Fox News Channel has a message for
all you blue collar workers out there
worried about losing your jobs to
overseas competition: Tough luck.
Neil Cavuto, on his "Cavuto on
Business" show Saturday (November 12,
2005), interviewed John Stossel, the
co-host of ABC-TV's "20/20" program and
author of Give Me a Break, on
the topic of manufacturing jobs going
overseas.
Sending jobs overseas creates new
jobs, Stossel said, because when a
company saves money by exporting jobs,
it has more money to do new things.
Cavuto asked Stossel, "People say
manufacturing jobs are leaving. What do
you say?"
"Bye!" said Stossel, waving at the
camera. "There's nothing wonderful about
manufacturing jobs. I think if you look
at what we want for our kids, that
should answer the question. We don't
want them working in a factory where the
work is underpaid, I mean, is very hard,
it may be uncomfortable. ... We want
them taking jobs as engineers, as
biologists. We think the services jobs
are good for our kids. I think it's
great if people in other countries want
to manufacture things and we can just
import it and pay for it with our
service jobs."
Stossel brushed aside Cavuto's
question about whether countries that do
not make things lose their dominance.
"Where's the evidence. We can trade for
the goods we need," he said. Stossel
added that we need not worry about bad
relations arising with the nations we
import from because we can just switch
to someone else.
Cavuto did a lackluster job of
interviewing Stossel. He never pressed
him on any point, such as whether
running a negative trade balance as the
U.S. does is good for the nation in the
long run. Nor did he force Stossel to
really deal with the issue of relations
with trading partners on which we are
dependent for manufactured goods. I
think that's because Cavuto basically
agreed with Stossel and knew that Fox
News Channel's position is the same.
Manufacturing workers usually are
represented by unions. Get rid of the
manufacturing jobs and you get rid of
the unions and that will make business
happy.
Later in the show, guest Jonathan
Hoenig, capitalistpig.com, predicted
that General Motors Corp. would "go
belly-up by the spring of 2006." Cavuto
asked him if that would bring a bailout
of the kind that helped Chrysler remain
in business for 20-some years before
merging with Daimler.
"God, I hope not!" said Hoenig,
living up to the name of his website.
Hoenig and Stossel showed their
disdain for people who work with their
hands. Stossel says we don't want our
kids doing these jobs because they might
be "uncomfortable." What about the
people who are doing those jobs now?
What about their hopes for their kids? A
lot of factory workers are a little too
old to retrain for those jobs as
biologists. Engineering jobs? You can
kiss those goodbye. The engineering jobs
will go where the manufacturing is. If
we're not making anything, we don't need
many engineers. And if they can figure
out how to manufacture things overseas,
they'll eventually figure out they can
do the engineering over there, too, with
engineers that earn a lot less than ones
in this country.
In World War II, Josef Stalin looked
at the shiploads of tanks, trucks,
jeeps, and other materiel that Michigan
was sending to the U.S.S.R. and said,
"Detroit is winning the war." Michigan
was the world's Arsenal of Democracy
then. When that manufacturing base is
gone, we won't be able to get it back
overnight. Tool and die making and all
the other skills that support the auto
industry are not learned overnight.
How will we support our military with
only service jobs? Our soldiers don't
need McDonald's hamburgers overseas.
They need tanks, planes, ships,
helicopters, and guns. Will we let the
Chinese make those for us once our
manufacturing capacity is lost?
The French already have won the
contract to build the next presidential
helicopter. Yeah, Cavuto, the French!
The most powerful country in the world
cannot even make a helicopter to take
its leader to Camp David for the
weekend.
If GM goes bankrupt, many other large
companies will follow. They will figure
out that if they go bankrupt, they can
get out of union contracts, payments to
their pension plans, and obligations to
existing retirees. A lot of people are
going to suffer. And people like Hoenig
and Stossel don't give a damn.
