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America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

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Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#201

Post by mcv »

pjc50 wrote: post #35

> China generates over twice as much electricity per person today as the United States. Why? This appears to be completely wrong? All the stats I can find say that the US has about 4x the per capita electricity generation of China. Other than that it seems to be mostly good points, especially the overall one: you cannot do this overnight. > If you’re building a new factory in the United States, your investment will a…

That is really the big problem with the current policy in the US: it's completely unclear what the policy is and how long it will last. This is not a stable climate for investment. Would you invest in a country where the president plays Russian roulette with the economy?

Most corporations will wait it out. Corporations that have an established interest (like Big Tech) will bribe Trump to get the exemptions they need to continue their business. Everybody else will have to decide how much they will want to depend on such an openly corrupt system. There industries that see no problem in dealing with corrupt regimes.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#202

Post by karn97 »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #113

> It’s years of accumulated skill, but it’s also a culture that is oriented around hard work and education that the United States no longer has. Sounds more like China has an exploited educated class/lack of oppurtunity than America has bad education. Plenty of American workers can multiply in their heads and diligently perform there work. These people work in white collar jobs though, not in factories snapping toget…

Westerners have had too good of a life and you cannot compete with an asian who is told every day if he doesn't perform he will be homeless. You just cannot compete.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#203

Post by Paradigma11 »

mantas wrote: post #77
imbusy111 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the important question is - is it worth it? Should we be doing something more valuable instead?

Depends on how evaluate what is valuable. E.g. here in europe a lot of people think subsidising local agriculture is not valuable and we should just import cheaper food. On the other hand, a lot of people agree that food security is kinda valuable by itself. And want similar security in more fields. In that sense yes, doing „low tech“ is valuable in the long run.

@agriculture.

Have you ever heard any concrete strategies and plans regarding food security?

Wouldn't there be policies about how many calories should be produced in what form, how long can it be stored, what would a local ramp up look like if there was a global catastrophe?

What percentage of agriculture is really relevant to food security?

Those are just empty words so farmers can get their subsidies and go on to produce more industrial rapeseed oil.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#204

Post by pjc50 »

rickdeckard wrote: post #137
pjc50 wrote: post #35

> China generates over twice as much electricity per person today as the United States. Why? This appears to be completely wrong? All the stats I can find say that the US has about 4x the per capita electricity generation of China. Other than that it seems to be mostly good points, especially the overall one: you cannot do this overnight. > If you’re building a new factory in the United States, your investment will a…

> China generates over twice as much electricity per person today as the United States. Why? >> This appears to be completely wrong? All the stats I can find say that the US has about 4x the per capita electricity generation of China. I believe the comparison is absolute production, not per person. Anything else would be odd. Considering China has 4x the capita of US it would mean that in absolute terms China is prod…

> I believe the comparison is absolute production, not per person

Original article definitely said "per person".

China allocates much more to industry and/because it allocates much less to personal consumption. Especially things like air conditioning. US per person consumption is still 2x that of EU average.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#206

Post by a2128 »

>There are over a billion people in China making stuff.

There surely can't over a billion factory workers in a population of 1.4 billion. I looked up a population pyramid, and let's say 100% of the population aged 15-64 is employed at a factory job, that's ~70% of the population which is only 985 million people.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#207

Post by iamacyborg »

sct202 wrote: post #123
imbusy111 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the important question is - is it worth it? Should we be doing something more valuable instead?

I've seen this brought up with board games that are now primarily made in China, because injection molding is cheaper there especially for small quantities. The US could make the board game minis, but everyone who is capable of it in the US is producing high value high quality aerospace, industrial, medical parts. It's a waste of their time to produce small runs of toy parts.

This seems like the kind of thing where 3d printing is probably good enough quality wise.

Of course, the 3d printers themselves are probably being made in China.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#208

Post by fendy3002 »

like_any_other wrote: post #163
pjc50 wrote: post #35

> China generates over twice as much electricity per person today as the United States. Why? This appears to be completely wrong? All the stats I can find say that the US has about 4x the per capita electricity generation of China. Other than that it seems to be mostly good points, especially the overall one: you cannot do this overnight. > If you’re building a new factory in the United States, your investment will a…

> Other than that it seems to be mostly good points, especially the overall one: you cannot do this overnight. It's annoying Americans were given only two choices - offshoring is great and let's keep doing it, and, as you say, the opposite, meth-fueled let's bring back manufacturing overnight. The kind of slow and steady protection and promotion of home-grown industry that China and most of Asia so successfully used…

Well, money talks and it's hard to choose the other option. On one hand bring manufacturing back to US and pay them higher, because otherwise the pay in McDonald's is better with a less demanding physical (cmiiw, don't live in US).

On the other hand, keep manufacturing outside of US for cheaper labor to keep price low and having bigger margin. It's an easy choice to make.

And again this is not a US specific problem, it's almost all of countries nowadays have a massive wealth gap that makes people racing to the bottom of living / working standard.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#209

Post by myrmidon »

Teever wrote: post #147
tokioyoyo wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once again, want to point out how this is simply American leadership not wanting to accept their loss and move on. For the first time in the history they're not being perceived as the "global leader", and that's not acceptable from their POV. Now it's just freaking out and hoping that some extreme policy changes will change the course. From my personal experience, most people act this way when they're in distress and…

This isn't just ego. This is an impending existential issue. America needs to increase manufacturing capacity if it wants to maintain hegemony and possibly world peace. China will soon have the ability to take Taiwan and Korea and Japan. If that happens it's game over for any American interests and perhaps democracy as a whole. Wargames[0] paint a grim picture of an upcoming conflict between China and America over Ta…

Do you think that global hegemony by force is long-term (centuries) sustainable at all?

What makes you confident that this could ever work on a longer term? The US is only ~5% of people globally, and I would expect any industrial/technological lead to melt over the years unless there is a monumental, continuous difference in spending (like what the US military did since WW2).

But I see no indication that you can keep that situation stable over the long term, and I honestly think that attempts like the current tariff approach don't help one bit in the long run while having massive harmful side effects (price inflation, loss of planning stability/soft power/productivity).

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#210

Post by bluGill »

dashundchen wrote: post #114
tbirdny wrote: post #71

America doesn't underestimate it, its president does.

I saw a chart passing around from this Cato Institute survey (Cato is a right wing think tank) [0]. It made me laugh. > America would be better off if more Americans works in manufacturing than they do today. Agree 80%/Disagree 20% > I would be better off if I worked in a factory instead of my current field of work. Agree 25%/Disagree 73% [0] https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/2024-08/Globalizat...

Those two are not in conflict. The claim is 20-25% of the population would be better off if they moved to a manufacturing job. The other 75-80% are better off where they are, but making the bottom better makes everyone better.
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