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

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

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

421–430 of 1001 posts

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

#421

Post by notatoad »

hnburnsy wrote: post #345

The thread was kind of hand wavy over the "$24* discount" for Footlocker? From the linked article... >Footlocker’s purchase price (read footnote #3) for every sale of $100 shows up as $66 in their financial reports, and not $50. In plain terms, Footlocker sells its merchandise for a 24% discount on the average. So $100 was never the sale price, just some made up, hoped for number that only appears on the shoe box, an…

>So $100 was never the sale price, just some made up, hoped for number that only appears on the shoe box, and not on anyone's financial statements. Really this should be Footlocker makes $6 on selling a $66 sneaker, for a margin of ~9%.

yes. but any arguments you see in favour of onshoring manufacturing would use undiscounted list prices, so it makes sense to start from that place.

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

#422

Post by jdasdf »

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.

None of those are state capacity issues.

Those are "State is pointing a gun at anyone who would fix them" issues.

Friendly reminder that 95%+ of the UK railway system was built by private for profit companies, with state involvement being primarily limited to not preventing it from happening.

All of these issues are 100% self inflicted by the state getting in the way.

All that needs to happen for them to fix themselves is to stop actively preventing private individuals from fixing them.

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

#423

Post by snapcaster »

jacknews wrote: post #156
explodes wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Human society has been optimizing for the wrong thing since 20,000BC. To that end, the future I want doesn't focus so much on money, but on needs. Letting a market dictate "needs" is clearly not working for the betterment of humanity a whole. While it helps with progress, I believe there is an upper limit when human behavior is brought into the equation.

exactly, the market doesn't deliver human flourishing

Compared to what?

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

#424

Post by matt-p »

peterfirefly wrote: post #397
matt-p wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we'd of done what, out of interest? Personally I don't 'agree' with brexit, but it's the reality that we're in. In typical british fashion we're trying to stay friends with the EU, even though they basically hate us, while also trying to do trade with the rest of the world. Predictably we can't really do much of 2 without 1 becoming a problem (and vice versa). However 1 is currently our biggest trading partner (as…

We don't hate the UK. We are just waiting (impatiently) for you to come to your senses.

So would we be able to get the exact same deal we had? We are under the impression the answer is no, as whenever we try and negotiate away stuff that's in neither of our interests it gets rejected.

Take this Eitas Visa for example, this is literally just sowing resentment towards the EU in the UK. It benefits nobody and is totally insane, it's just making people hate the EU. Same with not being able to use the digital passport machines at airports.. why?? We're a pretty secure country, we have digital passports. Brexit happens and now every time I go to Europe, which is a lot I've got a 50/50 chance of waiting 3 hours at the border for someone to stamp my passport while the digital gates have no queue. That means I now have to arrive 3 hours early every time just in case. If I bring a tool for work I need to spend weeks of paperwork on something called a carnet so I end up buying there and throwing out.

At the moment we're trying to give security backing for Ukraine and you're asking us to give up our fishing rights for the honour of helping secure Europe.

I get it, actions have consequences, but the thing is that only a minority voted for Brexit, most of us didn't. Each year you're disenfranchising a new generation of would be Europeans with this path. To me it's all dreadfully regrettable, the whole things a mess.

It's impossible for us to 'come to our senses' while we get treated like this in my view.

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

#425

Post by ForOldHack »

"I encourage you to note assume that every Asian worker is a slave." I do NOTE, that I was on Korea for 18 months, and saw over 20 factories, and knew a few people that worked there. They were making 1/10 of the minimum wage in America at the time, $0.75 vs $7.50, Today they are making $6.94, so I would assume that They are making few shoes in Korea.

"While it's difficult to pinpoint exactly which country pays the absolute least for shoe manufacturing, countries like Vietnam and Cambodia are known for having lower labor costs and are major footwear exporters, making them likely to be at the lower end of the wage scale for shoe production."

In Cambodia, they pay $208 per month, which is assuming a 160 hour work month, which I guarantee is the bare minimum which gives them $1.30 in wages per hour.

