And we care...why?

At this point is is one of the top music sites, loved by millions. SOmehow I really doubt any of those millions will go "Oh Fuck. God, now I can't listen to Spotify any more because they cheated in the beginning. Back to 45s for me".

Now a better story would have been of Spotify used the blood of RIAA executives to perform a dark ritual that helped them get the funding they needed to make it a viable business.

And many do. Certainly I've kept up. Just recently a job was presented that required an ability to work with both COBOL/mainframe technologies and .net C/S technologies. I seriously doubt a 20 something or even a 30 something could cope or would want to (sadly).

The dollar value is not jsut in what language one writes, but on the ability to think, problem solve, organize, and that is what experience brings to the table. The ability to learn a language is nothing compared to the ability to think creatively yet stay within the parameters of a project. Sadly, Hiring Managers and companies feel the former is more important and that will cost them more in the end.

Except if one of those mediocre workers makes a mistake that causes a system shutdown, introduces a bug that costs large amounts of monetary loses, delays a project past a release date that may break contracts. A good manager would have looked at the three and helped establish plans for vacation and sick day coverage. They would also consider what if on someone leaving and work to mitigate such an occurrence. Happy people are productive people. They are also loyal people and they a quality people. I'd take those three over a low cost team any day, because you get what you pay for and that has been the case for a long long time.

I agree (as I stated to goulh above). I've also seen such situations unfold, even to the point of a company hiring back the people they let go, but now at contractor rates. Stupid.

What the hell, that does not even make sense. I've read your other posts and you really come across as a management cheering squad or one of the rugged libertarians that seem to exist outside of reality.

First, that 20 something that is replacing the 40 something is not just as competent, he's quite less competent, but management does not care. They have one objective and that is to lower costs in labor. Delaying projects, lower quality does not matter before labor costs. Even worse, that 20 something will, within two years blow off the company that trained him for another company that pays more than the crappy 3% he normally gets. Now the company is out the cost of training him, has to pay to train another, and still causes project delays.

That 40 something, with a multi year experience base in the company's business may actually be more efficient and be able to help save company costs in other ways. He or she may also be at a point in life where they want to stay long term, accept smaller raises for the ability to keep set roots. Smart managers and companies are ones that allow the chaff to move on at the beginning levels, help those that want to stay stay, and retain the senior people for both mentoring roles as well as giving them problems to solve in cost cutting that do start with "Who do we fire next?"

Get a heart, then a brain.

You talk a good talk, but almost everything you example is based on manufacturing. Seats and cushions, or trade of seats and cushions. What the OP was referring to was those jobs that produce the same "seats and cushions", but at a lower price. Software development is not manufacturing and when you start to supplant the IT workforce in your own country by one in anothers you are causing two major drags upon your own economy.

First, you put people out of work that more and more are unable to find work since their jobs have been moved. Again, we are not talking about improved productivity in moving jobs, just reducing labor costs. Now that you have these local IT workers out of a job they become a burden on the government (unemployment), the healthcare system (inability to pay), and if long term, welfare or prison. Along with that you've taken a well paid person who pays taxes and spends money into one that uses taxes and has no money to spend.

Second, even if that person gets a job, it may be for less money. Given that, it means a reduction in tax revenue directly through employment taxes and a reduction in tax revenue in reduced spending. Both hurt GDP since they are more inclined to buy imports at a cheap price (how ironic) then products made in country. Trade deficits increase which further drags the economy down for the masses.

There is a difference between moving manufacturing jobs (bad as that is, see #2) and service jobs. IT is a service industry and there's not increase in efficiency by moving jobs over seas. Actually it tends to hurt companies long term since the service returned most times in lower quality and thus it costs more to fix. H1B, as abused today, hurts the GDP, because it allows companies to negotiate labor pricing down which impacts the buying power of the american worker and many of the H1B workers shipe their income back to families overseas, meaning it is not spent locally and not helping supporting businesses thus a drag on GDP.

Finally, when jobs are moved overseas, mainly higher skilled, those people still live in this country. It is not like the person disappears. Way back when there may have been room for displaced people to move and start over, western expansion was a prime example of that transition. However today there is no new frontier and technology is pervasive so take a manufacturing job or IT job away and it creates a vacuum that cannot be filled, yet the person stays. We have serious economic unrest, because decisionmakers think like you and never factor what to do with the people left on the side of the road. As exampled by history, unless you tried to kill them off (and that never works), they eventually rise up and try to kill you (that does).

