From - Mon Jun 4 08:28:50 2001 Message-ID: <3B1A56B1.1C1A6C27@clark.net> Date: Sun, 03 Jun 2001 11:24:33 -0400 From: Tiny Human Ferret Reply-To: klaatu@clark.net Organization: copyright 2001 all rights reserved -- non-UseNet transmission prohibited. X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (X11; U; Linux 2.2.17 i586) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: soc.culture.puerto-rico,soc.culture.mexican.american,soc.culture.latin-america,soc.culture.mexican,alt.politics.immigration Subject: Re: THE INS policy killed 14 human beings: 400 died 2000 References: <9ejgm0$3e8v5$1@ID-66657.news.dfncis.de> <3B0D8AC8.4415F042@motorola.com> <9eklr9$tk6$1@slb7.atl.mindspring.net> <3B0E5B19.73D47B9C@home.com> <9engb8$kmc$1@slb5.atl.mindspring.net> <9eoopb$drqt$1@ID-66657.news.dfncis.de> <3B1694D8.9920F7@motorola.com> <3B16C4BA.76013A59@clark.net> <3B16DF1D.7E815124@motorola.com> <3B17BFEB.75DFA2B5@clark.net> <3B17DDAA.FFE0D825@motorola.com> <84dc9988.0106022104.aa8c7ab@posting.google.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: 206.214.47.4 X-Trace: 3 Jun 2001 11:24:43 -0400, 206.214.47.4 Lines: 382 X-Authenticated-User: tjh22isp Path: vienna7.his.com!206.214.47.4 Xref: vienna7.his.com soc.culture.puerto-rico:164482 soc.culture.mexican.american:50286 soc.culture.latin-america:109334 soc.culture.mexican:118445 alt.politics.immigration:162288 "Pomponio Magnus, Gobernador Constitucional del Estado Libre y Soberano de Tejas de Santa Anna" wrote: > > Oliver Costich wrote in message news:... > > On Fri, 01 Jun 2001 11:23:38 -0700, David Vizcarra > > wrote: > > > > >Tiny Human Ferret wrote: > > > > > >> > > SO, maybe what we should be discussing is how it will be possible for some > > >> > > Mexican workers to work in the US and send some money back to Mexico, but > > >> > > not so many workers as to negatively impact the US economy. > > >> > > > >> > I agree, that's the idea that some US politicians (including California's > > >> > David (D), Arizona's Hull (R) and George Bush) and Mexico's Fox and Mexico's > > >> > Fox. In fact there are states that don't get enough "share" of Mexican labor > > >> > and need urgent help to keep some of their industry growing and many times > > >> > surviving. > > >> > > >> Ah, and here we get into the discussions about why we have had riots and > > >> demonstrations against the World Trade Organization and International > > >> Monetary Fund, in Seattle and Washington DC and in Praha in the Czech > > >> Republic. > > >> > > >> You probably are familiar with the "race to the bottom" of transnational > > >> corporations. This is the effect where corporations will move most of their > > >> manpower-intensive operations to the weakest economy, where workers are less > > >> insistent upon their rights and safety, so long as they have any work at > > >> all. For instance, it can be argued that the Border is being used merely as > > >> a legal convenience. There are no compelling reasons, other than the Border, > > >> to have a Maquiladora in Cuidad Juarez, for example. Juarez doesn't have any > > >> real economic life of its own, it has never really had much reason to be > > >> there, correct? But since the Border has one set of laws in Texas and > > >> another set of laws in Mexico, with less protections for the worker the > > >> microconomics of the maquiladora are "more efficient" in Mexico. But you > > >> will notice that they don't build the maquiladoras in the heart of Mexico, > > >> they build them as close to the Border as possible, because they don't want > > >> to pay the price of insurance for shipping in the interior of Mexico, or > > >> accept the costs of thefts or "diversion" or the inevitable "bite". > > > > > > Actually, I think it has to do with how close they are to the US, so the cost of > > >transportation of finished products is less. > > > > Guadalajara is pretty deep inside Mexico and is known as the Mexican Silicon Valley. > The Mexican government is now encouraging maquiladoras to settle throughout Mexico > for two main reasons: 1) the border is too dry to sustain more development and 2) > it is better to keep folks rooted in the interior lest. Tampico, for example, due > to the chemical industry corridor --volume is now close to that of the Houston ship > channel-- is being developed to host garment industry maquiladoras since they will > be close to the plants manufacturing rayon, etc. This makes lots of sense. I mean, if you're going to build a steel industry, you will want to build your main furnaces near supplies of both ore and coal if possible. Hence, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. It had the added advantage of a major river system when that was the best transportation method for the product. I suppose I should get a better atlas than I have presently got, and