"In Vietnam, shoe manufacturing workers typically earn wages that are significantly below a living wage, though some companies affiliated with the Fair Labor Association (FLA) pay double the minimum wage."

In Vietnam they pay $68/ month, which is $0.42 and 1/2 cents an hour.

The premise of the article, and the statistics they use are all based on preported manufactures claims, not the reality that exists in that country.

I would dismiss this article as pure fantasy.

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

#426

Post by hemabe »

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…

China could not only be ‘equal’ but ‘better’ than the USA - we should get used to the idea. China has an average IQ of 104 out of 1.4 billion people, while the USA has an IQ of 97. In purely statistical terms, this means that the USA has around 700,000 people with an IQ >= 140. China has 11,480,000 people with this IQ. This human capital will make the difference.

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

#427

Post by WarOnPrivacy »

boznz wrote: post #380
missedthecue wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China will probably be the only country that solves this.

..Any country can solve it, just incentivise families. Simple things like ensuring young people have access to affordable housing and daycare. If I was at the start of my career ladder in a major urban area now, having a family would be close to the bottom of my priority list. Its not rocket science.

> .Any country can solve it, just incentivise families.

In the US, parenting time is up 20-fold, from a few hours per week to 24/7 adulting.

Companion to that is that free-range land has shrunk from many sq/mi to a few sq/yds. Car culture and trespassing culture has eliminated the irreplaceable environments where adult-free, peer time nurtured mental health and abilities.

As near as I can tell, parenting and childhood is irreparably broken in the US.

We certainly seem incapable of recalling what sustainable parenting once looked like.

On rare occasion someone will recall that kids once roamed all over. Maybe that gets connected to less mental health issues. Either way it's all forgotten moments later.

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

#428

Post by milesskorpen »

peterfirefly wrote: post #418
lostlogin wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sales taxes are something people innately understand if they have spent any time in the US The way they are done in the US is maddening. You go to the counter and find the price is higher than the tag price by some random amount. It seems to vary wherever you go and depend on what you buy. A tariff might actually be better.

There's actually a really good argument in favour of that -- and in favour of paying income tax not as a direct tax (withheld from wages) but with a delay. It makes the taxes visible and painful and they will therefore (potentially) not rise as fast or as much.

I think that's an argument, but not necessarily a good one

Need to balance transparency in pricing vs. visibility of taxes. I don't think sales taxes are actually all that visible most of the time- it's not like the cashier is telling you "and your taxes are $X." But it does make it much harder to detect if the store is charging you more than list price.

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

#429

Post by NikkiA »

mvc wrote: post #411
ajb wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two parts to the fishing thing. From a pure economic perspective, fishing is insignificant. But within living memory obtaining food was a national security issue for the UK (during world war II). In a world in which states look not to grow their economy, but to harm others - and guess what, that's where we just arrived - not all industries can be considered purely on their revenue. Man cannot live on warham…

How much of a fish industry will remain when the North Sea is a battleground? Is there any fishing going on in the Black Sea at the moment? (genuine question)

> Is there any fishing going on in the Black Sea at the moment? (genuine question)

yes, while fishing vessels fairly rarely broadcast AIS, there's plenty of turkish, bulgarian, and even three russian fishing vessels broadcasting AIS in the black sea right now. No ukrainian vessels that I can see, but again, AIS is fairly rare for fishing boats anyway.

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

#430

Post by fragmede »

WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #427
boznz wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

..Any country can solve it, just incentivise families. Simple things like ensuring young people have access to affordable housing and daycare. If I was at the start of my career ladder in a major urban area now, having a family would be close to the bottom of my priority list. Its not rocket science.

> .Any country can solve it, just incentivise families. In the US, parenting time is up 20-fold, from a few hours per week to 24/7 adulting. Companion to that is that free-range land has shrunk from many sq/mi to a few sq/yds. Car culture and trespassing culture has eliminated the irreplaceable environments where adult-free, peer time nurtured mental health and abilities. As near as I can tell, parenting and childhoo…

I agree it's broken, just in the other direction. Just stick an ipad in front of the kid and ignore it for hours
Post reply on HN