Althea Leach of Union recalls working at the Nautica manufacturing plant in Rockland where high-quality clothing such as jackets and robes were produced by hundreds of local workers and sold across the world.
“They were excellent jobs. They paid well and provided benefits,” Leach said.
Leach served as president and chief steward of the labor union that represented the workers at the plant, which had operated in Rockland for 63 years before closing its doors in 2002. Leach had worked there for 29 years.
The loss of manufacturing jobs has been a trend not only in Rockland and Maine but across the country as production is shifted to countries where labor and other costs are far less.
The loss of manufacturing jobs has resulted in the dwindling of the middle class. Job losses accelerated with the Great Recession that started in 2007.
Glenn Mills, director of economic research for the Maine Center for Workforce Research and Information, said there has been a growing divide as good-paying production and administrative support jobs that used to be filled by workers with less education have been lost.
He said education and retraining are needed to bridge the growing gap between well-paying and low-paying positions.
The number of overall jobs in the state declined from 602,737 in 2007 to 579,681 in 2011, a drop of just under four percent.
Manufacturing jobs, however, fell by twice that rate — 14 percent from 59,313 to 50,768, according to statistics from the Maine Center for Workforce Research and Information.
Manufacturing jobs tend to pay more money. The average pay for a manufacturing job in Maine has continued to rise despite the recession, going from $44,538 to $50,327 during the same period. The average wage for all jobs in the state went from $35,126 to $38,024 during that same period, according to state figures.
Paper mill jobs, for example, were a great source of good-paying jobs for the noncollege population, he noted. As those jobs declined, these workers were not able to find jobs that pay comparable wages.
The decline in manufacturing jobs, however, began well before the most recent economic downturn. The state Labor Department noted that manufacturing jobs accounted for 43 percent of all jobs 60 years ago, while today only 8.5 percent of jobs in Maine are manufacturing. That trend is expected to continue.
“Now, and for the foreseeable future, manufacturers will be subject to foreign competition and technology-driven job and industry restructuring. Moreover, the pace of change will likely increase,” according to the July Labor Department report titled “Manufacturing Jobs: Trends, Issues, and Outlook.”
The Rockland area is a microcosm of the state and national shift. In 1980, nearly one out of three jobs in the Rockland area were manufacturing jobs. Last year, that had plummeted to one out of every 11 jobs.
The decline was swift in the Rockland area.
Holmes Packing Co. closed its Rockland sardine plant in 1981. That property is now the site of a restaurant and marina. North Lubec Manufacturing closed its sardine plant in Rockland in 1984. That property is now an office building. Nearby National Sea Products closed its fish packing plant in 1990 with the loss of more than 200 jobs, and is now also used for offices.
The area’s last sardine plant — Port Clyde Packing Co. in Rockland — closed in 1997 and is now a boat repair facility.
Schoolhouse Togs employed more than 30 workers making children’s clothing in Rockland until 1992, when the plant was shuttered. At the time of the closing, the plant manager noted the company could not compete with plants in Taiwan, Korea, Sri Lanka and the Dominican Republic. That building is now occupied by Hamilton Marine.
And there was Nautica.
In 1937, a group of Rockland-area business leaders got together and attracted an apparel manufacturing company to locate in Rockland. A four-story wooden building was constructed on Route 1 in Rockland and hundreds of workers were hired to produce garments.
The company stopped manufacturing in Rockland in 1990 but continued to operate its distribution center in Rockland, employing more than 300 workers until 2002 when it relocated to a plant in Martinsville, Va. After 1990, Nautica apparel was being produced in countries such as Madagascar and Sri Lanka where wages were significantly lower.
Workers at the Nautica plant were being paid more than $11 an hour in 2002 and the company provided full health benefits for the workers and their children, with employee contributions for spouses.
Leach said she keeps up with some of her former co-workers and many have to work multiple jobs, most in retail or custodial jobs that pay much less and with far fewer benefits.
Immediately after she lost her job at Nautica, Leach worked for about nine months at the local Career Center to help displaced workers find training for new jobs. Some of the other people from Nautica received training to become certified nursing assistants.
The job at the Career Center, however, ended after nine months and she spent her time after that volunteering at her daughter-in-law’s child care center.
Leach said she is concerned about the loss of the manufacturing jobs in the country.
“It’s really a shame,” Leach said on this Labor Day weekend. “There are so many kids who can’t go to college or don’t want to go to college.
She said the cost of college is so great that young people struggle to pay for that education and then worry about whether there will be a job that pays a good wage and benefits.
The former Nautica manufacturing plant is today the Breakwater Marketplace, which has several tenants including the Rockland Career Center.
At the Career Center in Rockland, employment specialist David Grima said that there is a new focus within the organization statewide. Instead of laid-off workers coming in and being trained for careers they want, the agency will try to match up workers to the needs of employers.
In the state report on manufacturing, Labor Commissioner Robert Winglass emphasized that point.
“Businesses over the last few decades didn’t always need more workers; instead they needed workers who could operate computers and understand technology. Those skills remain important now,” Winglass stated in the report, adding that both the Labor Department and Maine Department of Economic and Community Development were working to address those issues.
The manufacturing workforce is becoming more educated. The Labor Department report on manufacturing noted that much of the growth in output at production plants in the state was due to process improvements and new technologies which offset the reduction in workers.
