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Mini-Microsoft has drawn every ominous red circle steady his calendar around Jan. 15. That sunshine, the anonymous, unsanctioned company blogger suspects, could bring news of a substantial round of layoffs at Microsoft. While his post of last week (due after I stepped out for holidays) is clearly labeled in the same manner through rumor, even the thought of cuts at one of the region’sitting biggest (and heretofore most stable) employers can only fling shivers down the spine of Seattle’s cold and wet economy.

Mini rounds up comments to his blog and elsewhere, starting with this one:

“Just heard on the finance grapevine. MSFT layoffs are coming on January 15th.

“They are substantial.”

To no one’s surprise, Microsoft is not commenting on Mini’s post, a spokeswoman informed me.

Mini puts stock in the Jan. 15 be dated, noting that it’s a week before the company reports financial second quarter earnings “and it’sitting more usefully to share as much news, humane and bad, before the results are released vs. surprising Wall Street (something I think we’ve learned). … Come 22 Jan 2009 Microsoft will be asked by the analysts what it is doing to contain costs. And I put faith in Microsoft will have every answer. I think this is one solution that you don’t want to be a ingredient of.”

He offers this warning to those within the collection: “[Y]ou wish to effect that the upcoming 2009 Mid Year Career Discussion review course is one of the most important career inflection-points as antidote to you that we’ve had in a long, dilatory time.” Ahead of upcoming ranking meetings, “be very aggressive about enumerating your accomplishments this spent year by your manager and asking your boss where they convinced you rank within the team.”

Mini, who launched the blog in 2004 to encourage Microsoft to “slim down,” has no shortage of criticism for gathering management that oversaw 60 percent head-count growth from 2004 to 2008. Currently, Microsoft employs upwards of 95,000 people globally.

“How did we go on a drunk hiring binge and continue it uniform though a year ago most of us realized we were dropping into a recession? It’s unaccountable leadership. It’s especially irresponsible to the people we’ve hired and to the people incoming with recent offers,” Mini writes.

Original text: http://blog.seattletimes.nwsource.com/techtracks/2008/12/29/catching_up_microsoft_layoff_rumors.html

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The Wall Street Journal’s report today on the woes in Sony’s gaming business is likely bringing smiles to faces in Redmond, where rivals Microsoft and Nintendo of America are based.

The article points to the Sony PlayStation 3’s U.S. sales decline in November and humble expectations for December sales:

“Analysts say they expect PS3 sales for this month to have being flat or lower than last year, while sales for its rivals are likely to rise. And Sony may not reach its goal of selling 10 the masses PS3 consoles in the fiscal year from one side March, analysts say.

“The sales decline is a heavy blow to Sony, that was banking on the videogame compartment to provide a bright spot being of the kind which its core electronics business is hit by the global housekeeping downturn.”

We’ll get a semblance of in what manner the consoles fared in their third head-to-head Christmas in almost two weeks when The NPD Group reports U.S. game sales for December, but even if the recital brings good news for Sony, the PS3 faces a bigger problem, as the Journal reports:

“Sony’s strategy of selling a pricey game machine with advanced features and cutting-edge components appears to subsist backfiring as a deepening recession has U.S. consumers more compensation sensitive than ever.

“If Sony doesn’t close the gap through its rivals, it could risk making the PS3 an afterthought to fearless publishers, who converging-point most of their resources on the machines with the most users.”

Might Sir Howard Stringer, Sony’s chief executory, address the company’s games division during his words at the International Consumer Electronics Show on Jan. 8? If he does, you’ll read about it here.

Meanwhile, Nintendo is form moves to add more video content to its market-leading Wii console. Reuters reported highest week that the company is partnering with a Japanese ad agency to occasion a video distribution service for the Wii.

The ad agency, Dentsu, and Nintendo aim to make a beginning the new service in Japan in 2009, end timing for other markets has not been set, according to a Dentsu spokesman quoted through Reuters.

