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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

#771

Post by mlsu »

nitwit005 wrote: post #751
asdajksah2123 wrote: post #109

America does need to bring back manufacturing. Not because a manufacturing job that pays $25/hr is somehow better than a service job that pays $25/hr. The US needs to bring back manufacturing for strategic reasons and in strategic areas. And it needs to have the capability to scale up manufacturing in response to emergencies. But also, importantly, the US doesn't need to do this by onshoring all manufacturing. Near s…

The cheapest option would then just be to try to become allies with countries where manufacturing is growing the fastest.

Yes, China.

The policy should be collaboration with China. 50/50 state subsidized joint ventures with Chinese corporations on EVs, raw materials refining, solar panels and batteries, etc. At the same time, a gradual and predictable tariff in those targeted areas. All of this, with the explicit consent and collaboration with the Chinese government. You could kill 2 birds with one stone and focus these policies on green energy and energy independence -- lessening the effects of climate change.

That is what you would do, if you really cared about bringing manufacturing back.

As of today, there is absolutely no off-ramp. The Dem policy is basically trump lite with respect to China. We are moving in lockstep towards making them a geopolitical adversary, and for what?

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#772

Post by hnburnsy »

>We don’t have the infrastructure to manufacture

It is really that hard. Look what happened in Arizona. TSCM brought the most complex semiconductor chip making supply chains to the US on a vacant piece of land in NW Phoenix in about 4 years. And it wasn't just TSMC that invested in the Arizona site, but also companies like Linde ($600M), APS ($100M), Sunlit Chemical ($100M), Air Liquide ($60M), and Chang Chun ($300M).

Maybe others can comment, but are semiconductor chips the most complex thing to manufacture in the world? Not sure but the Arizona TSMC supply chain proves it can be done.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#773

Post by SR2Z »

imglorp wrote: post #701
glitchc wrote: post #589

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Concur, employee training and retention are at an all-time low. There are no positions available for junior employees, minimal onboarding and mentoring of new employees. Organizations have stopped planning people's careers. Used to be that the employee's career growth was their manager's problem, while the employee could focus on the work. Now the employee must market themselves as often, if not more often, than actu…

It's also fundamental tech and a research pipeline supporting new ones. There are numerous examples of whole competencies were transferred to a foreign partner, leaving only sales and marketing in the US. TV's for example, gone by 2000, leaving only a swirl of patent walls to further prevent them from coming back. https://www.detroitnews.com/story/opinion/2014/10/22/america... And research? DEC WRL, Bell Labs, Xerox…

Corporate research spending is nearly $1T/yr. Yes, corporations have a lower risk tolerance than the government, but that's not always a bad thing.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#774

Post by elif »

NoTeslaThrow wrote: post #581

We never stopped manufacturing, we just stopped employing people. > We don’t have the infrastructure to manufacture That's trivially false given we're the second-largest manufacturer in the world. We just don't want to employ people, hence why we can't make an iphone or refine raw materials. The actual issue is that our business culture is antithetical to a healthy society. The idea of employing Americans is anti-bus…

Chip subsidies seemed to work with little to no consequence. I'm not sure why you're so pessimistic about this obvious mechanism you even mentioned

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#775

Post by owlstuffing »

NoTeslaThrow wrote: post #728
owlstuffing wrote: post #717

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We never stopped manufacturing, we just stopped employing people. That’s a misleading oversimplification. While it’s true we haven’t stopped manufacturing, we did offshore a massive portion of it--especially after the Open Door Policy with China and subsequent free trade agreements. That shift didn’t just change where things are made; it fundamentally altered corporate incentives. Once production moved overseas, th…

Yes, I should have said "we just stopped employing americans".

I suppose so, since your use of “we” includes both America and China et al.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#776

Post by pif »

themaninthedark wrote: post #760
pif wrote: post #577

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Blue collar workers never pushed for globalization Maybe they didn't with their words, but they surely did with their money!

Yep! Those stupid blue collar workers buying cheap shit from Walmart because they couldn't afford to shop anywhere else, it's their fault their jobs were outsourced. The jobs left first, then the blue collar workers bought stuff from Walmart. Now you have the middle class who used to deride that cheap shit hooked on it, talking about how they can get next day from Amazon, Temu and Ali.

> Those stupid blue collar...

This is your opinion. I have not judged anybody.

My point is that cheap imports were welcome by everyone, especially by those who had the least purchasing power.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#777

Post by StackRanker3000 »

fleek wrote: post #503
kamaal wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would interesting to know what percentage themselves or their own children wanted to work at a factory. Can tell with a huge degree of confidence for all practical purposes thats 0. Its always easy to expect other people to make sacrifices working these jobs, while imagining you and your kids working office desk jobs.

Is everyone on hacker news so entitled and privileged they cannot even imagine an American citizen wanting to work for a living? I absolutely would work a factory job if it paid 100k+ and meant owning a home someday. Instead I got 100k student loans and make 60k at a desk and I'll never have a life outside of work because I simply can't afford it. I'll be 35 this year after 12 years of working and just starting to ha…

You would be able to afford a lot less if everything you bought was made in factories where every worker was paid north of $100k. That includes your home, by the way.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#778

Post by Yeul »

ninetyninenine wrote: post #747
maxsilver wrote: post #575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So paying everyone living wages doesn’t really do anything to solve the problem because the products created by people who are paid living wages are by definition more expensive due to labor costs. They aren't though. In America, "Paying living wages" always means "pay way more", because America underpays labour and overcharges for literally everything (products, services, basic cost of living -- every product on A…

That's right now. For China to even get to the state they are in now, workers were heavily, heavily exploited. In fact exploitation is the reason why they are the way they are now.

Isn't that the case for every country? My grandfather lived in a shack. He was a farmhand. In the winter his family almost starved.

Our nation's prosperity is a very recent phenomenon.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#779

Post by nitwit005 »

mlsu wrote: post #771
nitwit005 wrote: post #751

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cheapest option would then just be to try to become allies with countries where manufacturing is growing the fastest.

Yes, China. The policy should be collaboration with China. 50/50 state subsidized joint ventures with Chinese corporations on EVs, raw materials refining, solar panels and batteries, etc. At the same time, a gradual and predictable tariff in those targeted areas. All of this, with the explicit consent and collaboration with the Chinese government. You could kill 2 birds with one stone and focus these policies on gree…

Or, Mexico, Vietnam, India, etc. Despite perception, they don't have all the world's manufacturing.

Re: America underestimates the difficulty of bringing manufacturing back

#780

Post by MetaWhirledPeas »

runako wrote: post #768
MetaWhirledPeas wrote: post #767

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A factory worker making cutlery or light bulbs will generate less money for the economy than the average Costco employee. The good news is that we don't need to calculate the value of an employee, because the market itself makes it loud and clear: wages. The higher the wages, the higher the value. In any sane company, the less valuable an individual is to the bottom line, the less they get paid. So then, if the wag…

Agree 100%. And in this case, the market is yelling that we should not bring low-productivity jobs back to the US.

*Yet ;)
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