bostonbubble.com

john p · Joined: 10 Mar 2006 Posts: 1820

I'm concerned about massive centers being downsized in any country, it could be one are of China to another. In Boston, if you lose your job, there is another company you can apply to. I wonder if this will be true in some of these developing countries. If they pull up stakes the people that are dependent on them for their living will be in trouble and might put some political pressure on. The Middle East is a good example of how you can pump money into a place and create a cultural explosion of old school types and western types. This is the resentment that the 9/11 psychos had. That is the dangerous context we were in and we didn't play it right. The lesson from 9/11 should be not to empower unstable regions of the world. This outsourcing will not end at just the "back of house" stuff. It would be a mistake to underestimate some of these developing countries. The whole "Don't worry, we won't steal your business" business is a trap.

Boston ITer · Guest

First of all, I don't think we'd learned anything from 9/11. The lesson was simple, take stock, be grateful for what you have, and finally, be vigilant in what you do. Those are the hallmarks of a strong society. Instead, we had mass panic as if WWIII between the US-USSR had erupted (which would be a lot worse than a couple of towers), a slew of govt screwups (like giving student visas to Atta and others on pre-911 watchlists), unconstitutional laws plus McCarthyism, and hot war incursions in the middle east (unlike during the more stealth cold war with an entire '70s full of Intl terrorism i.e. Carlos).

In the years to come, the former USSR will have far more oil than the middle east as more and more of Siberia comes online but yet, due to Putinism, there'll be very little visible terrorism. Likewise, China will develop along the same lines, but with a broader economy and its system will focus on higher end IP development, manufacturing, etc and push the smaller stuff to their satellite states in Asia or Africa.

john p · Joined: 10 Mar 2006 Posts: 1820

Why wouldn't we import oil from Russia? I am sick of the Middle East.

Boston ITer · Guest

john p · Joined: 10 Mar 2006 Posts: 1820

Too bad, if Russia had their head on straight they could make some big money...

Guest · Posted: Sun Jun 17, 2007 6:40 pm GMT Post subject:

The Boston area needs a place like this

www.rtp.org

This is where the leaders of research can plan and orchestrate a method of maintaining a region's lead in core research and development activities than in hoping for some mindless mantra like "Boston's got MIT why plan a research initiative for 2030?" or how about "real estate only goes up?"

In contrast, North Carolina has the right idea and the only question is long term implementation.

Now, instead of a plan, we have a mythical faith in free market (a.k.a race to the bottom) mechanics which as you know, only leads to a combination of asset bubbles and no real jobs outside of finance-private equity/hedge funds. And unlike the NYC/Tristate region, we don't even have the hedge funds creating jobs.

Boston ITer · Guest

Guest · Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2007 1:06 am GMT Post subject:

AgentGrn · Joined: 28 Sep 2006 Posts: 82

Great ... government surplus butter in a state that is very gun-unfriendly.

Interesting times ahead, to say the least. I'm almost thankful that I don't have a full down payment ready ... just in case I do have to move.

john p · Joined: 10 Mar 2006 Posts: 1820

http://financial-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Guns+and+Butter+Curve

I'm tired of having to do research to keep up with you guys.

India Guest · Guest

Boston ITer · Guest

john p · Joined: 10 Mar 2006 Posts: 1820

I'm a bit out of my realm here, but I like to take advantage of having some smart people paying attention so here are a few questions:

Isn't the emerging market in China and India going to be a hungry economy to fuel, just to serve itself? I mean aren't the Chinese companies more concerned about having a dominant role in their own local market than to serve us? I understand that the profit margins are much higher when you're serving/exporting to a higher cost of living area, but as the dollar weakens and their market grows, do you think the focus might be to win the local markets? I'm interested to know the current state and the future trend if anyone has thoughts. It's interesting to hear that an Indian company is outsourcing to Mexico. Have margins will travel...

Boston ITer · Guest

john p · Joined: 10 Mar 2006 Posts: 1820

You know some of these countries have billions of people so I wonder if you'll find say 100 million have one strategy and another 100 million have another. I wonder if it is hard to judge what direction so many people will go. I'd imagine that there might be a prevailing direction but with so many people, it will spread out in a ton of different directions and it is a matter of what the size and shape of the economic fallout zone will be. I think it might be too broad to judge in simple terms.

I think the language and numbering barriers might continue to keep economies partitioned off to some degree. I think that although we speak different languages with many countries, many use the same numbers so at least math is the common language. I guess computer code is as well to some degree. How broad is the computer coding language and are there any major language problems?

As far as a company paying a premium to be in Boston, I wonder because we have a stable base of talent, a secure banking system, and it is a safe environment for employees, it lowers the risk factor for opening shop in a shady, corrupt, but cheap area. Does anyone have any insight about the changing risk factors in other areas?

I'm also wondering what the commercial leases are doing for office space in Boston and where we rank as far as the burn rate to pay rent versus other areas.