And Bouchard proved, on multiple occasions since he left politic, that he's now totally disconnected with the realities of the working class, busy as he is making big money, paid by the government and peoples he's now promoting the merits. He now have nothing to gain from whatever class of society he now consider below him so, he can now suck-up to the upper class, where he is comfortably sitting.
How can Canada stay ahead of China and India ?
- Thread starter New York
- Start date
Forgot to mention that Bouchard also mentioned that Quebec won't be able to compete in the future with the rest of North America because people in Quebec on average work fewer hours than most other North Americans in similar types of jobs.
If people in Quebec can't even compete with their neighbours living in Ontario, New York, etc., there is no way that they can compete with places like India, China, and parts of South America where on average they work harder, longer, and make less money than we do. Of course, their quality of life is a lot worse than our quality of life.
If people in Quebec can't even compete with their neighbours living in Ontario, New York, etc., there is no way that they can compete with places like India, China, and parts of South America where on average they work harder, longer, and make less money than we do. Of course, their quality of life is a lot worse than our quality of life.
cars, biotech, info tech etc....
Hello my neighbor Canadians,
To stay ahead of China and India, I think Canadians should be able to manufacture and produce cars like the Chinese will.
Canadians should also have more biotech companies and info technology companies.
We have just a few now, we need hundreds more to compete.
I don't want to drive a China made car in a couple of years.
I want to drive a Canadian made cars, 100%, not just a subsidiary like Ford or GM.
Hello my neighbor Canadians,
To stay ahead of China and India, I think Canadians should be able to manufacture and produce cars like the Chinese will.
Canadians should also have more biotech companies and info technology companies.
We have just a few now, we need hundreds more to compete.
I don't want to drive a China made car in a couple of years.
I want to drive a Canadian made cars, 100%, not just a subsidiary like Ford or GM.
NY, you can drive a car built wherever you want, as long as you don't mind about quality or, to be precise, the lack of quality of some...
I'd love to drive a Canadian car but, it won't happen soon, probably never, even if it get built... Canada copies the USA in every way so why car production be different? We'll produce the same shit as the US cars, with same problems caused by same cost cutting mentality, no matter what the effects these cuts have.
I'd love to drive a Canadian car but, it won't happen soon, probably never, even if it get built... Canada copies the USA in every way so why car production be different? We'll produce the same shit as the US cars, with same problems caused by same cost cutting mentality, no matter what the effects these cuts have.
If you're small, you need to develop expertise in select fields and make it attractive for businesses who operate in those fields to come here. That's the reason why Ubisoft chose Montreal over other major cities in Europe and the US for their new digital film production studio.
New York said:
Cheaply made cars are a commodity. Why would you want to compete in a market for commodity where low labor cost and volume drive market share?
Agreed. But in order to make that happen you need to have in place the infrastructure to support the generation of these enterprises. That usually means a critical mass of good universities, venture capital, educated labor force, tax breaks for R&D, and a desirable place to live. Except for VC and more government tax incentives for small business R&D, Quebec has all of these attributes.New York said:
If you want to know the REAL way to stay ahead of China and India....
I really think there is no way to stay ahead of China and India. Sorry to say, but China and India's population together is about 2.4billion. A bit more than 1/3 of the planet's population.... Canada's population...? 32million. This is equivalent to a medium sized city in China or India... not very big.
So to ask, how does a country that is 0.01% population of those 2 countries compete... it's almost a joke to even think we can compete in certain industries. Keep in mind the average person in China gets paid about $200/month for a low wage job, and a decently good job gets paid $250/month... china and india just has too much damn man power and people that are willing to do a certain job for $200/month than there are Canadians capable to even think of getting paid only $200 a week! Average Canadian income a month is about $2000 a month.. so for that 1 worker in Canada.. you can hire 10 of them in China.... any normal business man can easily do the math and figure out that have 20 "decent" workers, is better than have 2 "great" workers in Canada.... and to make a whole container of clothing lets say... what takes about 10 employees in Canada and $20k of salary to make that container will only cost about $4k salary for 20 employees in China.. that means he the business just made themselves $16k extra in their pocket...
Sorry to say it, but there's not much we can do to compete with a country's population that is 1.3billion... We should just be happy and satisfied and content with what Canada is and can do. There are plenty of jobs out here for people that are willing to work, but those people that complain they can't find a job because of businesses outsourcing... either you're not looking hard enough, or you've got pretty damn high expectations of yourself.
I really think there is no way to stay ahead of China and India. Sorry to say, but China and India's population together is about 2.4billion. A bit more than 1/3 of the planet's population.... Canada's population...? 32million. This is equivalent to a medium sized city in China or India... not very big.
