America has to get its head around the idea that not focusing on the lowest dollar all the time is necessary in order to bring back manufacturing back to America.
The good news is that automation will reduce the difference between the price of a China made item and an American one.
“America has to get its head around the idea that not focusing on the lowest dollar all the time is necessary in order to bring back manufacturing back to America.”
Prior to the globalist George H. W. Bush beginning the globalist free trade policies that destroyed American industry, we had:
1). Most manufacturing jobs paid a middle class wage versus $1.00 a day wages in China. In addition manufacturing jobs were a ladder for unskilled labor and high school grads to reach a middle class lifestyle and white collar jobs.
2). Quotas that restricted the amount of goods in various product categories that could be imported. Thanks to quotas, apparel sewing factories in Pennsylvania, Appalachia and the poor rural south provided jobs and income for poor people who today are on the dole. Often the reliable income from a sewing job for the wife, allowed small farmers to survive.
3). Tariffs on foreign products provided income to the federal government and protected American domestic supply chains. Remember, in the 35 years from the 1865 to 1900 the United States had the highest tariffs in its history. During that 35 years the US experienced an incredible economic growth rate moving from a primarily agricultural nation devastated by four years of civil war to the greatest industrial economy on the planet. So much for the claim by modern economists protective tarriffs are not economically beneficial.
4). Our integrated domestic manufacturing supply chains were essential both for a strong middle class and national security. The United States and the western powers won WWII in the factories of the United States. Without the conversion of US factories to war production, and the unprecedented output of military weapons and supplies from those factories, the armies, navies, and air forces that defeated Japan and Germany would not have been possible.
If you want to rebuild manufacturing in the US, you are going to have to bring back tariffs and quotas. Otherwise there is no economic incentive to rebuild the factories in the US.