Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

rand.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 523 posts

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#61

Post by justonceokay »

whatshisface wrote: post #22
ryandrake wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because the US has emphasized college as the only respectable education path, as well as the only path to well paid jobs. If I could make as a machinist what I make as a software monkey, all other things being equal, I'd go back in time and train to be a machinist. People will go where the money is.

The only way to "solve" this is to reduce US output of valuable goods so that people are attracted to jobs that pay less and make less valuable goods. I don't understand why everyone's so enamored with the prospect of making $50k working a lathe in a world where engineering jobs have been made rarer artificially. It won't even be a job in a factory that makes something cool like rockets or lithography machines, witho…

Fred Flintstone wasn’t just looking to work behind a desk though. He was looking for a promotion to management. In those days a desk job meant that you had some authority. You had worked your way through the ranks and put in your time. It was a sign that the company values you and you would be taken care of. Gold wristwatches and all that.

Plenty of people still work in the data entry mines, even though that’s a desk job. In a lot of ways being an Uber driver about as cushy as a desk job in terms of physical demand on the body, but it certainly isn’t a status position.

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#62

Post by letitbeirie »

hwillis wrote: post #31
jackyinger wrote: post #4

How’s basing the US economy on services looking now? My brother is an extremely skilled machinist, the sort who could build machine tools if he had the resources. And let me tell you there ain’t many of them, especially not young ones. Why? Because the US has emphasized college as the only respectable education path, as well as the only path to well paid jobs. That’s how you end up with a manufacturing industry full…

> My brother is an extremely skilled machinist, the sort who could build machine tools if he had the resources. Machine tools are not designed by extremely skilled machinists, they are designed by engineers. Machinists do not know how frames deflect or resonant modes or overconstraint or the other things that are critical in machine tool design. Machine tools are inherently dynamic systems where moving cutters cause…

> Machine tools are not designed by extremely skilled machinists

But they're built by extremely skilled machinists. I've practiced engineering for decades but I wouldn't even want to be in the same room as any object I've personally made being spun up the first time.

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#63

Post by whimsicalism »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #24
ryandrake wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because the US has emphasized college as the only respectable education path, as well as the only path to well paid jobs. If I could make as a machinist what I make as a software monkey, all other things being equal, I'd go back in time and train to be a machinist. People will go where the money is.

Not everyone can be a SW engineer. Same how not everyone can be a doctor. Or a lawyer. For a lot of people, bolting bumpers to Fords is as good as it gets in terms of job prospects.

okay then tax and redistribute, don’t try to pick winners and do stupid industrial policy that makes everyone poorer.

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#64

Post by jkubicek »

turtlesdown11 wrote: post #29
jackyinger wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me of a friend’s defense of the service focused economy: “I’ve got a PhD in economics”. Sure services may be great when things are going well, but you can’t ONLY have services, and then go and blow up international trade and expect to have a good time.

Quit the hyperbole. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/IPMAN https://www.brookings.edu/articles/global-manufacturing-scor... > Manufacturing constitutes 27 percent of China’s overall national output, which accounts for 20 percent of the world’s manufacturing output. In the United States, it represents 12 percent of the nation’s output and 18 percent of the world’s capacity. In Japan, manufacturing is 19 percent of th…

Where is the disconnect between the US being the #2 manufacturer in the world and my sense of doom and gloom about Trumps trade-war attack on our trading partners?

I suspect it's this:

> Advanced manufacturing technology development can be found throughout the United States. In Indiana for example, Rolls Royce, which makes jet engines, employs thousands of engineers. Zimmer Biomet makes surgical products in Warsaw, Indiana, a city that has become a national hub for orthopedic products.

So much of what I buy as an individual is imported. My fruit comes from South America, my electronics come from Asia, my outdoor equipment comes from Canada (and the raw fabrics probably sourced from China).

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#65

Post by markus_zhang »

pjc50 wrote: post #50
markus_zhang wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO if Trump is serious about bringing manufacturing back to US, his No.1 job is to remove all middle-high managers from all government agencies. The whole government has been bathing in the globalization alcohol for so many years that there is a huge interest group rooted for it to go forever. You can't do much without removing this group. There is no "legal", "orderly" retreat from the current situation IMHO. It's…

> There is no "legal", "orderly" retreat from the current situation IMHO. It's going to be messy. .. so what's the point of this again?