see if I can't develop an informed opinion. Thanks for the information, by the way. Regarding the Guadalajara industry, I know a lot of people forget how nasty are some of the chemicals used in etching circuitry. Hopefully the people around Guadalajara are taking adequate precautions towards containment and recycling of these solvents and their loads. I seem to recall reading that Guadalajara was one of the best parts of Mexico in terms of natural conditions. > Other places deep are in Chihuahua > (not Juarez) and Puebla. Yucatan is big on the maquiladora garment industry. Though > I think the garment industry won't stay in Mexico long but will soon end up in Haiti > or Central America. Haiti could certainly use the industry, and doesn't have much in the way of resources to be exploited, other than the population. Garment workers don't need a whole lot of education, and Haiti isn't known for having good public schools. > > > It's not less than making them in the US. One of my neighbors in > > Mexico has a furniture manufacturing shop. He pays $10 a day but is > > always harping on getting Mexicna wages up to the same as the US. He's > > quit this since I asked him who would buy his furniture if the cost > > were the same as making it in the US. > > > > A client commented just recently that machine shop costs in Reynosa are now higher > than in the US side. Unfortunately the chicanada doesn't have the skills or git-and-go > take up the opportunity and start servicing these maquiladoras. I don't blame them, > the Rio Grande Valley wears all initiative out of folks, must be the damn heat or the > pollutants in the drinking water from all that pesticide spraying. The contracts then > go to firms in Pittsburg or Jersey. You'd think that people would get the message about the Rio Grande Valley. It can't support a very great population, and as you say, the pollutants of previous generations are now fouling the water table. I think people need to start making plans to abandon the area and let it lie fallow. So, maybe it's a better thing that services are coming from New England or wherever. I think the border is where it is, out in the middle of the godforsaken desert, mostly so that there would be less contact between the US and Mexican culture on a daily basis. Each culture seems to corrupt the other. If Mexico establishes a strong industrial base in the interior, which can be largely independent if necessary, the border then becomes a place for trading, rather than merely the line beyond which US firms may ignore safety and environmental regulations. I mean, I don't see anything wrong with doing business with Mexico, I do see something wrong with US and transnational firms exploiting differences in business conditions which vary from nation to nation, so as to evade worker protections. > > > > > > >> So does Mexico really benefit? Somewhat. But would Mexico have parity with > > >> the US in economic terms, if Mexico had worker-protection laws like the US > > >> does? Of course not! Cuidad Juarez is way out in the middle of nowhere, in a > > >> godforsaken desert with a horribly polluted river running past it, and > > >> almost no remaining ground-water, and the aquifer is being recharged with > > >> industrial contaminants. Juarez is a temporary, and expendable, legal > > >> refuge, where employers may evade the restrictions placed on them by > > >> progressive governments. > > > > > > Actually worker-protection laws are better than how you picture them. The CTM > > >(Mexican Confederation of Workers) is perhaps the strongest union of workers in > > >Mexico and it's quite influential. Have you heard about the strike against one of > > >those Corean maquiladoras in Tijuana? > > > > > I have seen the Ley Federal del Trabajo enforced to the benefit of the worker, > and this was during the PRI regime. The worker protection laws in the US are > a joke. Case in point, I recently knew of a handicapped employee that suffered > harrasment and endangerment due to his condition. He quit as he felt his health > was at risk. The Texas Workforce Commission denied his application for > unemployment. Quitting because some big bully has threatened you and management > won't protect you was not deemed a sufficient cause to the TWC. Per the TWC, > he should have given his notice and waited the standard two weeks. By which time > he would have been beaten up, of course. The TWC is so pro-business that if it > ever got out into the daylight you would find them all brown from all that kissing > of business rectums. At least the labor board --in Reynosa-- is sometimes willing > to stand for the worker, the TWC NEVER will. Yes, I have had dealings with the TWC. I was not pleased with the results in any of the cases. But in any case, this person should have resorted to the Federal Equal