
Why China won’t own next-generation manufacturing - endswapper
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2016/08/26/why-china-wont-own-next-generation-manufacturing/
======
Animats
China's "manufacturing engine" has not "largely stalled". Here's China's GDP
growth.[1] 6.7% annually this year, down from 7.9% in 2023. The US is 2.2%.
China is not "stalled". If you want numbers that can't be faked, inbound
container counts at the port of Los Angeles are up.

The claim that "75 percent of all robots used in China are purchased from
foreign firms" only makes sense if you count Hon Hai/Foxconn as "foreign". HQ
is in Taiwan, but Foxconn has over a million employees in China. Their Foxbot
robots [2] are being produced at a rate of 20,000 per year. The US only has
26,000 robots total, mostly in automotive.[3] Foxconn claims they have good
enough robotic precision now to use their robots to make iPhones.

The article is really a rehash of a paper by Dieter Ernst.[4] The
"manufacturing decline" in China reflects layoffs in mining and metals. Those
are both industries where even basic mechanization cuts the number of
employees enormously. Those industries were mostly state-owned, and were
oversized and overstaffed for the demand. About a third of China's state-run
firm jobs (30 million) disappeared between 1998 and 2015. Ernst writes
"Outside of mines and minerals, manufacturing apparently continues to act as
an employment absorber." That's not manufacturing decline; that's modernizing
the steel industry. (More high-quality stuff, less rebar, fewer workers, less
pollution.)

Ernst complains that the 13th Five Year Plan isn't specific about how new jobs
will be created. He points out that salaries for college graduates seem to be
declining, and unemployment rates for college graduates are up. This matches
US experience. There's the usual complaint about not enough pre-trained
vocational workers. However, companies in China are used to having to train
their people - after all, many are right off the farm.

The article has a picture of "carbon fiber silk thread". There is no such
thing. There is, however, a stock image from Getty Images miscaptioned that
way.

It's a typical Vivek Wadhwa article, written to get attention.

[1] [http://www.tradingeconomics.com/china/gdp-growth-
annual](http://www.tradingeconomics.com/china/gdp-growth-annual) [2]
[http://www.scmp.com/tech/innovation/article/1829834/foxconns...](http://www.scmp.com/tech/innovation/article/1829834/foxconns-
foxbot-army-close-hitting-chinese-market-track-meet-30-cent) [3]
[http://www.ifr.org/industrial-
robots/statistics/](http://www.ifr.org/industrial-robots/statistics/) [4]
[http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2820433](http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2820433)

~~~
dmritard96
I appreciate the well thought our response.

I offer a counter on one point:

"If you want numbers that can't be faked, inbound container counts at the port
of Los Angeles are up."

There is a world wide glut of shipping capacity.
[http://money.cnn.com/2016/03/31/news/economy/china-
shipping-...](http://money.cnn.com/2016/03/31/news/economy/china-shipping-
slowdown/)

port of LA could still be up but perhaps it isn't really an adequate example
to generalize.

otherwise, I am in the same place. Sure, countries where production left due
to labor costs will be able to compete again, and will enjoy some advantages
around strong research institutions and being close to their markets, but its
silly to think that China won't now have a strong consumer market to provide
for, that they can't innovate, and that they can't have top tier research. I
have lived in the US and China and I always get this feeling that Westerns
think they have a monopoly on ideas and China has a monopoly on
cheating/cloning/cheap. They are all wrong.

~~~
dmritard96
also, I would love to offer some interesting numbers

I manufacturer in china ([https://flair.co](https://flair.co)) and just
recently got some quotes from Bay Area Metal shops.

A tool for metal stamping that costs me 5KUSD in China was quoted to me for
55KUSD in the East Bay. And, the 5K cost gets refunded to me after 40K pieces
are bought...