So to ask, how does a country that is 0.01% population of those 2 countries compete... it's almost a joke to even think we can compete in certain industries. Keep in mind the average person in China gets paid about $200/month for a low wage job, and a decently good job gets paid $250/month... china and india just has too much damn man power and people that are willing to do a certain job for $200/month than there are Canadians capable to even think of getting paid only $200 a week! Average Canadian income a month is about $2000 a month.. so for that 1 worker in Canada.. you can hire 10 of them in China.... any normal business man can easily do the math and figure out that have 20 "decent" workers, is better than have 2 "great" workers in Canada.... and to make a whole container of clothing lets say... what takes about 10 employees in Canada and $20k of salary to make that container will only cost about $4k salary for 20 employees in China.. that means he the business just made themselves $16k extra in their pocket...
Sorry to say it, but there's not much we can do to compete with a country's population that is 1.3billion... We should just be happy and satisfied and content with what Canada is and can do. There are plenty of jobs out here for people that are willing to work, but those people that complain they can't find a job because of businesses outsourcing... either you're not looking hard enough, or you've got pretty damn high expectations of yourself.
Canada and USA can stay ahead of China and India by being productive. To improve productivity, these countries should invest heavily in IT and train their employees in using IT to be more productive.
If a western worker can use technology to do a job that requires 3-6 workers in developing world then companies can pay him/her higher salary than a worker in the developing world.
The second thing that USA and Canada can do is innovate. Innovations creates jobs that pay well. Manufacturing, textile, and agriculture sectors are around for long time and the scope for innovations in these sectors is very limited. The jobs in these sectors are monotonous and can be outsourced to developing nations.
Biotech and space technologies appear to be new areas where innovations can occur in the US and Canada.
China as a communist nation has problems (currency devaluation, aging population, birth controls, uneven sex ratio etc.) that will remain hidden for a long time before there is a snow ball effect. India, on the other hand, is not really a threat. India has a long way to go. While India has made some progress in Knowledge Economy, it is mired with poor infrastructure and has several public health issues which need to be ironed out before it can really compete with the West (in terms of productivity).
The poor and low skill workers in the west are the ones that will really pay for economic raise of China and India. High skill workers will command higher money regardless of which country they work for, which include China and India because if their countries do not pay well they will be willing to move to a country that will pay well. As long as USA and Canada keep on innovating, they will attract the Chinese and Indian high skill talant to our countries. There is no demand for a chinese automobile worker in USA and Canada and that is why he/she works for chinese wages in China.
Anyway, USA has a loop hole to deal with some of the cost issues. USA owns territories in the Pacific (Islands of Gaum and Saipan). These territories is where USA textile manufacturing is located. Anything manufactured on these territories bears "Made in USA" tag, but Fedral labor laws and minimum wages do not apply to these territories as these territories do not pay any taxes to Fedral government. Due to proximity of these islands to the Phillipines, low wage workers manufacture "Fruit of the loom" Made in USA garments. So technically, textile manufactures in USA can easily compete with low wage countries by bringing these workers to one of the islands and paying them 10 cents more than what they were earning in their home country.
If a western worker can use technology to do a job that requires 3-6 workers in developing world then companies can pay him/her higher salary than a worker in the developing world.
The second thing that USA and Canada can do is innovate. Innovations creates jobs that pay well. Manufacturing, textile, and agriculture sectors are around for long time and the scope for innovations in these sectors is very limited. The jobs in these sectors are monotonous and can be outsourced to developing nations.
Biotech and space technologies appear to be new areas where innovations can occur in the US and Canada.
China as a communist nation has problems (currency devaluation, aging population, birth controls, uneven sex ratio etc.) that will remain hidden for a long time before there is a snow ball effect. India, on the other hand, is not really a threat. India has a long way to go. While India has made some progress in Knowledge Economy, it is mired with poor infrastructure and has several public health issues which need to be ironed out before it can really compete with the West (in terms of productivity).
The poor and low skill workers in the west are the ones that will really pay for economic raise of China and India. High skill workers will command higher money regardless of which country they work for, which include China and India because if their countries do not pay well they will be willing to move to a country that will pay well. As long as USA and Canada keep on innovating, they will attract the Chinese and Indian high skill talant to our countries. There is no demand for a chinese automobile worker in USA and Canada and that is why he/she works for chinese wages in China.
