Canuckistani

It is morally wrong to make individuals bear the costs of outsourcing or new technology. It's also economically wrong, because those idled people cost us all money. Especially if we create whole regions of it, like the rustbelt say. It's a waste of human capital, breeds discontent, crime and poor health. Our state should be more collective in that sense.

A good point that Michael made is the the savings of using such a machine will go to the shareholders of the company, while the people displaced, and all of us (social programs) bear the cost. Some of that cost has to be placed back on the company, IMO. When i was in highschool in the 60's, I was told I could expect to work about 20 hours a week, since the lenght of workday was declining as machines did more work, so they had to teach me golf and tennis etc so I'd know what to do with my time. The expectation was, during a time of decreasing inequality, that I would make a fulltime wage from those 20 hours. Didn't happen of course, soon after OPEC turned off the taps and the West has never been the same, with people working more and more hours, those that have jobs. And many don't make a fulltime wage from their fulltime work. The point is that at one time the expectation was that the benefits of mechanization would be shared equally across society, not just the rich. It's the same with outsourcing - if we send our boring factory jobs overseas, taking away many jobs with good incomes, then we'd better have other jobs the people displaced can do for a similar income. If not, the country bears the cost, as we aare seeing.

Well since Mulroney was the one bringing it in, no. Don't trust Mr Oleaginous. But before Bush I used to be for closer ties with the US. The FTA did seem like a reasonably good idea. I think they possibly blew it with NAFTA.

We've been gaining ground selling our resources, that's it. Short term gain for long term pain. Nothing in the PIGS's troubles had to do with worker protection that I can see. More about not collecting taxes and getting caught up in the same bankings scams the US did. Germany is a model we could look at. Maintains it's manufacturing base by figuring out what it's good at. During the recession, the govt worked with companies to keep workers on ar reduced hours and pay, so that when things opened up again, they were ready with trained personnel to quickly take advantage of it - something we would never consider here. We should be training Canadians for the jobs we have, like Germany does, instead of importing people for them. Our temp worker systems is a complete sham - these are permanent postions fille by low wage workers because the employer doesn't want to pay the wages required to attract Canadians. That should be changed. And we need a proper industrial strategy that works on keeping manufacturing jobs in Canada as best as possible. We can't compete for lowest wages, so we should compete for productivity and quality instead.

I'm not for a globalization that turns us back into hewers of wood/drawers of water. I'm not for a globalization that creates a transnational elite that is able to play off nations against each other for their own interests. I'm not for Free Trade with countries that have totally different social organizations that allows them to exploit workers the way we can't (and shouldn't) do here - that's not a level playing field. Enriching a few Canadians with Free Trade while the middle class loses their jobs and standard of living is not Free Trade I would support. Free Trade with the US or Europe are one thing, with China and India something else.

Unfortunately yes. It's about creating a global elite that transcends borders and will be able to maintain it's position with the use of technology. I used to be all for globalization, as I thought it was about lifting 3rd world people out of poverty and creating greater economic equality. Instead, it seems to be about importing 3rd world attitudes of privilege and subservience, making the rich richer as well as the 20% who provide higher level services to them, and making the bottom 80% into techono serfs. The new feudalism. Wonder how long that will last this time.

That's great, and of course people need to be adaptable. Things change. But you also seem to argue against policies that help people with that adaptation. And against policies that prevent the change if it really is inimical to the country's wellbeing.

That's certainly my impression. I think Michael has Stockholm syndrom. He doesn't think there's anything that can be done about it, so he's learned to love it.

Well yeah, our policies need examining. Surely you're under no illusion that we haven't been gutting out the middle class - ie losing wellpaying jobs that don't require too much specialized training, and replacing them with Mcjobs? As for technology, there's no way that can balance out. If putting in new tech requires just as many people to operate and service, then there's no saving to industry and no point doing it.

Let them adapt as they best see fit, and help them with that in making training affordable and easy to get. But if all the IT jobs are being outsourced, then there just may not be IT jobs for the displaced IT workers to go to. What I'm talking about is at least having some jobs for them to do rather than just be on some sort of welfare. Maybe they'd be happier doing infrastructure work, or environmental reclamation or any of the other things we're not doing enough of in the country. This sort of thing is only going to accelerate as middle class jobs disappear - time to deal with it properly.

Mulroney made a huge error there, just created a "dream castle" for the natives. They're not nations, Canada is a nation. They are citizens of that nation, should get the same rights and responsibilities as any other citizen.

Because they're wasting your time, not paying somebody to deal with you. I think the main reason for these things is to frustrate people so they'll just give up. And notice how they want you to punch in your account info, then first thing when you ge a human is you have to give it to them, then you get transferred, the new person asks you why you were transferred (as if it was your idea) and then wants your account info....

