Re: [Futurework] FW: Republicans Grow Skeptical On Free Trade
Agree. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Christoph Reuss Sent: Sat 10/6/2007 7:45 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [Futurework] FW: Republicans Grow Skeptical On Free Trade WASHINGTON -- By a nearly two-to-one margin, Republican voters believe free trade is bad for the U.S. economy, a shift in opinion that mirrors Democratic views I don't have the impression that Bill Clinton believes that free trade is bad, neither lately at the WEF. Chris SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword igve. ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] Call Centers in Small Towns Can Run Into Problems
Theory Practice: Call Centers in Small Towns Can Run Into Problems --- To Deal With Attrition, 1-800-Flowers.com Changed Its Approach 22 October 2007 The Wall Street Journal javascript:void(0) A few years after 1-800-Flowers.com Inc. opened call centers in two small Southwestern towns, it ran into a big problem: High attrition combined with the small populations meant the offices were running out of people to hire. It felt like we had employed everyone in town, says Denise Thompson, a Flowers human-resource executive. The shortage prompted Flowers to overhaul its approach to staffing. Executives increased efforts to retain existing agents, and expanded their network of home-based agents to reduce reliance on local labor markets. It is a cautionary tale for the call-center industry. Over the past decade, companies have sought to lower costs by sending call-center jobs overseas to places such as India. After customer complaints of poor service, some companies sought alternatives closer to home, particularly in small cities with low wages and little competition for workers. But as Flowers discovered, that strategy doesn't always pan out. The conditions that attracted one company often attract others, pushing wages higher and triggering turnover. In a small city, you're going to burn through that in a couple years -- just about everybody who could work there has worked there, and has moved on, says Tim Houlne, chief executive of Working Solutions in Plano, Texas, which provides companies with home-based call agents. He says the small-town labor shortage is prompting some companies to move call centers back to big cities despite higher wages, or to use home-based agents. Call-center workers often quit because the work is stressful and the pay is low -- $8 to $14 an hour in many cases. Agents must field calls from angry customers while being monitored. Turnover -- the annual rate at which workers quit -- at call centers can reach 100%, consultants say. By contrast, the national average for all employers is about 10%, says Michael Tindall, a director at the Saratoga human-resource unit of PricewaterhouseCoopers. Flowers opened call centers in Ardmore, Okla., in 2000 and in Alamogordo, N.M., in 2001. Executives liked the areas' modest wages and supply of workers who had completed two years of college. Scouts had visited retailers in the towns to gauge the friendliness of service workers. Still, both centers were plagued by high turnover. The local economies grew, providing workers with other options such as warehouse, mining and construction jobs, according to Shibu Joseph, a former Flowers manager who studied turnover at the centers for a dissertation. People had other avenues for a job that is not as stressful, Mr. Joseph says. For the year ending June 30, 2003, attrition among agents in Alamogordo was 113%; at Ardmore, 71%. People would try the job on and it wasn't to their liking and would leave, says Ms. Thompson at Flowers. Managers had trouble hiring enough agents for peak holiday times, when staffing needs rose to 500 or 600 from 300 people per center. Flowers executives realized they had to change their staffing model. They raised wages, though a spokesman declines to divulge details. They instructed managers to focus on retaining workers. When workers said they didn't like working seven straight days during peak times, managers agreed not to schedule agents for more than six consecutive days. Flowers also bolstered supervisor training. Tina Bayless, site manager for Ardmore, says she recently attended a course that recommended giving workers specific feedback -- such as acknowledging a sales increase -- rather than general praise. When they feel like you're paying attention to the details of [their] performance, it makes them feel better, instead of just saying, 'Oh, good job today,' Ms. Bayless says. She relayed the lesson to her managers. Flowers also expanded its pool of home-based agents around the U.S. to about 500, from 72 about a year ago, Ms. Thompson says. Tapping those agents during peak times eases demands at call centers. To reduce isolation and stress among the home agents, Flowers created Internet chat rooms where they can seek support and advice. For the year ending June 30, 2006, turnover at Alamogordo fell to 52%. But it rose at Ardmore, to 81%. Flowers declined to provide current turnover figures, but says Ardmore has improved recently and overall its efforts seem to be working. The chat room helped Ali Watt, a Long Island, N.Y., mother of four who works as a home-based agent for Flowers. Last year, she heard from a frustrated caller whose funeral-arrangement order hadn't arrived on time. I was panicked, she says. She posted a message in the chat room. A coach helped her cancel the first order, and offer a discount on another. Earlier this year, she was promoted to be a chat room coach herself, helping other agents navigate tricky issues. She works 25 to 30 hours
[Futurework] Strong economic growth: in crime
Organized Crime Takes Lead In Italian Economy, Report Says 23 October 2007 The New York Times javascript:void(0) ROME, Oct. 22 -- Organized crime represents the biggest segment of the Italian economy, accounting for more than $127 billion in receipts, according to a report issued Monday. The new figure reflects a trend that has been under way for a few years, the annual report says. The figure last year was $106 billion, making it not quite the biggest segment of the economy. The report also said the line between legitimate business and criminal activity was becoming harder to discern. The annual report was released by the Confesercenti, an association of small businesses. It says that through various activities -- extortion, usury, contraband, robberies, gambling and Internet piracy -- organized crime accounts for 7 percent of Italy's gross domestic product. ''From the weaving factories, to tourism to business and personal services, from farming to public contracts to real estate and finance, the criminal presence is consolidated in every economic activity,'' the 86-page report said. The report also points to a disturbing trend of collusion in which big businesses participate, especially in public works. ''The businessmen prefer to make a pact with the Mafia rather than denounce the blackmail,'' the report said. The report comes on the heels of a visit to Naples by Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday, when he condemned ''deplorable'' mob violence that he said had insinuated itself into everyday life. Recent news reports have described threats to journalists in Sicily and the Campania region from organized-crime families. Usury represents the most lucrative activity by organized crime, with syndicates taking in $43 billion while racketeering brings in $14 billion, the report estimated. Illegal construction nets about $19 billion. The businesses most afflicted by organized crime are in the south -- in Sicily, Campania, Calabria and Puglia, the report found. The report says 80 percent of the businesses in the Sicilian cities of Catania and Palermo regularly pay protection money, known as ''pizzo.'' === ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
Re: [Futurework] Universal soldier?
This article has no place on FW. What does it have to do with the future of work? If you wish to slam armies and the concept of war then go to another site. If you want to slam Israel then, again, go to another site. Arthur From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Darryl or Natalia Sent: Thursday, October 25, 2007 9:05 PM To: futurework Subject: [Futurework] Universal soldier? What is the future of work in the military to be? Most now fail to see a future force of peace keepers, since it's pretty obvious that controlling the oil industry and acquiring oil for the US are the reasons for most budget allocations. But where does that leave those who would otherwise have enlisted for a career of defense training, when the actual reason for their services is merely one of overcoming and overpowering? Billions are spent on military technological improvements that result in more destruction, deaths and displacement than conventional combat ever did. An emphasis on killing, rather than actual defense, could account for the most obvious failures. In World Wars I and II, soldiers and citizens alike believed they were defending our freedom. Far fewer came back from these wars so damaged psychologically. For Viet Nam, Korea, the Gulf and Iraq wars there has been a deployment of so-called freedom fighters with little to defend but the psychotic egos of the ruling elite. Add to it that the instruments of destruction are now much more sophisticated, and far more harmful to all life forms. Today's soldiers are alarmingly more disassociated from the human targets upon whom misery is inflicted because of this sophistication of weaponry. When an army recruits its troops, what checks are in place to prevent Joe/Jill Psycho from joining the ranks of defenders? How many different qualifying tests does he/she take? And once enlisted, what restraints are ensuring that defense, rather than offense, be the primary motivator for staying in the ranks? It's rather a silly question, isn't it, because civilians aren't usually being protected in these current wars, as evidenced by the high casualties, costly mercenary protection for officials only, and Iraq's billion dollar Green Zone, isolated from any civilian interaction. My deduction, by the recent wars' outcomes and horror stories, is that offense is the operative motivation in modern warfare. I realize the military has some expenditures on personnel who generate beneficial human resources studies and policies, but these outlays, retained primarily for the sake of having public relations reps who can actually field questions, are utterly dwarfed by egregious budgets directed at wiping out the so-called enemy at any expense. With such a pervasive attitude, it's no wonder we have soldiers who are either freshly enlisted or grow to be wholly dangerous. An Israeli psychologist blames Israeli soldiers' immoral and criminal behaviour on boredom and poor training. This is an insane explanation! She's an apologist not only for incompetent army recruiters and top command, but for sadistic individuals who must never be allowed to hide behind the stress of boredom to justify relief at the expense of human life or injury of any type. From everything I've ever read about soldiers anywhere they're stationed, there are always too many amongst them who believe in their right to be brutal -- and most of them get away with it because of commanding officers' implicit approval or fellow troops covering for them. Israel boasts of having the most humane troops in the world in their recruitment efforts. The article below certainly disputes that claim. How many armies of any global significance are left that can define their jobs as being ones which consist strictly of defense? The Pentagon's budget, the US's most crippling, undergoes scant approval, checks or balances. It reaps the largest share of the treasury, thereby establishing its department (if we measure in terms of dollars) as the most revered, above health and welfare, environment, education, etc. Yet the department does nothing beneficially significant for anyone anywhere (excepting the elites' portfolios) and generates more harm than could ever be imagined. One might well conclude that waste by warring is what Americans most value, and that the future expenditures of their nation are assuredly focused upon continued psychotic activity, if not for the painful fact that the immoral self-serving ruling elite actually have control of how the treasury is spent. Same goes for Israel. The future of work, by reason of treasury allocations, is in killing or overcoming, first and foremost. Yet there's no money in it but for the elite and the mercenaries. So, national troops are either initially misled into believing they are developing a career defending their nation, are being recruited against their will, or are being selected specifically because they possess criminal and
Re: [Futurework] Universal soldier?
Armies do commit atrocities. All armies. Even Canadian armies. Yes, even those armies in countries without a free press. Because Israel is a democracy with a relatively free press that these atrocities are made public. Other countries in the mid east have similar stories to tell as do most armies in the world. So go ahead and show righteous indignation. It is only possible because of the relatively open society that is Israel. Anyone for looking at what is going on elsewhere in the mid east? arthur From: Darryl or Natalia [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Fri 10/26/2007 6:11 PM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM Cc: futurework Subject: Re: [Futurework] Universal soldier? Arthur, You are discouraging a discussion of the future of work in the military. Is it less important than the future of the auto sector, agriculture, or any other industry for that matter? That I find its near future to be grim has substantial relevance to this site's mandate. That you feel emotionally charged by my opinion should not preclude its relevance given that the military is the primary focus of the US (and Israeli) economies and more increasingly their cultural well-being. In case you've forgotten, the US is the most frequently discussed economy on this site, and its economy and activities directly affect Canada and the global markets. This was no slam of Israel, Arthur. You're hyper-sensitive beyond the call of loyalty. I was targeting chiefly US military and the elite who control them, but you're saying I overstepped my boundaries regarding Israel for similar behaviour/unspoken policies. The article was shocking to me, and reminded me of Abu Graib stories very actively discussed on this site with most everyone's participation, including your own, without any objections from you. Don't tell me that your recent submission of crime activities and their related illegal economies is anymore relevant to this site. If anything, both organizations are swindling the people. The difference is that people are legally employed by the military; most of the US treasury is being wasted upon it, and yet its institution accomplishes little, but destroys so much. It's a huge sector that you are saying is off-topic because I'm stating that as an employer, its future is costly, bleak and without meaningful direction? I realize that most men currently contributing to this site are WWII Vets, or are still tied to the military. As a Vet, one would think that the future of such a significant sector would be of concern. When we envision an ideal future of work, are you suggesting that the military are to be exempt from criticism or are to be off-topic altogether? I'm someone who would prefer a peace corps, but let's not squash a valid discussion because you can't deal with my opinions in this respect. You can't say this is irrelevant. It's hugely relevant, just as war-related industries are hugely relevant. The US military is stationed in 130 nations, and is the largest nuke peddler on the planet. Since when does such economic activity bear no relation to the future of work? Natalia Kuzmyn Cordell, Arthur: ECOM wrote: This article has no place on FW. What does it have to do with the future of work? If you wish to slam armies and the concept of war then go to another site. If you want to slam Israel then, again, go to another site. Arthur From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Darryl or Natalia Sent: Thursday, October 25, 2007 9:05 PM To: futurework Subject: [Futurework] Universal soldier? What is the future of work in the military to be? Most now fail to see a future force of peace keepers, since it's pretty obvious that controlling the oil industry and acquiring oil for the US are the reasons for most budget allocations. But where does that leave those who would otherwise have enlisted for a career of defense training, when the actual reason for their services is merely one of overcoming and overpowering? Billions are spent on military technological improvements that result in more destruction, deaths and displacement than conventional combat ever did. An emphasis on killing, rather than actual defense, could account for the most obvious failures. In World Wars I and II, soldiers and citizens alike believed they were defending our freedom. Far fewer came back from these wars so damaged psychologically. For Viet Nam, Korea, the Gulf and Iraq wars there has been a deployment of so-called freedom fighters with little to defend but the psychotic egos of the ruling elite. Add to it that the instruments of destruction are now much more sophisticated, and far more harmful to all life forms. Today's soldiers are alarmingly more disassociated from the human targets
Re: [Futurework] Universal soldier?
Natalia, You say in your posting. I realize that most men currently contributing to this site are WWII Vets, or are still tied to the military. You are saying something that is not proven. There is one poster from National Defence. Perhaps one other poster is a veteran. Beyond that your statement is like so many you have posted: A rant, without evidence. I too am against war. But I realize that sometimes armies have to be created to protect citizens, even those who prefer a peace corps From: Darryl or Natalia [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Fri 10/26/2007 6:11 PM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM Cc: futurework Subject: Re: [Futurework] Universal soldier? Arthur, You are discouraging a discussion of the future of work in the military. Is it less important than the future of the auto sector, agriculture, or any other industry for that matter? That I find its near future to be grim has substantial relevance to this site's mandate. That you feel emotionally charged by my opinion should not preclude its relevance given that the military is the primary focus of the US (and Israeli) economies and more increasingly their cultural well-being. In case you've forgotten, the US is the most frequently discussed economy on this site, and its economy and activities directly affect Canada and the global markets. This was no slam of Israel, Arthur. You're hyper-sensitive beyond the call of loyalty. I was targeting chiefly US military and the elite who control them, but you're saying I overstepped my boundaries regarding Israel for similar behaviour/unspoken policies. The article was shocking to me, and reminded me of Abu Graib stories very actively discussed on this site with most everyone's participation, including your own, without any objections from you. Don't tell me that your recent submission of crime activities and their related illegal economies is anymore relevant to this site. If anything, both organizations are swindling the people. The difference is that people are legally employed by the military; most of the US treasury is being wasted upon it, and yet its institution accomplishes little, but destroys so much. It's a huge sector that you are saying is off-topic because I'm stating that as an employer, its future is costly, bleak and without meaningful direction? I realize that most men currently contributing to this site are WWII Vets, or are still tied to the military. As a Vet, one would think that the future of such a significant sector would be of concern. When we envision an ideal future of work, are you suggesting that the military are to be exempt from criticism or are to be off-topic altogether? I'm someone who would prefer a peace corps, but let's not squash a valid discussion because you can't deal with my opinions in this respect. You can't say this is irrelevant. It's hugely relevant, just as war-related industries are hugely relevant. The US military is stationed in 130 nations, and is the largest nuke peddler on the planet. Since when does such economic activity bear no relation to the future of work? Natalia Kuzmyn Cordell, Arthur: ECOM wrote: This article has no place on FW. What does it have to do with the future of work? If you wish to slam armies and the concept of war then go to another site. If you want to slam Israel then, again, go to another site. Arthur From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Darryl or Natalia Sent: Thursday, October 25, 2007 9:05 PM To: futurework Subject: [Futurework] Universal soldier? What is the future of work in the military to be? Most now fail to see a future force of peace keepers, since it's pretty obvious that controlling the oil industry and acquiring oil for the US are the reasons for most budget allocations. But where does that leave those who would otherwise have enlisted for a career of defense training, when the actual reason for their services is merely one of overcoming and overpowering? Billions are spent on military technological improvements that result in more destruction, deaths and displacement than conventional combat ever did. An emphasis on killing, rather than actual defense, could account for the most obvious failures. In World Wars I and II, soldiers and citizens alike believed they were defending our freedom. Far fewer came back from these wars so damaged psychologically. For Viet Nam, Korea, the Gulf and Iraq wars there has been a deployment of so-called freedom fighters with little to defend but the psychotic egos of the ruling elite. Add to it that the instruments of destruction are now much more sophisticated, and far more harmful to all life forms. Today's soldiers are alarmingly more disassociated from the human targets upon
Re: [Futurework] Audit on Mental Health care for Cdn soldiers inAfghanistan
This one is for Natalia. - http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/americas-army.htm http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/americas-army.htm How America's Army Works- The U.S. military has spent millions of dollars and thousands of man-hours on ... a video game. America's Army is free and it has amazing features. Why are people getting so upset about it? From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Darryl or Natalia Sent: Thursday, November 1, 2007 2:45 PM To: futurework Subject: [Futurework] Audit on Mental Health care for Cdn soldiers inAfghanistan I suspect our affected soldiers are doing better than affected US troops, but the stories of how soldiers are financially under-supported to help them cope with the emotional costs of being heroes bear similarity. The audit is perplexing because it is determined that almost twice as much funding goes to health care for military patients compared to that spent on civilians, perhaps due to the disturbing fact that one in five soldiers returning from Afghanistan suffer head injuries, yet mental health care is deemed inadequate. If that is the case, then my point, way back when I first wanted to discuss the future of work in today's military, is at least in part, explored here. With military spending mostly focused upon weaponry and equipment, success of the missions in which they partake trumps mental well being of the actual troops who make the sacrifice. Unchecked, this becomes not only a systemic failure, but is cumulative, contributing to skepticism of top command's/government's priorities. BTW: I just learned from the CBC that the recruitment byline being used in Cdn. high schools and universities is COME FIGHT WITH US. Not, come defend with us! Hmmn. So they are targeting the most aggressive amongst youth after-all. Oh, and we now have the Israeli army also recruiting our youth under a program called Sar-el, who have already sent me some spam for just going to their website @ sarelcanada.org. I also learned that the Canadian government's largest cash outlay on youth programs, $1 billion, has gone to the military youth camps program, where they get a taste for firing grenades and rifles. Now, is that in keeping with putting defence first? Afghanistan veterans not getting needed mental health care, audit finds Mike Blanchfield , CanWest News Service Published: Tuesday, October 30, 2007 OTTAWA - The Canadian Forces are falling short in meeting the mental health needs of soldiers returning from Afghanistan because the demand for care is outstripping available resources, Auditor General Sheila Fraser said in a report to Parliament Tuesday. The shortfalls, which came to light as part of a broader audit of the rising cost of military health care, suggest the military has yet to learn some hard lessons of the past decade, when retired general Romeo Dallaire, now a Liberal senator, offered himself as a poster boy for the mental health suffering of many Canadian peacekeepers who served with him in Rwanda or on other operations in the Balkans. This latest audit suggests that the Defence Department is failing to meet the needs of the new generation of men and women currently serving in Afghanistan as part of the military's most demanding combat mission since the Korean War more than half a century ago. One disabled veteran of Canada's involvement in the first Persian Gulf War of 1991 questioned how the Forces can justify purchasing $20 billion worth of new planes, helicopters and other hardware, while neglecting the well documented mental health needs of their personnel. The care of families for mental health is quite small compared to some of these equipment purchases, said Sean Bruyea, a former intelligence officer who has battled post-traumatic stress. The most important resource of the military is the soldier, and the family is the primary support of that soldier. The audit singled out CFB Petawawa, Ont., near Ottawa, and CFB Gagetown, N.B., as two military bases where the mental health services offered to Afghanistan veterans and their families are inadequate. The department recognizes that treating mental health illnesses appropriately should also address the member's environment, which for many members means helping the family cope as well. Thus, in order to meet obligations to treat the member, the department may also need to include the family, the audit said. However, when surveyed by the department, mental health services in places such as CFB Petawawa and CFB Gagetown - bases with large numbers of members returning from deployment in Afghanistan - said they were unable to extend member care to include family support because of resource shortages. Officials with the auditor general's office stressed that the Defence Department has no legal obligation to treat families, only military personnel. But the military itself has acknowledged that
[Futurework] Decline of the Tenure Track Raises Concerns at Colleges
