Corporate profits are up. Stock prices are up. So why isn't anyone hiring?

Actually, many American companies are — just maybe not in your town. They're hiring overseas, where sales are surging and the pipeline of orders is fat.

More than half of the 15,000 people that Caterpillar Inc. has hired this year were outside the U.S. UPS is also hiring at a faster clip overseas. For both companies, sales in international markets are growing at least twice as fast as domestically.

The trend helps explain why unemployment remains high in the United States, edging up to 9.8 percent last month, even though companies are performing well: All but 4 percent of the top 500 U.S. corporations reported profits this year, and the stock market is close to its highest point since the 2008 financial meltdown.

But the jobs are going elsewhere. The Economic Policy Institute, a Washington think tank, says American companies have created 1.4 million jobs overseas this year, compared with less than 1 million in the U.S. The additional 1.4 million jobs would have lowered the U.S. unemployment rate to 8.9 percent, says Robert Scott, the institute's senior international economist.

"There's a huge difference between what is good for American companies versus what is good for the American economy," says Scott.

American jobs have been moving overseas for more than two decades. In recent years, though, those jobs have become more sophisticated — think semiconductors and software, not toys and clothes.

And now many of the products being made overseas aren't coming back to the United States. Demand has grown dramatically this year in emerging markets like India, China and Brazil.

Meanwhile, consumer demand in the U.S. has been subdued. Despite a strong holiday shopping season, Americans are still spending 3 percent less than before the recession on essential items like clothing and more than 10 percent less on jewelry, furniture, electronics, and big appliances, according to MasterCard's SpendingPulse.

"Companies will go where there are fast-growing markets and big profits," says Jeffrey Sachs, globalization expert and economist at Columbia University. "What's changed is that companies today are getting top talent in emerging economies, and the U.S. has to really watch out."


With the future looking brighter overseas, companies are building there, too. Caterpillar, maker of the signature yellow bulldozers and tractors, has invested in three new plants in China in just the last two months to design and manufacture equipment. The decision is based on demand: Asia-Pacific sales soared 38 percent in the first nine months of the year, compared with 16 percent in the U.S. Caterpillar stock is up 65 percent this year.

"There is a shift in economic power that's going on and will continue. China just became the world's second-largest economy," says David Wyss, chief economist at Standard & Poor's, who notes that half of the revenue for companies in the S&P 500 in the last couple of years has come from outside the U.S.

Take the example of DuPont, which wowed the world in 1938 with nylon stockings. Known as one of the most innovative American companies of the 20th century, DuPont now sells less than a third of its products in the U.S. In the first nine months of this year, sales to the Asia-Pacific region grew 50 percent, triple the U.S. rate. Its stock is up 47 percent this year.

DuPont's work force reflects the shift in its growth: In a presentation on emerging markets, the company said its number of employees in the U.S. shrank by 9 percent between January 2005 and October 2009. In the same period, its work force grew 54 percent in the Asia-Pacific countries.

"We are a global player out to succeed in any geography where we participate in," says Thomas M. Connelly, chief innovation officer at DuPont. "We want our resources close to where our customers are, to tailor products to their needs."

While most of DuPont's research labs are still stateside, Connelly says he's impressed with the company's overseas talent. The company opened a large research facility in Hyderabad, India, in 2008.

Rising middle class
A key factor behind this runaway international growth is the rise of the middle class in these emerging countries. By 2015, for the first time, the number of consumers in Asia's middle class will equal those in Europe and North America combined.

"All of the growth over the next 10 years is happening in Asia," says Homi Kharas, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute and formerly the World Bank's chief economist for East Asia and the Pacific.

Coca-Cola CEO Muhtar Kent often points out that a billion consumers will enter the middle class during the coming decade, mostly in Africa, China and India. He is aggressively targeting those markets. Of Coke's 93,000 global employees, less than 13 percent were in the U.S. in 2009, down from 19 percent five years ago.

The company would not say how many new U.S. hires it has made in 2010. But its latest new investments are overseas, including $240 million for three bottling plants in Inner Mongolia as part of a three-year, $2 billion investment in China. The three plants will create 2,000 new jobs in the area. In September, Coca-Cola pledged $1 billion to the Philippines over five years.

The strategy isn't restricted to just the largest American companies. Entrepreneurs, whether in technology, retail or in manufacturing, today hire globally from the start.

Consider Vast.com, which powers the search engines of sites like Yahoo Travel and Aol Autos. The company was founded in 2005 with employees based in San Francisco and Serbia.

Harvard Business School Dean Nitin Nohria worries that the trend could be dangerous. In an article in the November issue of the Harvard Business Review, he says that if U.S. businesses keep prospering while Americans are struggling, business leaders will lose legitimacy in society. He exhorted business leaders to find a way to link growth with job creation at home.

Other economists, like Columbia University's Sachs, say multinational corporations have no choice, especially now that the quality of the global work force has improved. Sachs points out that the U.S. is falling in most global rankings for higher education while others are rising.

"We are not fulfilling the educational needs of our young people," says Sachs. "In a globalized world, there are serious consequences to that."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40827123/ns/business-us_business



LMAO

These are the same corporations the Repub party fought so hard to lift the limits on their involvment in our National policies.

Thank You Republican Party and US Supreme Court.

It just keeps coming back to me.
The Republican Party called limiting corp involvement in American Politics and the political donations they give unconstitutional.
Now these corps are taking even more of our jobs out of country.

Then the SOBs refuse to extend unemployment benefits to, the same people whose jobs are being outsourced, unless the tax-cuts to the same people (corps) are extended.

Talk about a win win for the corps, and a screw you to the American people.......

