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Comment by brcmthrowaway | Hacker News Reader

Can the west compete?

The problem with the west is that it’s already developed. Everything in the west is a bit like the European automobile industry, it’s highly refined for what it is and we expect to milk it for some time to come.

Same thing happened with the financial institutions and internet infrastructure - those who had the early versions of it established early ended up lagging behind once the technology was superseded.

The poorest countries in Europe had the best internet for a while because the richest countries wanted to milk the copper wires they invested on.

The US for long had much worse payments systems than Europe and Africa because they were at advanced stage on adopting the early technology.

strongly disagree. the West has almost no manufacturing capability or labor force (at an affordable rate) at the moment. it's almost unsustainable even for a small business to be paying $20 an hour in some cities let alone run large factories

Is it maybe because centering divs was much better career choice than dealing with machines and chemicals for more than a decade now? If that’s changing and manufacturing becomes a need, it should correct by itself.

The west, especially the USA invested gargantuan money into high margin high scale businesses and the Chinese worked their way up in dealing with atoms with help of the west. Now they too can do many of the high margin stuff and the west will have to re-learn how to deal with atoms. It happened because the west’s rich were simply shittier than Chinese bureaucrats and invested badly by choosing wrong KPI or ideas. Wonder what happens if the AI thing doesn’t pan out after pouring enormous money on it(instead of on something strategically important but not as potentially lucrative).

IMHO things are reversible, especially for the USA. Europe is in a worse place as its demographics and energy situation is less favorable.

> correct by itself

As a mechanist there’s more tax on my work now than when I was centering Divs because it was considered "research and development", which comes with tax exemptions. I won’t share the salary difference but you can bet it’s inversely proportional to the tax.

This is in France but I’m sure other Europeans countries have found ways to favor IT startups over usefull industries.

This is a ridiculous statement. The west has absolutely staggering manufacturing capacity.

China has more. And the trends are in the wrong direction, to be sure. But Germany and the US, among many others, have tremendous capacity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_automotive_assembly_pl...

Define "the west". There was an interesting article here in HN the other day [0] "Almost 10% of South Korea's Workforce Is Now a Robot". China now surpasses all the west-aligned nations in terms of total industrial robots [1], however the west still has the upper-hand in terms of robot to population density ratio.

I think it is a matter of strategy and it seems China's strategy is innovation, science and productivity. We on the west seem to like consumption before everything else and IMHO we are doing it wrong.

0 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42225091

1 - https://www.statista.com/chart/31337/new-installations-of-in...

Depends if the Chinese need a market to export to.

The main issue with china is a reliance on exports and a declining population...

All work and productivity is ultimately an enabler of consumption.

I think another axis is an underlying cultural difference: balance of collectivism vs individualism. China can say “there will be a factory here” because it’s overall good to have one, even if a few noses are out of joint. In California it’s decades of fights to get a train. The trick to competing is to find the right balance for the next decades. China used to be all-central-planning, which was sluggish and not agile. Now it’s guided by central planning (great for overall alignment) over many years rather than jerky 4 year stints, combined with massively distributed efforts to generate high levels of competition and agility. What is the optimal balance for your country or state?

> China's strategy is innovation, science and productivity. We on the west seem to like consumption before everything else and IMHO we are doing it wrong.

What is this even supposed to mean? You can't have productivity without consumption - who are you producing things for? Well, consumers - duh.

China is the beneficiary of having relatively low marginal costs, but it's worth noting that's been changing and production has been moving out of China and into other cheaper regions - i.e. Vietnam.

> however the west still has the upper-hand in terms of robot to population density ratio.

Considering that latest data shows that China industrial robot density is only lower than SG and SK (surpassing Japan and German recently), then the west doesn't have the upper hand anymore.

Isn't robot density per 10,000 workers the standard metric used by the International Federation of Robotics?

https://x.com/orikron/status/1859657159338025418?t=9J4ASQP_M...

Any big grouping can compete if there’s enough will. Look at how eg Russia has rejigged much of its war machine during the Ukraine war. Look at how Ukraine has turned themselves inside out to compete. At some level of pressure, countries transform. How much will it take? Is simple economic pressure enough? Can eg Europe gather enough of its massive educated population to transform?

In economic competition, as with poker, if you don’t know who the sucker is…you’re it. China has been making suckers of many countries and they are slowly waking up.

There is a sense in which China has made a sucker of itself, too. China has some serious internal economic structure issues and it remains to be seen how long those issues and the downstream problems it creates are sustainable.

For an example, remember the amazing speed of construct demonstrated by the Chinese government building covid quarantine facilities? Hundreds of square miles of em across every province. They're all gone now.

I always hear this as a criticism of China but then I watch some footage of the actual place and it looks like it lives in the future (to be fair, it's uneven, but let me tell you I've traveled to the US enough times to be shocked at how uneven it can get). Sure, there's real problems I'm sure, where isn't there, but here in Canada by the time we've built a kilometer of an LRT line massively over budget, China has added a new high speed rail line.

Never forget that China somewhat strictly controls what comes out of the country innterns of media and footage. Much contending out of there is paid for. You can see this in influencers who very awkwardly point the camera away from homeless people when they come into frame briefly. And also the plethora of videos by influencers "going out looking for homeless people" and not finding any.

I don't believe so anymore - at least not in California.

https://www.hoover.org/research/californias-businesses-stop-...

"Between January 2022 and June 2024, employment in US private businesses increased by about 7.32 million jobs. Of these 7.32 million jobs, about 5,400 were jobs created in California businesses—representing about .07 percent of the US figure. Put differently, if California private-sector jobs grew at the same rate as in the rest of the country, they would have increased by over 970,000 during that period, about 180 times greater than the actual increase."

Didn't California shut down surfboard blank production? You can't even make traditional surfboards in California anymore. They don't want jobs that produce environmental waste. Not all states are like that.

What does "the west" even means ? You can't find two countries that agree on half of the topics of the day, no matter how small or meaningless the topic is

Nope, we're too busy talking about our tiny little problems now (which flavor of politician will get to pillage the gold chest for themselves and their little friends for the next X years, ecology, genders, migration, &c.), and we already sold/moved all our heavy industries to... well... China. We're left with services but guess what, you don't build an healthy/sustainable economy on uber eats, airbnb and a crumbling public service system on the verge of dying due to demographic issues

Meanwhile China's totalitarian regime allows them to do things 10-100x times more efficiently than we could, mixed in with a bit of state capitalism, add the fact that they became our factories for pretty much everything, that they have access to most raw materials needed for pretty much anything. Sprinkle with a bit of spirit of revenge for the century of humiliation and you got a pretty good cocktail.

They have a long term vision, no counter powers, a fraction of our regulations and the will we lost sometimes in the last 50 years

Temu and Shein are 25% of packages transiting in France for example, they'll do the same things with their car, until they destroyed local companies, then they'll buy them for scraps. Can't blame them, we're letting them do it

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Alexandre-Monnin/public...

Not with NEPA (and CEQA and friends). The current environmental movements will have to be dismantled since they are extractive rent-seekers on production. Fortunately, a new administration will soon be power so there is an opportunity to remove the roadblocks to America’s future success.

A world with a Chinese hegemony is not going to be pretty, as online DoorDash hammer and sickle communists are about to discover.

