While manufacturing may comeback to US, the employment in Manufacturing sector may not increase as much due to automation.
And due to other increases in productivity.
The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
71–80 of 235 posts
Re: The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
#72While manufacturing may comeback to US, the employment in Manufacturing sector may not increase as much due to automation.
I've been finding this graph: https://tropicsofmeta.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/2007-real-... very helpful (y-axis is percentages of GDP and workforce.) Manufacturing never left the US, in terms of output, it's just that jobs did.
Which is why salary as a percentage of GDP is at an all time low.
Re: The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
#73I'm pretty sure our manufacturing output exceeded China's for most of the oughts, also. The myth that "we don't make things here anymore" is, well, a myth. We just don't employ people to make things anymore.
China exceeded the US in manufacturing output in 2010. And while absolute output hasn't gone done, our share of manufacturing output has. The US manufactured 28% of all goods in 2005, and 17% in 2015.
Re: The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
#74While manufacturing may comeback to US, the employment in Manufacturing sector may not increase as much due to automation.
I've been finding this graph: https://tropicsofmeta.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/2007-real-... very helpful (y-axis is percentages of GDP and workforce.) Manufacturing never left the US, in terms of output, it's just that jobs did.
[deleted]
Re: The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
#75I haven't been myself but my wife is a process engineer and had to go to China to install and train people on a new machine so this is only second hand... But one of the reasons China is so good at manufacturing is because everything is in one place (or at least clusters)... need 10,000 of an Integrated Circuit? The company that makes it is literally down the street. Need some raw materials? That's down the other str…
Yes, mostly we sell the equipment and design services that make the manufacturing possible. There is huge leverage in that and the higher margins that WallStreet demands. For quite some time (mostly) Asian governments have been investing in education, infrastructure, and equipment to manufacture the consumer items of the world.
It is much harder to do development and understand the real manufacturing bottle necks when you don't see them first hand... even harder when you can't easily get the raw materials.
I was struck with this the first time I tried to order in the US a PCB to the tolerances available in China. The yield was so bad, they basically weren't available. It was cheaper and faster to have the parts built in China and shipped back than to order from a proto house in the US.
Why? They used similar equipment in China (I saw it myself), but they ran it 2-3 shifts every day and it was completely dialed in. In the US they turned it on once a week and tried to make enough prototypes to pay for it.
Re: The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Although I hope it is true. I don't know if being a manufacturing powerhouse is actually all that exciting anymore. There aren't really that many jobs in manufacturing anymore. Some of Toyota's modern car plants employ a meager 1500 people which is about and order of magnitude decrease from what car plants used to employ. This las election was frustrating for this very reason everybody assumes getting manufacturing…
Producing our own food is not exciting either, but would you like to live in a place that produces no food and has to import 100% of what is needed to survive? This is the same thing here. Manufacturing is not a sexy activity anymore, but it is necessary, as long as we still live in a physical (non-virtual) world.
> a place that produces no food and has to import 100% of what is needed to survive
like, say, New York City? Sure!
No, the rooftop garden on the Park Slope Whole Foods does not count.
Re: The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
#77While manufacturing may comeback to US, the employment in Manufacturing sector may not increase as much due to automation.
I've been finding this graph: https://tropicsofmeta.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/2007-real-... very helpful (y-axis is percentages of GDP and workforce.) Manufacturing never left the US, in terms of output, it's just that jobs did.
This chart is almost worthless as a measure of US Manufacturing capacity or production. Why? Because sizable orders to a handful of companies (eg. Boeing, GE, Lockheed, etc.) offsets and distorts the disappearance of thousands of medium and small manufacturers over the past two decades. Its tempting to attribute the associated job losses to automation, but one look at this table: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_manufacturing_... and its clear millions of similar jobs have shifted overseas.
Re: The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
#78I haven't been myself but my wife is a process engineer and had to go to China to install and train people on a new machine so this is only second hand... But one of the reasons China is so good at manufacturing is because everything is in one place (or at least clusters)... need 10,000 of an Integrated Circuit? The company that makes it is literally down the street. Need some raw materials? That's down the other str…
> Although I hope it is true. I don't know if being a manufacturing powerhouse is actually all that exciting anymore. There aren't really that many jobs in manufacturing anymore. Some of Toyota's modern car plants employ a meager 1500 people which is about and order of magnitude decrease from what car plants used to employ. This las election was frustrating for this very reason everybody assumes getting manufacturing…
1500 jobs + the peripheral jobs (as a another commentator pointed out) could be a boon for many of the small counties* in which these plants are located.
*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Toyota_manufacturing_f...
Re: The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
#79I haven't been myself but my wife is a process engineer and had to go to China to install and train people on a new machine so this is only second hand... But one of the reasons China is so good at manufacturing is because everything is in one place (or at least clusters)... need 10,000 of an Integrated Circuit? The company that makes it is literally down the street. Need some raw materials? That's down the other str…
China wasn't always that way: it was a choice they made to become the worlds manufacturers, with the complicity of the global financial elite. We moved the factories over there, we can move them back.
Why? After all the American people want cheaper things and that is done by moving factories to China.
Re: The U.S. Will Surpass China as the No. 1 Country for Manufacturing by 2020
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
To be automated, which is what will, and is happening.
I'm perfectly happy with that, although I think it is oversold and used as an excuse in many cases. So long as the productive capacity, intellectual property and knock on effects are kept domestic, good.
Have you heard of comparative advantage? It may not be advantageous for the U.S. to keep such things domestic; instead the intellectual property may be better utilized in China.