IT IS UNAMERICAN AND IT'S JUST NOT ON
Oct 30th, 2006 | 07:39 PM
#21
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 9,922
Likes: 0
fnarf, my 2c worth - I'm not a knee-jerk anti-globalist, but I do think that where the boardroom is can be important.
I think that many Americans aren't relaxed at all about the fate of the US auto industry, perhaps with good reason. Your Toyota may be made in Fremont, just as mine was made in Melbourne, but the R&D and engineering skills behind those cars, with their spin-off benefits for other industries, are 90% Japanese. Chrysler is now effectively controlled by Daimler-Benz, and I can't see how it's healthy for America that critical decisions affecting American workers and consumers are being made in Germany. That's quite apart from repatriated profits and their effect on an already serious balance-of-payments problem. GM and Ford aren't looking too healthy either.
It all smells too much like economic colonialism to me, and we've hardly begun to see the effects of China's industrialisation, which will eclipse Japan's. Since the 18th century the western world has been able to exploit Asian and other under-developed peoples to its profit - maybe the worm is starting to turn.
In themselves Vegemite and Arnott's biscuits may not be of crucial importance, but given the above it's not surprising that many Australians get nervous when they see foreign corporations taking control of highly visible national assets, and their government shrugging its shoulders.
I think that many Americans aren't relaxed at all about the fate of the US auto industry, perhaps with good reason. Your Toyota may be made in Fremont, just as mine was made in Melbourne, but the R&D and engineering skills behind those cars, with their spin-off benefits for other industries, are 90% Japanese. Chrysler is now effectively controlled by Daimler-Benz, and I can't see how it's healthy for America that critical decisions affecting American workers and consumers are being made in Germany. That's quite apart from repatriated profits and their effect on an already serious balance-of-payments problem. GM and Ford aren't looking too healthy either.
It all smells too much like economic colonialism to me, and we've hardly begun to see the effects of China's industrialisation, which will eclipse Japan's. Since the 18th century the western world has been able to exploit Asian and other under-developed peoples to its profit - maybe the worm is starting to turn.
In themselves Vegemite and Arnott's biscuits may not be of crucial importance, but given the above it's not surprising that many Australians get nervous when they see foreign corporations taking control of highly visible national assets, and their government shrugging its shoulders.
