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... and they can shed their existing obligations -- including the union contracts -- and reorganize as new companies with no legacy labor costs ... would they then be able to compete with the foreign company labor costs, and would that make them competitive again with the Southern state factories?
If so, the southern Senators could win this battle, but end up losing the war.
In the long run, though, it's hard to imagine that today's battlefield will still be around tomorrow. This is big, no? The whole map for the whole came could get totally redrawn, this time around. Maybe what we need to do is provide national health insurance for every citizen and adequate national retirement for every old person, and then let all our companies in every industry shed those costs and compete on that basis -- paying for skills and work today, not paying to support yesterday's workforce. It might allow for a level playing field and a more rational outcome.