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haas has been morally corrupt for some time.
they're essentially the 'john deere' of machining, they sell under-performing over-priced crap that only they can sell parts for or maintain, which is convenient for them because they produce machines that have some of the highest downtime in the entire industry due to lack of repair facilities/parts/availability as well as overwhelming small quality control problems.
In short, the MBAs happened. Clueless management was brought in who then decimated anything they did not understand. I.e. everything. Aided by Reagan policy to aggressively outsource manufacturing from the nineteen eighties US manufacturing just imploded.
Just speculating here, but by the time the Japanese and the Germans caught up and got really good at machine tools, the metric system would have become an obstacle as well. Because the US insisting to do everything in inches, foot pounds, and what not doesn't translate very well internationally when you start outsourcing all your manufacturing. Outsourcing meant manufacturing standardized on the metric system using equipment and parts not made in the US.
Just speculating here, but I imagine that all that combined lead to a natural preference for non US based manufacturing companies that took over from US companies to not use any US made equipment or parts. So, manufacturing became predominantly metric based and that would have affected standard components, screws, bolts, parts, etc. All made by non US companies standardizing on all of that.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Book recommendation: "Trade Wars are Class Wars" by Michael Pettis. If you don't buy the apologetics that permeate the popular economics sphere but still want an expert to walk you through the details, this is your book.
Sounds like commie gobbledygook. (RIP Norm MacDonald, the thinking mans comedian!)
This book gives detailed, and very accurate, descriptions of how trade wars which appear to be foreign conflicts-- i.e. one country united against another-- are almost always actually domestic conflicts between competing interest groups inside the same country; often during these conflicts, those interest groups can make alliances with equivalent groups in other countries. This is a commonly-observed phenomenon which, for brevity's sake, we reify as class, and does not require any Marxist axioms or analysis to understand.
Right, it seems the U.S. economy is trying to say, "making elementary machine tools is beneath us." The important bit is at the end: the U.S. is still a top buyer of machine tools (made elsewhere). Is the same thing to happen with software? When it becomes worth the time of the U.S. economy to produce basic machine tools again, they'll get to create new machine tools factories using all the latest technology: so it i…
Right. The US economy was well poised to tackle the massive task of computerizing humanity and, being a nascent technology stack with green field opportunities abounding, it was more profitable than continuing to produce machine tools. Meanwhile the Pax Americana has eliminated the risk premium to manufacturing overseas, so our entire economy has reconfigured itself around this task and opportunity of computerizing h…
But some manufacturing, in fact a large amount, is Chinese. And I'm not convinced they've got our best interests at heart. Either China needs to calm down over their "Wolf Warrior" style, or we need to cut back on providing benefits to an obviously and increasingly antagonistic power.
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The other part, with respect to Taiwan + China, is that we must defend Taiwan as they are a critical source of advanced-materials (ie: computer chips) to us. Yes, its more efficient to have Taiwan centralize production, but it does come at a cost. We need to be ready to defend Taiwan and keep it safe if we are to continue to build computers and phones out of Taiwan-only parts.
> A strong dollar made imports even cheaper by comparison I think that summarizes the article. It has been cheaper to import, so we do. The strong dollar policy supports some industries at the expense of others.
This is the answer to all American manufacturing woes. The dollar as a reserve currency gives the US a ton of global leverage but requires a trade deficit thus it comes at the expense of domestic industries.
Lemme try:
Because trade deficits induce demand for dollars? Like how Japan and now China hold a bajillion US dollars? So if the US had (prolonged) trade surplus, no one would be holding dollars?
But wouldn't trade partners still need US dollars to buy US goods? Like the situation post-WWII?
So then we'd "loan" partners US dollars to buy our stuff?
Aiugh. My brain just broke.
How does a noob like me learn about these systems. I know it all probably makes sense to the learned. But with my folk (mis)understanding, these claims sound counterintuitive.
Thanks.
> Constant pressure to hit quarterly performance targets meant that machine quality often suffered. In some cases, machines would be shipped out the door unfinished so the delivery could be booked, and assembly would be completed by service technicians at the customer’s location. In his history of the American machine tool industry, Albert Albrecht states that “the actions of these larger corporations and conglomerat…
The counter example is the semiconductor tool industry where the advancement of technical capability remains ahead of the rate other countries can catch up with them. Internal to the industry, the 'low-tech' machines are made by Japanese manufacturers: Track (TEL), Wet (Screen).
US/Europe (AMAT, LRCX, KLAC, ASML, ASMI) remain dominant in that capital equipment market.
Markets do not drive efficiency. At least not if chasing quarterly profits drives bad decisions.
"When the machine stopped: A cautionary tale from industrial America"
https://www.amazon.com/When-machine-stopped-cautionary-indus...
Note: referenced in the OPs original article
Read a great book on this in college in formative years. Made me pretty depressed about how management/markets can target false equilibrium points. Markets do not drive efficiency. At least not if chasing quarterly profits drives bad decisions. "When the machine stopped: A cautionary tale from industrial America" https://www.amazon.com/When-machine-stopped-cautionary-indus... Note: referenced in the OPs original arti…
> Constant pressure to hit quarterly performance targets meant that machine quality often suffered. In some cases, machines would be shipped out the door unfinished so the delivery could be booked, and assembly would be completed by service technicians at the customer’s location. In his history of the American machine tool industry, Albert Albrecht states that “the actions of these larger corporations and conglomerat…
It’s not necessarily the case that greedy, ignorant MBAs came in and ruined everything. Like, if their practices were so inferior, then any domestic firm that didn’t get taken over by them should’ve had a leg up and could’ve dominated the domestic market.
Don’t you think the more likely source of “pressure” was the international suppliers who had lower costs?
> Aided by Reagan policy to aggressively outsource manufacturing from the nineteen eighties US manufacturing just imploded.
Was the policy to outsource everything, or liberalize markets and let firms and consumers more freely choose where to buy things from? Globalization has done quite a lot to lift people out of poverty and keep prices low.