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The deep cuts in Chrysler's engineering staf, with 40% of the engineering staff gone under Daimler and Cerberus, is hsowing up at job fairs. Jim Badhorn was a Chrysler engineer for 21 years before he took the buyout. He designed the rear doors of the Chrysler 300 sedan. Badhorn put much of the $75,000 into acollege fund for his 2 daughters. He hits the gym everyday. He is arenter so his home in Birminghan isn't like the other owners who have lost 40% of their home value. And he can't even find the end of the job line when he goes to a job fair for a military contractor.

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Remittances to developing countries are an important part of the social safety net in these countries. They are spent quickly so they help support food and housing costs, help reduce the impact of an economic downturn, and leave more money for health and education expenses. Remittances to Latin America and the Caribbean were at about $69 billion for 2007 and 2008. Now these remittances are declining. Mexico's declined by 12% in January 2009, Columbia suffered a16% drop, Brazil a14% decline, Guatemala and El Salvador a 8% decline. For countries like Guatemala remittances at $4.3 billion are ahead of coffee, and sugar, and 10% of the people some 1.35 million live in the USA, And 3.5 million people in Guatel=mala depend on these remittances. Any appreciation of the US dollar cushions the decine in colume of remittances. Ecuador has a dollarized economy and has been hit hard. That is because it has alarge population in SPain, and Spain is one of the hardest hit economies, and the euro has declining versus the dollar. Low skilled professions in which these people work, in construction, manufacturing, hotels and restaurants, are oftent he hardest hit. Migrants are stayingput in these countries even turning doen incentives like those in Spain of lump sum payments to return home, and tend to be resilient, working odd jobs and longer hours and making do with less to tide over abad period....

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Infosys built its business on outsourcing by U.S. business. President Trump's executive order to "Buy American, Hire American" is changing the way it does business. Infosys plans to hire 10,000 software engineers in the U.S. by 2019. 

A big change is also coming from new technologies in computing that require small teams to work side by side with customers. This is best done by having software engineers in U.S. offices and not engineers in offices thousands of miles away. A president of Infosys says this is the new face of computing at Infosys.

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For the regions hardest hit by the coronavirus and its variants- the US, Brazil, India, Europe, Russia, China and Africa, the researchers and the frontline workers in South Africa are doing an incredible job. This report by Stephanie Nolan in the NYT shows the work of researchers at KRISPS advanced medical research center and the frontline workers in South Africa, who are making a difference. Shown are researchers and scientists at KwaZulu Natal Research Innovation and Sequencing Platform in Durban, South Africa on whom the world depends for stepping up the fight against the coronavirus- Dr Tulio de Oliveira, principal investigator of the national genetic monitoring network, and Saleem Abdul Karim, epidemiologist. On the frontline workers who visit patients homes to make sure immune compromised patients have access to their medications is Sizakele Mathe, community health worker. Stephanie Nolan has provided a much needed account of what work is being done on the frontlines to keep us all safe. ...

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The pandemic and ensuing lockdowns, unemployment in the US separated workers from their jobs just long enough to give them a chance to rethink how bad their jobs, incomes, and working conditions were before 2020, says this expert in the NYT. The aid to unemployed workers through long term unemployment benefits, moratorium of rent payments, direct money to households, gave workers enough financial room to make the choice not to go back to poor paying jobs with huge contact risks from coronavirus in the restaurant, fast food franchise, travel and entertainment industries, related industries.  With the Biden administration investing in child care, maternity leave, care for elderly leave, new opportunities for relocating and looking for work were opening for women, and for men who had stuck to old jobs and put up with lousy conditions because of a lack of alternatives. Biden administration's Families and Workers Plans, the effects of the pandemic, helped to shape a new culture of what was possible for workers- a sense that dignity in the workplace was part of culture in America. Restored by FDR/Truman and now again by Biden after two tech booms in the 1920's and the 1990's. A similar situation of a change in culture respecting the dignity of workers and of work is taking place in European Union as stated by SPD leader Olaf Scholz in his election campaign in Germany. Scholz is now incoming Chancellor replacing Merkel. European Union countries have better laws and rules in place for worker retention, and also better worker protections so that the great resignation that happened in America took place in a milder version. ...

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Closing the plant at Genk in Belgium cost Ford an estimated $750 million and years of difficulty with workers and the community. The plant employs 4300 workers and the cost comes to about $190,000 per worker. Many auto plants in Europe are operating at about 60% of capacity in 2013, and about 7-8 million units of car and light truck capacity remains idle, by some estimates. Ford was compelled to take this action because of billions of dollars of losses for Ford Europe as sales declined because of the eurozone financial crisis and austerity measures.

