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A True Energy Policy
May 24, 2011 | 41 comments
Another Perspective
Killing Manufacturing
Any wonder why our manufacturing has moved outside of our boundaries?
One of the greatest threats facing our country today doesn’t come from outside our borders. It’s not the possibility of a terrorist attack. It is not the continually increasing illegal immigration across our southern border. It’s not even the likelihood of a disrupted oil supply.
The greatest problem we face is the self-imposed cost and regulatory burden placed on the development of manufacturing businesses. America, at least the America I grew up in, was the land of the free and the home of the innovator. We used to celebrate entrepreneurs and reward those willing to take a risk. America, the “can do” America of my early years, allowed it’s innovators to operate with relatively little restraint or restriction. If you wanted to start and operate a business, “have at it, we wish you success” was the motto of our great nation. If you had an idea for a “better mouse trap” build your plant, install your equipment, hire your people and good luck.
In the '60s we had a positive balance of trade and it was growing faster than anywhere else in the world. Japan, the second most industrialized country, produced goods that were considered inferior to those produced by our great American factories. China, South Korea, Mexico? Not even on the map! Today our balance of trade is negative by a long shot and the quality of our manufactured goods is inferior to that of many other countries. Much of what we consider manufacturing in the U.S. today is really the assembly of components manufactured in other countries. Manufacturing profits go to businesses outside America because we regulate manufacturing facilities into oblivion.
Today the environment for starting and operating a manufacturing plant is not good. Gone are the days of “Great, go to it, do the best you can.” Replaced by, “NIMBY” — Not In My Back Yard. The government has imposed itself as our costly overseer, placing environmental, zoning, and wage/benefit restrictions so burdensome in time and cost that businesses are left barely competitive if not impossible to begin.
Have a great idea? See a viable opportunity? Want to build a product or establish a manufacturing plant? Go see your local government officials. You will find the “go for it” attitude replaced with, Manufacturing??? Why do you want to consider such a dirty business? Why would you want to put your fellow citizens at risk? What would we do if someone were to get hurt? How could we possibly live with ourselves if, God forbid, some kind of particle escaped into the air or blew into a river? How could you live with yourself if your employees weren’t all being treated equally and being supplied with incredibly attractive wages and benefits?
I would like to relate my recent experience trying to start a Carbon Fibre manufacturing company in a Northeastern U.S. State. After meeting for three weeks with the economic development offices of the State and City, it was determined that after I located and acquired a facility, at my cost and risk, even if it were properly zoned, it would have to be approved for a special use exception. Thereafter we were told to budget in excess of $300K for pre-approval EPA, environmental, and other studies. The studies would take about 6 months at minimum — with no guarantee of a successful outcome. Even if we were approved, and in spite of the fact that at opening we would be hiring approximately 25 technically competent people in a high unemployment region, we would have to go to the Union hall and negotiate a trades contract before hiring the first employee. I would be forced to unionize and hire more expensive, “senior union members.” I am not allowed to go to Craigslist and hire younger, entry level trainees. My cost of operation becomes higher before even opening my doors and I have no choice in this matter. Unbelievable!!!
Even if I am willing to take the time, spend the money, and successfully navigate the bureaucratic hurdles, what additional risks do I face? How about this: OSHA arbitrarily decides I’m not in compliance with one clause in their multi-thousand page regulatory bible. Or, an employee-union member decides he is not being treated fairly or that the benefits package is not equal to that of federal or state employees, and files a grievance How about the EPA deciding, retroactively, that in the event of a power outage there is a chance my factory might leak a “toxic” substance? I will be sued, shut down and possibly prosecuted criminally.
Now, consider my experience the last time I visited China. I was escorted by the governor of Tianjin State to one of his new cities and shown the process to open a manufacturing facility. I was led into a room with a series of desks. You start at the first desk where you present your plan. Thereafter you proceed from one to the next obtaining approvals or agree to modifications on the spot until at the last table where you are shown what lots and buildings are available that best suit your needs and the price of each. The total timeline for permits, from beginning to approval, takes about 3 hours.
At the end of the line you pay your fee, get your permit, and choose your construction manager if a new building is necessary. The city designates the building team to come the following day and begin construction. Generally you are guaranteed that you will be able to move your equipment in within 5 months.
There are no restrictions on importation of equipment, state officials help with marketing and sales inside the country and do not restrict exportation of the manufactured goods or profits. Now, this is China so the government and the state share 30% of your business, but considering the ease of entry, increased in-country sales and helpful attitude, this is a small price to pay, especially considering America’s 35% plus corporate tax rates. Also, if the price of the lot or building seems high, and they like your project, they will negotiate the price and terms.
This is why our balance of trade is so out of whack. This is why many companies move out of the United States for foreign environs. This is why the United States is losing its position as the greatest manufacturing country in the world.
The greatest threat to our American future doesn’t come from other nations, it comes from within. We have become our own worst enemy.
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Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 5.10.11 @ 6:08AM
Fire 18,000 idealists at the EPA and create millions of jobs. It's a no brainer.
figusja| 5.10.11 @ 7:25AM
Since they want the whole country to go back to pre industrial society. I say take them all and put them to live on federal lands with no assistance what so ever. Lets just forget they are even there. They can be the unpaid park rangers. Then we would be in-charge. Responsible land owners aware of our responsibility to nature but not subservient. Is that what you mean?
Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 5.10.11 @ 8:46AM
That's actually funnier than you may believe.
Yes, they are the protectors of the environment as they hide behind their synthetically produced desks and waste watts of energy surfing the internet or trying to design new angles to launch against private owners.
Few of them probably ever go near a park, they are simply overpaid bureaucratic idealists who succor on Al Gore's mental teats, while doing little to actually help the environment while doing everything possible to destroy America.
In essence, they are like 18,000 Osama Bin Ladins.
JFGalt| 5.10.11 @ 12:48PM
The flaw in your plan is that these people feed off of the power that they garner being an "official". They are otherwise useless but now the guy that flunked english and algebra decides the economic benefits to a citizenry. The only other thing they are qualified for is welfare. It will be a struggle to make this class of person give up the power that we have acquiesced to them.
Patrick| 5.10.11 @ 1:06PM
You just need someone who can take the heat. Scott Walker and Paul Ryan come to mind.
Richard Baker| 5.10.11 @ 6:21AM
Agreed. Reality doesn't intrude these lefties. Fire them all. They don't produce anything but mindless bureacracy. What has always amazed me about these clowns is that they act as if none of this insanity of theirs will affect THEM.
oldfart| 5.10.11 @ 6:39AM
Another problem is the manner in which the Federal Government hires people. It used to be that to become a Civil Service Employee a person had to take an exam. The exam was not that difficult but the applicant to demonstrate that they could read, write and do simple math calcuations. Somewhere along the line this practice was determined to put some people at a disadvantage. Basically those that could not read, write or do simple math. Now, even if the applicant lies through their teeth on the documents, nothing can be done until they are hired, and then it is up to the supervisor to 'build' a case that the person is not qualified for the job. It is much easier to shuffle the first person to a 'do nothing' position and try agin, and again and again until a person is found who actually knows what they are dong.
Any we wonder why the Dept of Ag writes 100 pages of regulations on how to grow corn?
JFGalt| 5.10.11 @ 12:52PM
What amazes me is the process to get hired by the federal govt. I tried some years ago for a technical position. The requirements were insane - in 25 years of private practice I never met another person with those outlandish skills required. But someone got it. Who? Someone with an inside track. A buddy or friend of someone high up. Someone with a political connection (more likely). Job requirements are often written to specific people. Still for other positions I have seen eminently qualified people rejected at the first round and have watch them hire absolute dolts. The process makes no sense because they can't be following their own rules.
Ed| 5.10.11 @ 1:27PM
I agree. The Feds have these KSA (Knowledge, Skills, Ability) requirements that perhaps one person in the USA can fill for a particular job. Insiders get these jobs.
Ironically, in the middle of the last decade, the Feds were complaning about a looming labor shortage because people were retiring and the labor pool was drying up because of these arcane KSA requirements. Three years of Obamanomics have fixed that problem.
Have you considered| 5.10.11 @ 6:47AM
Great article. I have these types of conversations with my aunt (who just turned 70) She simply does not understand why manufacturing is fleeing our shores. This is a nice condensed version of why.
Now throw in the complexities and expense of getting a patent, and the picture becomes even more clear.
The days of 5k plus a good idea being turned into a business are long gone. So sad.
Patrick| 5.10.11 @ 1:11PM
And much of that is buried under pointless "processes" that can be patented, while real invention has to take a number.
Of course, there's no guarantee that since your patented item is now public that someone won't be able to market a slightly modified knockoff (made in Reynosa, Mexico perhaps) before you ship your first widget.
Old Soldier| 5.10.11 @ 7:57AM
Yep. Saw it myself.
Both my grandfathers worked in manufacturing. During their long careers, they went from producing with their hands to using their heads to make stuff. I was ready to do the same thing.
I worked in 3 different factories in my youth. I loved the process and I loved being able to see the product of my labor rolling down the line.
When it came time for a civilian career, however, I knew that manufacturing was dead in this country. The towns, states, and the feds all do their utmost to discourage business - particularly manufacturing businesses. Our big government is driving us into poverty and ruin.
PolishKnight| 5.11.11 @ 9:46AM
OldSoldier, believe it or not, I don't think it's intentional. Allow me to explain:
All industries, including government, put their own interests first and then trod over everyone else to meet their bottom line. Just as the automobile industry helped kill rail as a competitor, it's only natural for government to not care about industry since industry isn't a direct special interst group for their agenda. On the other hand, growing the police state, regulators, social services, etc. will have them happily enabling those "industries" to thrive.
In the former USSR, where the government did engage in manufacturing, they were quite friendly to big factories being built, looking the other way at emissions standards, and breaking their own rules to meet an operational quota. Or for that matter, look at the semi-commie Chinese we're buying from!
It's a problem: How to get regulators to protect the environment and consumers without them becoming an outright enemy of those they regulate? One way might be to close the feedback loop: If the industries go out of business, so do they.
