🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Aug22.013907.9370@tss.com> mathon@tss.com (John D. Mathon) writes:
>By what measure do you mean healthier?  The American is still the richest,
>most productive worker in the world BY A WIDE MARGIN.

	[Rest of the long rant deleted...]

	But then why have we lost major industries to the Japanese and
Europeans?

	Example: consumer electronics.

	Which American company is still in _that_ business?

	And which countries produced small and easily affordable cars
for a heck of a long time? Hint: The US is not among them. Detroit has
had a lot of catching up to do.

	I don't know how much of this is really true, but I've seen
serious speculation that the US is getting a bit too Third-World-like
in exporting agricultural and mineral resources and importing
manufactured items. Now that the Cold War is over with the Evil Empire
having imploded (much to the dismay of a heck of a lot of Cold
Warriors, I'm sure), I think it time to turn to improving civilian
manufacturing.

	One thing that we can start working on, to name one of my
favorite examples, is high-speed railroading. The Europeans and the
Japanese are way ahead of us there. Amtrak's fastest route, the
stretch between New York City and Washington, DC, is a heck of a lot
slower than the French TGV, which travels at 180 mph on some routes.

	Public transit also needs expansion. Endless traffic jams and
freeway-building haven't done much to make our cities more livable.
Pushing gas taxes up to reasonable levels might be a good idea; that's
why European gas prices are a lot higher than ours.

	Screaming "We're the greatest!!!" is not going to do much
good.

	I like what one Canadian friend I once had said: what is
considered economically left-wing here in the US would probably be
called conservative (you got it, conservative) in Canada and other
places.


/Loren

John D. Mathon states <speaking of, he claims, Sweden, Norway,
Germany, France, "and so on">:
> Not only that but they have unemployment rates DOUBLE THE
>US Average.
Oh my god!  You mean it's DOUBLED here in Norway since the last
report two or three weeks ago?  I've GOT to start reading the
papers more closely.

> Every one of them has had a transition in the last ten(except
Fran\ce)
>years to more conservative governments and the opposition leftist
parties
>have become more conservative than the rightest were before.

I must have slept through this here.  I could swear the country
was still led by Labor - which has been almost taking turns with
the Conservatives since the end of the war in leading the government.
But since you say so, i am sure you, on the other side of the
Atlantic, must know more than i do living here.  Also this shift to
the right, i was totally unaware of it.  Just think!  All this
major change going on right under my nose, and i missed it!

>THERE IS NO REASONABLE MEASURE BY WHICH ONE CAN CONCLUDE THAT
EUROPEANS
>ECONOMY IS HEALTHIER THAN AMERICANS>

Using capital letters.  Now i'm convinced that you're right.

If i were you, i'd get your eyes checked; it seems that jingoism
is making everything look black and white to you again.

-Cindy Kandolf
 cindy@solan.unit.no
 Trondheim, Norway

In article <1992Aug25.151711.11213@oracle.us.oracle.com> mfriedma@uucp (Michael Friedman) writes:
>In article <1992Aug22.042821.23309@s1.gov> lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich) writes:
>>In article <1992Aug22.013907.9370@tss.com> mathon@tss.com (John D. Mathon) writes:
>>>By what measure do you mean healthier?  The American is still the richest,
>>>most productive worker in the world BY A WIDE MARGIN.
>
>>	But then why have we lost major industries to the Japanese and
>>Europeans?
>
>Why not?  What does it matter if we lose and industry here and there?
>If we had rampant unemployment I might be a bit more worried. 

  Were there supposed to be smiley's here?     I think we *do* have 
  rampant unemployment.  Japan's unemployment rate is 3.2%.  Our official
  unemployment rate is 7.8% and that only counts people who show up 
  at the state employment office regularly.  It also doesn't reflect all
  the former high-wage, good-job workers who are now flipping burgers
  and driving cabs.   Michael Friedman is surely one of the few people
  in the US who doesn't think we have rampant unemployment.

  I'm NOT agreeing with the other poster's hopes for a social-democratic
  solution to this:  The unemployment rate in West Germany before unification
  was >8%, I'm sure the unified Germany's rate is higher still.  The
  unmplyment rates in Canada and the UK are also higher than the US and
  AW&ST said in the current issue that French aerospace industries will
  cut 32,000 jobs over the next 2 years; this on top of a very weak 
  economy there.   So it's clear to me that more government spending and 
  bigger deficits isn't the solution.  But on the other hand neither is
  Mr. Friedman's pollyanna attitude.


