On why US workers are falling further and further behind...

I've lost count of how numerous times I've read, in various newspapers, journals, and seen in speeches, policy attempts, and what-not, on how to retain jobs in US, given the onslaught of globalization, and on how the middle class (particularly the blue collar working class) is falling further and further behind.

Most of what we hear is the knee-jerk, action-and-reaction from politicians who either bash corporations for outsourcing jobs overseas (from the left), or putting up trade barriers to try to halt the inflow/outflow of labor and capital (from the right).

While those talks from politico makes for good news headlines, they rarely address the real core issue. Unless US is to shut its door from the world, it will never be able to stop the force of globalization. Albeit being the largest economy and world power, the only thing that US can do is to adapt. In order to adapt, one has to know what to adapt to. Therein lies the issue of the need to acknowledge the core issue(s) for disappearing jobs.

Naturally, there are many issues that is the core. Numerous reportings like Fortune and BusinessWeek stress the need for US to be in the forefront of innovation and technology. But the undeniable fact is that, more and more companies are outsourcing even the innovation and invention of new products to overseas country like India, China, and even Taiwan. So does the use of technologies, when we see lots of high tech jobs going to these countries, as well as up-and-comers like Eastern Europe and Russia.

And these developing countries are becoming richer (thanks to their phenomenal savings rate, in particular, in Asian countries like China), and the amount of capital they amass is eye-popping.

Amidst all these, I see two basic issues. If US workers are to compete heads-on, ounce-for-ounce, with workers in, say, China or India, how are we being judged on right now? While we might offer a lot of "advantages", on the most basic terms, most management in companies only see two things: How much do you (as a worker) cost? Can you do the job?

Well, given our cost and standard of living in US, and for Chris sake, we are a developed country, of course we are most expensive (in terms of salary). So, that's strike one for us in the comparison.

So then, the next question is, can you get the job done? Here is where the excellent article that I read comes in. While we all know for quite some time now that our education system is in disarray, we're graduating fewer and fewer young people in tech and research fields, and we are always TALKING about how to fix it. The truth is, it's still very broken. This is all while our counterparts in the developing world are viewing education highly, pushing their younger generation to more advanced studies. And eventually, they could work on far more complex projects, at cheaper rate.

If I were a corporate chieftain, and if you ask me which workers I would choose (US or offshore), the answer is plain simple.

This is happening right here, right now, while politicians keep talking about how to keep the jobs here. For one, if they would focus as much energy in talks and in trying to keep jobs here, and instead focus on the real meat of issue on how to improve our education, we would be in far better shape to compete in this globalized economy.

To illustrate a point, my son skips a grade when he enters private school (since the public school would not admit him due to funding constraint in that year). When he transfers back to public school two years later, he could have been in grade 3, but the school wants to push him back to grade 1. It's only after much talk that they would allow him to go to grade 2. The standards of the public school grade 2 is like the private school grade 1 level. And we are talking about one of the best schooling system in this state in New England!!!

And then there is this mentality here: That smart kids are nerds. That being young and skipping grades are not cool. I can tell you that, should these kids have been in Asia like China or Hong Kong, these kids would be the COOL kids who are reveled. In US, they're ridiculed and frowned upon. If you ask me, would this culture foster smart kids, it will be a resounding NO.

Would the fixing of the education system now have helped those who are retrenched and whose jobs have gone overseas? No. But it's a stupid idea to try to lure back those jobs, and work at half the previous pay or less. This country really needs to focus on the right issues...FAST.