Trump continous effort to bring manufacturing back to US will have very bad worldwide effects.

[dissolved]

Let me guess which sector you don't work in.About 10%-ish (a very important 10%).It's taken decades to get people to think exactly like you.

Now's as good as a time as any to make the US worker competitive again on an international scale. Be not afraid.

I agree with this.

 

[dissolved]

Also, the real effects of a reestablished manufacturing will probably only be seen in their full benefit years down the road. Maybe even a decade or more.

American manufacturing and it's spinoff markets is along-range, right plan.

 

[panamaican]

Also, the real effects of a reestablished manufacturing will probably only be seen in their full benefit years down the road. Maybe even a decade or more.

American manufacturing and it's spinoff markets is along-range, right plan.

You have to draw a distinction between American manufacturing and low skilled American manufacturing labor.

American manufacturing is doing fine and has been for quite a while. Low skilled American manufacturing labor is not.

So we're not trying to reestablish manufacturing...it never went anywhere. We're trying to reestablish low skilled labor.

 

[Teppodama]

You have to draw a distinction between American manufacturing and low skilled American manufacturing labor.

American manufacturing is doing fine and has been for quite a while. Low skilled American manufacturing labor is not.

So we're not trying to reestablish manufacturing...it never went anywhere. We're trying to reestablish low skilled labor.

Maybe what we need is a "heritage" manufacturing sector that allows for minimal automation with a focus on skilled labor. Not everyone currently in need of jobs is going to succeed at college or retraining in another industry. Some are simply too "old" to do so effectively. Set it up so it can be phased out over 25 or 30 yrs are successive generations have more focus on higher education. It also allows for more development of school initiatives in communities that are typically hit by this sort of thing.

 

[Buck Swope]

Lets cut the shit. Companies outsource to implement slave labor in 3rd world countries. The money isn't passed on to the consumer. It isn't passed on to the workers. It's just funneled straight to the top. It's definitely not used to hire more people to make better and more interesting products. That's a load of shit

They want to make us believe that everything would cost an arm and a leg if everything was manufactured here but the only reason everything would cost that much would be because CEO's want to be able to keep their salaries as insanely high as they've been since they've been taking advantage of poor people in other countries. If they went back to being rich like they used to be instead of insanely rich like they are now, the products would relatively cost the same and a larger percentage of this country would be working and working at a higher wage.

Do you honestly see this happening?

 

[panamaican]

Maybe what we need is a "heritage" manufacturing sector that allows for minimal automation with a focus on skilled labor. Not everyone currently in need of jobs is going to succeed at college or retraining in another industry. Some are simply too "old" to do so effectively. Set it up so it can be phased out over 25 or 30 yrs are successive generations have more focus on higher education. It also allows for more development of school initiatives in communities that are typically hit by this sort of thing.

Good luck with that. I can't imagine any company investing the money to prop up unskilled labor just so that they can phase them out again in a decade or three. They already did that. They phased these people out over the last 20+ years.

The real problem is that the phased out people struggle with accepting that they are unskilled labor. They still nostalgically see themselves as the backbone of manufacturing internationally. Because of that they reject any policy directions that aims at helping "unskilled labor" because that's for other people, not them.

It's like a kid who's flunking math. He's never going to accept private tutoring if he refuses to acknowledge that he's failing. As long as he keeps blaming the textbook or saying that the teacher just doesn't like him, he's never going to get better. No matter how much help you offer him.

 

[Teppodama]

Good luck with that. I can't imagine any company investing the money to prop up unskilled labor just so that they can phase them out again in a decade or three. They already did that. They phased these people out over the last 20+ years.

The real problem is that the phased out people struggle with accepting that they are unskilled labor. They still nostalgically see themselves as the backbone of manufacturing internationally. Because of that they reject any policy directions that aims at helping "unskilled labor" because that's for other people, not them.

It's like a kid who's flunking math. He's never going to accept private tutoring if he refuses to acknowledge that he's failing. As long as he keeps blaming the textbook or saying that the teacher just doesn't like him, he's never going to get better. No matter how much help you offer him.

So do you truly believe that all of the current unskilled labor affected by the changes in manufacturing are capable of being retrained to a skill level sufficient that they can stay above the poverty line?

 

[panamaican]

So do you truly believe that all of the current unskilled labor affected by the changes in manufacturing are capable of being retrained to a skill level sufficient that they can stay above the poverty line?

No. I don't.

But that doesn't mean we prop up their former industries to protect them from economic change. We have to be more forward thinking than that.

It's like propping up typewriters just because some people can't become proficient on computers. Or camera companies just because 70% of photos are now taken by smartphone. Industries die. The labor has to move on. We can help them move forward but we shouldn't be crafting strategies on how to stall progress just so they don't have to deal with it.

