[UnderseaLcpl]

Originally Posted by Platapus

Can we put this in big honkin font that flashes red?

Yes, you may.

I always shake my head ruefully when I hear that China is "taking" jobs.

I wish I could be so tactful. I usually launch into a tirade like the one I posted above when the subject comes up.

This whole thing started post WWII when the American people made a choice:

Made in America for X price
Made in Japan for Y price

Americans, being good capitalists, chose the option that gave them the mostest for the leastest.

I see your point, but that isn't exactly how it works. We'd all love to believe that there is some kind of logical course of action we can take to strengthen our nation. It is that very desire that interested parties love to prey upon, particularly when their jobs are at stake.

In reality, there is no easy way out. Buying American does nothing to perpetuate the US economy. No amount of national pride will ever rebuild the manufacturing sector because you cannot override the inviolable law that people will always end up purchasing whatever is the most economical. Societal visions mean little or nothing to a family that is simply trying to make its wat in the world. They will always opt for the most economical product, to the best of their ability.

No one stole any jobs, no one took any jobs. The customers (us) chose.

And we always choose what is most efficient. Well, most of the time, anyway.

Don't blame the government, don't blame "big business", blame the customers for choosing to buy foreign goods.

Oh, but I do blame the government. In fact, I blame the government for at least 37% of the failure of US industry, which is equal to the corporate tax rate; read 37% increase in the prices of goods. I also blame it for additional increases in the prices of goods through tariffs, superfluous licensures, and the ridiculously expensive legal fees that must be paid just to buy or sell something in this damn place.

There is no point in blaming US customers, or any customers for that matter. They are a known factor. They will always buy the mostest for the leastest. Even if they didn't, they could not support the US economy on their own. You must either be competitive or innovative to be prosperous. The world does not pay for mediocrity.

You've been suckered into believing something that isn't true by people who don't give a rat's ass about you or anyone else. They simply proffer the argument that buying American is better because they want to keep their jobs and charge you extra for their own gain. You would not believe the lengths they will go to achieve their goal, either. Read ten pages of US trade law and you will see the ludicrous lengths people will go to to preserve their jobs at the expense of prosperity for everyone else.

As with most things in life, you have to earn prosperity, which means that you have to be competitive. Being competitive in a capitalist society means giving people things they actually want and not manipulating them, or worse, forcing them into paying more.

Well, now it is probably too late. America can't rebuild our manufacturing factories and even if we did, the price of the goods would not be attractive to the customer.

You are correct. The American manufacturing industry is dead, more or less. Nobody is going to pay the wages we demand.

But who cares? Our economy is not a modern manufacturing economy anymore, just as it wasn't a sweatshop economy 150 years ago, or an agrarian economy before that. Thank God we didn't listen to the whining of people who wanted to keep their jobs then. Whay should we do so now?

I believe you will find few American customers willing to pay American wages, to buy at American prices, what can be obtained from overseas.

Correct. But you will find more than enough investors willing to pay poor overseas wages for cheap goods. That's the wave of the future, and most American companies have already realized this.

Sure Americans "care" about the lost jobs... but do Americans care enough to pay much more for the same product? Probably not.

Does anyone care enough to pay more - no matter where their loyalty lies?

Most Americans seem satisfied buying a smarmy magnet from a Chinese company that states "buy American products"

And you judge them for this?

No one took anything. We choose to give it away.

Indeed, but not in the way you imagine.

As Porky Pig would say "We buttered our bridges, now we can sleep on it

Bbde bde bbde- that's all, folks