The notion that there aren't significant cost differences now is also
misrepresented in the article. Sure, I would love to produce parts next to my
apartment both because of convenience and proximity to my market (not because
of bruhaha made in america nationalism nonsense) but it simply doesn't make
financial sense.

~~~
vinceguidry
So get that tool in China today because you need it today.

The article was about the future. All signs are pointing to that tool costing
you ~7.5USD in the US in the near-term future. With better shipping, support
and logistics. The price differential is going to, at some point, matter way
less than those other considerations and you may well decide to eat the entire
$7.5K switching cost just to get access to them. I buy all my iPhones retail,
for full price, from Apple.

Of course China is going to win a bunch of price races today, it's like
competing in swimming vs. Usain Bolt as a varsity college swimmer. Sure, you
might win the first few races. But once Bolt gets serious, he's going to be
able to level his skills up way faster than you will, even given your 5 year
head start. His genetics are simply better.

The US just has better DNA for commerce. Other countries can win battles, but
never the war.

~~~
ComodoHacker
>genetics >has better DNA

It's a bit racist, isn't it?

~~~
reflexive
I don't see any mention of race. Is the belief that phenotype expresses
genotype racist?

------
tlb
One way to create controversy is to say something that's true, but many people
don't accept and will therefore argue with. Such journalism can push the world
forward by calling attention to mistaken ideas.

This article, like many by the same author, might be dubbed 'wrongtroversial'.
That is, it creates controversy by saying something wrong.

Wrongtroversy is far more scalable. It's very hard to discover something that
is: (a) true (b) not widely accepted (c) not recently mentioned by other
journalists. But if you drop condition (a), you'll never run out of ideas.

The most effective wrongtroversial articles assert something that's wrong for
several different reasons. People will then proceed to argue with each other
about which reason is more important, generating follow-on controversy.

Credit to @pg for coining this term.

~~~
chvid
Great term. But I really wonder how can you have an academic career and then
write stuff like this?

~~~
cJ0th
even academics do have to eat occasionally.

------
rgbrenner
I don't follow this line of thinking at all. What's the argument here? That
Chinese can't learn how to manage certain things? That they can't improve
their educational system? Does anyone seriously think this is true?

And then to end with, _well even if they do, we can just import their robots_.
Ok.. then wouldn't they "own next-generation manufacturing" if they are the
ones making the tools, pushing what machines are capable of, etc. I mean, does
the writer really think we can dominate next-gen manufacturing if we don't
even make the tools? What's our competitive advantage then?

~~~
aub3bhat
Also the last straw argument "Chinese can't innovate/be bold because only
Liberal arts degree holders can do that."

While conveniently forgetting that current leading company in Drones DJI is a
Chinese company and they brilliantly managed to build their own Tech industry.
Frankly American journalists are deluding themselves if they assume that all
asians are like what they chose to show in Hollywood (where they are portrayed
as lacking communication skills) and as if innovation is a western monopoly.

~~~
mahranch
China can't be innovative because they lack the cultural foundation for it.
Innovation requires creativity, critical thinking, outside the box thinking,
etc etc etc... All things which China's PRC sees as a threat to their power so
they squash it down. They want flesh robots, not revolutions.

So they have to steal IPs to be competitive. Whether it's plans for the space
shuttle or the latest iPhone, China will steal literally anything with
virtually no shame. Unfortunately, they don't see the side-effect of this IP
theft. That is, it reduces innovation even more. When you shortcut your way to
the top (or in this case, the middle), you don't have that same foundation for
innovation. A huge part of innovation is the process itself -- it lays the
foundation for future innovations. A framework or path. That foundation is
just as, if not more important that the innovation itself. And that's what
China is missing out on.

They're being left behind while IP theft is going to get harder and harder for
them as countries/businesses wise-up.

~~~
kalleboo
Weren't people saying the same thing about the Japanese 30 years ago?

~~~
gozur88
Yes they did.

It's true if you're behind the state of the art you copy whoever is out in
front. Because there's no reason to reinvent the wheel. Once you catch up,
though, you start doing your own R&D because it makes sense to do so. That's
what the Japanese did, that's what the Koreans did, and that's what the
Chinese will do when they feel they've learned everything they can from
manufacturers in other countries.

It's going to take awhile, though. Chinese companies are having problems
filling slots at the very top of the high tech skill ladder. A relative of
mine works for a company that moved an optics manufacturing operation from
China to Switzerland for cost reasons. The particular expertise they needed is
rare in China, and people who have it can write their own ticket.