 

[Teppodama]

No. I don't.

But that doesn't mean we prop up their former industries to protect them from economic change. We have to be more forward thinking than that.

It's like propping up typewriters just because some people can't become proficient on computers. Or camera companies just because 70% of photos are now taken by smartphone. Industries die. The labor has to move on. We can help them move forward but we shouldn't be crafting strategies on how to stall progress just so they don't have to deal with it.

Without real viable options for work that provides sufficient compensation, most of these people will end up on the dole and remain there till they die. I would rather prop up an industry for a further generation or two to allow those currently above a certain age to gracefully pass through to retirement. One at least offers them the opportunity of honest work for honest pay.

Hell, the government loves spending money so much lets get started on infrastructure. With a sufficiently expansive plan, there would be plenty of jobs for blue collar workers seeing their manufacturing industry fade away. How about we skip buying or researching a couple dozen billion dollar fighters to help pay for the infrastructure project..

 

[Possum Jenkins]

'Fuck rest of the world' - you will all change your tune when ENTIRE world turn their back at you the same way America going to turn its back to the rest of the world.

The US is already isolating itself politically. The marches against Trump outside the US are a clear sign of this. Trudeau's statements are pretty shocking considering Canada is a close ally. Another trusted ally, the UK, has a petition of over 1.6 million people asking that Trump not be allowed to visit.

And this is only 10 days into his administration and with all his attention paid to domestic policy. Once he gets started with foreign policy it'll be a total shitshow.

The right-wing isolationists will be thrilled though. The "internationalists" are their #1 enemy so adopting North Korea-style isolationism will be outstanding. Screw taking it back to the 1950s, they want to go back to the 1050s when the contact with the outside was minimal.

 

[panamaican]

Without real viable options for work that provides sufficient compensation, most of these people will end up on the dole and remain there till they die. I would rather prop up an industry for a further generation or two to allow those currently above a certain age to gracefully pass through to retirement. One at least offers them the opportunity of honest work for honest pay.

Hell, the government loves spending money so much lets get started on infrastructure. With a sufficiently expansive plan, there would be plenty of jobs for blue collar workers seeing their manufacturing industry fade away. How about we skip buying or researching a couple dozen billion dollar fighters to help pay for the infrastructure project..

As for these people ending up on the dole until they die...plenty of people are already on the dole because they can't find work. We're not going around and propping up whatever industries they used to work in. We tell them, correctly, that they have to go out and find new work. Get new skills. We don't enact an economic time bubble for them. I don't see how unskilled manufacturing is any different. Typewriters going under? Learn to use a mouse.

If you want them to pass gracefully into retirement, strengthen the safety net for the elderly.

Propping up their industries is not honest work for honest pay. Honest work would mean going out and competing for whatever jobs are out there and whatever pay exists. Dishonest work is propped up industries paying wages that don't make economic sense, ie. dishonest pay.

 

[cooks1]

I think Trump is doing great things for America.

But we will find out in 3 years how it's going.

We will see. Hoping for the best. It still baffles me though how people do not equate tariffs to taxes. Because that is essential what they are.

When I hear Spicer and Trump prattle on about imposing a 20% tariff on Mexico to pay for the wall, it makes me wonder if they understand anything. Anything at all.

Say you impose a 20% tariff on goods coming into the US from Mexico. Mexico does not pay that 20%. The purchaser in the US pays that 20%. And then that additional cost is factored into the price of the goods, which are also bought by people in the US. So a 20% tariff is little more more than a tax on people in the US. And a highly regressive tax at that.

If you want to make the argument that a tariff might alter the trade balance, that's fine. But the US is not the only nation allowed to impose tariffs. If the US imposed a tariff, Mexico would likely impose one soon after, essentially taxing their citizens. And so it goes. With Mexico and every other country.

In the end, this is a loser for the US, because while we are by far the worlds biggest economy, we are still only 17% of the worlds economy. Giving yourself a larger piece of a smaller pie both limits growth and elevates risk.

All this really does is drive up the cost of goods. And one of my big concerns is that inflation is how Trump will grow the economy. Combine these tariffs with the additional cost involved with forced increased domestic production under fear of penalties, and add in some interest rates that have nowhere to go but up (Which of course is none of Trumps doing, but an issue nonetheless) and you could have our economy growing at 5% a year with 10-12% inflation, which is not growth at all. It is a recession hidden in an inflationary spiral.

Trump will be focusing on how to give the rest of the world less of our pie. IMO, the time would be better spent working to get more of the rest of the worlds pie. And there are definitely things we could be doing in that area.

