...at least for the ten to fifteen years it will take for our transportation network to catch up.
How long would it take us (assuming that governments didn't get in the way, and that there's actually a will to do it) to build up US manufacturing and source more things here?
I suspect that it would take equally as long as it will be to get through the existing ports. We don't have the skilled labor to work in manufacturing, nor do we have the desire to pay for inflated prices--do you think those former McDonald's workers are going to build things for any less than $15/hour? More likely, they'd want to double that wage.
And the Federal bureaucracies will be there to triple the cost of everything. Over-regulation is one of the reasons so much manufacturing went overseas in the first place. For example the cost of permits to build a refinery in the USA is more than the cost of building the actual refinery.
Lou, mass production is cheap wear ever it’s done. Here, there any where. It’s degrees of cheapness.