Why do we need more factory jobs?

[Toni]

I don't think anyone has mentioned two issues with having most manufacturing overseas:

1. The environmental costs are enormous just in the shipping.

No. Shipping costs are a reasonable proxy for environmental impact of shipping and shipping across the ocean is very cheap. It's an economy of scale thing.

2. Supply chain issues which are very significant and costly. We ran into those when we were doing a home renovation and I had difficulty obtaining some pretty mainstream items such as....towel bars. Granted, I wanted a specific towel bar to go with the rest of the bathroom hardware but we're talking months of delays. And it was a stupid towel bar! What if it was something more important, such as a part for an automobile (or a whole line of automobiles), etc. This became a panic inducing issue for patients and their families needing some very common medications.

Have we forgotten the pandemic already?

This I agree with. Anything essential should be produced locally.

The point has been made that parts/products shipped from China will then be transported throughout the US mostly via land.

So would products/parts manufactured here in the US.

Why not just produce here in the US and skip the part where we must ship everything from China?

The cost of shipping as a proxy for environmental costs is only valid if the environmental costs are actually built into the shipping price. They are not. Instead we rely only on costs of fuel, labor, and whatever fees are assessed in ports.

 

[robnisch]

The US auto industry management has a history of making a lot of bad decisions. Just look at how they missed the oil crisis in the 70's.

 

[ZiprHead]

And US CEO pay is actually pretty much in line with the rest of the industrialized world. Comparing the top CEOs is a deceptive tactic used to pretend there's a problem--what should be compared is CEO pay vs company size. We aren't out of line by that scale, what's really going on is we have bigger companies. Partially because we simply are bigger and partially because our tax code so favors it--acquisitions are done with pre-tax dollars.

Really?

Survey details​

Figure 1 compares total compensation paid to large company CEOs across the five countries, while Figure 2 compares the mix of pay elements. Figure 3 provides a historical view of median CEO compensation over the most recent five years for each country included in the study. Finally, Figure 4 similarly compares the historical typical pay mix for CEOs for the same period.

View attachment 44455

Look at the second sentence of what you quoted of my post.

Look at the first sentence in my post. They used similar corporate size.

No. Your first sentence says "large". Therein lies the problem--the US has bigger companies.

Prove it.

Great Britain: Vauxhall, Jaguar, Land Rover, Mini, and many others

Germany: Mercedes Benz, BMW, Ford Of Europe, Opel , Volkswagon, Smart, plus others.

France: Renault, Citroen, Peugeot, Alpine, and many others.

US car companies: Ford, Tesla, Chrysler, GM, and a few niche market producers.

And why would size make such a great difference?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Look how many jobs have gone away from US union production. Detroit's products are simply not competitive with Japanese ones.

And for some obscure reason you feel that is due solely to the UAW?

I think it mostly is. There's simply so much more labor cost in a US car.

And the UAW imposed those labor costs how?

They're unions. Strikes. US cars not being competitive in most markets is a direct result of the sort of policy you favor. They get enough government protection that the US carmakers haven't gone out of business but they have been severely damaged by the UAW.

You make it seem as if the UAW imposed those costs and that management had no choices.

Realistically, they didn't. Unions slowly destroy whatever company they have sufficient power in.

 

[Politesse]

Realistically, they didn't. Unions slowly destroy whatever company they have sufficient power in.

So slowly you can't even tell the difference. Amazing!

https://www.princeton.edu/~davidlee/wp/unionbf.pdf

 

[laughing dog]

Look how many jobs have gone away from US union production. Detroit's products are simply not competitive with Japanese ones.

And for some obscure reason you feel that is due solely to the UAW?

I think it mostly is. There's simply so much more labor cost in a US car.

And the UAW imposed those labor costs how?

They're unions. Strikes. US cars not being competitive in most markets is a direct result of the sort of policy you favor. They get enough government protection that the US carmakers haven't gone out of business but they have been severely damaged by the UAW.

You make it seem as if the UAW imposed those costs and that management had no choices.

Realistically, they didn't. Unions slowly destroy whatever company they have sufficient power in.

You are long on content-free observations and short on reason and facts.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I don't think anyone has mentioned two issues with having most manufacturing overseas:

1. The environmental costs are enormous just in the shipping.

No. Shipping costs are a reasonable proxy for environmental impact of shipping and shipping across the ocean is very cheap. It's an economy of scale thing.

2. Supply chain issues which are very significant and costly. We ran into those when we were doing a home renovation and I had difficulty obtaining some pretty mainstream items such as....towel bars. Granted, I wanted a specific towel bar to go with the rest of the bathroom hardware but we're talking months of delays. And it was a stupid towel bar! What if it was something more important, such as a part for an automobile (or a whole line of automobiles), etc. This became a panic inducing issue for patients and their families needing some very common medications.

Have we forgotten the pandemic already?

This I agree with. Anything essential should be produced locally.

The point has been made that parts/products shipped from China will then be transported throughout the US mostly via land.

So would products/parts manufactured here in the US.

