Re: OT:Re: Oh, this is so microsoftish ...

From: Tim X <timx_at_spamto.devnul.com>
Date: 27 May 2003 19:37:12 +1000
Message-ID: <87llwsn31z.fsf@tiger.rapttech.com.au>

>>>>> "Nuno" == Nuno Souto <wizofoz2k_at_yahoo.com.au> writes:

 Nuno> "Jim Kennedy" <kennedy-down_with_spammers_at_attbi.com> wrote in
 Nuno> message
 Nuno> news:<DKpAa.467413$Si4.404905_at_rwcrnsc51.ops.asp.att.net>...

>> On a Off topic note Nike is moving some of their manufacturing
>> back to the USA. They find that they can be more nimble here and
>> save a significant amount of money. (and still pay US wages).

 Nuno> Yeah,yeah.  I have not a single doubt at the first opportunity
 Nuno> they'll do it all over again.  What happened is they got so
 Nuno> much bad PR for what they did in Indonesia they simply had to
 Nuno> change, whatever the cost.

 Nuno> As I said: these things have a hidden cost.  It's a pity that
 Nuno> myopic senior management accepts on-the-fly spreadsheets with
 Nuno> nice graphics as enough justification to go ahead with this

 Nuno> sort of thing. Without once considering the TOTAL cost of such  Nuno> measures. Or auditing the nice graphics.

 Nuno> Apologies for the OT content, but quite frankly my level of
 Nuno> tolerance for this sort of crap has gone way below zero
 Nuno> nowadays.  I dont' for a second consider that somehow companies
 Nuno> like this have "seen the light".  They'll do it again if given
 Nuno> even one chance.  Wait until China opens its doors.

 Nuno> The whole thing is beyond contempt.  Two centuries ago everyone

 Nuno> called it slave trading. Nowadays they call it economic  Nuno> rationalism and globalisation. Change the flies, same s**t.

Yes, there was some interesting talks given by some academics from ANU who were arguing that we need to move away from using standard GDP/GNP measures for measuring economic growth and profitability at the national level because they fail to take into account issues relating to standards of living, environmental and human costs. Although I can't see it happening, it would be nice if other issues apart from share prices and company profit were taken into consideration just a little bit and there was some measure of long term management success, not just short term.

Maybe the management wage should be set to some multiple of the lowest wage paid by a company and payouts based on long term profitability so that management would consider the long term impacts and not just the impact while they are in the position of responsability.

Enough off-topic for me today! Thanks for the indulgence.

Tim

-- 
Tim Cross
The e-mail address on this message is FALSE (obviously!). My real e-mail is
to a company in Australia called rapttech and my login is tcross - if you 
really need to send mail, you should be able to work it out!

Received on Tue May 27 2003 - 04:37:12 CDT