Misc socioeconomic rant
What manufacturing do we have on the US anymore? Heavy machinery, barely, even Boeing is outsourcing the bulk of their latest wonder plane and it's so far behind schedule it's a fucking joke, heh. And the outsourcing was supposed to streamline shit and work better than before and it's been nothing but worse all the way around.
We don't even make fucking Levi's in this country anymore! You seen a pair lately? The quality is piss poor compared to what it used to be but American consumers demanded lower prices and they obliged by taking their manufacturing off shore.
As I've said before IMO there are only really two ways to lower costs of goods and that's lower material costs or lower labor costs. Materials have been about as cheap as they're going to get for some time now, and labor is the last bastion of cost cutting in retail manufacturing. We've cut manufacturing, we've cut labor, we've cut management, we've cut support costs, all sent over seas to cheaper labor markets with government subsidized health care among other perks, like weaker labor and safety and pollution laws.
The US used to manufacture just about everything it needed, and we still could if we tried but we won't. And we won't because it would be inconvenient. And convenience is the only thing that matters today. Convenience drives every aspect of our social culture. Technology has allowed it, but the culprit is mankind's inherent laziness and selfishness. We want what we want and we want it now and that's been the social norm since at least the 80's. Fucking Reagan, heh.
So as jobs flee and benefits and income dry up, there's even more pressure on manufacturers to lower costs, and again material costs ain't moving, so labor costs are the only thing left. The jobs the US outsourced to India barely ten years ago are already being outsourced to cheaper labor markets.
Everything is going up because everything has to be shipped because nothing is made locally anymore because it's cheaper to make things in one big ass group than in smaller spots spread out over area. It's cheaper for Wal-Mart to buy everything there is and sell everything there is because they sell so much of it so by the very same concept of competition choice in the marketplace is reduced as smaller competitors can't compete on price because the bottom line is always price.
The forces have been circling the toilet bowel for a while now, but the centrifugal force has picked up enough speed that it's self perpetuating now. It's moving on it's own and there's not much we can do to stop it. The world's gonna take one massive economic dump real soon, but then 'real soon' is arbitrary.
Eventually we're going to run out of emerging labor markets to exploit, and what then? What happens when there's no place else that's cheaper? Well then we'll have some semblance of stability. It's just insane that it's so much cheaper to make plastic fucking clothes hangers in China than the US while having to ship the fuckers all the way here. That it's that much cheaper to make cheap crap in China and then shit it all the way to the US is just insane. It's nuts and we can't keep on this track.
We need to stop pretending the idea of a 'free market' is even attainable let alone desirable or even possible. There is no free market. Every country on the planet has subsidies, tariffs and quotas of some kind. Ever. Single. One. So lets stop pretending we all don't protect our own markets.
The problem for the US is we don't protect the right ones or the ones we do protect for the right reasons or in the right way. Fucking ethanol subsidies a perfect example of stupid. That's the dumbest God damned thing I can think of that's going on right now domestically. Fucking farm states are really starting to piss me off, and the industry is dominated by massive nationals now anyway, why are we still pretending that family farms are a force or consideration in this country anymore?
Any form of government is only as strong as it's protections of it's citizens, and any economic model is only as honest as it's protections of it's consumers. We're failing on both accounts and it's because people are greedy fuckers, but even the people that are being screwed won't change the system because they think they can be one of the greedy fuckers themselves. Once they make it they want the same shit the people got that are there now.
We don't even make fucking Levi's in this country anymore! You seen a pair lately? The quality is piss poor compared to what it used to be but American consumers demanded lower prices and they obliged by taking their manufacturing off shore.
As I've said before IMO there are only really two ways to lower costs of goods and that's lower material costs or lower labor costs. Materials have been about as cheap as they're going to get for some time now, and labor is the last bastion of cost cutting in retail manufacturing. We've cut manufacturing, we've cut labor, we've cut management, we've cut support costs, all sent over seas to cheaper labor markets with government subsidized health care among other perks, like weaker labor and safety and pollution laws.
The US used to manufacture just about everything it needed, and we still could if we tried but we won't. And we won't because it would be inconvenient. And convenience is the only thing that matters today. Convenience drives every aspect of our social culture. Technology has allowed it, but the culprit is mankind's inherent laziness and selfishness. We want what we want and we want it now and that's been the social norm since at least the 80's. Fucking Reagan, heh.
So as jobs flee and benefits and income dry up, there's even more pressure on manufacturers to lower costs, and again material costs ain't moving, so labor costs are the only thing left. The jobs the US outsourced to India barely ten years ago are already being outsourced to cheaper labor markets.
Everything is going up because everything has to be shipped because nothing is made locally anymore because it's cheaper to make things in one big ass group than in smaller spots spread out over area. It's cheaper for Wal-Mart to buy everything there is and sell everything there is because they sell so much of it so by the very same concept of competition choice in the marketplace is reduced as smaller competitors can't compete on price because the bottom line is always price.
The forces have been circling the toilet bowel for a while now, but the centrifugal force has picked up enough speed that it's self perpetuating now. It's moving on it's own and there's not much we can do to stop it. The world's gonna take one massive economic dump real soon, but then 'real soon' is arbitrary.
Eventually we're going to run out of emerging labor markets to exploit, and what then? What happens when there's no place else that's cheaper? Well then we'll have some semblance of stability. It's just insane that it's so much cheaper to make plastic fucking clothes hangers in China than the US while having to ship the fuckers all the way here. That it's that much cheaper to make cheap crap in China and then shit it all the way to the US is just insane. It's nuts and we can't keep on this track.
We need to stop pretending the idea of a 'free market' is even attainable let alone desirable or even possible. There is no free market. Every country on the planet has subsidies, tariffs and quotas of some kind. Ever. Single. One. So lets stop pretending we all don't protect our own markets.
The problem for the US is we don't protect the right ones or the ones we do protect for the right reasons or in the right way. Fucking ethanol subsidies a perfect example of stupid. That's the dumbest God damned thing I can think of that's going on right now domestically. Fucking farm states are really starting to piss me off, and the industry is dominated by massive nationals now anyway, why are we still pretending that family farms are a force or consideration in this country anymore?
Any form of government is only as strong as it's protections of it's citizens, and any economic model is only as honest as it's protections of it's consumers. We're failing on both accounts and it's because people are greedy fuckers, but even the people that are being screwed won't change the system because they think they can be one of the greedy fuckers themselves. Once they make it they want the same shit the people got that are there now.
posted by opus512 at 5:28 PM
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