No. Nixon et al handed us to CCP whole. But hey, cheap TVs, clothes and what not.

west can compete. unlike byd’s, which get bricked all the time without infrastructure to maintain and repair them, west (and japan even more so) build cars that last. this is china we are talking about, the last thing I want is a car made by them… :)

Do you have any data about that? I have only heard the opposite from owners and it sounds a lot like the things Americans used to say about Japanese cars prior to getting stomped by them in the 80s.

two friends in russia, traveled to mexico twice this year, boss from australia… story after story after story always the same, amazeballs for X number of days and then get bricked, interior issues, steering …

This can't be a serious take, right? Chinese consumers don't expect much less when it comes to maintenance and repair. And given their 3M+/year vehicle production output, they're not a small player.

reach out to countries that sell these cars, find people on social media and/or if you have them in real life or travel… these cars are absolute garbage

not sure what your perspective is based on. gi your persistence, it seems it's likely not rooted in actually talking to these people, but perhaps some slight unconscious bias?

most of the things you use in your kitchen and also your device. you're typing this on were manufactured in China

I had the pleasure of seeing one in Mexico recently. If this car is garbage, sign me up! But alas, it's impossible because we decided that since we can't compete we'll just make them essentially illegal.

I got a chance to ride in several Chinese EVs recently and was incredibly impressed. They looked great, were comfortable to ride in and felt well made. And the drivers all seemed very happy with them. I would definitely consider buying one if they were available in my country.

There were many terrible electric cars out of China for years. Every province had its own little EV manufacturers. China's car industry is less concentrated than the US, but the big players are winning.

BYD is only the 9th largest carmaker in China. SAIC, Changan, and Geeley are the top 3. SAIC and Changan are state-owned, but Geeley is private, as is BYD. SAIC makes about 5 million vehicles a year. General Motors, over 6 million. BYD, around 3 million. Tesla, a little less than BYD.

Reviews of newer BYD cars are quite favorable. It's not like five years ago, when China's electric cars were not very good.

BYD has a simplified design for electric cars. The main component is the "e-axle", with motor, axle, differential, and wheels in one unit. There's a power electronics box which controls battery, motor, and charging. And, of course, the battery, made of BYD lithium-iron-phosphate prismatic cells. Talks CANbus to the dashboard and driver controls. BYD offers this setup in a range of sizes, up to box truck scale.

BYD and CATL are spending huge amounts of money to get to solid state batteries. The consensus seems to be that they work fine but are very hard to make. The manufacturing problems will probably get solved.

(Somebody should buy Jeep from Stellantis and put Jeep bodies on BYD E-axles. Stellantis is pushing a terrible "mild hybrid" power train with 21 miles of electric range, and an insanely overpriced all-electric power train. Stellantis prices went through the roof under the previous (fired) CEO, and sales went through the floor. Jeep sales are way down, despite customers who want them.)

it will take years before they can prove that their cars are made to last. I won’t be lining up to buy them but in 5-10 years perhaps

Kia/hyundai went through that phase already, and just got through it with absurd 10 year warranties when they first came out. China could do the same in the states, although I think they will have enough traction in SEA/Africa/Russia//Australia by then that they won’t have to.

Mine comes with a 5 year warranty, and a 7 year battery replacement warranty. I'm fine with not waiting.

Well, not sure how enforceable will it be, time will tell.

There are some not so good portents:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ducsx9jbsgc

does it also say it is OK to wait 8 months for warranty replacement or 11 months for battery replacement? :)

Chinese cars used to have lots of quality problems because they didn’t embrace automation, afraid that would take away jobs (Toyotas made in China 12-15 years ago were notoriously bad compared to ones made in Japan/usa). But in the last ten years, they’ve gone full speed ahead on it, as aggressive as the Japanese, and the quality increases are really noticeable. It’s not just a tech upgrade, they’ve really changed the way they are thinking about manufacturing (not just a jobs program).

> BYD is only the 9th largest carmaker in China. SAIC, Changan, and Geeley are the top 3

Protip: when you calc Chinese numbers, be sure to lookup the latest data. 1 year or 2 means landslide difference.

SAIC sales dropped > 11% and profit down by 27% in the first two quaters 2024. Think about that for a second.

BYD sold over 500k cars last month:

https://cnevpost.com/2024/11/01/byd-sales-oct-2024/

That's up over 60% year on year. If they are not already the largest carmaker in China they will be very soon.

