HIGHEST MANUFACTURING JOB LOSSES BY STATE
August 2001 August 2002
CALIFORNIA
75,900
PENNSYLVANIA 38,200
WASHINGTON STATE 30,900
NEW JERSEY 23,800
NORTH CAROLINA 22,300
FLORIDA 18,900
In 1997 manufacturing jobs in the US increased by 254,00 new jobs. Since 1998 the US has lost over 2 million manufacturing jobs.
In 1981 Unions represented 27 percent of manufacturing workers. By 2001, Unions represented 15 percent.
NEWS SERVICE REPORTS
(AS THEY APPEARED IN THE SYRACUSE POST STANDARD)
BUSH ADMINISTRATION SEEKS CHANGE IN OVERTIME RULES
(FROM AP)
"Heeding the complaints of employer groups, the Bush administration is revamping decades-old labor regulations in an overhaul that could force many Americans to work longer hours without overtime pay.
The administration argues that the pillars of American labor law, which established the 40-hour work week, a minimum wage and overtime pay, are antiquated....
'Nothing prohibits employers from requiring as many hours as they want,' said Chris Owens, public policy director for the AFL-CIO. 'The overtime pay requirement is the only thing that acts as a brake on excessive work hours.'
....the administration (is seeking) changes... to workplace regulations and programs, including the Family Medical Leave Act (providing unpaid leave), job training programs and unemployment insurance....
The Labor Department is expected to issue the new overtime pay rules for public comment by the end of March (2003).
Congressional action is not required."
2/2/03
OUR TAKE: Has anyone noticed that "casual overtime" is an oxymoron?
THE UNITED STATES TRADE DEFICIT
> Unfair trade deals such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) & the World Trade Organ-ization (WTO) have caused our trade deficit to explode. Rising trade deficits caused by these deals have cost 3 million actual and potential U.S. jobs since 1994.
> Our trade deficit in goods is historic: It is more than 16 times larger than it was 20 years ago, and is now more than 4 percent of our GDP. In the past 10 years, it has grown by 600 percent!
> Last year the United States imported more than $450 billion more in goods than we exported, for a trade deficit of more than $1.2 billion a day.
> Trade deals touted as market-opening agreements instead have worsened our trade balance dramatically. Our combined trade deficit with Canada and Mexico has ballooned to nine times its size before NAFTA, jumping from $9 billion in 1993 to $83 billion in 2001.
> No other industrial country runs trade deficits like we do: Europe's trade deficit is one-tenth the size of ours and Japan runs a trade surplus. Numerous nontariff barriers and regulations protect other industrialized countries' markets.
> China is now the top contributor to our trade deficit. We buy more than $5 worth of goods from China for every $1 we sell, and we ran an $83 billion deficit with China last year. Since Congress granted China Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status and China joined the WTO, the U.S. deficit with China has grown more than 20 percent, by more than $14 billion.
TRADE AND JOBS
> The U.S. Department of Labor says more than 450,000 workers have lost their jobs because of NAFTA. In 1999, the General Accounting Office (GAO) found that 47 percent of the workers qualifying for NAFTA trade adjustment assistance were Latino and 66 percent were women. Using a different methodology, the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) estimates that the growth in U.S. trade deficits with our NAFTA partners has resulted in a net loss of more than 750,000 U.S. jobs.
> Even when employers don't actually shift production, their threats to do so can undermine Union organizing drives and erode wages and bargaining power. A Cornell University survey done in 2000 showed that workers trying to organize Unions won Union elections 51 percent of the time in plants without threats, but only 24 percent of the time when employers made threats to close the plant and move to another country.
> Under NAFTA, the number of people employed in Mexico's maquiladoras grew by 800,000 but real wages in Mexico fell by about 20 percent and poverty there has grown.
The above information is from the AFL-CIO website. Read and learn more about the state of American manufacturing:
