White Collar Professionals Demand: Stimulate This!
by Trude Diamond, Tom BishopLink to article
“The proposed ‘shovel ready’ jobs stimulus package does too little, too late for those of us who shovel information and business processes,” according to Trude Diamond, United Professionals (UP) board member. “What are we supposed to do? Wait until the road builders and bridge constructors start shopping again, and the retailers and service providers can afford to get bank loans to grow, and finally those businesses need white-collar workers and managers again? Wait for the “trickle-up” principle to work? By that time, we’ll be living in our not-yet-repossessed cars, hoping that someone will call our prepaid cell-phone with a job offer. And what’s to keep the businesses from outsourcing the kinds of jobs we do, anyway?”
Of course, the national stimulus plan wisely addresses blue-collar, build-the-infrastructure (which is rotting as we speak) types of jobs. The able-bodied, (mostly) young, (mostly) men who do those jobs are precisely the demographic that every nation’s leadership knows are most likely to join the rebel guerillas in the jungles—or city alleys and underground tunnels—if you don’t keep them productively busy.
But, as wise as the plan is to get “the young and the restless” back to work, it would be equally foolish to leave the unemployed educated professionals to their own and increasingly angry devices. Never mind the possibility of engineers hacking the power grid and Internet servers. It’s just bad for the nation to not employ its brain-trust. We can contribute significant, workable concepts and processes that will achieve corporate and public goals. When we have money, we educate our children to ensure the next generation of American leadership — rather than sending them off to work to help pay the mortgage now that Mom and Dad are receiving unemployment compensation and food stamps. The government can create information-worker and manager jobs, too. Schools need more teachers. Federal, state and local government offices need more competent communicators working in all their offices. Think of how effective we’d be as watchdogs over the ethics of elected officials or as agents of the SEC; recent events have demonstrated how many more of those we could use.
On the private-sector side, the business bailouts must demand job-creation—re-creation, really. Corporate bailout money should come with strict rules about bringing off-shored call center and software development jobs back home as a condition of receiving the stimulus funds. Now. Not over 12 or 18 months. Now. “Flash cut,” as we say about certain business system change-overs. You know … with the same speed we U.S. workers experienced when we were laid off from those jobs in the first place. “Here’s your pink slip and check for two weeks’ pay; the security officer will accompany back to your desk to clean it out.” That kind of NOW.
Stimulus by the Numbers: Too Little, Too Late for the Middle Class
United Professionals has found that, though the total cost of the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act of 2009 is reported to be $789 billion, only about $180 billion is direct spending for job creation, of which less than $30 billion will be spent in 2009. (Most of the $100 billion to be spent in 2009 is for aid and tax cuts.)
“In the entire bill, about $33 billion is directly targeted to white collar jobs,” says UP member Tom Bishop, “which includes $19 billion in Health IT to be spent from 2010 through 2016, and that is too little, too late for the middle class, which is reeling from rounds of lay-offs and years of downsizing and off-shoring.” Bishop notes that the rest is largely for science, defense, and energy research. One unknown is the $39 billion in aid to states for education programs, because states will apply this money differently according to their immediate needs.
The stimulus bill just signed by President Obama is a good start that we hope will put the brakes on this economic collapse. But it falls far short of sustaining and rebuilding America’s middle class, which has been so badly shattered before and during this recession.
“We urge people to visit UP at www.unitedprofessionals.org, read others’opinions and post comments on this critically important topic,” states UP board chair Bill Holland. “UP plans to initiate local discussion groups and connectivity to local news media outlets in the near future.”