Michael Tomlinson| 5.10.11 @ 8:28AM
"I would like to relate my recent experience trying to start a Carbon Fibre manufacturing company in a Northeastern U.S. State." That was your first mistake trying to locate in a Northeastern state. Why waste time and money investing in the most anti-business and pro-union part of our country? Businesses need to flee the northeast and left coast and leave it to the tree huggers, union thugs and former hippies.
"Head to the Red States and damn the DemocRATS."
grant1863| 5.10.11 @ 9:03AM
I agree, come down to Florida we're trying to get rid of regulation and weather's alot better than the Northeast. You can always go back in the summer.
JFGalt| 5.10.11 @ 12:54PM
Agreed but come to Texas instead - it's a nicer place to live.
Nunya| 5.10.11 @ 5:34PM
No, come to Utah. We have mountains, a moderately dry climate, and a high-tech rich envrionment. :-)
Patrick| 5.10.11 @ 1:13PM
You still have to deal with the Feds....but at least you wouldn't have to deal with union goons.
Roger Pol | 5.25.11 @ 10:04AM
Michael, I would, but I live in the NE because it is the home of multiple generations of my family. I consider the opening of a facility here a community service as much as a business opportunity.
darrell judd| 5.10.11 @ 8:36AM
I'm sure you are correct that American regulation is very onerous. But, are you willing to leverage a communist slave state, 57 cent per hour 16 hour a day labor, forced abortion, no human rights, and closed markets against our regulations? If the answer is yes, then there is a great deal more at work than American regulation.
David W| 5.10.11 @ 9:13AM
China's behavior doesn't seem to prevent the current adminstration (or previous adminstrations) from borrowing billions of dollars from it.
When the regulations in this country seem to be more "soviet union stupid" instead of "business smart" then sure, companies will go to China (of course, if they want to come to Texas or the south they would be more than welcome to - we want businesses to be successful. And we are right to work as well).
Old Soldier| 5.10.11 @ 10:50AM
Communist Slave state, Communist Nanny state...whatever, they both suck. At least you are allowed to make a profit in China. I would prefer India myself.
(I can't believe we've descended to this point - we are most certainly in decline)
Dan Hirsch| 5.10.11 @ 11:06AM
"darrell"
You miss the point. American business has weighed the regulations against the necessity to have products produced under those horrendous conditions and found that this becomes an economic necessity. Want us to go back to being the world's premier steel or automobile manufacturer? Then give business a simple set of reasonable, stable rules and watch America take off.
But right now look at what the NLRB is doing to Boeing who is trying to build a new aircraft in a right-to-work state, SC, rather than under organized labor's thumb in Seattle. The EPA cooks up new limits on CO2, a gas required for the growth of, God forbid, GREEN plants and promises to charge every manufacturer and vehicle operator taxes because they produce it - will they charge us for breathing? Who knows?
When a manufacturing concern considers where to put a plant, here or 'over there' they must consider what their competition is doing to control their costs. If you cannot reliably predict that the US Government won't arbitrarily raise your costs for some arbitrary reason, e.g. CO2 production, unreliable renewable energy requirements, or the boutique concept du jour, then you will reasonably go elsewhere. And if they only require $.57 an hour for labor, exactly whose fault is that?
Government needs to let the legal profession (the ambulance chasing personal injury and class action lawyering crowd) enforce safety and health requirements and stop trying to make rules to protect every consumer and employee from every potential accident in what is an irreversibly dangerous world. Bureaucrats' primary function, their maintain objective, their prime directive is to preserve their own jobs and hire their friends.
Get rid of EPA, OSHA, DOE ( both Education and Energy) and maybe, just maybe, manufacturing will rebound in this country. But as long as there are bureaucrats sitting around sucking from the citizens' purse with nothing to do except invent more disasters to protect us from.
Global warming? They have 160 years of temperature data, 40 years of satellite thermal data on a 4,000,000,000 old system and they think they can predict 100 years out. Bologna!
Oil shortages! In 1977 they said we'd be out of petroleum by 1992. Bologna.
In 1790, Malthus said the whole world would starve by 1830. Anybody remember the 1830's. More bologna!
America, man up, accept the risks that life presents - the government can never protect you. They can't close a border - they'll NEVER cure cancer. Besides if they did, it'd put a lot of them out of jobs.
Haven't you heard the DOT sponsored radio ads telling us that children under 4'9" tall need to ride around in a car sitting in a booster seat? My FORTY YEAR OLD sister with three kids is not 4'9" tall, so she's supposed to ride in a booster seat?!?
Can't we, please, shrink the government, please!?!?
Sheesh, I gotta go work..
darrell judd| 5.10.11 @ 12:42PM
I agree that regulation (and bureaucracy) is a big problem in America, but, the main reason why America's manufacturing has been declining for a long time is Capitalists choosing freely to sell jobs/assets for short term profits. Nothing will make a principaled conservative (remember when conservatives were human rights critics of the PRC?) abandon his principals more than a quick buck.
Pecos Pete| 5.10.11 @ 1:20PM
Darrell,
The reason a manufacturing company can't make short-term or long-term profits in the USA is due to excessive regulation. The whole list of alphabet agencies is the cause of the decline of manufacturing in the USA.
