""We can't match the Third World labor prices""
interesting how you say that because US wages relative to say Indian wages are lower today than they were 30 years ago..thus India is less cost competitive today than it was 30-40-50 years ago.
So the gap there is closing. India, while socialist, is not communist. Slight difference, but it does translate into more freedoms. China, on the other hand is not seeing your closing gap. The Reds are quite content to expend $195 billion annually...they're own official statements...just to keep their currency pegged. And they use their other powers of communist tyranny to keep wages at slave levels...below all other third world nations. Which of course is what it is all about for them.