A friend sent me a series of photographs of the Emma Maersk, a container ship that sails between China and California delivering goods for Wal-Mart. Here are some excerpts from the commentary that accompanied the pictures:

"The Emma Maersk is a monster ship that transports goods across the Pacific in just 5 days!! This is one of three ships presently in service, with another two commissioned to be completed in 2012. These ships were commissioned by Wal-Mart to deliver their purchases from China . They hold an incredible 15,000 containers and have a 207 foot deck beam!!

The full crew is just 13 people on a ship longer than a US Aircraft Carrier (which has a crew of 5,000) With it's 207' beam it is too big to fit through the Panama or Suez Canals . Cruise speed: 31 knots.

The goods arrive 4 days before the typical container ship (18-20 knots) on a China -to-California run. 91% of Walmart products are made in China . So this behemoth is hugely competitive even when carrying perishable goods. The dock has 11 cargo crane rigs that can operate simultaneously unloading the entire ship in less than two hours.

A recent documentary in late March, 2010 on the History Channel noted that all of these containers are shipped back to China , EMPTY. Yep, that's right. We send nothing back on these ships. What does that tell you about the current financial state of this country? Just keep buying those imported goods (mostly gadgets) until you run out of money.

Then you may wonder what the cause of unemployment (maybe even your job) in the U.S. and Canada might be????"

My impression: This just emphasizes that the U.S.A. has exported jobs that are badly needed by those unemployed members of their indebted middle class. The resulting short term atmosphere of "prosperity" that was created is having some long-lasting negative consequences.