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It is a common fallacy among the general public that manufacturing, the actual physical production of stuff, is the key to economic prosperity, and if that process were to find its way on the other side of some border, then the local economy can’t prosper. But this is hogwash.

www.johnkay.com/2012/11/14/fetish-for-making-things-ignores-real-work

That article ignores the fact that anti-competitive situations allow for exhorbitant price markups. This is what big business always does: it looks for dirt cheap labor because it is looking for an easy way around the economics it sees locally. This is what slavery in the U.S. was about, cheap labor. Also, the waves of immigration that were allowed in the 1800's: cheap labor.

In all such cases, you have people who own, or nowadays don't own, just manage, large enterprises who think in very narrow economic terms, despite the fact that they are the steward of said large enterprises. Now to be clear, I am most emphatically not talking about "social responsibility" garbage; management's only true responsibility is to the shareholder. What I am talking about is taking a step back and actually thinking on a longer time horizon. Also, thinking not only the the direct, here-and-now, quarter-to-quarter scope, but realizing that a large enterprise in a given state or town is like an elephant that lives in the backyard: it has to be careful about what it does in order to avoid destroying the economy that it relies on. The most direct effect, of course, is causing the local economy around the business headquarters and operations inside the nation and state it is chartered in to tank. Case in point, Detroit Michigan. Big business had it's way there - it was the core of the economy. By being morally and intellectually lazy, looking for the easy way out, big business abandoned Michigan and now it's a mess. If we look farther out, and America itself is living in an economic wasteland nightmare, how is that good for big business shareholders of American companies ? Answer, of course it's no good.

Economists (frequently pinheads) think too macro once they get beyond about their second economics class. They forget about the basics.

Every time someone is working on something that needn't be done (twiddling thumbs, writing an email, having a pointless meeting, writing a regulation, complying with a regulation, thinking about how to avoid legal problems arising from a regulation, etc., ad nauseum), they are a) being paid (costing everyone) but not adding to the pile of goods and services available to purchase.

The more there is available to purchase, the more downward price pressure, which represents a better standard of living.

Economics can be clearly understood by a little simple drastic extrapolation. What if there were only 10 people working and producing in a society of 1,000 and 990 people in that society just lounged around and waited for the 10 people to make the food and serve them, make everyone's clothes, grow the food, build the houses, etc. How high would that standard of living be ?

Take the same population of 1,000 and switch it: 10 who are unable to work because they're sick or old, and 990 that are highly motivated and working a) diligently and b) wisely. They'd have all the necessities taken care of easily, and would go on to making various forms of education, entertainment, culture, scientific exploration, etc., that could be efficiently produced and therefore affordable and constantly deliver increased capability and happiness to the 1,000 people.

Economists and politicians today all-to-often list ethereal goods and services that are spoken of as being most worthwhile. In fact, if one digs into the reality of things, one finds they are not.

Take higher education for example. While in an advanced economy this is an area that would be worthwhile yet intangible for many who could afford to it but would not absolutely need it, due to the fact that our higher education system is simply a propaganda machine, sadly it does far more harm than good for us today.

Another source of confusion: high-tech jobs and jobs requiring advanced education, technology, innovation, etc. Sadly, the bell-curve's biggest early promoters, the educated elites, fail to acknowledge, either knowingly or unknowingly, that these jobs are simply confined to a small percentage of society. This is in part because of people's capabilities and interests, and in part because these jobs produce so much societal benefit relative to "worky-work" jobs that there simply is no need for a large percentage of the workforce to be employed in them. Simply put, there is no need for 10 million engineers to design cell phones, and most of the population could not do the job.