It is NOT the quick buck that is driving manufacturers overseas, it is instead that there are NO bucks for manufacturing unless subsidized by the government.
Nunya| 5.10.11 @ 5:43PM
I agree. I used to work for a company that had manufacturing and distribution facilities all over the world, including the US. It wasn't just the cost to manufacture, there were issues with shipping costs, etc., which made sense to have facilities closer to the end user.
I've been to South America many times on business trips, and our workers were paid approximately $15 per week (more or less). From OUR standards that sounds ridiculously low; HOWEVER, that was the going rate for a laborer in that area (we also provided breakfast and lunch for our workers, something I've never seen in the US). Their costs of living are far less than ours, so what would seem to be a pittance to us was actually a decent wage for them. Trying to compare our wages to another country without discussing their costs of living is absurd, and trying to state that we should be paying US level wages in a country with a cost of living 1/100th of ours is just stupid.
Jobe| 5.11.11 @ 1:50PM
So your advice would be to avoid the evils of communism in full bloom, submit to communism in the budding stage and go broke in the process. Some choice!
Roger Pol | 5.25.11 @ 10:09AM
Darrel, My real point is to show the differences in the hope that somehow the bureaucracy will begin to "get it" and set up a one stop permitting shop like the chinese so that we can get manufacturing moving forward efficiently again.
Terry Mitchell| 5.10.11 @ 8:38AM
This is the biggest bunch of BS I've read on-line ever. LOL! I'm in manufacturing. I do Global installations of assembly lines and this is not reality.
jothepro| 5.10.11 @ 8:51AM
Tell us what realty is Terry.
Dai Alanye | 5.10.11 @ 3:18PM
I formerly worked in design of special manufacturing machinery--what is often referred to as automation equipment. Over the years more and more of these businesses left the US as foreign companies became more competitive, and as more of US manufacturing was moved overseas where a hundred workers with simple equipment could produce more cheaply than ten American workers with automated production.
Nothing surprising, of course, for the same sort of thing had previously happened to the steel and auto industries. Much can be laid to the account of unions and compliant managements, but let's be fair and give government regulation its share of blame.
jothepro| 5.10.11 @ 8:48AM
I have worked in a factory for almost 39 years now. I hope to retire in 2 years and can't get out fast enough.We are an open shop in Michigan. Go figure.
We make plastic wrap and bags. OSHA and MIOSHA are the biggest obstacles we as workers face. Anything that moves has to guarded. I beleive we keep the local metal shop in business. When I started work there as a skinny young kid fresh out of high school, We didn't guard anything and hardly anyone got hurt. The only time I have gotten hurt in recent years was either working around or trying to remove a guard to fix something.
Frekki| 5.10.11 @ 2:28PM
You're not kidding. Our shop enforced the mandoor rule. Seems you cannot go through a overhead door by walking, so everywhere we now have "Man Doors". Well they had to cut a hole in a wall, install a door, then install heavy steel channel railing around the door's exit, then install a spring loaded safety rail in the railing. The overhead door they did this for is a rubber sheet door, if it came down it couldn't possibly hurt you, and was designed as a 20' mandoor. The whole thing is mind boggling. And if you climb to the top of a 5 story silo, there is a spring loaded gate at the top you must use to leverage yourself up and open at the same time.
Welcome to the future, it would be worth it if I could have a rocket belt and Barbarella.
DC| 5.10.11 @ 8:50AM
Have to echo Mr. Tomlinson, above, I can't imagine why this entrepreneur would have tried to start any business in a Demoncrat-choked, union stiff NE state. Why bother? You know the outcome before you've even started. The governments (all levels) there and on the Left Coast see productive businesses as owing them money for the privilege of locating there; they are merely golden geese to be plucked to death. If Il Duce Negro has his way, there won't be a choice to move to a Right to Work state, because (like Boeing) any company that tries will be sued by the NLRB, with the full resources of the federal government supporting a decade or so of litigation. For now, yes, move to Texas. Move to Alabama, Tennessee, Wyoming, Idaho, S. Carolina, Oklahoma--some free-er, much redder states that will welcome you and (unlike China) won't confiscate your profits and property on a whim.
And to Mr. Mitchell, above, I'm not sure what planet you're living on. I spent several years in and out of multinational manufacturing plants throughout the US, Canada and Mexico. In the SE U.S., Texas and Mexico, the attitude in the plants (and those in Mexico were unionized) was can-do, find a way, work hard, produce quality, make things happen, etc. Old style American stuff. In Canada and the upper Midwest, 180 degrees different. Stultifying, union stooge, "management" is all bad, I won't work one minute past my shift, I'm entitled to my job--disgusting. So why the hell would anyone locate a new business or expand an existing plant in such places, amongst such people? Answer: they wouldn't, unless there's a government gun (literally or figuratively, in the form of NLRB, IRS, etc.) to their heads. Wake up. Start thinking seriously about secession. Let the entitlement-addled welfare addicts stew in their own Euro juices while real America breaks away and continues the Constitutional republic it once was.
PolishKnight| 5.10.11 @ 9:18AM
With all due respect to the author, I think he may have misunderstood the motives behind the Chinese government's "helpfulness" in his business process.
