posted 04-26-2005 02:14 PM ET (US)            

I just bought some BF Goodrich tires, 2 were made in China and the other 2 were made in Thailand.
I guess not many ties made in US anymore. :(

posted 04-27-2005 08:23 AM ET (US)            

Its not just the cost of the American worker driving these jobs away, its also our jacked up health care system. Its threatening to run the auto makers bankrupt within five years because of the sweet deals automakers gave away in previous contracts when the costs were much less.

posted 04-27-2005 08:32 AM ET (US)            

In the case of outboard motors, the owners of all those boats cruising around with outboards made in foreign countries have sent money abroad where it has enriched the workers in another country instead of the workers in our country.

In the case of China, it really won't be that far down the road before the guy working on the assembly line in China will be using some of his wages to buy gasoline for his new automobile. But you should not worry about this. Here is why:

If everything works out economically, according to current plans, we will balance our trade deficit when this worker also spends some of his money on buying a DVD of a new Hollywood movie staring Alec Baldwin. (You all remember Alec Baldwin, right? He is the actor who said he was going to leave the United States if George W. Bush was elected president.)

Now this kind of balance of trade, where we let China manufacture durable goods like outboard motors, and we here in the United States offset that loss of trade by selling them artifacts of our culture like cinematic movies or rap music CD's will be a great success. What we will do is to hook the growing middle class of manufacturing workers in China on our culture, and eventually they will have enough income to become tourists. They will fly over here to see America, and then we can get some more money back from them by renting them a room in our homes which we now operate as a Bed and Breakfast for foreign tourists.

Some of us could even make a buck back by operating tour boats where we could cruise them around areas like Detroit, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh and show them relics of the industrial heartland of America. By then, of course, all outboard motors will be made in foreign countries, so they will feel a sense of nationalistic pride when they look aft at the transom and see their outboard motor purring along.

I can see it now. The young Mr. Chow Ling, on his first visit to America, cruising in my Boston Whaler as I show him the ruins of the old Ford Motor Rouge River Plant. He turns to his wife, his chest swelling with pride, and gestures toward the black Mercury four-stroke on the transom.

posted 04-27-2005 03:07 PM ET (US)         

When you buy a foreign made product, the social security deduction/contribution from the worker's wages are paid to THAT government, not yours. So are the income taxes. You are funding their retirement program and their government, at the minimum. And their grocery store is over there, not here where your kid can work. And now they can buy more gas, too, driving up the price of yours. Real smart.

It's kind of like smoking. When you're young (less than 40 to me), you still think you will live forever, and it's not going to affect you, and that there will be plenty of time to correct the problem and break the addiction. And then, at some unpredicatable age often younger than you thought, you get the inevitable health problems. It's kind of like the guy who said "If I'd have known I was going to live this long, I never would have smoked."

It's like this with trade deficits and foreign products too.
One day it will pop up and hit you (an me) in the face. We need a BALANCE of trade, not what we currently have.

posted 04-27-2005 03:43 PM ET (US)            

First, I know of many Whaler owners in the Bay Area that are Chinese. Secondly, and more importantly my Wife is Chinese and my 13 month old Daughter is half Chinese. Yes, some of them are bad drivers. But, what the h@ll does that have to do with Outboard engines or Boston Whalers?

I'm not to happy about the chinese plants, but what can we even do about it in the current political/business climate?

posted 04-27-2005 03:57 PM ET (US)            

Apologies are in order. The real problem is deeper and needs more than an apology.

Its sad to see and hear what is still out there.

posted 04-27-2005 04:00 PM ET (US)            

A big part of the problem is the fact that the Communist Chinese government pegs the value of the Yuan to the Dollar rather than allowing it to float. They do this out of fear that if the Yuan is allowed to float and reflect its' true value, Chinese exports will become more expensive to the rest of the world, and they will sell less. To compound matters, most of SE Asia takes the same approach out of fear of loosing competitiveness to China.

Larry, you are pretty much right on with your assessment, except that China isn't putting all that money into social programs. They are putting a good portion into tanks and missles aimed at...guess who??? - US!

China learned a very valuable lesson from the Soviet Union - it takes money to win a war...

