Ford America. Globalisation: A Test Case in Reality.

I could be wrong, but I think they cut 10,000 jobs last year and 30,000 the year before that. So this isn't new. I might be mixing GM in there but I'm too tired to look it up.

It gets to where you can't afford to keep up with the education.... I'm a automotive engineer that was cut 4 years ago.... Ours went to Mexico & China..... I've got 3 degrees & now at 55 they pull another degree out of there ass they want you to get.....

The educated here are the working poor.... Student loans up the ying yang most of my co workers had student loans of over $30,000.... They can't live up to there education standards, because of the loans.... They cut back, these people go bankrupt...... Then the grand finalli is, your education is dated, you need this brand new degree we pulled out of our ass.....

Education is one of the biggest businesses we have & it's running people in the ground trying to keep up with it.... It is sad to me, for the young people here....

In our state the most need workers are trades people.... They have bigger adds than the colleges do.... That's got to say something is wrong with education today, in the US....

Sorry, one of my pet peeves.....

Very similar situation over here. A friend of mine had a physics degree and ended up getting a job..... pumping gas. 6 years of his life in higher education, and he can't get a job to suit.

Funny you should mention tradesmen. Another mate of mine got laid off by our last carmaker when they folded (MGRover, as Aaron mentioned). He decided to retrain and take up a trade. Plumbing courses at all local colleges are on an 18 month waiting list. He met up a with a former middle manager from the company who's now training as a plasterer.

They're pushing further education big time over here, with univeristy placements at an all time high, but what exactly is waiting for people out there when they finish? Not much. Several years ago, IT firms wouldn't so much as look at you if you didn't have at least an MCSE. Now, you can have all the qualifications up the arse, if you don't have experience, you don't get a sniff. Industry has done a 180. Not long before it'll do it again.

I'm caught up in it because of my age.... A lot of my old credits won't work in a new degree.... So I'd have to do 3 years worth of school to get the degree they want now.... I'd be a grad. again at 58 & starting back out on the bottom again.... I was senior staff before though....

No, I'm getting a little to old to play the next round of the education game..... [shrug]

Even if I did get the new degree, it would be a re hash of what I've already had....... Just another way of getting $$$$ for a new paper / job..... [shrug]

RC, I hear you mate.

Now if it was me I would tell you this: there's no way I could go back in my late 50s to do another degree. No way in the wide world! I dont know how you can do it, mate. You shouldn't have to, is what I'm saying. You should be able to retire for Christ's sake.

Truly, I'm knocking 28 and I feel a touch too old to go back to uni and if I was any older there's no way I could do it.

Not to mention having a family. When the fock will I manage that?

On the other hand, my sister who is extremely well educated and doing really well for herself rationalised it to me in this sense:

"You never stop learning Brett. Its a fact of life in Western countries that re-training is a constant in the postmodern world we live in and until you can afford to retire you'll have to update your skills as required."

Its going to be hard for me. I'll have to get night-time work which means cleaning shitters or working in a call centre to make ends meet. I was telling Dh that my new apartment, while very nice and comfortable, is bloody expensive and I've already eaten a fair way into my savings and I'm focked if I injure myself and cant work.

I know life's hard and all. Fock, I've slaved at shite jobs before to get by and I'm not afraid to roll the sleaves up and get stuck into it, but if I graduate with this next degree and find that I'm unable to make a go of it then I dont know WTF I'll do.

Education is NZ's second biggest export after sheep

pretty tradgic when you think that for each paper i do the university gets $1600. that is 4 hours a week for 16 weeks for $1600. and to think they have one lecturer for 20 students per class. they are earning $500 an hour (the university)

most of the course is such BS its not funny. i am really really disapointed in education these days. its a lame excuse to rip people off. they have 140 people per every 20 computers or somthing here, its a joke.

i guess its an international issue. (especially in the western countries where education is such a fashion)

Alltaken

I find it hard to understand why, and this is a problem all over the world, companies refuse to hire older people. There are, of course, the health risks but medicine is not what it was before and the experience one gains over a life-time of work cannot be replaced by any number of degrees.