They didn't want him going to outside contractors who weren't connected to the local commie lords to build his buildings or hire his workers. Since the price of labor in China is so cheap (along with human life overall), this isn't a big concern but it's just a different barrier to business albeit such a low one he failed to notice it.
Just wait until he tries to sell his products to the Chinese and compete with a local, well-connected businessman...
Indy| 5.10.11 @ 9:26AM
Talk to Nikki Haley, I'm sure SC would welcome mfg. jobs. Right to work states are the only places to even try to expand mfg.
Old Soldier| 5.10.11 @ 11:08AM
Still have to deal with OSHA, the EPA, and the highest corporate taxes in the world.
Gordon W.| 5.10.11 @ 9:34AM
First the author is saying socialism is better?
At least you could talk about the benefits and negatives of both sides. Every business in China has to at least have 50% Chinese ownership. The US has a reliable courts system and taxes are very low (GE got a refund...)
Pecos Pete| 5.10.11 @ 10:50AM
Ah Gordon, there you go again. Unless you are being sarcastic.
Old Soldier| 5.10.11 @ 11:06AM
He's saying their Socilaists are better than our Socialists.
Their Socialists are pro-business and helpful - ours aren't.
Patrick| 5.10.11 @ 1:18PM
That's because beneath the commie paint-job, China is a fascist state bent upon world domination.
Old Soldier| 5.10.11 @ 2:20PM
What's under our statist paint-job? Stupidity and laziness?
Patrick| 5.10.11 @ 10:29PM
You forgot entitled.
Stan Redmond| 5.10.11 @ 11:19AM
I didn't get the impression he is saying the communists are better. His example of China is to contrast how easy it is to start a business in a country or state that has not placed the hurdles against business that we have in the USA.
Roger Pol | 5.25.11 @ 10:17AM
Gordon, Not quite accurate. As I stated in the article, the Upeer end percentage of "ownership" transferred to the chinese is only 30% and that becomes negotiable depending on the type of business and the level of desirablility to the local Chinese state.
Al Adab| 5.10.11 @ 11:16AM
And meanwhile our federal government, always acting in our best interest of course, is attempting to stop Boeing from locating a plant in Carolina where the company wishes to operate. Apparently we can only make our own choices when they comport with government preferences. There is a word that describes that situation and Liberty is not the word.
howard lohmuller| 5.10.11 @ 11:19AM
Mr. Pol's outrage at American Governmental barriers to manufacturing is indeed understandable and discouraging. However these restrictions are not the only cause of the loss of American manufacturing.
The world population has been increasing by one billion people every 15 years. Most of the increase is in Asia. In fact almost 40% of the world's population live in 2 countries, China and India, both developing industrial nations.
Many of these workers will work for dollars a day. American workers want and need $100. to $200. per day. Thus low wage countries manufacture or assemble most low technology or learned technology products. Advanced technology products and services may be done in high wage countries of origin until low wage countries get the technology.
World population trends are expected to continue through the rest of this century. And many question whether the Chinese and Indian economies can continue to grow and create jobs at their present rate. If this is the case, manufacturing can be expected to be drawn to high population low wage countries into the future.
Patrick| 5.10.11 @ 1:22PM
Advanced technology doesn't fare well in a country with such an epic failure of educating our citizens. That the abysmal education comes with a pricetag that is (last I checked) second only to Switzerland in its cost per student only makes our national collapse that much more poignant.
Dai Alanye | 5.10.11 @ 3:28PM
Educational failure is unfortunate but hardly the main or even an important factor in the US loss of manufacturing. Break the union stranglehold on some industries, lower taxes on corporate profits to zero (after all, who pays them but the consumer?), get rid of the more stupid government regulations, seriously reduce government expenditures in general--these actions can revitalize American industry.
Stan Redmond| 5.10.11 @ 11:26AM
To add insult to injury our all knowing government has placed so many environmental restrictions on land use that it's nearly impossible to mine or harvest our own natural resources. I am FORCED to buy my raw materials from a communist Chinese company because they own 99% of the worlds rare earth mines and inventory. After the Japanese Tsunami the communist government decided to cut rare earth exports but 72%. My products are living on borrowed time and my leftover inventory because the cost increase has pushed me out of the market. The frustrating part is we have those materials right here in US soil but we won't touch it.
Out of spite I may even move my manufacturing to China. As much as I hate to do that I would rather pay taxes and fees to the communists then the wannabe commie clowns in DC. With the export restrictions from China there's not much of a choice for me. Go out of business or move to China. Will Obama be calling for less mining restrictions on US soil to keep manufacturing in the US? not a chance.
Pecos Pete| 5.10.11 @ 1:23PM
Stan: Exactly!
Richard| 5.10.11 @ 12:38PM
There is more to it than this. Established businesses tend to use zoning, licensing, and other government regulations to restrict competition. New and small businesses just cannot afford the costs of complaince but big business can.
Petronius| 5.10.11 @ 1:27PM
The desire of our Liberal dictators to control our attitudes, appetites, and consumption trumps all else.
gary siebel| 5.10.11 @ 1:46PM
News Flash: It was conservative economists who said it was not only OK to export our manufacturing, but that it was a great idea to do so. Now you are supporting the corruption of the Chinese system, where greased palms are the rule (which means no rules) and pollution is out of control.