Why not just produce here in the US and skip the part where we must ship everything from China?

The cost of shipping as a proxy for environmental costs is only valid if the environmental costs are actually built into the shipping price. They are not. Instead we rely only on costs of fuel, labor, and whatever fees are assessed in ports.

Fuel--trucks and ships both burn hydrocarbons and produce CO2. Trains probably do even if they are electric. Fuel is a substantial cost of transport--thus a reasonable relationship between fuel cost and environmental impact exists. That ship replaces 10,000-20,000 trucks.

Labor--people need to eat and food production is very high carbon for what the human body can do. (Yes, a bus with a reasonable load factor is greener than people on bicycles.)

Taxes and fees are obviously unrelated to the environment.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

And US CEO pay is actually pretty much in line with the rest of the industrialized world. Comparing the top CEOs is a deceptive tactic used to pretend there's a problem--what should be compared is CEO pay vs company size. We aren't out of line by that scale, what's really going on is we have bigger companies. Partially because we simply are bigger and partially because our tax code so favors it--acquisitions are done with pre-tax dollars.

Really?

Survey details​

Figure 1 compares total compensation paid to large company CEOs across the five countries, while Figure 2 compares the mix of pay elements. Figure 3 provides a historical view of median CEO compensation over the most recent five years for each country included in the study. Finally, Figure 4 similarly compares the historical typical pay mix for CEOs for the same period.

View attachment 44455

Look at the second sentence of what you quoted of my post.

Look at the first sentence in my post. They used similar corporate size.

No. Your first sentence says "large". Therein lies the problem--the US has bigger companies.

Prove it.

Great Britain: Vauxhall, Jaguar, Land Rover, Mini, and many others

Germany: Mercedes Benz, BMW, Ford Of Europe, Opel , Volkswagon, Smart, plus others.

France: Renault, Citroen, Peugeot, Alpine, and many others.

US car companies: Ford, Tesla, Chrysler, GM, and a few niche market producers.

And why would size make such a great difference?

And comparing automakers is supposed to prove anything?

The thing is there is a clear relationship between company size and CEO pay and it applies across all countries. You need to control for this to make an honest comparison--but as with so much social justice "research" they fail to control for obvious confounding factors.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Realistically, they didn't. Unions slowly destroy whatever company they have sufficient power in.

So slowly you can't even tell the difference. Amazing!

https://www.princeton.edu/~davidlee/wp/unionbf.pdf

There's a big sampling flaw here: Unionized businesses are almost all businesses where the employer can't flee. They don't face much if any non-union competition. The businesses where unionization would eat the company reasonably quickly (note that their average time frame is about 10 years) nobody tries to unionize because it would so obviously be a bad deal.

Existing unions can also be a very bad deal for the workers. Look at Detroit. The UAW understands the problem and is trying to solve it by a two-tier approach: the old workers get a much better deal than the new ones. Or look at pilots: an extremely powerful union because strike-breaking is impossible, the guys with tons of seniority get very big paychecks, the ones with little seniority get chicken feed. 10x between senior and junior does not make sense!

 

[laughing dog]

Realistically, they didn't. Unions slowly destroy whatever company they have sufficient power in.

So slowly you can't even tell the difference. Amazing!

https://www.princeton.edu/~davidlee/wp/unionbf.pdf

There's a big sampling flaw here: Unionized businesses are almost all businesses where the employer can't flee. They don't face much if any non-union competition. The businesses where unionization would eat the company reasonably quickly (note that their average time frame is about 10 years) nobody tries to unionize because it would so obviously be a bad deal.

In other words, unions don’t destroy businesses.

 

[Politesse]

There's a big sampling flaw here: Unionized businesses are almost all businesses where the employer can't flee. They don't face much if any non-union competition. The businesses where unionization would eat the company reasonably quickly (note that their average time frame is about 10 years) nobody tries to unionize because it would so obviously be a bad deal.

It's like you don't even realize you're admitting the obvious.

 

[ZiprHead]

And US CEO pay is actually pretty much in line with the rest of the industrialized world. Comparing the top CEOs is a deceptive tactic used to pretend there's a problem--what should be compared is CEO pay vs company size. We aren't out of line by that scale, what's really going on is we have bigger companies. Partially because we simply are bigger and partially because our tax code so favors it--acquisitions are done with pre-tax dollars.

Really?

Survey details​

Figure 1 compares total compensation paid to large company CEOs across the five countries, while Figure 2 compares the mix of pay elements. Figure 3 provides a historical view of median CEO compensation over the most recent five years for each country included in the study. Finally, Figure 4 similarly compares the historical typical pay mix for CEOs for the same period.

View attachment 44455

Look at the second sentence of what you quoted of my post.

Look at the first sentence in my post. They used similar corporate size.

No. Your first sentence says "large". Therein lies the problem--the US has bigger companies.

Prove it.

Great Britain: Vauxhall, Jaguar, Land Rover, Mini, and many others

Germany: Mercedes Benz, BMW, Ford Of Europe, Opel , Volkswagon, Smart, plus others.