Opportunity and Employment Commission, they are the proper authority for resolving such workplace disputes involving disablity. But yes, I do see the point about the workplace violence, that is for the State and Local governments to resolve. > In fact, I remember one time I was > unemployed --during the last Bush recession, damn these Bushes-- and the TWC guy > who was telling us unemployed bums what forms to fill out lectured us about how > grateful we ought to be that the employers had given these funds to keep our lazy > asses from starving, I am not exaggerating the language. Obviously, this particular > idiot had never learned that capital if and of itself does not create wealth, unless > you believe in bubble type speculative ventures, but that it accrues through worker > plusvalia, hence the funds were partly due to my work and I did have a hell of a > plusvalia as an engineer (500 to one, I calculated it). Not that this stoogey of > the bosses could have spelled plusvalia. Makes you turn communist, he, he. I always > wondered why the Chicago Martyrs are never honored in the one country where they came > from. Betcha the average 'murrican has not the foggiest idea who they were. Ford, > Rockefeller, et al, sure did a thorough job of expurgating them from 'murrican history > books used in the school system. This is an interesting point, not entirely sure how germane it is to the discussion. Someone once remarked that quite often we see what is represented as the major political issue, it is in reality nothing but a smokescreen, something to distract the public from other changes which may be effected with little notice. It was this person's thesis that the whole Vietnam War was much less about containing Communism than it was about destroying the Social Justice movements, in particular it was about destroying the power of citizen-organized unions. It was this person's thesis that the government preferred to channel the energies of Activist Youth towards resisting the Draft and the War. Why? Because while it was seen as very profitable to promote worker health through such things as the 40-hour work-week and Workman's Compensation insurance, etc., _enough changes were seen as being already made_. So (according to this person) the Government encouraged Activist Youth to organize against the War and the Draft rather than against Corporate Management... and Management was seen as preferring to deal with corruptable Unions which were thought to be heavily influenced by racketeers. Once the students were busy fighting the Draft, they could not enter the workforce and increase the strength of the Unions. The gains of the Unions had largely been made and had passed into law, for the most part. The older workers who could not be subject to the Draft were satisfied with what they had, and the Unions could be dismantled. Witness Nixon's "wage/price freeze" -- supposedly a response to runaway inflation, but the effect that it had most powerfully was absolutely prohibiting Union strikes, which was represented as a secondary side-effect of the decree, but considering the conditions in Detroit and Chicago, probably the true goal was staving off Union agitation. The end result? Much of the manufacturing simply moved to Canada in the case of Mopar, or began to be outsourced overseas, notably to Europe. My suspicion is that the whole US failure to remove illegal-alien workers from the interior, it's the Real Issue, everything else is just the smoke-screen as was the Vietnam War back in the day. The Real Issue is breaking up the vestiges of the unions, and preventing the organization of new unions. You see, employers are finally at the point where they want to repeal the laws for worker benefits, or if they cannot do that, simply give the jobs to people who are not covered by the laws, to wit, illegal aliens. > > > >> Doesn't Presidente Fox understand that so long as the maquiladoras are in > > >> operation, Mexico can _never_ have citizen protections and civilized social > > >> systems? He's got to choose one or the other. Mexico can grow rich in this > > >> manner only by cannibalizing the workers. Or it can protect the workers, but > > >> who will hire them then? You would know better than I do that the average > > >> Mexican only goes to sixth grade. > > So? The average US High School graduate has only the equivalent of a sixth grade education. > When Toyota first started US operations --in Tennessee?