English speaking labor in MS, AR and TX.
No unions.
No trans-Pacific shipping costs (and no tariffs).
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I know the workers are cheaper in China (so many of them killing for jobs), but the costs for a US company to manage non-English speaking people surrender IP to competitors, and ship products back to the US...I know I'm not the math guy in our business, but I have to think that short term decisions are being made.
US companies have trade secrets that they can share among all of their US sites (and European sites), but they absolutely cannot let their fellow coworkers use those secrets in China, because they know that the secret will be lost to a pop-up local competitor in China...it will appear out of no where, and may even use the same marketing color scheme. It's crazy.
One company there had to forcibly remove their local management when they found out that they were doing their own thing in Chinese, and falsifying reports in English...you just don't hear about executives barricading themselves in their factories here in the US.
The alternative to that? Open a slightly more expensive factory in Jackson, MS, pay your people a little bit more every year, but don't worry about losing your trade secrets to competitors, and don't worry about managing in multiple languages, and don't worry about shipping costs, and don't worry about the IT team being paid by the PRC.
US companies are naively accepting subsidies, and renting directly from the PRC (the biggest landlord in China) at cheap rates...and they are naively assuming the PRC will behave just like the United States government. The only problem is that the PRC does not act like the US. The PRC has a unified goal: replace all US economic power now with PRC economic power in 50 years. Their sole goal is to learn, steal and then compete against all the US companies that are naively building and hiring over there.
Until we make it a crime in the US for US companies to lose their trade secrets in China, this will continue.
When WalMart takes lowest bid for coffee makers, the US manufacturing does not have a chance.
The forces of the markets are holding a gun to the heads of some of these companies.
Without getting into too much detail, about 10 years ago I worked with a business that had to close down a US operation and move to China. They simply could not manufacture and sell in a globally competitive market... for every US based engineer, they could hire 6 in China. Skilled labor... take off 80% of the cost. We looked at every angle and in the end, for the business to be sustainable it had to move.
In this case, the down stream customers had also moved, so going to China had a cost advantage and a service advantage.
I am not saying that I like it but (as Chris Rock would say) I do understand.
Be Safe!
My company could hire a Ph.D. scientist in India for $25k/yr.
And, US business and markets think on a quarterly basis.
But the PRC thinks in terms of 50 years and 100 years.
The United States, as a nation, is committing a 50 year blood letting suicide by pushing our businesses to China. The time for protectionism is here.
This is a brutal situation and has been evolving for the past 40? 50? years.
This may be the time that supply chains are re-defined and some weight (as you mention with IP) is added to other factors when sourcing decisions are made. My direct experience is a little dated, but total costs for newer facilities (materials, construction labor, costs associated with safety, costs associated with environmental concerns) as well as ongoing labor, management including management or the PhD's ... are staggering in the money that was saved.
Just not an easy answer on this one.
You supply a decent or better product at a cheap cost that will be obsolete in a few years and the consumer can then get the brand new shiny one at the same or less cost that works even better.
made in America?
We look at the Chinese and complain that they take our jobs at low wages... and then scoff at the French for their short work week (they are so lazy.)
Easy to catch yourself (I'm talking about me here) being a hypocrite.
Not sure what we should do, but I find it easy to see how we arrived here.
Verizon rep in here before shit shut down telling me that I need an 11 and because we buy so much other shit from them he can give it to me for close to free. Politely declined. The cheap products we so dearly love, even the companies we work for, all made and feed the Chinese beast. Yet somehow this situation is all the Chinese fault? Pshaw.
Plus, why don’t we develop some alternatives to them with cheaper labor. Oh yeah, that’s right Orangeman say TPA bad.
The tariffs are designed to change US business behavior.
I don't blame China for competing with lower wages. I do blame them for stealing IP and setting up domestic companies to compete against the US companies they stole the IP from.
what needs to be incentivized.
And we all knew what they were doing and what the bargain with the devil was. Price of a consumer driven consumption economy.
There is an economic war going on, and we can't pretend it isn't happening.
China is the United States in 1941...a sleeping giant with 100 times more potential power than the potential of the US in 1941, and we know what the US accomplished when it woke up...and China isn't really sleeping...it is laying in wait.
But we are a consumer driven society.
Let’s partner with places where we don’t have to do that.
Tariffs aren’t the answer for our type of economy. Never have been.
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many cities in China. Another ignorant expert whose understanding on China is still in 1990's. No wonder Biden is your candidate.
And by the way, I lived in China for a while.
Is nice.
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him into retard.
It is not a "cool" suggestion to make in the business world.
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My company does nothing wrong, and everything good.
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about all the time like some.
What "my" company decides to do informs what I say on this forum. Why do you want to know if it does what I recommend or does the opposite of what I recommend? That is irrelevant to the discussion.
It’s just funny to watch you squirm and shuffle all the time.
Oh yeah, about 25 years ago, I worked for a big firm that did lots of shit I didn’t think was right. I left and have worked for myself since.
P.S. I had also made shareholder so the move cost me some big time, short term cabbage.
Feel free to assume the worst, though.
Some people are also willing to push it all on the table and take a chance. Some aren’t. To each their own.
You recruited workers from rural area of China. Unlike local Cantonese who have home and family life, these workers work and live in your factory. They go back home in rural area for 1 month vacation on Chinese new year, and work rest of 11 months. That's the only way I can think now Guangzhou can gain advantage over Jackson MS.
But hey how else could they amass billions in cash.