Globalism

(Via Slashdot) Paul Craig has an article up portraying globalization and outsourcing as being a form of class war in the U.S. From the article:

During the past five years (January 01 - January 06), the information sector of the U.S. economy lost 644,000 jobs, or 17.4 per cent of its work force. Computer systems design and related work lost 105,000 jobs, or 8.5 per cent of its work force. Clearly, jobs offshoring is not creating jobs in computers and information technology. Indeed, jobs offshoring is not even creating jobs in related fields.

While I am concerned about outsourcing, I can’t help but wonder if there’s a bit of abuse of statistics going on here.

You may recall that we started out the decade with a nasty downturn in the economy, including the bursting of the dot-com bubble.

How much of the job decline described was a result of the economic downturn, rather than other influences including outsourcing, I wonder.

As seen at Forbes:

Norwich Union, the domestic arm of UK insurer Aviva PLC, said it plans to axe 4,000 jobs, some 11 pct of its workforce, in an effort to cut costs by 250 mln stg a year.[...]

Aviva said about 1,000 of the jobs will be offshored to India, while a further 500 information technology (IT) roles will be outsourced to external contractors.

As seen in an AP story:

Danish toy maker Lego Group said Tuesday it will end its
production in Enfield, Conn., and lay off 300 people there in early 2007,
while some 900 employees in Denmark will also be sacked over the next three
years.

The production in Enfield is to be moved to Mexico, the group said in a
statement. Along with the 300 production layoffs, the distribution facility
in Enfield will also be affected, Lego said, without providing
details.

Aw, man. I feel sorry for the workers. Also, our proximity to the Lego
plant was just one of the quirky attractions for living on this side of
Hartford. At least we still have the airport in our back yard…..

This wire story caught my eye today:

School board members in a Minnesota district call it anti-American and anti-Christian. In New Jersey, members of one school board argue it’s a waste of money. Now, a suburban Pittsburgh school district is abolishing it over questions of politics and cost.

Supporters of the increasingly popular college preparatory curriculum known as International Baccalaureate are firing back with some of the same arguments — saying efforts to quash IB are about the beliefs and politics of the program’s opponents.[...]

High school students pursuing an IB diploma study subjects from six groups: language, individuals and societies, math and computer science, the arts, experimental sciences and a second language. The core of the curriculum is a 4,000 word-essay, a theory of knowledge class and a community service requirement.[...]

Critics, however, have argued that IB’s multicultural themes promote values that conflict with traditional Judeo-Christian values. Some opponents have called it Marxist because the International Baccalaureate Organization is a signatory to the Earth Charter, a collection of global principles created in France in 2000.

This is one of those stories that makes a person say, “what the heck?!”

I had a passing acquaintance with the IB program when I was in high school. My high school, Memphis White Station, didn’t offer it, and instead went gung-ho with AP offerings.

I was somewhat jealous of the IB program because it seemed to be viewed more highly among colleges (particularly international universities that expect more of students than what most American high schools provide), and because I found the coordinated curriculum of the program appealing. (In the 11th grade, I had a great deal of synchronicity among my AP U.S. History, Honors English, and AP Music Theory classes that made it a very good year for me.)

I didn’t recall ever hearing anything about IB being un-American.

The wire story makes reference to the Earth Charter. I hadn’t previously heard of it before, but a query to Google solved that problem. A copy can be found here.

There are clauses in there that arguably go against current policies of the current administration — it’s very pro-UN, pro-environment, and it can be interpreted as anti-corporate. However, that doesn’t necessarily make it anti-American. While I’d like the document more if it mentioned using entrepreneurship and lightly-regulated-but-otherwise-free market to facilitate its other goals…. that doesn’t make it un-American.

Have things deteriorated to the point where I’m a traitor if I think the UN is a potentially good idea, if only it could operate more efficiently? Am I unpatriotic because I’d like to see industry operate in a sustainable manner?

And un-Christian?! The Charter reads of peace, tolerance, charity, and responsible use of the bounty of creation. I fear that alleged christians who find such values to be un-Christian ought to re-examine the teachings of He whom they claim to follow.

I chimed in earlier with my €0.02 on the ports issue. Americablog points out that the New York Times has run a column on what should be the common thread between both sides of the issue — a lack of existing port security.

