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Comment by toomuchtodo | Hacker News Reader

Bringing (automated) manufacturing back to the US and ensuring the security of our supply chains while also doing economic harm to an authoritarian government while they're in a precariously unstable economic situation? As a US citizen, I'm fully onboard. Call China's bluff. Monetary policy (cheap money) is in a phenomenal place to support the necessary infrastructure investments (roads, rail, energy, etc), and that spending will keep the US economy humming while further decoupling us from China's.

What good are values as a nation if we're willing to trade them for profits and cheap goods from China?

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The manufacturing won't come back it'd move to other Asian countries like Vietnam first.

It's ok for that manufacturing to go elsewhere, it's still a huge win for the US in the case in which the conflict with China continues to worsen (likely). It's the ideal approach to dealing with them: drain their economy of its manufacturing & exports and incubate a dollar-caused stagnation as they're unable to transact at the required scale with the rest of the global economy without a massive, endless supply of dollars (the Yuan has a trivial share of global foreign trade). They're already starting to suffocate under the lack of dollars right now, as their current account balance is shifting permanently negative. I'd expect them to begin increasingly restricting their citizens from foreign tourism, as it's a sizable source of dollar bleed, it's a luxury they can't afford much longer. They'll do it under the guise of the need to reinvigorate the Chinese spirit at home and to stop importing negative foreign incorrect values (some party b.s. like that).

It's perfectly fine to redirect all US->China manufacturing into other nations such as Vietnam. Not only is that great for helping other nations develop (many of which are regional competitors of China, so it's further ideal that those nations become stronger vis-a-vis China), it reduces China's position of strength.

>What good are values as a nation if we're willing to trade them for profits and cheap goods from China?

And yet you promote Tesla, cozying up to the CCP and telling us that "China is the future" so that he can build some cheaper cars and get around tariffs? Whatever helps "the mission"?

https://www.wraltechwire.com/2019/09/02/teslas-elon-musk-i-r...

Are you kidding? US foreign policy regularly ignores "values" for other interests.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Communiqu%C3%A9s

That's begging the question in an important sense though; what is under discussion is precisely a history of ignoring "values" for our other interests in China, the result that has created which did not match the stated goal of the previous policy, and the question of whether we should continue with that previous policy.

It would be a particularly perverse deployment of "whataboutism" if one argues that honoring our values over profit is not something we should do now, because whatabout the fact up until quite recently we weren't?

> It would be a particularly perverse deployment of "whataboutism" if one argues that honoring our values over profit is not something we should do now, because whatabout the fact up until quite recently we weren't?

You don't even have to go until "quite recently," we can demonstratively saying we're--today, tomorrow, and for the foreseeable future-- aiding the yemeni genocide. "Whataboutism," is a complete spook that, oddly enough, details conversations because OP is likely not pointing out that we should ignore our values, but rather that the USA has no values to honor in the first place.

True, but the U.S. has hardly any official values.

Well said.

Thank you, I appreciate it.

> As a US citizen, I'm fully onboard

To be the advocate for devil, US salary is too high and regulation/labour too tight, protests too many.

In other words, not 'business friendly'.

I disagree. Wages have stagnated for decades. Regulation too lax, especially with regard to predatory financial practices and environmental damage. Protests, too few.

The US is the most business friendly developed nation ever to exist. It is a corporate welfare state built upon the exploitation of the laborers.

That's a very limited concept of 'business friendly' and inaccurate in any case with regards to the US.

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