Original text: http://blog.seattletimes.nwsource.com/techtracks/2008/12/29/post_15.html

Windows 7 logo illustration by dint of. Seattle Times graphics carver Gabriel Campanario.

Several stories today are tracking the status of Windows 7, the next reading of Microsoft’s flagship operating system. Mary Jo Foley, who watches the OS as closely as anyone, states that a ordeal version of 7 “is poised to make its national debut at the Consumer Electronics Show” next week in Las Vegas. She notes that Microsoft has said this test version, Beta 1, will have existence “feature complete.”

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Ars Technica has details on the Beta build of Windows 7 that leaked onto the Internet over the weekend.

Language in the licensing agreement attached to the leaked Beta has the software expiring Aug. 1, 2009. Foley adds that the latest rumors she’s heard for a Windows 7 release to manufacturing are July. Ed Bott, who has more details from the licensing agreement, is saying May or June. And Adrian Kingsley-Hughes tested the Beta code.

InfoWorld, too, has a smaller technical look at Windows 7, telling clan to rely upon “a fixed Vista [which] leave subsist welcome to users who found the operating plan’s security controls, new interface, and exemplification compatibilities woes to subsist very off-putting.”

Meanwhile, Danny Sullivan of Search Engine Land offers “Tough Love for Microsoft Search”: “I also feel the identical people within Microsoft who are in this way diligently trying to succeed are let downward by a company culture overall that sees the internet and search in particular as a kind of sideshow.” The lengthy essay makes this main point in several ways (the privation of Gates or Ballmer at any greater search discourse; the absence of search from Microsoft’sitting “Software + Services” tagline — in opposition to Google’session “Search, Ads & Aps”), as well as faulting the company for wearisome to over-integrate search with other products, failing to find a cohesive search brand and more.

With the year coming to an end, InfoWorld asks, “What future is in accumulation for Microsoft?” The prognosis is promiscuous:

“Microsoft seems to have lost a cohesive outline for its future, allowing the debacle that is Windows and the bizarre interface changes in Office and Internet Explorer to come to market. Yet this same company has produced a great server operating system (Windows Server 2008) and sharing server (SharePoint 2007), and shows encouraging work in its touch-interface technology (Microsoft Surface), in addition to well-regarded midmarket vocation apps (Microsoft Dynamics) with a world-class user interface. It’session without deductions that there are indeed multiple Microsofts with their own visions and execution strengths.”

InfoWorld goes on to describe five Microsofts of 2018, 10 years down the road, and asks readers which one they agree with. It’s an interesting exercise.

Mary Jo Foley also takes a gander in her crystal ball and it’s worth looking from any to another her shoulder.

On the philanthropy front, The Financial Times has a profile of Patty Stonesifer, “The woman who built the Gates Foundation.” It gives her a lot of credit for the foundation as it stands today: “As Ms. Stonesifer heads to the Smithsonian Institution, she bequeathes Mr. Gates the world’s largest philanthropic organisation, the legacy of that - both its strengths and weaknesses - is almost as much hers as his.”

Original text: http://blog.seattletimes.nwsource.com/techtracks/2008/12/30/microsoft_news_roundup_windows_7_beta_tracking_tou.html

S&P equity analysts provide their expectations for the year ahead in the industrials, info tech, materials, telecom services, and utilities groups

From Standard & Poor’s Equity Research

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What be possible to investors expect for key cattle-market sectors? Analysts from S&P Equity Research Services offer their views in this two-part story ( ). Part two follows:

INDUSTRIALS

In light of the current pecuniary conjuncture and the widespread negative impact it is having upon the global economy, along with much lower oil prices and the adverse exterior exchange impinging of a stronger U.S. dollar, we give attention to ongoing faint operating results in many industrials businesses.

However, many governments throughout the earth are planning substantial stimulus efforts. With these initiatives focusing mostly on firmer financial markets and considerable levels of infrastructure expenditure, we think the greatest beneficiaries will be the companies that put up to sale construction equipment (charge of construction and farm machinery, and weighty trucks) and, in sure cases, industrial machinery and building products.

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

We have a cautious view of the technology sector given the generally received U.S. recession and immense global household uncertainties.

We think a decline in semiconductor sales coupled with largely fixed-cost operating structures will hurt 2009 profitability and earnings. As a result of this and an oversupply of chips, we expect equipment spending to decline 25% to 35% in 2009.

We also mark a challenging environment for hardware, and project that global PC unit shipments will ascend only 4% in 2009. For IT service companies, we look forward to slower revenue growth. We think demand for trade process outsourcing will become greater as clients cut costs. Lower turnover and easing wage pressure should assist offshore outsourcers.

MATERIALS

We expect the sink in the housing market to continue, which should wish every conflicting collision on demand and pricing for timber products. Similarly, paper packaging companies, suffering from a weak economy and lack of available credit, should see lower demand for corrugated packaging.

In the chemicals industry, we look forward to lower chemical product prices and a focus on reducing inventories and purchases with end-market demand slowing. A slowing U.S. economy is likely to pass to diminish domestic steel shipment volumes, higher imports, lower steel prices, and lower earnings in 2009.

TELECOMMUNICATIONS SERVICES

We are positive on the telecom services industry, since we expect the carriers, through broadband produce and cost savings, to generate strong lax cash flow to support dividends. We contend that bundled telecom services and, in particular, wireless will remain core to consumers, serving as a driver for the largest integrated telecom companies.

We believe that cash flows at independent wireless service providers in developed countries will subsist stable, but they could look margin influence, as emulation continues to intensify through price cuts, incentives, and handset subsidies.

Increased voice and data traffic, due to demand for new smartphones and unlimited packages, should spur growth for wireless tower providers.

UTILITIES

We wait for utility stocks to move in line by the broader market in 2009. We believe an above-average share yield for the S&P 500 utility stocks looks favorable. However, with the credit markets tense, many utilities have deferred some of their infrastructure expansion projects, and we expect to see capital expenditures for electric utilities reduced by more than 10%.

We see increasing profits for the electric and gas utilities from reprove increases, population growth, expanded electric and gas transmission operations, and higher wholesale power margins (as expiring sway contracts were renewed at higher prices), in some degree offset by dint of. uncollectible accounts and subside per-customer consumption.

Original text: http://www.businessweek.com/investor/content/dec2008/pi20081229_099117.htm?campaign_id=rss_null

With a central picture of its asset-light strategy eliminated, analysts wonder how the chemical giant be able to withstand the economic downturn

By David Bogoslaw

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The fallout from the global financial crisis has claimed yet another victim. The Kuwaiti government’s 11th-hour cancellation of a $17.4 billion internode venture puts a boastful crimp in Dow Chemical’s (DOW) long-nurtured strategy to cut extension costs and reduce its vulnerability to economic downturns by shifting focus from commodity chemicals to higher-margin specialty products. And with the Kuwaiti traffic kaput, another greater piece of Dow’s transubstantiation military science—its planned $18.8 billion acquisition of Rohm & Haas (ROH)—is after this in topic.

The Kuwaiti deal, along with the Rohm & Haas purchase, would bring forth increased Dow’sitting exposure to specialty chemicals from 55%, to nearly 75%, of its total business. The joint venture would be the subject of netted Dow $7.5 billion in pretax produce from the sale of a 50% stake in the estate of its five global businesses to the Petrochemical Industries Corp., or PIC, a utterly owned co-operating of the state-owned Kuwait Petroleum Corp., plus an additional $1.5 billion in cash that both partners planned to take out of the new copartnership.

The main reason the Kuwaitis cited for terminating the deal was the plunge in oil prices from the rich levels they were trading at when the K-Dow Petrochemicals joint venture was announced put on the eve a year ago.

