Now here are some quick thoughts.
- Chongqing is incredible and very different. It is built in a hilly/mountainous terrain so there is green space between the urban areas.
- 20+ story apartment buildings are everywhere and they are actively building probably another 50+ based on the cranes that are everywhere I have driven.
- There are huge variations from high tech, fashion oriented, wealthy, modern to traditional, poor and ram shackle.
- The picture of the woman brooming along the street is a common occurrence. The plants and trees near the highways are beautifully landscaped. Imagine driving along 494, 55, etc and there is some person with a broom and dust pan walking along the street about every 2 miles.
- Then the construction sites vary from modern equipment, to large groups of people out there with hand tools. Huge modern cranes right next to bamboo scaffolding...
Maybe we could give all the welfare recipients and the unemployed orange suits, brooms and dust pans.... It would definitely reduce the unemployment rate... Thoughts?
China's slave labor economy based model wouldn't work very well in the United States.
ReplyDelete--Hiram
Slave labor? These folks are paid and they get the flashy orange uniform.
ReplyDeleteAnd in the USA we are working hard and being forced to pay taxes to pay them for doing nothing... Now who is the "slave" in the USA?
Just think we could give them all a broom and dust pan, and pay them a wage. Then it would be their choice to work or go hungry. No "slavery" involved, just a free will choice.
Given the choices, I am pretty sure many would look harder for a different job. (ie option 3)
Orange uniforms? Is orange the new black for them?
ReplyDeleteOne of the really nice things about walking down the streets of Minneapolis is the lack of netting on buildings. Here, there is much less concern than there is in China, that passersby, will be injured by falling workers.
--Hiram
Bring back the WPA!
ReplyDeleteWiki WPA
ReplyDeleteIt looks like WPA produced "capital / structural" improvements. This would be more of an on going expense with short term benefits like welfare itself.
Now Hiram you are paying these people, what do have against asking them to do something of value for the money you are being forced to give them?
Of the thousands and thousands of high rise buildings I have seen, none of them have nets to catch the mentally unstable. And overall the people seem almost more happy than the typical Americans I know.
ReplyDeleteHow many suicides, attempted suicides and crimes occur in St Paul per year? Remember that the FoxConn complex you are alluding to has about the same number of people in it as St Paul. I am pretty sure FoxConns stats are far better than St Paul.
And people go their freely to work because things are better there than the other options available. No one forces them to be there...
You are letting your American is better bias show.
If we're going to have government pay people to do stuff, why not pay them to do stuff with long-term benefit?
ReplyDeleteWhat would you have this likely untrained labor pool do?
ReplyDeleteBesides we are funding stadiums, roads, bridges, light rail, bike paths, etc already.
ReplyDeleteMuch of which has agressive minority employee/owner reqts already.
Obviously, there would be some limits in terms of construction. But they certainly could do things like painting or basic landscaping at public facilities. Or it could be used as a chance to train work in some of those trades.
ReplyDeletePositively MN
ReplyDeleteMpls Employment and Trg
Central MN Jobs Trg
MN Unemployed Trg and Education
Fed On Job Trg
MN HHS Trg
Hennepin Employment Resources
ODC MN
It seems there is no shortage of work to learn programs in MN. In fact my Ethiopian buddy took advantage of one of them, and all the free education opportunities that are available for poor minorities when he immigrated from Ethiopia at 19. ~9 years later he speaks great English, has a BS ME from U of MN and a good job.
ReplyDeleteThe question is how do we get more of the poor and unfortunate to make the sacrifices my friend chose to make. He lived cheap, worked hard, pursued all the benefits he could and focused on his future.
By the way, as I drove home from the airport to Plymouth, I noticed that our medians and shoulders are more polluted than those of the roads in China. It seems we could use those folks out there keeping America beautiful.
ReplyDelete