National Desk; SECTA Decline of the Tenure Track Raises Concerns at Colleges 20 November 2007The New York Times DEARBORN, Mich. -- Professors with tenure or who are on a tenure track are now a distinct minority on the country's campuses, as the ranks of part-time instructors and professors hired on a contract have swelled, according to federal figures analyzed by the American Association of University Professors. Elaine Zendlovitz, a former retail store manager who began teaching college courses six years ago, is representative of the change. Technically, Ms. Zendlovitz is a part-time Spanish professor, although, in fact, she teaches nearly all the time. Her days begin at the University of Michigan, Dearborn, with introductory classes. Some days end at 10 p.m. at Oakland Community College, in the suburbs north of Detroit, as she teaches six courses at four institutions. ''I think we part-timers can be everything a full-timer can be,'' Ms. Zendlovitz said during a break in a 10-hour teaching day. But she acknowledged: ''It's harder to spend time with students. I don't have the prep time, and I know how to prepare a fabulous class.'' The shift from a tenured faculty results from financial pressures, administrators' desire for more flexibility in hiring, firing and changing course offerings, and the growth of community colleges and regional public universities focused on teaching basics and preparing students for jobs. It has become so extreme, however, that some universities are pulling back, concerned about the effect on educational quality. Rutgers University agreed in a labor settlement in August to add 100 tenure or tenure-track positions. Across the country, faculty unions are organizing part-timers. And the American Federation of Teachers is pushing legislation in 11 states to mandate that 75 percent of classes be taught by tenured or tenure-track teachers. Three decades ago, adjuncts -- both part-timers and full-timers not on a tenure track -- represented only 43 percent of professors, according to the professors association, which has studied data reported to the federal Education Department. Currently, the association says, they account for nearly 70 percent of professors at colleges and universities, both public and private. John W. Curtis, the union's director of research and public policy, said that while the number of tenured and tenure-track professors has increased by about 25 percent over the past 30 years, they have been swamped by the growth in adjunct faculty. Over all, the number of people teaching at colleges and universities has doubled since 1975. University officials agree that the use of nontraditional faculty is soaring. But some contest the professors association's calculation, saying that definitions of part-time and full-time professors vary, and that it is not possible to determine how many courses, on average, each category of professor actually teaches. Many state university presidents say tight budgets have made it inevitable that they turn to adjuncts to save money. ''We have to contend with increasing public demands for accountability, increased financial scrutiny and declining state support,'' said Charles F. Harrington, provost of the University of North Carolina, Pembroke. ''One of the easiest, most convenient ways of dealing with these pressures is using part-time faculty,'' he said, though he cautioned that colleges that rely too heavily on such faculty ''are playing a really dangerous game.'' Mark B. Rosenberg, chancellor of the State University System of Florida, said that part-timers can provide real-world experience to students and fill gaps in nursing, math, accounting and other disciplines with a shortage of qualified faculty. He also said the shift could come with costs. Adjuncts are less likely to have doctoral degrees, educators say. They also have less time to meet with students, and research suggests that students who take many courses with them are somewhat less likely to graduate. ''Really, we are offering less educational quality to the students who need it most,'' said Ronald G. Ehrenberg, director of the Cornell Higher Education Research Institute, noting that the soaring number of adjunct faculty is most pronounced in community colleges and the less select public universities. The elite universities, both public and private, have the fewest adjuncts. ''It's not that some of these adjuncts aren't great teachers,'' Dr. Ehrenberg said. ''Many don't have the support that the tenure-track faculty have, in terms of offices, secretarial help and time. Their teaching loads are higher, and they have less time to focus on students.'' Dr. Ehrenberg and a colleague analyzed 15 years of national data and found that graduation rates declined when public universities hired large numbers of contingent faculty. Several studies of individual universities have determined that freshmen taught by many part-timers were more likely to drop out. ''Having
[Futurework] FW: A Brief History of Christmas
A Brief History of Christmas By John Steele Gordon 21 December 2007 The Wall Street Journal javascript:void(0) Christmas famously comes but once a year. In fact, however, it comes twice. The Christmas of the Nativity, the manger and Christ child, the wise men and the star of Bethlehem, Silent Night and Hark the Herald Angels Sing is one holiday. The Christmas of parties, Santa Claus, evergreens, presents, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and Jingle Bells is quite another. But because both celebrations fall on Dec. 25, the two are constantly confused. Religious Christians condemn taking the Christ out of Christmas, while First Amendment absolutists see a threat to the separation of church and state in every poinsettia on public property and school dramatization of A Christmas Carol. A little history can clear things up. The Christmas of parties and presents is far older than the Nativity. Most ancient cultures celebrated the winter solstice, when the sun reaches its lowest point and begins to climb once more in the sky. In ancient Rome, this festival was called the Saturnalia and ran from Dec. 17 to Dec. 24. During that week, no work was done, and the time was spent in parties, games, gift giving and decorating the houses with evergreens. (Sound familiar?) It was, needless to say, a very popular holiday. In its earliest days, Christianity did not celebrate the Nativity at all. Only two of the four Gospels even mention it. Instead, the Church calendar was centered on Easter, still by far the most important day in the Christian year. The Last Supper was a Seder, celebrating Passover, which falls on the day of the full moon in the first month of spring in the Hebrew calendar. So in A.D. 325, the Council of Nicea decided that Easter should fall on the Sunday following the first full moon of spring. That's why Easter and its associated days, such as Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, are moveable feasts, moving about the calendar at the whim of the moon. It is a mark of how late Christmas came to the Christian calendar that it is not a moveable feast, but a fixed one, determined by the solar calendar established by Julius Caesar and still in use today (although slightly tweaked in the 16th century). By the time of the Council of Nicea, the Christian Church was making converts by the thousands and, in hopes of still more converts, in 354 Pope Liberius decided to add the Nativity to the church calendar. He also decided to celebrate it on Dec. 25. It was, frankly, a marketing ploy with a little political savvy thrown in. History does not tell us exactly when in the year Christ was born, but according to the Gospel of St. Luke, shepherds were abiding in the field and keeping watch over their flocks by night. This would imply a date in the spring or summer when the flocks were up in the hills and needed to be guarded. In winter they were kept safely in corrals. So Dec. 25 must have been chosen for other reasons. It is hard to escape the idea that by making Christmas fall immediately after the Saturnalia, the Pope invited converts to still enjoy the fun and games of the ancient holiday and just call it Christmas. Also, Dec. 25 was the day of the sun god, Sol Invictus, associated with the emperor. By using that date, the church tied itself to the imperial system. By the high Middle Ages, Christmas was a rowdy, bawdy time, often inside the church as well as outside it. In France, many parishes celebrated the Feast of the Ass, supposedly honoring the donkey that had brought Mary to Bethlehem. Donkeys were brought into the church and the mass ended with priests and parishioners alike making donkey noises. In the so-called Feast of Fools, the lower clergy would elect a bishop of fools to temporarily run the diocese and make fun of church ceremonial and discipline. With this sort of thing going on inside the church to celebrate the Nativity, one can easily imagine the drunken and sexual revelries going on outside it to celebrate what was in all but name the Saturnalia. With the Reformation, Protestants tried to rid the church of practices unknown in its earliest days and get back to Christian roots. Most Protestant sects abolished priestly celibacy (and often the priesthood itself), the cult of the Virgin Mary, relics, confession and . . . Christmas. In the English-speaking world, Christmas was abolished in Scotland in 1563 and in England after the Puritans took power in the 1640s. It returned with the Restoration in 1660, but the celebrations never regained their medieval and Elizabethan abandon. There was still no Christmas in Puritan New England, where Dec. 25 was just another working day. In the South, where the Church of England predominated, Christmas was celebrated as in England. In the middle colonies, matters were mixed. In polyglot New York, the Dutch Reformed Church did not celebrate Christmas. The Anglicans and
[Futurework] compare executive pay
SEC launches Web tool to compare executive pay http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071221/bs_nm/sec_paydata_dcprinter=1;_ylt= AqHLJqxge5MQxBLvBcX8miyb.HQA The Securities and Exchange Commission launched an interactive tool on Friday that gives investors and the public an easier way to compare executive pay and benefits at 500 of the largest U.S. companies. The online tool includes direct links to full proxy statements, including footnotes and the companies' explanation of their compensation decisions. The site -- www.sec.gov/xbrl -- also lets users compare pay data by industry, executive type and size of company, among other specifications. (Reporting by Karey Wutkowski; Editing by Andre Grenon) ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] Airline Employees Anger
NY Times December 22, 2007 Fliers Fed Up? Airline Employees Feel the Same By JEFF BAILEY http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/b/jeff_bailey/index.html?inline=nyt-per And you thought the passengers were mad. Airline employees are fed up, too - with pay cuts, increased workloads and management's miserly ways, which leave workers to explain to often-enraged passengers why flying has become such a miserable experience. A rich record of the employee discontent emerges from regular question-and-answer sessions held at US Airways http://www.nytimes.com/mem/MWredirect.html?MW=http://custom.marketwatch.com/custom/nyt-com/html-companyprofile.aspsymb=LCC , which is both the worst-performing big airline in the country and a company that encourages its 36,000 workers to direct tough questions at its chief executive, W. Douglas Parker. Doug, I watched you on CNBC today, said one e-mail message from a worker, sent on Oct. 25. And I hate to tell you but the interiors of our plans [sic] smell bad and they are filthy. As an employee I am embarrassed to admit working for US Airways. When are you going to quit talking and do something about it? The rancor is not any worse at US Airways than at most other big carriers. What is different is that Mr. Parker, 46, subscribes to the let-it-all-hang-out school of employee relations. He says management learns a lot about how the airline is actually performing through an uncensored give-and-take - and he willingly provided transcripts of the Q. and A. sessions. The brawling dialogue does, however, suggest that airline service might get worse before it gets better. The current US Airways is a result of the most recent big airline merger, with America West Airlines in 2005. Mr. Parker tried unsuccessfully to acquire Delta Air Lines http://www.nytimes.com/mem/MWredirect.html?MW=http://custom.marketwatch.com/custom/nyt-com/html-companyprofile.aspsymb=DAL a year ago. Now, other airlines are mulling mergers as a way of cutting costs to offset high fuel expenses. Such deals could start a broader service decline. In recent months, US Airways had the worst record for on-time flights and misplaced bags among the major airlines and it piled up the most customer complaints at the Transportation Department. How long do you think the airline will be around the way it's running right now? a US Airways worker wrote in July. Many US Airways employee questions are more parochial - about benefits and free travel privileges. But quite a few inquiries reflect the workers' concerns for customers. Who thought it would be a good idea to have pink Pepto-Bismol ads on tray tables talking about diarrhea? a worker wrote in July. The Pepto ads were replaced in August. Another employee wondered in October 2006: Why can we not get better quality snack items for our coach customers? One customer recently compared the generic pretzel nubs we serve to the fish food you buy in a .25 gumball machine at any zoo or park. Actually, fish food would appear to be too costly. We've worked with our purchasing team, management explained, to bring in many companies to compete on our main cabin tidbit item (pretzels). To date, no one has been able to match our current cost, about 3 cents per package. Mr. Parker, at quarterly sessions, answers a mix of questions from workers who have crowded into a meeting room at the Tempe, Ariz., headquarters and those sent by e-mail from around the country. The sessions are videoconferenced companywide. Workers who normally answer questions from the media handle the overflow on those occasions, posting answers on an internal Web site and putting some of the exchanges in a weekly newsletter. They often quote prior remarks by Mr. Parker, so much of the grilling is directly addressed to him. What makes the exchanges unusual in corporate America is that the questions are presented precisely as they were asked, full of attitude and, often, anger. Not some sanitized version, Mr. Parker said in an interview. Employees, he added, are going to talk about it anyway. So, last April, a question came in: A statement that Doug made in a letter today was 'Most of our reliability issues were related to a difficult reservations system migration. That project is now back on track ...' NO IT IS NOT, not even close! Could we please use some of the money that we were going to purchase Delta and get a computer system with the capabilities that we require? Another question that day: I was on an Airbus http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/airbus_sas/index.html?inline=nyt-org yesterday that was extremely dirty. The headrests on the blue fabric seats were a grayish brown color. Several seats were ripped. The seat cushions had no cushion left. Are we the 99-cent store airline? How do I take pride in this product? Airline mergers may be profitable but, in the short term at least, they are rough on
[Futurework] France looks to alternative to GDP
French Use Happiness As Economic Measure AP Business Writer 782 words 10 January 2008 Associated Press Newswires javascript:void(0) . PARIS (AP) - What price happiness? French President Nicolas Sarkozy is seeking an answer to the eternal question -- so that happiness can be included in measurements of French economic growth. He's turned to two Nobel economists to help him, hoping that if happiness is added to the count, the persistently sluggish French economy may seem more rosy. It reflects a general feeling in Europe that says, 'OK, the U.S. has been more successful in the last 20, 25 years in raising material welfare, but does this mean they are happier?' said Paul de Grauwe, economics professor at Leuven University in Belgium. The answer is no, because there are other elements to happiness, said Grauwe, once a candidate for the European Central Bank governing council. In terms of gross domestic product, the internationally recognized way of measuring the size of an economy, French growth lagged behind the U.S. throughout most of the 1980s and '90s and in every year since 2001. Although recent turmoil in financial markets may hit the U.S. economy harder, the loss of speed in the world economy's biggest player will also drag down growth in France. Economists say growth may fall short of the government targets this year. Sarkozy's move raised questions about whether he wants to ward off disappointing growth numbers as a rise in oil and food prices combined with a slowdown in the U.S. clouds the effect of his economic reforms. Since his election in May he has sought to boost growth, notably by encouraging people to work longer than the much maligned 35-hour week. Sarkozy has often appeared impatient with the French economy's lackluster performance, once declaring: I will not wait for growth, I will go out and find it. Frustrated with the what he termed Tuesday the growing gap between statistics that show continuing progress and the increasing difficulties (French people) are having in their daily lives, Sarkozy said new thought should be given to the way GDP is calculated to take into account quality of life. At a news conference Tuesday, Sarkozy said he asked U.S. economist Joseph Stiglitz, winner of the 2001 Nobel economics prize and a critic of free market economists, and Armatya Sen of India, who won the 1998 Nobel prize for work on developing countries, to lead the analysis in France. Sen helped create the United Nations' Human Development Index, a yearly welfare indicator designed to gear international policy decisions to take account of health and living standards. Once the preserve of philosophers, measuring happiness has now become a hot topic in economics. A recent report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development considers taking into account leisure time and income distribution when calculating a nation's well-being. And the European Commission is working on a new indicator that moves beyond GDP to account for factors such as environmental progress. Richard Layard, a professor at the London School of Economics and author of the 2005 book Happiness: Lessons from a New Science, said Sarkozy may be seeking recognition for policies, popular in Europe, that promote well-being but don't show up in the GDP statistics. Governments are rated on economic performance, and this influences policy in favor of boosting GDP, the value of goods and services produced over a calendar year, he said. But people don't want to think they live in a world of ruthless competition where everyone is against everyone, Layard said. Valuable things are being lost, such as community values, solidarity. His book shows that depression, alcoholism and crime have risen in the last 50 years, even as average incomes more than doubled. Jean-Philippe Cotis, the former OECD chief economist who took over as head of France's statistics office Insee two months ago, said Wednesday that a measure of happiness would complement GDP by taking into account factors such as leisure time -- something France has a lot of. France's unemployment rate is stubbornly high, and when French people do work they spend less time on the job -- 35.9 hours per week compared with the EU average of 37.4. Cotis said he looked forward to a passionate debate beyond the traditional realms of his science. Statisticians are also interested in happiness, he said. And so, it would seem, are presidents. Basking in the happy glow of new love with model-turned-singer Carla Bruni, Sarkozy showed on Tuesday that his concern for happiness is universal. A president, he said, doesn't have more right to happiness than anyone else, but not less than anyone, either. = ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] test
@3:45 ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] FW: France looks to alternative to GDP
French Use Happiness As Economic Measure AP Business Writer 782 words 10 January 2008 Associated Press Newswires javascript:void(0) . PARIS (AP) - What price happiness? French President Nicolas Sarkozy is seeking an answer to the eternal question -- so that happiness can be included in measurements of French economic growth. He's turned to two Nobel economists to help him, hoping that if happiness is added to the count, the persistently sluggish French economy may seem more rosy. It reflects a general feeling in Europe that says, 'OK, the U.S. has been more successful in the last 20, 25 years in raising material welfare, but does this mean they are happier?' said Paul de Grauwe, economics professor at Leuven University in Belgium. The answer is no, because there are other elements to happiness, said Grauwe, once a candidate for the European Central Bank governing council. In terms of gross domestic product, the internationally recognized way of measuring the size of an economy, French growth lagged behind the U.S. throughout most of the 1980s and '90s and in every year since 2001. Although recent turmoil in financial markets may hit the U.S. economy harder, the loss of speed in the world economy's biggest player will also drag down growth in France. Economists say growth may fall short of the government targets this year. Sarkozy's move raised questions about whether he wants to ward off disappointing growth numbers as a rise in oil and food prices combined with a slowdown in the U.S. clouds the effect of his economic reforms. Since his election in May he has sought to boost growth, notably by encouraging people to work longer than the much maligned 35-hour week. Sarkozy has often appeared impatient with the French economy's lackluster performance, once declaring: I will not wait for growth, I will go out and find it. Frustrated with the what he termed Tuesday the growing gap between statistics that show continuing progress and the increasing difficulties (French people) are having in their daily lives, Sarkozy said new thought should be given to the way GDP is calculated to take into account quality of life. At a news conference Tuesday, Sarkozy said he asked U.S. economist Joseph Stiglitz, winner of the 2001 Nobel economics prize and a critic of free market economists, and Armatya Sen of India, who won the 1998 Nobel prize for work on developing countries, to lead the analysis in France. Sen helped create the United Nations' Human Development Index, a yearly welfare indicator designed to gear international policy decisions to take account of health and living standards. Once the preserve of philosophers, measuring happiness has now become a hot topic in economics. A recent report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development considers taking into account leisure time and income distribution when calculating a nation's well-being. And the European Commission is working on a new indicator that moves beyond GDP to account for factors such as environmental progress. Richard Layard, a professor at the London School of Economics and author of the 2005 book Happiness: Lessons from a New Science, said Sarkozy may be seeking recognition for policies, popular in Europe, that promote well-being but don't show up in the GDP statistics. Governments are rated on economic performance, and this influences policy in favor of boosting GDP, the value of goods and services produced over a calendar year, he said. But people don't want to think they live in a world of ruthless competition where everyone is against everyone, Layard said. Valuable things are being lost, such as community values, solidarity. His book shows that depression, alcoholism and crime have risen in the last 50 years, even as average incomes more than doubled. Jean-Philippe Cotis, the former OECD chief economist who took over as head of France's statistics office Insee two months ago, said Wednesday that a measure of happiness would complement GDP by taking into account factors such as leisure time -- something France has a lot of. France's unemployment rate is stubbornly high, and when French people do work they spend less time on the job -- 35.9 hours per week compared with the EU average of 37.4. Cotis said he looked forward to a passionate debate beyond the traditional realms of his science. Statisticians are also interested in happiness, he said. And so, it would seem, are presidents. Basking in the happy glow of new love with model-turned-singer Carla Bruni, Sarkozy showed on Tuesday that his concern for happiness is universal. A president, he said, doesn't have more right to happiness than anyone else, but not less than anyone, either. = ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca
Re: [Futurework] The Collapse of Globalism
http://www.google.ca/search?hl=enq=review%3A+The+Collapse+of+GlobalismbtnG=Google+Searchmeta= 40k - Cached - Similar pages How to Save the WorldJohn Ralston Saul's new book The Collapse of Globalism is saying what most economists have been afraid to say: The emperor has no clothes. . 9-11 Review ... blogs.salon.com/0002007/2005/08/04.html - 110k - Cached - Similar pages Amazon.co.uk: The Collapse of Globalism: And the Reinvention of ...This review is from: The Collapse of Globalism (Hardcover). With a calm detachment, punctuated by occasional wit, the Canadian philosopher J.R. Saul ... www.amazon.co.uk/Collapse-Globalism-Reinvention-World/dp/1843544091 - 139k - Cached - Similar pages John Ralston Saul: The Collapse of Globalism - Cafe Book BlogHaving received a review copy of The Collapse of Globalism a week and half I just watched a recording of John Ralston Saul's October 8 speech on The . ... writerscafe.ca/book_blogs/writers/john-ralston-saul_the-collapse-of-globalism.php - 50k - Cached - Similar pages Amazon.com: The Collapse of Globalism: And the Reinvention of the ...This review is from: The Collapse of Globalism: And the Reinvention of the World (Hardcover). The Collapse of Globalism is a book-length version of an ... www.amazon.com/Collapse-Globalism-Reinvention-World/dp/1585676292 - 219k - Cached - Similar pages Amazon.com: The Collapse of Globalism: And the Reinvention of the ...This review is from: The Collapse of Globalism: And the Reinvention of the World (Hardcover). If this were a series of audio tapes with an liberal allowance ... www.amazon.com/Collapse-Globalism-Reinvention-World/dp/0670063673 - 207k - Cached - Similar pages More results from www.amazon.com » Saul, 'The Collapse Of Globalism' « Like Pulling Teeth4 Responses to Saul, 'The Collapse Of Globalism'. Well, look who's joined the blogosphere! SEBOTRON! You should review Martin Wolf's Why Globalisation ... spstrangio.wordpress.com/2007/11/23/saul-the-collapse-of-globalism/ - 22k - Cached - Similar pages chapters.indigo.ca: The Collapse of Globalism: And the Reinvention ...His scintillating investigation into the collapse of globalism is essential reading for ... Average Customer Rating: 3. Anonymous's Review. Write a Review ... www.chapters.indigo.ca/.../9780670063673-53815-Review.html - 32k - Cached - Similar pages John Ralston Saul's 'The Collapse of Globalism'Having received a review copy of The Collapse of Globalism a week and half before, I must say that I was only able to get half way through it before seeing ... www.blogto.com/arts/2005/06/john_ralston_sauls_the_collapse_of_globalism/ - 48k - Cached - Similar pages The Collapse of Globalism and the Reinvention of the WorldRésumé: John Ralston SaulThe Collapse of Globalism and the Reinvention of the ... As I write this review, in September 2007, the most recent of these ... agora.qc.ca/cosmopolis.nsf/Articles/no2007_2_The_Collapse_of_Globalism_and_the_Reinvention_of_t?OpenDocument - 24k - Cached - Similar pages -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Ed Weick Sent: Monday, January 21, 2008 10:02 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [Futurework] The Collapse of Globalism I know I have it and that I've read it though I'll be damned if I can find it right now or even, with any clarity, remember what it said. It was three years ago, after all. However, a few months ago I also picked up a book at a used bookshop, The Mind and the Market by Jerry Z. Muller. It deals with how various heavy thinkers such as Voltaire, Adam Smith, Edmund Burke, Marx and Hegel thought about economics and its place in society. The message in general is that how the economy was dealt with had to fit the prevailing philosophical, religious and political views of the time. I would suggest that things are different now. We live in a world that has collapsed into itself and where things that once happened in far off places now intrude into our own back yards. In my view, economics, far from being linked to philosophy or religion, tries to make some rational sense of what is going on, but in a compressed world in which what happens in China can affect us as much as what happens next door. I may comment more if I can find Saul's book. Ed - Original Message - From: Mike Spencer [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, January 20, 2008 8:09 PM Subject: [Futurework] The Collapse of Globalism To the extent that globalism is a significant factor work work, this should be on-topic. I just found John Ralston Saul's 2005 book, _The Collapse of Globalism and the Reinvention of the World_ [1] on the remainder shelf for a couple of bucks. (I guess I should get out more if the remainder shelf is the first I've heard of a new book by our former First Gentleman. :-) Has anybody (or everybody) else already seen and read this? If so,
Re: [Futurework] [Ottawadissenters] Bubbles anyone?