France: Renault, Citroen, Peugeot, Alpine, and many others.

US car companies: Ford, Tesla, Chrysler, GM, and a few niche market producers.

And why would size make such a great difference?

And comparing automakers is supposed to prove anything?

The thing is there is a clear relationship between company size and CEO pay and it applies across all countries. You need to control for this to make an honest comparison--but as with so much social justice "research" they fail to control for obvious confounding factors.

Again, prove it.

 

[RVonse]

Democrats and Republicans agree, Biden and Trump are hugging each other in agreement:

Manufacturing jobs are superior to other jobs and must get special subsidy.

I totally agree with the democrats and republicans that we need more manufacturing in the US and they are completely correct. But the most important reason they are correct has nothing to do at all with any of the stupid reasons given in your poll.

The number 1 reason we need manufacturing again is to become a nation of thrift instead of the nation of squandering. The US needs to become productive again...to produce more than we consume like we did BEFORE WW2. And the only legal and moral way to do that is to produce more goods than we consume which requires a local manufacturing base to do this.

Warren Buffet says this better than anyone:

 

[laughing dog]

From about 1800 to 1870, the US ran persistent trade deficits without hindering economic growth. From around 1870 to 1970, the US running trade surpluses. Now the US is back to trade deficits. It was easy for the US to run trade surpluses after WWI through the 1960s because Europe was rebuilding its economy.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Realistically, they didn't. Unions slowly destroy whatever company they have sufficient power in.

So slowly you can't even tell the difference. Amazing!

https://www.princeton.edu/~davidlee/wp/unionbf.pdf

There's a big sampling flaw here: Unionized businesses are almost all businesses where the employer can't flee. They don't face much if any non-union competition. The businesses where unionization would eat the company reasonably quickly (note that their average time frame is about 10 years) nobody tries to unionize because it would so obviously be a bad deal.

In other words, unions don’t destroy businesses.

In other words, they've already destroyed most businesses they can destroy.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The number 1 reason we need manufacturing again is to become a nation of thrift instead of the nation of squandering. The US needs to become productive again...to produce more than we consume like we did BEFORE WW2. And the only legal and moral way to do that is to produce more goods than we consume which requires a local manufacturing base to do this.

The basic problem here is the trade deficit doesn't show the true picture. The thing is we tend to import goods and export services--and since services aren't a thing they don't get counted as an export.

 

[RVonse]

The number 1 reason we need manufacturing again is to become a nation of thrift instead of the nation of squandering. The US needs to become productive again...to produce more than we consume like we did BEFORE WW2. And the only legal and moral way to do that is to produce more goods than we consume which requires a local manufacturing base to do this.

The basic problem here is the trade deficit doesn't show the true picture. The thing is we tend to import goods and export services--and since services aren't a thing they don't get counted as an export.

Of course services are counted toward GDP. Even government spending is counted toward GDP which it shouldn't and wasn't in the past when measurements were honest.

Considering Warren Buffet's success understanding money and his honesty, I'm inclined to believe what he is saying about this subject. Buffet is not the only billionaire saying this either, Ray Dalio (another billionaire) tells exactly the same story with the US. Our nation can NOT continue to consume more than it produces. Because the squandering of existing infrastructure, education, and production is the recipe for poverty and 3rd world status.

Either we need to drastically lower what we consume or we need to start producing more. Right here in the US.

 

[laughing dog]

The number 1 reason we need manufacturing again is to become a nation of thrift instead of the nation of squandering. The US needs to become productive again...to produce more than we consume like we did BEFORE WW2. And the only legal and moral way to do that is to produce more goods than we consume which requires a local manufacturing base to do this.

The basic problem here is the trade deficit doesn't show the true picture. The thing is we tend to import goods and export services--and since services aren't a thing they don't get counted as an export.

You are misinformed . The value of exports minus the value of imports is the trade balance . Exports include services.

 

[RVonse]

From about 1800 to 1870, the US ran persistent trade deficits without hindering economic growth. From around 1870 to 1970, the US running trade surpluses. Now the US is back to trade deficits. It was easy for the US to run trade surpluses after WWI through the 1960s because Europe was rebuilding its economy.

1800 was well before I was alive so I can not comment. But it is very curious that 1970 happens to be the year that the US stopped running trade surpluses. Because that is just about the time I would say lifestyle standard of living began to change (in a bad way) for most people in the US.

 

[laughing dog]

From about 1800 to 1870, the US ran persistent trade deficits without hindering economic growth. From around 1870 to 1970, the US running trade surpluses. Now the US is back to trade deficits. It was easy for the US to run trade surpluses after WWI through the 1960s because Europe was rebuilding its economy.

1800 was well before I was alive so I can not comment. But it is very curious that 1970 happens to be the year that the US stopped running trade surpluses. Because that is just about the time I would say lifestyle standard of living began to change (in a bad way) for most people in the US.

Living standards rise from 1800 to 1870 while the US ran trade deficits.