As someone from Australia, which hasn't shut its self off from the China EV market. I drive a BYD Dolphin. You should be worried. They are cheaper, and more full-featured than European equivalent. They aren't junk.

Also, they aren't the only big player from China. Australia is soon getting GAC/Aion, Geely, Jaecoo, Leapmotor, Deepal, Xpeng.

Here is an article if interested. https://www.carexpert.com.au/car-news/which-chinese-car-bran...

Does Australia ask manufacturers to setup factories locally? I always think it's a good idea for employment and perhaps technology transfer. I don't know why Canada is not doing that. Getting a couple of big car factories could be huge for the locals. That's thousands and thousands of employment.

Australia had a domestic car manufacturing by Ford and GM - popular V8 rear wheel drive sedans on their own platforms but the govt decide to stop protecting the industry and Ford and GM was also not willing to invest money in manufacturing is such a low volume market and little export potential.

People used to say the same things about things made in Taiwan, then Japan, and then China, for things like electronics and white goods. It was true - until suddenly it wasn't.

In engineering you ultimately have to build stuff. Over, and over, and over again. You'll mess it up a lot at first, and then one day you'll realize that you haven't.

China is not stuck in 1965 trying to make an EV out of a saucepan and a backyard forge. They learn, and they keep trying. They have a domestic market that their government allows to be used as a test bed for everything they are doing, which sounds more coercive than it really is, especially given the fierce Sino-centric patriotism they have.

If Xi can last another 20 years without a palace coup, or manage a smooth transition of power that does not whipsaw policy, the West is in serious trouble.

Yeah but Japan has long had a cultural obsession with delivering high quality products. I don't know if China ever did, but if it did, much of it was wiped out during cultural revolution and replaced with succeed at all costs.

And there is a difference between success and excellence.

For example there have been zero bullet train fatalities in its entire history, and several Chinese HSR fatal accidents already. For political reasons the quality of the HSR wheels in China took a sharp downturn so expect more accidents in the coming two years.

Japanese-American here. This is revisionism. Japan was absolutely known for low quality products in the past. Probably the best "pop-culture" reference to this is "Back to the Future" when Marty travels back in time to 1955 and shows Doc a Made in Japan product (camera, I think?) Doc says its junk because its Made in Japan, but Marty sees it as high quality because its from the 80s.

Thats correct but it's hard to argue that it isn't a postwar blip in Japanese history as many companies of renown have lineages spanning both sides of the war, producing high quality product, anyways it feels like more than your median country.

Obviously quite literally survivorship bias, but since that's literal, it counts.

Japanese cameras became popular with pros during the Korean War precisely because they used high-quality materials and had great quality control. A good Leica was still better at the time, but you were much more likely to get a good Nikon.

Please show the news of several Chinese HSR fatal accidents, except the 2011 wenzhou hsr accident which happened during the early days of operation that everyone knows about, and it has been a decade since.

"For political reasons the quality of the HSR wheels in China took a sharp downturn so expect more accidents in the coming two years." if this doesn't happen, are you going to apologize for your lies, propaganda, defamation?

There was one as recently as 2022 in rongjiang. And yes it was a natural disaster, but do remember that the bullet train operated during the tohoku earthquake with a derailment but no fatality.

IIRC there were three derailments in 2020, I'm not certain any of them caused fatalities.

> except the 2011 wenzhou hsr accident.

Reminder. Bullet train: zero fatalities. Even during the "early days". No excuses. How to be safe is a solved problem since the last century.

> wheel issues

There are leaked videos of HSR in china shaking.

your iPhone is manufactured in China :). your view is very outdated, or maybe even willfully. I'm sure they're plenty capable

I have a chinese EV (GMW, not BYD.) I am a very happy owner; huge features for the price. I am not sure i can see buying of a "mainstream" manafacturer again. (My country has no tarrifs/no domestic car building.)

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