Between 1990 and 2010, information from the U.S. Census found that the number of manufacturing workers with some college education rose from a third to a half.
On the reverse side, professional and technical jobs have increased, according to the state Labor Department. MIlls said this has led to a divide between workers with higher education and those workers with less education. A recent report by the Labor Department noted that the unemployment rate for Mainers with less than a high school diploma has risen from 7.6 percent to 15.4 percent since the recession began. For workers with a bachelor’s degree or more education the jobless rate rose from 2.4 percent to 3.4 percent.
One specific area of employment that has seen an increase in jobs has been in health care and social services. Those jobs statewide increased 3 percent during the same period from 96,674 to 99,451. The average pay for those jobs is $40,554.
Grima said there is a shortage of trained workers in health care.
“It’s almost an unmeetable need,” he said of the demand of health care workers and the available workforce.
He noted a $4 million grant statewide is speeding up the training for higher level nurses.
“We want to address the shortage before it becomes a crisis,” he noted, as demand for health care is on the rise with an aging population.
The Labor Department projects that through 2018, the greatest percentage growth in jobs will be computer and mathematical ones. The number of those jobs is projected to increase nearly 13 percent. Those jobs will pay an average of $35.04 per hour. The other area of growth is personal care and personal service positions, which are projected to increase 11 percent. The pay for these jobs will average $11.37. Production jobs are estimated to decline by another 6 percent.
Other job trends
A further review of the changes in employment in Maine shows the following changes in employment and pay for jobs in Maine from 2007 through 2011.
• Construction jobs fell 19 percent from 30,964 to 25,202 from 2007 to 2011.
• Retail service jobs declined from 87,902 to 81,127, a drop of nearly 8 percent. The pay in these jobs rose 4 percent in that period from $23,139 on average to $24,187.
• The leisure and hospitality industry, where many jobs are seasonal, saw little change in the overall number of jobs, 60,337 to 60,157. The pay rose from $15,722 to $16,880.
• Jobs in the financial industry slipped by nearly 6 percent from 31,986 to 30,222. The average pay for workers in this industry rose 12 percent from $48,112 to $54,032. The financial industry includes insurance and real estate employees.
• Professional and business service jobs increased nearly 7 percent from 53,795 workers in 2007 to 57,345 workers in 2011. The average pay for these jobs — which includes legal, architectural, engineering, accounting and advertising — rose from $42,842 to $46,128.
• Government jobs declined since the recession began, falling a little more than 2 percent from 99,815 to 97,370. That included local government jobs, which dropped from 61,198 to 58,986, and state jobs, which decreased from 24,496 to 23,739. The number of federal government jobs rose from 14,121 to 14,644.
The average pay of all government jobs in Maine rose from $38,453 to $41,147. Local government jobs saw wages rise 10 percent from $31,773 to $34,985. State government jobs saw pay decrease less than 1 percent from $41,076 to $40,876. Federal employees saw their average wages in Maine rise nearly 6 percent from $62,854 to $66,408.
The review of employment figures also points out a continued gap between pay in different geographic areas of Maine.
Sagadahoc County had the highest average annual wage for Maine counties in 2011 at $43,994. Bath Iron Works is located in this county. Cumberland County came in second with an average annual wage of $43,051.
The lowest average annual wage was found in Piscataquis County at $29,642.
What the economic icons driving the world free market don’t seem to understand is that when you maximize profits by outsourcing manufacturing you do not have customers that can afford to buy your imported crap no matter how cheap it is. The economic system has to be a symbiotic relationship between investors and those who purchase the products. If you don’t employ people, they cannot purchase your products. Plain and simple. The GOP is pushing for less regulation in business and banking. This, by virtue of the current economic malaise Americans face today, has been proven to be a failed economic model. Trickle down economics don’t trickle down and people cannot rebound from economic duress if all the good jobs have been sold to maximize profits.
Oh so true watchdog. It’s apparently a lesson that Romney and Ryan still haven’t figured out. Not to mention ALEC, MHPC & Grover’s commando’s and the current House GOP.
The business cycle works best when one business purchases something from another business, necessitating the second business to hire a new employee to build whatever that product might be, the newly hired employee receives a wage then has the ability to purchase goods and services. The most important part of that equation is the financial exchange between those two businesses.
How is the new stricter regulations on how small business owners can use their equity to expand other lines of their business helpful?
For instance.. A few years ago it was possible for a small business person to get a loan from the equity in one business to reduce debt or start a new business line elsewhere. Under the new finreg regulations it is no longer possible. A small business now has a tougher time expanding. It is the regulation that is at fault.
Please tell me what banking regulations you favor and how is that regulation going to help grow the economy?
Cheesecake I recall you are a business woman who has had some success. That’s good, I congratulate you. However if your success is on the backs of your employee’s, i.e. you do not pay them a living wage, then shame on you. Just as your brethren in the GOP do not understand, without a fair exchange in the economic success story, the success is doomed to failure. Perhaps not in 5 years or even 10 but it is doomed. I’m not an economist but I’ve been around for awhile now. I believe the current economic malaise started with Ronald Reagan’s term. As for the effect of deregulation (I believe this was also a Reagan term highlight), I do not know how anyone who has been around as long as you and I could be blind to witnessing how banking deregulation has contributed to our problems today. There is also the deregulation in international outsourcing (the world market), union busting, etc which have devastated the great American labor machine, and thus it’s economic muscle. Yes, Clinton did contribute to the problem by granting China most favored trading status. But for the most part this is a GOP problem from start to, well from start to now, because it isn’t finished yet. Thank you Reagan, thank you Gingrich and your contract with America, thank you Bush 2 for taking a budget surplus and going into the red again (this without including the hidden budget used for those wasteful unnecessary wars!), and thank you GOP for enslaving Americans. At least your enslavement is equal for all and not based upon sex or color. Now that I think of it, perhaps the GOP has declared war against women.
