Duffbert's Random Musings

1 - Although I agree with the idea, getting corporate America to go for it is highly unlikely. No corporate head will attempt this at the risk of losing his/her own job.

I think for this to work investors have to buy into the idea. I doubt many will.

In the same light, aren't many Americans contributing to their own downfall by habits such as shopping at the Walmarts of the world, which only feed the need for cheap labor. So while many cry about losing manufacturing jobs to overseas labor, isn't shopping at companies that feed the overseas labor market a cat chasing it's tail?

I have actually been playing with the idea of using government to force the changes. Two ideas come to mind. Make it more expensive to use overseas labor (although I am not sure how that can be worked out technically). The second idea is to make major layoffs more expensive for a company than it would be to keep workers hired. Remove the incentive for massive layoffs to (as you say) "maintain some level of growth."

2 - @1 - The Economist: "If there is one proposition with which virtually all economists agree, it is that free trade is almost always better than protection."

{ Link }

But.... y'know... I'm sure labor protectionist policies can come to the rescue in spite of 300 years of economic analysis. Surely the way out of financial crisis is to make it more expensive for the average American to buy clothes, food and consumer goods.

3 - Growth is a tricky topic. In biology we call organism with indefinite growth cancer . However in economy there are a number of forces at work (the technology community being one) that increase productivity on a constant basis. Without growth the need for labor is shrinking. This is one of the reasons why companies lay of workers: the growth slows below productivity gains.
It is as much an corporate as a macro-economic issue: how to distribute less and less labor in the workforce with more of that less labor being highly qualified and not McJobs anybody could do. While a country with a humming economy could *afford* simple transfer payments, the exclusion of a large part of the population from the work culture is like frozen dynamite: you don't now when it is going to explode. Too much time, no responsibilities and (potentially) lack of education is a poisonous mix.
stw

4 - There is a difference between free trade and unfair trade/exploitation - I am sure the economist would agree with that statement

That being said...

The quandary would be employed people paying more for clothes, food and consumer goods but still being able to buy them OR unemployed people who can't afford clothes, food and consumer goods and can't afford to buy them

5 - Go to news.google.com and type in Starbucks and Jet.

Here's one: { Link }

6 - I have always wondered why it is accepted conventional wisdom that any company that isn't growing is in trouble. If said company is making a profit, then to me they are doing just fine. I really don't get it. Why is a $50 million company that makes 5% profit every year and maintains exactly that position a bad thing? Presumably there's some underlying reason why it's impossible to maintain that position indefinitely? I've never seen an explanation of it, though, it's always accepted as a given.

I used to work for a company that would set profit targets and base the company bonuses off of them (many companies do this), and whenever those targets were in danger they would do layoffs [aside: I was one of those receiving the bonus, so I didn't have a resentment issue]. The argument was that the company couldn't afford to be perceived as being in trouble, which may be perfectly accurate. But it says something odd about the way companies are valued in the market if a company's failure to meet its own goals but still remaining (in this case VERY) profitable is a reason to lower the company's value.

I wouldn't suggest government regulation as a solution to the situation, by the way. I'm just interested in the question. And the way Tom linked it to morality in an economic crisis is very relevant to me. I wonder if there are companies that are being more moral than others in this scenario, because as a moral consumer I'd like to reward that behavior.