Since everything is made in China why don’t we want to have the power of making stuff anymore? (employment, generations)
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Drive in any old inner city amd see all the empty factories that have been long overgrown some gentrified and turned into lofts or fancy breweries but many lie abandoned and falling into disrepair. we used to be a manufacturing powerhouse. go to an antique store and look at all the things that were made in the USA.
environmental regulations were the first step. Taiwan started making some of our stuff for awhile and then China started once we had all our labor laws in place. then more laws came in until China was fully empowered to take on a majority of all western manufacturing.
and who used to work at those inner city factories? it’s no coincidence housing projects started getting built around the same time.
So it wasn’t the free market that made this happen. it was the hand of government that made the market react as usually is the case. Now we have GenZ’s and millennials calling for socialism we are told that the IRS is the foundation of America. We are happy to pay our taxes there is never any questioning of our taxes and where the money actually goes , we’re just happy to pay it because government is pure and righteous. Corporations may be greedy and misappropriate money but surely the government would never misappropriate or foolishly spend money. By the way, I think Ukraine needs a few more billion of our money. Did any of us vote for this?
I thought the people that we elect are supposed to represent Americans and American interests but so much of our money is wasted and recklessly spent overseas and there is absolutely no accountability. there is absolutely no questioning of it. just fork over more of our money and more of our manufacturing and more of our standing in the world. I recently heard Mexico has opened a new oil refinery. i wonder which countries will be the world superpowers in 20 years. here is a hint: they aren’t teaching their kids about nonbinary pansexuals in the classroom. they are and have been playing the long game. we have become so privileged and open minded that our brains have fallen out. The more I see that’s going on in America makes me come to the sad realization that we do not deserve a representative republic. We in fact do deserve a hard authoritarian socialist regime.
Chinese labor costs have skyrocketed, and in the largest cities, Managers now make $35k/yr.. Doesnt sound like a lot, but compared to 10 years ago, it is a small fortune.
China has already lost its wage advantage to other places.
Chinese labor costs have skyrocketed, and in the largest cities, Managers now make $35k/yr.. Doesnt sound like a lot, but compared to 10 years ago, it is a small fortune.
China has already lost its wage advantage to other places.
Yes, our Corporate Overlords have already diverted operations away from China to countries like Somalia and Burundi where they can enslave the most impoverished human beings (to improve their profits).
Everything even the sealed packaging on things we send domestically, even the bottle to open of our own drinks, even our own American flag Poles are made in China
But when I buy things on eBay, I see rare durable well made stuff , clothing, jackets, cabinet sets, allllllll made in America !!! All it it ?
Then if you want a customized version of a product you see you can’t…
I want to see where and how things are made . Can I move to China? My friends are moving to China Korea Japan Philippines Thailand Vietnam all over like all over Asia. Because everything is made there they can build like 45-story buildings in 4 days, they have amazing skyscrapers I wish we had more factories like the Chinese.
All you have to do is convince factory workers in the United States that they can live on five bucks an hour and we can do exactly what you want. Wages are less than that in Myanmar and Viet Nam and a few other countries, but all of them do not have factories capable of producing any precision parts.
Chinese labor costs have skyrocketed, and in the largest cities, Managers now make $35k/yr.. Doesnt sound like a lot, but compared to 10 years ago, it is a small fortune.
China has already lost its wage advantage to other places.
China has a lot of other industries now which are pulling workers away from low paying manufacturing jobs. The same thing happened in the USA as our country developed. The manufacturers either pay more or the jobs won't get done. Hence, we all get inflation until another alternative is found.
We can say China has lost wage advantage, but wages are only one aspect of the process of manufacturing. Surely there are lower wage countries to choose from, but just because they are cheaper doesn't mean all the jobs are going to go there. Not all low paying jobs are unskilled in manufacturing. India is lower paying, and has been for years. Yet it hasn't taken off as a manufacturing hub the way China did. Mexico is pretty cheap, yet a huge percentage of the available labor comes running to America to earn more. Hard to be a manufacturing hub when all your workers live in another country.
Not everything is about money, but people sure do try their best to make it that way. The fact is, 50% of all manufacturing work today is still manual labor and much of it requires years to master. China invested the time mastering these crafts and built an entire economy around protecting that. You can send all the jobs to places where people invested no time mastering this crafts, and you will get very little out of them comparatively speaking. Not until the manufacturing infrastructure and culture is in place, and that can take a whole generation or more.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cuebald
All you have to do is convince factory workers in the United States that they can live on five bucks an hour and we can do exactly what you want. Wages are less than that in Myanmar and Viet Nam and a few other countries, but all of them do not have factories capable of producing any precision parts.
In a few more years, it will be $10/hr, a few more, $15/hr, and a few decades, you will be a 2nd world country like most of South America. That's how that story ends when you are that greedy that you feel entitled to $3 or $4/hr labor. People have to live on very little to support your super awesome precious life of leisure and conspicuous consumption. It isn't the norm throughout time and there is always a mean revision.
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