All true, and my employer exhorts it. Unfortunately, I can attest that some (stress some) managers are incapable of generating the interest or concern to actually review and employees performance relative to their job. It means you actually have to do some research and go to the point of activity to know what is average and above average, otherwise it becomes a bragging society, which is a pretty standard way business work. Just MHO.

Again, I am not against the free exchange of workers and employers, I just do not think the government should be manipulated into encouraging it. It creates an artificial environment as well as a disposable ethic that reduces the relationship between worker and employer. There has to be some trust between the two. It also encourages lazy and craoppy management. Why fix your broken process when you can hire a cheapo dude to keep pounding it? Management rarely tries to cut costs through process improvement, I have had personal experience in trying to bring that idea forward. That is why Lean 6 Sigma is a hot area to get certified in, as companies just want to hire a consultant to come give answers they could find for themselves.

Not a matter of time, but of ability and dedication. An employee should be evaluated based not on time put in, but of quality of effort. An employee who puts out good work is always an asset and should be treated as such by an astute employer. Then, the next consideration is loyalty. Hiring and training a newbie is costly and in many cases takes 6 months to 2 years depending on the complexity of the job. If quality of performance is not an issue, then quality of output is in question.

You could ask "how many" about home grown workers as well. Generally speaking people form Asia and India in particular have more drive and ambition to better themselves. They want to up the number of visas to have a larger pool of qualified workers.

As free people we should be help to hire anyone we wish from anywhere in the world that we believe will do the job well. Would you deny this?

Hank Rearden would do whatever was best for his business, for producing the values he wished to produce and would do so without over concern over whether a work had been with him a long time or not. As would be correct. An employee is selling his/her talent on a time basis for a fixed price (modulo stock options etc). If the employer can get the same or better talent for less + the cost of the change then rationally they should consider it. However the entire premise of the OP is wrong.

Wow! We go through the feet thing regulalry, we have one Appy mare who constantly gets abscesses even when she has not even been on rough ground or anything. We have gotten real good at poultices, wraps and getting them to break,, luckily have not had one in a couple months now...

I shod horses in a former life. . whatta fun thing! . one
thought that I was a stool and sat on me. . one had
foundered front feet and was a real challenge. . one
mare was the smartest of the bunch, and had perfect
feet ....... farrier in my spare time, and midnight feeder,
caretaker and icebreaker! -- j
.

Oh, I agree William, my point is this has grown over many, many ages. Going back to Standard Oil and monopoly/antitrust law. It has just kept getting fed by more and more special interests. That is why the law is basically an insane mess, with contradictions, vagueness and outright special rules for special people. It would be a mess to untangle and a mess to continue.

One way of addressing the issue.

I question whether the free market is the same free market we used to speak of. There is so much government interference, designed to make the free market pay tribute to get what they want, that it is a spinning dervish that feeds upon itself, and technology and communications has just increased the speed. Were it a purely free market, we would not have CEOs who blatantly fail, get kicked out with millions of dollars in parachute silk, at the cost to the shareholders and customers (like Home Depot). There are way to many wandering souls who hitch themselves to companies, and then move on in an endless cycle upping their "value".

Keyword: Some. How many? I have seen the issue up close and I can tell you the success rate is not that large, and then the ones that do fail wander away to join the other non documented crowd. Then they just order in another shipment, and cull the herd. Why do you think they keep wanting to up the number of visas? Not because we are in some kind of boom economy.

Bravo for them; we need that type of person here. I am merely attempting to indicate which way I think the default should be set.

Jan

Bravo for them; we need that type of person here. I am merely attempting to indicate which way I think the default should be set.

Jan

It's called the free market. One of the ways you find out how things should be done is some idiot screws up, damages or destroys his company and you learn from it.

I do think that modern business is too short sighted. I'm not sure what to do about that. The only solution I have is in the area of tax policy -- which is certainly not an objectivist approach!

I would suggest that the holding period for long term capital gains be raised to 5 years. That would make people think longer term than the next quarter.

If the solution to government interference in the marketplace is government interference in free speech and who one can voluntarily support I'd suggest we look for a better answer.

You don't get more freedom by accepting less.

The way we worked things was when business was booming and we were expanding, we had certain employees who had greater responsibilities than others. We put them on a salary plus bonus set-up. When business declined we were happy to note that the references and teaching we had given them got them good jobs elsewhere.

Unfortunately my wife has 6 horses, so I am condemned to work forever. We also have a large ranch property to sell and it is barely at the break even point. So off I go...

Also, look at the plane that ripped it's tail off in SF. They had no idea how to really land it, they had been trained to rely on the autopilot, and when presented with a real issue, flew it into the ground.

In all kinds of ways. Remember the Taiwanese plane that crashed because when an engine failed, they cut the remaining good one? Lack of training and skill and experience, the lowest common denominator.

I also agree with that, but I also see totally uninformed managers making crazy decisions in order to answer the call to cut costs, and this seems so applicable. I have also seen it in action, and I can testify that it ends up with brute force engineering being applied. These guys bring very little to the table but a gegree and some knowledge. There are a few bright lightbulbs, but not a lot. I have had to work with them, and they can be told "you can do this this way because" and a day later they do it again.

I agree, the slave part is just a reference to trying to buy the same level of expertise by finding them in another country. I do not believe that we have any shortage here, I think this is a manipulation, and the story is being strategically spread to ensure the policy does not arouse huge response. Business wants to cut costs, and I believe you will find a lot of campaign money tied up in all this.

It isn't as bad as slaves. The government interference is all over the place, not just in immigration politics. We have a mixed economy part free and part statist, with the politics becoming worse. It hasn't stopped highly motivated people from living and growing, but success is not the default position -- it takes effort and the freedom to do it -- and even the possibility is diminished as the scope and intensity of force by government interference becomes worse. Along with the mixed economy, success is also more mixed: some people succeed better than others while some are squashed because the effects of government force are not uniform across the population. It depends on what and who they go after, consciously or not.

There have always been companies, mostly large corporations, which are so political that they treat employees badly or which because of financial circumstances can't do better what they would like to. You go into engineering (or anything else) because that is what you want to do, and then find (or perhaps ultimately create) a company to work for. Nothing lasts forever and you probably have to change companies along the way, learning to be wary of the biggest ones and other pitfalls. None of this is new and it didn't start with immigration politics.

Yes there are laws about this, But a lot of company's get round them, especially the low budget ones

and we are having such fun in retirement! . no clock
to punch, and fewer a$$es to kiss. . if I am tired, I can
go and take a nap. . if I want, I can go for a walk, or
sit and throw things at the tv news in the afternoon,
or take my sexy wife out for lunch. . it's Wonderful !!! -- j
.