Apple bringing some manufacturing jobs back to the USA

[Sam1]

[url="http://news.yahoo.com/apple-produce-line-macs-us-133841213.html"]http://news.yahoo.co...-133841213.html[/url]

Not that I needed a reason, but it will make me feel a bit better knowing I have the option to buy something useful that's made in America again. Edited December 7, 2012 by Sam1

[Chucktshoes]

Am involved in this conversation with a friend on FB about how Cook's comments on manufacturing skill sets in the US labor force is a big issue that must be addressed if we wish to reignite our manufacturing base in this country.

[Sam1]

So you're suggesting that having a masters degree in art studies with a speciality in oil canvas between 1453-1455 isn't as useful as someone with 10 years of machining experience?

[monkeylizard]

That depends on if you need a good art forger or a good iron forger.

[Djay3]

[quote name='monkeylizard' timestamp='1354848221' post='856234']
That depends on if you need a good art forger or a good iron forger.
[/quote]

Now that's funny and too damned clever!

[Chucktshoes]

[quote name='Sam1' timestamp='1354847305' post='856217']So you're suggesting that having a masters degree in art studies with a speciality in oil canvas between 1453-1455 isn't as useful as someone with 10 years of machining experience? [/quote]
What makes that even funnier is that she has a degree from Memphis College of Art.

[vontar]

And it begins

[img]http://dilbert.com/dyn/str_strip/000000000/00000000/0000000/000000/00000/0000/200/215/215.strip.sunday.gif[/img]

[timcar86]

Somehow I don't see "assembled in America" as the same thing as "made in America"

[SonnyCrockett]

[quote name='timcar86' timestamp='1354877737' post='856333']
Somehow I don't see "assembled in America" as the same thing as "made in America"
[/quote]
The way things are today and the lack of suppliers and resources really limits production on stuff like this
So to build something here in the usa means pulling in parts from all over the globe to MFG it here..
We are now a global manufacture thanks to things lie NAFTA and other silly deals

[Hershmeister]

There probably a tax reason for this decision

[monkeylizard]

[quote name='SonnyCrockett' timestamp='1354882493' post='856352']
We are now a global manufacture thanks to things lie NAFTA and other silly deals
[/quote]

Only partly. We're a global manufacturer and global economy because communication and transportation are now fast cheap and easy and economies with lower waged workers are building stable infrastructures. It has always been cheaper to build things in Mexico and China. A rural Chinese worker may build a tractor for $0.12 a day, there wasn't any electricty to power a factory, roads/rail/ports/ships to carry the finished tractor to market, and no communication lines to track progress, submit orders, etc. His low wage didn't matter. Now we have communications and transportation and infrastructure allowing manufacturing to move to locations where workers have lower wage demands (lots of various reasons for that and room for a whole board of discussions on the topic).

Tariffs are simple ways for a nation to protect an industry from international competition by artificially inflating the cost of certain imported goods. NAFTA and other free trade agreements remove the tariffs making the imported goods reflect their actual cost, which is often lower than domestic production. The flip side is that our exports to member nations likewise don't get artificially inflated in their markets. Certain industries benefit from it and others suffer. Any given FTA is going to benefit some mebers more than others. I think NAFTA hurt us more than it helped, but it didn't make us into a global manuifacturing economy.