 

[original doom]

When jobs come back they will be automated.

 

[dza76wutang]

As for these people ending up on the dole until they die...plenty of people are already on the dole because they can't find work. We're not going around and propping up whatever industries they used to work in. We tell them, correctly, that they have to go out and find new work. Get new skills. We don't enact an economic time bubble for them. I don't see how unskilled manufacturing is any different. Typewriters going under? Learn to use a mouse.

If you want them to pass gracefully into retirement, strengthen the safety net for the elderly.

Propping up their industries is not honest work for honest pay. Honest work would mean going out and competing for whatever jobs are out there and whatever pay exists. Dishonest work is propped up industries paying wages that don't make economic sense, ie. dishonest pay.

This makes sense when the competition is fair and will make a lot of sense when automation and AI dominate the discussion.

As much as I favor the idea of free market and competition, I think we have a weird situation here. We have people who have to compete in intrinsically unfair competitions.

In some parts of the world, a worker can be paid $1/hour. In USA nobody can work for that. In some parts of the world, pollution is allowed. In USA it isn't. This is not the same as France propping up its iron industry against the Flemish because iron was less plentiful / more costly to produce in France. We are not benefitting from gratuitous natural bounty, we are benefitting from a government's willingness to exploit, dare i say, harm its population.

This is why I think we need to more carefully consider how deep in the gray this issue is. It is definitely not black and white.

 

[MoparOrNoCar]

Do you honestly see this happening?

No not at all.

My point wasn't that it's going to happen. It was the fact that they are lying to us to make us think that the only way we can afford these products at a reasonable rate is by them using slave labor overseas to create them. It's a lie to keep us from placing them blame on their outright greed.

 

[Higus]

Hell, the government loves spending money so much lets get started on infrastructure. With a sufficiently expansive plan, there would be plenty of jobs for blue collar workers seeing their manufacturing industry fade away. How about we skip buying or researching a couple dozen billion dollar fighters to help pay for the infrastructure project..

I worry that this just shifts the forces driving automation in manufacturing into infrastructure projects. It might be a temporary reprieve for low skilled laborers for as many years as it takes for automation to catch up (a rate that will be directly proportional to it's overall costs), but what then? What happens when there isn't a demand for low skilled labor in a country with a large supply of it?

 

[panamaican]

This makes sense when the competition is fair and will make a lot of sense when automation and AI dominate the discussion.

As much as I favor the idea of free market and competition, I think we have a weird situation here. We have people who have to compete in intrinsically unfair competitions.

In some parts of the world, a worker can be paid $1/hour. In USA nobody can work for that. In some parts of the world, pollution is allowed. In USA it isn't. This is not the same as France propping up its iron industry against the Flemish because iron was less plentiful / more costly to produce in France. We are not benefitting from gratuitous natural bounty, we are benefitting from a government's willingness to exploit, dare i say, harm its population.

This is why I think we need to more carefully consider how deep in the gray this issue is. It is definitely not black and white.

There are no intrinsically unfair competitions the way you're describing them. In the U.S. nobody can work for $1 because the American worker's unions lobbied to kill that with the minimum wage. No one came over here and forced us to keep raising our minimum wage.

Plenty of Americans are childish on this. They want high minimum wages then they want to blame corporations for not wanting to pay them. But they don't think they need to get more skilled to justify those wages. So it's everyone else's fault.

Those $1/ foreign workers were $1/hr workers even when we had those factory jobs. They didn't suddenly drop their pay scale to steal our work. We kept increasing our pay demands until we stopped being competitive. Then we turned around and blamed them for not doing the same thing.

 

[panamaican]

I worry that this just shifts the forces driving automation in manufacturing into infrastructure projects. It might be a temporary reprieve for low skilled laborers for as many years as it takes for automation to catch up (a rate that will be directly proportional to it's overall costs), but what then? What happens when there isn't a demand for low skilled labor in a country with a large supply of it?

You learn what I learned in India talking to a former government official. They slow down the implementation of tech because they don't have any other way to employ those people. So rather than unlocking the potential of their nation, parts of it are still in the 19th century just so that some uneducated Indian can have a job.

Now, to be fair, India didn't have public education until recently so there really wasn't a way for those people to get skills. But we do, so what is our excuse?

 

[Buck Swope]

No not at all.

My point wasn't that it's going to happen. It was the fact that they are lying to us to make us think that the only way we can afford these products at a reasonable rate is by them using slave labor overseas to create them. It's a lie to keep us from placing them blame on their outright greed.

Great point.

 

[Sir Galahad]

So three relatively small counties and two sparely populated ones? While China counters with what, half of India?

They're America's most trusted allies. We don't need shitty products from China.