I'm going to be hanging my brand new E-Tec 90 on my Montauk tonight, and I'm very proud to buy American whenever I can. I just wish more people were...

posted 04-27-2005 05:09 PM ET (US)            

Hurrah for the inaccurately-named free market...hurrah for bastardized corporate capitalism. We Americans are seriously blind to reality and incredibly easily duped by slicksters. Here's one example the corporations don't want you to know about--last year our wonderful 'free market' pharmaceutical industry (which howls like a stuck pig when American citizens want to exercise their free market choice and buy medications at one-third the cost in Canada) spent more money on advertising than on research and development. Think on that one for a while, if you dare...

posted 04-27-2005 06:26 PM ET (US)         

I bought my 1989 Outrage new, for cash, with profits wholly made from sale of some Microsoft stock, the unbelieveably greedy American company everyone loves to hate. Most here seem to like the boat. I kept people employed in FL and Wisconsin with that purchase, from dirty stockholder profits made from the invention and application of DOS and the PC.

It is now fashionable to blame the executives for everything, since it is un-American to blame the working classes, the designers, engineers, IT's, advertizing, clerical, accounting, legal, and manufacturing workers for, and all of us other "good guys", let's say, all of the so-called (I don't agree) terrible US cars and DFI outboards that have come to market. But in reality, it's all of us, but never "ME", taken together, turning out these inferior products? It's hard to blame management when the best US engineers they can hire aren't designing cars, or outboards, as good as the Japanese or Germans, and the plant workers are doing a lousy job putting them together. Or is it our collective "work ethic"? Just today, someone here called a yet unseen Verado 115 a "big pig". Brilliant.

I find it hard to buy any of this, but that's the "feel good" class warfare justification these days. Maybe we collectively need to clean up our act before we are completely bought out.

posted 04-27-2005 09:27 PM ET (US)            

• Kim Philby
• Guy Burgess
• Donald Maclean
• Anthony Blunt

See if your local library has a copy of MY SILENT WAR, by Kim Philby, written from Russia after he defected. It is a rather amazing account of Soviet spying in the 1950's and the extent to which it penetrated all levels of our society. People like to laugh about Joe McCarthy, but in retrospect, he was on to something.

The same thing goes on now, except the industrial espionage is all to the Far East. Intellectual property theft by China has cost us $20 to 24-BILLION per year, according to William Lash, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Market Access and Compliance.

http://www.caltradereport.com/eWebPages/front-page-1113806582.html

posted 04-27-2005 09:34 PM ET (US)            

Apologies are in order.

This country IS being sold down the river buy the CEO's and children of CEO's (they really suck the company dry) is what I have seen being in the engineering field for 30 years.

We could design the best damn products in the world again if the CEO's would start reaching a little deeper for R&D. And take the time for long term developement of product instead of their, again fast profit on a under developed product using the cheapest choice of materials for higher profits.

I have never gotten the dollar the legal papers I have to sign to confer the right to the patents I have worked on to the COMPANY. And forget a bonus or percentage of profits from these well designed products all I have ever gotten is pink slips when they move production of my products to Costa Rica, Mexico, and God forgive us all, China. When those guys are ready they will steal our designs and tell us they can't make production for a couple of months, create market demand and sell thier more inferior product to our customers or ourselves because it's cheaper than we could make it.

Well enough of my meandering. I must say that I'm still happy with my career choice it is rewarding to see a product go to market.

By the way, do any of you big wigs want to over pay me to design some of the best products my way?

posted 04-27-2005 09:43 PM ET (US)            

You quote:

quote:

---

don't blame the true culprits, American and multi-national corporations and their bloated, greedy ruling executives. Does any one of you really think the Brunswick CEO/CFO/Board of Directors/upper level management/major shareholders give a good goddamn about anything but putting money in their already overstuffed pockets? Do you really think they care whether Mercury outboards are produced in the U.S. or in freaking Timbuctu, as long as they get salaries, options and dividends up to 150 times that of an American production line worker?

Hurrah for the inaccurately-named free market...hurrah for bastardized corporate capitalism. We Americans are seriously blind to reality and incredibly easily duped by slicksters.