I glanced at the article, thumbing through it at the newstand. The closing paragraphs indicate that another bubble is needed to support the losses from the previous bubble. This would mean that we have to create still more debt to support the next bubble. The new bubble would rest on new money minus the losses absorbed by banks and citizens. This time around I think both banks and citizens will need a longish rest before they re-enter the casino economy .. This is why a rest or recession is likely. Citizens who have lost will want to leave the table. So the article was interesting and cynical and essentially said that a sucker is born every minute. I think it will really be that a sucker is born every decade. arthur From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Ed Weick Sent: Thursday, January 24, 2008 7:50 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: futurework Subject: [Ottawadissenters] Bubbles anyone? There is a very thought provoking article in February's Harper's: The Next Bubble; priming the markets for tomorrow's big crash. It's by Eric Janszen who has had considerable experience in America's financial sector. Janszen argues that since the 1970s, high value goods producing industries such as steel and automobiles have no longer played a dominant role in the US economy - such items, though still made in the US, could be purchased more cheaply from countries with lower labour costs, such as China and Japan. The industry that has come to dominate the US is what he calls FIRE, finance, insurance and real estate. When goods producing industries were dominant, the year to year pattern of market behaviour consisted of moderate booms and busts. If too much was produced, slowdowns or recessions occurred. If too little was produced, aggregate demand rose, leading to a booming economy. Keynesianism made sense in that kind of economy. The economy could be stimulated out of a recession by government spending on infrastructure. A boom could be moderated by a tightening of government expenditures. The economy works very differently under FIRE. Booms and busts really don't matter very much anymore. Bubbles matter. Bubbles involve the ramping up of activity in a particular economic sector, driving its securities up to very high values, packaging good and bad securities into Consolidated Debt Obligations (CDOs) and then marketing the CDOs nationally and internationally. That is essentially what happened during the high-tech boom of the 1990s. Share prices were inflated to levels much higher than the values of the assets they represented. Everyone wanted into the game and a lot of money was lost when share prices collapsed at the beginning of this century. Recently, real estate, and particularly housing has followed a similar pattern. What the bubble phenomenon depends on is a widespread belief that what the investor is putting money into is something good that cannot possibly fail or won't be allowed to fail. In the 1990s, high-tech was the future we couldn't live without. It was well worth buying into and wouldn't be allowed to fail. The subprime mortgage fiasco has been much the same thing. Everyone deserved to own their own home and, as Barry has pointed out, it wasn't just a modest starter home they deserved, it was a big house with a two car garage and the possibility of adding a swimming pool in a few years. So what is going to generate the next bubble? Janszen argues that one possibility is alternative energy. It is a wide open field which includes everything from nuclear power, to wind power, to ethanol, to many other possibilities. It already has its marketable heroes who are in the forefront of saving the environment and who recognize that we can't keeping sucking oil out of the ground forever, people like Al Gore. Focusing on it will undoubtedly produce some very good and necessary things, far more so than real estate, but it will likely also draw a lot of people in and suck a lot of money out of them. Ed __._,_.___ http://geo.yahoo.com/serv?s=97476590/grpId=15209059/grpspId=1705083512/ msgId=7603/stime=120128 Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional Change settings via the Web http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/join;_ylc=X3oDMTJnZmprbz VrBF9TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZn RyBHNsawNzdG5ncwRzdGltZQMxMjAxMjIyMjI4 (Yahoo! ID required) Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Delivery: Digest | Switch to Fully Featured mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Delivery Format: Fully Featured Visit Your Group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters;_ylc=X3oDMTJlOXAzOTJ0BF9 TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHN sawNocGYEc3RpbWUDMTIwMTIyMjIyOA-- | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ | Unsubscribe mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] __,_._,___ ___
[Futurework] FW: job market is even worse than you think
__ From: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM Sent: Monday, February 4, 2008 11:51 AM To: futurework Subject: job market is even worse than you think Why job market is even worse than you think Nation's first job loss in more than four years tells only part of the story of the weak labor market. The ranks of the long-term unemployed are growing. By Chris Isidore, CNNMoney.com senior writer http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/01/news/economy/longterm_unemployment/ind ex.htm?section=money_mostpopular February 2 2008: 9:05 AM EST NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- A government report on January jobs showing that employers trimmed payrolls for the first time in four years set off alarm bells. But the report, which was released Friday, tells only part of the story about the underlying weakness in the labor market. The number of Americans out of work for at least six months is rising - reaching levels more typically seen deep into a recession or period of job contraction, not at the beginning. And while some economists believe that the drop in jobs reported in January might later be revised away to show a narrow gain, it's clear that the rise in long-term unemployment is a far more established trend and one economists say isn't going away anytime soon. Harder to find a new job. The number of long-term unemployed stood at a seasonally-adjusted 1.4 million in January, up about 21% from year-earlier levels and up 3% from the previous month. The full-year average for 2007 was 1.2 million long-term unemployed, nearly double the reading for 2000 - just before the last recession. For all of 2007, about 17.6% of those who were unemployed had been out of work six months or more. That compares to only 11.4% who were long-term unemployed in 2000. And while the unemployment rate dropped to 4.9% in January from 5% in December, the latest reading showed 18.3% of the unemployed have now been out of work for at least six months. You have to understand that 5% unemployment today is worse than 5% unemployment 10-15 years ago, said Jason Furman, senior fellow, Brookings Institution. Furman and others say long-term unemployment is not just a problem for those struggling to find jobs. It poses a risk for the economy as a whole and cuts into household earnings and economic output. If 5% of the labor force is unemployed for a short time as they switch jobs, they could keep spending, drawing on a combination of government assistance and personal savings. But those who are unemployed more than six months lose unemployment insurance benefits and are more likely to deplete savings to the point where they are forced to cut back on spending. They also will be far more likely to accept jobs at lower pay than their previous positions, which puts downward pressure on wages. We are looking at a labor market already that is weak and set to get a lot weaker, said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. Job seeker surprised by difficulty. Les Tarlton had worked in the telecom industry for eight years when the company he was working for shut its operations near his suburban Dallas home in January 2003. I thought surely I can go out and get a job, he said. I had a good reputation in the company. I had survived a lot of earlier layoffs. It wasn't like I lost my job because of anything I did. But five years later he has yet to find a permanent job to replace the one he had doing business performance analysis. He's had a variety of short-term contract positions, but nothing long-term. Part of it is my age, said Tarlton, 54. They can hire a person straight out of college for a lot less money. And while I have skills in business and finance, my college degrees in are in Christianity and psychology, my master's is in theology. That doesn't help. Tarlton is now home schooling his six-year old and taking care of his other four children while his wife works. But the total household income is a fraction of what it used to be. While he still sends out about five resumes a week, he said he essentially gave up hopes of a new job about two years ago. We've burned through all of our retirement trying to survive, he said. Problem could get worse As the stimulus package makes its way through the Senate, there have been pushes to extend unemployment benefits beyond six months. Even if it's not included in this bill, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she would support separate legislation to address the growing problem. While it might have been premature to extend benefits in the past at this level of unemployment, today it could be overdue, said Furman. If the economy does enter a recession, the problem of long-term unemployment could reach levels not seen since the early 1980's, according to Baker. A report from the Congressional Budget Office last October confirmed that the long-term unemployment problem
[Futurework] test
@ 1:25 pm ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] Boom or/and Bust
Nickeled and Dimed author Barbara Ehrenreich The Boom was a Bust for Ordinary People So thoroughly is the economy decoupled from ordinary experience that according to a CNN https://webmail.ic.gc.ca/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/related/topic/Cable%2BNews%2BNetwork%2BLP%2BLLLP?tid=informline poll, 57% of Americans thought we were already in a recession a month ago. Economists may complain that this is only because the public is ignorant of the technical definition of a recession, which specifies at least two consecutive quarters of negative growth. But most of the public employs the more colloquial definition of a recession, which is hard times. And - far removed from whatever happens on Wall Street, the Nikkei, Dax, or the curiously named FTSE - most Americans have been living in their own personal recession for years. I could see this when I was doing research for a book on white-collar unemployment in 2004. Although the economy was officially on an upturn, I met laid-off people who'd been searching for a job for more than a year and often ended up - after selling their homes and borrowing from relatives - taking low-wage work as big-box sales clerks or even janitors. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/01/AR2008020102828.html https://webmail.ic.gc.ca/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/01/AR2008020102828.html ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
Re: [Futurework] Fw: [Ottawadissenters] Another book one shouldn'tread!
I diagree with you folks. I think its the job of those who are appointed to positions of power, police officers, firefighters, elected officials to act in the public interest. Robert Reich was secty of Labour in Clinton cabinet. . Reich saw many things while in cabinet. He saw the downside of globalization, he saw the increasing bi-modal distribution of incomes. He saw. But he did nothing. He said nothing. He stood for nothing. He did not discharge his duties in the public interest: He acted in his own best interests. He stood by and watched while major structural changes were underway. Now Reich displays some academic prowess and his answer to the many problems that only govts can address?? Civic governance. We have to roll up our sleeves and take back the economy. Hunnnh. In a word, Reich is a wimp. Self-centered wimp. Who is trying to peddle some books. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Ed Weick Sent: Sat 2/16/2008 5:32 PM To: Darryl or Natalia Cc: futurework Subject: Re: [Futurework] Fw: [Ottawadissenters] Another book one shouldn'tread! Hi Natalia, and thanks for the response. Where I agree with Reich and disagree with you is that I really don't think we can keep blaming elites for the mess we're in. As Reich argues, we really do have to start blaming ourselves. If our so-called democratic system isn't working for us but is working for people who are far richer than we are and can manipulate us, what are we doing about it? Very little, I'd suggest. The subprime mortgage debacle is a case in point. How on earth would people who had no hope of meeting the requirements of those mortgages get themselves into them? And of course there were crafty buggers waiting in the wings for bad stuff to happen. It happened alright, but it turned out to be far worse than they thought it would be. And Walmart. Last time I shopped there, about a year ago, I was told that an associate would help me. An associate may get a few benefits to keep the peace, but not nearly as many as a good ol'fashion union member (I know a little about the benefits of collective action because as a west coast boom man I once belonged to the International Woodworkers of America). Why don't the associates just get together and walk out that door? I suppose it's because there are ever so many others out there waiting to get in. But why are they? Where the hell solidarity and our mutual interdependence gone? Reich's final chapters, which I read quickly, deal with taking back our democracy. If the elites have grabbed it off, we've let them. Perhaps it really is time to see what some vigorous marching and fist shaking will do! Ed ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework --- avast! Antivirus: Inbound message clean. Virus Database (VPS): 080212-0, 02/12/2008 Tested on: 2/13/2008 6:25:31 PM avast! - copyright (c) 1988-2008 ALWIL Software. http://www.avast.com http://www.avast.com/ avast! Antivirus http://www.avast.com/ : Outbound message clean. Virus Database (VPS): 080215-0, 02/15/2008 Tested on: 2/16/2008 12:03:34 PM avast! - copyright (c) 1988-2008 ALWIL Software. ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
Re: [Futurework] Fw: [Ottawadissenters] Another book one shouldn'tread!
What bothered me about Reich was his after the fact interest in doing something. It is like a building inspector on the take and looking the other way when, say, the building is a fire hazard but becoming very vocal after leaving the job. Why not do something when he had a chance. If he was a team player during the Clinton years why not keep his silence or at least talk about the pressures that were on him to conform to the party line. I know he did something like this in an earlier book (Locked in the Cabinet?) Was he afraid to speak out when in Cabinet? Why not resign in protest? As I said: Wimp. arthur From: Ed Weick [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sun 2/17/2008 7:48 AM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM; Darryl or Natalia Cc: futurework Subject: Re: [Futurework] Fw: [Ottawadissenters] Another book one shouldn'tread! I don't think we disagree, Arthur, at least not strongly. You say: I think its the job of those who are appointed to positions of power, police officers, firefighters, elected officials to act in the public interest. I agree, but you raise many questions. Most importantly, what is the public interest and who defines it? Is it, for example, Harper acting through the PMO? There are various publics, which raises the question of which ones our elected and appointed officials should most strongly give their attention to. In Harper's case how should he weigh and balance the interests of the Alberta oil patch versus street people in our largest cities, or for that matter Ontario auto parts makers versus the oil patch? And one can't ignore the fact that political parties are corporate entities whose prime interest is remaining in power and not necessarily helping you or me even if, to remain in power, they have to appear to be useful to the public. I read Reich's final chapter very quickly, but I rather liked his message that democracy belongs to everybody and if it has been captured by elites, storm the ramparts and take it back. But of course I recognize that we're not going to do that and he probably does too. Ed - Original Message - From: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Ed Weick mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] ; Darryl or Natalia mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: futurework mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, February 16, 2008 6:30 PM Subject: RE: [Futurework] Fw: [Ottawadissenters] Another book one shouldn'tread! I diagree with you folks. I think its the job of those who are appointed to positions of power, police officers, firefighters, elected officials to act in the public interest. Robert Reich was secty of Labour in Clinton cabinet. . Reich saw many things while in cabinet. He saw the downside of globalization, he saw the increasing bi-modal distribution of incomes. He saw. But he did nothing. He said nothing. He stood for nothing. He did not discharge his duties in the public interest: He acted in his own best interests. He stood by and watched while major structural changes were underway. Now Reich displays some academic prowess and his answer to the many problems that only govts can address?? Civic governance. We have to roll up our sleeves and take back the economy. Hunnnh. In a word, Reich is a wimp. Self-centered wimp. Who is trying to peddle some books. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Ed Weick Sent: Sat 2/16/2008 5:32 PM To: Darryl or Natalia Cc: futurework Subject: Re: [Futurework] Fw: [Ottawadissenters] Another book one shouldn'tread! Hi Natalia, and thanks for the response. Where I agree with Reich and disagree with you is that I really don't think we can keep blaming elites for the mess we're in. As Reich argues, we really do have to start blaming ourselves. If our so-called democratic system isn't working for us but is working for people who are far richer than we are and can manipulate us, what are we doing about it? Very little, I'd suggest. The subprime mortgage debacle is a case in point. How on earth would people who had no hope of meeting the requirements of those mortgages get themselves into them? And of course there were crafty buggers waiting in the wings for bad stuff to happen. It happened alright, but it turned out to be far worse than they thought it would be. And Walmart. Last time I shopped there, about a year ago, I was told that an associate would help me. An associate may get a few benefits to keep the peace, but not nearly as many as a good ol'fashion union member (I know a little about the benefits of collective action because as a west coast boom man I once belonged
[Futurework] FW: America's economy risks meltdown
http://news.yahoo.com/;_ylt=ApOvt0wJ06BjqUPgNqsCoeX3ULEF America's economy risks the mother of all meltdowns By Martin WolfTue Feb 19, 1:25 PM ET I would tell audiences that we were facing not a bubble but a froth - lots of small, local bubbles that never grew to a scale that could threaten the health of the overall economy. Alan Greenspan, The Age of Turbulence. That used to be Mr Greenspan's view of the US housing bubble. He was wrong, alas. So how bad might this downturn get? To answer this question we should ask a true bear. My favourite one is Nouriel Roubini of New York University's Stern School of Business, founder of RGE monitor. Recently, Professor Roubini's scenarios have been dire enough to make the flesh creep. But his thinking deserves to be taken seriously. He first predicted a US recession in July 2006*. At that time, his view was extremely controversial. It is so no longer. Now he states that there is a rising probability of a 'catastrophic' financial and economic outcome**. The characteristics of this scenario are, he argues: A vicious circle where a deep recession makes the financial losses more severe and where, in turn, large and growing financial losses and a financial meltdown make the recession even more severe. Prof Roubini is even fonder of lists than I am. Here are his 12 - yes, 12 - steps to financial disaster. Step one is the worst housing recession in US history. House prices will, he says, fall by 20 to 30 per cent from their peak, which would wipe out between $4,000bn and $6,000bn in household wealth. Ten million households will end up with negative equity and so with a huge incentive to put the house keys in the post and depart for greener fields. Many more home-builders will be bankrupted. Step two would be further losses, beyond the $250bn-$300bn now estimated, for subprime mortgages. About 60 per cent of all mortgage origination between 2005 and 2007 had reckless or toxic features, argues Prof Roubini. Goldman Sachs estimates mortgage losses at $400bn. But if home prices fell by more than 20 per cent, losses would be bigger. That would further impair the banks' ability to offer credit. Step three would be big losses on unsecured consumer debt: credit cards, auto loans, student loans and so forth. The credit crunch would then spread from mortgages to a wide range of consumer credit. Step four would be the downgrading of the monoline insurers, which do not deserve the AAA rating on which their business depends. A further $150bn writedown of asset-backed securities would then ensue. Step five would be the meltdown of the commercial property market, while step six would be bankruptcy of a large regional or national bank. Step seven would be big losses on reckless leveraged buy-outs. Hundreds of billions of dollars of such loans are now stuck on the balance sheets of financial institutions. Step eight would be a wave of corporate defaults. On average, US companies are in decent shape, but a fat tail of companies has low profitability and heavy debt. Such defaults would spread losses in credit default swaps, which insure such debt. The losses could be $250bn. Some insurers might go bankrupt. Step nine would be a meltdown in the shadow financial system. Dealing with the distress of hedge funds, special investment vehicles and so forth will be made more difficult by the fact that they have no direct access to lending from central banks. Step 10 would be a further collapse in stock prices. Failures of hedge funds, margin calls and shorting could lead to cascading falls in prices. Step 11 would be a drying-up of liquidity in a range of financial markets, including interbank and money markets. Behind this would be a jump in concerns about solvency. Step 12 would be a vicious circle of losses, capital reduction, credit contraction, forced liquidation and fire sales of assets at below fundamental prices. These, then, are 12 steps to meltdown. In all, argues Prof Roubini: Total losses in the financial system will add up to more than $1,000bn and the economic recession will become deeper more protracted and severe. This, he suggests, is the nightmare scenario keeping Ben Bernanke and colleagues at the US Federal Reserve awake. It explains why, having failed to appreciate the dangers for so long, the Fed has lowered rates by 200 basis points this year. This is insurance against a financial meltdown. Is this kind of scenario at least plausible? It is. Furthermore, we can be confident that it would, if it came to pass, end all stories about decoupling. If it lasts six quarters, as Prof Roubini warns, offsetting policy action in the rest of the world would be too little, too late. Can the Fed head this danger off? In a subsequent piece, Prof Roubini gives eight reasons why it cannot***. (He really loves lists!) These are, in brief: US monetary easing is constrained by risks to the dollar and inflation;
Re: [Futurework] Fw: [Ottawadissenters] Another book one shouldn'tread!
