OT:Shooting Ourselves in the Foot

The good ones will improve themselves anyway.

The bad ones will never be any good.

Knowledge should never be hoarded. Experience cannot be given away, only /experiences/.

Back in my high school days it was common for students to help each other out; if a classmate didn't understand something, I was happy to explain it, and I found that others were glad to return the favor.

When I went to college, I realized that I was competing with people who were very, very smart, and it made me wonder whether I was doing myself harm by sharing knowledge with others. I gave this a lot of thought early in my freshman year, and finally came to the conclusion that if the only way I could successfully navigate college was to withold information from others, I'd rather sell shoes.

It's been about 35 years since I made that decision, and I've never regretted it--in school, on the job, or on Usenet.

Of course, I still draw the line at designing other people's traffic light controllers.

Bob Perlman Cambrian Design Works

Is it our destiny to be rich and well fed, while the rest of the world stays poor and hungry? Must we always be the elite? Is the world economy a zero-sum game, where we want 90% of the winnings?

John

sooner or later the system will reach balance.. we will all earn less... and therefore eat less Big Macs.. so weigh less... then we will all get paid less too and spend less ...

Simon

and

But we are talking about human. Mostly nonlinear, illogical and insatiable. With improved transportation and communication systems we are getting (a little bit) closer to a balance. But will never reach.

Eastern cultures are generally more fatalist(I do not know this word describes what i mean), more contented with what they have.Unless you awake them by an atomic bomb.

yusuf

Actually it costs them frequently that much less to live in a reduced life style in their locale, so western wages are not demanded. That however changes as soon as the region becomes westernized, and lifestyle changes occur that they frequently are striving for by following the western/american/european dream.

Examples are that most of russia has a very low standard of living left over from cold war era ... but I understand Moscow is now nearly as expensive as any other westernized city.

Even in the US, with the median mortgage well over a half million $$s in silicon valley we find good professionals rapidly going broke and leaving the area for lower paying jobs in the midwest, and suddenly being able to afford a

Compare that to a $250,000 home in east Palo Alto or Oakland.

There will be no balance.

Europe is declining. Africa and the Middle East will never go anywhere. The US is starting a European style decline, derived from liberal self loathing and guilt.

Japan has show its weakness of character, and complete lack of creativity in solving its money problems the last decade. I wonder if there is a single original idea in China. Russia is overrun with corruption.

India - well, I don't know much about India.

Call me an optimist. Maybe we can have a renaissance in the west. I hope so.

East bay "budget starter home"

and a few miles away:

What's so bad about taking a 40% pay cut, and moving?

And we might also consider where a large part of that precious knowledge originated. Our numerical system came from India. Wherever we look, we are likely to see the Chinese did it first.

If you're an optimist then the pessimists must have all died....

Phil

If you decide to not share information with people beause you're afraid they're going to use that information to compete with you then you might just as well shut down all the schools too (K through University). After all, you wouldn't want all those youngsters growing up and potentially competing for your job, would you?

As far as wages go: yes, the disparity is a problem. We in the US (and Europe) have environmental, labor laws, etc. that we must comply with whereas in many of the other places you mention they don't. Hopefully, though, as people's standard of living rises in those other places they will also be able to afford to desire a cleaner environment and safer workplaces. In the meantime until wages rise in India/China/Eastern Europe (and lots of other places around the world that have decided to actually educate their people) we in the US will likely need to learn to live with less. A falling standard of living, which to some extent we're already seeing (corporations defaulting on pension obligations, less people with health insurance, lower 'real' wages, record debt). The current US administration seems to be obsessed with investing in military adventures, while places like India have decided to invest in educating their people - which investment do you think will pay off better in 20 years? It's all a matter of priorities.

Phil

An optimist believes this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist fears he may be correct.

Cheers

PeteS

All this discussion of Eastern competition and no mention of capitalism. It's what the capitalist system always does, always SAYS it does. It will always chase the cheapest workforce and the cheapest supplies, like it did in Northern England and South Wales in the 1800s, the sweatshops of New York in the 1880s, Japan and Hong Kong on the 1950s and 60s, Korea in the 80s, Malaysia, India, China.. it just sloshes about. Two choices: think up another system or stop whinging.

Paul Burke

In article , HoustonEngineer writes

Interesting mix. The groupings I would have thought should be Indian/Chinese/Japanese US/Europe (east and west)

The innovations have come from all over. Just because there is a good business climate for high tech in California does not mean the things developed and produced there are necessarily invented there.

Who is they? If you mean the Indians, Chinese and Taiwanese the answer is : was yes, is yes and no in that order. Salaries in India are I believe rising and they are being under cut by China.

Who is "our" this is an international NG. The experience global. Perhaps it is just that the Indian students are smarter and realise there is much experience on this NG and hang out here. US student could too.

No. Many of the questions are answered by Eastern Europeans as well. I know of several tools that are developed in Eastern Europe. They some very good people. The Eastern Europeans have some of the best mathematical and computing brains on the planet.

who is "ourselves"?

It is an interesting question. Part of the answer is to certify or license engineers the same as in other professions. IE like the PE in the US and other countries and the C.Eng in the UK and Eur. Ing in Europe.

This means like Doctors, architects civil engineers there is a minimum standard for embedded Engineers. IT also means the salary will stabilise at a reasonable rate and be less effected by sweat shops and unqualified people.

There are similar qualifications for technicians. This will help remove the unqualified and raise the standard of the profession in general. The problem is that there will be losers in the west as well. There are probably as many unqualified hackers here as there.

However it will improve the situation globally.

Why do you think that?

Why do you think that?

Giggle.

As opposed to the U.S. ruling (Repulbican) party which is sea-green incorruptible, so much so that even your courts have noticed.

Your ignorance is more extensive than you think.

I'd call you pompous twit. We had a renaissance in the west some six hundred years ago. It's still running - rather bumpily, and better in some areas than others - but we still keep on doing better in one area after another.

Careful how you say this - remember, our (US) current government is running out of ideas on how to convince people we are "winning" a "war".

It is no secrete that the US, both the mass populace and the government administrations put far too little emphasis on education and this is causing a declining society. There is no way that as a society that the people will be able to compete with anybody when they have the highest illiteracy rate of the industrialized world.

I grew up near a major city that has one of the highest crime rates, highest poverty rates, very low coverage of health care, some of the worst schools in the nation but yet the city spends billions per year on constructing new sports stadiums and entertainment districts.

Another thing that is absolutely amazing to me that so many people in the US are without health care coverage, yet nothing is being done about it. By no means do I believe in giving a handout to the able bodied who are just too lazy to get off their butts, but there are still certain basic things that should be available to those who need it and can't afford it.

These are just two examples of the priority problems in a society where a D- student can make a fortune running around with a damned ball but the honor student who studies hard can earn a median salary that is barely livable. As far as passing on knowledge, become a teacher and you will earn a salary that is almost poverty level.

The US, both its people and its government need a serious change in priorities and in attitude.

They're all moving to Arizona and driving the prices up :-(

...Jim Thompson

It's all about market. Do you go to the ball games? I don't. If no one attended the games guess what the salaries would be.

...Jim Thompson