Reagan ripping those solar panels off the White House was a disaster. Guess which country now leads in the production of solar panels, and not because of government regulations?
DC| 5.10.11 @ 5:13PM
Since nobody else has done so directly, let me be the first: Mr. Siebel, you're a complete idiot. There's a big, big difference between endorsing the freedom to take advantage of comparative advantages, and cheerleading the destruction of the U.S. manufacturing base. Conservatives support the former, leftists like you, the latter. Do you have solar panels on your house? Why not? Can't afford them? Unreliable? Welcome to reality. If you had any money, you could feel free to spend 5x as much per unit of energy, and take up 20x the space with the generation units, and still need backup diesel power. But you'd rather impose those costs on the rest of us, or mandate (I guess) that the White House set a brainless, pointless, ludicrously expensive example that only the leftist elite could (or would want to) follow.
Jackasses like you are what make secession so attractive--you don't live in the real world, and we don't want you in ours. Stay in yours, do your best, we won't bother you. But don't you dare try to impose your utopia on us. We know it doesn't work and we know where your utopian, quasi-religious eco-communism leads. Go there yourself. Leave us alone. Let us go.
Phil Sukalewski| 5.10.11 @ 8:36PM
If Herman Cain doesn't get the Republican nomination, I'm voting for you, DC, as a write-in candidate.
big bob| 5.10.11 @ 11:15PM
Love it!!!
Pat| 5.10.11 @ 3:03PM
Here’s the story of one manufacturer’s experience in California. Once upon a time, a small manufacturing plant was alive and well in a Northern California community. For almost 76 years, this plant provided continuous employment for over 100 workers and produced useful, made in the USA products – but nothing lasts forever. The local residents, who had moved in long after the plant was built, complained to the Mayor about the plant, Madame Mayor agreed with them, the plant is ugly, an eyesore, noisy and too many supply trucks were coming and going. Of course, Ms. Mayor felt exactly the same way about the Federal nuclear weapons lab located not far from the plant – except the Feds told her to shut-up and to get lost and they, the Feds, had the power to issue insults without fear of repercussion.
The City’s Fire Chief informed the plant’s management it was too dangerous to fight a fire should one start within the plant, the firefighters would simply throw a curtain of water around the plant so as to protect nearby homes and allow the plant to burn to the ground. The state environmental agency sent the CHP (California Highway Patrol) to inspect the plant for air quality violations – somehow the state police had won the bureaucratic war over jurisdiction, but the well-dressed, young officer who showed up at the plant knew only how to give out speeding tickets, he had no clue about environmental hazards – so he casually wandered among the buildings with his clipboard trying to appear busy.
The Feds decided the plant should be on the Super-Fund List, after 76 years something had to be polluted, right? But they backed off later and apologized for their original false findings – after the plant’s owners had spent many thousands defending themselves from our government’s employees. Eventually, the owners saw the light, closed the plant and moved operations to Nevada, to a desolate location where only the coyotes would complain.
Now that former plant site is bare ground, a security guard drives by once a night to ensure no one has stolen the dirt – and the city and county receive greatly reduced taxes on the vacant property, plus 150 workers lost their jobs. The surrounding residents pay more in taxes now, plus their $700,000 tract homes have lost hundreds of thousand in market value during the current recession, but they stubbornly insist it was correct to drive out the eyesore plant.
The owners of the bare ground, where their profitable plant once stood, vow never to build another plant in California and to move their remaining administrative offices to another state. The Kingdom of California is too greedy, too stupid, too unreasonable they tell one and all. Recently, they built a brand new, eyesore plant within mainland China, California wasn’t even considered as a possible site. Soon, they plan to build several additional plants to support their thriving business, not in California though, maybe not even within the United States, a nation with a decidedly anti-business attitude. But California and the Feds don’t care, what’s another unsightly manufacturing plant to them, better to convert the land to bare dirt and grow vast crops of overpriced – and unoccupied - tract homes instead.
Oldefarte| 5.10.11 @ 3:26PM
Bravo Roger! This country is dying a slow death and its all due to Democrats, labor unions, and excessive government. We don't build things anymore, and what we do build is labor-unioned to the hilt, which jocks the product price through the roof and makes it uncompetitive with foreign made/priced products. Get rid of the Democrats, the unions the government, start making things and this country will proper, grow and employment will explode!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Amor de Cosmos| 5.10.11 @ 3:35PM
Mr. Pol, come to Tennessee. We would welcome you with open arms.
Roger Pol | 5.25.11 @ 10:25AM
Amor, thanks for the offer. Lived in Nashville for 3 years. Too far from large bodies of water for my taste.
Melvin| 5.10.11 @ 3:50PM
Hence my theory on Secession. I've brought this up many, many times in the past. Some have agreed or some have quietly labeled me a loon.
By reading all of the above posts, the producers have but no choice but to secede to those states with like minded people want to prosper.
Look at many of the posts here. There are of what used to be in this Country. People, come now, we don't have to abide or suffer under a small percentage of bureaucratic elitists who want us to fund their vision of utopia.