-- they could not find any > line worker capable of keeping up Shewhart charts. They had to get engineering students > to work on these. They tried some MBA's but these were dumb as toast, couldn't handle > math, which was why they took business classes in the first place. Much has changed in US schools since that time. Can the same be said of Mexico? I must also point to changes in automation, especially in numerical-control machine tools and semi-intelligent "worker management" automation. I agree that it is shameful that possibly most high-school graduates can be out-thought by a PC but there it is, directing the hands that we cannot manufacture as cheaply as we can breed them. > > > > > > > But in the northern cities you're talking about it's even higher. There is much > > >inequality in the education system in Mexico, specially with the "indigenous" > > >people. > > > > > >> So it would seem that Presidente Fox's > > >> only realistic strategy is to hope for money from the Illegals, and to > > >> massively reform the tax-system and to put as much revenue as possible > > >> towards improving public education and vastly improving the rate of > > >> high-school graduation for the average Mexican... and eventually, educated > > >> Mexicans will come to understand how the maquiladoras are exploiting the > > >> worker, and how that exploitation enables greater profits for greedy > > >> transnational corporations. > > > > > > Maquiladoras are hardly exploiting the workers (I'm talking about Maquiladoras > > >in Baja California). Most of my ex-classmates work (as engineers) in the > > >maquiladoras and are aware of the quality of the treatment they receive. You might > > >be talking about sweat-shops. > > The Solectron plant in Monterrey offers free transportation to its workers (they > have a fleet of buses that follow several routes throughout the city). The cafeteria > is free, sometimes they offer filet mignon (I've eaten it). The plant has its own gym > for its employees with weights, etc. The pay must be better than that of the line folks > in Reynosa as the workers seem to be dressed better. Then again, Monterrey has > an industrial tradition going back to the founding of the iron mill back around 1903. > The significance is that any colonial mindset from a would-be maquiladora would not > be welcomed. Excellent. > Reynosa and the Tamaulipas border didn't have that industrial tradition > hence there you had some definite sweatshop/colonial mentality from some maquiladora > management, especifically I am thinking of the old Zenith and its "we will test you > frequently to see if you are pregnant and fire you if you are" policy. I remember > the case of the charwoman that had an acid spill --her feet were as red as a shrimp > and the fumes had got her dizzy, I hosed her feet and took her into my office to > recuperate, figuring the poor woman could at least die in AC-- and when I complained > to Zenith management to get her at least a lousy pair of gloves I got nowhere, except being > told to mind my business. This would not have occurred farther south --say Tampico-- > where there is an established industrial tradition and you don't mess with the unions, > especially in safety matters. As a consequence of all that mistreatment, Zenith > was always loosing money. Now it is Korean owned and supposedly they are no longer > such bad assholes...though they got some real mamada type things like having the line > folks stand up and do a "wave" and shout "Zenith es calidad!" every so often. If I > remember right, Deming himself railed against setting up icons or slogans, though > in justice the whole ceremony could have a physiological benefit of relieving fatigue > and boredom. Yes, it would probably be better to have "exercise breaks". I hear very conflicting reports about Korean management. Some allege that they're very good with making plants profitable, but I also hear that they don't exercise much foresight in terms of forestalling resentment. Apparently the culture is very regimentarian and equates mere survival with happiness, at least in terms of employment, pay, and benefits. You'd think that they would learn to perceive the balance between going overboard with frills and perquisites for employees -- which would not be profitable -- and alternatively trying to squeeze every last cent out of the operation at the expense and to the detriment of workers. > > > > > > >> And those greedy transnational corporations are > > >> most profitable where the workers are most exploitable, and they will expend > > >> large sums of money to corrupt the government to retain the laxity that > > >> permits this expanded profitability. If they can't prevent enactment or > > >> enforcement of worker-protections, they will go where such laws are lax, > > >> creating economic hardship in places that have worker-protections, creating > > >> political forces to remove worker protections. > > >> > > >> the worker always loses, unscrupulous greedy transnationals only win. > > >> > > >> When we rioted in Seattle, we were rioting for you too, se~or. But do we get > > >> any solidarity from the Mexicans or the other third-worlders? Not much! > > > > > > Well, don't