While I have no doubt there are isolated incidences of that, I would have a very very very hard time ever believing it was systemic---preferences change, other countries figure out better ways of doing it, their wages are more competitive for a particular product, and/or regulations are better for an environment revolving around the creation of product "X".
To be honest, you sound like a globalist monopoly shill. This is their meme. "We'll buy up the new idea and send it to our shit factory in polluteville because our workers there can do it better and everyone will be better off".
You're confusing something here or I'm just not getting your point.
Your earlier charge that I'd have to be a lunatic to believe Americans are better at producing bananas, though extreme, is equally bullshit. You obviously don't have any firsthand knowledge of the banana industry, or do you think CAFTA is so that Guatemalans can buy a Cadillac Escalade duty free?. Actually, the US exports more bananas than Guatemala, so maybe we have to go the Ecuador to study their banana export model to verify your claim. If you think hordes of small banana pickers lugging their bunches to the freight ship on banana day couldn't be done more productively by Americans then call me a lunatic.
The move, for example, to send US steel capacity to Asia was a cold, calculated move. It had zero to do with labor cost savings. I'll repeat, it had ZERO to do with labor costs. The steel magnates (banks) used the wildly distorted business cycles of the 70s to set labor up to take the blame. It took sending the top US production, management and quality control engineers to Asia for a decade and a half before the Chinese could make a wood screw that didn't break when driven into pine (and they haven't improved much since).
Someone invents a product, someone invents a production method for the product, someone invents the machinery for the production lines, someone builds the machinery, someone mans the line to actually produce the product, someone inspects the product for QC.
The Asians don't get a lower price for the raw materials. They don't get a better price on the machines from Japan and Germany for the production line. They need 8 workers for every American to produce the same wealth. Their "scrap it" rate is astronomically higher because they don't have a "save it" department and their skill levels must be seen to even comprehend the vast gulf. The freight is a cost that isn't incurred here at all.
We import and pay a premium price for faucets made in Germany because they're the best engineered and highest quality faucets in the world... NOT because they're cheaper. No American would by a Chinese made pot metal and plastic look alike because no entrepreneur in the US would consider seeking out a Chinese build house to import such a shit product.
Home Depot, OTOH, would not only try a move like that, they have with thousands of products, for decades. This is the missing piece of the product development, manufacturing, shipping puzzle; marketing. The very same reason Ron Paul isn't the front runner. The globalists control the marketing. They can lie through their teeth with impunity. They can sell obsolete products as "new and improved", filling the landfills to overflow while they sic the GS Pukes on their US competition to force them to "Go Green, or else".
It took the Chinese 2,000 years longer to discover the wheel. They don't like modernization. They were perfectly happy for thousands of years. Then the empire was overthrown by the communists and Davey Rockefeller was on his way for a visit soon thereafter. Next came MFN status followed by "The Chinese Miracle".
American productivity, OTOH, evolved voluntarily. The worlds entrepreneurs risked everything to come here and work 70 hours a week for free on top of 70 hours for subsistence wages in hopes of realizing their dreams because it was the only place in the world where that scenario was possible.
Those 2 cultures compete? That's like a Canadian sandlot football team playing the Green Bay Packers. Period. And I'm awfully weary of hearing the global free trade horse shit story. Especially the part that blames our being forced to buy obsolete, toxic, cheesy bullshit products (sold as a good thing by marketeers and many people on this forum) on the "fat, lazy, stupid, overpaid, leeching ingrate" US worker. BTW, this was a propaganda campaign that began at the same time steel production was being moved to Asia. You know, "Japanese worker noble, humble and good... American worker stupid, obnoxious and lazy".
There are 30 electric car companies in the US. They've been building viable and affordable products for years. Can you name a few? Have you seen their products anywhere in the news... ever? No. We'll have to wait until communist GM rolls out their twice as expensive, doesn't work version of parts made in China and assembled in Mexico. Why? Because the globalists control marketing
and capital. They'll starve the entrepreneur while convincing you that their global version of the product is green and better made elsewhere, where "they can figure out better ways of doing it".
Believe me, if it were true, I'd embrace it. I've been in US manufacturing/retailing for 40 years. I lived through the transition. I've toured plants and studied raw mats in to boxed product out since I was 17. I've studied marketing. I spoke with the Home Depot folks when they were a lumber yard chain in Atlanta in the early 80s. Etc. It isn't true. None of it. That's why I don't embrace it and never will. The American entrepreneur is being lynched and his rotting corpse is being left to dangle for everyone to see. And there are many Americans who are cheering the whole affair and talking down to those who are aware and alarmed as though they're pitiable idiots.
Of course, there's a lot more to it. I just don't have the time or inclination to write a book. But, if you or anyone else is gonna tell me how it is with bananas or whatever, please include some data to back it up instead of the usual smoke and arrogance.
Bosso