---

I have to respectfully disagree Tony. I hold the humble opinion that Americans are not being duped, nor are we blind, nor are we tricked, nor are greedy corporate suits pulling the puppet strings. I believe several things to the contrary. I believe we know what the corporate world is doing, and we really don't care. I believe Americans don't care until they are directly affected. Americans can stop buying products any time they please. This would surely end any business corruption, but we won't. We want our products and we want them cheap. As long as Joe Consumer has money to spend, he doesn't care where it comes from as long as it is good quality and affordable. Now, as soon as the product takes away his job -- then he cares.

My point is mainly directed at your idea that people need to be educated towards the "real reality", when I say the ignorance you despise in the population is there by choice. We want to be ignorant - not in a bad way, but people mainly want to be self-assured and not really bothered with other people's problems. Other people don't pay their house note, car note, utility bill, kids tuition, etc., so why worry about others' problems when we each have a stack of our own? Now I know next comes the comment that the pattern is expanding and "it could happen to me next". Well, yes and no. I believe in checks and balances, and there are a bazillion things in the world that could happen to me next. Just another reason we choose to be ignorant. By the way, my understanding of ingorant is lack of knowledge of a particular subject. Ignorant is not uneducated as a general term.

Anyway, you are a wise man, one I would call a polymath (a name I jokingly call myself). I enjoy reading your points and they help me formulate my own.

Regards,
Jamie

(OK, just a little one: a.e!)

posted 04-28-2005 10:33 AM ET (US)            

This is typical of society...we get more worked up about political correctness than the real issues of what's going on around us.

posted 04-28-2005 12:15 PM ET (US)            

Brunswick has to adapt to their current environment or perish.

posted 04-28-2005 03:01 PM ET (US)            

Please re-read my last post. I'm not an 'anti-US corporation' person, and I'm sorry that you were annoyed if you thought I was. I'm an equal-opportunity anti-multi-national corporation type of guy. Nowhere in our Declaration of Independence or Constitution do I find mention of the word corporation (certainly not multi-national corporation), nor do I find any justification for their dominance in our nation's laws, culture, and/or social fabric. I'm especially annoyed (and frightened by) globalized corporate power, and often find myself allied with thoughtful conservatives on this issue, since a multi-national corporate structure, in our opinion, leads to the loss of not only American jobs, but of American sovereignty.

Now that's MY take on why Mercury outboard production jobs are heading offshore...along with millions of other jobs and literally thousands of erstwhile American manufacturing plants. What's YOUR explanation?

posted 04-28-2005 03:37 PM ET (US)            

When’s the last time you bought an American made camera, TV or home electronics? I guess we can't manufacture them with any cost effectiveness.

Brunswick has to be cost effective or we will have no choice but to buy Yamaha, Suzuki or Honda outboards.

posted 04-28-2005 03:44 PM ET (US)            

The global multi national corps are eating up our economy by merging and laying off, moving offshore and downsizeing to reap bogus profits that are counter productive to the economy as a whole. A true test of the economy is to trace the dollar through its entire cycle and like water, see where it finally trickles down to. Corporations are the biggest welfare mothers on the planet. I think it is ok outsource manufacturing as long as measures are taken to protect or retrain the workforce to stay employed. After all, the bread and butter of large multi nationals like Kraft, Phillip Morris, BRP, Brunswick, etc is the low to middle class wal mart shopping public.

Ignorance, apathy and laziness on the part of the poople are all to blame... and I'm no fool not to include myself and my large collection of overseas built toys that are part of the problem! Nikon camera, Dell computer, yamaha engine, etc... It's hard to do anything about it, but at least we're discussing it... and that can't hurt.

It's entertaining and informative to read the opinions of some pretty smart folks.

posted 04-28-2005 06:19 PM ET (US)            

UNION.

Unions have SCREWED our nation as bad as the frivilous lawsuit.

posted 04-28-2005 07:49 PM ET (US)            

Life will change, and who know whether it will be for the better or worse, but some serious or not so serious changes in our lifes will occur.

posted 04-28-2005 08:10 PM ET (US)            

But why worry about a Saudi that has brought the country to it's knees. The total impact of 9/11 seems to be growing like a cancer.... I could never understand why all of a sudden Bin Laden is no biggie and "ah forget him..."

posted 04-28-2005 08:21 PM ET (US)            

And yeah, of course it's the unions' fault. I mean it's pretty ridiculous that an American union man or woman gets paid thirty or forty bucks per hour while the poor ol' multi-national corporate CEO only brings down thirty or forty million per year. You got it right again, Knots.

posted 04-28-2005 10:16 PM ET (US)         

DEMOCRATIC
You have two cows.
Your neighbor has none.
You feel guilty for being successful.
Barbara Streisand sings for you.

