Foxconn jobs shrinking by the day, but the costs remain huge

I have to give credit to the Racine Journal-Times for continuing to get real information on the developments at Foxconn. Instead of taking after the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, and being uncritical cheerleaders for this scam, the Journal-Times has provided content and details that continue to reveal this “game-changer” is even more of a fraudulent ripoff than when this boondoggle was jammed through the Legislature less than a year ago.

Michael Burke of the Journal-Times was able to interview Foxconn executive Louis Woo in a report that ran Wednesday, and it was the latest confirmation that the Fox-con isn’t going to lead to the large-scale, large-screen factory that we were told it was supposed to be.

Woo said Foxconn has dramatically changed its initial presumptions about how it would manufacture in the United States. Originally the company figured it would simply duplicate its China model here — until it realized that the much higher labor costs here would guarantee failure.

“If, six months ago, you asked me: What would be the mix of labor? I would pull out the experience that we have in China and say, ‘Well, 75 percent assembly line workers, 25 percent engineers and managers,’ ” Woo said.

“So, ask me the question today,” he said, then replied, “now it looks like about 10 percent assembly line workers, 90 percent knowledge workers.” Advanced manufacturing here will be done largely by robots and a lot of automation, he said.

Thank you, Mr. Foxconn?

So much for the “major manufacturing plant” that we were told Foxconn would be. Oh, but Mr. Woo insists the jobs that do stay will be high-tech, so that’s better right?

…Woo added: “Mainly, we will certainly need to take advantage of the talent pool in the U.S. Do a lot more research and development (that it does in China), looking into future technologies.”

Woo clarified that when he mentioned 10 percent assembly line workers, those people will operate the robots and tell them what to do. He said he has to look more closely into what those jobs will pay but said: “Normally we will pay a lot more than minimum wage even for the … relatively low-skill-set workers.”

Oh, a lot more than minimum wage? Like the $14.50 an hour you need to pay to get the full 17% tax break on those jobs? BREAK OUT THE PARTY HATS, FOLKS!

And don’t worry, even though Mr. Woo claims that only 2,000 people will be working at Foxconn by the end of 2019, and that production of the LCD displays won’t start till 2020, and that robots will be doing a lot of the work, he’ll still have 13,000 people working in Racine County within 5 years. You betcha!

You know, just like how Scott Walker claimed in August, 2013 that Wisconsin would still add 250,000 private-sector jobs in his first term. We didn’t even come close, although we MIGHT hit that as we near the end of Walker’s second term…with the key word being “might”.

“But Jake, I heard an ad from a Realtors front group that claims Foxconn only gets paid for the jobs they create, so it isn’t too costly if there’s less people working, right?”

WRONG, because here’s what the right-wing Realtors leave out of that ad.

1. Foxconn gets 15% back on every dollar that they put in to build the plant, up to $9 billion. That’s true no matter how many jobs they add there (as long as they hit the minimums for that year).

2. $252 million was borrowed to speed up work on I-94 South with the idea that Foxconn would be going in, and Walker’s DOT sent $134 million down to the Foxconnsin region to upgrade numerous two-lane state highways and local roads, while taking away $90 million for similar road projects in the rest of the state.

3. Don't forget the hundreds of millions of dollars in local subsidies, infrastructure and other taxpayer-funded improvements were taken out with the idea that Foxconn would bring a massive amount of jobs. With fewer jobs comes fewer people that need to move into the area, and less need to do more building and spinoff businesses. Which means the local taxpayers in Racine County (and especially the Village of Mount Pleasant) are on the hook for a helluva lot in the coming years, for something that won’t come close to paying back the tax-funded investments that were made.

Look, people like Louis Woo and Scott Walker lie and spin for their living. People like them think that rubes outside of their inner circle will go along with anything they try to sell as long as they can be convinced some pot of gold is lurking around the corner (which Walker and Woo know will never exist).

These guys need to be cut off of their welfare program ASAP, before their grifts handcuff us even more.