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Comment by fxtentacle | Hacker News Reader

You’re not wrong, but how should politics fix this? It’s easy to buy the machines and the software and the training for a tool die shop. But the actual production is still messy and dangerous and needs lots of electricity. And while the salary is not horrible, it’s also not good, because no matter what you do you compete on price with shops in Shenzhen. That means what you actually need to get this manufacturing back to the US is cheaper cost of living. Your US employees need to be able to afford a middle class lifestyle in the US while matching CN salary levels. If that doesn’t work, prospective employees will choose other jobs.

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Cost of energy can definitely be affected by government projects and regulations.

>compete on price with shops in Shenzhen

One way to help with this fight is to charge a tax on things made in Shenzhen. This helps by funding the government, helping build roads and fund things like healthcare, and also makes those items more price competitive with American-made goods.

People are downvoting you. But that is not entirely fair.

Tarrifs can work. They're an excellent tool when applied stratecally, gradually, and combined with focused effort to nurture local alternatives.

Just because we're currently seeing them used in the most crude and reckless way possible does not diminish their value.

Your feeling of obligation to add a disclaimer is why others felt the need to downvote that comment you replied to. Be the fairness you claim to want.

I only need a disclaimer because the very concept of tarrifs has become politically charged. The original comment makes a good argument without any value statement about current politics or recent events.

The comment should normally not have needed the context i added; to be taken seriously.

Give scholarships only for craftspeople education.

Anything but lowering the cost of living..

this really reminded me of the McDonalds people giving scholarships instead of increasing the prices of their jobs.

But OP specifically says that they have to lower US job's prices to CN's level but that is only really possible bottom line only if the cost of living actually decreases... which is a bigger issue and a bit of paradox for some time as well on how to do it.

Automation? Though china are not half bad themselves.

Or bet on china crashing their housing bubble and take their currency stability and industry with them. But we've been predicting that for well over 10 years and it hasn't happened yet.

... and it would be quite useful to have local industry to replace it with, or we just end up crashing the USD aswell when nobody can produce anything.

One of the largest robotics manufacturers in the world has recently had its ownership transferred from Germany to China. And there’s already multiple dark factories inside China which can produce smartphones without any light, because there’s no humans left in the building. So if you want to outcompete China on automation, you basically need to be the best in the world.

German Kuka were aquired 2016 yes indeed. But kuka is only 6th largest by market share. Swizz and Swedish ABB robotics is largest by market share and is still European.... hoold on... nonnononnno

https://new.abb.com/news/detail/129685/abb-to-divest-robotic...

If by recent, you mean in 2016, then sure that’s recent in terms of 5000 years of Chinese history.

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