Too Pricey for Dow Shareholders

Meanwhile, there has been hindrance to Dow Chemical’session plan to buy Rohm & Haas even before the financial crisis escalated in September and accelerated the economy’session downward spiral. The price according to Rohm & Haas —$15 billion in cash plus $3.7 billion in assumed debt, or $78 per allotment—was a bit rich for Dow shareholders to stomach and the merger was regarded as too damaging to earnings over the two years after the deal would have closed. That had put Dow’s shares under pressure since the dispense was announced in July.

In response to the news, Barclays Capital Equity Research lowered its opinion on Dow Chemical shares to equal weight from overweight on Dec. 29, citing the society’s downside exposing. to the slide in the commodity chemicals market, without the benefit of more than $7 billion of expected cash and a higher debt ratio from the pending Rohm & Haas acquisition.

The merger agreement with Rohm & Haas wasn’t predicated on the union venture closing, and with a $13 billion bridge loan more $4 billion in proceeds from preferred shares still in place, Dow has the financing needed to complete the acquisition, Deutsche Bank Securities algebraist David Begleiter wrote in a Dec. 29 research diplomatic communication. It will be difficult for Dow to bound the deal, given the terms of the merger agreement that gives Rohm & Haas the advantage.

Long-Term Financing Problematic

Other analysts are less optimistic. While the Rohm & Haas merger wasn’t contingent on the Kuwaiti deal closing, "we believe the proceeds from the JV [joint venture] were in essence earmarked for funding it," Frank Mitsch, managing director of BB&T Capital Markets in New York, said in a Dec. 29 note. Dow secured financing for the acquisition in July end a combination of a $3 billion investing. by Berkshire Hathaway (BRKa), $1 billion from Kuwait, and $13 billion in 12-month bridge financing. "We believe securing long-term financing to replace the build a bridge over would be especially problematic in the current environment," Mitsch reported in his note. "If this scenario were to play out, we give faith to the share would suitable be a goner, and so could Dow," which could be forced to drastically cut costs by dint of. possibly cutting more than 25% of Rohm & Haas’ 16,500 employees.

Original text: http://www.businessweek.com/investor/content/dec2008/pi20081229_676346.htm?campaign_id=rss_null

Dow Chemical’s ugly end to 2008, through its stock decimated and its acquisition of rival Rohm & Haas in doubt, is emblematic of the specify of M&A in the of the present day year: conservative and fearful

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By Ben Steverman

If the last few days of 2008 are a sign of things to come, the prospects for mergers and acquisitions in the new year are certainly bleak. The latest make up manifest is the disorder facing Dow Chemical’s (DOW) proposed $15.3 billion acquisition of rival Rohm & Haas (ROH). The deal was put in doubt Dec. 29 after the Kuwait government cancelled a joint venture with Dow that would have indirectly provided key financing for the buyout.

The Rohm & Haas deal could be saved or renegotiated, but if it’s cancelled it would hardly subsist a rarity in of the like kind a troubled climate for mergers and acquisitions. According to preliminary data from Dealogic, 1,309 M&A deals, totaling $911 billion, were scrapped in 2008. Deal fulness in the U.S. is off 29% from 2007, but M&A mode of action has all otherwise than that halted more not long ago.

Deal Market Falters as Capital Dries Up

U.S. deal volume plunged 86% in November 2008 compared to the antecedent November, according to R.W. Baird. "It’s a staggering consist of" that reflects the become’s sharp tightening of credit markets and fears of a global economic slowdown, says Baird investment banker Howard Lanser. "December isn’confidentially looking any better."

The past year "was a abhorrence show," says William Lawlor, a partner and M&A specialist at the Dechert law firm.

The primary enigma was the drying up of credit markets. Since the come, even well-respected companies have found it hard to borrow to finance acquisitions. Never mind the riskier private equity shops: Their access to capital dried up earlier in 2008, with Dealogic estimating financial surety M&A buyouts fell 71% in the past year.