As an American I'm tired of being pile driven into the earth. I, you, us, we don't have to live under these untenable conditions. We're suffocating, while be allowed just enough air to observe our demise.
We always pin our hopes on elections. "When we get our people in, things are going to change." Well, our people are in, and it doesn't make a tinkers damn worth of difference does it? Yes, the producers might win a few elections, but the Liberals own the Judicial Branch of the government, they wholly own the regulatory arms and appoint unelected bureaucrats who are charged with finishing off what few producers are left.
People we are so divided as a Nation right now, there are but two ways the producers have left. As I have noted Secession and join into new Republics with those like thinkers who want to produce, prosper and live from under the yoke of stifling regulation.
The other is Civil War. There are those that seem to think we are in the beginning of that phase now. There is but 20% of Americans who feel that government with stifling rules and oppressive heavy handed government that dictates income redistribution to those the government feels is less fortunate.
Why should the remainder 80% have to live under that already proven failed political philosophy.
Communism, Socialism, Socialism light, no matter what it is called is a destiny to failure. Our once proud and productive cities have been turned into rotten fetid cesspools of humanity that thrives on government handouts, crime, prostitution, drugs, and wanton feral violence.
We don't have to live under these intolerable conditions people. We as proud Americans would be remiss in our duties as Americans to let this travesty to continue .
DC| 5.10.11 @ 5:16PM
Pick a state--I'm in.
Rick Z| 5.10.11 @ 5:05PM
Sure, build your factory in China. Hire and train local workers. Have tea with the accommodating local officials.
Just, don't be surprised six months later, when a competing, 100% China-owned competitor opens its doors, just a mile down the road. .... Note: there is no Chinese word for "intellectual property" or "patent"; none that is used in a serious manner, that is. Courts in China dispense justice according to the wishes of the Communist Party. ...... ......
PCPSmoker| 5.10.11 @ 6:50PM
bless you for writing this. Finally a good comparison between freedom and statism.
George S| 5.10.11 @ 7:24PM
This is half the story. The other half is that there are over a hundred federal law enforcement agencies and over 100,000 full time federal employees who carry firearms and have custodial powers. What on earth for? Well, the short answer is that every government agency starts out with a mission -- e.g., clean the air, manage fish and wildlife, protect the flying public. To accomplish that, they need delegated powers to author rules. Rules turn into regulations. Regulation require more employees to manage and oversee their implementation. Regulations are useless unless they have teeth; very impractical to go to a federal judge and get an injunction against a polluter caught in the act. Hence, police powers are needed to enforce regulations. More regulations are required to manage regulations (more sub-agencies spawned). As more regulations are written, more people are unwittingly snared. More violators means more law enforcement.
That's the bottom line: it is very easy to break a federal law and get sanctioned or imprisoned. Oh, and just try ignoring or overlook a provision of the Marxist inspired Fair Labor Standards Act - the very reason American workers are overpriced in many markets. But China doesn't threaten your freedom by just trying to make an honest buck. They welcome your business, unlike the Democrats here who expect you to take all the risks and then rob you blind with taxes and regulatory costs. And then let the
sharkslawyers pick the rest of your carcass in with tort suits.Melvin| 5.10.11 @ 7:35PM
Amen brother, and where does it say in the Constitution that government can grant itself all these powers?
It doesn't, if anything the Constitution gives the people the power to rebel against tyranny. Oh, excuse me, the Liberals and Progressive Republicans call this, "Compassionate government." But as the producers of this Country know all to well, this government of ours is anything but compassionate.
PCPSmoker| 5.10.11 @ 9:01PM
Same here brother. I look at Barack's security detail with the SUVs and the machine guns, and wonder what they think this country is about.
Dee See| 5.10.11 @ 11:40PM
Upset about the 'in your face' economic
TREASON op of the last 3 decades?
START spreading the word, and making those
plans to march on the New York Fed, and
the tax-free 'benny violent', EUGENICS driving
'chair-IT-ABel' foundations and NGO's this
July 4th.
START thinking HUAC meets NUREMBERG
2012.
--------------------------------START NOW!
John | 5.11.11 @ 12:22AM
We all agree that onerous regulations need to go. But 6 years of a GOP congress under president Bush changed nothing as these traitors championed exporting our vital manufacturing base overseas (including technology), especially to Communist China, and called anyone who opposed this decimation of our industry and American jobs a protectionist.
Multi-national companies own both parties and could lobby successfully for less regulation but they like their slave labor with our enemies. And these Benedict Arnold corporations have both the MSM and the talk-radio phony patriots in their back pocket and this is why both the left and (so-called) right media came down hard on Trump.
Our founders were dead set against free trade and big on tariffs, yet globalist El-Rushbo and his ilk call tariffs a liberal policy -- alas, we are doomed. We urgently need a new American-first media to enlighten naïve Americans that we are being sold out by cheap-labor globalists who have zero loyalty America.
