up, the refi biz is going to dry up, cutting off the available cash for these purchases.

Without jobs, there will not be a real recovery. Period. The onsely-twosey indicators reported in the financial press are red-herrings to distract people from the big picture.

Putting people out of work to boost the profits and share price of a company and enrich a few select people detracts from the economy as a whole. The problem is, the people doing the cutting have all the control. They get their money, and don't care. They pay the politicians, who in turn not only look the other way ('it's a free market', 'they need to remain competitive') but they also set policy to make it easier to slash the jobs (H1/L1 visa, trade agreements, tax breaks).

When you take a guy making $60k as a programmer and reduce his pay to $20k working at Starbucks, or someone who was making $24k doing customer service, and put them on the dole, you've drastically reduced the amount of income taxes and sales taxes they'll pay (please don't tell me this is a beneficial tax cut!) At the same time, taxes on the very wealthy are decreasing; who is going to pick up the difference?

More info on specific outsourcing initiatives can be seen at http://h1b.info/outsourcing/

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