The following is an exceptional article from the BBC News service on jobs coming back from China to the state of New Hampshire, which has lost the most jobs per capita of any state in the country.
It is clearly, from this article and from the opinion of many economists, NOT NOT NOT tax breaks that bring back jobs or keep jobs here, or lead to any decision to start or expand a business for that matter. The Grover Norquist political insanity is a total myth, fantasy, right wing wet dream piece of nonsense and misdirection. It is the irrational ideology rather than science that has so effectively contributed to the chasm between the 1% and the 99%.
It's a long article (like the posts I tend to write) because it doesn't try to reduce a complex topic to a stupid over-simplified sound-byte or the equivalent.
But there was one quote that deserves attention as highly significant.
From the BBC
Presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney pledge to create jobs, and that will involve bringing home manufacturing jobs from China. But do politicians even offer American businesses what they need to bring jobs back?
Though politicians may be quick to take credit for bringing manufacturing jobs back from China, "it's all baloney", says Richard D'Aveni, professor of strategy at Dartmouth College's Tuck School of Business.
US 'disadvantage' That's not to say that government shouldn't try to help businesses compete with China.
Most of Hypertherm's employees work in New Hampshire
The US is fighting and losing a new economic Cold War with China, he says, in part because the country has failed to adapt.
"Our form of capitalism is at a disadvantage compared to state capitalism," says Mr D'Aveni.
"If you look at the manufacturing jobs that have been lost, in a very real sense those jobs have gone and probably will never come back," he says.
"They've gone to China or to Mexico, or to other countries with lower labour costs or lower natural resource costs.
"But in part, they've been replaced by automation, by technological change."
Tax breaks and subsidy programmes can create a short-term boost, he says. But to promote long-term economic growth, policymakers need to focus on educating the workforce.
"Where New Hampshire competes is in producing high value-added products that require a significantly trained workforce," he says.
"And that's a very difficult combination for other countries to be able to match."
He compares his firm to successful German manufacturers who have invested locally and for the long term rather than chase short-term profits.
Hypertherm has spent a couple of million dollars on a training institute to ensure a steady stream of skilled machinists. The states of Vermont and New Hampshire and the federal government in Washington helped.
That is the type of government support many in the state call for. The presidential candidates do address workforce training in their platforms, but most of their economic arguments focus on taxes.
Mr Romney promises lower business taxes, while Mr Obama says he'll end tax breaks for companies that outsource American jobs.
I asked Evan Smith at Hypertherm how much he considers taxes when deciding where to manufacture.
"I can't think of a single strategy meeting that we've had where that's come up," he says.
Which makes the Romney goal and the goal of other conservatives so dangerously catastrophic in privatizing education for the goal of profit more than education. For example charter schools are often for profit entities, which while a few succeed, overall fail at twice the rate of regular public schools (worse in some states). You can read the study here.
We need solutions that work that are fact driven, not solutions that are ideology driven.
It is clearly, from this article and from the opinion of many economists, NOT NOT NOT tax breaks that bring back jobs or keep jobs here, or lead to any decision to start or expand a business for that matter. The Grover Norquist political insanity is a total myth, fantasy, right wing wet dream piece of nonsense and misdirection. It is the irrational ideology rather than science that has so effectively contributed to the chasm between the 1% and the 99%.
It's a long article (like the posts I tend to write) because it doesn't try to reduce a complex topic to a stupid over-simplified sound-byte or the equivalent.
But there was one quote that deserves attention as highly significant.
From the BBC
US election: How can politicians bring back jobs from China?
Presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney pledge to create jobs, and that will involve bringing home manufacturing jobs from China. But do politicians even offer American businesses what they need to bring jobs back?
Though politicians may be quick to take credit for bringing manufacturing jobs back from China, "it's all baloney", says Richard D'Aveni, professor of strategy at Dartmouth College's Tuck School of Business.
US 'disadvantage' That's not to say that government shouldn't try to help businesses compete with China.
Most of Hypertherm's employees work in New Hampshire
"Our form of capitalism is at a disadvantage compared to state capitalism," says Mr D'Aveni.
"If you look at the manufacturing jobs that have been lost, in a very real sense those jobs have gone and probably will never come back," he says.
"They've gone to China or to Mexico, or to other countries with lower labour costs or lower natural resource costs.
"But in part, they've been replaced by automation, by technological change."
Tax breaks and subsidy programmes can create a short-term boost, he says. But to promote long-term economic growth, policymakers need to focus on educating the workforce.
"Where New Hampshire competes is in producing high value-added products that require a significantly trained workforce," he says.
"And that's a very difficult combination for other countries to be able to match."
He compares his firm to successful German manufacturers who have invested locally and for the long term rather than chase short-term profits.
Hypertherm has spent a couple of million dollars on a training institute to ensure a steady stream of skilled machinists. The states of Vermont and New Hampshire and the federal government in Washington helped.
That is the type of government support many in the state call for. The presidential candidates do address workforce training in their platforms, but most of their economic arguments focus on taxes.
Mr Romney promises lower business taxes, while Mr Obama says he'll end tax breaks for companies that outsource American jobs.
I asked Evan Smith at Hypertherm how much he considers taxes when deciding where to manufacture.
"I can't think of a single strategy meeting that we've had where that's come up," he says.
Which makes the Romney goal and the goal of other conservatives so dangerously catastrophic in privatizing education for the goal of profit more than education. For example charter schools are often for profit entities, which while a few succeed, overall fail at twice the rate of regular public schools (worse in some states). You can read the study here.
We need solutions that work that are fact driven, not solutions that are ideology driven.
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