Johnny| 5.11.11 @ 6:19AM
After reading through these mostly thoughtful comments there is one simple thing glaring at me that was never mentioned. We are caught in a vicious circle. The MINIMUM wage causes maximum problems. Who, in his right mind, can not see that if the government mandates a minimum wage it drives the cost of everything upward? If the employer must pay more for labor then does not the employer have to charge more for the goods or services produced, requiring higher wages for people to be able to purchase same??? Artificial or government instituted inflation on a continual basis. Everyone has to earn more just to survive every time the min. wage increases, and the poor jerk making min. wage still can't buy squat... mostly teenagers working for the summer anyway. Our government at it's finest.
Melvin| 5.11.11 @ 7:23AM
I read somewhere this week, that the wage or the balance of it, changed drastically during and after WW2.
For the life of me I just casually glanced at it, and noted the highlights of the story, but doggone it, I didn't save it, because it applies exactly to what you just posted.
This wage imbalance that we have now, just didn't come about on it's own.
david| 5.11.11 @ 9:30AM
Knowing all this why do we have free trade with countries that are at an advantage with us in terms of less regulations and lower wages? Would it not make more sense to only trade with countries that have regulations and fair wages so we could remain competative and keep our middle class?
Roger Pol | 5.25.11 @ 10:32AM
David, Where would we find these countries, and if we can, why would we want to trade with countries which enforce as ridiculous regulatory burden on it's manufacturing base as we do?
Gretchen| 5.11.11 @ 7:23PM
As Pogo once said: "We have met the enemy and he is us."
Skip in St. Boni| 5.11.11 @ 9:54PM
I am a 63 year old Metallurgical Engineer that has watched our government drive the metal working industries out of the country through regulation. In addition, our tax money financed the creation of metal working industries around the world. Under the guise of reducing pollution, improving worker safety, etc., we have pushed many of our core industries into countries with minimal controls for pollution, worker safety, etc. The NIMBY philosophy has driven much of our core industry away. We, as a country, labor under the illusion that everyone will work at home and earn their living on their home computer.
Cheng Hsiao| 5.11.11 @ 9:57PM
Rog,
Please consider to move your Carbon Fibre startup to Yantai, China, when you meet and discuss with the Chinese delegation this Saturday.
Best,
Cheng
andrew carnegie| 5.14.11 @ 2:45AM
A couple of things about manufacturing, which I think are important to note. The first being a result of hindsight. Starting with the 1990s, federal, state and local governments in the entire developed world (excluding Canada and Germany) believed that "services" was the way of the future. And why not? Flashy malls, swanky suburban software campuses looked like an awesome future. I mean look at the campuses of the tech companies on the west coast, or the financial sector of 2005. Salaries that easily exceed 100k for entry-level 22 year olds fresh out of college, and generally in the 150-200k range. No unions, but amazingly flexible work hours, gourmet food in cafeterias, nap rooms, laundry and haircuts on site! Governments totally wanted this over "dirty" factories and 50-75k blue collar jobs.
What is the flipside to this? These jobs were created on the scale of thousands, while manufacturing creates jobs on the scale of millions. Sadly hindsight is 20-20 , and letting the industrial sector languish like that was downright boneheaded.
BUT, I'm very curious about what Germany is doing. They have more regulations, way more taxes, more unions, and vacations days which are mandatory, and exceed 5 weeks per year. I mean things like excess overtime, or an employee missing vacation in a year becomes an HR violation. But regardless, they are still competitive. German exports of manufactured goods were below American exports in 2000, today they're higher (excluding 2010, where American exports were marginally higher due to exchange rates). Also remember America exports something like $40-50 billion worth of weapons, and nearly $140 billion of agricultural products, which Germany doesn't really do. And German products are wanted the world over. Think of the Audis, Porsches, or Mercedes you see.
So my question is this:
How are they doing it? Government goons and union goons are goons, and will try to squeeze every last dime out of you anywhere in the world. What's different between Germany and America that makes it possible for German manufacturing to be so strong? How can America leverage whatever the heck the Germans were able to do, and get it right?
Shanghai Dan | 5.22.11 @ 2:04PM
A few thoughts from someone who recently opened his own manufacturing facility in China (Songjiang district of Shanghai):
1. Wholly Foreign Owned Entities are now allowed - I own 100% of my company, there is no sharing with the Government.
2. My permitting process was similar to the above; however, since I am leasing a facility it took just over an hour.
3. My taxes are amazingly simple: 17% when selling/shipping domestically, 0% when exporting.
4. One thing many people in this thread don't realize: for most parts, the cost of labor are tiny. I make audio components, and labor accounts for around 4% of my cost of product. When I ran a place in the US, my cost of labor was around 5%. It's not labor costs that drive the decision, it really is the regulatory and tax situation in the US.
Roger Pol | 5.25.11 @ 10:38AM
Dan, excellent observatiuon. Labor restrictions enforced by government supported Unions are more an issue than cost of labor.
Roger Pol | 5.25.11 @ 10:46AM
To all respondants, thank you for your contribution to the discussion. Your observations are all greatly appreciated. You can read more from me at my blog: AmericanCitizenBiker
Adult toys | 7.4.11 @ 1:20AM
ObaMa . stop war.!!!!!
Michael Bruce Halus| 10.20.11 @ 5:07PM
Good Article, agree fully