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For years, we only bought American cars. With the exception of one memorable Chevy Suburban, they all required constant repairs and fell apart at about 80,000 miles.
We had a Chevy Super Sport that blew valve springs about once a week. A Dodge sedan that we should have set fire to. ...
Then we bought a Subaru. It could out climb a Jeep on snowy roads. Everyone wanted to go sledding with our family. We drove it until it rusted out. I bet it's still running, hauling dog food for some musher.
We now drive Toyotas.
I wouldn't go back to Fix Or Repair Daily for love nor money.
And Subarus and Toyotas are.....drum roll....today manufactured here in the good ol' USA. In places like Indiana and Kentucky.
Once upon a time 80% of the US people were engaged in agriculture and grew enough surplus to feed the other 20%. Today, less than 2% of the population is engaged in agriculture and produces more surplus food than at any point in history.
Why blame?
Technology substitution/ industrial robotics have eliminated more jobs than anything else, over time. Technology/ industrial robotics are being designed to compete with the cheapest sources of global labor.
It takes far fewer humans to produce a whole lot more. In 25 years, we will ponder job function that existed in 2019 that no longer do.
Competition, automation and a changing world, US citizens want cheaper products. You can forget about coal, its not coming back in spite of Trumps claims and that is for the best. Detroit was almost destroyed because of protectionism and complacency, what manufacturing is there in the rust belt.
Exactly correct. I didn't vote in the poll because the true answer was not among the choices.
Coal mining and steel making are gone, and good riddance. It is only natural that, as we progress, dirty and dangerous mining and heavy manufacturing jobs either get automated or sent overseas. American workers should be educated and trained to perform high value-added jobs in science, technology and healthcare sectors. The Rust Belt was a little slow in realizing this, which led to its decline, but is now coming back. Pittsburgh is a shining example;
"Touted as the “most livable city†by the likes of The Economist and Forbes, its highly literate and educated workforce has contributed to a robust and diverse local economy known as a center for technology, health care, and bio-science. It is a leader in startup businesses. Uber and Ford’s announcement in 2016 that they would base development of their self-driving cars in Pittsburgh, rather than in Silicon Valley, is a telling example of the power of high-tech image and low costs." - https://prospect.org/article/pittsburgh-conundrum
Once upon a time 80% of the US people were engaged in agriculture and grew enough surplus to feed the other 20%. Today, less than 2% of the population is engaged in agriculture and produces more surplus food than at any point in history.
Why blame?
Technology substitution/ industrial robotics have eliminated more jobs than anything else, over time. Technology/ industrial robotics are being designed to compete with the cheapest sources of global labor.
It takes far fewer humans to produce a whole lot more. In 25 years, we will ponder job function that existed in 2019 that no longer do.
Why blame?
Why blame? Because the people who are hurting desperately want to believe that a single shyster can take a few actions and make the pain go away. And will vote accordingly.
Based on what? Impossible to evaluate your claim without ant citations or links.
I was in the west burbs of Detroit in spring of 2016 on a job interview. Dunno about the city center but Novi to Wixom and some other towns that I forget the name are BOOMING with cranes everywhere.
Most of what I saw was 2 to 5 story office building attached to a warehouse/ factory going up.
Once upon a time 80% of the US people were engaged in agriculture and grew enough surplus to feed the other 20%. Today, less than 2% of the population is engaged in agriculture and produces more surplus food than at any point in history.
Why blame?
Technology substitution/ industrial robotics have eliminated more jobs than anything else, over time. Technology/ industrial robotics are being designed to compete with the cheapest sources of global labor.
It takes far fewer humans to produce a whole lot more. In 25 years, we will ponder job function that existed in 2019 that no longer do.
Why blame?
I completely disagree. While some of the labor intensive and dangerous jobs have been eliminated by tooling or robotics , that is a small portion. Here in the metro Detroit area there used to be a tool and die , mold, broaching, welding , fabrication shop on every corner. These are all gone and China has taken over. Sure , ACME Mold might still have an office here, but all the machining and building is done offshore.
Same with design shops. Now places like India and Mexico are doing class A surfacing, die and mold design, and product design that used to be done here. This is all part of the manufacturing process.
Now I'm just referring to automotive, I'm sure it's effected many other industries as well.
Oddly enough, some of the companies that survived without sending things offshore have streamlined their shops so much that they design and build an IP tool (for example) cheaper than a Chinese company. Yet they will lose out on the work because the supplier that is quoting the tooling spend millions in an "offshore design center" which in the end is costing them more. This happened on a program I was on. We had to send the tooling to China because their "shop" was sitting idle. It disgusted me.
yes the people in the rust belt was sacrificed for NAFTA
Oh, honey ... The collapse of U.S. industry started long before NAFTA.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Vegabern
News Flash: It's 2019. The "Rust Belt demise" happened decades ago. The majority of cities in the Rust Belt are well into their reconstruction and are thriving.
In some places, the demise is still happening.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BentBow
Over regulation is the root of all the problems listed.
Are you ready to chuck the 40-hour work week?
Do you like your paid vacation, employer contributions to your health care, and other workplace benefits?
You can thank unions for those things. But if you want to go back to 6 days and 45+ hours a week as was customary in U.S. industry in the early 20th Century and before, go right ahead.
Do you enjoy cleaner air and water than existed 50 years ago? More efficient automobiles and appliances?
You can thank federal regulations for those things.
Just my take on things. Personally, I feel it is the over regulations that has hurt the rust belt. And, I believe the driving force behind this is huge companies lobbying congress to pass the regulations so it would crush the smaller companies from competing. The bigger companies had the money to either outsource their jobs to avoid the regulations, or to just pay up the regulations while still able to offer low prices for their products. The small companies simply did not have this luxury and were eventually shut down due to bankruptcy.
I also would like to note, it seems to be these same big companies are the ones lobbying congress to push for mass immigration, and H1B1 labor laws because they can take advantage of the slave labor.
You are absolutely correct with the exception of your last paragraph. The real America looks like what we make it look like. You can point to the depressed places like Detroit or Youngstown that used to boom with industry and say that their natural state is what they look like today, or you can drive through places like Silicon Valley or Austin Texas or Minneapolis where business is booming and say that’s the real America.
The Rust Belt represented the classic American Dream and the easy life of the good ol days. Everything was more laid back and you didn't need to go to college (and accumulate all the associated debt) in order to make a very good living in the manufacturing plants. Vestiges of this still exist in parts of the South like my local area which has many high paying jobs in the refineries and petrochemical facilities and skilled labor on the pipelines, port facilities, railroads and barges. All of this for men without a college degree. There's a lot of liberal elitism toward those who don't go to college and Democrats and liberals don't really care about American workers without a college degree in their attempt to help illegal aliens and foreign nations.
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