Yes, the only beneficiaries are the shareholders of RBC. As such, they should be contributing (more than they are) to having that unemployed person retrained and another job found for them. And there may not be other jobs, same with jobs lost to technology - the whole point is to reduce the labor force. So we need to be creating jobs for all those people - as I said, on building and rebuilding infrastructure and on socially beneficial jobs, such as assisting seniors, say. And of course not be importing so many people every year who all want jobs too. Make sure Canadians are employed before we do that.

When farmers moved to the cities, there were plenty of jobs waiting for them with the new industrialization. What jobs have come about to replace technology and especially outsourcing (which is doing the same job in the same way somewhere else)? Nowhere did i say new tech should be forbidden, just that the negative effects of that tech should not be only borne by the people displaced by the tech. We as a society should pay to help situate those people in other jobs.

I would expand that to all corporations owing the country. It's the country's investement in infrastructure and trained people that allowed the corporation to operate and make a profit there, it's the consumers of that country that create that profit. Corporations should do their thing to maximize profits, nations should do theirs to restrain that impulse enough not to damage the nation and to tax the profits sufficiently that people harmed by this drive for profit are made whole again by retraining or otherwise not just putting them on the rubbish heap.

It's a good thing if the profits from replacing a worker with a computer are shared across society. If those workers losing their jobs have to bear the costs, while a rich people get richer from pocketing the savings, then we slowly destroy society. Even if we just provide state benefits to the job losers it's a loss to the country - people need to be productive, not on welfare. So if the savings from introducing technology are used to create good jobs elsewhere, that would be a positive approach. It's not like we don't need infrastructure that needs replacing, of social service jobs caring for people or environmental clean up etc. But the retraining opportunities need to be there, and so the prospects of the new jobs. Not retraining people for jobs that don't exist.

I believe this has happened to Micheal, and he now has Stockholm syndrome where he thinks it's just peachy keen.

That's a dump postion to take. Foreign aid build goodwill across the world and is meant to help people help themselves (tho it's often a boondoggle). Taking in genuine refugees is a humanitarian thing to do. I very much against massi immigration to Canada, but support us takign a good whack of genuine refugees. We don't help the rest of the world by collapsing our economy by outsourcing our middleclass jobs tho. Those "brown" workers will go back to India to do jobs formerly done here, except they may find not so many of them are needed as Canadians are put out of work and don't have the money to put the in bank in the first place. Outsourcing is our corporations cutting their own throats - just slowly. Lennin was right, we will sell them the rope with which they hang us, and we'll do ti even after they (the communists) are gone. Sell your grandmother capitalism contains the seeds to its own demise

They should get exactly the same sentence as anybody else convicted of the same crime. The reason they whipped their victim doesn't matter, nor should your hate of Muslims be allowed to influence the sentence. There is no law against being Muslim. They should be deoported, if eligible for it. We allow way too many people to stay in Canada after being convicted of serious crimes. Again, has nothing to do with their religion, but what crime they committed.

What's the alternative? Everybody knows when you put your money in a bank, theres some risk, same as putting it anywhere else. Why should the Germans have to pay because the Cypriots elected govt three times that made for a freewheeling banking sector - they were inviting in the dirty money. If they didn't get the bailout, even depostis below 100k wouldn't be safe - how is that any better. Maybe govts should set up money warehouses - you put in your money and it's guaranteed to be there. Thing is, you'd have to pay to do that, since it costs money to run the place, and insure it against theft or what have you. I wonder how much business a place like that would do during good times? My guess is very little, then when things got dicey everybody would try to put in their money. And of course, if a place like that was popular, it would take a bunch of money out of circulation, no leveraging on being lent out for businesses etc - much less growth.

Harper probably had very little to do with this, he can`t micromanage every riding. OTOH, the brain trust behind the election likely came up with this scheme, Harper is leader of the party as well as the govt, so ultimately the buck should stop with him. Not for criminal charges, but for being held responsible at election time. Thing is, most of the people that would vote CPC wouldn`t really care about this, anything to win. Which, I beleive is true for all the parties, not just the CPC.

I think he'll be bought off. Any penalty from this trial will be a slap on the wrist, and his future with the CPC or their supporters is assured by his silence.

Enough not to blow 2 million bucks on a bs scheme. All it takes is a bit of logic - ie it wasn't lack of plankton that reduced salmon runs in the first place. But this was sold as a quick get rich scheme by selling carbon credits for the plankton blook. Doesn't look like the natives are ready for prime time. Indigenous People in Canada have basically become a cargo cult - the white man will drop cargo from the sky. When that wasn't enough they turned to other get get rich quick schemes.

So he hacked the computers of his won party and went rogue?

My worry too. How could they go all this time and only wind up with this guy.