riot for us then. Thanks to globalization Mexico is the #1 exporting > > >nation in the world, and that has brought plenty of foreign investments and jobs. > > >Our economy is much stronger now, employment is at it's lowest, the inflations is > > >the lowest in decades, etc. > > > > > There is a definite slowdown in those maquiladoras serving the automotive sector; > however, I think that the slowdown has not been as bad because at the same time there > are a lot of transfers of whole plants or product families going on from the US to Mexico. > It should all get going again in the Fall. Meanwhile, I am glad they had gutted their > engineering staffs...the remaining engineers now have twice the work piled on them and > about the same deadlines, so its easier to convince them to outsource me software development > work, great! Well, for now it's good for you... but you should probably hope that they don't start passing _you_ so as to outsource development work to, say, Bangaldesh or India. > > > >> > And it would damage the "coyote" industry, which is used to smuggle drugs > > >> > into the US many times and is the cause of death of thousands of Mexicans. > > >> > > >> And this "coyote" industry is increasingly funding itself towards becoming a > > >> transnational criminal force which rivals national military organizations in > > >> funding, equipment, manpower, organization, and is not encumbered by being > > >> territorially based. Mexico's military should be extremely worried about > > >> this... except it is already entirely corrupted and many believe that it is > > >> inextricable from this transnational criminal combine which extends from the > > >> leftist rebels in Colombia to the hearts of all north american cities. > > > > > > I doubt it, and don't think it's entirely corrupted. > > Where does corruption start? At the border? I think that all this war on drugs > is the result of payoffs to 'murrican politicians to help keep the street price of > drugs up. Corruption is like an advanced cancer. In an early cancer, you can say "okay, if we excise the tumor, it's all done with and the patient can go home". But in the advanced stages, you can't tell where the tumor ends and the healthy tissue begins. There's no place to cut, you just tell the patient to go home and set their affairs in order, they are going to die. This whole "War on Drugs" is, in my humble opinion, purely to benefit the Prison Industry. If you think about it, nobody else benefits. Nobody. If you can think of anyone, anyone at all, who actually benefits, please enlighten me. Well, okay, maybe some revolutionary farmers in Columbia benefit somewhat, but they'd benefit as much if their crops were legal, if you analyze profits versus risks. And another benefit is to the poorest neighborhoods in the US, or at least for a while this was true, as the suburbanites would flock to deliver their paychecks to any reliable source of contraband. But also there was astounding violence as a result, and the sources of contraband have permeated to all points and so there is no longer such a flow of cash from the middle-class districts into the ghettos. So, perhaps with that benefit removed, there is more pressure to re-concentrate the dealerships into the ghettos. the "War on Drugs" will both prop up the Prisons Industry and help reconcentrate the dealerships. And in the meantime, the middlemen, the smugglers, and their contacts, will get quite rich if they can survive the rigors of their trades. > > > > > > >> So don't cry for the coyotes in the narcocorridas, cry for their victims > > >> across three continents, who will only become more numerous, across a > > >> greater range of territory. > > > > > > Narcocorridos are censored in many (most?) of the major radio stations in > > >Mexico. I hate them (personally). > > > > > >...david > > David, I just signed you up for the Complete Works of the Tigres del Norte gift > package. The semi truck should be pulling into your driveway soon. Ah, yes, the > driver will give you a package. Don't open it. A bro' from the Crips will show > up at your place afterwards to pick it up. Tell him that I said to send the payment > to the Grand Cayman account. Don't mess up the supply chain, please, reconstructive > knee surgery is expensive. Don't thank me, I could have chosen the Collected Works > of Selena, now, that IS disgusting! Hold it, you're showing him the lead, I don't see any silver for him! He only knows that it could be Tejano music instead of a narcororrida in which he will life his life. How can this be seen to be profitable? -- Non-UseNet re-transmission of this article is a willful violation of US Copyright Law and the Berne Convention. Statutory damages are $250,000.00 Whom thou'st vex'd waxeth wroth: Meow. <-----> http://earthops.net/klaatu/