Only 4 percent or 5 percent of those containers are inspected. There is virtually no standard for how containers are sealed, or for certifying the identities of thousands of drivers who enter and leave the ports to pick them up. If a nuclear weapon is put inside a container ” the real fear here ” “it will probably happen when some truck driver is paid off to take a long lunch, before he even gets near a terminal,” said Mr. Flynn, the ports security expert.[...]

“I’m not worried about who is running the New York port,” a senior inspector for the International Atomic Energy Agency said, insisting he could not be named because the agency’s work is considered confidential. “I’m worried about what arrives at the New York port.”

That port, along with the five others Dubai Ports hopes to manage, are the last line of defense to stop a weapon from entering this country. But Mr. Seymour, head of the subsidiary now running the operations, says only one of the six ports whose fate is being debated so fiercely is equipped with a working radiation-detection system that every cargo container must pass through.

I wish that this aspect of the story would get a bit more play in the mainstream media. When you get down to it, that is the core problem. If we had decent security in place, ownership of the port operations would be a mostly moot point.

Yes, such security measures would be expensive. However, experience in Hong Kong suggests that it is doable. And if money is the issue — consider whether it would be cheaper to tighten security, or to clean up the mess if a nuke were detonated in the Port of Baltimore. (Imagine the loss of culture is Dundalk went up in a puff of radioactive smoke!)

However, this is an election year, so naturally the media and the politicians will hook on to the easiest-to-grasp aspect of this whole affair, magnifiy it, and run with it until the public becomes exhausted with the matter.

Normally I have to all-but-ignore the op-ed pieces in the Wall Street
Journal, because of their fascist…er, I mean rabid neoconservative
bent.

Today, there’s one that I can actually somewhat agree with. The opinion
folks over at the Journal are fussing at international pressure to
move the alleged governance of the internet into the hands of the U.N.,
reducing the influence Washington has over the net.

Considering the gripes many of us have with the current herd of
pachyderms in power, that on the surface seems like a potentially wise move.
However, the Journal picks up on a potential (probable?) flaw with
such a move:

Maintaining the root zone file involves assigning — or, more
commonly, accrediting other companies to assign — domain names[....] Icann
also manages the top-level domains such as .com and .org. This includes the
248 country-specific ones — from .ca to Canada to .aq for Antarctica, and
everything in between. Local authorities set policy for their
country-specific extensions, conferring with Icann to make sure everything
works smoothly.

[...]Real “governance,” on the other hand could bring oversight of
content and even transactions by a new international body — two jobs that
Icann explicitly doesn’t perform. For an example of how the Internet is
governed, look no further than the strict limits China [...] places on Web
sites that promote or even discuss democracy.

[...]So far, exactly what this intergovernmental body would look like or
do remains worryingly vague. According to a report of the U.N.’s Working
Group on Internet Governance, this body could be a Global Internet Council
to which Icann reports; or it could keep Icann in place and simply make
recommendations; or it could take over Icann’s duties an relegate the
private sector to “providing advice.”

The working group’s report says the governing body would respect freedom
of expression. At the same time, it holds as one of its “key principles”
the “respect for cultural and linguistic diversity as well as tradition
[and] religion.” On the Internet, it says, “that translates to multilingual,
diverse and culturally appropriate content” (our emphasis). And who
decides whether content is culturally, or otherwise, “appropriate”? Today,
no one. Tomorrow, Tehran, Beijing or Brussels.

There are many issues with this piece, including the fumbling of how
ICANN operates, as well as portraying ICANN as the good guy. These flaws
help reinforce why I tend to write off the WSJ op-ed folks as a pack of
rabid elephants. Nevertheless, even rabid elephants can make a good point
from time to time.

As flawed as ICANN is, and as troubling some of the cultural restrictions
the feds have made noises about imposing on internet content are, the idea
of creating a multinational organization with the authority to regulate
internet content is even more disturbing. While there may be some
protection coming from the ineffective nature of U.N. bureaucracy, I’m
rather uncomfortable with what could arise if a U.N. governing body ever
gained traction. Give me the protection of the First and Ninth Amendments,
regardless of how oft-ignored they are in the U.S. anymore.