U.S. Workers move to Asia to reclaim lost jobs
U.S. Workers move to Asia to reclaim lost jobs
Date: Wednesday, November 19, 2003 2:13 PM
JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER
www.ZaZona.com
This article is quite entertaining but it's obviously a farce. Blue
collar workers in the U.S. would never be allowed to work in India or
China even if they were willing to endure the sweatshops. The WTO is
putting pressure on China and India to have a nonimmigrant visa, so
perhaps one day in the future Americans will be able to go there and
work for 35 cents an hour, but until then, we will just have to stay in
the U.S. and be happy with welfare and unemployment checks.
India has an employment visa, but it's very restrictive. Essentially
you can only work in India if you are a businessman setting up a plant
to allow more offshoring of US jobs. I called the Indian Consulate in
San Francisco and they pointed me to this page for information on what
they call "employment visas". They said they don't have a nonimmigrant
visa like H-1B or L-1.
http://www.indianconsulate-sf.org/ (click on passport visas)
Business Visa: i)Valid for 6 months/one year with multiple
entries.
A letter (on company letterhead) from Sponsoring Organization
indicating the nature of applicant's business, probable duration
of stay, places and organizations to be visited incorporating
therein a guarantee to meet maintenance expenses, etc. should
accompany the application. ii) Long term Business visas for ten
years (multiple entries) in case of US Citizens and five years
(multiple entries) for other nationals are available only to
those who have set up industrial/business joint ventures in
India. This fact, along with the details of joint venture in
India must be mentioned in the sponsorship letter.
China is far more restrictive. Their employment visa is called a "Z
Visa".
http://sf.chinaconsulatesf.org/visa/eng/visa0intro.htm
Z Visa: Issued to an applicant who is to take up a post
or employment in China, and their accompanying family members.
You can't work in China unless you are invited by the Chinese Communist
government. One of the methods of getting invited is to bring $3
million US dollars to give to a "city". Since the government owns
everything, you will pay the money directly to the Communists, and then
of course you are one of their favorite Americans!
Here are some of the Chinese restrictions on employment visas. As you
can see, the US has the most generous guest-worker visas of any
industrialized nation - or third world for that matter. Singapore is
just as tough, and don't even bother to try to work in New Zealand or
Sweden.
http://www.china.org.cn/english/2003/Jul/70158.htm
* You have to have a health test to make sure you aren't carrying an
infectious disease.
* Foreign citizens who have invested more than US$3 million in the city
* Senior management staff or technicians who rank as president, vice
president, director, general manager, vice general manger, general
accountant, or above in joint ventures or foreign-invested companies
* Senior advisors who are invited or hired by ministerial-level
organizations
* Scholars hired at state-level
http://www.freepressed.com/manufacturing.htm
Blue Collar Workers move to China, India to reclaim lost jobs
Mass exodus of manufacturing jobs prompts mass migration of American
workers to the Third World .
Kellerman hopes he will fit in at his new job in Calcutta.
Free Trade Zone--Thousands of blue collar workers are leaving the
United States in pursuit of the 2.7 manufacturing jobs that moved
overseas during the past three years.
Deke Kellerman, a worker at the recently-closed Maytag Plant in
Galesburg, Illinois, is moving his family to India so that he can keep
his job constructing refrigerators. His pay will be cut from $11.95 to
a whooping 35 cents an hour.
"There aren't any jobs here in the states anymore," Kellerman said. "So
me and Missy, Deke Jr. and Delyn decided wed move over there and
give it a shot. I figure as long as they got a Mickey Ds and I can
catch the Bears on TV, Ill be happy."
The Kellermans are not the only family from the closed Maytag plant
that are moving half-way around the world to save their jobs.
Buel Jackson, his wife, Mary and their children Tucker, Conroy and
Beldin followed Jacksons job all the way to the slums of Surat in
the Western Indian State of Gujaret.
"Sure, we dont have any running water, tuberculosis is rampant and,
last week, a couple of buildings in the slum collapsed, killing a bunch
of people, but were happy...sort of," Jackson said.
In the Jackson familys one-room abode, the children sleep on mats on
the floor. The youngest child, Beldin, lay on the floor sweating from a
severe bout of dengue fever.
"The hardest part for me has been getting used to the food," said Mary
Jackson, as she placed a cool cloth on her sons forehead. "We
cant afford any."
The slums of Surat may be infested with diseased rats and open sewers,
but at least it's close to the sweatshop where the Jackson family works
together.
Mary Jackson who used to weigh a portly 180 pounds has lost 50 pounds
since the family moved to India three months ago.
She moved about the apartment wearing an Eskimo Joe shirt underneath a
Sari.
While the Jackson family used to regularly throw away several pounds of
food per week, they now pour a little water into their bowls after they
have had their daily allotment of rice so that they can sop up every
last morsel of food.
Besides Buel, the rest of the family also works on the assembly line at
the Maytag plant for 12 hours a day eeking out barley enough money to
survive.
The mass exodus of manufacturing jobs started during President
Reagans tenure and gained steam when President Clinton signed the
NAFTA free trade agreement, which opened up the borders between the US
and Mexico. The creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO) has led
to the further loss of jobs. Both groups have loopholes that allow them
to overturn national laws in areas such as safety and environmental
standards.
"Increasing poverty and joblessness in the United States is not just an
afterthought of our policy; it's the main motivation," said Robert
Noriega, an assistant secretary of state. "Free trade is primarily
about taking jobs away from Americans and creating economies based on
slave labor around the world for the financial benefit of
multi-national corporations."
Pittsburgh, PA Steel Worker Thomas Barrett, moved his family to Shuiye
Town in the Henan Province of China to work for Huaguan Iron and Steel
Co. after his company, Bethlehem Steel, shuttered its door earlier this
year.
Thomas and Amy Barrett couldn't ask for better jobs except ones that
paid enough to friggin' eat on.
Barrett works 14 hours a day in unsafe conditions while his children
are schooled at the state-run Communist public school where they are
taught anti-American propaganda and to hate Buddhists.
"Well, we couldnt continued to compete against the slave wages that
they pay over here in China so I decided if you cant beat them join
them," Barrett said.
Barretts wife, Amy, works in a Textile company where she sews
together blue jeans for shipment to the United States.
"Kind of ironic isn't it?" she said.
The 3 million lost jobs are not ever expected to return to the United
States. Many analysts predict that within 10 years most of the
manufacturing jobs in the country will have been lost permanently.
High Tech jobs are also being shipped overseas as Microsoft and other
computer companies outsource tens of thousands of IT jobs to India and
Singapore.
"Either everyone will work flipping burgers or we are going to undergo
a mass exodus out of the U.S. in the next twenty years," said Jerry
Cohen, leader of NoWTO.
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