There has always been a push to manufacture in the states. The first buy American law dates back to 1933 (or at least the first I found with a quick search - feel free to correct me if you know more). George Washington wore a suit from New England at his inauguration to encourage American manufacturing. Things have been moving elsewhere for a long time, but there is still a push to build in the US, and new manufacturing in the Us is created all the time.
Created faster than lost overall. There is more total manufactured in the US than at anytime in history. However population is up even more than production and jobs in factories are down by an order of magnitude (because of automation) and so it seems like we are producing less.
If you’re producing less per capita, and consuming more per capita, you’re producing less overall for the purposes of the discussion around relative pain of cutting off Chinese imports.
We’re talking about the relative pain of cutting off Chinese imports or getting into a trade war with them. In that context, the fact that we import far more from them then we produce domestically compared with decades ago means that it will be more painful to do so now than it would have been decades ago.
The reality is that while there is a tiny ‘buy American’ push from some people, the vast majority of the American economy and regulations are setup to allow private capital to trade freely abroad and import at will. And it was done intentionally so that rich people could benefit from cheap overseas labour, furthering wealth inequality when middle class factory workers lost their jobs to increase corporate profits with cheaper overseas factories.
There has always been a push to manufacture in the states. The first buy American law dates back to 1933 (or at least the first I found with a quick search - feel free to correct me if you know more). George Washington wore a suit from New England at his inauguration to encourage American manufacturing. Things have been moving elsewhere for a long time, but there is still a push to build in the US, and new manufacturing in the Us is created all the time.
The series of free trade agreements the US negotiated with everyone they could would say otherwise.
Created as fast as it’s lost?
Created faster than lost overall. There is more total manufactured in the US than at anytime in history. However population is up even more than production and jobs in factories are down by an order of magnitude (because of automation) and so it seems like we are producing less.
If you’re producing less per capita, and consuming more per capita, you’re producing less overall for the purposes of the discussion around relative pain of cutting off Chinese imports.
That sounds like a “how to lie” with statistic fact. You can use per capita or total production numbers to make different arguments.
No, it’s focusing the conversation.
We’re talking about the relative pain of cutting off Chinese imports or getting into a trade war with them. In that context, the fact that we import far more from them then we produce domestically compared with decades ago means that it will be more painful to do so now than it would have been decades ago.
The reality is that while there is a tiny ‘buy American’ push from some people, the vast majority of the American economy and regulations are setup to allow private capital to trade freely abroad and import at will. And it was done intentionally so that rich people could benefit from cheap overseas labour, furthering wealth inequality when middle class factory workers lost their jobs to increase corporate profits with cheaper overseas factories.