~~~
mahranch
This is completely nonsense. Japan did not commit mass espionage and IP theft.

Copying? Reverse-engineering? Sure, what country doesn't do that? _That 's the
baseline_. China is doing something completely different and on an entirely
different level. The sheer volume and amount of IP theft and espionage they
engage in is jaw-dropping. Whether they're using useful idiots/nationalists to
steal the space shuttle plans, or running their hacker groups targeting
corporate/governmental entities 24/7/365, it's moronic to equate that to Japan
in the 70s/80s.

Again, Japan wasn't known for their espionage efforts because they engaged in
so little in comparison with everyone else. Hell, Russia was the bigger threat
in the 80s thanks to the cold war. Japan was a complete non-factor. Japan had
a growing economy that people were scared would supplant the U.S _but that 's
where the similarities end_. I'm befuddled how this nonsense is allowed to
stand here on hackernews. It's reddit level garbage.

~~~
gozur88
>This is completely nonsense. Japan did not commit mass espionage and IP
theft.

"Espionage"? I looked back through my post and didn't see that word anywhere.

>Copying? Reverse-engineering? Sure, what country doesn't do that?

Yes... and that was the point.

>I'm befuddled how this nonsense is allowed to stand here on hackernews. It's
reddit level garbage.

Yes... yes it is.

~~~
mahranch
You compared China of today to Japan of the 80s. That is laughable garbage, my
comment was to show how moronic that thought process is.

~~~
gozur88
Two things: One, it's not moronic at all. Modern China and 1980s Japan are
very much in a similar economic position. And two, your comment did nothing to
challenge that assertion.

------
austinz
"Advanced manufacturing requires management and communication skills and the
ability to operate complex information-based factories" is meaningless
consultant jargon. It would have been better to explain exactly what about
advanced manufacturing makes it so special that it requires 'management' and
'communication' skills that the managers and workers in non-advanced factories
apparently lack. Meanwhile, "ability to operate complex information-based
factories" is almost a tautology. Maybe talk about industrial IOT, or what
specialized skills are necessary to efficiently operate a factory full of
robots, or _something_?

~~~
crdoconnor
MBAs pretending they're special snowflakes rather than a waste of money.

------
Joof
They have resources, land and an interest in local manufacturing. Chinese
software engineers are good enough for Baidu (and have big names like Ng to
help them get up to speed).

Even in America, we recognize that Chinese (and other asian cultures) are
often better at a wide variety of academic subjects.

Their great firewall and isolationism forced them to build their own software
and it appears to work well.

I'm convinced that some percentage of their enormous population can work in
engineering as well or better than our engineers.

Don't underestimate China.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Many Nobel prize winners have been Chinese, only one was a citizen of the PRC
when they did the work/received the award. China's problem isn't it's people,
but it's crazily dysfunctional government that wastes it's tremendous human
capital.

~~~
sangnoir
> Many Nobel prize winners have been Chinese, only one was a citizen of the
> PRC when they did the work/received the award

Is that statement supposed to inform me about the shortcomings of the PRC, or
those of the Nobel prize? I can't tell.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
It is supposed to inform you of the achievement of the Chinese people, and not
to conflate them with the Chinese government.

------
bubo_bubo
OK, so let's say that a Chinese company moves its stuff to the US.

As a former toolmaker, (you can guess why) I have to say "why would they do
that?" They would have to invest in training for people to be toolmakers,
millwrights, etc. - the trades closely related to engineering (toolmakers do
both design and machining, for example) that have gone stale in this country
because there are no jobs and no apprenticeships for people to learn them.
These are the skills needed to make tools for the assembly lines. And we don't
have them any more. You need someone on the shop floor to debug the tooling
and that person is still in China.

All the skill is now in China. It's not coming back. So neither is the
manufacturing.

If you have a A.T. Cross pen, please chuck it in the ocean.

Yes, I'm pessimistic and angry. Because I saw an entire industry get gutted
just so a few at the top can have _more_.

------
cannonpr
Isn't this article just another sign of western/US based interests feeling
like they might have already lost the race ? It feels far more like a
'feelgood' article to prevent panic and to reinforce propaganda of western
superiority for the masses, I just can't view it as a structured argument...

------
my_first_acct
The article is by Vivek Wadhwa [1]. One quote, which doesn't quite make sense
to me:

"Even though China is graduating far more than 1 million engineers every year,
the quality of their education is so poor that they are not employable in
technical professions."

Not even one of them is employable?

The author is clearly knowledgeable, so I wonder if this is an editing error.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivek_Wadhwa](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivek_Wadhwa)