What's the point of what?

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#66

Post by ty6853 »

neogodless wrote: post #47
FirmwareBurner wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not everyone can be a SW engineer. Same how not everyone can be a doctor. Or a lawyer. For a lot of people, bolting bumpers to Fords is as good as it gets in terms of job prospects.

This is the eternal evolution of individual labor. But then the question is - do you think going backwards to an earlier time is a solution? Go far enough back to individual homesteads doing some light farming, hunting, fishing. You'll be self sufficient, but you won't be able to afford a phone or television! It's going to be a difficult problem (always) solving for the future of individual contributions to society a…

It would take you 10+ years of skilled labor savings in any case to afford a homestead capable of sufficient farming and hunting output to sustain a family. Because you are competing not with homesteaders but rich professionals or pensioned .gov retirees who want some escape from the pollution/crime/cramp of the city.

Even if all of US became homesteaders this would likely still be at least a little bit the case, because foreigners would simply buy the property instead. Take a look at places like Spain, Portugal, etc and the high land prices are based on global competition not vs the low local wages.

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#67

Post by InDubioProRubio »

morkalork wrote: post #9
jackyinger wrote: post #4

How’s basing the US economy on services looking now? My brother is an extremely skilled machinist, the sort who could build machine tools if he had the resources. And let me tell you there ain’t many of them, especially not young ones. Why? Because the US has emphasized college as the only respectable education path, as well as the only path to well paid jobs. That’s how you end up with a manufacturing industry full…

Crushing unions is partly to blame here. I've got relatives whose families have been working in the mining industry for a few generations. They all lament the good old days that are long gone now.

The unions got crushed, when the sovyeet union caved in. There main negotation power was the threat of a takeover by a of a viable economical alternative. It was just a illusion though..

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#68

Post by A_D_E_P_T »

ferguess_k wrote: post #52
A_D_E_P_T wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a way to do it. This playbook has been used repeatedly throughout the 20th century. First you invite industry to reshore via subsidies and preferential access to government contracts. If necessary, the government must directly invest in new firms. (They already do this in a very small way with In-Q-Tel and others, so it's not totally beyond the pale. For a time there was even a US Army VC firm.) If you talk t…

I think the playbook is easy, as you described multiple countries went through more or less the same process. The difficulty lies in political will and execution. Either fails then the whole scheme fails.

Direct government investment in new firms is politically complicated in the US, I think. Also, yeah, execution could be a problem. There'd need to be some sort of compliance mechanism to ensure that people don't just take the money and buy fancy cars. At the same time, it can't be too heavy-handed, or bureaucratic checks-and-balances will bog down the entire program and destroy any momentum it might have had.

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#69

Post by jayd16 »

franktankbank wrote: post #11
turtlesdown11 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How’s basing the US economy on services looking now? You mean the worlds strongest, most developed and most successful economy?

On paper. That's not to say we don't have the greatest potential for even greater prosperity but you can't eat stonks. Right now we are making good on promises to the boomer generation while absolutely dicking over the generations who are making good on the promises of old.

Wealth inequality seems like completely perpendicular subject. What does on shoring lower paying jobs and ballooning the cost of goods do to help that?

Re: The Decline of the U.S. Machine-Tool Industry and Prospects for Recovery (1994)

#70

Post by ferguess_k »

potato3732842 wrote: post #55
ryandrake wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Manufacturing does not mean jobs. Exactly. I think a lot of people who say they "want manufacturing to come back to the USA" have a picture in their imagination of a 1950s factory employing hundreds of middle class people standing along an assembly line picking up parts with their hands and working on them, or turning bolts on a car as it goes down the line. Then the old steam whistle blows, and all those workers e…

Those were not middle class jobs before the 1950s nor were they for long afterwards. The idea that one can be functionally illiterate yet afford a home, a car and a family by spending 40hr and no more riveting spring hangers onto Chevrolets, or whatever, is a legacy from a blip in time during which the US had a bear monopoly on state of the art for the time manufacturing. Those men who worked comparable factory jobs…

I think maybe with two people working a blue collar job that is much more realistic objective, once better wealth distribution has been figured out.
Post reply on HN