Republican Candidates and Trip to the East
2 Comments Published by Dr. Beyster September 23rd, 2011 in Government, Politics, San Diego.There was yet another Republican Presidential debate on TV again last night, and I frankly am undecided about who to vote for. It looks like the party has some good alternatives to Obama, which is a good thing since I think his performance has been mediocre to date.
There seems to be an increasing vacuum of leadership at the top on both the world stage and at home. This lack of leadership is not just a problem with the President, however. Congress is increasingly dysfunctional and divided.
The failure of Congress to produce a long-term budget solution is having a negative impact on our nation’s economy, and there is no apparent resolution to this problem in sight. I am afraid that this will continue to haunt us for years to come.
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I’m in the planning phase for a possible trip back East within the next few months. If all goes according to plan, I will visit Washington, Rutgers, and Michigan. I’ll post updates here on this blog as we get closer to firming up the arrangements and set travel dates.
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I was pleased to get back out on the boat last Friday. We made a short voyage across San Diego Bay to Loews Resort on Coronado, where we had a very enjoyable lunch.
– Bob
Would you be willing to look at an ole sailors opinion of why the economy will continue to get worse?
I so, I will attempt to paste it here.
If anything gets cut off, don’t hesitate to shout at me.
I read an article today about you in Washington Technology that I found interesting (Oct 2011 issue).
I even worked for SAIC for a very short time in the 90′s, but something with a lot more money came up (bad decision in hindsight) so I left, but that is not what this is about.
I wanted to discuss something that is very dear to my heart and that is people having jobs and companies having business so that they can give people jobs.
I first experienced what America is going through in 2003.
For four years I wondered what had happened because I have always been able to make better than the average wage by 4 or more times as much.
I hadn’t changed, but something had and no, I’m not asking you for work (I just want you to ponder something and maybe give me some insight into how to make it happen if you have the time).
In late 2007 I began to realize what was happening and I founded Keep America At Work at http://www.KeepAmericaAtWork.com where I began to research and document my findings.
It took about 3 more years, but finally I ran across the following two articles and things began to make sense.
1. The U.S.-based CEO of one of the world’s largest hedge funds told me that his firm’s investment committee often discusses the question of who wins and who loses in today’s economy. In a recent internal debate, he said, one of his senior colleagues had argued that the hollowing-out of the American middle class didn’t really matter. “His point was that if the transformation of the world economy lifts four people in China and India out of poverty and into the middle class, and meanwhile means one American drops out of the middle class, that’s not such a bad trade,†the CEO recalled.
http://keepamericaatwork.com/?p=200297
2. “We have been seeing wage inflation over the past several months,’’ said Chris Ruffle, who helps manage $19 billion as China co-chairman of Martin Currie Ltd. Rising salaries may prompt businesses that operate plants in China to move to lower-cost countries such as Vietnam and Cambodia, Ruffle said.
http://keepamericaatwork.com/?p=202864
Either of these things by themselves will not cause the problems that we are seeing in the global economy, however taken together they will continue to drive the global economy even further downward until it reaches zero.
Yes I know.
Big words from somebody that does not hold any positions as a leader in any of our governmental or corporate positions.
But bear with me for a second.
Let’s take six countries and their GDP (PPP) per capita totals
China – $7,600
European Union – $32,700
United States – $47,200
India – $3,500
Japan – $34,000
Brazil – $10,800
Now using any data available to you as they all will work the same way, quantify them as to how many make more than and less than this average wage
China has a population of 1,339,724,852 with 450,000,000 making more
European Union has a population of 501,064,211 with 337,779,000 making more
United States has a population of 311,624,000 with 239,233,000 making more
India has a population of 1,210,193,422 with 100,001,000 making more
Japan has a population of 127,950,000 with 99,144,000 making more
Brazil has a population of 190,732,694 with 75,944,000 making more
We can now multiply the (PPP) figures times the quantity of people making more and we find that we have a combined GDP (PPP) total of $30,298,265,600,000.00 or a little over 30 Trillion Dollars.
This is our starting point.
30 Trillion Dollars for only 6 countries out of about 253 countries
Now let’s implement the first assumption above and since we are both ex-sailors, we’re going to go all in and carry it all the way out to its eventual ending point by putting everybody in the United States and the European Union out of work and creating 4 people in China and 4 people in India for each person taken out.
We have now increased the middle class in China from 450,000,000 to 956,932,000 which will give us a (PPP) figure of $7,272,683,200,000.00 which is what Wall Street is betting on.
We have now increased the middle class in India from 337,779,000 to 1,351,116,000 which will give us a (PPP) figure of $4,728,906,000,000.00 and you might note that this is more than the existing population of India which means this figure that Wall Street is betting on will not materialize either.
If you’re still with me, you will see that we now have a combined GDP (PPP) total of $16,192,680,400,000.00 (remember, we took out all of America and all of the European Union, kind of like we do in gtmo for wargames.)
Are you seeing what I’m seeing?
But don’t trust my numbers.
Have your best and brightest try to disprove my theory.
As one sailor to another, I may not be able to buy an interview anymore, but I would bet my life on this.
Feel free to use it in anyway that it will benefit you and your organizations.
Now I have no way of knowing if you will even see this, but I felt that it was worth a chance because there are people like me out there that cannot buy an interview even though our CEO’s and Politicians are saying they can’t find qualified people (and yes, I would put me up against any of your former colleagues)
I want to put an end to this nonsense.
I want to put the people back to work matching people up that need jobs with companies that need people so that I can do my part to Keep America At Work.
My solution can be found at http://www.KeepAmericaAtWork.com/jobs
If you know of anybody that may be interested in such a concept, I would be willing to talk to them and yes, I realize I don’t have a penny to my name so maybe somebody else will need to take the concept and run with it.
It does not matter to me just as long as we can Keep America At Work, or better yet, Keep the World at Work.
Respectfully,
Virgil Bierschwale
Keep America At Work
Virgil: Thank you for your detailed post. I can see that you have thought a lot about our country’s financial situation. I hope you will keep me informed about what you learn. — Bob