Anyway, USA has a loop hole to deal with some of the cost issues. USA owns territories in the Pacific (Islands of Gaum and Saipan). These territories is where USA textile manufacturing is located. Anything manufactured on these territories bears "Made in USA" tag, but Fedral labor laws and minimum wages do not apply to these territories as these territories do not pay any taxes to Fedral government. Due to proximity of these islands to the Phillipines, low wage workers manufacture "Fruit of the loom" Made in USA garments. So technically, textile manufactures in USA can easily compete with low wage countries by bringing these workers to one of the islands and paying them 10 cents more than what they were earning in their home country.
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DoingittoDeath said:
It does not make any real difference, but politicians can claim that textile industry in USA is alive and well (without mentioning where it is located and who is working at what wages). Anyway, corporations making a lot of money is not always such a bad thing. Most of the Americans have their money invested in 401K retirement accounts. If corporations start loosing money, people will lose out on their retirement account value, which will hurt the majority. What is debatable is the executive compensation, which takes a chunk out of corporate profits that would have gone to shareholders.
Like I said before, the current economy will hurt only a segment of the population. Depending on which segment of overall workforce a person is located, he/she may be a winner or a casualty.
btyger said:
Lots of high tech jobs are being lost to India and China. I don't believe that Canadians and Americans don't want these jobs. I've called many high tech companies for support on their products (cellphone, PDA, computer, etc.) and received a tech on the other end with a heavy accent (mostly East Indian accent). It was very evident that I was dealing with someone currently living in India or Pakistan. The reason why companies are using India/Pakistan is that they have a reasonable grasp of the English language whereas China does not. Besides these low paying high tech jobs (call center help desk jobs), larger companies are also transferring their research and development to their offices in India and China (look at Nortel which is actively doing this everytime they lay off people in the world. Most of the layoffs are not happening in their offices in India and China).
Software outsourcing is an interesting subject and does impact middle class directly. Call center and R&D are two different kinds of jobs. I consider call center jobs as low skill jobs. As far as R&D jobs are concerned, US and Canada need people with high math and analytical skills. This is where the real competition is.
Most high school students in US don't have great math skills and there are very few US students that choose Math and Engg. majors. Due drop in state funding for US public universities, most universities are competing for students for their tution dollars. As a result, professors have to teach classes with the "student satisfaction" as one of the objectives.
Politicians have noticed this problem and have created an initiative to hold grade school teachers responsible with "No child left behind" as one of the initiatives. For some reason, people do not like this initiative.
Canada, perhaps due to its high taxes, does provide a lot of state funding for Canadian universities. In many ways, I think Canadian Math and Engg. education would be more challanging than its US counterpart.
The advantage that US has is its capacity to pay high salaries to attract the best brains. Even though US undergraduate education may not be a great educational value (it has a great cultural value due to NCAA events etc.), the professors in US universities are absolutely best in the world because they are the best paid in the world. This means that US will even attract the best Canadian professors by paying them best salaries. Low taxes in US also helps.
If US looses its advantage of attracting the most talanted then it will lose its economic edge. Since Canadian economy is heavily dependent on US economy, it will loose too.
In economic equilibrium sense, neither China nor India will ever have a standard of living better than US and Canada. The best they can do is to have a standard of living that is equal to that of the US and Canada. Since the current difference in standard of living is so high that the US and Canada will loose their standard of living a little bit and; China and India will gain a little bit, until an equilibrium is attained.
Most high school students in US don't have great math skills and there are very few US students that choose Math and Engg. majors. Due drop in state funding for US public universities, most universities are competing for students for their tution dollars. As a result, professors have to teach classes with the "student satisfaction" as one of the objectives.
Politicians have noticed this problem and have created an initiative to hold grade school teachers responsible with "No child left behind" as one of the initiatives. For some reason, people do not like this initiative.
Canada, perhaps due to its high taxes, does provide a lot of state funding for Canadian universities. In many ways, I think Canadian Math and Engg. education would be more challanging than its US counterpart.
The advantage that US has is its capacity to pay high salaries to attract the best brains. Even though US undergraduate education may not be a great educational value (it has a great cultural value due to NCAA events etc.), the professors in US universities are absolutely best in the world because they are the best paid in the world. This means that US will even attract the best Canadian professors by paying them best salaries. Low taxes in US also helps.
If US looses its advantage of attracting the most talanted then it will lose its economic edge. Since Canadian economy is heavily dependent on US economy, it will loose too.
In economic equilibrium sense, neither China nor India will ever have a standard of living better than US and Canada. The best they can do is to have a standard of living that is equal to that of the US and Canada. Since the current difference in standard of living is so high that the US and Canada will loose their standard of living a little bit and; China and India will gain a little bit, until an equilibrium is attained.
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New technology ?
Hello my neighbor Canadians,
The key to compete in this new world is new technology.