Not quite on point but it's a quote that I like It's difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it. - Upton Sinclair -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Christoph Reuss Sent: Wednesday, February 20, 2008 5:16 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [Futurework] Fw: [Ottawadissenters] Another book one shouldn'tread! Arthur Cordell wrote: What bothered me about Reich was his after the fact interest in doing something. It is like a building inspector on the take and looking the other way when, say, the building is a fire hazard but becoming very vocal after leaving the job. Why not do something when he had a chance. ...like Al Gore who had been the world's 2nd most powerful man for 8 years and started preaching for the environment AFTERwards... During his 8 years in office, the U$ CO2 emissions increased stronger than ever before... Chris SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword igve. ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] FW: Have you seen who is thinking about running for congress?
Subject: Have you seen who is thinking about running for congress? http://lessig08.org/ http://lessig08.org/ Larry Lessig is an interesting teacher. He was at Harvard and is now at Stanford. He teaches law. He is thinking of running for congress. The website above contains a number of videos. The first explains why he is thinking of running. The second explains why he prefers Obams to Clinton. He presents an ethical and principled approach to politics. Refreshing. ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
Re: [Futurework] Have you seen who is thinking about running for congress?
who is Lessig? http://lessig.org/bio/short/ https://webmail.ic.gc.ca/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://lessig.org/bio/short/ http://www.lessig.org/ https://webmail.ic.gc.ca/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.lessig.org/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Lessig https://webmail.ic.gc.ca/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Lessig From: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM Sent: Thu 2/21/2008 3:15 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Subject: FW: Have you seen who is thinking about running for congress? Subject: Have you seen who is thinking about running for congress? http://lessig08.org/ http://lessig08.org/ Larry Lessig is an interesting teacher. He was at Harvard and is now at Stanford. He teaches law. He is thinking of running for congress. The website above contains a number of videos. The first explains why he is thinking of running. The second explains why he prefers Obams to Clinton. He presents an ethical and principled approach to politics. Refreshing. ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
Re: [Futurework] FW: Have you seen who is thinking about running forcongress?
* Creativity and innovation always builds on the past. * The past always tries to control the creativity that builds upon it. * Free societies enable the future by limiting this power of the past. http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/policy/2002/08/15/lessig.html From: Michael Gurstein [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thu 2/21/2008 5:19 PM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [Futurework] FW: Have you seen who is thinking about running forcongress? Hmm... Interesting... Mr. Deeds goes to Washington... The (US) Poli Sci texts all say that the fundamental strength of the US system (democracy?) is its capacity to innovate/adapt... Interesting test. MG -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Cordell, Arthur: ECOM Sent: February 21, 2008 12:16 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [Futurework] FW: Have you seen who is thinking about running forcongress? Subject: Have you seen who is thinking about running for congress? http://lessig08.org/ http://lessig08.org/ Larry Lessig is an interesting teacher. He was at Harvard and is now at Stanford. He teaches law. He is thinking of running for congress. The website above contains a number of videos. The first explains why he is thinking of running. The second explains why he prefers Obams to Clinton. He presents an ethical and principled approach to politics. Refreshing. ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] test
@fes ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] Countrywide Treats Bankers to Ski-Resort Trip
This is for Natalia... --- Countrywide Treats Bankers to Ski-Resort Trip 22 February 2008 The Wall Street Journal javascript:void(0) The U.S. home-mortgage industry is in the dumps. That doesn't mean the party is over for mortgage bankers. Countrywide Financial Corp. javscript:void(0) , the nation's largest mortgage lender by loan volume, will host about 30 representatives of smaller mortgage banks for three nights next week at the Ritz-Carlton javscript:void(0) Bachelor Gulch ski resort in Avon, Colo. At one of the country's most-glamorous skiing spots, a regular room on a weekday starts at $750. The first items on the agenda for guests arriving Monday evening: Cocktails and ski fittings. Next is dinner at the Spago restaurant, whose menu includes Kobe steak with wasabi potato puree for $105. (For the budget-minded, pan-roasted buffalo filet with Kabocha pumpkin flan is $54.) The annual event is for bankers at correspondent lenders, which originate loans and then sell them to Countrywide. The Calabasas, Calif., lender is paying for hotel rooms, meals, skiing and tips, according to a program distributed to attendees. The schedule calls for four-hour business meetings Tuesday and Wednesday mornings, followed by skiing and dinner. Those dinners are at Zach's Cabin, where diners arrive by sled, and at Larkspur in Vail, Colo., where the menu includes California farmed Alverta President caviar, listed at $140.50. Many companies entertain business partners in luxurious settings, of course. But this event stands out because of the company's circumstances. Countrywide's board agreed last month to sell to Bank of America Corp. javscript:void(0) for about $4 billion, less than a fifth of its market value 12 months earlier. Rising defaults and falling home prices led to losses of about $1.6 billion at Countrywide in the second half, and the company has reduced its work force by 11,400, or 19%, since July. Countrywide's servicing arm, which collects payments and handles other administrative tasks, has about 90,000 loans in foreclosure, or 1% of the total. Sen. Charles Schumer, a New York Democrat who has been pushing Countrywide and others to do more for people facing foreclosure, called on Countrywide to cancel the trip and devote the money to refinancing distressed homeowners. A Countrywide spokesman declined to comment. The company has argued in recent news releases that it is making efforts to keep distressed borrowers in their homes. Among those are agreements with nonprofit consumer-advocacy groups to negotiate loan workouts for borrowers. A Bank of America javscript:void(0) spokesman declined to discuss Countrywide's hospitality. - ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] test
@fesmail ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] FW: Oooops. Countrywide Puts an End To Ski Junket
Subject: Oooops. Countrywide Puts an End To Ski Junket Business/Financial Desk; SECTC Countrywide Puts an End To Ski Junket 25 February 2008 The New York Times The weather forecast may call for snow and good skiing conditions in Avon, Colo., on Monday. But no one at the luxury resort, near Aspen, will be hitting the slopes -- or eating $105 Kobe steaks -- on Countrywide's dime this week. Countrywide Financial, the besieged mortgage lender, has canceled a gathering of bankers from smaller mortgage banks at the Ritz-Carlton Bachelor Gulch ski resort (where room rates begin at $725), Countrywide said in a statement on Sunday. The company was to pay for 30 invited guests' hotel rooms, meals, skiing and tips. In the statement, the company said that ''in light of recent events'' it had decided to cancel all gatherings with business partners and clients for the rest of the year, moving quickly after being criticized for planning such an extravagant event. The three-night gathering, which was to include business meetings as well as skiing, drinking and sampling expensive meals like $140 caviar and Kurobuta pork osso bucco at the Spago restaurant, had already drawn negative press. ''Let 'Em Eat Kobe Steak,'' a headline in The New York Post sneered on Saturday. Countrywide has held the gathering every year for its correspondent lenders, which make the loans and sell them to the company. And companies treating business partners to high-priced junkets is nothing new in the corporate world. But this year's event coincides with a continued crisis in the mortgage markets. Default rates are skyrocketing. Countrywide, the nation's largest mortgage company, has foreclosed on about 90,000 loans so far. Banks have called for intervention from the federal government to prevent a wider housing crisis. Moreover, Countrywide agreed last month to sell itself to Bank of America for $4.1 billion, a fraction of its former market value. It has reported a $422 million loss for its fourth quarter, after setting aside $924 million for credit losses and taking an $831 million impairment charge related to home equity lines of credit. It has also laid off more than 11,000 employees since last July. ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] Lessig decides against running
LESSIG DECIDES AGAINST A RUN FOR CONGRESS http://www.uptilt.com/c.html?rtr=ons=4zc,xtd2,2aec,4f3u,4ryq,amq5,h810 Larry Lessig won't be running for the U.S. Congress after all. Lessig said on Monday that he won't try to seek election in the congressional district stretching from the western edge of San Francisco down the peninsula into Silicon Valley. The seat was left vacant by the death of Democratic Rep. Tom Lantos this month, and Lessig said last week he was considering a campaign. [CNET] ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] The End of Outsourcing to India ???
http://www.finextra.com/community/fullblog.aspx?id=1012 The end of outsourcing to India 29/02/2008 14:01:19 Forbes reports today that India's competitive advantage for offshore services is disappearing fast as wage demands mean that services are now 66% cheaper for US and European firms in India, compared with 84% a few years ago. As wage demands increase, it can only be a matter of time they say, where it will cost the same. In fact, they forecast this could be as soon as 2015 based upon current trends. The issue India then has is that Forbes reckons India doesn't have any people who think, create or differentiate because all the thinking is done by their customers. India has 'outsourced' the thinking and just do the implementing. Is this the likely future ... ... or is this just a US-magazine trying to forecast the end of India's competitive advantage because Americans don't like hearing about India's success? http://www.forbes.com/2008/02/29/mitra-india-outsourcing-tech-enter-cx_s m_0229outsource.html?partner=alerts Commentary The Coming Death Of Indian Outsourcing Sramana Mitra 02.29.08, 6:00 AM ET BURLINGAME, CALIF. - India is riding high on outsourcing. Information technology and IT-enabled services will employ 4 million people in 2008 and account for 7% of gross domestic product and 33% of India's foreign-exchange inflows, according to Nasscom, an Indian IT industry organization. The death of this industry is far from anyone's mind. However, the reality is that wages are rising in India. The cost advantage for offshoring to India used to be at least 1:6. Today, it is at best 1:3. Attrition is scary. Jobs that are low value-added and easily automatable should and will disappear over the next decade. People talk a lot about India moving up the value chain. Some of that has indeed happened. An industry that started gaining momentum when Indian software developers were tapped to help fix the Y2K problems in old software code has blossomed beautifully into one that offers a much more comprehensive spectrum of services. Yet, India, for all its glory, is still the world's back office. India's tech industry is a services industry. The Indians don't do the thinking. The customers do. India executes. As a result, India has not learned to invent technology products of its own. Barring a few exceptions, the huge amount of venture capital chasing India finds it difficult to be deployed. There is way too much money, way too few deals. Instead, tech-sector VCs are now diverting capital to retail, real estate, hotels and other non-tech sectors. India's $30 billion IT/ITES services industry, meanwhile, is slowly and surely losing its competitive advantage. Most of the 4 million people that the industry employs have now arrived. They have breezed through the milestones that their fathers had to toil all their lives to reach. A phone. A watch. A TV. A car. A house. They are complacent. They will not take risks. They have outsourced thinking to their customers. As the 1:3 cost structure becomes 1:1.5, it will soon become inefficient to use Indian labor. Why not Oklahoma or British Columbia? For many Europeans, Eastern Europe has already become more compelling than India. The pure labor arbitrage equation will no longer balance. ADP, the largest U.S. payroll services provider, has 45,000 employees worldwide, of which only 2,500 are in India. It has around 1,000 workers in El Paso, Texas, it's expanding a location in Augusta, Ga., and it's opening a facility in Jackson, Miss. It's also growing a location in Halifax, Canada. ADP isn't moving its workforce to India--it's hedging its bets geographically. On a recent earnings call, ADP's chief executive used terms such as smartshoring, and nearshoring to describe the strategy. The software as a service (SaaS) megatrend in technology also plays against India. Here's an example: There's a tiny Silicon Valley start-up called InsideView. It helps customers to generate sales leads, qualify those leads and use technology tools to help find big sales opportunities for customers. In November 2007, InsideView acquired a company called TrueAdvantage, which did the exact same thing manually with a team of 150 people in India. After the acquisition, InsideView moved all 2,500 of TrueAdvantage's customers over to its SaaS solution. All 150 TruAdvantage employees in India were laid off. That's been a familiar tale in Detroit--but no so far in India. But that's changing. Indian powerhouses like Infosys and Wipro must diversify their portfolios away from pure body-shopping and process competencies to technology-driven advantages. They, too, could build--or acquire--SaaS businesses. So far that's not happening. Infosys is still hiring thousands of new employees in India every year. The mood is upbeat. Nasscom is forecasting 25% annual growth in the Indian IT services industry for the next few years. The golden goose is still laying large, warm eggs, enough to
[Futurework] Feds print money
Fed and central banks team up to unstick markets By Glenn Somerville and Emily Kaiser 23 minutes ago The U.S. Federal Reserve and other central banks on Tuesday teamed up to get hundreds of billions of dollars in fresh funds to cash-starved credit markets, allowing financial firms to use securities backed by home mortgages as collateral for central bank loans. Stocks surged, bonds fell and the long-suffering U.S. dollar rose in reaction to the moves, a sign financial markets saw the plan as a viable remedy to ease a crisis that has threatened world economic growth. The Dow Jones industrials were up 1.5 percent in trading just after midday (1600 GMT). In the latest effort to ease a credit contraction that has disrupted global finance, the Fed, Bank of Canada, Bank of England, European Central Bank and Swiss National Bank announced a series of aggressive measures to boost liquidity. It was the second time in three months that central banks from around the globe had launched coordinated efforts. In the near term, the Fed and global central banks have provided the thing everyone needed, and that's cash, said Martin Blum, head of emerging markets research at UniCredit in Vienna. The actions ... deal with this issue by making it easier for banks to get cash, and that's important. The Fed expanded its securities lending program, offering up to $200 billion of highly-liquid U.S. Treasuries to primary dealers, secured for 28 days. It also significantly expanded the types of securities that can be used as collateral for loans. In effect, the plan allows banks to exchange unwanted mortgage notes for easy-to-sell government securities. However, the U.S. central bank also said it would not accept private mortgage-backed securities that credit ratings agencies had put under review for possible downgrades. That takes a bite out of the eligible debt, although the Fed said there may be as much as $1 trillion that would qualify for the auctions. The Fed's moves came after some huge holders of mortgage-linked debt received demands for more cash as the value of the securities they held plunged. Investors, paralyzed by fears of a market shutdown, have shunned large sectors of the debt market, causing prices to tumble and leaving many offers for sales unfilled. The action came on the back of an announcement from the Fed on Friday that it would expand auctions of short-term cash to $100 billion in March and launch a series of repurchase agreements expected to be worth $100 billion, bringing the total of recently announced actions to a hefty $400 billion. SMALLER RATE CUT? The Fed has shaved 2.25 percentage points from benchmark interest rates since mid-September in an effort to offset the impact of the credit tightening. Economists widely expect at least another half-point reduction when the Fed's policy-setting committee meets next week. But Goldman Sachs economist Jan Hatzius said the latest steps from the Fed make a more aggressive cut less likely. This announcement makes clear that Fed officials are pulling out all the stops they can think of to deal with financial stress through the increased provision of liquidity into the system, he wrote in a note to clients. To the extent they see this as substituting for rate cuts, this should reduce the probability of a 75 basis point rate cut next Tuesday. As part of the latest effort, the European Central Bank said it would auction up to $15 billion for a term of 28 days, the Swiss National Bank said it would auction $6 billion and the Bank of Canada said it would it provide about $4 billion. Despite the positive market reaction, some analysts questioned whether the latest round of central bank efforts would have much staying power. Earlier efforts by the Fed and its counterparts were successful in reviving markets for a short time, only to see them unravel again when the next bout of credit turmoil emerged. This Fed action is good for a day or two, said Michael Cheah, senior portfolio manager at AIG SunAmerica Asset Management in Jersey City, New Jersey. There are three problems in the market. One is the price of money, then liquidity and counterparty risk. The Fed can do all it can in the first two areas by trying to reduce (interest rates) and the price of money. However, these moves are not going to mitigate the counterparty risk, he said. Banks have essentially lost faith in each other after seven months of market unrest, making them reluctant to lend money to one another and driving up borrowing costs for the consumers and companies that power the world economy. The Fed said its new lending facility will operate through weekly auctions that will start on March 27. It also said it was increasing existing currency swap lines with the ECB and SNB, allowing those two central banks to offer more U.S. dollars in their respective markets. (Additional reporting by Al Yoon in New York; writing by Emily Kaiser; editing by Gary Crosse)
[Futurework] test
@1:55 pm ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] FW: Feds print money
__ From: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM Sent: Tuesday, March 11, 2008 1:47 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; '[EMAIL PROTECTED]' Subject: Feds print money Fed and central banks team up to unstick markets By Glenn Somerville and Emily Kaiser 23 minutes ago The U.S. Federal Reserve and other central banks on Tuesday teamed up to get hundreds of billions of dollars in fresh funds to cash-starved credit markets, allowing financial firms to use securities backed by home mortgages as collateral for central bank loans. Stocks surged, bonds fell and the long-suffering U.S. dollar rose in reaction to the moves, a sign financial markets saw the plan as a viable remedy to ease a crisis that has threatened world economic growth. The Dow Jones industrials were up 1.5 percent in trading just after midday (1600 GMT). In the latest effort to ease a credit contraction that has disrupted global finance, the Fed, Bank of Canada, Bank of England, European Central Bank and Swiss National Bank announced a series of aggressive measures to boost liquidity. It was the second time in three months that central banks from around the globe had launched coordinated efforts. In the near term, the Fed and global central banks have provided the thing everyone needed, and that's cash, said Martin Blum, head of emerging markets research at UniCredit in Vienna. The actions ... deal with this issue by making it easier for banks to get cash, and that's important. The Fed expanded its securities lending program, offering up to $200 billion of highly-liquid U.S. Treasuries to primary dealers, secured for 28 days. It also significantly expanded the types of securities that can be used as collateral for loans. In effect, the plan allows banks to exchange unwanted mortgage notes for easy-to-sell government securities. However, the U.S. central bank also said it would not accept private mortgage-backed securities that credit ratings agencies had put under review for possible downgrades. That takes a bite out of the eligible debt, although the Fed said there may be as much as $1 trillion that would qualify for the auctions. The Fed's moves came after some huge holders of mortgage-linked debt received demands for more cash as the value of the securities they held plunged. Investors, paralyzed by fears of a market shutdown, have shunned large sectors of the debt market, causing prices to tumble and leaving many offers for sales unfilled. The action came on the back of an announcement from the Fed on Friday that it would expand auctions of short-term cash to $100 billion in March and launch a series of repurchase agreements expected to be worth $100 billion, bringing the total of recently announced actions to a hefty $400 billion. SMALLER RATE CUT? The Fed has shaved 2.25 percentage points from benchmark interest rates since mid-September in an effort to offset the impact of the credit tightening. Economists widely expect at least another half-point reduction when the Fed's policy-setting committee meets next week. But Goldman Sachs economist Jan Hatzius said the latest steps from the Fed make a more aggressive cut less likely. This announcement makes clear that Fed officials are pulling out all the stops they can think of to deal with financial stress through the increased provision of liquidity into the system, he wrote in a note to clients. To the extent they see this as substituting for rate cuts, this should reduce the probability of a 75 basis point rate cut next Tuesday. As part of the latest effort, the European Central Bank said it would auction up to $15 billion for a term of 28 days, the Swiss National Bank said it would auction $6 billion and the Bank of Canada said it would it provide about $4 billion. Despite the positive market reaction, some analysts questioned whether the latest round of central bank efforts would have much staying power. Earlier efforts by the Fed and its counterparts were successful in reviving markets for a short time, only to see them unravel again when the next bout of credit turmoil emerged. This Fed action is good for a day or two, said Michael Cheah, senior portfolio manager at AIG SunAmerica Asset Management in Jersey City, New Jersey. There are three problems in the market. One is the price of money, then liquidity and counterparty risk. The Fed can do all it can in the first two areas by trying to reduce (interest rates) and the price of money. However, these moves are not going to mitigate the counterparty risk, he said. Banks have essentially lost faith in each other after seven months of market unrest, making them reluctant to lend money to one another and driving up borrowing costs for the consumers and companies that power the world economy. The Fed said its new lending facility will operate through weekly auctions that will start on March 27. It also said
Re: [Futurework] [Ottawadissenters] Maybe we can drink biofuels and become self-propelled?