---peter

In article <1992Aug25.151711.11213@oracle.us.oracle.com> mfriedma@uucp (Michael Friedman) writes:
>In article <1992Aug22.042821.23309@s1.gov> lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich) writes:
@	But then why have we lost major industries to the Japanese and
@Europeans?

>Why not?  What does it matter if we lose and industry here and there?
>If we had rampant unemployment I might be a bit more worried.  As it
>is, we concentrate on what we do best and let them concentrate on what
>they do best.

	Our consumer-electronics industry is essentially gone. Yes,
G-O-N-E, gone. Try finding a stereo system that isn't made in Japan or
Korea or some other such place some time.

	Although the IBM-PC design was Made in America, there is a big
population of clones that were made abroad.

	Our car makers have had to make deals with Japanese car
makers just to get Japanese designs.

	If it wasn't for that, then American car makers would have
less of a market than they do now, what with the Europeans and
Japanese and Koreans making more affordable cars.

@	I don't know how much of this is really true, but I've seen
@serious speculation that the US is getting a bit too Third-World-like
@in exporting agricultural and mineral resources and importing
@manufactured items. 

>Well, first off, as far as I know we are a net importer of mineral
>resources.  Where have you seen this speculation?  As far as
>agricultural goes, what's wrong with that?  Are you suggesting that we
>shouldn't be exporting so much food?  If so, how do you suggest we
>correct the situation?

>A.  Eat more?
>B.  Grow less?
>C.  Grow the same amount but let it rot?

>Why are any of these choices superior to exporting food?

	I'm not complaining about exporting food in principle, I'm
just complaining about the lack of other significant exports.

	My mother said something interesting once. Instead of
exporting wood to Japan, we should be exporting stuff made from wood
instead.

@	One thing that we can start working on, to name one of my
@favorite examples, is high-speed railroading. The Europeans and the
@Japanese are way ahead of us there. Amtrak's fastest route, the
@stretch between New York City and Washington, DC, is a heck of a lot
@slower than the French TGV, which travels at 180 mph on some routes.

>Why do we want high-speed railroading?  New York to DC costs about
>$100 to fly.

	A heavily subsidized $100 to fly. Amtrak is no Bullet Train,
but it costs less on this route -- and is actually less subsidized
than the airline industry, which has had a host of indirect subsidies
in the form of airport maintenance, air traffic control, airliner R&D,
and so forth.

	And I've found even Amtrak trains more comfortable than the
typical airliners.

Is it really worth the money to build a high speed rail
>line between those two cities?  Especially if you take into account
>the fact that high speed rail lines need to be much straighter than
>current rail lines so you need a whole new right of way that goes
>through the Eastern seaboard, one of our most densely populated regions.

	I agree that that is a potential difficulty, but if one has
neighboring land available, one can straighten out existing lines. The
NY-DC route is already pretty straight, happy to say.

@	Public transit also needs expansion. Endless traffic jams and
@freeway-building haven't done much to make our cities more livable.

>Compared with what?  How they were 20 years ago before the amazing US
>economy let virtually anyon who wanted one buy a car?  Or compared
>with what they would be if we hadn't built the freeways?

	Buy one, maybe. Use one? I wouldn't count on cars being very
usable when lots of other drivers have exactly the same idea of where
to go. Do you _enjoy_ gridlock?

	Between San Francisco and Oakland there is the Bay Bridge and
the Transbay Tunnel. 

	I've been across the bridge a couple of times by bus, and at
the San Francisco end, there would be a traffic jam -- and my
crossings were on weekends. I've been through that tunnel by BART, and
it was fast and comfortable, if a bit noisy.

	Besides, you can't read while driving, and you can't do very
much sightseeing, either.

@Pushing gas taxes up to reasonable levels might be a good idea; that's
@why European gas prices are a lot higher than ours.

>I love liberals.  They are so damned predictable.  "RAISE TAXES"!!!

	Since you hate taxes so much, I presume that you want a lot of
government services without having to pay for them. Given your
priorities, these include such things as roads and airports.