Guest-worker visas come under fire

TalkBack 29 of 33:

Next »

« Previous

• Thread View
• Flat View

Protectionism? Not really.

The big multi-nationals are throwing this term around in
order to protect their interests. The fact is that it is not
"proctionism" as has been defined for almost 100 years.

Protectionism was originally designed to limit the import of
manufactured goods, made by foreign companies in foreign
countries. Protectionism, usually in the form of high tariffs,
made those goods more expensive than domestic goods.
This was practiced by virtually all major countries.

A perfect case of pure "protectionism" was when Bush raised
tariffs on European steel a little while back.

Today, domestic companies (in many developed countries -
not just the US) are simply shifting their production (and the
employment that goes with it) to low wage countries. Then
they are shipping those goods (including services and
software) back to their home countries. In many cases the
domestic companies hire sub-contractors to do the work.
This relieves them of responsiblity for the workforce in the
low wage country - giving them "deniability" when it's found
that the foreign workers are treated like animals. The
domestic company says; "We didn't know about it, so we
didn't do anything wrong". Nike played that game for years.

The simple fact is that the developed nations have never
faced such a threat to employment, standards of living, and
their tax structures. This is a NEW ball game.

The term "protectionism", with its negative conotation, will be
trotted out by allthose with a vested interest in exporting
jobs to low wage countries. But, in truth, prevention of this
job exporting has nothing to do with "protectionism" as it's
been practiced over the last 100 years.

Posted by: j.m.galvin   Posted on: 02/05/04 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

Alert moderator to an offensive message

Subscribe to this discussion via Email or RSS

SponsoredWhite Papers, Webcasts, and Downloads

• Dell Delivers Innovative Mobile at Saint Cecilia's Wandsworth Church of England School Dell Saint Cecilia's was a new school that wanted to place ICT at the core of ... Download Now
• Gartner Webcast: Data Loss Prevention, Compliance Trends Trend Micro The regulatory environment is changing. Find out what companies need to ... Download Now
• Five Steps to Determine When to Virtualize YourServers VMware Server virtualization isn't just for big companies. Entry-level ... Download Now