And I guess when starvation hits, its time to put some of your portfolio in the stocks of funeral parlours oops I mean funeral homes. http://www.funeralhomesguide.com/NewJersey/Passaic/TheMadonnaMultinationalHomeforFunerals.html I mean, business is business, eh?? arthur From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Ed Weick Sent: Tue 3/11/2008 3:38 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: futurework Subject: [Ottawadissenters] Maybe we can drink biofuels and become self-propelled? From the Daily Reckoning. The looming problem may only partly be energy, but mostly it may be food if agricultural lands are moved into large-scale biofuel production. But hey! According to the author, there's an opportunity to make some money if things go that way. Ed While shortages of key industrial and energy commodities are frightening, no other sector will threaten global stability more than agriculture. It seems ironic that as global population is reaching an all-time high, we are turning at least half of our crops into ethanol or biofuel. This is a questionable, if not idiotic, alternative that clearly does as much damage as good. While the short-term impact is obvious, the longer-term ramifications for agriculture on a global scale could be devastating. The idea of food inflation is new to many Americans, who are used to prices for food being only about 13-16% of income. Back when my grandmother got off the boat in 1912, they were more like 45%. The facts of life are not always pleasant, but the truth must be told without all the politically correct, wish-upon-a-star answers. The U.S. is blessed to be one of the nations with some of the best agricultural land on the planet. From sea to shining sea, we have cropland as far as the eye can see. For years, the bounty of the land has been a supermarket for the world; now it's a fuel station, too. China, which has hundreds of millions more hungry mouths than we have, has far less arable farmland. And worse, China has far fewer controls in place to regulate farming methods. In recent years in the United States, the number of immigrants has swollen. The porous borders continue to attract newcomers as if it were still 1912. Here in the U.S., a lot of people still think that America can still absorb a massive influx of immigrants from all over the planet who are poor, tired and hungry. And while that is nice, romantic thinking, the fact of the matter is we cannot. As investors, we must look at this situation as an opportunity for our portfolio. First of all, I suggest if you have some extra land (condo developers and house flippers, listen closely), grow a vegetable garden, and if you are ambitious, raise some sheep and cows, because they will come in handy. A little more practical and with less bunker mentality is to add stocks of some of the key agricultural companies that help support the industry, like those dealing with equipment making, fertilizer, irrigation and transport. These are the names you always hear, like John Deere, Monsanto, Caterpillar, etc. These companies will do well for the same reasons drillers and equipment maker stocks do so well when the energy markets are surging. The same thing applies to these agricultural-related companies. Agriculture is in a serious bull market right now, one that is not likely to end anytime soon. Now, none of these is an official Outstanding Investments recommendation, but take a long look at this sector. I think you will see the picture is clear why this is a smart sector in which to have at least some exposure. Regards, Kevin Kerr for The Daily Reckoning __._,_.___ Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional Change settings via the Web http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/join;_ylc=X3oDMTJnNXI0MGxwBF9TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNzdG5ncwRzdGltZQMxMjA1MjY0MzMz (Yahoo! ID required) Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Delivery: Digest | Switch to Fully Featured mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Delivery Format: Fully Featured Visit Your Group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters;_ylc=X3oDMTJlNDlycGNuBF9TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNocGYEc3RpbWUDMTIwNTI2NDMzMw-- | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ | Unsubscribe mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] __,_._,___ ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
Re: [Futurework] [Ottawadissenters]
Surprised he didn't get into subsidizing and/or giving tax breaks for abortions. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Harry Pollard Sent: Thursday, March 13, 2008 2:27 PM To: Future; Ottawa Subject: [Ottawadissenters] Something I ran into about Walters. Utter madness, driven by arrogance? Looked further and found this. Harry .. Gerard Jackson - BrookesNews.Com Monday 17 December 2007 Barry Walters, an associate professor of obstetrics at the University of Western Australia, revealed the greens' totalitarian mentality by demanding that the state force parents to pay $5,000 per child at birth to offset the babies so-called carbon footprint. He also proposed that for each year after that parents should be made to pay $400 to $800 per child. In support of his views Walters made a favourable reference to proposals by the infamous SPA (Sustainable Population Australia) for a maximum of two children per family. Full column at: http://www.brookesnews.com/071712greens.html Harry ** Harry Pollard Henry George School of Los Angeles Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 (818) 352-4141 ** __._,_.___ http://geo.yahoo.com/serv?s=97476590/grpId=15209059/grpspId=1705083512/ msgId=7883/stime=1205432847 Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional Change settings via the Web http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/join;_ylc=X3oDMTJnZjhjb2 VuBF9TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZn RyBHNsawNzdG5ncwRzdGltZQMxMjA1NDMyODQ3 (Yahoo! ID required) Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Delivery: Digest | Switch to Fully Featured mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Delivery Format: Fully Featured Visit Your Group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters;_ylc=X3oDMTJlN3ZzNnNsBF9 TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHN sawNocGYEc3RpbWUDMTIwNTQzMjg0Nw-- | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ | Unsubscribe mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] __,_._,___ ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] FW: Great Art
Artistic comment on society and the way we use, mis-use and waste resources. From: Paul-Andre Sent: Tue 3/18/2008 2:17 PM I am sure you would be delighted with this work. http://www.chrisjordan.com/current_set2.php?id=7 ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
Re: [Futurework] FW: Great Art
An artist friend sent me the link. arthur -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of M.Blackmore Sent: Wednesday, March 19, 2008 10:17 AM To: futurework Subject: Re: [Futurework] FW: Great Art Where on earth did you find this link? It's one of the few things that have mind-boggled me for years... wish I'd see them fullsize on an international tour... On Tue, 2008-03-18 at 16:11 -0400, Cordell, Arthur: ECOM wrote: Artistic comment on society and the way we use, mis-use and waste resources. __ From: Paul-Andre Sent: Tue 3/18/2008 2:17 PM I am sure you would be delighted with this work. http://www.chrisjordan.com/current_set2.php?id=7 ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
Re: [Futurework] FW: [TriumphOfContent] At Megastores, Hagglers Find Prices Are Flexible
Oh great. Now we are becoming a true third world economy with haggling as a way of doing business. arthur From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Michael Gurstein Sent: Sun 3/23/2008 12:44 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [Futurework] FW: [TriumphOfContent] At Megastores,Hagglers Find Prices Are Flexible Worth knowing... MG -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Steven Brant Sent: March 23, 2008 8:26 AM To: Triumph-Of Content Subject: [TriumphOfContent] At Megastores, Hagglers Find Prices Are Flexible http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/23/business/23haggle.html The New York Times March 23, 2008 At Megastores, Hagglers Find Prices Are Flexible By MATT RICHTEL SAN FRANCISCO - Shoppers are discovering an upside to the down economy. They are getting price breaks by reviving an age-old retail strategy: haggling. A bargaining culture once confined largely to car showrooms and jewelry stores is taking root in major stores like Best Buy, Circuit City and Home Depot, as well as mom-and-pop operations. Savvy consumers, empowered by the Internet and encouraged by a slowing economy, are finding that they can dicker on prices, not just on clearance items or big-ticket products like televisions but also on lower-cost goods like cameras, audio speakers, couches, rugs and even clothing. The change is not particularly overt, and most store policies on bargaining are informal. Some major retailers, however, are quietly telling their salespeople that negotiating is acceptable. We want to work with the customer, and if that happens to mean negotiating a price, then we're willing to look at that, said Kathryn Gallagher, a spokeswoman for Home Depot. In the last year, she said, the store has adopted an entrepreneurial spirit campaign to give salespeople and managers more latitude on prices in order to retain customers. The sluggish economy is punctuating a cultural shift enabled by wired consumers accustomed to comparing prices and bargaining online, said Nancy F. Koehn, a retail historian at the Harvard Business School. Haggling was once common before department stores began setting fixed prices in the 1850s. But the shift to bargaining in malls and on Main Street is a considerable change from even 10 years ago, Ms. Koehn said, when studies showed that consumers did not like to bargain and did not consider themselves good at it. Call it the eBay phenomenon, Ms. Koehn said. The recession is helping to push these seedlings to the surface, she added. It's a real turnabout on the part of the buyer and the seller. John D. Morris, an apparel industry analyst for Wachovia, said that the ailing economy was not necessarily forcing all retailers to negotiate. But he says he believes that when there is an opportunity for negotiation, the shopper has the upper hand. This is one of the periods where the customer is empowered, Mr. Morris said. The retailer knows that the customer is enduring tough times - and is more willing to be the one who blinks first in that stare-down match. While tough times give people more incentive to change their behavior, it is the wealth of information about products made available on the Internet that gives consumers the know-how to try it. People now can quickly amass information on product availability and pricing, helping them develop strategies to get the best deal. Michael Roskell, 33, a technology project manager from Jersey City, N.J., said he and a friend from high school periodically visit electronics stores. While Mr. Roskell expresses interest in buying an item, his friend acts as though he is dissatisfied with the price and threatens to leave. We play good cop, bad cop, Mr. Roskell said. In February, he said, the friends got $20 off a pair of $250 speakers at 6th Avenue Electronics in the New York area. Earlier, he and the same friend negotiated to buy two 46-inch high-definition Sony televisions at P. C. Richard Son, a New York-area electronics chain. List price: $4,300. Price after negotiation: $3,305.50. My parents never did this, Mr. Roskell said. But once you get it, you realize there's a whole economy built on this. The strategy can even work when buying pants. At least it did for David Achee of Maplewood, N.J., who said he went to a Polo Ralph Lauren store in the SoHo neighborhood of Manhattan last month and became interested in a pair of pants on the clearance rack for $75. He told the salesperson that he had seen a similar pair on the Internet for $65, adding that he thought the pair on the rack looked worn (even though he did not really think so). He got the pants for around $50, he said. Among his other tactics, he said, he sometimes threatens to walk out of a store and go to a competitor, as he did recently to get a price break on a drum set at a music store. But, mainly, he relies on researching prices
[Futurework] Getting Ready For Bank Failures
FDIC Set to Add Staff as It Girds For Bank Failures 26 March 2008The Wall Street Journal The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. javscript:void(0) plans to hire as many as 138 new employees to help deal with the potential for rising bank failures amid the current financial morass. An agency spokesman said the FDIC hopes to boost the number of employees in its Division of Resolutions and Receiverships to as many as 380 from the current 223. The division is already authorized to have 242 employees, so the new hiring effort will seek to add an additional 138 new positions, half of whom will be temporary hires. We're offering reassurance that we'll be prepared, spokesman Andrew Gray said. The reason for the staffing increase is twofold: an expected increase in bank failures, and the retirement of current employees. FDIC officials have acknowledged they expect an uptick in the number of banks that fail and need to be taken over by the agency. The resolutions division is tasked with handling the fallout from a failed bank, and has already had to deal with two failed banks this year. A total of three banks failed in 2007, the first bank failures since 2004. And while the FDIC has stressed that failures remain historically low, the agency does have 76 firms on its list of problem banks. == ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] Stafford Beer
For those who remember Stafford Beer. SANTIAGO JOURNAL Foreign Desk; SECTA Before '73 Coup, Chile Tried to Find the Right Software for Socialism By ALEXEI BARRIONUEVO 28 March 2008 The New York Times javascript:void(0) SANTIAGO, Chile -- When military forces loyal to Gen. Augusto Pinochet staged a coup here in September 1973, they made a surprising discovery. Salvador Allende's Socialist government had quietly embarked on a novel experiment to manage Chile's economy using a clunky mainframe computer and a network of telex machines. The project, called Cybersyn, was the brainchild of A. Stafford Beer, a visionary Briton who employed his ''cybernetic'' concepts to help Mr. Allende find an alternative to the planned economies of Cuba and the Soviet Union. After the coup it became the subject of intense military scrutiny. In developing Cybersyn, Mr. Beer changed the lives of the bright young Chileans he worked with here. Some 35 years later, this little-known feature of Mr. Allende's abortive Socialist transformation was remembered in an exhibit in a museum beneath La Moneda, the presidential palace. A Star Trek-like chair with controls in the armrests was a replica of those in a prototype operations room. Mr. Beer planned for the room to receive computer reports based on data flowing from telex machines connected to factories up and down this 2,700-mile-long country. Managers were to sit in seven of the contoured chairs and make critical decisions about the reports displayed on projection screens. While the operations room never became fully operational, Cybersyn gained stature within the Allende government for helping to outmaneuver striking workers in October 1972. That helped planners realize -- as the pioneers of the modern-day Internet did -- that the communications network was more important than computing power, which Chile did not have much of, anyway. A single I.B.M. 360/50 mainframe, which had less storage capacity than most flash drives today, processed the factories' data, with a Burroughs 3500 later filling in. Cybersyn was born in July 1971 when Fernando Flores, then a 28-year-old government technocrat, sent a letter to Mr. Beer seeking his help in organizing Mr. Allende's economy by applying cybernetic concepts. Mr. Beer was excited by the prospect of being able to test his ideas. He wanted to use the telex communications system -- a network of teletypewriters -- to gather data from factories on variables like daily output, energy use and labor ''in real time,'' and then use a computer to filter out the important pieces of economic information the government needed to make decisions. Mr. Beer set up teams of computer programmers in England and Chile, and began making regular trips to Santiago to direct the project. He was paid $500 a day while working in Chile, a sizable sum here at the time, said Raul Espejo, who was Cybersyn's operations director. The Englishman became a mentor to the Chilean team, many of them in their 20s. On one visit he tried to inspire them by sharing Richard Bach's ''Jonathan Livingston Seagull,'' the story of a seagull who follows his dream to master the art of flying against the wishes of the flock. An imposing man with a long gray-flecked beard, Mr. Beer was a college dropout who challenged the young Chileans with tough questions. He shared his love for writing poetry and painting, and brought books and classical music from Europe. He smoked cigars and drank whiskey and wine constantly, ''but was never losing his head,'' Mr. Espejo said. Most of the Cybersyn team scrupulously avoided talking about politics, and some even had far-right-wing views, said Isaquino Benadof, who led the team of Chilean engineers designing the Cybersyn software. One early challenge was how to build the communications network. Short of money, the team found 500 unused telex machines in a warehouse of the national telecommunications company. Cybersyn's turning point came in October 1972, when a strike by truckers and retailers nearly paralyzed the economy. The interconnected telex machines, exchanging 2,000 messages a day, were a potent instrument, enabling the government to identify and organize alternative transportation resources that kept the economy moving. The strike ended within a week. While it weakened Mr. Allende's Popular Unity party, the government survived, and Cybersyn was praised for playing a major role. ''From that point on the communications center became part of whatever was happening,'' Mr. Espejo said. ''Chile run by computer,'' blared The British Observer on Jan. 7, 1973, as word of the experiment began leaking out. But as the country's political and security situation worsened, Mr. Beer and his Chilean team realized that time was running out. Mr. Allende remained committed to Cybersyn to the end. On Sept. 8, 1973,
Re: [Futurework] FW: [TriumphOfContent] At Megastores, Hagglers Find Prices Are Flexible
Except that it changes the market dynamics. Once haggling becomes part of the purchase equation, consumers will always wonder if they should have spent more time haggling to get a better price. arthur From: Harry Pollard [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sun 3/30/2008 3:36 PM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM; 'Michael Gurstein'; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [Futurework] FW: [TriumphOfContent] At Megastores, Hagglers Find Prices Are Flexible Demeaning for someone to save $120 an hour when he might earn just $15 an hour? Come now Arthur. You might not want to do it but if others do it's their decision because it is profitable to them. Harry ** Harry Pollard Henry George School of Los Angeles Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 (818) 352-4141 ** From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Cordell, Arthur: ECOM Sent: Monday, March 24, 2008 5:20 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Michael Gurstein; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [Futurework] FW: [TriumphOfContent] At Megastores, Hagglers Find Prices Are Flexible It also depends on how we value our time. When shopping, I prefer to spend as little time as possible in the act. I would rather be doing something else with my time than haggling. Almost anything else. So someone spends 10 minutes to save a few dollars or even 20 dollars. May be OK for some, not for me. For some its a game, for me its a waste of time and demeaning to all concerned. arthur From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Harry Pollard Sent: Mon 3/24/2008 7:30 PM To: 'Michael Gurstein'; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [Futurework] FW: [TriumphOfContent] At Megastores,Hagglers Find Prices Are Flexible Come now, gentlemen, there is nothing wrong with bargaining. I recall that about 25 years ago I had taken an English professorial friend into Tijuana in Mexico. He liked a sport coat and was told the price was $25. He was about to buy it when I intervened, said the price was too high and began to walk out of the shop. After some haggling my friend got the coat for $5. It was a voluntary agreement between buyer and seller. Commercial concerns haggle all the time in the real world. Of course the rich don't care to haggle. Maybe the middle class think it's beneath them to haggle thereby taking on to themselves a veneer of richness. Of course in Europe practically every retail price is fixed. The peons have gotten used to it and pay up without a murmur. Harry ** Harry Pollard Henry George School of Los Angeles Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 (818) 352-4141 ** /listinfo/futurework http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] job market 2009 style