~~~
cududa
The only accurate prediction he's ever made is that Groupon would collapse

------
madengr
America doesn't need to ship electronics components over to China for
manufacturing (into larger products). Those components are already made in
Asia, and they have raw materials too.

I believe it really boils down to having a large enough middle class to afford
advanced manufactured products. If those products don't require labor to
manufacture, then who will earn enough to buy them?

------
wrong_variable
Keep Dreaming.

China has made it a _national priority_ to provide better standard of living
to their people then the West.

 _..With rising salaries, labor unrest, environmental devastation and
intellectual property theft, China is no longer an attractive place.._

How are these things bad ? China has their own class of capitalists now - they
no longer need wall street to finance their projects.

China may have bumpy roadblocks - but at the scale they operate - financially,
manpower and political will. It sort of doesn't matter. Its like a elephant
worrying about what an ant thinks.

Any issue that china faces - they seem to figure out how to overcome it. In
the EU we cannot even figure out how to get our currency right - even though
modern finance started here. China made all the right decisions when it comes
to Keynesian economics.

And sure they have a lot of debt - but the losers are the banks who are
lending them money. Who is going to knock on China's door to ask for their
money back ?

China can afford to waste 1 million of their own engineers to just beat
Airbus. That is the scale at which they operate. Just like how Stalin was able
to screw up so many times.

I have meet a lot of Chinese students - and if they were good at English and
didn't grew up with the great firewall. Silicon Valley wouldn't prolly exist.
Software is the only industry where I have seen American and Indian be better
than the Chinese - but its a very anecdotal observation.

You do not have to do a lot of analysis - just listen to a few episodes of Dan
Carlin's hardcore history.

For most of history China dominated economically and technologically. Just
because Europeans had better war technology ( due to the fact that europeans
were do divided ) were we able to dominate for a few hundred years.

We are going back to what normal looks like.

Edit:

I am not some chinese shill, my personal opinion is china should be punished
for crushing other countries through unfair trade practices.

The free market doesn't work if there are companies that have the backing of a
state with 1.3 billion people !

China would probably dominate even without the massive financial backing of
their state banks. But the aggressive nature of their expansion is worrying.

American's are still protected - you should ask the peripheral countries about
the effect of the rise of China to their economies ( Vietnam, etc ) why do you
think Obama is trying to push the TPP ?

China also worries me because they are showing that democracy doesn't matter,
when it comes to wealth creation.

~~~
tonyedgecombe
"Any issue that china faces - they seem to figure out how to overcome it."

Apart from running a democratic and open society.

~~~
nine_k
It does not seem like an issue to them. At least, not for their industry.
Englandof 1700s was not an open and democratic society either, but it lead the
industrial revolution.

~~~
mwfunk
Very true, but you're overlooking the fact that England of the 1700s was in
the 1700s.

~~~
nine_k
History is a pretty local thing. The ideas of democracy and freedom (these are
two different, often contradictory things) seem ti be pervasive in Western
Europe or North America. This does not mean they are pervasive, or desired, or
even understood everywhere in the world, despite the "civilized West"'s
attempts at propagating these ideas.

Chinese government has a pretty tight grip on the nation's information
sources, and has a very significant political and military power. Democracy
has no chance to be exported there, as it was exported e.g. to Iraq and
Afghanistan (rather unsuccessfully).

Chinese government makes a lot of efforts to keep the political system of
China under control, without Western-style democracy (and probably any other).
It also makes a lot of efforts to keep China producing and selling a lot of
stuff, and becoming better and better at it. It's rather successful on both
accounts.