My people are paid above average for our industry in the Bangor area. They also get basic insurance coverage paid at 100% for the individual. 5-6 paid holidays depending on how they fall. 3 paid sick/vacation weeks annually. (I also throw in a snow day or two, depending. ) They used to get fully paid family insurance coverage but the Democrats in Augusta ended that for us in the 90’s.
As for your other comments.. I think there is too much difference in our personal experience and knowledge for me too explain why I believe you are wrong. Suffice it to say, no matter what events got us here, We will not escape it until business begins to purchase items from each other which necessitates hiring new people. Access to credit for small business would help out and the current regulations that banks must now live by when loaning have made that harder for the little guy.
if your above statement is true, you’re part of the answer rather than part of the problem, and i commend you. furthermore, i know a person with an impeccable work history who’s looking for work — so if i ever find out your company name i’ll send her to you. (it’s not me, i can no longer work).
I like what you had to say Cheesecake except the very first sentence. The oft used expression “paid above average for our industry” is not necessarily a living wage. Your phrase is used by many companies to make it appear as though they are generous but it hides part of the real problem. For instance; if a person works for a pizza restaurant (no, I do not) for minimum wage (this is normal pay for this job) and the pizza place down the road pays $8/hr, the second pizza place can make the same claim as you. However we all know that $8/hr is NOT a living wage. Not in Bangor, not anywhere in this country. Here’s the catch, the person making those pizza’s cannot afford to buy one for themselves! That is exactly what my first post is all about. By the way, I applaud you for the healthcare coverage you offer. Very good. But guess what, the pizza guy cannot purchase healthcare on their wages. Meanwhile the GOP is anti-universal healthcare and yet they have no answer for the $8/hr employee who lacks healthcare because of “average wages for our industry in this area.”
I am not a business expert nor an economist. However over the last 35 years my professional career has at various times been sorely affected by economic conditions in this country. I think that after this much time I have, in a general way, gained at least a modest insight on the cause and effect of an unregulated, open, free market on our country. So I stand by my opinion. Oh, my work was in physics research and statistics.
The Key to the phrase..”paid above average for our industry” means that if I pay any more my competitors will eat me for lunch.
You never answered my question…. the one you brought up…. Please tell me what banking regulations you favor and how is that regulation going to help grow the economy?
They don’t understand because we have instilled “entitlement mentality” and someone owes them something just for allowing them to be hired by the company.
Why should people be grateful to an employer? After all, they built that business too?
Remember a couple months ago when the BDN had a story about police departments not being able to get qualified police candidates?
Two reasons;
1) Bad backgrounds
2)Entitlement mentality…they don’t want to work for it, they are already entitled to the job.
As far as a living wage….we are in an age where making more money is not necessarily going to be a good thing.
It started a couple decades back when unemployment insurance started to be looked at like paid vacation.
Some people chose seasonal work and layoff.
Canada is full of this as well.
I understand that completely Cheesecake, you cannot compete with foreign products that aren’t made on a level playing field. This is exactly why we need to regulate our import trade more vigorously. That way you earn a return on your investment, your workers make a living wage, and America remains strong economically. Yes, we can still have trade with the world but this needs to be regulated so that America comes first for ALL Americans, not just the investors.
Cheesecake is a male who has no interest, or should I say, a negative interest in women’s issues.
HonkytonkBob is gender challenged. Sometimes male, sometimes female depending on who in the household logs on.
Gender-challenged? What does that mean exactly?
i’m not arguing your “clinton” point, but we might remember it was NIXON who opened trade with china. he was touted as the first president to visit china, and 6 months later there was a mcdonald’s in tienamen square. (please forgive me if i’ve misspelled it)
It was China’s entry into the WTO (both dems & reps) that caused part of the problem we find ourselves in. That was much later after Nixon. The other side ofthat coin is what damage could we have done to world relations (and conflict) had we not allowed China into the WTO? There is always another point of view to consider.
Nixon opened diplomatic relations with China.
Nixon did it because of the Viet Nam war and the Chinese support of N. Vietnam. As concerns the Chinese it was the Korean war all over again.
success of a company is almost ALWAYS on the backs of the employees, hence obama’s remark “you didn’t build this (your employees did)”, and there’s nothing wrong with that. the problem shows up when that employer reduces the availability of income to less than it legitimately takes for an employee to support himself. employers who afford the employees enough time & wages to live on are effectively providing the support of that employee and family, and therefore DESERVE any profits or wealth that can be gained from it. CEOs of profitable companies who ship jobs overseas and cut american workers’ ability to make a living, just to increase the company’s bottom line, should be tarred, feathered, folded spindled and mutilaated.