If Canada can produce cars with new technology like hydrogen fuel cell or hybrid with new innovations, then Canada can beat almost everybody else, including the US.
Where are the brains in Canada ?
Hello my neighbor Canadians,
The key to compete in this new world is new technology.
If Canada can produce cars with new technology like hydrogen fuel cell or hybrid with new innovations, then Canada can beat almost everybody else, including the US.
Where are the brains in Canada ?
Make the CEO's of RBC, Master Card, Visa, Sears etc call their own "help" desks any time they want something. Let's see how many jobs come back.
btyger said:Yeah, I guess everyone's had that experience. I read a survey that said India had the worst customer service in the world...
My only problem with the CS that I've had to deal with (other than the language barrier when dealing with someone with a strong Indian accent or a strong Spanish accent) was that sometimes they didn't even know the product that they were supposed to be supporting. I once called about a problem with an unlocked GSM phone and the person didn't know what an unlocked phone was. I can understand that most people probably don't know what an unlocked GSM phone is but when you are supporting the product, you should know what it is.
Imagine calling Microsoft and saying "I'm having a problem with Microsoft Access on my Vista machine" and the tech person saying "You're having a problem accessing your Vista machine, what type of operating system is it running? Did you say that the manufacturer of the PC was a company called Vista?"
There is also the time lag when you speak to the CS people so this gives you another idea that you are dealing with someone oversees (like using a single-duplex system where only one person can talk at a time) or that the company is using a very cheap VOIP solution.
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centaurus said:
True. However that trend is reversing. lots of indians heading back as the economy there booms.
As for your second point you might be surprised how many canucks and brits are now working and living in india heading up indian companies particularly in the airline and natural resources business.
Article in Gazette about China today.
Hello my neighbors,
There is an article in the Gazette today about how fast China is rising, at a dizzying pace.
When will Canada and the leaders wake up and compete with China so we won't be left behind ?
The article said skyscrappers in China are rising like mushrooms.
Hotels in Montreal are getting old. We need to build better amd more and charge less to attract more people.
Hello my neighbors,
There is an article in the Gazette today about how fast China is rising, at a dizzying pace.
When will Canada and the leaders wake up and compete with China so we won't be left behind ?
The article said skyscrappers in China are rising like mushrooms.
Hotels in Montreal are getting old. We need to build better amd more and charge less to attract more people.
New York said:
... Since when were we a "world power"?
We were never ahead of China and India as a "world power". India, maybe... but China's in the UN security council, the big Five.
I think what you meant was "economic power"... In that case, Japan is the problem. China and India are raising fast, but Japan's already there (note that Japan isn't a "world power" per-se).
Edit: Analysising the issue:
First off, I LOVE economics, politics... etc...
Well, China might be climbing fast, but there is a BIG problem with China... Loss of professionals and Communism.
Lots of chinese "brains" move to Europe and America (US/CA) causing a vaccum effect. Those people fled their country before of the poor political system they have (communism). Their laws are very rough too (not based on the British Common Wealth Laws like Canada). China will not go "too far" if they stay with Communism (it will be like 10-20 years before they reach the US level). All the bleeding-hearts who tried to "save" China's population by getting the world to see what the communist government does to its people... they cause a so-called "democratic communism" government to evolve (China isn't as "Red" as the old Soviet Union times). Once China LOSES it's Communist Government (which I don't think will happen anytime soon)... THEN they will be a problem. Now they are just catching up economically. Personally, I wouldn't worry about competing with China... we don't need to. We have the US. Canada's not going to stand up to China if something happens (it won't happen), US would.
I saw on a special on China about it's populations. The chinese has VERY diverse economies in different parts. You got the Bejing, Hong Kong... etc... which have developed PAST most US and CA cities. THEN you can the crappy country side where people live on like 5 dollars a day or something. China need to seriously WORK on stablizing the country's wealth before it threatens the US as the leading power. India on the other hand, need to surpass China and the US if they want to compete. One of the reasons the US is protecting Taiwan is because the resources Taiwan have (Taiwan is basicly a large concentration of chinese wealth).
As for the Chinese "invasion" in Canada... it's not a big deal as long as they contribute to the society (which they do). They just act "less Canadian" by refusing to learn the languages (some of them), but overall I think they benefit the economy (professionals and business owners). As long as they don't assimilate us, why the hell do we care?
To MontrealAsian:
Yeah, hiring only Chinese people IS RACIST. BUT, if they also hire Canadians who SPEAK CHINESE (which lots of Canadians are learning)... then it's not. Choose based on attribute and not RACE. I dated a Chinese girl once, she taught me chinese... a bit.
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