Perhaps we are mis-communicating. I'm talking about the erosion of the middle class in America and how we're starting to resemble a 3rd world economy with a top 1% living in gated communities while the rest live in squalor.
Take my own business as an example. I run a dental prosthetic manufacturing business. My bread and butter is from the middle class. When they have jobs and dental insurance, I do well.
When I came into this business in the 90s, growth seemed relatively effortless. As long as your quality was good, your service was dependable and you put a lot of work and care into your lab, you were virtually set to grow each year. Hiring experienced technicians was impossible, since all of them were already employed. Any time I did hire an experienced tech, I quickly found out there was a reason they were available for hire (drug problem, anger problem, etc). I had to hire inexperienced trainees and train my own techs.
To take one department as a prime example, we peaked in 2001 in our partial denture metal frame castings, with 6 technicians and 18-20 frames cast each working day.
I look back nostalgically on those good times as the days of flowing milk and honey.
Today, I employ 3 technicians in that department. We produce about 10 frames a day. The department's production has been sliced in half since our peak. Meanwhile, I have experienced technicians knocking on my door all the time, unsolicited, asking if I'm hiring. I have to turn them away, taking an application to keep on file "just in case". As if.
What happened?
Did a local competitor grab up my framework business? No. In fact, not one of my local competitors even casts their own frames.
So where did the business go? I know exactly where.
China.
A national corporation offers to ship frameworks off to China to have them done at a fraction of a price, so low that I can't possibly compete with it. There are other corporations that will do the same.
This is the new normal in America.
Take my own business as an example. I run a dental prosthetic manufacturing business. My bread and butter is from the middle class. When they have jobs and dental insurance, I do well.
When I came into this business in the 90s, growth seemed relatively effortless. As long as your quality was good, your service was dependable and you put a lot of work and care into your lab, you were virtually set to grow each year. Hiring experienced technicians was impossible, since all of them were already employed. Any time I did hire an experienced tech, I quickly found out there was a reason they were available for hire (drug problem, anger problem, etc). I had to hire inexperienced trainees and train my own techs.
To take one department as a prime example, we peaked in 2001 in our partial denture metal frame castings, with 6 technicians and 18-20 frames cast each working day.
I look back nostalgically on those good times as the days of flowing milk and honey.
Today, I employ 3 technicians in that department. We produce about 10 frames a day. The department's production has been sliced in half since our peak. Meanwhile, I have experienced technicians knocking on my door all the time, unsolicited, asking if I'm hiring. I have to turn them away, taking an application to keep on file "just in case". As if.
What happened?
Did a local competitor grab up my framework business? No. In fact, not one of my local competitors even casts their own frames.
So where did the business go? I know exactly where.
China.
A national corporation offers to ship frameworks off to China to have them done at a fraction of a price, so low that I can't possibly compete with it. There are other corporations that will do the same.
This is the new normal in America.
Atheist Forums Hall of Shame:
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist
