Day: February 14, 2004

Picking vice presidents? and other things

Today’s NY Times’ Quotation of the Day:

“If anybody tells you they wouldn’t be interested in being vice president, they’re not telling you the truth.”
– SENATOR JOHN BREAUX, Democrat of Louisiana.

Nice thought, Senator Breaux. Be sure to check out the fascinating corresponding article too.

See, there are reasons why I try to avoid on-line spoilers about tv shows. “Angel” may or may not have its last season (which WB almost sprang on people last season), with more emphasis on the more-likely-than-not. WB, like so many other networks, finds ways to frustrate me. Heck, just to sound like a conspiracy theorist, I ask, “Are they all trying to make me go to cable??”

CBS, as much as I’ve long wanted to avoid it (because I never did forgive it for cancelling a show I liked, and for being serious hypocrites with the whole Reagan movie and Super Bowl halftime nonsense), has done nicely with “Joan of Arcadia.” I enjoyed this article about this nice show.

Enjoy the rest of this V-Day night.

More outsourcing

Jobs Lost Abroad: Host of New Causes for an Old Problem

Mr. Neustrup a Silicon Valley worker is quoted: “It’s great for these developing countries to move up and adopt this technology,” he said. “The trouble for us in the U.S. is that we’re at the top of the ladder getting squeezed. And I’m not sure there is a good answer.”

That’s the crux of the matter. The people at the top are squeezed and there’s no way to go but down. The room at the top is too small and unachievable for most people at a certain age level. You think that after X many years of formal education, continuing education and other professional schooling, you can be relatively safe of your career and financial path but that’s not possible any longer. The US worker is left more and more to her own devices. No support by way of benefits or job training by companies and no retirement support by the federal government (i.e. Social Security being privatized). So Kristof’s view that education is the answer is belied by the types of professional’s losing their jobs, the highly educated ones who have little room for maneuver. So, with “creative destruction” occuring in the workplace, highly educated individuals need to find their place elsewhere to make their fortunes elsewhere (i.e. entrepreneurship)

In the short term, the economic power of these highly educated (and paid) professional workforce will be felt. It’s just so happens that the interest rate is low and it must be low because that’s what’s floating the country since people are so highly leveraged. But this debt must be financed by overseas money and that’s a fickle situation. We live in interesting times and I’m sure a study of history would shed a better light of what may happen.

=YC