Comment by yibg
1 day ago
I hear people (media, politicians) talk about bringing manufacturing jobs back to America, but I haven't heard too much well articulated reasons for why.
There are issues with national security, reliance on less than friendly nations etc. For instance, we'd want to grow our own food, even if importing would be cheaper. But those surely aren't the majority of manufacturing jobs.
Given the choice of increasing the number of high paying, high skills jobs or the number of relatively low skill, dangerous manufacturing jobs, why wouldn't we choose the former?
It's about leverage, which you mentioned.
If you have no leverage during a negotiation and your counterpart has can say 'no' without having to give up anything then you're screwed.
America doesn't have to be the best manufacturers, but we do need to have the ability to say, "fuck it we'll build it ourselves" when the other side of the table says something we don't like.
And anyone living in the fantasy utopia where the whole world agrees on everything and there's peace all the time... read more history.
But you don't have to build it yourself.
If China wants to play hardball then Vietnam can make the goods. This is the great system we had until Trump decided he'd piss off every country. We had a very much you vs the world when doing diplomacy as USA but now it's just you vs USA which is a much weaker position.
There won't always be a Vietnam or an India.
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Global supply chains seem to be gradually breaking down due to a mix of politics, demographics, and armed conflicts. Everyone has become accustomed to the post-WWII system of global free trade but historically it is an aberration and everything will eventually revert to the mean. I wouldn't be surprised if China disintegrates into another civil war within the next few decades. We can't necessarily rely on foreign countries to make stuff for us anymore so if we want to have stuff we might have to make it ourselves.
Problem is if we (any country really) tried to build everything ourselves while other countries engages in trade then we are at a major disadvantage.
Of course some things are more sensitive and should be made domestically even at lower efficiency / higher cost. But if that’s applied to everything then we are just shooting ourselves in the foot. Plus the opportunity cost of not doing something else that we are more uniquely positioned to excel at.
> China disintegrates into another civil war within the next few decades
I'm curious about your reasoning on this. China was not the one at the top of my list of "Major world powers likely to have a civil war sooner than later"
China has had major internal violent conflicts many times: in 1967, 1960, 1937, 1916, 1856, and so on. Another civil war probably isn't imminent but based on historical patterns it's entirely possible in our lifetimes. There could be an external shock in terms of a severe disruption in food or energy imports, or an internal power struggle between CCP factions. Xi Jinping isn't immortal and no one can predict what might happen when he leaves power.
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Agree. At this point, a civil war is more likely in the United States than in China.