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Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

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Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#251

Post by _bxg1 »

unityByFreedom wrote: post #250
_bxg1 wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but the U.S. is actively discouraging/thwarting testing efforts, because ~the economy~. And our chief executive is disseminating misinformation (whether out of ignorance or ulterior motives is unclear). I'm not saying China did a great job. But they seem to have gotten a handle on things at least, meanwhile we've yet to even really start preparing. And we have the advantage of hindsight, which they didn't have.

> they seem to have gotten a handle on things at least According to the Chinese communist party.

They can fudge the specifics, but I highly doubt they could hide the fact of whether or not it's continuing to explosively spread across the country.

Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#252

Post by twblalock »

triceratops wrote: post #214
twblalock wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people can't afford a $400 sweater. What are they supposed to do? Local manufacturing is for rich people who can afford it.

A lot of now-developed countries had 100% domestic textile production 60-70 years ago and yet nobody went naked (OK not 0% obviously but very few). People owned fewer pieces of clothing overall, but everyone could still afford to be clothed. If textile manufacturing became 100% local again, local wages would also rise by a similar amount. $400 wouldn't seem unaffordable for a sweater. Or the sweater would cost corres…

If local wages rise, wouldn't that include the wages of the people who work at the local cotton producers, textile workers, and clothing retailers? Thereby making the manufactured goods more expensive, rather than less?

If we could have cheap manufactured goods and also pay living wages to the workers who produce them, we would not have outsourced.

You can produce cheap goods with cheap labor (or robots), or expensive goods with expensive labor.

Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#253

Post by powowowow »

jcims wrote: post #99
TheFiend7 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100%, OP completely changed the tone and contents of their comment. Like night and day.

Hey I'll take it. We all fly off the handle now and then. :)

Thanks. Sometimes I suck. I'll do better.

Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#254

Post by tanilama »

handedness wrote: post #244
tanilama wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We never expected China to be able to manage domestic risk well Well, they have seemingly largely recovered and move their way back to normalcy, as other countries started catching fire. I think a lot of people's takeways will be different than yours: China's ability to control crisis like this scale is going to be valuable assets to global investors.

If one completely ignores their dangerous obsession with secrecy and its major role in the spread of said fire to the rest of the globe, yes.

Which I don't disagree.

However, such virus already exists in the wild, though the chances are there, it can jump to human anytime in the future regardless of national boundaries.

Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#255

Post by hnick »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #238
tanilama wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a critical flaw in this thinking. Other countries will catch the virus at some point too. Without stringent measures, it will take more time for other countries to come back from it. In other words, China becomes safer after this.

But that's exactly why diversification works. If you have manufacturing only in China and China shuts down, you lose. If you have manufacturing in both China and Mexico and China shuts down, you manufacture in Mexico. If six months later China is back online and Mexico is in quarantine, you manufacture in China. Having presence in multiple regions lets you keep going the whole time. Having presence in only one region…

It's easy to say it'd be great to have diversification now but it also costs more to maintain that capability every day that nothing like this is happening. If supply is not interrupted for a 10 year streak that will add up and you fall behind riskier competitors.

It depends on a company's risk profile as to whether that is tolerable.

Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#256

Post by hnick »

tanilama wrote: post #254
handedness wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If one completely ignores their dangerous obsession with secrecy and its major role in the spread of said fire to the rest of the globe, yes.

Which I don't disagree. However, such virus already exists in the wild, though the chances are there, it can jump to human anytime in the future regardless of national boundaries.

We should all be prepared but developed nations have a much smaller interface with the natural world meaning this kind of crossover is less likely, and many developing nations have a smaller global role meaning it won't spread as easily (see Africa & Ebola). I think China is somewhat unique here.

Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#257

Post by tanilama »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #238
tanilama wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a critical flaw in this thinking. Other countries will catch the virus at some point too. Without stringent measures, it will take more time for other countries to come back from it. In other words, China becomes safer after this.

But that's exactly why diversification works. If you have manufacturing only in China and China shuts down, you lose. If you have manufacturing in both China and Mexico and China shuts down, you manufacture in Mexico. If six months later China is back online and Mexico is in quarantine, you manufacture in China. Having presence in multiple regions lets you keep going the whole time. Having presence in only one region…

Diversification looks great, but is not easy. It is not like software where it can be easily replicated across continent.

Manufacturing requires logistics, capability of water/electricity and skilled labour. Those are not easily scalable across the globe. And manufactures do concentrate, it is easy to source parts to make stuff from the same region.

So in a way, expanding physical manufacturing is very hard and expensive. And in case of COVID-19, it is not the answer even, since, the disruption is almost simultaneously happening globe wise, capacity planning and shifting can't be that agile to adjust, let alone the demand will be hampered too.

So, I think unless it is for megacorp that has that much of money to burn, diversification on globe scale is just a dream.

But for key industry, like medical supplies, I think that is where the state should come and play, to incentivize a domestic capacity that could chime in handily when disruption happens.

Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#258

Post by hnick »

parliament32 wrote: post #164
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They didn't want a $400 locally knitted sweater, made from neighborhood sheep. They wanted a $40 sweater that was made as efficiently as possible, and $360 of change. Except that the difference was never that large and never had to be that local. What happened was that they didn't want a $42 sweater made on the same continent over a $40 sweater made on the other side of the world, because it gave back $2 in change.…

>the different was never that large Here's a basic sweater for $3.19: https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/women-s-autumn-clothi... Find me one made in the US within a factor of 10 of that price.

You won't easily find one after the manufacturing base has already been gutted. It's too late to look now except for the higher priced boutique items that still exist.

Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#259

Post by lildoggo »

tanilama wrote: post #241
Scoundreller wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Centralize production/operations in China” is the opposite of globalization.

I think globalization doesn't mean equally distribution. Globalization as how it operates, it means to assign the job to whichever country that is most cost-efficient for that part of the production.

I once took a college course based entirely on answering the question 'What is globalization' Globalization can be just about any interaction between two entities...

Moving production to China? Globalization

Moving production back to the US? Globalization

...

Anti-globalization movement? Globalization

Or maybe my professor was just nuts, I feel crazy typing this out

Re: Coronavirus has disrupted supply chains for nearly 75% of U.S. companies

#260

Post by cheez »

fountainofage wrote: post #65
lutorm wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a net good effect in terms of resiliency, in the long term... Well, this is the problem, right. Resiliency only pays off when there's a crisis, otherwise it's a net cost. So if you're outcompeted by the other non-resilient companies before that crisis happens, it doesn't help. I feel like societal resiliency needs to be rewarded (in many contexts, utilities are obvious but also food supply, etc) but I don't k…

This is part of the thinking behind tarriffs - make that resiliency more competitive.

ORANGE. MAN. BAD.

The media messaging regarding tariffs being bad is ridiculous.

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