the US dollar is turning into toilet paper

[DannyOcean_]

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Everything I read and hear pretty much says that dollar will definitely continue to decline...

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This is as good a reason as any to bet that the dollar's relative value will increase.

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It also clarifies why the probability that it increases or decreases is equal.

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People who try to predict things like currency fluctuations end up dying early. However, they do have the benefit of being right 50% of the time.

[ThaSaltCracka]

I haven't read everything, but my two observations/comments.

My understanding is that the Bush Admin has been leaning torwards lowering the value of the dollar, without saying so. The reason being that it will benefit the US economy and in particular US industry and manufacturing.

Secondly, I have definitely noticed my money has been stretched thin in the past 2 years. prices are definitely increasing, but wages don't seem to be increasing at the same level. I have confirmed this with several people, but it's all anecdotal.

[TheMetetron]

I have access to a wide-range of JPY, CHF, EUR, and GBP denominated equity, money-market, and bond funds through my Swiss Bank.

I haven't yet taken advantage of it, but I intend to invest in these a lot more in the future, especially since they have small/mid-cap Japan & European equity funds which make me happy [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] Unfortunately, the ER on these bastards is TWO PERCENT. Going to have to decide if that is worth it.

Anyone know how this affects US taxes and how I need to pay taxes on this? Worth it or not?

Edit: They also have Japan & Europe Index Funds with .6% ER, but I guess I could just get the same thing cheaper through Vanguard. Might make another thread asking for advice on how to invest with these fund options I have.

[hit_the_set]

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kyle,

I hope you're not planning to outsource to India.

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I'm planning on doing this shortly. Why?

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Most companies are finding it to be cost-prohibitive now. Wages have gone up something like 50% and 75% in the past 2 years and, with the time difference issues, many are starting to leave.

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I can see why companies are finding it cost-prohibitive. With the dollar value going down, offshore rates will increase by 5-10% atleast but not 50-75%. But I dont see how the time difference is a hindrance. Offshore gives you a nice advantage of 16-24 hr work day. Offshore business is booming and it would be stupid to think that many companies are starting to leave.

my 2 cents..

[scrub]

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But I dont see how the time difference is a hindrance. Offshore gives you a nice advantage of 16-24 hr work day. Offshore business is booming and it would be stupid to think that many companies are starting to leave.

my 2 cents..

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The time difference may not be a big deal in basic manufacturing, but that's mostly gone anyway.

The time difference is a big deal when you're talking about outsourcing skilled positions like software development of product design. It's a big deal when you can't get folks together for meetings regularly, or when those kinds of workers can't direction from their supervisors more than once per day. Teams end up wasting tons of time when a project stalls for a day while everyone waits for someone on the other side of the world to weigh in on something.

When you add in the fact that wages are going up since we're starting to exhaust the pool of highly skilled workers in places like India, outsourcing isn't such an obvious decision.

scrub

[Boris]

Offshoring works well for large organizations with mature and stable workflows. Beyond that, the very high management overhead really eats in to the savings gained by lower wages.

[The Bride]

As a Brit and an American I'd like to offer the following perspective.

At the start of the twentieth century Britain was the undisputed superpower, the leading industrialised nation and the principal source of manufactured goods world wide.

It then got itself embroiled in very costly wars, borrowed heavily to subsidize those wars and failed to notice that another country with a cheap labor force was investing heavily in manufacturing R&D.

70 years later the UK was effectively bankrupt and turned to the IMF for a loan. I think its an interesting historical lesson that should warn the US against complacency when it comes to our competitive advantage relative to other countries particularly those in Asia. Its very easy for a country to overextend itself and fail to invest in domestic infrastructure because it has come to believe in its own innate superiority.