What's wrong with Globalization?

Flawed argument. Thinking about globalization like that makes it a loaded question.

And opening borders simply changes the available jobs (with large benefits to the consumer: ie. cheaper prices).

 

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If you are a smart consumer you don't buy crappy substitutions for what you need. You talk as if you need to spend $100 a day just to get by in life.

 

Yea, brother! If you don't like the choices you are given, why not try making your own?

 

Exactly... its never as bad as the crazies on this forum make it out to be. :tongue:

 

Not if you can't get it elsewhere, and I'm not pushing consumerism, my personal philosophy is less is best. As an example of the point I'm trying to make here, look at the communications industry. You're on the internet now, right? So some huge corporation is transmitting the data to/from your computer, or when you're talking on the phone, same deal, and it's a service you probably use every day. Now what if that service was run by one huge corporate monopoly? Maybe they decide to jack the rates, or start charging you money each time you send a PM or an email, or maybe they cut back on their servers so you can't get online half the time. If that happened to me, I'd go to a different provider, but there aren't many choices. If there were only one choice, you'd basically be stuck, or you'd go without altogether.

I dunno about you, but I didn't invent the internet like Al Gore did , so I'd end up going without. I'm glad we still have choices. And I will concede that the FCC has laws governing what the providers can get away with, so perhaps this isn't the best example, but that could change...

 

Dude....why worry about this stuff? What world are you living in? There has never been more competition among the corporate world as there is today.

 

Dude...I'm not worried about this stuff, just making a point. You might begin to worry though when the Wal Marts of the world control the entire economy, 0.1% of the richest Americans own 99.9% of everything, and the only jobs available for the rest of us are at McDonalds and Wal Mart, paying minimum wage...

Don't get me wrong though, globalization could be a good thing if corporations had a social conscience...

 

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No corporation is sued more in the United States than Wal-mart.

Walmart has already cancelled its operations in Germany and South Korea and will more than likely do the same in China. Walmart is not the most successful retail or grocery store in the UK, either. Worldwide monopoly? Please.

McDonald's will probably be banned in most EU countries within the next decade, too...

One of the reasons why both are so successful and numerous in the U.S. is because many, many people go to them. Obviously.... if people didn't shop at Walmart what would be the point of expanding?

 

True, it's good that we currently have the choice to shop elsewhere, I do.

I tend to associate monopolies with globalization based on my observation of consolidations in which large corporations effectively buy out the competition. They'll pull shit like temporarily selling their product at a loss or violating patents to put a smaller company out of business, or force the smaller company to sell out to them, because they have the deep pockets to absorb short term losses. Then you try to call them for some customer service, good luck getting a human being on the line.

As for free trade, it could be a good thing if the people in foreign countries producing the goods were the ones benefitting from it, but that's usually not the case. It's the corporate fat cats who prosper while kids in sweat shops over seas work their asses off so that we can get our sneakers here a little cheaper.

 

Globalization
Helps destroy unions
Helps destroy the middle class
Helps corporations void local enviornmental laws
Enables the theft of patent ideas
Centralizes power.

Decentralized systems are more able to react to changes than are centralized systems.

 

Initially, however eventually the wages of the higher paid worker country will drop to the point where in terms of time spent per dollar the benefits evaporate.

 

Yes. In the short term, it seems great to be able to get our stuff cheap 'cause it's made elsewhere, but in the long term we pay the price in the form of lost jobs, lower wages, etc.

A globalized economy might work if the playing field was level, but it's not.

 

Well, first of all a view basics
we don't really want to look at japan's history how they managed the jump to an economic world power being part of G8, but I can remember pretty well that that was during the 2. world war.
If you think that Afghani culture was only about opium trade then this only shows the former influence the USA had on Afghanistan when they paid Osama Bin Laden as CIA agent to take over the country witht the taliban (history again)
Then our economic system forces consumerism on people - this means that we are (unless we own land and are self-sufficient) forced to consume within the capitalist system. Unfortuneatly mass-production is chaeper than other ways (organic, fair trade, bla) and therefore many people have to buy those products because there is no alternative
Also McDonalds spends 2 of it's 3 bio. income in just a little counrty like austria on advertisement - choice or manipulation?
That no two countries with McDonalds have gone to war is probuably because war nowadays is an instrument of buying all the infrastructure in a country and this way controlling it - the bank of Iraqu has been bought by western companies because the USA forced the government to sell it out - soon they will have McDonalds -yippi (and guess who will own it)
Trade does not bring peace, we live in a capitalist society. Trade means that somewhere in the world workers live in poverty. Otherwise the production wouldn't work - you need "Surplus Value" (money that gets taken off the workers) to make your business growing

it's time for a change
lollipop

 

So civilization is now based on Starbucks, MacDonalds and Baskin Robbins. How sad.

No two countries with MacDonalds not going to war, probably has more to do with the fact that MacDonald's doesn't build until they know US corporate interests are protected before they build. They are a fast food franchise they are not a political power and should never be deemed as such. You can do polls and studies to prove anything. MacDonald's should never be a benchmark on which to guage a society.

 

What happens to the world when there is no poverty? The corporations sell us on the fact they are lifting living standards. What happens when all living standards throughout the globe have been lifted? What then how do they continue their corporate gains, how do their CEOs continue to justify they outrageous salaries?

Perhaps they hold another war to bomb another country back ten years so they can take advantage.

 

The McDonalds theory of Peace is about trade liberalization bringing peace. It isn't about McDonalds, it's just used as a benchmark of openess to trade.

And it isn't entirely true, either, I don't believe. Didn't Kosovo have a McDonalds? I can't quite remember.

 

well youve just proven who the real idiot is since there IS A MCDONALDS IN IRAQ as well as porno theaters & many other westernized stores opening & destroying the local culture

whos the complete idiot?

 

Well, this argument shown who has at least a bare-bones education, considering a)he didn't write the article, he's just citing it poorly and b)every single first-year political science student since the end of the nineties has been forced to read it.

And for the record (before you go around calling people complete idiots), I haven't found any record of McDonalds in Iraq (of course I did a two second search on the internet, so take it with a grain of salt.

And lastly, you're critcizing an article you haven't even read - which is hilarious, because you're missing the point.

 

Poverty is a constant feature of our world. No matter what anyone does or doesnt do poverty will always be with us.

Untill modern times most of the world lived at the sustinece level and didn't think anything of it.

The legal entity of The Corporation has allowed individuals some protection of thier property against predatory goverment seizure.

Trade and industry have allowed sustinece level people the opportunity to earn cash compensation. In China, one generation ago most people never earned hard currency but were compensated by goods-in-kind, foodstuffs and the like. Now a days although the salaries are low they are 100% higher than previous earnings.

The advent of vaccinations and medicine has allowed populations to boom lending the impresion of growing poverty when in truth in the old days mortality would have claimed large numbers of society.

Poverty is all about perception and relativity. In The West one is considered poor if he doesnt own a car or his home is a rental. He can have a cell phone, visit the beautician and own various home appliances

In West Africa the diference between poverty and middle class is footware, potable water and cooking oil, perhaps a few ounces of meat.

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Globalization is good.

To say otherwise is ignorant.