Tags: American Recovery & Reinvestment Act, stimulus package, Tom Bishop, trickle up, Trude Diamond
February 24th, 2009 at 12:02 pm
President Obama and Congress: Wrong Direction
Why are President Obama and Congress rejecting other economic solutions? Is this their first cover-up? No need for more taxpayer bailouts and economic stimulus, if politicians would do the following: First, repeal all sales taxes and replace the lost revenue with an import tax/tariff on imported labor and manufactured goods. Second, repeal all local tax incentives that shift business costs to taxpayers and that create poverty wage jobs (click on http://www.flyergroup.com and enter Brent Pittman in the search for details within letters);or change these incentives to pay a living wage, minimum wage of $14/hour (parent with one child). Third, re-regulate banks and financial corporations. Fourth, enact a windfall profits tax on oil and gas companies; but, rebate this money through tax incentives for drilling and building refineries (including ethanol ones in other countries) as well as eliminating the $.54/gallon import tax on sugar cane ethanol. This strategy will slow these companies from using excess profits to enrich executives and to buy company stock. Fifth, increase taxes on fuel guzzling vehicles, wealthy individuals and corporations (eliminating corporate welfare and tax loopholes) to pay for the Wall Street bailout, the Iraq war and to pump more oil in Iraq for export. These strategies will lower the $11 TRILLION ($14 TRILLION forecasted) taxpayer debt leading to a stronger dollar that will reduce inflation and increase the number of good paying jobs with benefits for American citizens.
Brent Pittman Brownsburg, IN 317-852-4470 February 10, 2009
February 24th, 2009 at 2:57 pm
What about he one million plus jobs in this country occupied by H-1B guest workers?
The domestic work force was completely bypassed for these jobs.
If congres would put this right, and it wouldn’t cost any money, the middle class just might be back in business.
Besides, it’s the right thing to do.
February 24th, 2009 at 11:55 pm
Well said! As a former technical support specialist and trainer who lost a job in January 2007, I’ve yet to secure a new IT opportunity here in New England. Competition for the few jobs that there are leave most prospective employees who aren’t 25 year old males, wondering if their resumes have been turned in to paper airplanes that are being flown into the abyss of office cross cut shredders. With over a decade of experience in IT, I now work at part-time job with no benefits for minimum wage until things change.
In the meantime, I continue to run my blog methlabhomes.com to warn others about homes that have been used as meth labs; homes that are being rented and sold to innocent individuals. Once they find out that they’ve been living in a former meth lab is typically when I hear from them. They’re hoping that I can tell them about a rescue plan that will help them to pay for the decontamination of their home. They’re hoping that I will tell them that their homes pose no danger to themselves or their children. They’re hoping that I know of someone who can help them by providing them with the thousands of dollars they need to make their homes safe to live in. Unfortunately, all I can do is offer my emotional support and share some information with them that they don’t always want to hear – if they’re living in a contaminated meth lab home, it’s best that they find a new place to live asap. Once they do that, their health symptoms may improve but their financial problems don’t. Paying rent to live in another home while they’re still paying the mortgage on their contaminated home isn’t something they can do, so they often let it go in to foreclosure.
If Obama really wants to help stop foreclosures and do something that will improve our environment and the health of children in the U.S., he needs to do something to help the forgotten victims of the war on meth. He has got to mandate that banks reveal to buyers if a home was ever used as a meth lab too. Right now, banks have a meth lab bailout plan – they don’t have to disclose the history of any homes they sell. Yet, private sellers aren’t allowed to claim ignorance like banks can do. If a private seller knows that the home was once a meth lab, they need to disclose that. Banks shouldn’t be any different. Letting families with children move in to homes that the government classifies as “hazardous waste sites” by letting banks off the hook…that’s wrong on so many levels.
February 25th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
I agree wholeheartedly. As a senior advertising copywriter who was laid off in november, I’ve heard plenty about how the stimulus will create jobs via infrastructure improvements. That’s all well and good for blue-collar workers and engineers. But what about people such as me; white-collar workers who make their living via communicating, by connecting ideas with interested individuals? We seem to be left out in the cold. Ms. Diamond is right — there are plenty of ways the government could use those of us who do the heavy lifting with our minds and creativity rather than with our backs and arms (and this is not to disparage blue-collar workers, who work hard and deserve every opportunity they can get). But by focusing mainly on infrastructure rather than knowledge-based information and communications, President Obama (who I enthusiastically supported for president) is missing the point, and marginalizing a huge segment of American workers.