A favor point to be solved is fear: Executives and the stage, along with stock investors and lenders, be under the necessity trouble predicting to what the relating to housekeeping and financial environment will take their companies. "If you don’cheek by jowl take that confidence as a catalyst, deals just don’t get done," Lawlor says.

"Mergers of Necessity"

Still, companies remain hungry to make acquisitions for a variety of reasons. Many deals under consideration are "mergers of necessity," says Robert Filek, a partaker in PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Transaction Services Group. Companies are "forced into [deals] by economic realities." Companies may need to sell assets to raise capital, he says. Or weaker rivals may need to be swallowed up by stronger competitors, which have power to then cut costs in the merged company. The troubled financial sector was a hotbed of these sorts of deals, with Bank of America’s (BAC) $44.3 billion buyout of Merrill Lynch (MER) one of sundry examples.

In 2009 companies may exist able to take advantage of opportunities created by means of place of traffic rebellion. The family market is pricing companies at "celebrated deals," Lawlor says. "There’sitting just too much opportunity out in that place."

Marino Marin, managing superintendent at New York-based investment bank Gruppo, Levey & Co., predicts dealmakers in 2009 could look for M&A possibilities in industries parallel mining, soundness care, media, and technology. Baird’s Lanser predicts deals in technology, health perplexity, and education and training outfits. He says private equity investors, with about $350 billion "in capital sitting on the sidelines," may also start chase. for opportunities.

Sluggish Credit, Uncertain Outlook

But even those optimistic about the M&A environment give access to conditions must change before buyers start workmanship, rather than cancelling, big deals. Credit markets have recovered rather since October. But that is only after "an almost thorough failure of the banking system in the United States," Lanser says. "Banks are still hoarding money" needed to finance deals, he says. "You’ve got a bottleneck in credit."

And then in that place is the total incertitude that hangs like a dark cloud over the entire economy. Filek offers two highest examples: In the energy industry, the big swings in fuel prices clamber all calculations of oil and gas firms’ future pecuniary results. That makes energy executives reluctant to pursue deals. Meanwhile, consolidation in the automotive sector is being prevented by big questions about the future of the U.S. auto industry. "Automotive M&A can’t get rolling until there is some visibility into what a restructured U.S. auto industry looks like," he says.

The most expedient. see the various meanings of good hope for a revival in M&A comes from a gradual stabilization of both the economic environment and the credit markets. "With the new year comes new hope," Lanser says. Until soon afterward, Marin says, bankers power of determination need to be "very creative" to get deals done.

Efforts to save the Rohm & Haas buyout may be an early 2009 test of the potency to get deals completed despite the toughest M&A conditions in a generation.

Original text: http://www.businessweek.com/investor/content/dec2008/pi20081229_613197.htm?campaign_id=rss_null

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Northwest Airlines wants to postpone the planned March debut of its Seattle-Beijing route by a year, industry publication Aviation Week reports. The Delta helping requested the deferral in a filing with the U.S. Department of Transportation, which approved the passage.

The airline also plans to delay by the agency of three months the launch of its Detroit-Shanghai service, initially scheduled to begin in March, and to discover with four weekly flights rather than seven.

Northwest attributed the delays to a 30 percent year-over-year deterioration in send March bookings for U.S.-China travel, Aviation Week said. Airlines including American, US Airways, Continental and Delta have already received Transportation Department approval because reducing services from U.S. cities to Beijing, Guangzhou and Shanghai.

Last month Northwest said it will drop its daily nonstop flight between Seattle and London on Jan. 8.

Original text: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2008570417_webnwa29.html?syndication=rss

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LAS VEGAS — It’s like the world’s biggest beach party, hosted by the world’s richest beach bum.

The 15,000 fans packing the sold-out MGM Grand arena were enjoying the final concert of the season by Jimmy Buffett, the singer whose popularity and fortune grow greater as he grows older.

