Now that we have another china recall, can the USA start making our own STUFF again?

Question

its better to be self sufficient than rely on others to do the work for you....besides .....
Why do the huge conglomerates, such as FISHER PRICE, have SO MANY factories in foreign countries that make and sell America Products, that Americans readily purchase--such as the recent recall of thousands of toys from fisher price?
Why dont we produce our own American toys such as Elmo & Dora the Explorer--even Mickey Mouse and Superman?

Answer 1

What happened to our buy American initiative we had years ago? If we stop buying their products, companies may once again manufacture here if they see a growing market. Like not buying an American flag made in China.

Answer 2

1

Answer 3

The answer has always been in our hands. If the label says made in China, don't buy it.

Also, don't buy into the scam that American products will cost more. American workers will make more per hour, but how much does it cost to get goods from China on our store shelves? All those boats and trucks get imported goods from Asia to New York for free?

Answer 4

Manufacturing is the lowest value added step in the production of a good. Concept, branding, engineering, sales, and after-sales support is where the real money is at. (Shih smile curve)

Self-sufficiency sounds nice in theory, but if you took that down to a personal level, could you grow all the food you eat, sew all the clothes you wear, build your own computer from scratch, etc..?

The division of specialized labor is one of the most important factors that has contributed to the exponential growth in the quality of life. International specialization is the next logical step in that process. When Japan took over the TV manufacturing industry from us, we started building computers. When they took over cars, we started exporting more airplanes.

With all that said, Chinese stuff is terrible. You get what you pay for. At least "Made in Mexico" doesn't mean "poisonous."

Answer 5

The Unions and the politicians made it too costly to make simple things in the US. Just about everything is now being imported. The only products we still make are too bulky to ship cheaply from other countries and even those are being attacked by unassembled goods. A service economy is what caused the fall of Rome and we are headed in the same direction. The politicians get rich while the people get lazy and look for handouts instead of working to get ahead.

Answer 6

Are you kidding?

The companies in this country would not dare try to make anything here. The labor costs are too high and the unions would eat them alive. For example, companies like Sara Lee will move out of a territory to avoid having a sales department go union. Yet the northern union friendly people keep buying their products.

Answer 7

Nope. Too expensive, end of story. Why would you, as head of a corporation, make your goods in a country where workers expect a reasonably high wage, when you can make them on the other side of the world where workers will expect a wage maybe half of what it is in the US? Where you don't have to worry about being sued from every little accident, where there are less restrictions on pollution and safety, and where there may even be laws prohibiting the formation of unions?

It's just too sweet a deal for the corporations to not do it, no matter WHAT the right thing to do may be.

Answer 8

You know this is one of those times when I have to say that I bought a piece of ready to assemble furniture at Target and got savagely burned.

Every metal bolt in that stupid set could be bent in half using my bare fingers!

I had to go over to Lowe's and buy $20 worth of furniture hardware to replace the cruddy metal parts the Chinese manufacturer put in its assembly kit.

What a piece of garbage!

My wife bought a small portable AM FM stereo, of course its made in China. It had a limited warrant. Yeah you had to send it to China and pay for return s&h. Yeah right. It cost more to ship the piece of junk back to China, and to ship it back than the lousy $15 she paid for it.

The stuff China is putting out today is indicative of a class of new robber-barons, just like we had 120 or more years ago.

Make it cheap, cruddy, and make it using a sweatshop.

Eventually the guys that chintz on quality in China will get the message when their junk starts piling up.

Otherwise I try to buy American. I'm sick of giving China my money.

Answer 9

Yes, as long as you and I are willing to pay the much higher price it would cost. If all products were suddenly domesticated, then all over the country we would see a huge jump in our cost of living and I don't know if we are prepared for that.

Answer 10

Of course it is all about the big corporations bottom line. They could put Americans back to work, but that would mean the CEO's would have to bring their pay back down to earth(OMG they would have to give up their third vacation home!) It would also mean the stockholders would have to take a smaller cut. Everyone seems to think that prices would skyrocket, but have you seen the prices of those toys now?