I believe that is what I said. “However if your success is on the backs of your employee’s, i.e. you do not pay them a living wage,..” I don’t have a problem with a business making a profit. I have a problem with the business making a profit and not paying a living wage to it’s employee’s or making a profit by outsourcing manufacturing to another country to save a dime at the expense of Americans.
Watchdog, you appear to have a fundamental lack of understanding of basic economic principals (not to mention human nature). The very “inequality” you seem to find so offensive is a necessary and positive component of a healthy economy.
Give up on Cheesecake!
I tryed to explain the Paradox of thift to him, her whatever.
If you can make it through it will be a miracle!
ditto
delete
thift??
No. Businesses grow when products are sold to consumers, not each other. That’s just doing each others laundry. B2B commerce is important, but consumption by employees off all types of goods is what drives true growth.
Well said, and much shorter than my long diatribe.
You are incorrect. The consumer always…. I repeat, always, is the last to the party. The consumers have to be employed somewhere in order to have an income to spend. When full employment happens is the period when the consumer has the most effect on business.
The importance of the B2B part of the economy has been understated by the neo-keynsians. In my business I watch for other businesses coming through my door. That’s where the money is and where, if it is busy enough, I gain enough confidence to hire a new person. (then they have money to spend)
B2B commerce is only part of the economy and without consumers, there is no economy.
One example: a supplier of construction good sells to construction firm (B2B) who works for a developer (B2B) who SELLS the house to a consumer! Without that consumer, the developer would not hire the contractor to build the house who would not buy any goods from the supplier.
That other business coming in your door is selling to consumers.
Right now the consumer can’t afford to purchase a house because he/she is unemployed.
Where do they get the money??? They get the money from being hired. Why are they hired? Because of two things…. One) business is selling something that makes them more efficient or gives them a competitive advantage over another business. Two) Easy credit for the business to purchase this new item/idea.
Business is not simply buying something off the shelf and selling it to someone else. Business is totally reinventing yourself regularly. Technology does it, competitiveness does it. New ideas do it. You need to let business especially small ones do that.
The consumer comes in later in that cycle. Not first. That’s not to say that the consumer cannot drive demand…. but in a high unemployment environment like now business reinventing itself is key. The government getting out of the way is important. Easier access to credit for small business to purchase these new ideas/equipment is important.
More like it was the lack of regulation that led to the financial crash.
I’d expand your purchasing cycle to include the consumer, not just business-to-business purchases. The unemployed aren’t going to contribute to the consumer economy.
And the fact that the unemployed aren’t contributing to the consumer economy is my entire point. They can only do so when they have a job…. where does that come from? Certainly not other unemployed? It comes from business making a needed purchase from another business, necessitating hiring. Then the consumer joins the mix. He/She can’t until she has money in her pocket.
As for regulation of tight credit for small business why is this a good thing? How does it promote growth?
Which is why, if you recall, the present Obama administration has repeatedly said that food stamps etc. helps the economy.
Millions of illegals cross our borders to find work that Americans won’t do, and yet we are paying Americans to not do them.
Its a very shallow way for them to see economic stability.
Nope the most important is the consumer who can afford to puchurse the items. the B2B only works if there are consumers later down the line.
Henry Ford figured this out 100 years ago when he started paying workers $5 a day! It was unheard of, but he knew that only a well-paid worker could afford to buy a Model T and it was by selling more Model T’s that he and Ford would become richer. It really is that simple.
You are living in a time warp and need to snap out of your static “progressive” thinking.
When Ford entered the auto making business a century ago he had a captive market for manufacturing (labor) and sales (USA). The USA is no longer the center of the world economic universe because we have a global market for labor and sales.
The BO Administration bailed out GM for $49.5 billion of which the US Treasury says taxpayers will lose $25.1 billion. Despite BO claims that his actions saved the US car industry consider the following as reported by GM CEO Akerson and other auto industry media sources:
– 7 of 10 GM vehicles are built outside the USA and the foreign share of their manufacturing is growing;
– GM sells almost as many cars in China as in the USA;
– GM completed construction of its newest $250 million state-of-the-art Advanced Technology Center in Shanghai in the past year;
– The vehicle with the highest USA manufactured content is the Toyota Avalon and 3 of the 5 highest USA content vehicles are made by non-union Japanese companies;
– While GM is replacing a few assembly plants in the USA its major growth will be in the manufacture and sale of vehicles in China.
The evidence points to the GM bailout by BO for political reasons to shore up support from the UAW. While BO talks-the-talk of saving USA jobs he is facilitating his crony capitalists friends exportation of jobs. “Saving the Middle Class” is a nice sounding mantra but current government policies are not taking us there. The USA’s static employment, low GDP growth, increased government spending and escalating debt all mirror the path taken by another country: Greece.
No-one, but no-one ever called Henry Ford progressive. He knew his customers had to be able to buy his products and that is as true today as it was then.
Today, corporate profits (US and global) are at record highs, but middle class wages have been flat for years. This trend to push down middle class started long before 2008, so start with Reagan before you begin blaming Obama.
I did not say that Ford was “progressive”. I said that your thinking was “static progressive”, i.e. that you are using a simplistic logic (albeit wrong) applicable to a different era and stage of economic development. Ford paid his workers more due to the fact that it more than compensated his workers for the painfully dull rote work they performed on a fast paced assembly line. Ford figured out that even while paying a higher wage he achieved a much higher rate of production per labor hour thereby reducing the cost per vehicle.