I hear y'all. A lot of manufacturing jobs and things that have to be made using labour are going overseas for obvious reasons – in return we get cheap consumer goods. A lot of IT jobs are going to India because over there, no matter how poor you are, getting a PhD is like getting a degree is in terms of being an aim here.

Now I'm a stingy bastard, being in journalism – it's a field you can enter with no qualifications (though there are some you can get) and based off of skill. It's one of the few professions like it left in the world, though thankfully so long as there are concerned people buying tabloids I'll be in a job. Otherwise, I'm a bum with not a qualification to my name.

Problem we're facing at the moment is that all the traditional jobs are buggering off and the services sector can require specific training.

However, on the whole as an economic macro thing, this isn't so bad as we've never had such a cheap and high standard of living (yes, cheap is a relative term…) On the other hand there are guys like RC in their 50's and looking for work. Economic booms always leave people behind, and even where the chance to retrain is made available it can be a bitch when it's your third time doing it.

There is no easy answer, I suppose…

With your education and experience you should just do temp jobs. I doubt they care how old you are and they pay half way decent.

Locksmith, very little formal training about. Yet a good demand for skilled personnel. I have a plan for that one.

That and the fact that the people running the company are making millions. How many companies have said they need to reduce workforce or close plants because they arent making money, but yet are paying millions a year to higher ups.
Take HP for example. When Carlie got 'fired' from here job what did she get? $20,000,000 !!!. This was at the same time HP was laying off employees because they werent making enough money. I was one of those that got laid off.
As far as education goes and degrees, How many people have heard this: "You dont have enough experience"?
Thus the paradox, how can you get experience if no one will higher you becuase you dont have experience?
And many companies wont higher you if you dont have a degree even though you may have 5 to 10 years experience.
Pensions? Forget about them. The days of a company taking care of you for your 20-30 years of work are pretty much gone. Heck many people dont even stay with a company long enough to get a pension. 2 to maybe 4 years and their gone.
Companies dont want to "train" you anymore. If you dont have it before hand you can forget about getting the job.

Maybe you do have to be in a Union, I dont know. I was in one for about 1 year but never did anything with it.
401K is great as long as the stock market stays up. One good crash and were all screwed. My dad lost over 16K on the drop after 9/11. Whats going to happen if it would drop similar to what it did at the Great Depression?
Social Security is a joke. Health costs are outrageous and only going to get worse. Education is going nowhere but UP, UP, and away. Yet the number of good paying jobs are getting less and less.

That's inflation - 12,000 a year then is, essentially, 50k now. That's why they always say "In today's money..." when talking about a fortune 50 years ago. Just look at all the stuff you have now compared to what your parents had growing up and suchlike.

That reminds me. Around 92 or 93. My ex and I where shopping. The two guys in the store where laughing. They where from China. They where talking about a product they where looking at. That was made in ChinaA

My cousin worked for GE for a number of years in Managment. He's your age. He got axed awhile back thru GE downsizing. Now he's teaching High School.

Years ago I saw peice in the newspaper. MD,BS, PHD and so on. But no JOB. It gave a list of all those plus more.

Consulting is good, since you need to be close to the customer. Better yet, be an analyst. It's a job that cannot be exported.

For everyone out there on this thread, I highly recommend Tom Friedman's book World is Flat.

It tells you about all the jobs that are going to India and China, and gives you a very good perspective on this entire transtion. For folks that are on this thread and are hurt by this transition, it would is a "must read".

I'm slowly working towards becoming a consultant. I'm currentl a *Network Analyst* which works for me.

It's rare when someone actually recommends a book worth reading. I've heard of this book and since you brought it up, I think I'll go out and pick it up. I've heard people talk about it but no one has really explained what it's about so I didn't take much stock in it.

