Re: [PEN-L] Robert Reich: U.S. dollar heading for a collapse - September 25, 2004

[Ralph Johansen]

Robert Reich wants to avoid the U.S. dollar heading for a collapse, by increasing manufacturing in the US and concomitant living wages. So  1) what'll we make,  2) what'll take the place of those commodities and jobs for the people in the South who now make them, 3) what guarantee of a comparable return on investment is available as incentive to these reinvented manufacturers to make things here instead of parceling components around the globe to areas of cheap labor, 4) what comparable return on investment here, unless labor is reimported and a larger two-tier US economy, along with the maintenance costs of the labor which don't have to be borne locally otherwise, 5) what of the diminished capacity of national governments to impose rules on TNCs to the extent necessary to bring about Reich's "significant measures", 6) what of the precarious world economy if the US shifts away from speculative and rentier activities to making an honest living again, 7) how rearrange the always tenuous relationship between shipping more and more dollars elsewhere, with the recipients in turn investing in US treasury and other securities here, 8) how prevent the growth of autonomous regional co-prosperity spheres in other parts of the world when the US surrenders control over the global ballgame by pulling more and more manufacturing back here, 9) what of the glutted world market for commodities and the resultant effect on already stagnant economies, 10) compelling greater cooperation among regions of the South and the likelihood that they will develop their internal markets, 11) what of the effect on the real estate bubble? 12) What sorts of "significant measures are [available] to control the budget deficit and to begin rebuilding the economy so that real manufacturing wages, which have been largely stagnant in the U.S. since the Reagan era in the 1980s, begin to grow"? 13) As Melvin P. might have it, how make living wages available when even textiles are cut and pieced by robotic assembly?  140 Do we make policy by fiat and prescription, or 15) is there a set of organic parameters imposed, whereby we make our own history but only insofar as the prevailing conditions allow? What'll we see there, who will be there, what'll be the big surprise?   Ralph ----- Original Message ----- From: Jurriaan Bendien To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, September 27, 2004 3:40 PM Subject: Re: Robert Reich: U.S. dollar heading for a collapse - September 25, 2004 Reich said regardless of who is the next leader, significant measures are going to be needed to control the budget deficit and to begin rebuilding the economy so that real manufacturing wages, which have been largely stagnant in the U.S. since the Reagan era in the 1980s, begin to grow. Interesting - "Symbolic analysts are in ever greater demand in a world market that places an increasing value on identifying and solving problems," is what Mr. Reich wrote in 1991. Now it's back to good old manufacturing.   J. Do you Yahoo!? Take Yahoo! Mail with you! Get it on your mobile phone.