Bad day at work

[phat46]

We "laid off" (fired) 13 guys today at work due to lack of work in the forseeable future. It was hard to shake hands and say goodbye to guys I've worked with for years, especially the young guy that just found out Monday his wife is pregnant, or the one that just had a baby. I know it's juat a matter of time till we are history, we just can't build a product in Michigan and ship it to Mexico and expect to make any money. We are competing against ourselves in Mexico now, and we can't beat $40 a week. for wages.

[kb426]

sad day for everybody involved. I was told to lay off 13 guys a week befroe Christmas years ago. Didn't like it then, don't like it now. Our country is in deep dodo because of greed.

[40]

That Sucks! I hope they were at least afforded some type of severance package to help smooth the transition.The economy is definitely taking a down turn in our area....I have enough work to stay busy thru the end of the year but it's not looking very promising for next year.Usually by now,I have contracts for at least one new home if not two by this time in the Fall.....I haven't had a call in the last month.I have relied strictly on my reputation and word of mouth since I started this business many years ago but may have to spend my first $1 ever on advertising....though if nobody has a job or $$ that may be a waste also.

[donsrods]

I hear all the time that the unemployment rate here in SW Florida is only 2 percent.  What that number fails to mention is that the majority of those working are working for wages that make it very hard, if not impossible to support a family.  Florida is a service industry State........we really don't make any products, we just have  tourism and some other industries like that.

I feel sorry for you guys who are losing your jobs. The bigger part of that picture is that the United States is manufacturing less and less every year, outsourcing it to these other Countries. Even the new industries like computers and electronics are being serviced in places like India. Whenever I have a problem with my computer, I know the help on the other end of the line will have a foreign accent.

Used to be if you worked hard and kept your nose clean you could make a decent living and do more than just live pay to pay.  The rules have changed, and I don't like what I am seeing for America's future.

Good luck guys.


Don

[Fat Cat]

Joe that sucks. I have been there twice in the last 10 years.

The saddest part of this is not the outsourcing. Outsourcing is not as big a problem as the national media makes it. They do not report all the insourced jobs that come into this country every year. The problem is that most of these companies do not even offer one bit of help to those displaced workers. There are a bunch of workers that have spent years doing a job that has been removed from the workload and they have no useable skills for the new jobs opening up. If they would invest a few dollars having some of these people retrained they would not have to look for people to take those jobs in a year or so.

[Beep]

It is your own fault. It is their fault. It is my fault. Actually, it is eveyones fault and it is a simple round table-table re-action. It is not that complicated.  Jobs come from demand. Period,,end of coversation. Where there is a demand, there will be a builder or maker or providor. This builder-maker-providor will hire workers. Demand = building something = hiring people. Simple.

:oops: Currently we (and I mean all of us) in America demand stuff and that's good. However, we want it at the absolute cheapest price and don't care who builds-makes or provides it. In 98% of the cases we don't even look to see who built it or where it is built. Price,,,,that's all we look at. And that's not good in the long run.  Yes, quality is important, but price is where we go,,every single time.

Listen up dudes.....labor is cheaper in other places. This is a fact of life on earth. If we don't buy "made in America" stuff becuase it is too pricy and buy the cheaper one, guess what?  Builers-maker-providors who want to stay in business move to that other place. It is not a hard equation.

T he answer: stop buying at Walmart and go to the little guy down the street. Stop buying Toyotas, Nissans, Hundais and all the other "cheaper" cars and buy a Ford or Chevy of Chrysler.

Outsourcing happens for a reason. Believe me when I tell you that no CEO or Board of Directors that I know gets up in the morning and starts wondering where he can ship the jobs to today. We make that decision for him every day.

Now I know that this is going to * off the people who don't want to think about complicated things, but think about it the next time you see a lay-off.  And think about this, Ford is likely going down sooner than you think. Chrysler is actually a German company. We will then only have one car company here. Hmmmm, talk about lay-offs.