"who cares, america won't manufacture low end stuff like refrigerators, but we'll manufacture high end stuff like TVs."
"who cares, america won't manufacture low end stuff like TVs but we'll manufacture high end stuff like computer chips."
"who cares, america won't manufacture low end stuff like computer chips but we'll manufacture high end stuff like bored ape NFTs."
I also think it will help us as a society if we let people work rather mundane jobs that make essential products and receive good living wages. “I make a living making the bolts that keep your fancy EV together.” Service economy be damned.
That boat has long since sailed I’m afraid but maybe we can bring it back somehow. I remain hopeful.
Imperialism isn’t a necessity or even a proper answer. You need local expertise, education and decent living standards.
But these are industries where you don't job hop every couple of years - you do it for decades and your wage rises accordingly.
It's hard work, but there's always people who can do it and want to do it.
If we could figure out a way to equally exploit the Canadians we’d be set for generations.
Poland has been used for cheap labor ever since the fall of Soviet. Only difference is that Poland got a lot less cheap over the years, while Mexico seems to never stop being poor.
It's actually beneficial to the workers - 6 months at basically ~1500 Euros saved per month = 9000 Euros. 5-10 years of these "deployments" and you buy a nice house.
But yeah, there's plenty of labour to feed smarter countries' industrial machines. I say "smarter" because the governments of RO/BG are absolute shite at improving conditions for startups/small business - you know, the things that become big business and bring in money, keep workers, etc given the chance and time. DE/NL/SE/etc know how countries become "developed".
It was originally a kind of academic pretext for justifying exploitation of third world resources.
Then western economists drank their own koolaid.
They then tutted paternalistically at China in the 90s for engaging in export oriented industrialization and keeping their capital markets on a tight leash. They argued that China was shooting itself in the foot and should stick to things they were good at like making cheap tacky toys and clothes and open up their capital markets.
Those 90s New York Times op eds hailing comparative advantage and chastising China aged really badly.
and comparative advantage operates just fine without trade barriers. Since it's just a mathematical relationship, i.e. it can't be wrong, it also operates with trade barriers, just not as efficiently.
After all, the west has all the absolute advantages: rule of law, educated workforce, public infrastructure, financial capital, fertile soil, intellectual property.
No one should ever produce something in a developing economy. Just import all finished goods from the usual industrial nations until e.g. Greece is bankrupt from buying German made products. Suddenly the Germans introduce austerity policies and overall reduce the quality of life in Greece.
The theory of comparative advantage assumes comparative advantage never changes and cant be changed by trade policy. 90s neoclassical economists pushing this cult werent just proved thoroughly and conclusively wrong by the ascendance of China, their koolaid might have spurred on the end the American empire.
The thing we need to bring back is the full supply chain. E.g. it doesn't make sense to build things here if 90% of the components come from Shenzhen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxZYPG1ADPg
There are endless similar videos of people making simple machined, cast, or forged parts by hand like this, in horribly unsafe conditions, at least by today's workplace standards.
I was watching a video on the YouTubes where they were doing a large casting in the UK and I can’t imagine it was much different to how it was done a hundred years ago when the original thing they were copying was made. Other than better ppe with all the space tech I’d guess but as a casual observer it looked “horribly unsafe”.
People then swear off third party code and start writing the basics themselves or at least stop updating their dependencies.
Inspiration to make improvements to the nuts and bolts requires daily, constant exposure to the nuts and bolts. There is a lifetime of knowledge required sometimes.
"who cares, america won't manufacture low end stuff like computer chips but we'll manufacture high end stuff like Intellectual Property."
As this is the reality.
Not only do I see our competitive advantage in Intellectual Property declining, I also don't know what comes next after Intellectual Property.
Citation needed. Take me to this mystical place. I have lived in a couple of flyover states. Rent and housing aren't getting cheaper anywhere, compadre.
There's a good reason for this, the vast majority of people aren't shopping for homes in places without jobs.
Arrogance and hubris.
> Not only do I see our competitive advantage in Intellectual Property declining, I also don't know what comes next after Intellectual Property.
We maintain our interests as we always have: destabilizing other countries and war. However, I think pax Americana ends with climate change.
Perhaps, but it might also give opportunities to further it:
"No, Brazil, you can't cut down your forest in your country for farmland. We have to fight climate change! You need to stop right now or else."
If you read about Brazil cutting down parts of the Amazon in places like reddit you'll find that a lot of people in the developed world hold this kind of an opinion. They might even be willing to back some form of sanctions or punishment for Brazil for doing it. This gives a convenient excuse for developed nations to meddle with other countries again.
"Intellectual Property" based economics, like "Service Economy" that we all heard in the 90's has the same flaw, they are self canalizing and built on intangible "honor" based trade
Unlike Physical Manufacturing, of Physical Goods, or the development of Raw Resources.
Solid Foundational economies require the production of solid tangible assets, not "Intellectual Property"
Facebook moving towards the "metaverse" is disturbing to me because they are basically betting on people giving up on the real world, it's a form of surrender. Don't bother trying to solve real problems, just plug into the matrix
Even now US electric cars are mostly a loss leader in the legacy market, without the constraint of being produced in the US. What's going on here?