As for paying his workers more so they could buy his cars is pure poppycock despite revisionist history and the PR snippet on the Ford website. Ford was losing a lot of money on employee turnover. On average he went thru 52,000 people per year for 14,000 positions. Training and absenteism were killing his bottom line. He paid the highest wage to buy employee loyalty. He also reduced the work day from 9 to 8 hours so he could run three continuous equal hour shifts.
Henry Ford was a numbers cruncher. He knew that sometimes spending an extra $buck saved him $2. Only the upper middle class and wealthy could afford to buy an auto in the early 1900’s because the average factory worker had no credit.
Ford believed in welfare capitalism and knew what he was doing. The turnover problem was part of it, but that was driven in part by workers going from job-to-job in Detriot where labor was in great demand and wages would be a little better at another company, but not a lot.
Ford outdid them by a lot with the $5/day and he did not just pay employee loyalty – he raised the wages for other businesses. Everyone learned a middle class with buying power was the future. There were not enough rich people to buy all the cars car makers could produce and the Model T was never meant for the wealthly, even if a few of them bought them. The rich were buying Packards and other nicer autos. BTW, the Model T was introduced to the market for the factory worker and they bought plenty of them.
Growth is driven by the middle. That’s been true for many years and will always be true.
Actually the wage disparity began a few years earlier about 1967-68. It was small but it was there. Two things were happening then … the welfare state was taking off and growing and the baby boom years came to an end… related? I don’t know.
That is what he said and what is remembered the most. It was the unbelievable employee turn over rate at his factory that was mostly responsible for the wage increase.
Henry Ford had it right (a living wage so that workers could buy their product). Those who do not learn from history …
Hey, WatchdogME – You say there has to be “a symbiotic relationship between investors and those who purchase the products.” You’re right. That’s why Wal-Mart, Sam’s Club, and all the “dollar stores” are so successful. Labor can’t demand $50,000 per year plus benefits from American manufacturers and then spend their wages on Chinese made junk. They can’t have it both ways.
Well written, thank you.
I have seen personally trickle down economics work…and it works well.
My parents worked for wealthy people who hired them to maintain do carpentry, paint etc. their business properties.
When people feel confident and have money…they spend it.
Every year they spent a lot of money re-doing their properties that they leased.
They employed many people…appliance manufacturers, and sales, flooring people, interior decorators, furniture manufacturers and on and on and on.
This all trickles down to the working people, like my parents, who then spent it again and again.
Nice job Paulie with the sign!Worst gov in the country.Maine suffers.
The LePage Economic Miracle marches on.
Throw the GOP out this November.
Yessah
Bravo!
Dummy, this is the fruit of a generation and more of left wing Democrat ideology.
Well, if you think Obama’s gotta go because of high unemployment nationally, then how can our governor not be thrown under the train too. Can’t have it both ways LSC.
Our governor is not up for reelection.
True but every time he opens his mouth and bxxxhslap’s Mainer’s who dare to disagree with him he just makes the arguement for his removal that much stronger. And you sure don’t see anyone riding to his rescue, do you ?
I expect Obama will be gone alot sooner than our beloved Governor.
Too bad.
Sticks and stones … (and extreme stereotyping)
WE need ditch diggers everone can’t work in an office
Nah, they’ll through you in a mental hospital if you do…. Then replace a walkway and never fix what caused the damage to the walkway in the first place… :/
Yes but should Maine be noted as the state that can provide a digger for every ditch?
This article speaks to one of erroneous assumptions that the authors of “No Child Left Behind” made regarding all American children. There is no shame in having aspirations to be a production or construction worker, a mechanic, or any other professional which may or may not be less cerebral. Having worked in education for almost 30 years, I have seen a trend in philosophy where the expectations are ridiculously the same for all students, regardless of their aptitudes, interests, or individual gifts and talents (or lack of).
By some arbitrary date set by the feds, 90% of all students in public schools must either meet or exceed the standards set by the feds in Math, Science, and Reading or else! Yet, the test constructions by which these standards are measured have changed repeatedly, the evaluation methods have changed repeatedly, curricula and teaching methodology has also remained on a treadmill of change.
But we expect all students to pass standards that are continually being revised, updated, and reworded a million times so they sound halfway intelligent. The big question: “What do we want our students to know and be able to do” in order to obtain a high school diploma has really never been determined to this hour. However, we have spent billions of dollars trying to get it “right.”
American schools are held hostage to to these moving targets, which to be honest, don’t really measure true learning. True learning can only be measured in the aftermath of a student’s school experience.
If we want to know if we are doing a good job educating our children, let’s measure success by looking at them ten years after graduation. Have we given them the tools they need to function and make a life for themselves? Have we given them the confidence they need to believe that regardless of how they perform on a standardized test, they can still be really successful, productive citizens?
God bless our teachers who are in the midst of this craziness, helping each child reach his or her individual potential while worrying if everyone in their class “meets or exceeds the standard”.
One-size-fits-all is the inevitable and unfortunate consequence of the increasing federalization of education. Expect more of it.
And comercialization and State “guidance” and …
dIt doesn’t matter sometimes how well educated you are. If you head into a field that doesn’t pay well, you will always live hand to mouth. As long as workers are discourage from unionizing, they will be at the mercy of those whose investments rely on the corporate bottom line. And that means low salaries and poor benefits.