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on Sent: Tue 4/1/2008 12:55 PM Subject: [Ottawadissenters] job market 2009 style job market 2009 style: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2uErWWwQTo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2uErWWwQTo __._,_.___ Messages in this topic http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/message/8016;_ylc=X3oDMTM1OWh2YjhtBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRtc2dJZAM4MDE2BHNlYwNmdHIEc2xrA3Z0cGMEc3RpbWUDMTIwNzA3MjU2NgR0cGNJZAM4MDE2 (1) Reply (via web post) http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/post;_ylc=X3oDMTJxaWFiZ2o3BF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRtc2dJZAM4MDE2BHNlYwNmdHIEc2xrA3JwbHkEc3RpbWUDMTIwNzA3MjU2Ng--?act=replymessageNum=8016 | Start a new topic http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/post;_ylc=X3oDMTJmbzdnczA2BF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNudHBjBHN0aW1lAzEyMDcwNzI1NjY- Messages http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/messages;_ylc=X3oDMTJmbWpoODFxBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNtc2dzBHN0aW1lAzEyMDcwNzI1NjY- | Files http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/files;_ylc=X3oDMTJncW12ZDRoBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNmaWxlcwRzdGltZQMxMjA3MDcyNTY2 | Photos http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/photos;_ylc=X3oDMTJmNzdmZGdxBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNwaG90BHN0aW1lAzEyMDcwNzI1NjY- | Links http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/links;_ylc=X3oDMTJnY2wybHVxBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNsaW5rcwRzdGltZQMxMjA3MDcyNTY2 | Polls http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/polls;_ylc=X3oDMTJnZjUwZWEyBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNwb2xscwRzdGltZQMxMjA3MDcyNTY2 | Members http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/members;_ylc=X3oDMTJmazJuYXI1BF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNtYnJzBHN0aW1lAzEyMDcwNzI1NjY- | Calendar http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/calendar;_ylc=X3oDMTJlNmpyaWJsBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNjYWwEc3RpbWUDMTIwNzA3MjU2Ng-- Yahoo! Groups http://groups.yahoo.com/;_ylc=X3oDMTJlM3NobWY4BF9TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNnZnAEc3RpbWUDMTIwNzA3MjU2Ng-- Change settings via the Web http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/join;_ylc=X3oDMTJnODJodGUzBF9TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNzdG5ncwRzdGltZQMxMjA3MDcyNTY2 (Yahoo! ID required) Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Delivery: Digest | Switch format to Traditional mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Delivery Format: Traditional Visit Your Group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters;_ylc=X3oDMTJldnRlZzIxBF9TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDZnRyBHNsawNocGYEc3RpbWUDMTIwNzA3MjU2Ng-- | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ | Unsubscribe mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Visit Your Group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters;_ylc=X3oDMTJmM3RvOWs2BF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRzZWMDdnRsBHNsawN2Z2hwBHN0aW1lAzEyMDcwNzI1NjY- Yahoo! Search Start Searching http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=13oma95v2/M=493064.12016265.12445672.8674578/D=groups/S=1705083512:NC/Y=YAHOO/EXP=1207079766/L=/B=dsp.AdFJq2k-/J=1207072566759446/A=3858796/R=0/SIG=10pbnnlc1/*http://search.yahoo.com Find exactly what you want. Moderator Central Yahoo! Groups http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=13oos7ooc/M=493064.12016262.12445669.8674578/D=groups/S=1705083512:NC/Y=YAHOO/EXP=1207079766/L=/B=d8p.AdFJq2k-/J=1207072566759446/A=5028925/R=0/SIG=11e3tma2a/*http://new.groups.yahoo.com/moderatorcentral Get the latest news from the team. Y! Groups blog The place to go http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=13o1k235s/M=493064.12016258.12582637.8674578/D=groups/S=1705083512:NC/Y=YAHOO/EXP=1207079766/L=/B=eMp.AdFJq2k-/J=1207072566759446/A=5191953/R=0/SIG=112mhte3e/*http://www.ygroupsblog.com/blog/ to stay informed on Groups news! . __,_._,___ ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] Signs of the times
Commodity prices rise and raw materials are found everywhere. == Business/Financial Desk; SECTC As Price of Lead Soars, British Churches Find Holes in Roof 8 April 2008 The New York Times javascript:void(0) EDMONDTHORPE, England -- Thieves peeled long strips of lead from the roof of St. Michael and All Angels, until a barking dog sent them fleeing from this tiny Leicestershire village. But by then, they had left a hole of about 100 square feet in the top of the 800-year-old church. For centuries, people have stolen religious artifacts in Europe, including chunks of religious buildings, but Britain is in the midst of an accelerating crime wave that some experts call the most concerted assault on churches since the Reformation. Instead of doctrinal differences, the motivation is the near record price that lead -- the stuff many old church roofs are made of -- is fetching on commodity markets. ''The local parish church has become a victim of international demand for metals,'' said Chris Pitt, a spokesman for Ecclesiastical, a company that specializes in insuring religious buildings and other heritage sites in Britain. Lead's price on global markets has rocketed sevenfold in the last six years, largely because of rising demand from industrializing countries like China and India. Centuries ago, its malleability made it a popular building material; now it is sought mainly for use in batteries for vehicles and backup power systems for computer and mobile phone networks. It is also used to make bullets and shot, cables and paints. Because of booming demand, new mines are opening in South America and Asia, where deposits are plentiful. There is also a growing business in recycling lead, mainly from used batteries (where 75 percent of lead ends up) but also scrap metal. Lead prices reached a record of $3,900 a ton late last summer mainly because of supply problems from mines in Australia, consumer demand in China for cars and motorbikes, and speculation by hedge fund managers on volatile commodities markets, said William Adams, a metals analyst at BaseMetals.com in London. The price has pulled back since, trading at about $2,750 a ton, he said, but it could climb again on continuing supply problems and steady Chinese demand. One of the oddest consequences of the historically high price is that idyllic corners of Britain -- a nation that gave birth to the Industrial Revolution -- are suddenly feeling the strain of Asia's industrialization. ''Churches have become pretty savvy at protecting property inside their buildings, such as the altar ware and money in boxes,'' said Mr. Pitt of Ecclesiastical, ''but now the most valuable thing these churches have is being taken away piece by piece, and that is tearing away the very fabric of these buildings.'' Ecclesiastical is raising its premiums for churches after paying out claims last year totaling $:9 million ($18 million), mostly for thefts of lead from roofs, he said. Before 2005, such claims were almost unheard-of. A crucial problem for Britain's churches is that many go unused for long periods of time, largely because of a decline in churchgoing. Services here in Edmondthorpe, for example, are often held just six times a year. In some cases, clergy members and parishioners discover roof thefts only once rain pours into the building, damaging cherished items like carved wooden screens and ancient organs. The thefts can lead to thousands of pounds of structural damage, too. In Edmondthorpe, the damage will cost $:10,000 ($20,000) to repair. ''It's ruthless how they do it,'' said Nigel Peters, an inspector with the Leicestershire constabulary, describing lead thefts at Edmondthorpe and seven other local churches. ''It's such a skill to lay down the lead, and then it is literally just ripped away.'' Mr. Peters said his force had carried out raids on two local scrap metal dealers but had found no evidence of wrongdoing. He said no arrests had been made in connection with thefts in his part of the county. Historical preservation rules require many churches to replace roofs with original building materials, including lead, despite its attractiveness to thieves and its cost. Many fear thieves will return after the repairs. ''Whenever I get an early morning phone call these days, I think, 'Oh no, they've taken the roof again,' '' said John Deave, 80, a retired barrister and a churchwarden at St. Guthlac's Church in Stathern, another Leicestershire village, where the church was vandalized in January. Mr. Deave suspected that thieves had climbed up the drainpipe, peeled a three-foot-wide strip from the roof, and threw their haul down into the churchyard, where they left a piece of metal and an indentation in the grass, before driving away. Insurance paid most of the $:2,300 bill to fix the roof. But the church had to pay the $:500 deductible with parishioners' money and reserves from tiny ''peppercorn rents'' still collected on nearby
[Futurework] Signs of the times (2)
Business/Financial Desk; SECTC There's Gas in Those Hills 8 April 2008 The New York Times javascript:void(0) HUGHESVILLE, Pa. -- At first, Raymond Gregoire did not want to listen to the raspy voice on his answering machine offering him money for rights to drill on his land. They want to ruin my land, he thought. But he called back anyway a week later to hear more. By the end of February, he had a contract in hand for $62,000, and he pulled together a group of 75 neighbors who signed $3 million in deals. ''It's a modern-day gold rush in our own backyard,'' Mr. Gregoire said. Not just his backyard either -- a frenzy unlike any seen in decades is unfolding here in rural Pennsylvania, and it eventually could encompass a huge chunk of the East, stretching from upstate New York to eastern Ohio and as far south as West Virginia. Companies are risking big money on a bet that this area could produce billions of dollars worth of natural gas. A layer of rock here called the Marcellus Shale has been known for more than a century to contain gas, but it was generally not seen as economical to extract. Now, improved recovery technology, sharply higher natural gas prices and strong drilling results in a similar shale formation in north Texas are changing the calculus. A result is that a part of the country where energy supplies were long thought to be largely tapped out is suddenly ripe for gas prospecting. Pennsylvania, where the Marcellus Shale appears to be thickest, is the heart of the action so far. Leasing agents from Texas and Oklahoma are knocking on doors, leaving voice mail messages and playing host at catered buffets to woo dairy farmers and retirees. They are rifling through stacks of dusty deeds in courthouse basements to see who has underground mineral rights to the deepest gas formations. Thomas B. Murphy, a Pennsylvania State University educator who runs a program to instruct landowners on their rights, estimated that more than 20 oil and gas companies will invest $700 million this year developing the Marcellus Shale. Up to one half of that will be invested in Pennsylvania, he estimated. The cost to companies for leasing mineral rights jumped from $300 an acre in mid-February to $2,100 now. ''It shows you the pace this is going,'' Mr. Murphy said. ''I would call it breakneck.'' Dale A. Tice, a lawyer representing landowners in lease negotiations, said companies were on a ''feeding frenzy.'' Industry experts say in the last three years companies like Anadarko Petroleum javscript:void(0) , Chesapeake Energy javscript:void(0) and Cabot Oil and Gas javscript:void(0) have leased up to two million acres for drilling in the region, half of that in the last nine months. Whether their bets will pay off is by no means a sure thing. Researchers at Penn State and the State University of New York at Fredonia estimate that the Marcellus has 50 trillion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas, roughly twice the amount of natural gas consumed in the United States last year. But government estimates of the amount of gas recoverable from the Marcellus are relatively modest. Early test results have encouraged companies to keep drilling, but most are holding details of their test wells close to the vest. The company that has done the most work is Range Resources of Fort Worth, which says it plans to invest at least $426 million in the Appalachia region this year. The company has reported promising results from the first 12 wells that it has drilled horizontally, the technique considered by most experts to be the most effective in the Marcellus. The most recent six have each produced more than three million cubic feet of production a day in recent months, and company executives say that is better than the average for wells recovering natural gas in the Barnett Shale in north Texas. ''The Marcellus is important to Range and it could be important to the country but it really is still early,'' said Rodney L. Waller, a senior vice president at Range. ''I can build you a scenario where it can be significantly better than the Barnett but it's a function of economics.'' Energy experts say the Marcellus, along with other smaller shale formations being developed around the country, is coming under scrutiny at an opportune moment, just when conventional domestic natural gas production and imports from Canada are diminishing. With easy-to-find gas fields in decline, the country will need to explore in deeper waters in the Gulf of Mexico and penetrate deeper under the surface on land. If all goes well, the Marcellus could help moderate the steep climb in natural gas prices and reduce possible future dependence on natural gas from the Middle East, which is beginning to arrive at coastal terminals in liquefied form. Natural gas in the Marcellus and other shale formations is sometimes found as deep as 9,000 feet below the ground, a geological and engineering challenge not to be underestimated. The shales are
[Futurework] Signs of the times (3)
Commodity prices rise and raw materials are found everywhere. === Business/Financial Desk; SECTC In U.S., Metal Theft Plagues Troubled Neighborhoods 8 April 2008 The New York Times javascript:void(0) CLEVELAND -- Metal scrappers have attacked churches and ransacked homes in this Midwestern city, leaving entire neighborhoods uninhabitable. Saint Theodosius Orthodox Cathedral here lost its insurance after a thief stole copper panels from the roof years ago. Three churches in Cleveland Heights have been stripped of copper gutters. And in the last few months, three churches in the North Collinwood neighborhood were stripped of copper downspouts. ''Our neighborhoods are being pillaged, not by Vikings or Goths, but by modern-day barbarians,'' said Mike Polensek, North Collinwood's City Council member. Even manhole covers and sewer drains are being stolen out of streets to be sold as scrap metal, Mr. Polensek said. Houses, however, are the greatest targets of commodity scavengers in the United States. Neighborhoods depopulated by the rising tide of foreclosures make easy targets. So many houses have been stripped of siding and copper pipes that neighborhoods must be abandoned and turned into green spaces, said Jim Rokakis, treasurer for Cuyahoga County, which includes Cleveland. ''We have to pull out,'' he said. ''There's nothing left.'' It is common for home builders and remodelers here to erect signs on plywood that read ''All PVC pipes, no copper,'' indicating a house has less expensive plastic piping. In the last six months, the police in the city of Cleveland Heights have arrested two groups of scrappers who used government foreclosure lists to plot which houses to sack. Scrap metal thefts began to soar 12 to 18 months ago. ''There's a direct correlation between the price of commodities and the number of metal thefts,'' said Bruce Savage, spokesman for the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries. The institute received 174 reports from the police around the country regarding metal thefts from Jan. 1 to March 28 of this year, a sharp increase over the period in 2007, and the actual number of thefts is much higher, Mr. Savage said. Copper pipes, among the most commonly stolen items, are selling for just over $3 a pound. The local police report bronze urns taken from gravestones and long sections of aluminum bleachers stolen from high school stadiums. Catalytic converters in vehicles are also popular targets because they contain platinum, which this month sold for an average of $1,900 an ounce. === ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] FW: Call My Lawyer ... in India
Subject: Call My Lawyer ... in India Knowledge Process Outsourcing http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1727726,00.html /time/magazine/article/0,9171,1727726,00.html Time Magazine Thursday, Apr. 03, 2008 Call My Lawyer ... in India By Suzanne Barlyn Mark Alexander, a Dallas attorney, says he's ethically obligated to do what's best for his clients, and that includes saving them money. So when one of them asks him to research a securities-fraud topic, for example, or breach of contract, he doesn't even think about applying his $395 hourly rate. Instead, he calls Atlas Legal Research, an outsourcing company based in Irving, Texas, that uses lawyers in India to provide the service for $60 per hr. When a client pays me a $25,000 retainer and I can save them money, I will do so, says Alexander. Handing off the work to a $225-per-hr. junior associate is not an option. They don't even know where to stand in the courtroom, he says. While the Americans learn, well-trained lawyers in secure offices in Mumbai (formerly Bombay), Bangalore and Gurgaon (outside Delhi), who typically earn $6,000 to $30,000 annually, do legal grunt work. Alexander's sentiments may explain why outsourcing is blossoming in the legal profession, which is known--and often despised--for its high prices. Law-firm partners bill at a national average of $318 per hr. and at $550 per hr. at large New York City firms, according to a 2007 survey by Altman Weil, a legal-consulting company. Starting salaries for attorneys at some large firms now stand at $160,000. So a U.S. company's simple problem can generate hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees. The considerable savings is perhaps one reason Forrester Research, based in Cambridge, Mass., has projected the offshoring of 29,000 legal jobs by the end of the year and as many as 79,000 by 2015. It's part of India's inevitable move up the corporate food chain, from lower-value business process outsourcing--like call centers--to knowledge process outsourcing (KPO). The latter category encompasses higher-skilled jobs, such as engineering and medicine, and relies on the KPOs to behave more like branch offices of U.S. companies. ValueNotes, a business-research firm based in Pune, India, says a subset of KPO called legal process outsourcing (LPO) has grown revenues 49% from 2006, to $218 million last year. The figure will nearly triple, to $640 million, by 2010, it says. ValueNotes counts more than 100 legal-services providers in India, ranging from a handful of overseas corporate legal offices, such as Oracle's and General Electric's, to companies that contract to provide low-cost legal services to U.S. and British businesses. Leaders include Integreon and LawScribe, both in Los Angeles, and New York--based Pangea3. Persuading lawyers to export work wasn't an easy sell, says Ganesh Natarjan, CEO of seven-year-old Mindcrest, which has its headquarters in Chicago and employs 440 lawyers in Mumbai and Pune. Lawyers are a risk-averse group, so it was a slow process for them to adopt the idea, says George Heffernan, vice president and general counsel. Mindcrest's services include document review, research and support for compliance functions. The last cost large companies an average of $2.9 million each in 2006, according to Financial Executives International in Florham Park, N.J. Educating American lawyers about India's English-speaking attorneys, who are trained in a common-law system modeled on Britain's, helped change attitudes, at least among top lawyers for U.S. companies, Heffernan says. About 75% of Mindcrest's clients are FORTUNE 500 companies. Mindcrest hired 390 lawyers last year alone, a staff increase mandated by clients with some large-scale projects, it says. But outsourcing worries some experts because the ethical rules that bind U.S. attorneys have no force in India. Lawyers are being seduced by the business end of outsourcing and are not being concerned enough with the ethical issues it's raising. I'm deeply troubled that outsourcing companies do not understand the scope of a lawyer's duty to confidentiality, nor are they familiar with conflict-of-interest rules, says Mary C. Daly, dean of St. John's University School of Law in New York City. LPO firms say they are up to the task of security and confidentiality. At Integreon's facilities in Mumbai and Gurgaon, for example, guards search attorneys' belongings to ensure they're not carrying flash drives or laptops, according to CEO Liam Brown. Computers don't have disc drives, usable usb ports or CD burners, and most can't print. Attorneys work for a specific client in areas called dedicated delivery centers, which are accessible via a fingerprint scan and monitored by cameras. Each room can hold up to 36 terminals--many of them with dual screens. The company never stores data locally. Rather, the lawyers work directly on the client's server
[Futurework] FW: Gloom? What gloom?
