Live data from Hacker News

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

twitter.com

591–600 of 1001 posts

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

#591
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…

Businesses in a country that is a complete economic power house from plastic spoons to particle colliders and supercomputers are not going to outsource their finance to an overseas has-been.

They have their own straight-C-plus high schoolers they can train in finance.

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

#592
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…

> We need to anticipate a future where China is equal to America

I'm a US American living in Asia. I can't tell you with 100% certainty that in terms of technological progress, China is far far ahead of the US.

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

#593

Earlier quoted context omitted.

american has superiority in like number of incarcerated people per capita and infant mortality - that’s about it :)

Consumer debt too.

I read “Rich Dad Poor Dad” and apparently debt is a great thing… My “poor” Dad just never thought me this

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

#594

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Fishing is less profitable for the whole UK than Warhammer. This sounded completely insane to me. I tried to look up numbers and found that Games Workshop brings in > 0.5 billion in revenue (!!), compared to all of UKs fisheries at 1 billion-ish (profit margins are, as you'd expect, pretty favorable for the plastic figurines that they don' even paint for you). Thanks for this interesting fact.

What’s even more astounding is that most of Games Workshop’s manufacturing remains in the UK.

Not only that, they are actively expanding their manufacturing because their revenue is limited by supply. Their factories are running 24/7 and some products are still consistently out of stock.

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

#596
post #102
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…

It feels like the US is going to step on its own rake however. Instead of Fishing, it’s manufacturing. Largely a dead industry that has proven to struggle to stay profitable without extremely cheap back breaking laborers or huge regulatory cuts that we’re just not going to be able to sustain, putting both employees and customers at risk.

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

#597
post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In theory, you're right, however it ignores some key points; -Some of their costs are in fact linear based on the cost of the item. Inventory cost doubles, perhaps now they have to take out higher interest debt to finance that. Things like insurance would also at least double. Transaction fees (like card fees at about ~2%) and other parts (like returns risk) also increase linearly. -Reduced sales due to increased pri…

Presuming that theft rates will increase also if the item is more costly and affordable to less[edit*] people. Also if inventory is damaged in the warehouse or on the sales floor, lost or unsold then those cost scale with the cost of the item.

[flagged]

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

#598

"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 ab…

It is pure fantasy.

Pray tell, if they aren’t slaves, are they free to leave, and where to? What an asshole.

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

#599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right. And the more of that that happens, the better for the economy overall. The less of that that happens - implying more of it ends up in JKR's proverbial dragon hoard, not doing much good beyond being an impressive pile of wealth for the dragon to sleep on top of - the less good for the economy overall.

I don’t think your comment is accurate. When rich people get large amounts of money they don’t hoard it like they did in Roman times. That money either goes into the stock market or to a bank. If it’s in the stock market that money is being used in investments that further economic growth. The portion of the leftover money that’s in the bank is then lent out by the bank to others in the forms of loans and so on for p…

A lot of that "economic growth" is stuff like flooding the US with opioids, burning mountains of gas and coal to produce crypto scams, and chaining people to the office 60+ hours a week to produce reports justifying their "impact".

The nominal gdp is my father's time was lower and yet he could buy a house and support a family of four on a single salary as an immigrant in his early 20s.

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

#600
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…

That assumes that China’s population doesn’t collapse, which mathematically seems quite likely (and it’s already declining).
Post reply on HN