As long as you decide to work for someone else you live at their mercy. Unions do not change that dynamic… but they can end your employment sooner.
Well, we can’t all be self-employed, can we.
What I said still holds true. If you work for someone else you live at their mercy.
The 1%, including Romney & Harold Alfond took all the decent jobs to China, leaving the working class to the unemployment line.
These are some of the companies Bain Capital invested in or saved financially from going bankrupt.
AMC Entertainment, Aspen Education Group, Brookstone, Burger King, Burlington Coat Factory, Clear Channel Communications, Domino’s Pizza, DoubleClick, Dunkin’ Donuts, D&M Holdings, Guitar Center, Hospital Corporation of America (HCA), Sealy, The Sports Authority, Staples, Toys “R” Us, Warner Music Group and The Weather Channel.
The only reason these companies were broke was the compensation the
execs were pillaging! I remember when Hathaway shirts (Warnaco) closed the
Waterville factory and gave the CEO a $10 million bonus.
That was Warren Buffets company. The big Democratic financier.
Yeah, the same guy Alfond sold Dexter Shoe to for $400 million. (I guesstimate that every worker who EVER worked for Dexter Shoe earned Alfond $5,000 for EVERY YEAR they worked for him just on the sale proceeds not to mention the profit he took each year! Twenty year employee earned Alfond $100,000 just when he sold it.). More jobs to China.
Now list all the one’s that they chopped up and sold and sent jobs overseas?
This is an interesting article and Bain & Co. Which was the company’s name before when Mitt ran it.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-federal-bailout-that-saved-mitt-romney-20120829
You are right of course. The workers whose jobs he saved didn’t deserve to have them saved.
I am right in only that we do not want as President someone who thought it was all perfectly ok and moral to take American jobs (even if it was only 1) and send them overseas to make his millions.
Why would you expect that that person would do what is best for America and not for his and his backers bottom line.
On a side note: Isn’t it telling that Romney’s yacht is a foreign flagged (Cayman Islands) vessel. The only reason someone would register their yacht in the Cayman Islands is to not pay taxes, it sure isn’t for their ability to protect the yacht. I’ll bet he still expects the US Navy (paid for by US taxes) to keep the sea lanes open for him.
What you do not understand (maybe) is that the business survived. It would not have survived here…. and that was the point. You can be protectionist all you want but all that does is hurt you in the end. NOTHING would be preserved.
Actually Bain took companies with good bottom lines and good lines of credit, borrowed them into trouble then cut them up and took what profit they could while rewarding themselves handsomely. Not good business sense if you are going for long term viabilty, which they weren’t.
I didn’t know that business finance was your expertise, much less that you were privy to the books of private companies before Bain took them public. I defer to your intimate knowledge.
Pot, meet kettle.
I think I am as privy to the books of private companies as you are when you said that the businesses that Bain cut up for profit would not have survived anyway.
“GOP candidates have attacked Mitt Romney as a “vulture capitalist” who destroyed jobs. The charges center on his 15 years at the private equity firm Bain Capital. But what are private equity firms, and what do they do?”
http://www.npr.org/2012/01/19/145463691/vulture-capitalism-how-private-equity-firms-work
I know you won’t like the site but facts are still facts.
Pot, meet kettle.
I think I am as privy to the books of private companies as you are when you said that the businesses that Bain cut up for profit would not have survived anyway.
“GOP candidates have attacked Mitt Romney as a “vulture capitalist” who destroyed jobs. The charges center on his 15 years at the private equity firm Bain Capital. But what are private equity firms, and what do they do?”
http://www.npr.org/2012/01/19/145463691/vulture-capitalism-how-private-equity-firms-work
I know you won’t like the site but facts are still facts.
NPR? Come on. Better source. These are the same people that call the Defense Department the War Department. Out of the 1940’s.
Business by its nature finds the best way to survive. Denying that is pretty silly, which is what you are saying.
Gingrich lost and is pretty bitter about it. I take his comments in the same vein as Maddow at this point.
He was a non-person at the Republican convention.
I knew you would attack the source but you can’t attack the substance.
American business was doing quite well before Mitt and the rest of the Venture Capitalists (Vulture Capitalists is a better term for those like Romney) started “saving” American business.
How well has business done since Venture Capitalists came on the scene?
Have you looked into the Pingree holdings overseas?
Is she running for President?
which one of these companies offers substantially more than minimum wage, full-time work, or worthwhile benefits? it’s the same as every president who’s claimed to have created jobs — they created jobs, alright, but not ones a person can support a family on.
I see. We would all be so much better off if the largest Hospital organization in the world went belly up. I can see that.
I feel sure the 100,000’s of thousands of people these companies employ would be welcome to sleep on your couch when the can’t pay their bills.
lol… ok, you mentioned ONE industry. now tell me about the OTHER companies you mentioned, and compare your “hundreds of thousands” of workers to the TWENTY THREE MILLION people who are looking for jobs at a livable wage. tell you what, i’ll take the 100 thousand on MY couch, when you take the other 22 million 900 thaousand on yours. fair?
All of those companies employ people above minimum wage at some level. In addition even the burger joints by extension support other industries that pay more… ad agencies and truck drivers etc. White collar jobs. You just see the kid at the counter and think that’s all. Of course it isn’t.