No kidding. Everyone just wants money fast these days. It might as well be a giant pyramid scheme where the rich get all the money and everyone else fails.

Pretty soon money isn't going to be the driving factor anymore at this rate. Things need to get regulated or something in common areas. Gas is regulated since everyone basically needs it. Why not regulate things that are vital to the US structure? Yeah it takes away huge mark ups and what not.. but it's getting out of hand.

How about "curbs" like the Stock Market has? That'd be nice to see.

It truly is the downfall of this country. The stucture of this country is being outsourced to countries we can't rely on.

I was talking to someone last night and they referenced America turning in the the old Roman Empire and how it's going to collapse. Everything is going out and we're forgetting about the structure.

Greed for money is over coming the common idea that we need to stay self sufficient yet still support global operations. While businesses aren't exactly in our politics/gov't.. I think the gov't needs to step up and do something to keep at least one brand all American and can sustain the US should something come up.

Build it in the US, no business tax. That alone would generate jobs which I would assume could generate considerable tax based on the mass amount of workers being hired.

26 help desk? For computers?

How many people do 26 people support!?

Figuring 1 person should be able to support 250 users.. My current place of employment I support roughly 500 a piece but the network/PC isn't used extensively or anything.

We have 51 locations all across the US and a few in Canada. Total IT staff of 15.
5 are trainers, 7 are developers, and 3 of us handle all the hardware, servers, software, network, etc.

We support 24x7x365.

Roughly 1300 computers/3000 users.

26 seems to he a huge amount of helpdesk people. I know my local hospital system has an IT staff of 140 people to support their entire organization which has like 20,000 users and 8,000 computers in 7 locations across the city.

I hate to say it but it sounds like there might be a case of poor management and resource allocation which resulted in the layoffs..

The McDonalds thing is possible.. but that person also has hands on duties - cleaning the floors, accepting money, etc.
While technically possible, economicly it's not feasible. But you make a vaid point without a doubt.

I think there is a law that states you have to live in the US to do taxes or something - so you can be held accountable by US laws if for tax reasons. There are hundreds of careers that can be done elsewhere for less though.

Not sure what's stopping them from parking the cruise ship. That's a good diea though. Maybe there's an international law against it or something? haha I'm sure there's some reasoning behind it.

You have good points..

I do admit though.. I like what Bush has done for the educational system though. Under Clinton, I couldn't get a penny to go to school. Under Bush, I got all the money I needed but I still had a spend a little to go to school - consider it my portion to guarentee I followed through since I had to invest my own money.

Bush has been pushing community colleges hard. I like that because it's not 4 years, it's 2 years. You can get your accounting, nursing, computers, business management and fill the gaps of the good jobs. Those who go on for 4 year degrees, Ph.D's, Masters, etc. Let them have the higher jobs.

Actually, I found out last night that my friend's wife who has her PhD is only making $33,000 a year as a professor at a university. How sad is that? The low end tech job I almost took back in '99 paid $36,000.

PhD in business management or something like that. She teaches business courses and stuff. I guess there isn't much demand in business for someone who knows what ethics are these days.

Seriously now. I speak to the damn person with a 4 year degree and they still screw my orders up. I don't even use the drive through for that reason. I like to look eye to eye with the people when I order anything. Yeah, people think I'm weird cause I'll park, go in just to get my order to go. I like the little connection of standing there and talking to the person who is going to make my food. I like to see what it looks like.

How truly sad is that.. we already have 90 second drive through windows, give me a damn break. Why don't they just do call ahead so you just drive up, say your order number or name, pay and leave? Or just use a credit card over the phone.

We're filling the world with push button monkeys and morons.

But you're still going to have that sleepy person making the food. Either way, someone still has to be physically present.

Now you're just investing in technology, call centers or equipment to answer the phones.. from a guy in India who I can't even understand on a good day.

It honestly want to see the run down on the numbers to see how much they plan on saving and how much they're going to speed their 90 second line up.