There are a few examples of countries becoming wild economic successes under
quite undemocratic regimes: South Korea and Singapore spring to mind. But both
are not Communist (or former Communist, since the Chinese seem to have
abolished much of their previous communism). Maybe this is why the didn't look
so suspicious to the Western public.

~~~
df41
A funny thing is when I was talking to a lot of friends in China recently,
while they like america in general, they believe the Chinese system is
superior to the western "democracy". Do not get me wrong, they blame the
Chinese government for many things rather fiercely at the same time.

I somehow feel like they are overly optimistic but could not find any proof to
refute their point (talking about the current US election clearly did not
help...). They are mostly upper middle class who worth more than me. So I
guess they may be biased? However the taxi drivers seem to have the same view.

An anecdote: none of them want to immigrate (at least to US) and their only
major concern seems to be the air quality. Since they can buy everything else
from overseas anyway.

~~~
learc83
>An anecdote: none of them want to immigrate (at least to US)

I think your sample is skewed. Chinese people from all social classes are
immigrating to the US at record rates. The US gets about 25% of all Chinese
emigrants each year, a number that's been growing not decreasing. China
recently overtook Mexico as the top source for new immigrants in the US.

Look at the number of Chinese students, the number of H-1Bs, and the number of
Chinese green card applications for evidence of middle class highly educated
immigration.

For less educated immigration, visit any Chinese restaurant in any backwater
town in the country. You'll find that the front of house is staffed by an
endless supply of new immigrants.

~~~
df41
My sample is definitely skewed, since it is just like a dozen of upper middle
class friends. However, your argument may be flawed as well :)

It is possible that Chinese immigrants are on the rise, but it is not like a
Chinese person can easily immigrate to US, legally or not. Comparing the
number of Chinese and Mexican is a bit silly, because of the "undocumented".

The number of Chinese students is meaningless as not every student wants or
can stay. The number of H-1b may mean something but my feeling is that Chinese
are getting less in recent years. Do you have actual data? The green card
applications is more direct evidence, but some real data showing the trend
would be useful.

Anyway, I think if there is no pacific in the middle and there is no wall at
the border. At least 100 million Chinese people would love to move to US...

------
endswapper
This is important because ethical, sustainable manufacturing is foundational
to a sustainable economy. I don't think any single entity - country, company,
person should "own" manufacturing. Some of the other comments touch on this,
but manufacturing has far broader implications for the domestic middle class
(whatever country you're in) as well as for the environment.

Manufacturing jobs as we remember them - Roseanne at the plastic utensil
factory, nor as they are - assembling iPhones, are not next-gen manufacturing
jobs. Those jobs will be designing, building and maintaining automated
industrial productivity.

I think manufacturing gets overlooked because it is not relatable and not
sexy. However, it is incredibly cool. There is a significant opportunity for
innovation with tremendous social and environmental impact.

------
IANAD
For many years additive manufacturing printers have been getting better, but
slowly. In most cases, the printing process has leaned heavily on people and
software for addition of part supports and other part modifications, and a
good 3D manufacturing team will include experienced personnel; it's not easy
to replicate.

While large companies typically mass produce, there are certain parts that
cannot be made via traditional manufacturing processes. They've been using
additive manufacturing typically for tooling and higher-end products in these
cases.

Also, there is a trend towards customization, faster iterations of part
design, and using a variety of part materials within each additive
manufactured part that each have their own qualities.

But, printer manufacturers have seen opportunity in making the printing
process faster and easier to use, which over time will reduce the need for all
of the people involved in the process. Already some of the latest printers are
autogenerating supports and making it simple to remove those supports. That's
just a small part of the process, but it is a significant step.

So, while traditional mass manufacturing companies will be hurting in a decade
or two, eventually printers will no longer require humans to be involved at
all. Then, any company with enough money to buy a large number of printers
could manufacture 3D parts at mass scale.

I think it is premature to say that China won't eventually own next-generation
manufacturing eventually, but it won't in the next few decades unless they
drop everything and get on it.

------
hacknat
Sounds like this article is bunk from the comments, but I have simple answer
for why they won't own it, or at least why it won't even matter: Automation.
With automation eating labor to the core, the supply chain (cheap as it is,
though time in the supply chain costs money too) will be the next thing to be
eaten. I think we're going to see a much more distributed model of
manufacturing in the future and it will involve precious little labor.

