Quote:

Me too. But this is beginning to remind me of my union carpenter brother who chides me for riding a Triumph rather than a US made Harley while he drives a Dodge truck (assembled in Mexico) talks on his cell phone (made in China) wears his favorite jeans (made in Thailand) and plays with his electronic goodies (mostly made in Asia)

Protectionism has always been an economic disaster. The way to change things around is personal choice. As long as the vast majority of people shop mainly by price we will have goods made where it's cheaper to make them. The American worker has always been the most productive in the world but when an unskilled union laborer is paid $80K a year we shouldn't be surprised when the work is sent off shore. Our education system is steadily loosing ground when it comes to making our kids competitive, our tax system punishes risk takers, many of our politicians demean and disparage those who create employment opportunities and we all want the good life without making much effort to attain it. Much of the press ignores positive economic news for political reasons, joining with politicians who hope to benefit by spreading fear and despair. If we want to prosper we need to do it individually.

Here are some opportunities. Start a toy manufacturing company in the USA. Open a good chroming business that does good work and meets it deadlines. Invest in Vanson leathers or some other high end jacket company that makes its products here.



There's only one fly in the ointment here Larry. At most big corporations, such as FORD or GM, etc..., the Purchasing Agents who are responsible for sourcing components for assembly, are judged SOLELY on the amount of money that they can save on the components that they are responsible for. I've personally seen this up close, where they consider it acceptable to bring major components into a product from Mexico, for example, with a 300 ppm(parts per million, or defects per million which is how most industries measure defects) defect rate. Well, customers such as FORD DEMAND a 0 ppm defect rate on the parts that they buy from us. That means that the manufacturing floor becomes the filter for all of these defects (not to mention when the defect somehow reaches the customer), which of course, drives up manufacturing costs significantly in the US. But this is completely normal and encouraged ACROSS THE BOARD by Purchasing Managers at the Big 3, and I suspect at other companies outside of the Automotive Industry. It's not just the consumers causing the problem, but a mindset in corporate America to buy the cheapest from WHEREVER you can get it, because the end customer is always pushing for price cuts (even if consumers aren't, since when is the last time the price of the next model year car has gone DOWN?!), and the easy way is always to go to China/Mexico/Eastern Europe. And despite the mantra from everyone that QUALITY is first, the truth is simply that COST is first, ALWAYS.