Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

#221

Post by majewsky » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 1:58 PM UTC

tdeck wrote: post #68

jfoutz wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vaguely related, It would be really interesting to see a government try juries for legislation. Let representatives do everything they normally do but vote. A jury selected from voters in proportion to representatives is convened. The bill sponsors and opponents make their case to the jury. The jury votes. It might be an unmitigated disaster. But, it would be interesting.

This is how democracy worked in ancient Athens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition

TIL there's a word for that strange political idea that I like very much. Thanks!

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

#222

Post by randomdata » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 2:02 PM UTC

mamon wrote: post #170

BurningFrog wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then again, software is one of the few industries where you can do quite well without a formal degree or license. This makes it unusually open to the uncredentialed, if not the unskilled.

Define "unskilled". I would say that even if software developer does not have a degree he or she still needs to be quite smart. Now imagine typical blue collar worker having IQ below 100, who dropped from high school (as they often do) learning advanced technical concepts like network protocols, dozen of JS frameworks, not to mention higher order functions and macros. That's the issue with technical advancements: the…

> Now imagine typical blue collar worker having IQ below 100

I, quite honestly, really struggle to imagine this person. As someone involved in the agriculture industry, I see a lot of blue collar people. They all seem quite intelligent and capable to me. Some I could consider absolute geniuses. Save a small group who have real crippling disabilities, I'm not sure I have ever met a person who I think would struggle with those technical concepts.

It's a time commitment, for sure, but not a particularly difficult undertaking. What I have observed over the years are numerous people who think that this kind of technical work would be an awful way to make a living. That's the real barrier to entry. It is difficult to put in the necessary time when you get absolutely no enjoyment out of it, as difficult as that is for me – and I expect everyone else around here – to understand.

Or maybe I've just lived a sheltered life. The high school completion rate where I live is about 90%, so these people who you say can be identified as high school dropouts are not particularly common to begin with.

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

#223

Post by krakensden » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 2:03 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #201

coldtea wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Service industry" includes financial services, which have been hugely lucrative to the West. For whom? > It's a globally integrated supply chain, and cannot be otherwise. There is no way countries are going back to a blast-furnace-to-car vertically integrated manufacturing world. The most competitive manufacturing though is "blast-furnace-to-car vertically integrated", just not within the same factory (which it wa…

For whom is manufacturing lucrative? The capital owners. Isn't that why we had all those labour disputes and replacement of labour with capital? As others have been pointing out this is mentioned in the article: "Because of automation, there are far fewer jobs in factories. But the value of stuff made in America reached a record high in the first quarter of 2016". Is China better , or just cheaper, due to starting fr…

China is better. They have a rich, Shenzen style ecosystem for all kinds of manufacturing. They are not perceived as better because of the cultural distance and because of deliberate obfuscation on the part of marketing departments.

The US still has a lead in things that are heavily automated and meant for domestic consumption, and in super design intensive things- machines with engines, maybe Intel's fabs.

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

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Post by dogma1138 » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 2:04 PM UTC

bluedino wrote: post #97

dogma1138 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Automation isn't the enemy of manufacturing these days as much as decentralized manufacturing is. Once 3D printing evolves to the point of being suitable to print everyday items it would kill a lot of jobs all across the supply chain the manufacturing industry.

>> Once 3D printing evolves to the point of being suitable to print everyday items That won't happen any time soon. Sure, you can print household items like a cup, plate, and possibly silverware but so many household things are made out of materials that aren't really 'printable' (a pillow or couch for example) or complicated devices with components (headphones, a can of air freshener, a laptop), manufacturing plays…

These items being 3D printable are considerably closer than you think.

We can actually 3D print a pillow now since we already have printers that can 3D print with memory foam. https://3dprintingindustry.com/news/now-can-3d-print-memory-...

The current high end generation of printers use a combination of lithographic/ultrasound and chemical based process control can produce rigid and flexible materials from the same substrate. e.g. http://carbon3d.com/

And we can print already circuit boards as well as embed wires and conductors in the 3D printing process, we can also 3D print basic components like resistors and capacitors. http://www.kurzweilai.net/3d-printing-basic-electronic-compo...

If you think this ain't happening any time soon, we either have a very different definition of soon or you don't really understand just how far 3D printing and additive manufacturing in general has progressed over the past 5 years alone.

We are considerably closer today to the day where when you need a new pair of headphones you simply walk to a kiosk than to the days when low-skilled labor manufacturing was a major part of western industry.

While this isn't going to be done within 2 years, within a decade it is going to be possible, especially considering that additive manufacturing is already being used by local shops and major companies are pushing for this in order to simplify their supply chain.

