Reich

The main concept that Reich is trying to portray is that the wage gap between the classes in the United States is becoming even larger. He examines three classes of people and how they are being affected. The producing class is losing their jobs because companies are moving the jobs overseas, where the same work can be done for a lot less money. He said, “Routine producers in the United States, then, are in direct competition with millions of routine producers in other nations” (paragraph 4). The in-person servers class relies on the producers to make a living. If the producers do not have any income, they do not have money to spend on what the servers are selling. The lack of business can cause the servers to lose their jobs as well. The third class, the symbolic analysts, are gaining wealth, while others are losing it. The analysts are selling their knowledge and experience to corporations all over the world.

Reich’s piece is not new information to us. The separation between the classes has been widening for years. He mentioned that the producing class is losing their jobs because of outsourcing. This is still true today and many Americans are still shocked about it. Companies are going to do what they have to, to stay in business. Looking at car production is a good example. Foreign car companies can make the cars cheaper than domestic companies, like Ford and General Motors can. There are car factories by my hometown and there are always stories in the news about more layoffs being expected. The workers were laid off because the cars could be produced cheaper in Asia. Many of the workers had worked there since high school and the factory life is all they know. It is going to be difficult for them to find other, decent paying jobs. The layoffs also affect local businesses that depend on the factory workers to spend their money in stores and restaurants. What is happening is that the world is moving away from having many market economies to being one global economy. The globalization process is causing countries, mainly the ones that have been industrialized for decades, to lose power. Countries, like Hong Kong and China, are expanding their economies. Reich said in paragraph 11, “The shift of routine production jobs from advanced to developing nations is a great boom to many workers in such nations who otherwise would be jobless or working for much lower wages.” The globalization process can help third world countries attract businesses causing their economy to be stronger but complete globalization can be harmful. If the world’s largest economies become too intertwined, it would only take one of them to fall to bring the rest down. Americans losing jobs to foreign countries maybe bad for them, but the benefits for the other countries need to be looked at. Companies move their jobs overseas to save money, which ultimately saves the consumer money. A factory worker in China would be paid, for the day, less than a factory worker, here would be paid hourly. These factory workers also do not have the opportunity to receive an education, unlike most people here. These jobs give others around the world the chance to earn a living, but at the American workers expense. Maybe outsourcing should be taken as a sign that industrialized countries need to have more jobs that require a higher education and let the countries that can produce cheaply do so. Doing so would allow both countries to benefit.

Reich’s ideas present the problem of the class gap but he does not offer a viable solution. I would have enjoyed the piece more if he had offered a way to correct the problem. The piece was interesting however, I felt that it started to be repetitive and lost my attention. He used many examples to prove his points. The examples were helpful but there were too many. Some companies were receiving tax breaks for moving their jobs overseas and that needs to stop. American companies need to be given incentives to keep their operations here and not to take them to other countries. There are many people to blame for the gap between classes. Our time would be better spent trying to fix the problem than finding people to blame.