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Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

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Re: Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

#461

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The entire point of producing more energy is to consume it. If the point of producing more energy is to produce more products, and instead it gets gobbled up by idiots giving us the next crappy phone app that runs in the cloud, then it's not me that's missing the point si it?

All those computers in the data center are just as much products as anything else. If you don't like the apps, by all means don't buy them.

>All those computers in the data center are just as much products as anything else.

Sure, and if they were cranked out of American factories, that'd be awesome. But since they're shipped across the Pacific on a boat, they're not really the kind of products that help.

>If you don't like the apps, by all means don't buy them.

If apps are all we get out of doubling power production, then I'll do one better and we'll just not double power production.

Re: Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

#462
post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious to compare this to other countries that have state owned/mandated insurance and are so far still mostly covering everything and which are always touted as "superior" to the US, who "have the most expensive health care system". Can't use Canada as OHIP et. al. don't cover much and the same employer tied insurance scheme as in the US exists and is necessary. An example of a country with "good healthcare" an…

Canadian (OHIP recipient) here. As a long time employer, and former employee, I can tell you that no one takes a job here for the heath care. Some things like dental and vision are not covered (unless you are under 18, over 65, or low income), but everything else is. Over the course of a decade my father in law had 3 heart attacks, a stroke, and ultimately lost a year long battle with lung cancer. The total health ca…

> Now the downside … because health care is free, everyone uses it and the wait times are longer. My grandfather recently required an MRI (non life threatening). The wait time in Ontario was 3 months. He drove to the USA, paid out of pocket, and had it done within in week …

Imo, singapore solves this well, by ensuring that some cost is borne by the patient at point of use, but it's never anything excessive. No one goes bankrupt from emergency hospital visits.

Re: Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

#464
post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the relative value of those same labor (hairdresser, daycare worker) changes. If my labor as a tech worker was $50 / hour I'm willing to pay $30 / hour for a haircut. But now if I make $100 / hour I'm willing to pay $60 for the same haircut. And in both situations I still need a haircut and the hairdresser is still the place to go to get one.

Sure, but the gap between your hourly wages has doubled.

Which is fine right? If both wages just keeps up with inflation, the gap will increase by the same amount as well. In fact in this particular case I wouldn't even expect the hairdresser's wage to increase the same amount proportionally, which is also fine. Not all wages should increase at the same rate.

Re: Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

#465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Historically, they were better jobs due to a strong labor movement, but that movement has been largely destroyed. This is a widely believed narrative, but not necessarily true. The competing narrative that better living and working conditions arise from better technology and cheaper energy is just as supported by the data. Perhaps even more so because it also explains the post-1971 decline.

How does the explanation without labor power dynamics explain the post-1971 decline? Electricity is cheaper inflation adjusted than it was then, and technology has certainly progressed since 1971.

And working conditions are better now than 50 years ago too.

Re: Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

#466
post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Historically, they were better jobs due to a strong labor movement, but that movement has been largely destroyed. There's something to be said that the labor movement was destroyed by eliminating the need for the labor. Bringing the labor back would see the labor movement return.

People still work, so this is a very bizarre comment to make.

Not really sure how you come to the conclusion that I was under the notion that nobody is working. Union membership has been in decline for decades. Labor jobs have been leaving the country for decades. Bring back the labor jobs that the unions represent and the union membership will go back up as well. The labor jobs that still remain are what's left of the union membership.

Re: Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

#467
This ship has sailed. Economy will not revert back to what it was with wishful thinking. Especially offshoring jobs is the utmost goal of every CEO, even if the wage is one dollar less. This benefits himself and his customers giving no f... for the unemployed.

China is living its 1990's this decade: the boom is starting to wear off. Next comes India which is living its 50's. Next will come Nigeria which is in it's 20's. Offshoring jobs will continue until the end of modern civilisation.

Re: Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

#468
post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The old chestnut that Henry Ford didn't actually say comes to mind though: "I wanted to pay my workers enough so they could afford the cars they were building." If they were making them in the US, Tim Cook could pay them enough to afford an iPhone on a payment plan with Verizon or AT&T. Even if he didn't want to, there's a federal minimum wage US workers employers are required to pay. What's frustrating is the invest…

> That money could have been spent on America This is wishful thinking, and similar to how how video game producers think if they stop N people from pirating a game, there will be N more copies of the game sold. No, instead of that the game will be played less. And analogously, less iPhones would be produced. You could argue that less iPhones would be good for the world, but that’s orthogonal to the topic.

IPhone production cost in China is between $10 and $30 per item. I believe a factory with US-level wages would not increase its price but it would definitely decrease Apple's profit margin.

Re: Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

#469

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not like the cost of clothes would be that much more if produced domestically though... the difference is the margins would be lower, a domestic employee would have a job and the domestic economy as a whole would be stronger as a result. Not to mention, the lower margin also means the wealth gap would be more narrow and there would be less incentive to stoke the flames of class warfare.

Why do people assume that clothes (and other goods, mind you) produced in the US are a mere hypothetical? There are plenty of brands that do so, and your general public overwhelmingly ignores them (and, as you have just demonstrated, don't even know they exist) precisely because they are way more expensive than consumers have been conditioned to believe that clothes should cost. For instance, actual MiUSA jeans from…

Where did I say there are no clothes produced in the US? That said, I do think there's room to compete of most US clothes were produced domestically and that the pricing could come well below the existing US brands.

There's also brands made in China for cheap with Euro brand labels attached that sell for several hundred. Cost is not the same as price.

Re: Jensen: 'We've done our country a great disservice' by offshoring

#470

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What countries, beyond the US, are you speaking to? I mean, I'm interested in what countries you're talking about that don't leverage tariffs and other restrictions to favor domestic industries in those countries.

Most countries had tariffs before trump, including USA. None have dumbass tariffs like trump though.

You should realize that the Trump tariffs are about opening negotiations from a position of strength and not a final position...

Plenty of countries have negotiated more favorable tariff positions.

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