In Spending by the Very Rich, No Such Thing as a Slowdown 14 April 2008 The New York Times javascript:void(0) Who said anything about a recession? Sometime between the government bailout of Bear Stearns javscript:void(0) and the Bureau of Labor Statistics report that America lost 80,000 jobs in March, Lee Tachman spent roughly $50,000 last month on a four-day jaunt to Miami for himself and three close friends. The trip was an exercise in luxuriant male bonding. Mr. Tachman, who is 38, and his friends got around by private jet, helicopter, Hummer limousine, Ferraris and Lamborghinis; stayed in V.I.P. rooms at Casa Casuarina, the South Beach hotel that was formerly Gianni Versace's mansion; and played ''extreme adventure paintball'' with former agents of the federal Drug Enforcement Administration. Mr. Tachman, a manager for a company that executes trades for hedge funds and the owner of ''a handful'' of buildings in New York, said he has not felt the need to cut back. ''I always feel like there's a sword of Damocles over my head, like it could all come crashing down at any time,'' he said. ''But there's always going to be people who are trading, and there's always going to be a demand for real estate in New York.'' He is hardly alone in his eagerness to keep spending. Some businesses that cater to the superrich report that clients -- many of them traders and private equity investors whose work is tied to Wall Street -- are still splurging on multimillion-dollar Manhattan apartments, custom-built yachts, contemporary art and lavish parties. Buyers this year have already closed on 71 Manhattan apartments that each cost more than $10 million, compared with 17 apartments in that price range during all of 2007. Last week, a New York art dealer paid a record $1.6 million for an Edward Weston photograph at Sotheby's. And the GoldBar, a downtown lounge, reports that bankers continue to order $3,000 bottles of Remy Martin Louis XIII Cognac. ''When times get tough, the smart spend money,'' said David Monn, an event planner who is organizing a black-tie party on May 10 for dignitaries and recent purchasers of apartments at the Plaza Hotel; the average price there was $7 million. ''Short of our country going on food stamps, I don't think we're doing anything differently.'' Some extreme spenders say they have not cut back on their impulse Bentley or apartment purchases because they have made so much money in the good times from the Internet, stock market and real estate. Some have been able to move their money into investments like private equity that are available only to those with extensive capital. Some rationalize cars and home renovations as ''investments.'' And some simply don't want to skimp on the weddings and anniversary parties that they see as milestone events. ''We're trying to spend on what we feel is important,'' said Victor Self, an executive with a fitness company who, with his partner, is planning to spend $100,000 on a commitment ceremony on St. Barts and a dessert party for 200 to 300 guests at Jeffrey, a clothing store in the meatpacking district. Many economists warn that the nation's financial troubles may spread far more widely, and could ultimately touch even the wealthiest. The financial sector could lose as many as 20,000 jobs in New York City by the end of 2009, according to the city's Independent Budget Office. And at a March 18 policy meeting, Federal Reserve Board members raised the possibility of a ''prolonged and severe economic downturn,'' recently released minutes show. That threat has undoubtedly caused some affluent people to consider some degree of frugality. But that still leaves plenty who are consuming away, and one of the things New Yorkers love to consume is real estate. In October, Marc Sperling, the 36-year-old president of an equity-trading company, bought a new condo on the Upper West Side in a building where four-bedroom apartments like his cost more than $4 million. When he moves into the completed building next year, he plans to hold on to his other two apartments in Murray Hill and Miami Beach -- each of which he values at about $2.5 million. Mr. Sperling views the nation's economic slump as a temporary problem, and is grateful that it has yet to affect him. ''I think if you have the means to ride it out, that's what you do,'' he said. His view of the subprime mortgage crisis seemed to reflect a sort of inverse class resentment. ''I don't want to sound harsh, but the people who were buying million-dollar houses with a combined household income of $70,000 or $80,000 were the ones who were chasing easy money,'' he said. Days before the collapse of Bear Stearns javscript:void(0) , the bank's chairman, James E. Cayne, paid $25 million for a 14th-floor condo at the Plaza Hotel. He, too, is invited to the May 10 party at the Plaza. It will feature a dozen female string musicians made up to
[Futurework] Billion-Dollar Paydays
Business/Financial Desk; SECTA Wall Street Winners Hit a New Jackpot: Billion-Dollar Paydays 16 April 2008 The New York Times Hedge fund managers, those masters of a secretive, sometimes volatile financial universe, are making money on a scale that once seemed unimaginable, even in Wall Street's rarefied realms. One manager, John Paulson, made $3.7 billion last year. He reaped that bounty, probably the richest in Wall Street history, by betting against certain mortgages and complex financial products that held them. Mr. Paulson, the founder of Paulson Company, was not the only big winner. The hedge fund managers James H. Simons and George Soros each earned almost $3 billion last year, according to an annual ranking of top hedge fund earners by Institutional Investor's Alpha magazine, which comes out Wednesday. Hedge fund managers have redefined notions of wealth in recent years. And the richest among them are redefining those notions once again. Their unprecedented and growing affluence underscores the gaping inequality between the millions of Americans facing stagnating wages and rising home foreclosures and an agile financial elite that seems to thrive in good times and bad. Such profits may also prompt more calls for regulation of the industry. Even on Wall Street, where money is the ultimate measure of success, the size of the winnings makes some uneasy. ''There is nothing wrong with it -- it's not illegal,'' said William H. Gross, the chief investment officer of the bond fund Pimco. ''But it's ugly.'' The richest hedge fund managers keep getting richer -- fast. To make it into the top 25 of Alpha's list, the industry standard for hedge fund pay, a manager needed to earn at least $360 million last year, more than 18 times the amount in 2002. The median American family, by contrast, earned $60,500 last year. Combined, the top 50 hedge fund managers last year earned $29 billion. That figure represents the managers' own pay and excludes the compensation of their employees. Five of the top 10, including Mr. Simons and Mr. Soros, were also at the top of the list for 2006. To compile its ranking, Alpha examined the funds' returns and the fees that they charge investors, and then calculated the managers' pay. Top hedge fund managers made money in many ways last year, from investing in overseas stock markets to betting that prices of commodities like oil, wheat and copper would rise. Some, like Mr. Paulson, profited handsomely from the turmoil in the mortgage market ripping through the economy. As early as 2005, Mr. Paulson began betting that complex mortgage investments known as collateralized debt obligations would decline in value, much as Wall Street traders bet that shares will drop in price. In that case, known as shorting, they borrow shares and sell them, wait for the price to fall, buy the shares back at a lower price and return them, pocketing the profit. Then, over the next two years, Mr. Paulson established two funds to focus on the credit markets. One of those funds returned 590 percent last year, and the other handed back 353 percent, according to Alpha. By the end of 2007, Mr. Paulson sat atop $28 billion in assets, up from $6 billion 12 months earlier. Mr. Soros, one of the world's most successful speculators and richest men, leapt out of retirement last summer as the market turmoil spread -- and he won big. He made $2.9 billion for the year, when his flagship Quantum fund returned almost 32 percent, according to Alpha. Mr. Simon, a mathematician and former Defense Department code breaker who uses complex computer models to trade, earned $2.8 billion. His flagship Medallion fund returned 73 percent. Like Mr. Paulson, Philip Falcone, who founded Harbinger Partners with $25 million in June 2001, cast a winning bet against the mortgage market. He pulled in returns of 117 percent after fees in 2007 and made $1.7 billion. The trade thrust him from relative obscurity to hedge fund heavyweight: he now manages $18 billion. Harbinger recently won agreement from The New York Times Company javscript:void(0) to add two members to its board. Hedge fund managers share their success with their investors, which include wealthy individuals, pension funds and university endowments. They typically charge annual fees equal to 2 percent of their assets under management, and take a 20 percent cut of any profits. With a combined $2 trillion under management, the hedge fund industry is coming off its richest year ever -- a feat all the more remarkable given the billions of dollars of losses suffered by major Wall Street banks. In recent months, however, scores of hedge funds have quietly died or spectacularly imploded, wracked by bad investments, excess borrowing or leverage, and client redemptions -- or a combination of those events. ''To some degree it's a very gigantic version of Las Vegas,'' said Gary Burtless, an economist at the Brookings Institution. As Alpha's list shows, managers who reap big gains one
[Futurework] trends in work
NT Times April 18, 2008 Workers Get Fewer Hours, Deepening the Downturn By PETER S. GOODMAN http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/g/peter_s_goodman/index.html?inline=nyt-per Not long ago, overtime was a regular feature at the Ludowici Roof Tile factory in eastern Ohio. Not anymore. With orders scarce and crates of unsold tiles piling up across the yard, the company has slowed production and cut working hours, sowing worry and thrift among its workers. We don't just hop in the car and go shopping or get something to eat, said Kim Baker, whose take-home pay at the plant has recently dropped to $450 a week, from more than $600. You've got to watch everything. If we go to town now, it's for a reason. Throughout the country, businesses grappling with declining fortunes are cutting hours for those on their payrolls. Self-employed people are suffering a drop in demand for their services, like music lessons, catering and management consulting. Growing numbers of people are settling for part-time work out of a failure to secure a full-time position. The gradual erosion of the paycheck has become a stealth force driving the American economic downturn. Most of the attention has focused on the loss of jobs and the risk of layoffs. But the less-noticeable shrinking of hours and pay for millions of workers around the country appears to be a bigger contributor to the decline, which has already spread from housing and finance to other important areas of the economy. While official unemployment has risen only modestly, to 5.1 percent, the reduction of wages and working hours for those still employed has become a primary cause of distress, pushing many more Americans into a downward spiral, economists say. Moreover, this slippage is a critical indicator that the nation may well be on the verge of a recession, if not already in one. Last month, the hours worked by those on American payrolls dropped, compared with six months earlier, according to an index maintained by the Labor Department. The last time the index moved into negative territory was February 2001, when the economy was on the doorstep of recession. A similar slide emerged in August 1990, one month into what proved an even more severe downturn. From March 2007 to March of this year, the average workweek reported in the private sector slipped slightly to 33.8 hours, from 33.9 hours, while overtime for manufacturing workers fell by a larger margin. At the end of last month, more than 4.9 million people were working part time either because they could not find full-time jobs or because their companies had cut hours in the face of slack business, according to a Labor Department survey. That represented an increase of 400,000 since November. And on Wednesday, the government reported that average earnings slipped in March after accounting for the rising costs of food and fuel - the sixth consecutive month that pay failed to keep pace with inflation. As people bring home paychecks that do not go as far, they are forced to economize, eliminating demand for goods and services that once captured their dollars, spreading pain to providers like auto dealers and lawn care providers. They, too, must trim their outlays on pay, shrinking working hours more and furthering the slowdown It means spending slows going forward, said Robert Barbera, chief economist at the trading and research firm ITG. Paychecks are diminishing just as millions of Americans are finding their access to credit constricted as well. Borrowing against the value of real estate - a crucial artery of household finance in recent years - has been pared back as home prices have plummeted and as banks have tightened lending standards in the aftermath of the collapse of the housing bubble. At this point, those avenues are blocked, said Jared Bernstein http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/b/jared_bernstein/index.html?inline=nyt-per , senior economist at the labor-oriented Economic Policy Institute in Washington. Consumption going forward is going to be in large part a good old-fashioned function of paychecks and incomes. Even before the rollback in working hours, pay was barely keeping up with the rising costs of gas and food. From February to September of last year, the average hourly earnings for workers in the private sector was still growing at a slightly faster clip than the pace of inflation, according to the Labor Department. But from November through March, as employers began to scale back in a variety of ways, wage growth fell below the pace of inflation, meaning that paychecks were effectively shrinking. Now, work opportunities are themselves declining, as the downturn snuffs out business. In the suburbs of Denver, Max Garcia was netting as much as $2,000 a month last year as a self-employed computer repairman, he said. As recently as November, he was still receiving three and
[Futurework] Consumer sentiment at a 26-year low
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Consumer confidence fell for a third straight month in April, hitting its weakest in 26 years, on heightened worries over inflation and the sagging housing market, a survey showed on Friday. Picture (Metafile) The Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers said its final index of confidence for April fell deeper into recessionary territory, to 62.6 from 69.5 in March and below economists' median expectation of 63.2 in a Reuters poll. The April result is the lowest since March 1982's 62.0, when the stagflationary period of low growth and high inflation was still an issue for many Americans. Short-dated Treasury debt prices briefly edged higher after the release of the data, while stocks briefly turned negative or extended prior losses. More consumers reported that their personal financial situation had worsened than any time since 1982 due to high fuel and food prices as well as shrinking income gains and widespread reports of declines in home values, the survey said. Never before in the long history of the surveys have so many consumers reported hearing news of unfavorable economic development as in the April survey. Nearly nine in 10 consumers thought the economy was now in recession, Reuters/University of Michigan said. While a tax rebate will bolster consumer spending, consumers favor by a wide margin using the rebate to repay debt and to add to their savings, according to the surveys. The report showed its reading on one-year inflation expectations climbed to 4.8 percent -- the highest since a similar reading in October 1990 -- from 4.3 percent in March. Five-year inflation expectations rose to 3.2 percent from 2.9 percent in March. The index of expectations for personal finances fell to 100, the lowest since August 1993, from 112 in March, while the index of current personal finances dropped to 86 in April, which was the lowest since November 1981, from 93 last month. (Reporting by Chris Reese; Editing by James Dalgleish) ole0.bmp___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] As Euro Nears 10, Cracks Emerge in Fiscal Union
MEMO FROM FRANKFURT As Euro Nears 10, Cracks Emerge in Fiscal Union 1 May 2008 The New York Times javascript:void(0) FRANKFURT -- The euro turns 10 next January, a milestone that will be marked with celebratory speeches, inch-thick scholarly papers and a commemorative 2-euro coin, designed by a Greek sculptor. It was chosen from five candidates in an online poll of European residents. For Greece, winning the coin contest may be the high point of the festivities. Seven years after forsaking its drachma for the euro, the Greek economy is faltering, inflation is spiking and exports have been hobbled by the surge of the euro against the dollar. Greece, said Thomas Mayer, the chief European economist at Deutsche Bank javscript:void(0) , is an ''accident waiting to happen.'' By most yardsticks, Europe's common currency has been a success, emerging as an alternative to the fading dollar for bond dealers, central bankers, Chinese exporters, even Jay-Z, the American rapper, who put a pop-cultural imprimatur on the currency by flashing a wad of 500-euro notes in a music video. Yet fissures are forming in the European monetary union that threaten to widen in coming months. Greece, Portugal, Italy and Spain -- the sun-drenched fraternity sometimes called Club Med -- are struggling with eroding competitiveness, rising prices and bloated debts. Meanwhile, Germany, the sick man of Europe for most of the euro era, is suddenly vigorous again. Economically fit after years of reforms and fortified by brisk global demand for its machinery and other goods, it has fended off China to retain its status as the world's export champion. Germany's northern neighbors are generally doing well, too, which has rekindled talk of a north-south divide: a north that is growing decently but is concerned about inflation, and so prefers higher interest rates and is willing to live with a strong currency; a south that is worried about stagnating, and prefers lower rates and a weaker currency. When leaders and laggards use the same money but have opposite problems, tensions are bound to surface. Take Italy, perhaps Europe's shakiest economy. Facing high labor costs, slumping exports and a gaping public debt, its old remedy for hard times would have been to devalue the lira. Now, chained to the mighty euro, it cannot do that. Instead, it will probably have to endure a recession and rising unemployment, something no politician -- but especially not one just elected, like Silvio Berlusconi -- wants to face. Mr. Berlusconi has already said he wants the European Central Bank to weigh more than inflation when setting monetary policy. In other words, the bank should lower interest rates, which would probably deflate the euro somewhat and make it easier for Italy to sell its wine and shoes overseas. Mr. Berlusconi has found an ally in Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, who has tangled repeatedly with the central bank on the same issue. Mr. Sarkozy will assume the rotating presidency of the European Union in July, giving him a ready-made platform for his views. The founders of the euro anticipated such tensions; some feared they would strangle the currency in its crib. But in the late 1990s, when the monetary union was being created, Europe's leaders set aside national concerns for the goal of a common currency. ''There was a major political will to get to the union,'' said Alexandre Lamfalussy, who was president of the European Monetary Institute, the forerunner of the central bank. ''There was also political will in the countries to put their own houses in order. I remember being very surprised at the time.'' Today, though, ''the old temptation of the governments to find a culprit for their problems has returned,'' he said. ''It is a wider problem than one or two political leaders.'' In some sense, the political honeymoon for the euro ended in May 2005, when voters in France and the Netherlands rejected the proposed constitution for the European Union. While that document had little direct bearing on the currency, it symbolized Europe's steady march from economic to political integration, a process that, for now at least, has stalled. Like so much in European history, the debate over the euro is at heart a debate over the role of Germany. When the monetary union was being fashioned, weaker states like Italy justifiably feared having their fortunes lashed to a Teutonic locomotive. Unexpectedly, though, Germany fell into a deep slump soon after the euro began circulating in 2002, three years after its adoption as Europe's currency. Because it accounts for a third of the monetary union's economic output, Germany, with its troubles, bequeathed Europe an easy-money policy -- the reverse of what Italy and its neighbors feared. ''Rather than struggling to keep up with Germany, they got tremendously low interest rates,'' Mr. Mayer of Deutsche Bank javscript:void(0) said. ''Instead of wearing a hair shirt, they were partying like crazy.'' In Germany
[Futurework] FW: The Cognitive Age
OP-ED COLUMNIST Editorial Desk; SECTA The Cognitive Age By DAVID BROOKS 2 May 2008 The New York Times javascript:void(0) If you go into a good library, you will find thousands of books on globalization. Some will laud it. Some will warn about its dangers. But they'll agree that globalization is the chief process driving our age. Our lives are being transformed by the increasing movement of goods, people and capital across borders. The globalization paradigm has led, in the political arena, to a certain historical narrative: There were once nation-states like the U.S. and the European powers, whose economies could be secured within borders. But now capital flows freely. Technology has leveled the playing field. Competition is global and fierce. New dynamos like India and China threaten American dominance thanks to their cheap labor and manipulated currencies. Now, everything is made abroad. American manufacturing is in decline. The rest of the economy is threatened. Hillary Clinton summarized the narrative this week: ''They came for the steel companies and nobody said anything. They came for the auto companies and nobody said anything. They came for the office companies, people who did white-collar service jobs, and no one said anything. And they came for the professional jobs that could be outsourced, and nobody said anything.'' The globalization paradigm has turned out to be very convenient for politicians. It allows them to blame foreigners for economic woes. It allows them to pretend that by rewriting trade deals, they can assuage economic anxiety. It allows them to treat economic and social change as a great mercantilist competition, with various teams competing for global supremacy, and with politicians starring as the commanding generals. But there's a problem with the way the globalization paradigm has evolved. It doesn't really explain most of what is happening in the world. Globalization is real and important. It's just not the central force driving economic change. Some Americans have seen their jobs shipped overseas, but global competition has accounted for a small share of job creation and destruction over the past few decades. Capital does indeed flow around the world. But as Pankaj Ghemawat of the Harvard Business School has observed, 90 percent of fixed investment around the world is domestic. Companies open plants overseas, but that's mainly so their production facilities can be close to local markets. Nor is the globalization paradigm even accurate when applied to manufacturing. Instead of fleeing to Asia, U.S. manufacturing output is up over recent decades. As Thomas Duesterberg of Manufacturers Alliance/MAPI, a research firm, has pointed out, the U.S.'s share of global manufacturing output has actually increased slightly since 1980. The chief force reshaping manufacturing is technological change (hastened by competition with other companies in Canada, Germany or down the street). Thanks to innovation, manufacturing productivity has doubled over two decades. Employers now require fewer but more highly skilled workers. Technological change affects China just as it does the America. William Overholt of the RAND Corporation javscript:void(0) has noted that between 1994 and 2004 the Chinese shed 25 million manufacturing jobs, 10 times more than the U.S. The central process driving this is not globalization. It's the skills revolution. We're moving into a more demanding cognitive age. In order to thrive, people are compelled to become better at absorbing, processing and combining information. This is happening in localized and globalized sectors, and it would be happening even if you tore up every free trade deal ever inked. The globalization paradigm emphasizes the fact that information can now travel 15,000 miles in an instant. But the most important part of information's journey is the last few inches -- the space between a person's eyes or ears and the various regions of the brain. Does the individual have the capacity to understand the information? Does he or she have the training to exploit it? Are there cultural assumptions that distort the way it is perceived? The globalization paradigm leads people to see economic development as a form of foreign policy, as a grand competition between nations and civilizations. These abstractions, called ''the Chinese'' or ''the Indians,'' are doing this or that. But the cognitive age paradigm emphasizes psychology, culture and pedagogy -- the specific processes that foster learning. It emphasizes that different societies are being stressed in similar ways by increased demands on human capital. If you understand that you are living at the beginning of a cognitive age, you're focusing on the real source of prosperity and understand that your anxiety is not being caused by a foreigner. It's not that globalization and the skills revolution are contradictory
Re: [Futurework] [Ottawadissenters] Economic De-growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity
the example I often use is that of the mother who says to her child, don't touch the stove it's hot. And says it many times. The child touches the stove and says Wow the stove is hot. Seems that sometimes we have to learn by doing. Even if its doing the wrong thing. arthur From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Ed Weick Sent: Thursday, May 15, 2008 10:40 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: futurework Subject: Re: [Ottawadissenters] Economic De-growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity This morning I listened to an interview with Lester Brown, President of the Earth Policy Institute and author of the Plan B books, the latest being Plan B 3.O. In the interview, Brown saw global population stabilizing at 8 billion and went through the usual list of problems that we are now encountering: global warming; shift in land use from food to ethanol production; aquifer and soil depletion; etc. A review of Plan B 3.0 can be found at http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/02/book_review_pla.php http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/02/book_review_pla.php and you can download the book as a PDF file there. An article by Brown and Jonathan Lewis recently appeared in the Washington Post and can be accessed at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/21/AR2008042102555.html?hpid=opinionsbox1 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/21/AR2008042102555.html?hpid=opinionsbox1 . What I found interesting is that the page on which the article appears also contains an add for a Toyota Tundra, a monster gas-guzzling panel truck! Oh well Brown is now into his seventies. While one has to admire what he and other aging eco-warriors have done and are still in many cases doing, I personally think it ain't going to work the way they want it to. I'm tending back to the view that people don't learn rationally, they learn catastrophically, a view that I've tried very hard to abandon. We accelerate until we hit a wall. Those that are left will then pick themselves up, scratch their heads, and ask each other 'now what the hell that was all about!?' Ed - Original Message - From: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, May 15, 2008 9:13 AM Subject: RE: [Ottawadissenters] Economic De-growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity I wish the project well. I don't think it will go very far. de-growth is usually called economic recession or economic depression. I don't see much support for this in any part of our society. I realize they are looking for managed or sustainable or optiumum or balanced de-growth, but the net result is that we have built a society that hands out economic goodies. People will have to be convinced that taking away such goodies is a positive or plus in their lives. Arthur From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Jon Legg Sent: Wed 5/14/2008 9:04 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [Ottawadissenters] Economic De-growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity Hi Dissenters, This looks interesting. I haven't taken much time to research this, but it appears that there is the beginning of discussions in Europe on de-growth (the word in French that is used is décroissance. It's the first of a number of conferences sponsored by some organization called, European Society for Ecological Economics. The name of the conference is, Economic De-growth for Ecological Sustainability and Social Equity. The web link is as follows: http://events.it-sudparis.eu/degrowthconference/en/ http://events.it-sudparis.eu/degrowthconference/en/ Without much study of all the material, I nonetheless draw some hope from the theme that there are some people who have realized that growth is the greatest problem. Very late in the game, but perhaps better late than never. Cheers, Jon __._,_.___ Messages in this topic http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/message/8391;_ylc=X3oDMTM1cmg2YnVpBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRtc2dJZAM4NDA0BHNlYwNmdHIEc2xrA3Z0cGMEc3RpbWUDMTIxMDg2MjQzMAR0cGNJZAM4Mzkx (8) Reply (via web post) http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ottawadissenters/post;_ylc=X3oDMTJxYm4xZHFtBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzE1MjA5MDU5BGdycHNwSWQDMTcwNTA4MzUxMgRtc2dJZAM4NDA0BHNlYwNmdHIEc2xrA3JwbHkEc3RpbWUDMTIxMDg2MjQzMA--?act=replymessageNum=8404 | Start a new topic
[Futurework] Desaparecidos (disappeared people)
Business/Financial Desk; SECTC For Wall St. Workers, Ax Falls Quietly 16 May 2008 The New York Times javascript:void(0) People on Wall Street seem to be vanishing overnight. Thousands are losing their jobs as hard-pressed banks cut deep. But while layoffs are nothing new in the financial industry (they come with almost every downturn), this round seems different: it is eerily quiet. So quiet, in fact, that people refer to these cuts as stealth layoffs. Some bosses hardly say a word after people are fired. At Citigroup javascript:void(0); , Goldman Sachs javascript:void(0); and Morgan Stanley javascript:void(0); , for example, the first clue that someone is gone can be e-mail messages that are returned to senders from a former colleague's inactivated corporate address. While the financial markets have found a bit of a footing lately, banks are pushing ahead with plans for some of the deepest job reductions in years. Since last summer, banks worldwide have announced plans to cut 65,000 employees. But exactly how many jobs have been or will be eliminated is unclear. In the past, banks typically made sharp reductions all at once. After the 1987 stock market crash, for example, employees were herded into conference rooms and dismissed en masse. This time, companies are making many small cuts over the course of weeks or even months. Some people who have lost jobs, and many more struggling to hold them, say banks are keeping employees in the dark about the size and timing of layoffs. Citigroup javascript:void(0); , for example, said last year that it would eliminate 17,000 jobs, or about 5 percent of its work force. Then in January, Citi said it would dismiss 4,200 more people. In April, it said an additional 8,700 would go. By contrast, after the financial upheaval of 1998, when many Wall Street banks pared payrolls, Citigroup javascript:void(0); eliminated 10,600 jobs, or about 6 percent of its work force at the time. The idea that banks will slowly wield the knife again and again unnerves many employees. People know the cuts are coming -- they just don't know when or where. ''Nobody knows who is coming in; nobody knows who is going out,'' said JoAnne Kennedy, who was laid off by JPMorgan Chase javascript:void(0); this year. ''They want to keep it all as quiet as possible.'' To some bank workers, one round of layoffs seems to blur into the next. At Goldman Sachs javascript:void(0); , low performers were dismissed from January through March. A few weeks later, the bank quietly began letting more people go. All told, Goldman is axing about 8 percent of its work force, although incoming employees this summer will make up for some of that loss. At Merrill Lynch javascript:void(0); , 1,100 people were laid off early this year, mostly in mortgage-related businesses. But in April, the firm announced 2,900 more cuts. JPMorgan Chase javascript:void(0); said last fall that it would lay off 100 people in its fixed-income division and then followed up with several smaller rounds of cuts in other parts of the bank. The casualties will keep mounting as JPMorgan javascript:void(0); melds with Bear Stearns javascript:void(0); , the troubled investment bank it is buying. Starting at the top, JPMorgan javascript:void(0); executives are eliminating jobs at their own bank, redeploying some people to other divisions and replacing others with Bear Stearns javascript:void(0); workers. As many as 5,500 Bear Stearns javascript:void(0); employees and 4,000 JPMorgan javascript:void(0); workers could lose their jobs before it is over. The steady drumbeat of bad news on Wall Street is sapping morale. Wendi S. Lazar, a partner at the employment law firm of Outten Golden, said companies are usually better off being open about cutting jobs. ''You're seeing a very, very inconsistent message to employees,'' Ms. Lazar said. ''It's, 'I don't know when it's going to happen, it may be tomorrow, it may be next month; we may be able to keep you, we may not.' '' Layoffs are always difficult, but some of the recent cutbacks have been messier than usual. Some JPMorgan javascript:void(0); employees learned that people from Bear Stearns javascript:void(0); would get their jobs before the bosses said anything. JPMorgan javascript:void(0); clients told them first. Some Lehman Brothers javascript:void(0); investment bankers found out their jobs were in peril when they saw cardboard boxes and dumpster bins in the hallways in March. And when Bank of America javascript:void(0); dismissed some bankers recently, it told them that their annual bonuses had been almost wiped out and that their personal belongings would arrive in the mail. The bank announced many of the layoffs on Feb. 13, two days before many employees would be able to start cashing out stock options. In January, when Ms. Kennedy was temporarily out of the office at JPMorgan javascript:void(0); because of surgery, her boss called to say her job had been eliminated. She did not
[Futurework] China becomes costly
Business/Financial Desk; SECTA Investors Seek Asian Options To Costly China 18 June 2008 The New York Times javascript:void(0) HANOI -- Canon is no longer building or expanding factories in China, but the company is doubling its work force at a printer factory outside Hanoi to 8,000. Nearby, Nissan is expanding a vehicle engineering center. Hanesbrands, the underwear company based in Winston-Salem, N.C., is setting up two new factories here, as is the Texhong Textile Group javascript:void(0); from Shanghai. China remains the most popular destination for foreign industrial investment in the world, attracting almost $83 billion last year. But a growing number of multinational corporations are pursuing a strategy that companies and analysts call ''China plus one,'' establishing or expanding Asian bases outside China, particularly in Vietnam. A long list of concerns about China is feeding the trend: inflation, shortages of workers and energy, a strengthening currency, changing government policies, even the possibility of widespread civil unrest someday. But most important, wages in China are rising close to 25 percent a year in many industries, in dollar terms, and China is no longer such a bargain. Even as companies seek other places to make their goods, they are stalked by overheated economies: in Vietnam, for example, inflation was 25.2 percent last month. More than corporate profit margins are at stake. When the cost of making goods in Asia rises, American consumers inevitably feel pain. The Labor Department said Thursday that import prices were 4.6 percent higher in May than a year earlier for goods from China and 6.4 percent higher for goods from southeast Asia. Companies are using the China-plus-one strategy to mitigate the risks of overdependence on factories in one country. Multinational corporations are ''thinking about all the world and keeping a balance'' between China and other countries, said Edward Kang, the chief executive of Ever-Glory International, a sportswear manufacturer in Nanjing, China. Ever-Glory, which sells to Wal-Mart javascript:void(0); and Kohl's javascript:void(0); , is building a factory in Vietnam. Companies remaining in China are desperately seeking to control costs. ''We will maintain our capacity in China, but we will make it more automatic and reduce the number of employees,'' said Laurence Shu, the chief financial officer of Shanghai-based Texhong, one of the world's largest makers of cotton and spandex fabric. To limit labor costs, Hanesbrands is building a largely automated factory in Nanjing. But the company is also building a factory in Vietnam, in addition to a factory it bought here, and two more in Thailand. Gerald Evans, the president for global supply chain at Hanesbrands, said that compared with China, ''we found more ready availability of both land and labor in both Vietnam and Thailand.'' Hanesbrands will be shifting some manufacturing from Mexico and Central America to Asia. In China, where rural villages are running low on able-bodied young workers to send to factories, wages are rising more than 10 percent a year for many assembly-line workers. And pay is rising even faster for skilled workers, like machinery repair technicians. In coastal provinces with ready access to ports, even unskilled workers now earn $120 a month for a 40-hour workweek, and often considerably more; wages in inland provinces, where transport is costlier, are somewhat lower but also rising fast. While Chinese wages are still less than $1 an hour, factory workers in Vietnam earn as little as $50 a month for a 48-hour workweek, including Saturdays. Texhong estimates that average labor costs for each textile worker in China will rise 16 percent this year, including increases in benefits costs -- on top of a 12 percent increase last year. New regulations are making it harder for companies to avoid paying for benefits, like pensions, further increasing labor costs. When those increases are combined with a currency rising against the dollar at an annual pace of up to 10 percent, labor costs in China are now climbing at 25 percent a year or more. Inflation in China -- more than 8 percent in February, March and April and 7.7 percent in May -- raises the prospect that labor costs will soar even faster soon. That could push up prices for a wide range of goods exported to the United States. China is also phasing out its practice of charging lower corporate tax rates for foreign-owned companies. By contrast, Vietnam still offers foreign investors a corporate tax rate of zero for the first four years, and half the usual rate of 10 percent for the next four years. Foreign direct investment in China has grown by a third over the last three years. By contrast, foreign direct investment has more than doubled in this period in the Philippines, quintupled in India and soared more than eightfold in Vietnam. Faster rates of increase in other Asian countries had partly reflected lower starting
Re: [Futurework] Things the GDP doesn't count
Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts. - Albert Einstein From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Darryl or Natalia Sent: Friday, June 20, 2008 10:14 PM To: futurework Subject: [Futurework] Things the GDP doesn't count Most will remember our discussions on a need for an improved economy, particularly one that would appositely assign realistic value to ever diminishing natural resources. The essay below expands more intriguingly upon this, and recommends that we should not only include far more in the old GDP formula, but that we need to revamp it almost entirely. The piece does not take in the illegal economies, nor to any remarkable extent that of falsely valued currency trades, etc., which we had talked about, but explores cause and effect of many so-called positive market conditions. I've excerpted one of the paragraphs you'll find below. Natalia Kuzmyn Most of the crucial life-supporting functions take place outside the realm of monetized exchange. They are not part of the market or the government - both of which function through money - but rather occur through natural or social process. The help and care of parents and neighbors; the cooling and cleansing functions of trees; woods in which to hike and hunt; clean water in which to fish and swim; these all are off the books. They do not register in the GDP until something destroys them and people have to buy substitutes in the market. This is insane. A tally of economic wellbeing needs to reflect reality, not just the portion of it that is convenient for economists to measure. THE THINGS THE GDP DOESN'T COUNT JONATHAN ROWE From congressional testimony That term the economy. . . what it means, in practice, is the gross domestic product or GDP. It's just a big statistical pot that includes all the money spent in a given period of time. If the pot is bigger than it was the previous quarter, or year, then you cheer. If it isn't bigger, or bigger enough, then you get Bernanke up here and ask him what the heck is going on. The what of the economy makes no difference in these councils. It never seems to come up. The money in the big pot could be going to cancer treatments or casinos, violent video games or usurious credit card rates. It could go towards the $9 billion or so that Americans spend on gas they burn while they sit in traffic and go nowhere; or the billion plus that goes to drugs such as Ritalin and Prozac that schools are stuffing into kids to keep them quiet in class. The money could be the $20 billion or so that Americans spend on divorce lawyers each year; or the $5 billion on identity theft; or the billions more spent to repair property damage caused by environmental pollution. The money in the pot could betoken social and environmental breakdown - misery and distress of all kinds. It makes no difference. You don't ask. All you want to know is the total amount, which is the GDP. So long as it is growing then everything is fine. . . It isn't just you. The President does it, the media, the reporters sitting at that table over there. They do it too. How many of them or of you asked during the recent debate over the stimulus package, exactly what it was that would be stimulated. How many of them say, when Bernanke comes up here to report on the nation's growth, Hey wait a minute. What exactly are we talking about here? Doesn't it matter whether it is textbooks or porn magazines, childbirths or treatments for childhood asthma born of bad air? Doesn't it matter whether the expenditure comes from living within our means or from going into financial and ecological debt? Don't we need to know such things before we can say whether the increase in transactions in the pot - what we call growth -- has been good or not? This is not an argument against growth by the way. To be reflexively against growth is as numb-minded as to be reflexively for it. Those are theological positions. I am arguing for an empirical one. Let's find out what is growing, and the effects. Tell us what this growth is, in concrete terms. Then we can begin to say whether it has been good or not. The failure to do this is insane, literally. It is an insanity that is embedded in the political debate, and in media reportage. . . We hear for example that efforts to address climate change will hurt the economy. Do they mean that if we clean up the air we will spend less money treating asthma in young kids? That Americans will spend fewer billions of dollars on gasoline to sit in traffic jams? That they will spend less on coastal insurance if the sea level stops rising? There is a basic fallacy here. The atmosphere is part of the economy too - the real economy that is, though not the artificial construct portrayed in the GDP. It does real work, as we would discover quickly if it were to collapse. Yet the GDP does not include this work. If we burn more gas, the
[Futurework] The Do-It-Yourself Economy
The Do-It-Yourself Economy By Ellen Goodman, Washington Post Writers Group Posted on July 18, 2008, Printed on July 21, 2008 http://www.alternet.org/story/91872/ I finally drew the line at a dinner invitation. My husband wanted to try a much-touted restaurant that presents you with a platter of raw foods and a hot pot. The prospect of this adventure in dining didn't exactly thrill me. If I want to cook my own food, I answered rather testily, I'll eat at home. Until then, I had drifted along with the do-it-yourself economy. I bused my own lunch trays. I booked my own movie tickets. I checked myself in at hotel kiosks. I even succumbed when an upscale seafood restaurant expected me to swipe my credit card through a handheld computer as if I were in a supermarket. But maybe it was the election-year rants about the offshoring of American jobs -- ranging from those of steelworkers to those of computer programmers -- that finally got me. The outsourcing of work to other countries has produced endless ire. But what about the outsourcing of work to thee and me? For every task shipped abroad by a corporation, isn't there another one sloughed off onto that domestic loser, the consumer? For every job that's going to a low-wage economy, isn't there another going into our very own no-wage economy? I'm not just talking about do-it-yourself gas pumping, which is by now so routine that the memory of an actual person washing your windshield has receded into the mists of AARP nostalgia. Back when gas cost $2 a gallon, self-service was offered at a discount. Today, gas is more than $4, and, in most parts of the country, full service -- a retronym if there ever was one -- is available only at a premium. What's happening on land is happening in the air. We are now expected to book our own itinerary, print our boarding passes and do everything at the airport except pat ourselves down for liquids. In this self-service economy, we also serve (ourselves) by having intimate and endless conversations with voice-recognition machines simply to refill a prescription drug or check our bank balance. We are expected to interact with labor-saving technology without realizing that it's labor-transferring technology. The job has not been saved; it's been taken out of the paid sector, where employees have a nasty habit of expecting salaries, and put into the unpaid sector, where suckers 'r' us. I am tempted to say that customer service has gone the way of the house call, but that reminds me that even medicine has been outsourced to patients who buy do-it-yourself kits to test and track everything from HIV to blood pressure. The Internet ad for a do-it-yourself eye surgery kit may be, I pray, a hoax. But in an era when every operation short of brain surgery is done on an outpatient basis, nursing care has already been outsourced to family members whose entire medical training consists of TiVo-ing Grey's Anatomy. The axis of this evil isn't really globalization, it's privatization. Consider all the major jobs that have now become part of our personal portfolio. We've become our own computer geeks as help lines become self-help lines. We've become our own pension planners and financial analysts managing our 401(k)s. We are even expected to be health care analysts, determining which star in the galaxy of drug prescription plans covers the ever-changing cast of pills in our medicine cabinet. All of this is framed in the language of free choice. As opposed to, say, free time. An MIT economist assures me cheerily that many Americans are willing to accept less service for lower cost. In a society built on the value of self-reliance, I am told, we may even feel virtuous when we put together our own bookcase or install our own hard drive. But I have yet to find an economist who has figured out the human cost of lower cost or tallied up the transfer of labor from companies to customers. I've yet to find a consumer who has added, subtracted or multiplied the amount of time we are now spending on the second shift of life management. Remember back when women were asking Can We Have It All? The answer turned out to be that we could have it all only if we could do it all ... and all by ourselves. Now men and women have won equal opportunity in the do-it-all-by-yourself world. We have officially become our own nonprofit centers. Welcome to the self-service economy where we are never without work to be done. Let's celebrate by dining out together. Bring your carrot peeler. Ellen Goodman's e-mail address is ellengoodman(at)globe.com. (c) 2008, Washington Post Writers Group Ellen Goodman is a member of the Washington Post Writers Group. ___ Futurework mailing list Futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca http://fes.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
[Futurework] FW: Travel Costs Rise: Meetings Go Virtual
NY Times July 22, 2008 As Travel Costs Rise, More Meetings Go Virtual By STEVE LOHR http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/l/steve_lohr/index.html?inline=nyt-per Jill Smart, an Accenture http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/accenture-ltd/index.html?inline=nyt-org executive, was skeptical the first time she stepped into her firm's new videoconferencing room in Chicago for a meeting with a group of colleagues in London. But the videoconferencing technology, known as telepresence, delivered an experience so lifelike, Ms. Smart recalled, that 10 minutes into it, you forget you are not in the room with them. Accenture, a technology consulting firm, has installed 13 of the videoconferencing rooms at its offices around the world and plans to have an additional 22 operating before the end of the year. Accenture figures its consultants used virtual meetings to avoid 240 international trips and 120 domestic flights in May alone, for an annual saving of millions of dollars and countless hours of wearying travel for its workers. As travel costs rise and airlines cut service, companies large and small are rethinking the face-to-face meeting - and business travel http://travel.nytimes.com/travel/guides/business/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier as well. At the same time, the technology has matured to the point where it is often practical, affordable and more productive to move digital bits instead of bodies. The emerging trend, analysts say, goes well beyond a reaction to rising travel costs and a weakening economy. These technology tools are going to change the way corporations think about travel and work in the long run, an analyst at Forrester Research http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/forrester-research-inc/index.html?inline=nyt-org , Claire Schooley, said. Past predictions that technology could replace travel have been frequent and premature. The main difference today, analysts say, is that the technology is finally catching up to its promise. No single breakthrough explains the progress, but rather a series of step-by-step advances - and steady investment - in telecommunications networks, software and computer processing. The results can be seen not only in the expensive new telepresence systems like those from Cisco Systems http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/cisco_systems_inc/index.html?inline=nyt-org or Hewlett-Packard http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/hewlett_packard_corporation/index.html?inline=nyt-org , but also in more mainstream collaboration technologies - Web conferencing, online document sharing, wikis and Internet telephony. The audio and desktop presentations in Web-based meetings, for example, are now more likely to be in sync and interactive. Companies of all sizes are beginning to shift to Web-based meetings for training and sales presentations. Only in the last two years has the technology gotten to point where it really makes sense to use it, said Alan Minton, vice president for marketing at Cornerstone Information Systems, a 60-person business software company in Bloomington, Ind. With his sales force doing many product demonstrations online, Mr. Minton estimates the group's travel costs of have been cut by 60 percent and the average time to close a new sale has been reduced by 30 percent. No one suggests that the face-to-face meeting is becoming obsolete, or that it is time for a requiem for the road warrior. Companies talk about using digital tools mainly as a way of making business travel more selective and more productive. Still, the potential for digital displacement of business travel is substantial. A report last month by the Global e-Sustainability Initiative, a group of technology companies, and the Climate Group, an environmental organization, estimated that up to 20 percent of business travel worldwide could be replaced by Web-based and conventional videoconferencing technology. The most dedicated business travelers tend to be management consultants, investment bankers, accountants, lawyers and technology services consultants. Much of their work has to be done in person with clients. But these professionals are increasingly using online collaboration tools for work within their firms. At I.B.M. http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/international_business_machines/index.html?inline=nyt-org , Michael Littlejohn, a work force and technology expert in the company's global services unit, said two years ago, he was on the road 13 to 15 days a month. These days, he says, he travels 8 or 10 days a month. But my time spent with clients is not less, he said. To really understand a client's problems or to close a deal, you need face to face. Corporate training and education is a field many companies are moving online, in part to trim travel costs. Darryl Draper,
