Global Production and Domestic Decay

As U.S. corporations continue to expand overseas and close or downsize domestic operations, American workers and their families experience repercussions ranging from relocation or early retirement to low wage re-employment or joining the ranks of the unemployed. This book examines the issues of globalization, capital flight, and corporate downsizing as contributing causes to the decay of domestic manufacturing operations in the United States. Corporate efforts to downsize manufacturing plants in the U.S. have produced the highest corporate profits since the end of the post-World War II recovery period. Furthermore, the study shows that recent domestic government policy actually encourages capital flight, championing higher corporate profits over strengthening the domestic economy. These policies have resulted in significant social costs, with growing income inequality and continued wage deterioration as an increasing number of American workers fall out of the middle class. Continued overseas expansion, closing of domestic operations, and its re-importation of products to the U.S. by the General Motors Corporation are cited as examples of the actions many manufacturers are taking in the pursuit of higher profits. The results of research into the dosing of a GM parts plant in upstate New York underscores the results of these actions on manufacturing workers and their families.