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This essay by Hein De Haas in the WSJ says there is a need for honest discussion about immigration in the US, about how best to accomodate the need for workers in certain trades and occupations in an organized way. In fact there is no need for the issue to be politicized this much. It needs to be depoliticized now that the needs for these workers are going to be larger not smaller as the US population ages and there is need for workers in healthcare and support for aging, and in other places such as construction, building infrastructure as US rebuilds aging bridges, roads and airports. In the seventies it was ned for agricultural workers and temporary workers moving back and forth across the border. Only in recent times has the border crossings assumed the scale and dimension it now has with 2.5 million border crossings at the peak. By comparison to the needs for workers only 500,000 are given work permits. And the laws have not been changed since the Reagan administration amnesty and legislation. Haas says workforce enforcement is negligible today in recognition of the fact of worker needs even under Republican administrations showing the need for honest discussion and resolution of this problem. The other problems of rebuilding manufacturing, US competitiveness, education and vocational training, are very different and require different solutions so that letting the immigration issue spill over the way it has is bad for America in deciding the future direction of the country and the economy, and renewing hope for the future. ...

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After heated debate Governor Christie and leaders of the democratic party in the legislature agree on changes to New Jersey's public employee retirement and health benefits and pension system. New Jersey's pension system has unfunded liabilities of $54 billon and some estimates forecast that it will run out of money to pay pensions by 2018. The retirement age for new workers is now set at 65 not 62, pension contributions go up to 7.5% from 5.5% for state workers and to 10% from 8.5% for public safety officers. A major change is to delay annual cost of living adjustments till the pension fund returns to a stable financial footing. The absence of this change would have meant reducing retirees pension value by 30% in the next ten years. After the plan is 80% funded a new employee-employer pension governing board will modify the contribution rates and pension rules based on advice from actuaries. On health benefits the changes are for workers earning more to pay a larger share of premiums- so that a worker earning $60,000 would pay 27%, and a worker earning $95,000 would pay 35%. This particular change is phased in over 4 years and saves $300 million....

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Plans of the Biden administration to bring back workers to the workforce in 2023 by increasing worker benefits. The place seen where America is lacking is participation of younger women in the workforce and older people who chose to retire during Covid. Increasing child care and benefits for child care is one line of action. Other approaches are being explored by Brian Deese of Biden's National Economic Council.

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Three CEO's have come and gone at Boeing in a couple of years. CEO backgrounds in finance did not work, backgrounds in engineering also failed. Boeing is searching for a new CEO and this time what is sought for is a worker centric mentality from the heart and inborn that identifies with what workers go through on the manufacturing factory floor. A picture emerges about the cost of missing quality culture at Boeing, and the cost of a culture of pushing planes as fast off the manufacturing floor as possible. The Guardian reports that Boeing said it would use $4-$4.5 billion due to crisis costs after a Jan 5 accident of a nearly new Max 735 aircraft and other accidents. This includes costs related to regulatory scrutiny and costs related to lower aircraft production and lower deliveries and is almost the entire gross profit of Boeing in 2019 pre pandemic year. What this shows that quality culture is basic to manufacturing and it starts with respect for dignity of workers shown through training, education, wages and benefits and a worker centric culture replacing a culture of managers addressing purely financial aspects of the business. Instead of saying lets take care of the financial aspects of the business, saying lets take care of the process of manufacturing  so that a good process centred on workers on their own motivation taking responsibility on the factory floor that will produce good financial results for the company as a whole.   ...

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This report in WSJ shows a generational problem that is creating a shortage of workers in Vietnam and China, that will require factory owners to increase wages significantly. US and European government policy supports these higher wages so that some of the manufacturing can be returned to bring jobs back home.   Younger workers do not want to spend much of their lives behind factory walls, and prefer less strenuous jobs shorter working hours in the services sector. They are having fewer children and at later ages than parents, resulting in less pressure to work in their 20's for a steady income. Factories in Vietnam are offering glass walls, yoga classes, improving cafeteria food, and offering kindergarden for worker children to attract workers.  In China there is 21% urban youth unemployment at a time of factory shortages. South Asian countries such as Bangladesh have infrastructure problems, and in India factories are finding it difficult to sign up workers. In the next 2 years this will result in costlier goods in US and EU, over 3-5 years this will bring many jobs back to the home countries. ...