How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia? • Hacker News Board

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#201

Post by thfuran » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:34 PM UTC

giardini wrote: post #80

bryanlarsen wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Their population is declining Not where it matters. China has a much larger under-employed population base than the US has. They still have a few hundred million peasant farmers whose children can and are getting educated and moving to the city. Their pool of labour is growing while the US's is stagnant. Not that it needs to grow -- over the last decade or so China's factory employment has been relatively constant…

We don't need "peasant farmers" to educate, we need AIs to program!8-)) The race between manual labor and machine labor is heating up anew. We don't yet have humanoid robots but they're on the design table, so it may be time to fasten your seat belt.

Educating a few hundred million former peasant farmers is how you get things invented.

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#202

Post by goatlover » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:34 PM UTC

throwacct wrote: post #87

bpt3 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their population is declining, and they are a long way away from parity with the west on a per-capita basis. I think China missed their opportunity. Also, the UK hasn't dominated finance for a century and has never been dominant in services, so it doesn't seem like an apt comparison.

This 100x. This is the time to go all in and truly shake everything from the ground up. If the US moves at least 25% to the continent, it could solve lots of issues by developing manufacturing for critical products in-house and nearshoring the rest to LATAM, helping reduce illegal immigration considerably. Win-win for the whole continent.

It will be more expensive for the consumer who will have been busy paying the tariff sales tax to get to that point. There's a reason businesses moved industry overseas.

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#203

Post by danaris » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:34 PM UTC

Lendal wrote: post #160

999900000999 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>cloud-cuckoo-land Welcome, this is where we're going to be for foreseeable future. Prison made inferior Nikes will end up costing 500$ a pair. Not that anyone is going to have money to buy them. As you mentioned we'd probably need to still source from other countries. The bigger issue here is the USD may lose its reserve currency status. The rest of the world might just trade in Euros and Yuan. Inflation will truly…

I think you underestimate them. They'll just buy shoes from another country, import them in secret, repackage them, and sell them as American made Nike. They could easily strong-arm Nike to make a deal to go along with this. They'll do a "tour" of the "factory" that makes nothing, and MAGA will eat it up. They'll show us doubters all how wrong we were to doubt the carnival-barking-clown savior of America. And then he…

> They'll just buy shoes from another country, import them in secret, repackage them, and sell them as American made Nike.

Who will?

The Trump administration? Why would they be selling counterfeit Nike shoes?

Nike themselves? Why would they buy shoes from someone else? And if you mean they'd just keep manufacturing them elsewhere...they'd still have to pay the tariffs when they hit customs, so they'd still be $$$$. Unless you're proposing that Nike is going to start an industrial-scale smuggling operation...? Or that the Trump administration is going to provide some kind of sooper sekrit tariff waiver just for them, so they can pretend to be selling Made in the USA Nikes? And that's only talking about Nike. What about all the other manufacturers of consumer—and industrial—goods?

None of that passes the smell test. Nike's not going to take a loss to pretend their foreign-manufactured shoes, which now cost them much more, are actually being cheaply made in the USA just to prop up Trump. And Trump is, to all appearances, 100% all-in on these tariffs: he would rather have them and utterly wreck the US (and global) economy than have things cost the same because no one is actually paying the tariffs just to "prove" that his bonkers excuse for an ideology actually works.

No; if Trump gets a third term, it will be, purely and simply, because he has managed to utterly destroy the machinery of democracy so that a free and fair election in the US is a wistful memory.

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#204

Post by throw0101c » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:35 PM UTC

3abiton wrote: post #194

bombcar wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a problem with just directly comparing them - because JKR probably brings in more revenue to the UK than fishing, with Potter copyrights. But most of that revenue goes to JKR, whereas most of the fishing revenue may end up in "working class" people's pockets.

> But most of that revenue goes to JKR, whereas most of the fishing revenue may end up in "working class" people's pockets. I am sure JKR has to pay taxes still, which goes back to the government.

> I am sure JKR has to pay taxes still, which goes back to the government.

Does JKR personally own the copyrights, or have they been sub-licensed to a corporation in (e.g.) Ireland?

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#205

Post by thfuran » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:35 PM UTC

ebruchez wrote: post #180

Sonnigeszeug wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'declining' on which level? China will surpass USA from a GDP Point of view in 2035. China surpassed Germany as industry machines export in 2018.

