Article: The American Economy: Continuing To Be Hollowed Out At A Near Record Pace

Where Will Your Children Find Jobs
And For Which Countries Benefit? EconomyInCrisis.org recently released our August 2007 Foreign Acquisition Report, which documented the amount of foreign takeovers of American companies through the current fiscal year. The numbers in the report are shocking; foreign owned businesses are purchasing U.S. businesses at a pace quicker than any time since 2000 (view the entire report here). These sales represent an unsustainable reality facing the U.S. economy: domestic profits and opportunity are being sent abroad. If we do not raise awareness about these issues to our friends, family and politicians, than our children will never forgive us for leaving them a future ridden with debt and fewer American owned companies to employ them.

U.S. Companies Acquired By Foreign Ownership: 1997-2007
Year	Acquisitions through August	Acquisition Amount (Billions)
2007	785	$129
2006	780	$58
2005	578	$55
2004	491	$54
2003	376	$45
2002	452	$42
2001	667	$101
2000	839	$153

Especially notable in the updated statistics is the amount of large companies (purchased for over a billion dollars) being sold in August alone.

Largest August 2007 Acquisitions:
U.S. Company	Foreign Acquirer	Nation	Amount
GE Plastics	SABIC	Saudi Arabia	$11.6 billion
Putnam Investments	Great-West Lifeco Inc.	Canada	$3.9 billion
Spirit Finance Corp.	Redford Holdco LLC	Australia	$3.5 billion
Ol Plastic Products FTS Inc.	Rexam PLC	United Kingdom	$1.8 billion
Color Kinetics Inc.	Koninklijke Philips Electronic	Netherlands	$815 million

Japan and China regard their companies as sacred wealth producing facilities. Their companies are not for sale. We are foolishly allowing all our companies to be stripped from us and are quietly receding from being a productive economic superpower to an unproductive consumer driven service (servant) economy. We are now developing the profile of a third-world country living on imports, debt, and in a state of dependency, no longer capable of supporting or defending ourselves. It’s Time to Take ActionAs Americans, we should not allow our best wealth producing companies to send their profits and technological know-how abroad. This is sacrificing our economic future through the senseless liquidation of our best companies to foreign interests. These were companies that took generations to build and were taken from us in an instant with the stroke of the CEO’s signature. These are the companies that were the source of our wealth and the means by which we were able to maintain a high standard of living and win WWII. Now without these companies we are becoming extremely vulnerable and increasingly defenseless, forced to live on imports and debt while deluding ourselves and continue to masquerade as a super-power.Send this e-mail to friends and family and ask them to join in the effort against the sell-off of American companies. Ask them to contact their congressional representatives to demand that we prevent the sale of anymore American companies to foreign interests. Urge them to use the information available on EconomyInCrisis.org to write letters to the editor and help turn America from a nation now based on consumption and debt to one of production and opportunity again. It’s up to you and all of us to take action for both our country and our children’s futures.Send your comments to editor@economyincrisis.orgVisit Our Website at: www.EconomyInCrisis.Org