You actually get a choice? Your response kills it fo those of us who do enjoy working at home. Fewer distractions, then in an office? You must work in a monastery.

There will come a time when from an energy stand point, telecommuting or work at home will be the preferred way to save energy. That we ahve the technology today to do this is a reflection of the 19/20th century mentality of middle/upper management. Try this next time, say "I love telecommuting" and when it is offered then and only then say no thanks. If they insist then please please just say yes.

May I introduce you to their Beta site? You may like, you may not, but it is coming. You could also try this other site which has a smililar look and feel, but less...um...noise.

Choices.

Finally, a three digit ID. Strange to be starting back at zero karma. My only beef, the red. Its rather jarring to the eyes. I know they could not sue /. color scheme, but even a IBM blue would be less alerting to the eyes. Still, I think I'm going to fade over to the new neighborhood more and more and keeping saying to myself, change is good.

In the summer Olympics, Idon't think you'd be able to run Evetning all with the same horse so you make a good point overall. However in sailing, they do run the same boats, same gear though the crew (or sailor) can adjust per his/her style. In this case then they do take teh equipment out of the equation.

The problem I see with toiday's Games is that money is the driving factor. I know, an obvious statement, but still one to be made. THos with the money get the best equipment. Got $100,000 then you get the better horse then another with maybe more talent, but less lucure. Better high tech boards, bob-sledes designed by NASCAR engineers help to skew the competition.

In sports where equipment is not the main part of the action (suits for example) then everyone where the same outfit. In sports where equipment is a factor, there is a moment when teams/players have to switch equipment and play again. Jamacia gets to ride with the US sled, the US with Irans. The better team will over come equipment issues. Even with Eventing this could happen though I'd lower the jumps a little to save lives.

Back when the Olympics was about amatuer athletes was when it was worth watching. Now it just is an extension of continuiong world sport events where I watch the same professional compete agaisnt each other....boring. There is not sotry in Bodie Miller any more, Shawn White is not who I want to see in an interview. Even my own sport Eventing has been corrupted to the point where I don't care to watch it. Given the amount of corruption embedded into the Olympic machine, why do we want to support it any more.

You're comparing apples to oranges. Bridges flooding out and getting fixed in time for ski season is a different effort then then immediate issues of snow/ice covered roads and little to no DOT equipment to handle it. The NE is prepared for snow because it is always there, each winter. The last two years we went sans snow all winter. Why pay for what you don't need.

I will give props to our local DOT this round for they really did respond better and the roads are much better and more important, people did not try to drive around.

That is a dusting of snow normally on black from the freezing/thaw the night before. Folks here in the south do not normally, if ever, drive with these types of conditions. These are the people that live by "Hey, Bubba, watch this?". These are people that feel no guvmunt is going to tell them to not drive by God...thus we get carnage.

As an ex-pat northern I know better and stay safe in my home (I'd say warm, but the heat pump stops working well when the temps stay 30 for three days.). By this afternoon it will warm up enough to start the melt. Then I can drive without worrying about some DIxie Yahoo thinking he's driving at Daytona and putting a four wheel slide into the side of my car.

No. I looked it up to be sure

a coherent group of tested general propositions, commonly regarded as correct, that can be used as principles of explanation and prediction for a class of phenomena: Einstein's theory of relativity. Synonyms: principle, law, doctrine.

Creationism is not testable so it cannot be a theory. It is a good story, it is a anecdotal way to try and explain our origins, but it is not a theory. Creationism cannot explain, nor establish tests to show here. As this link mentions, you can look at the question of Cain's wife from either a literal (were did she come from other then incest) or interpretive which really cannot be tested. God wiped out humanity after the flood and from just the loins of Noah;'s son came all of humanity? Not even possible or testable. So how then can Creationism be a theory? it is a set of stories meant to interpret the origins of man (and do so poorly). We might as well say that these stories are alternative theories about the creation of man and the world.

No, creationism is not a theory. It is a belief. It is a belief based on one sect of religious belief. While many religions have a variation of the beginning of man, only one is trying to shove it down the throats of rational humans. That group cannot set up experiments to test the hypothesis, they cannot perform any test to give credence to such a supposition so creationism does not even come close to being honored with the word theory.