ISP Information:
The use of one computer or device to make requests in place of another over a network. Proxies are often used for Internet security, or to control connections. You can use a proxy or proxy server to pass data between your internal network and the Internet. A machine on your network sends a request to the proxy; the proxy sends the request to a server on the Internet. Thus, it stands in for the computer on your network--t
ISP Glossary:
Proxy - "Is Wal-Mart Good for America?"PBS, Tuesday, November 16, at 9pm, 60 minuteshttp://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/walmart/PRESS RELEASEIn Circleville, Ohio, population 13,000, the local RCA televisionmanufacturing plant was once a source of good jobs with good pay andbenefits. But in late 2003, RCA's owner, Thomson Consumer Electronics, losta sizeable portion of its production orders and six months later shut theplant down, throwing 1,000 people out of work.Thomson's jobs have moved to China, where cheap labor manufactures what theAmerican consumer desires--from clothing to electronics--and can buy at"everyday low prices" at the local Wal-Mart.On Tuesday, November 16, at 9 P.M. on PBS (check local listings), FRONTLINE�explores the relationship between U.S. job losses and the Americanconsumer's insatiable desire for bargains in "Is Wal-Mart Good for America?"Through interviews with retail executives, product manufacturers,economists, and trade experts, correspondent Hedrick Smith examines thegrowing controversy over the Wal-Mart way of doing business and asks whethera single retail giant has changed the American economy."Wal-Mart's power and influence are awesome," Smith says. "By figuring outhow to exploit two powerful forces that converged in the 1990s--the rise ofinformation and the explosion of the global economy--Wal-Mart hasdramatically changed the balance of power in the world of business.Retailers are now more powerful than manufacturers, and they are forcing thedecision to move production offshore."In the case of Thomson Consumer Electronics, that's exactly what happened.Thomson was manufacturing picture tubes for Sanyo, a leading televisionbrand. Like many other suppliers, Sanyo was feeling the squeeze fromWal-Mart to reduce costs or lose the business altogether. In the end, Sanyoshifted its buy orders from Thomson to a foreign supplier."Wal-Mart has reversed a hundred year history that had the retailerdependent on the manufacturer," explains Nelson Lichtenstein, a professor atthe University of California Santa Barbara. "Now the retailer is the center,the power, and the manufacturer becomes the serf, the vassal, the underlingwho has to do the bidding of the retailer. That's a new thing."To understand the secret of Wal-Mart's success, Smith travels from thecompany's headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas, to their global procurementcenter in Shenzhen, China, where several hundred employees work to keep thecompany's import pipeline running smoothly. Of Wal-Mart's 6,000 globalsuppliers, experts estimate that as many as eighty percent are based inChina."Wal-Mart has a very close relationship with China," says Duke UniversityProfessor Gary Gereffi. "China is the largest exporter to the U.S. economyin virtually all consumer goods categories. Wal-Mart is the leading retailerin the U.S. economy in virtually all consumer goods categories. Wal-Mart andChina are a joint venture."When trade agreements were signed between the U.S. and China in the 1990s,bringing China into the World Trade Organization, American political andbusiness leaders embraced the idea. China's 1.2 billion people were viewedas an enormous untapped market for American-made goods. The reality, expertssay, is the opposite. China's exports to the U.S. have skyrocketed.Australian Donald Hay was one of the first entrepreneurs to spot opportunityin China's rice fields. Twenty years ago he set up his company, Hayco, justnorth of Shenzhen. Today he supplies big American companies like 3M, Procter& Gamble, and Wal-Mart with home cleaning products, toothbrushes, and otherhousehold items."What's happened is the world has come here as a marketplace," says Hay."It's like a supermarket for manufacturing today and the quality is up toworld standards, in a long way, past world standards....The people areenthusiastic, they're good workers."At a salary of only fifty cents an hour or one hundred dollars a month,Chinese labor is an unbeatable bargain for businessmen like Hay. And theChinese government is doin
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