Comment by stronglikedan
12 days ago
I don't think anyone underestimates that, as much as some people with the author's viewpoints would like it to be true.
To paraphrase Kennedy: "We choose to [bring back manufacturing]. We choose to [bring back manufacturing] in this [or the next] decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too."
We will do it, and we will win, whatever that means.
> To paraphrase Kennedy
What in the modern situation suggests the comparable level of diligence in approach to the goal? The fact that both goals are far-reaching does not suggest comparability of approaches to the solution.
Changing the way society/economy operates is nowhere near "building X," whatever X is, whether it's something hard like a bomb or a collider.
> We will do it, and we will win, whatever that means.
How do you know that you haven't won already? Shouldn't the end goal be clear? In the case of Kennedy you're referring to, criteria and motivation were clear.
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To a non-US bystander, your comment sounds like a no-thinking patriotic slogan. The details of the article are such that you can take any argument and bring it into discussion in order to show its irrelevance. But we're discussing slogans irrelevant to the situation and belief in the win, even though the win is not defined.
How many additional hours are Americans going to work? What pay cuts will they take? How many years later du they want to retire?
These are the questions people need to ask themselves. We both know what the answer is.
Americans need to take pay cuts so we can bring back high-paying manufacturing jobs!
/sarcasm, or summary of other discourse in this thread?
High paying manufacturing jobs seems entirely delusional. If you want to compete with China your workers must be as efficient as Chinese workers, so US manufacturing workers can't be better paid and doing less hours. That can not possibly work.
Putting aside the rah-rah patriotism, you perhaps don't understand the problem any better than Trump does. The moon mission to which you allude was difficult but, critically, that difficulty was not felt by most Americans: it was a challenge for NASA engineers. Trump's current economic plan will increase inflation, cripple America's role in world trade, and result in negligible increase in manufacturing in the short term. Wildly unpopular policies do not last in a democracy.
Did you read the article? The author is advocating for manufacturing in the US, but is pointing out the ways these policies undermine that very goal.