Craftsman now mostly made in China. Bummer.

[olddog]

Originally Posted by patrickt

The more sensitive subject is whether American labor should be entitled to a higher standard of "global living" simply because they live in this country. If foreign workers are prepared to provide suitable services, because their accustomed standard of living is lower, shouldn't our competing workforce lower its standard of living expectations in order to compete? People don't want to talk about that because the issue has the potential to explode... like stepping on a Twinkie....

The problem is your not thinking long term. Why do corporations move manufacturing off shore and then bring the end product back to the USA to sell it? Why not keep manufacturing in the USA and add the new plant off shore and sell the products there? The answer is they do not pay a high enough wage for those people to afford their product. They want to bring it back here to sell it to what was the greatest market in the world. The long term end result of bringing USA labor rates down to 3rd world rates is the destruction of our market.

When 80% of our people no longer make enough money to afford anything, they cannot buy anything. It's already happening. People continued to buy using home equity loans and credit cards. Then when the normal economic cycle took a dip, the Fed had to bail out the banks that were collapsing right and left.

What percent of our population are on some form of government assistance? When you can live at a higher standard of living on welfare than you can working, why work?

About half our population pays no income tax. Now part of the government wants to increase taxes rather than cut spending (much of which is assistance to those who do not work).

Now when labor rates are below $10/hr and 80% of the population is there, how many attorneys will the market support charging $200/hr? Will there be any high paying jobs left?

Yes the long term end result of moving manufacturing off shore and lowering wages is a financial collapse of the government, and without the manufacturing capability, a country without the means to defend itself.