Unemployment is a tough nut, granted, but I can tell you the folks in the WH haven’t a clue
how to get the UI rate anywhere below 8%. They don’t know how private enterprise works.
As for inviting people to your couch. I’ll take the 22.9m but you have to go first. :)
ok, which president OR congress saw this coming and took steps to avert it? it sure wasn’t any republican, and damn few democrats. so your “white house doesn’t have a clue” is meritless when compared to romney.
i’ve said this many times before, but i’ll repeat it here: NEITHER party has done much good for our citizens in the last 50 years or so, and BOTH parties have done major damage — so we’re stuck voting for the lesser of 2 evils. the democrats have done and will continue to do less damaga.
*damage, too…
I don’t poke people for spelling and typo’s. We all are not exempt…. Isn’t it sad when you are forced to settle for the candidate you think will do the least “damage.”
My point about the WH was that they believe they have the answers when generally imo they are the problem.
after scrolling thru the comments on here, it has become obvious that cheesey thinks hospital workers should have their jobs protected, while it’s ok to ship all other jobs overseas to make sure the company survives. hey cheesey, when all that happens — who will be able to afford a hospital bill?
My x-rays get interpreted in India. Yours too probably.
Probably .not
by the way, i find your screen name interesting… do you know what the term “cheesecake” referred to in 1955, other than a dessert? :)
People assume it is reference to my birth year. They are mistaken. The name in its entirety is a bit of an inside joke. Not fit for mixed company.
Your question: No I don’t. Will a google help?
maybe.
ok, i’ll tell you. in 1955, the term “cheesecake” referred to a woman (usually stunningly gorgeous) who had very little in the way of intelligence, and would escort a man to parties and other gatherings where showing up as a couple was preferred over a single person attending. it wasn’t necessarily promiscuous or lewd. today we might call it “arm candy”.
None!
This list represents wise investing in marketable items that CANNOT be produced overseas and the funds that were used for the investment were likely GAINED from the profits of companies that were. Retail dominates this list and being a commercial contractor in that businesss for over twenty years affords me an in depth understanding of their market. This should NOT be waved as a Badge of Honor for Bain when it comes to job creation.
I am missing your point. Could you clarify for me please?
Elect Romney: Send ALL manufacturing jobs to China…
Re-elect Obama and stay unemployed.
elect a congress dedicated to making sure the president fails, and you’ll have an ineffective president every time. congress is supposed to be there to read proposed bills, then decide whether to pass them or not based on their merit. making sure a president fails, regardless of what he proposes, with no regard to the merit of the proposal, or refusing to read such proposals, is treason.
One thing. The President IS the President and if he can’t work with Congress then it is on him… not the other 435 people. Other Presidents can work with the other party. That means he is a weak ineffectual President and he would still be if he is re-elected. What would change?
Takes two (parties) to tango.
But it only takes one person to lead. It has not been Obama.
If Obama were to succeed, Maine is permanently screwed.
A non-sequitur.
Transnational corporations owe no allegiance to any one particular country and thus manufacturing jobs in this country have been displaced to other countries with a lower standard of living. As this trend has continued our standard of living has declined. Countries with a rising standard of living tend to increase in population because they can afford to have children. Were it not for immigration and refugees, Maine’s population would have declined even more noticeably. Our global economic system pits nation against nation, sacrificing sovereignty for interdependence. A banking cartel of private central banks are working in conjunction with the World Bank, the Bank for International Settlements along with the International Monetary Fund to enslave humanity by trading our labor in return for money which is loaned out to nations at a compound interest rate despite the fact that the banks never had the money to loan out in the first place —they conjure it out of thin air and the money appears as arbitrary blips on a computer screen— and we are left indebted to these global bankers, the tricksters of the ultimate trickle down economic ponzi scheme. Because of our subservience to these bankers, we have outsourced our jobs and have increased our debt burden so much so that it will take generations to pay the debt off. We have been conned by clever global managers that have used the artificial scarcity of money to lower our standard of living to reduce the population; we’re all playing a giant game of musical chairs whether we like it or not.
See below
…of the labor union that represented the workers at the plant, …
That is why.
The phrases ‘labor union’ and ‘job losses’ go hand in hand.
Private union membership is down to 7% in the U.S.. Yet the big money people are still using them as the excuse for all the jobs going to China. Bull. Isn’t it ironic that the titans of industry have always accused labor unions of being communists, and now they use them as the reason for sending their manufacturing jobs to a communist nation. As a result of their lust for cheap Chinese labor, our trade deficit now stands at $350 billion with a communist nation and they now have their finger up our butt for over $1 trillion and climbing. Oh those commies and their unions.
So what does education level have to do with manufacturing jobs? These jobs don’t require a worker who puts ‘Part A’ into ‘Part B’ to have a degree in physics.
Maybe not, but at least a high school education can help make them a better person and citizen.
This kinda looks like a little double speak.The lawmakers say they need more tax breaks for big business to create more jobs and better pay but the more breaks they get,the more they want and create nothing but fatter pockets for themselves.The tax breaks just seem to give them enough to move the jobs over seas.
This article fails to mention the tremendous loss of ship building jobs that occurred after the enactment of a 10% luxury in the early 1990’s. There was a time when the help wanted ads were filled with boat builders looking for all types of help.