REPUBLICAN
You have two cows.
Your neighbor has none.
So?

SOCIALIST
You have two cows.
The government takes one and gives it to your neighbor.
You form a cooperative to tell him how to manage his cow.

COMMUNIST
You have two cows.
The government seizes both and provides you with milk.
You wait in line for hours to get it.
It is expensive and sour.

CAPITALISM, AMERICAN STYLE
You have two cows.
You sell one, buy a bull, and build a herd of cows.

BUREAUCRACY, AMERICAN STYLE
You have two cows.
Under the new farm program the government pays you to shoot one, milk the other, and then pours the milk down the drain.

AMERICAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You sell one, lease it back to yourself and do an IPO on the 2nd one.
You force the two cows to produce the milk of four cows. You are surprised when one cow drops dead. You spin an announcement to the analysts stating you have downsized and are reducing expenses.
Your stock goes up.

FRENCH CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You go on strike because you want three cows.
You go to lunch and drink wine.
Life is good.

JAPANESE CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk.
They learn to travel on unbelievably crowded trains.
Most are at the top of their class at cow school.

GERMAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You engineer them so they are all blond, drink lots of beer, give excellent quality milk, and run a hundred miles an hour.
Unfortunately they also demand 13 weeks of vacation per year.

ITALIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows but you don't know where they are.
While ambling around, you see a beautiful woman.
You break for lunch.
Life is good.

RUSSIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You have some vodka.
You count them and learn you have five cows.
You have some more vodka.
You count them again and learn you have 42 cows.
The Mafia shows up and takes over however many cows you really have.

TALIBAN CORPORATION
You have all the cows in Afghanistan, which are two.
You don't milk them because you cannot touch any creature' private parts.
You get a $40 million grant from the US government to find alternatives to milk production but use the money to buy weapons.

IRAQI CORPORATION
You have two cows.
They go into hiding.
They send radio tapes of their mooing.

POLISH CORPORATION
You have two bulls.
Employees are regularly maimed and killed attempting to milk them.

BELGIAN CORPORATION
You have one cow.
The cow is schizophrenic.
Sometimes the cow thinks she's French, other times she's Flemish.
The Flemish cow won't share with the French cow.
The French cow wants control of the Flemish cow's milk.
The cow asks permission to be cut in half.
The cow dies happy.

FLORIDA CORPORATION
You have a black cow and a brown cow.
Everyone votes for the best looking one.
Some of the people who actually like the brown one best accidentally vote for the black one.
Some people vote for both.
Some people vote for neither.
Some people can't figure out how to vote at all.
Finally, a bunch of guys from out-of-state tell you which one you think is the best-looking cow.

posted 04-29-2005 07:48 AM ET (US)            

I really think it is funny that his intellect is also challenged everyday.

I am a simple person, I speak with simple words. I know in my heart of hearts that the person America elected is a good, kind, intelligent man. He has a strong moral compass. In other words I have faith in his leadership.

As for Bin Laden, just because he is minimized in the press doesnt mean he is forgotten. Ever try catching a fish when the kids are on the bank making lots of noise? Fish runs away. But be quite... and look what happens.

Lastly, it is wrong to blame the last 10 years of so called lost jobs on President Bush. He did not pass NAFTA and surrender our sovereignity. That was President Clinton. The american worker refuses to work for 10 dollars an hour so American business owners employ illegal aliens to build roofs and houses. Big Business fault? No they have a right to earn a profit as well.

I won't even comment on the unions Tony, they go deeper than 40 bucks an hour.

posted 04-29-2005 09:47 AM ET (US)            

As I assume you know, Knots, the House of Representatives and the Senate both have substantial Republican majorities, and any acts passed in Congress must be signed by our gallant president to become law. What am I missing here?