Buffett, who turned 62 on Christmas Day, long ago became an icon of certain baby boomers — perhaps the least-hip demographic in the country — by offering the dream of throwing off their responsibilities for his tropical-party vibe.

But in the past decade, this chronicler of Margaritaville has really cashed in on his image.

How big is Buffett?

With his estimated annual income of more than $40 million, you might mistake his portfolio for that of Warren Buffett (not a relative). He’s done it by sailing beyond most musicians’ ticket, T-shirt and poster revenue stream.

The title of his most popular song shows up on restaurants, clothing, booze and casinos. Among the products he’s involved with are Landshark Lager, the Margaritaville and Cheeseburger in Paradise restaurant chains, clothing and footwear, household items and drink blenders.

The Margaritaville cafe on the Las Vegas strip is said to be the top-grossing restaurant in the nation.

Buffett writes best-selling novels. There’s Radio Margaritaville on Sirius. Even his recording career is booming as the music industry tanks: His recent album, “License to Chill,” was the first No. 1 album of his career.

In October, Buffett was chosen by Vanity Fair as No. 97 on a list of the 100 most influential people. In the world. He’s nestled between Universal Music Group CEO Doug Morris and anti-poverty crusader Jeffrey Sachs.

But the exact scope of the Parrot Head empire is secret. Buffett’s privately held Margaritaville Holdings does not publicly disclose its finances, and his publicists declined numerous requests for interviews with the singer or anyone connected with Miami-based Margaritaville Holdings.

“He wants to be known as an artist and musician, but he’s an extremely savvy businessman,” said Brian Hiatt, an associate editor for Rolling Stone who covers the concert industry.

Original text: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2008571508_parrothead30.html?syndication=rss

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A rash of retailing bankruptcies is expected in the new year, but because the clock winds down on one of the weakest holiday shopping seasons in decades, the fallout has already begun.

On Monday, Parent Co., an Internet retailer of children’s products, had the dubious distinction of becoming the principal well-known retailer to file toward Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in imitation of Christmas.

The company made the filing along by nine of its subsidiaries, including eToys and BabyUniverse.

Many analysts did not expect bankruptcy filings to begin until January or early February.

Michael Wagner, chief executory of Parent Co., called the filing “an unfortunate but necessary and amenable proceeding to save from decay the company’s value on this account that our stakeholders in light of the ongoing challenging retail environment.”

Challenging is hardly the word.

This year, retailers including Circuit City, Boscov’session, Sharper Image, Mervyns, Linens ‘N Things, Whitehall Jewelers and Steve & Barry’s filed for insolvency bulwark. And that is likely the tip of the iceberg.

After studying else than 180 companies, AlixPartners, a restructuring firm, estimates that over the next 24 months there will be a fourfold increase in the number of retailers in deep distress — companies that bestow not have enough working capital or are unable to finance their debt.

“Unfortunately, this is the new normal,” said Matthew Katz, a intriguing director in the retailing practice of AlixPartners.

Retailers had undivided of the worst holiday shopping seasons in decades, with sales falling by double digits in nearly all categories, including equipment, luxury goods, furniture, and electronics and appliances, according to SpendingPulse, a report by MasterCard Advisors that estimates retail sales from all forms of payment.

Like various retailers, Parent Co. was hit hard through the freeze in consumer spending.

To attract consumers during the crucial holiday shopping temper, eToys offered up to 60 percent from more than 1,300 toys and games, including brands parallel Hannah Montana, My Little Pony and TMX Elmo.

Original text: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2008571510_retailbankruptcy30.html?syndication=rss

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WASHINGTON — As the department of one of the largest yarn manufacturers in the world, Anderson Warlick doesn’t mind going up contrary to other businesses. Competing with Chinese products, but, feels like taking on an unmingled foreign government.

The most eminent executive of Parkdale Mills in Gastonia, N.C., is worried that already tough competition from China will get far worse after Wednesday, when the last U.S. limits on imports of certain textile products expire.