The collapse of the Housing Bubble (caused by very loose monetary and mortgage policies, which was in turn caused by the liberal philosophy of helping anyone, whether they deservered it or not) led to the great recession; not Trickle Down Economics, that brought us out of the early 1980’s recession and led to economic growth until the dot com bubble broke in 1999.
Thr Great Recession did not start until March of 2007, 2 months after the Liberals took control of Congress – hmmm interesting correlation?
If having the government regulate and control all manners of enterprise and life is so very beneficial for everyone, then why did the Soviet Union Collapse and why did China go to more of a free market? Also, how come North Korea and Cuba are not economic power houses. I dare say there are very few Koreans or Cubans sitting around on a Sunday afternoon, reading the paper on their computer and commenting on the news articles.
The people in poverty in Our Country have a higher standard of living then the middle classes in most countries. Free market enterprise and capiltalism has led Our Country to living standards never before seen in the history of the world. This is because free markets and capitalism fosters a desire to better one’s self and leads to hard work – something in which liberals do not believe.
the housing market crashed in 2005. the reason i know this is because i tried to sell my house at typical market value in an area where houses typically sold in 2 weeks or less, and in the 6 1/2 years after that NO houses sold at more than 60% of their previous value. today in that same area, you can buy a house which had a mtg value of $150k for $60k, and the market is flooded with them.
Wow, Lapage and the GOP hasn’t fixed in less then two year what Dems. and a so called independent spent sixteen years over regulating and taxing to death.
As long as we continue to buy cheap crap from China there will not be more jobs for Americans.
Buy American, save American jobs, and we we all benfit.
Okay, let’s try not blaming the American worker. I don’t think the education level of the offshore people who got our jobs is higher than ours. You can’t blame the unions either. Our minimum legal standards include a lot more than the minimum wage and they’re not compatible with the trade agreements we’ve made. I have no problem choosing which of these gets the death sentence. The trade agreements have to get the axe. I realize that will have a negative effect on relations with some other countries. We’ll just have to deal with that.
some of those manufacturing jobs in this story were low paying sardine jobs. there are better new jobs since the hay day of sardine plants. How do they know manufacturing will get lower then 8.5 percent or workers. I wouldn’t be surprised if manufacturing slowly rebounds with the wages going up in china. I dont think obama or lepage have anything to do with this. If u want more manufacturing jobs u could buy american made products
Thank O’Sham-a for that as well.
The best “job” in Maine? Welfare! Keep electing democrats for more….
We had better stay out of WalMart and stop buying that cheap Chinese crap or no one is going to have a job eventually and the communist Chinese are going to own ALL of our national debt.
Work for the government is the message I see in this.
Yeah, and this from the “small government” people.
I don’t know how anyone can even consider going to a 4 year college today… when they’re told that it will cost at least 100 thousand dollars… especially now that people’s wages have been flat for about 30 years now… it’s just about inconceivable for anyone other than the 1%. Maybe that’s how they want it to be, just another way of kicking the ladder away from the tower after they’ve gotten safely inside.
good point.. and you might add what Obama’s head of he Job’s Committee.. Jeff Immelt, CEO of GE got a snipet of a few million dollars from Obama.. and then took it to China where he built a new plant..nothing new for Immelt thoughAs the administration struggles to prod businesses to create jobs at
home, GE has been busy sending them abroad. Since Immelt took over in 2001, GE
has shed 34,000 jobs in the U.S., according to its most recent annual filing
with the Securities and Exchange Commission. But it’s added 25,000 jobs
overseas.
At the end of 2009, GE employed 36,000 more people abroad than it did in
the U.S. In 2000, it was nearly the opposite……..this from a recent article on GE and it’s American Dream .. head of the Jobs Counsel of the United States of America.. anyone see a problem here ?
There was a time in this country when you could drive through the parking lot of a manufacturing plant and see a goodly number of late model Cadillac’s. And I’m not talking about those of management. The working men and women could afford a nice car and a nice home. Those days are, for the most part, gone. What happened?
The only thing all those great minds mentioned above in the goverment jobs will do is create more jobs and drive the wage down in the jobs where their is a demand. But I guess that is what they are being overpaid and over benifed to do. We have got to be able to supply people with what they need for their basic needs and without manufacturing jobs we can’t do it and the only way we will ever get them back is threw a big drop in our living standards that has to effect workers in State, Local and Federal Goverment because at this point they are doing just fine and can’t see the problem.
Who is going to watch the “Socialist National Convention”(DNC) ??
Many of the foreign factory workers that took American jobs could barely read and write their own languages. It wasn’t their education. They work for nothing, that is the reason we lost our jobs. The race to the bottom. While American Corporations keep making record profits year after year.
According to Betty Sutton, we loose about 15 US Factories a day;
http://www.politifact.com/ohio/statements/2011/nov/07/betty-sutton/betty-sutton-says-average-15-us-factories-close-ea/
There is not much we are going to be able to do about this until our standard of living stabilizes, and people learn to get by and consume less.
Also before many try to blame the republicans just look at the outsourcing of the millions upon millions of our stimulus dollars under the current administration.
Those who export jobs while laying off Americans should be exported themselves. Only a damned fool would try to base a consumer economy on a consumer base with no income. Neo-liberalism has done nothing but evil to our national economy, and the great prophets of the Chicago School of Economics would best serve this country working at hard manual labor somewhere offshore.