I live in Ohio and that’s about the size of it. I sometimes wonder though. If there were hundreds of new manufacturing plants tomorrow, is the workforce really there for it? The small business owners I know struggle to find or keep people. Will the younger ones show up five days a week, shift work, consistently?
You get what you pay for. Goes for employees too.
They will show up when they work or go hungry. Look forward to a lot of trimming in the social aids that are destroying our formerly great work ethic. That’s part of the jobs, jobs, jobs, narrative. Working people pay taxes and non working people living free on the backs of others don’t pay taxes. We’ll go back to being a rich country again and pay off our debts.
The problem you mention is not confined to manufacturing. One of our friends is the head of HR at a large hospital here. He says that about half of all job applicants for positions other than staff physician cannot get through the criminal background check or drug screen.
They show up to flip burgers and pack products in warehouses for $8/hr, why wouldn’t they show up at a factory to make 3 times more ?
I think the key is in economies of scale. If America made a decision to become the world’s factory again, where automation produced 5 times the product using 2 times the current number of workers we could have high paying jobs and fill not only our own store shelves but the world’s.