[bumby]

What’s your perspective on manufacturing capacity being necessary for national security?

The U.S. has moved to service jobs because they tend to have the highest margins and capitalism is going to do what capitalism does. That is, unless specific guardrails are enacted to protect other societal interests.

[toomuchtodo]

That it’s important, but should be automated and understood to be cost inefficient. The cost inefficiency is a readiness premium. But when you have admin officials saying iPhone manufacturing is coming to the US, that isn’t what is being advocated for. China is the largest producer and buyer of industrial robotics for manufacturing, for example. They are built to build, this is not what the US is advocating for.

Do you think this admin would put the necessary guardrails on public private partnership manufacturing supply chain infra to prevent it from being strip mined or otherwise extracted for profit and not be available when needed? I do not, but I do support treating such manufacturing supply chains as critical national security interests. Maybe we’ll get another shot in a few years when competent folks are in control, but maybe not.

[bumby]

I agree with most everything you’ve said, but a lot of manufacturing for critical stuff is not automated in the mass-production sense. There are tons of small batch manufacturing in spaces like aerospace, electrical transmission, etc. that are probably considered critical and already difficult to get US companies to manufacture.

[toomuchtodo]

Agreed! But, again, I ask who is going to work these jobs if Americans have said they don’t want to? The labor market has been propped up by immigrants for the last half decade, and this admin is not friendly to immigrants. There are already not enough Americans who will work the manufacturing jobs that exist today (or the jobs going unfilled are outcompeted by higher wage service work).

Americans are cosplaying, they are not serious in this regard. If they were, they would be filling these jobs they say are so desperately needed, and manufacturers would pay whatever market clearing wage is required to fill said jobs. If they wanted good paying jobs today, they’d unionize. Way easier than waiting for manufacturing to come back (which will take years, if at all) and maybe have a shot at one of the few manufacturing jobs that are created.

China delivers results because they have the will to, Americans just want status and vibes.

(Purpose of the system is what it does, watch what people do not what they say, etc)

https://www.plantengineering.com/manufacturers-grapple-with-...

https://www.axios.com/2024/03/13/immigration-economy-jobs-gr...

https://www.axios.com/2023/05/08/us-labor-shortage-older-wor...

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

[anonfordays]

>The labor market has been propped up by immigrants for the last half decade, and this admin is not friendly to immigrants

Illegal labor to boot. Huge percentages of construction jobs in the US are (or were) filled by illegal immigrants getting paid low wages. It's not clear how those will be filled in the short term.

[chneu]

This is a thing that I've noticed that some folks just can't understand: Nobody is going to leave an inside job for an outside job.

At least not a meaningful amount of people.

I now have a great office job but I grew up farming, ranching, doing construction, roofing, worked at dairies so I've seen first hand who is working these jobs.

It's not white Americans. This is something some people just can't understand. They just don't seem to grasp that the folks doing these jobs are either temporary labor brought in from other countries or illegal immigrants. The reason is because there isn't enough domestic labor willing to do these jobs.

[anonfordays]

>Nobody is going to leave an inside job for an outside job.

>At least not a meaningful amount of people.

I would say this is true, or generally true, if the pay for the trades stays where it is. If plumbers start making $80k+ out of school, and master plumbers start making $200k+, etc. many would leave their inside jobs for construction.

Americans are not going to leave AC and a nice office for $18 an hour.

[bumby]

The three sectors that are most at risk: construction, agriculture, and meat-packing. (I might also put in-home health aides in there). Ironically, these essentially subsidize the costs that Americans feel the most: food, housing, and healthcare.

[bumby]

To support your point further, I’ve worked in manufacturing and the there was a lot of competition to fill the well-paying union jobs. The low-pay non-union jobs, not so much. I also worked in automation, which turned lines that previously had a dozen jobs into lines that had a couple.

[gowings97]

Bingo. If you pay them, they will come.