Is there any manufacturing in Des Moines?

[Chicago60614]

Right, in the 50's and 60's America was in a very unique place in the world, since wars had literally destroyed the other industrial powers. We kinda ruled the roost, and Americans standards of livings saw the benefit.

Now that we're in a more global economy, and we started going wild with our consumer spending, families are having to hold at least two jobs, and the manufacturing capacity has moved on to other cheaper countries who have built up their industrial base.

As long as we move to a more global economy, services in the US will only pick up, and manufacturing will go down. This is why Des Moines, Iowa City and Ames have done well the past few decades, they don't have a manufacturing economy - and don't have the drastic need to retool, reinvent themselves.

Chicago is another example of a city that has successfully shed a large % of its manufacturing jobs, and pulled in a lot of finance/service jobs. Detroit is an example of a city that has struggled to hold its manufacturing jobs, without finding any solid replacement industries.

The "new cities" of the south are going through the same booms that the midwest cities went through in the early/mid 1900's, except for them they're starting off with more service and tech industries, whereas the midwest started off with manufacturing.

[eejm]

[quote=El Rhino;2545779][quote=zz4guy;2544448]I'm not sure what you mean by entry level blue collar jobs pay more vs a 4 year degreed business major. I thought they would be about equal, if not better pay to the business major.

From what I gather the earning potential of someone with a business degree is going to be higher than those in blue collar jobs. As far as entry level goes, blue collar jobs usually pay a lot better. If you climb the ladder in a white collar job you can typically earn more.

I work at the Firestone plant and I made more than virtually everyone I know around my age with a college degree. Hell, a lot of people I know with college degrees are doing something way outside the realm of what they went to school for, like working retail or an entry level position at Wells Fargo that you could've gotten with a high school diploma and/or an AA in Business. I know if I were to get a general business degree and get a job with it, odds are I would take a very sharp pay cut (anywhere from 20-50% based on what I've read), plus all the money spent on school and the pressures of living a white collar lifestyle as opposed to blue collar.

I'm not knocking education, I'm going to school part time myself.

My husband works at the Firestone plant too, El Rhino. He is a 'computer guy,' and worked as such in a corporate environment for many years before he went to Firestone. The move there has been very positive for him, and has allowed him much more growth (professionally and financially) than he had in the corporate sector. It could just be his individual experience, but I certainly wouldn't discourage anyone from taking a job in manufacturing here. Firestone and Titan are both doing fairly well, I know.