GE Moves Green Jobs To China

[marmar]

from OurFuture.org:



GE Moves Green Jobs To China
By Mike Elk

July 23, 2009 - 11:42am ET


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While Ohio is traditionally thought of once being a center of auto manufacturing, there was such a strong tradition of light-bulb production in the state that the world's largest maker of light bulbs, General Electric, located the headquarters of its light bulb division in Cleveland. The jobs provided by light-bulb manufacturing allowed people to buy homes, send their kids to college, and fuel a vibrant economy in Ohio for decades.

But in the last decade, GE has closed over fifteen factories in Ohio and downsized numerous others. Since 1980, employment in GE Lighting has dropped by 68 percent.

A large chunk of that manufacturing has gone to China, and now GE plans to send even more to China in the wake of new clean energy policies. By 2014, Americans will only be able to purchase more energy efficient CFL light bulbs. However, GE has located all of its facilities for high-efficiency light bulbs to China and has told the union representing the workers that they have no intention to locate compact flourescent facilities in the United States.

GE is currently threatening to close one factory in Niles, Ohio that produces light bulbs. The workers, members of United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers of America (UE) at one are calling on GE to look for a way to refit their plant so that they can be part of the new clean energy economy. Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown and Rep. Tim Ryan wrote a letter to GE's CEO Jeffery Immelt expressing "deep concern" for the workers at the plant. "The workers and tradition of the Niles facility present an enormous opportunity to show how we can transition manufacturers from contracting industries, like incandescent bulbs, to emerging industries in energy and medical IT." ...............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/2009073023/ge-moves-green-jobs-china

[billyoc]

1. Hopefully the workers will occupy the factory and tell GE to fuck off.

[HughBeaumont]

2. Yes, but corporations aren't the enemy of this country. No sirreeee!!

That's that good ol' "freemarketinvisiblehandpullyerselfupbythebootstraps" at work there. Personal Responsibility, people. Retrain, adapt or die. Never mind that there just may be no job when you come out of retraining for whatever it is you're retraining for (oh, that's up to YOU also to figure out what careers are going to be hot, not the business leaders or pundits. Not a problem . . .). You didn't see this coming, it's YOUR fault. NEVER blame your corporate masters for ANYTHING that happens to YOU.

Heavy . . . HEAVY :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:, as if it needs to be said.

Corporate America is batshit insane. BAT. SHIT. INSANE. Batshit insane if they think this is a sustainable future. Ship all manufacturing before new industries pop up. Awesome. SMART.

Free movement of labor resulted in swaths of once-middle-class-wage blue collar and white collar career fields and industries reduced to the worth of widget assembly and entry-level grocery clerk in 1-2 decade's time, leading presently to 15 million unemployed workers with no jobs for them to go to and no foreseeable careers for them to "retrain to".

You complete restaurant-quality DUMBASSES. You're fucking this country and you don't even care. CORPORATE DUMBASSES.

[Vinca]

3. Outsourcing greed is the root of our financial woes.

You can't support a family in this country on burger flipper wages. Manufacturing used to pay a living wage . . . but apparently if every penny isn't squeezed out as profit, the corporations aren't happy. It's obscene. They should be significantly penalized in the pocketbook so we'll have money available for retraining and health care.

[PVnRT]

4. They're closing their glass plant in Lexington, KY

Why? Because of the legislation mandating the use of CFLs.

Of course, they can't do something like, I don't know, retool the plant to make the glass tubes that CFLs require or anything.

[pampango]

6. Exactly. GE decides it can't make a go of it in Ohio, but its current China-based supplier of CFL

bulbs is shifting production to Ohio partly to tap the experience of GE's ex-workers.

"Ohio could indeed be a hub of new light bulb production. Recently, a Chinese-owned manufacturer of high-efficiency light bulbs has opened a factory, citing Ohio as having some of the world's most highly skilled light-bulb workers.

Ohio's legacy of bulb production, and its factories that could easily be converted from incandescent production to CFL production, presents a grand opportunity to employ workers in building a green energy economy in Ohio. "

The irony is that the Chinese manufacturer (TCP) that has been producing GE's CFL bulbs (and is the largest producer of CFL bulbs sold in the US) is moving production to northern Ohio. "Company CEO Ellis Yan says it will likely cost 20-30 cents more per CFL bulb to produce them in Cleveland versus China, but that the cost can be managed given that the retail price of such bulbs is generally more than $3.00 and that TCP will be closer to eventual US customers." The fact that GE's management can't figure this out says volumes about them.

http://www.scdigest.com/ASSETS/ON_TARGET/09-07-06-1.PHP?cid=2559&ctype=content

"That will mean more personnel, too, Yan said. He intends to increase the domestic manufacturing sector, for one thing, assembling fluorescent ceiling light fixtures to meet demand. "We get an order and ship the products within 72 hours," he said. "You can't do that with all your manufacturing overseas."

http://blog.cleveland.com/business/2007/09/tcp_inc_growing_in_many_ways.html

[PVnRT]

7. I imagine, though, that the Chinese company

is more anti-union and pays less.

[pampango]

8. Sounds like working conditions there might be OK, but you're probably right

about wages and anti-union sentiment. (I didn't see any mention of either in any of the articles.) At least they are locating in a "union-friendly" area of the country.

"TCP offers some attractive amenities, including a nicely equipped aerobic workout space and a weight room for employees. Yan, a health enthusiast who runs three to six miles most days (including when he's in Shanghai), insisted on the fitness rooms."

[fasttense]

5. Until Obama does something about NAFTA and all those other

nifty little give aways to corporate America, all the green jobs will be going overseas, or maybe Mexico.