> China will surpass USA from a GDP Point of view in 2035. Don't be so sure, this has become much less clear. For example, in this article: "The Centre for Economics and Business Research, which in 2020 predicted that China would overtake the U.S. by 2028, revised the crossover point two years later, to 2036. This month, the British consultancy said it will not happen in the next 15 years." https://www.newsweek.com/2…

That was before the US decided to shoot itself in the face with economic policy.

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#206

Post by gorbachev » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:36 PM UTC

treis wrote: post #129

hx8 wrote: post #83

> But if we bump the cost of freight, insurance, and customs from $5 to, say, $28, then they wholesale the shoes to Footlocker for about $75. And if Footlocker purchases Nike shoes for $75, then they retail them for $150. Everyone needs to fixed percentages to avoid losses. I don't understand this paragraph. If Footlocker was okay with $50 profit/shoe, why do they need to claim $75 profit/shoe in their costs per shoe…

Because it's mostly wrong. Luxury goods like Nike's, iPhones, et.al. are priced to maximize revenue. If those started growing on trees for free it wouldn't appreciably change the price. They'd just bank the extra as profit.

The truly luxury Nikes, the ones that cost way more than $100 - $150 are not priced to maximize revenue, however. The evidence is their pricing on secondary markets, which often price them at multiples of the retail price.

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#207

Post by devb » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:37 PM UTC

logifail wrote: post #199

According to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41283368 we should be linking to the primary source. Q: Is there a specific reason* that this thread links to threadreaderapp? * other than politics, which we try Really Hard not to bring into HN...

One great reason is that you need an account on X to read the thread. I deleted my account many months ago, along with many, many other people.

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#208

Post by lotsofpulp » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:37 PM UTC

ttoinou wrote: post #73

bpt3 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their population is declining, and they are a long way away from parity with the west on a per-capita basis. I think China missed their opportunity. Also, the UK hasn't dominated finance for a century and has never been dominant in services, so it doesn't seem like an apt comparison.

But look at per capita per purchasing power

Power of the purchasing power was a luxury of the US being the most desirable source of stability, creating a high demand for US securities and money. If trust in the US goes down, then so does purchasing power.

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#209

Post by Gothmog69 » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:39 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #108

greatgib wrote: post #5

All around the "developed world", the shop/retailer/supermarket/distribution part of the price of a product is around 50%. Whatever the product or its price. I'm wondering if part of our issue with crazy inflated prices despite low margin for industry and manufacturing actors is not because of this abused margin for retailers. That have also a huge power as it is difficult to negotiate when you depend on your product…

A lot of that retailer margin goes into (a) wages, i.e. the jobs that everyone is supposedly trying to create, and (b) rent.

I think part of the bet of tariffs is that people will be less likely to go to physical stores moving forard anyways

Re: How much do you think it costs to make a pair of Nike shoes in Asia?

#210

Post by vkou » Wed, Apr 09, 2025, 5:40 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #102

rayiner wrote: post #42

Americans need to get over their view of “Asia” as being about making shoes. When I was working in engineering in the early aughts, we mocked the Chinese as being able only to copy American technology. Today, China is competitive with or ahead of America in key technology areas, including nuclear power, AI, EVs, and batteries. We need to anticipate a future where China is equal to America on a per capita basis, but f…

> US will find itself in the same position the UK is in now The thing is .. there's a point here, but it's not at all tied in with physical products. People are obsessed with one side of the ledger while refusing to see the other. Most of the stuff the UK is struggling with (transport, healthcare, energy) are "state capacity" issues. Things where the state is unavoidably involved and having better, more decisive lead…

> Most of the stuff the UK is struggling with (transport, healthcare, energy) are "state capacity" issues.

Oh, boy, let me tell you, the 'State capacity' of the United States, when it comes to doing things that aren't making war on its own, or other people, was both rotten to begin with, and won't survive another four years of this regime.

Dysfunctional as the UK is, it's government is not stuck at a triple point of learned helpelessness, intentional sabotage and paralysis (the US is currently, among other things, doing its best to bring cured diseases back), and a deeply negative-sum culture.

I've heard that the United States was a magical land of milk and honey in this respect, back when 'competent bureaucracy' wasn't a swear word in it, but I understand that ended ~45 years ago. (With a few surviving holdouts, like the Fed)