The car companies are a very good example of this, Audi and a few others have been investing heavily in additive manufacturing of replacement parts in order to be able to grant their authorized dealers and repair shops the ability to 3D print many parts in house. This means that car companies do not need to continue to manufacture replacement parts for decades and keep old tooling a live or to outsource manufacturing to 3rd parties in order to keep their cars running, this also cuts down the cost of shipping and inventory management considerably.

Many other businesses/industries also are expanding into similar techniques with plumbing, electrical work and HVAC systems being prime candidates and being actively piloted in the field, need a 4" Y connector? simply go to your truck and print one....

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

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Post by pjc50 » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 2:06 PM UTC

poof131 wrote: post #211

_nedR wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course, manufacturing capability is important for a nation from a strategic viewpoint. But even if the manufacturing returns to the country - the fact of the matter, is that those manufacturing jobs are never coming back. It will all be done by robots. This process is already well underway( https://www.ft.com/content/7eaffc5a-289c-11e6-8b18-91555f2f4... ) So those politicians speaking to old people in steel towns…

I’m finding this robots argument a bit tiresome. Seems more of an excuse to justify outsourcing than the inevitable end state. If for every 10 workers, instead of 9 losing their jobs and 1 managing the robots, couldn’t we have 10 managing the robots and 10 times more stuff. The latter seems the more likely outcome to me of free markets, but instead we seem to have pivoted into a micro-managed (FED, ZIRP) government s…

There is no distinction between "free market" and "profit extraction". There's no easy way to "10 times more stuff" either: not just natural resource limits but demand limits. People aren't going to buy 10 times more stuff without 10 times as much credit. Or vastly increased wages / basic income.

(There's an aside in Huxley's 'Brave new world' about new sports being invented with elaborate equipment requirements simply to soak up surplus manufacturing capacity)

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

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Post by IPbanned » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 2:06 PM UTC

yakult wrote: post #117

>According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were 64,000 steelworkers in America last year, and 820,000 home health aides — more than double the population of Pittsburgh. Next year, there will be fewer steelworkers and still more home health aides, as baby boomers fade into old age. Soon, we will be living in the United States of Home Health Aides, yet the candidates keep talking about steelworkers. I'm pickin…

I remember people half-joking that GamerGate was going to be the template for the 2016 election. I never would have imagined how right they would be.

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

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Post by krakensden » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 2:10 PM UTC

white-flame wrote: post #50

jfoutz wrote: post #35

Politicians are amateurs. I don't mean that in a pejorative way. Politicians are experts at politics, they can achieve consensus in seemingly impossible circumstances. If you pick a random politician, and ask them to design a transmission, or perform open heart surgery, they'd do as poorly as you or me. Yes, there are politicians from all walks of life, and you can probably find a surgeon politician. In general, the…

Contrast a politician with a juror. There's no real reason for a juror to focus on anything but the case at hand. They don't have a career as a juror to pursue, yet they're expected to learn about things relevant to the case. There's almost no personal incentives involved (which also happens to be heavily policed) besides scheduling. Now, a politician generally does things to further their political career. They don'…

California has not had particularly good results with term limits for congresscritters. The usual explanation is that it empowers lobbyists, who have continuity and expertise. I don't know if it is true, but it's worth considering.

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

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Post by markhahn » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 2:11 PM UTC

ironically, manufacturing is an industrial-age metaphor: people still seem to imagine that it can or could drive the economy, that election-quantity people might be supported by manufacturing, and that location of manufacturing is negotiable. all arguably untrue.

you can't brag about unicorns.

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

#229

Post by krakensden » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 2:13 PM UTC

mtbcoder wrote: post #197

BurningFrog wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say the core skill of politicians is to get elected. Writing good laws is not entirely unimportant, but it is a much smaller factor. And, as you say, they have experts to help out with that stuff.

> I'd say the core skill of politicians is to get elected. In the US, this could easily be mitigated with shorter campaign cycles.

If you banned campaigning, you'd get a shadow campaign from surrogates.

Re: Why Are Politicians So Obsessed with Manufacturing?

#230

Post by brightball » Thu, Oct 06, 2016, 2:50 PM UTC

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #174

brightball wrote: post #41

Because the numbers show that every dollar of manufacturing investment in an area produces $7.

How much do other types of investment produce?

Apparently I had my numbers wrong. Here's better info:

http://www.nam.org/Newsroom/Top-20-Facts-About-Manufacturing...

"For every $1.00 spent in manufacturing, another $1.81 is added to the economy. That is the highest multiplier effect of any economic sector. In addition, for every one worker in manufacturing, there are another four employees hired elsewhere. (Source: NAM calculations using IMPLAN.) - See more at: http://www.nam.org/Newsroom/Top-20-Facts-About-Manufacturing...