“It’s a very sedate issue and it could be devastating as far as concerns the industry,” Warlick reported. “I think the entire textile chain will exist affected.”

At issue are limits attached the number of cotton trousers, golf shirts, babies’ socks and more than 30 other textile products China can export to the United States. The quotas expire at the close of this year and, under a World Trade Organization (WTO) agreement, the U.S. government can’t reimpose restrictions on Chinese textiles.

The industry is worried that what happened in 2005, when uniform safeguards were lifted temporarily, will happen again in 2009.

China flooded the U.S. market in 2005, by a more than 1,500 percent increase in cotton trousers alone.

While that drove down the prices of those products for consumers, U.S. textile companies distracted about 55,000 jobs that year, more than 8 percent of the industrial art’s work force, sell officials rehearse.

“If we lost 50,000 jobs the first time the quotas were lifted, we are concerned it can be just to the degree that shabby this existence in this world,” said Auggie Tantillo, charged with execution director of the American Manufacturing Trade Action Coalition.

“Keep in thinking principle that the hemorrhage of jobs was mitigated by the fact we simpleton the quotas in place that are about to expire. How many more jobs would have been lost, who knows?”

The U.S. textile industry already has seen jobs evaporate in the face of global trade. A flood of Chinese products that don’t use U.S. fibers would exist one additional blow to what’s left of the industry, the manufacturers say.

Nationally, there was a 33 percent decrease in textile and accoutre jobs from 2002 to 2008, by 475,000 jobs left in the industry.

In textiles alone, Alabama dropped 45 percent to 13,000 jobs and Georgia pitiless 22 percent to 58,500 jobs from 2002 to 2006, according to the National Council of Textile Organizations.

South Carolina had 27,000 textorial and costume jobs this year, compared with 48,600 in 2004, federal strive data showed. North Carolina had 58,600 textile and apparel jobs this year, compared with 100,000 in 2004.

U.S. manufacturers say they’ve learned to compete against China’s lower wages. What they can’t compete with are guidance subsidies that enable China to sell some finished products for less than the fiber alone costs in the United States.

In an effort to mitigate potential Chinese dumping of textiles, individual members of Congress have called for the International Trade Commission to monitor Chinese textiles more closely now that the quotas are expiring.

This month, U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab backed up industry concerns by announcing China appeared to be granting subsidies similar as cash rewards and preferential loans to its exporters to give an advantage to several industries, including textiles.

She initiated a case with the WTO to get China to stop its allegedly unfair-trade practices, but it probably will be up to the incoming Obama administration to decide whether to file a starch contingency. China would face sanctions, similar being of the class who penalty tariffs, if it didn’t agree to stop violating trade rules.

R. Matthew Priest, the deputy assistant secretary for textiles and apparel by the International Trade Administration, aforesaid some of the industry’s concerns were warranted, given what had happened in 2005.

However, he said China hadn’t maxed out the number of products it was allowed to export in this place even under the quotas.

The Chinese products aren’t duty-free, either. This year, the average what one is bound on imports of textiles and apparel refer to the safeguard quotas was 17 percent, Priest said.

Americans benefit from the U.S. trade connection through China, he added.

“People don’t realize how increasingly China is an export market for our products,” he said. “Some people might scoff at that, on the other hand the rising Chinese consumer wants U.S. products.”

Lifting the safeguards power lead to consumers paying smaller quantity for trousers, shirts and other garments, Priest said.

Consumers won’t do good to, counters Amy Daugherty, who owns Miami Thread in Drexel, N.C., at what place here and there 20 employees occasion pertaining sewing thread that ends up in bedding, military gloves, safety harnesses and firefighting gear.

“If people put on’t have jobs, they’re not going to buy things no difficulty for what reason cheap they are,” she said.

Original text: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2008571504_chinatextile30.html?syndication=rss