"Unanswered is whether foreign acquisition prevents those firms and jobs from disappearing entirely."

Does that matter expect to speculate that we would be even worse off? If my net income is zero, and my expenditures put me in the red then I suppose I could be greatful that at least revenue wasn't declining but I'd still be in the red and losing money.

Counting a wash the same as a gain is nothing more than whitewash.

I am 110% in favor of global trade and I think outsourcing is a godo thing for the US economy in the long run. That being said, people employed abroad in order to manufacture/sell products in foreign markets are generally not included when the average person thinks of "outsourcing". "Outsourcing" is generally meant to be people employed abroad in order to serve the home country, not the country they are employed in. If MegaSuperCorp's sales office in Bombay, selling MegaSuperCorp's products to Indian consumers, would generally not be considered "outsourcing". MegaSuperCorp's call center in Bangalore used to handle support calls from American consumers, on the other hand, would be.

I'm an insourcer.

I'm a marketing consultant in Chicago who's providing support for an East African telecoms venture. Funded with South African & Middle Eastern (Arab) capital, built with East Asian manufactued equipment (primarily), skilled staffing by Indian infotech support personnel, local stafing for purchasing and sales and adminsitrative, the venture leader and myself are the only Americans invovled.

I'm working at a discounted rate, but my salary is still greater than that paid to everyone working for us in Africa (two dozen people and rising fast) combined. And we've spent a large amount of $$$ in the US for creative services.

But because we don't export any physical goods we have no contact with the Commerce Dept. We just don't exist in a way that would show up in their surveys. All we move out of the US is information and management expertise, and all that comes back is money.

(The IRS sure knows about us though!)

I wonder how much insourcing is being missed like us?

Please catch Adam's point above. Honda's building of Accords in Ohio for the American market is not insourcing. (To the extent that they're *exporting* American-made Accords, that would be.)

Of course, Ohioans are happy to be building Accords in any case (and to the same extent Honda's Honshu employees are sad).

I'm under the impression the continued existence of American factories is due to domestic content requirements. So Honda, Toyota, et al. must have some production here in order to sell here. Not a stunning victory for free trade, if so.

Not that I'm necessarily for or against domestic content requirements -- just pointing out that the insourcing may not be due to globalization but rather (in this case) good old fashioned protectionism.

Foreign auto plants a result of free trade/globilization? Were trade restrictions placed by President Reagen responsible for this foreign presence on american soil? Care to comment on this article?
http://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2003/Nyefreetrade.html

PS How's my grammer?

The content requirements referred to above ar labelling requirement, not trade restrictions.

I live in central Ohio, about 30 mi from the Honda Plant and I own 2 Accords a 2002 and a 2003. The 2002 was 95% North american content the 2003 was 65% I think that the reason for the discrepancy was that the new 5 speed automatic in the 2003 was not then being manufactured in the US.

Honda established their plants here for at least two solid business reasons. First to be closer to the customers in their biggest market. Second to limit their exposurer to dollar yen fluctuations.

As to the first, although the Accord is a world wide brand name the same car is not sold under the same lables and with the same equipment in all maekets. The Accord sedan in Europe and Japan is not sold as such in the US. A fully optioned out version is sold as the Accura TSX in the US. The Accura brand is not sold in Erope or Japan so the Accura TL (Which is a kitted out version of the US Accord sedan) is sold as the Honda Legend sedan in those markets.

Cars like the Camry and the Accord (US) which are very popular in the united states do not sell well elsewhere. SUVs seem unlikely to catch on in Europe. Manufactures who wish to compete in a global market must design and manufacture in a global market. GM and Ford have been doing it for years. Honda was the first japanese based company to do so.