And, many Americans support the bastards (Repub Party)

I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

You blame the Repubs, but no mention of Clinton doing the final legwork on Nafta or Obama telling the American voter that he would reform Nafta all the while his staffers were telling Canadian press that it was just campaign rhetoric and to ignore what he was saying to the people?
Please remember, Globalism has infiltrated both sides of the paradigm, you're just playing the taste test game between coke and pepsi, but when you remove the blinders, either way, you're getting a brown, caffienated and acidic drink.

What's up war?

Clinton did his damage with NAFTA, but it took the whole House and Senate to get that passed.

It wasn't the Republicans who passed the lobbying regulations recently. Heck no, they all voted no!

When they couldn't beat it with a no,
they took it to the Supreme Court, declaring it unconstitutional and got all limits removed and a free for all by corps to donate to political parties.

If Obama hadn't of dealt with them behind the Dems there would have been millions doing without unemployment benefits of any kind.

Laid off why?

How was Obama able to do it? (make a deal with the Repubs)

By giving the Repubs what they wanted most. An extension on the Bush tax-cuts to the wealthiest. (Corps)

Now all the anti-Obama (don't like him because?????) nuts, rag the man for that and call him a socialist because he cares for the American people.
He wants you to keep your job.
The Repubs only care for their wallets.

Long time no see Fanta, my friend.

My point is not an anti-Obama/anti-Bush stance, rather an antiglobalism stance. However, since the issue was put forth, I should address the Obama for people point. Obama is no more for the people than Bush was. Both were put into power by the money powers, the international banking parasites. In fact, Obama's administration has been the government by the bankers for the bankers, his is the most extreme wall street administration of modern times.

I for one do not consider Obama to be a Socialist, because he doesn't set the agenda, he is just running plays that his "coaches" are calling. These are Cherry picked from the worst of all political paradigms, From flat Marxist communism, to fascism, and yes, even from Capitalism. Obama's just the front man... a PR person and dare I say: A puppet.

I am all about anti-globalization man.

That's one reason I was for Obama.
He wants to penalize corps when they outsource American jobs, and limit lobbyist influence into our politics. He did that last one. But the Repubs claimed it was unconstitutional and took it to the Supreme Court.
They lifted all limits.

Thanks to the Party of NO!

So you even say how much better their international sales are then bash them for hiring overseas. It would be stupid to hire domestically for international business. It would be like Japan hiring Japanese for their American Toyota factories.

If he was seeking to do anything about the sucking sound that is the drain pouring out our jobs overseas, then maybe the man should stick to his campaign promises... but he can't because the agenda isn't his to dictate. Just like Bush, Obama's only taking orders

I have nothing to add here. I just wanted to say hi to Kerry. How have you been stranger?

I continue to survive... Still doing the radio shows, tinfoil hat and all!
How are the kitties and did your move go well? Shoot me a facebook!

It was unconstitutional because the president cannot dictate the business of a corporation. He cant tell them what to do (unless he bailed them out, then he might have SOME say in how they conduct their business) because that is pure dictatorship, and is indeed unconstitutional.

The fact that the left-leaning liberal Supreme Court agreed with the Repubs, reflects the fact that it was illegal for Obama to blackmail the companies.

These companies are American. They became major world dynamos off the American workers that manufactured and bought their products.
The reason their sales are better overseas is because they used and abandoned the American people. The American middle class has been decimated. Their jobs have been outsourced for cheap labor, and now their buying power is gone. Gone like their standard of living.
The rich controls our government. Allowing them to further destroy our standard of living and outsource more of our jobs.

We were once the largest purchasing force in the world and had the highest standard of living
The government (corps) tore down the largest organized resistance to their plans for globalization. The Unions! Unions protected American jobs.
With the Unions out of the way they now had an open road to gain more political power and get richer.
They can move their factory overseas, use cheap labor, and still export the product here cheaper, than build it here with American labor.
After just a short time and a shifting, growing, middle class in a new nation begins to demand more and more. They simply move on to another cheap labor source.
I've been saying it for 30 years if I said it for one. For globalization to work The American people must get poorer and poorer, so those in poorer countries can get richer. Their increase in standard of living will cost the American people theirs. Eventually everyone will be the same and the corps will control it all.
It we aren’t already there we are real close.

For 30 years I’ve watched as American voters supported laws which gave their very freedoms and rights away. We are losing our autonomy by our own stupidity.
I have other thoughts on how a rebellious and ingenuous society as ours managed to go to a generation who think the same, act the same, and fall for the propaganda. It’s almost like they are being brainwashed by the education system. But, I’ll keep that one to myself.

Giving the people doing this to us tax-breaks and handing them our children's future, handing them control of our government, well, it’s just insanity.

LOL I have heard more union people complaining about unions then praising them. They basically blackmail you into joining the Union and paying your union fees. But that was just in my experience.

Reagan killed the Unions!
I was in a Union once. I had no complaints nor heard many.
Unions gave us a voice and a fair part of the profits we helped generate.
Today, the American worker has less benefits, longer working hours, and no job security.
If the company says work Sunday, you work Sunday. If they say work Christmas Day, you work Christmas day.
Ohhh, you hear the *******, moans, and groans, but they have no unified voice.
If you stand, you most likely stand alone as your co-workers are too afraid to say anything. Then because you stand alone you become an example and they fire you. LMAO

For all your troubles, dedication, loyalty, and hard work, you get a 2.5% raise.
It doesn't matter than the cost of living went up 5% and the company's profits increase 100%.
2.5 is all you get.

You're so damned happy, you give them a tax-cut to boot.