February 27th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
I agree with Mike — and as a fellow communications professional, it’s disturbing to see clear, forthright communications as one of the first casualties of this process.
Just saying “transparency” over and over again does not automatically invoke it.
March 6th, 2009 at 9:39 am
I’m a former manager who retired and is now acting (but not for a living). You are all within the relm. Unfortunately, only a major correction in attitudes is going to get us out of this mess. First off, Companies must be willing to cut profit margins, which means stock holders have to accept a severe reduction in earnings. This can be offset by freezing or reducing wages, beginning with upper and middle management, and continuing down the spectre. That is the only solution that will return our technical and white colar jobs onshore. If two employees are proficient in software engineering, for example, but the company can get the off shore employee’s efforts for less in wage and benefit, while keeping the sales price of the product or service the same (increasing the margin) what incentive is there to hire or retain the higher priced US worker?
The other thing is to realize that Debt Based Financing and Debt Based Economics are the problem, and do something about it.
The last step is to remind our governments, at all levels, that the term “borrowing” implys “repayment.” That is something the seem to have forgotten.
March 11th, 2009 at 10:10 am
In my opinion, the H-1B visa and employment-based green card programs pose the greatest threats to the careers and livelihoods of white collar Americans. As Professor Norman Matloff (of UC-Davis) has written, the “prevailing wage” regulations for the H-1B visas and EB green card programs are riddled with loopholes that allow employers to underpay the foreign professional workers with respect to their American counterparts. The foreign workers are more than willing to accept these lower pay rates in exchange for the chance to be sponsored for an EB green card, which conveys legal permanent residence.
The vast majority of U.S. – based employers are classified as “H-1B non-dependent”. These employers can legally fire or layoff their American workers and replace them with (lower-paid) H-1B workers, even if the American workers are performing well in their jobs. For proof of this, refer to the U.S. Department of Labor Strategic Plan for 2006-2011, which is available at:
http://www.dol.gov/_sec/stratplan/strat_plan_2006-2011.pdf
On page 35 you will find the following passage:
“… H-1B workers may be hired even when a qualified U.S. worker wants the job, and a U.S. worker can be displaced from the job in favor of the foreign worker.”
This applies to all “H-1B non-dependent” employers. Since most U.S. based companies are classified as “H-1B non-dependent”, this means that the vast majority of firms in the U.S. can legally discriminate against American workers in favor of lower-paid alien workers.
Therefore, I believe that as the economy continues to contract, Americans are in even greater danger of being displaced by foreign workers on H-1B visas.
The H-1B and employment-based green card programs should be shut down.
March 11th, 2009 at 11:47 am
In many ways, the EB green card program is an even bigger threat to the careers of white collar Americans than the H-1B visa program is. If a company wishes to sponsor a foreign national for an employment-based green card, then federal law states that the firm must make a “good faith” attempt to hire Americans first. However, there are many ways around this requirement. In fact, many so-called open jobs are not really open at all, but are actually filled with H-1B workers who are desperately trying to get that green card sponsorship. Americans who apply for these so-called “open” positions will be summarily rejected with absolutely no transparency in the hiring process. For evidence of this you can view the following videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCbFEgFajGU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqGBIHmv7jo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fx–jNQYNgA
America is the only country which allows discrimination against its own citizens in the workplace. These programs and practices should be ended immediately.
September 4th, 2009 at 10:35 pm
I wonder why no one squawked when factories closed and blue collar jobs got sent overseas.
Now more than ever, middle class Americans are awakening to the nightmare that the same thing could happen to them.
No longer can the middle class continue to ignore the fact that, there is discrimination based on social class in determining who gets access to the distribution of a society’s resources unless, of course, the middle class is willing to accept their turn in doing without.