~~~
yourapostasy
The US offshored so much of its manufacturing, I have to wonder if there is
sufficient critical mass of knowledge, people, infrastructure, _etc._ left to
effectively automate. Or if American firms will instead buy solutions from
Chinese automation companies, and the US ends up ceding the large-scale (or
even decentralized distributed-scale) automated manufacturing future to China
as well. This could leave the US performing very high-end manufacturing
requiring lots of labor input, but what happens when what the Chinese firms
learned with automation in the lower-end manufacturing is used to encroach on
this high-end?

Bunnie Huang pointed out the very ecosystem of lots of manufacturers in close
physical proximity to each in China other enables them to try different ideas,
failing fast and cheaply (the dual SIM feature came out of such freewheeling
experimentation). Can the US automate if it has gaps in its own manufacturing
capabilities having let it atrophy for so many decades, or are US business
leaders assuming a future where they are always purchasing "lower-end"
manufactured parts from the next China (and if they are, how are they ensuring
those "lower-end" manufacturers don't climb up the value ladder and take their
market from them)?

~~~
hacknat
It's an interesting hypothesis, but it presumes all engineering for
manufacturing is done in China, which is usually not the case. It was my
impression most manufacturing in China is "offshored" by American firms. I
have no idea what the actual stats are though, so it'd be tough to say one way
or another.

------
norea-armozel
I'm not sure you can compare an existing factory in China with a non-existing
factory in upstate New York. The two have very different environments to
contend with. In China, they already have supply chains, investors, and
customers. Whereas an non-existent or proposed factory has to set each of
these up and still contend with competition with the existing factories. The
only real advantage a factory that's local (like one in upstate New York) is
they'll be closest to the demand for that region. So, they can attenuate their
output when demand rises/lowers. But as a whole this is only a potential
benefit in terms of the ecological impact (reduced over production for some
products). And I say potential because some areas are better manufacturing
certain products like it's cheaper to extract aluminium British Columbia where
they have cheap power due to hydroelectric power than say S. America where you
find the aluminium ore rich soils. Getting around infrastructure limitations
won't be as easy as simply pouring more concrete. Some places just will never
be able to compete and I think this is something some folks need to address in
such articles.

------
eggy
Yes, robots do the same in China as they do in the U.S.A., BUT you still have
to pay a human to turn on the lights and start or stop the robots. In the
U.S.A. it will cost you 4x more I am guessing for this person.

They are not just sticking to manufacturing. China holds the number one spot
in Supercomputers as of June 2016 with Sunway TaihuLight, which displaced
another Chinese supercomputer Tianhe-2. The Sunway also uses no U.S.A.
hardware. [1]

China also just announced a 64-core Arm processor Phytium that if confirmed
"will be the most powerful Arm server chip on the planet." [2]

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercomputer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercomputer)

[2] [https://www.top500.org/news/chinese-chipmaker-unveils-
speedy...](https://www.top500.org/news/chinese-chipmaker-unveils-
speedy-64-core-arm-processor/)

------
jcbeard
I agree with the headline, but I'm not sure I agree with the reasoning.
Manufacturing is increasingly robotic, however it's also increasingly mobile,
and scalable. In the not so distant future I think various forms of 3D
printing will take over manufacturing. You'll have your small home units and
large almost entirely automated industrial units building more complex
objects. Why would this happen? Labor costs are beginning to rise in China. As
are costs in other parts of the world. As costs rise, seems like the distance
becomes a huge factor. Manufacture locally, distribute locally. Now the
question becomes how to employ the worlds populace....

Also related/interesting:
[https://www.ted.com/talks/olivier_scalabre_the_next_manufact...](https://www.ted.com/talks/olivier_scalabre_the_next_manufacturing_revolution_is_here?language=en)

------
pm90
This is a rather poorly written article. The main premise seems to be that
manufacturing is being automated, China is automating manufacturing by buying
robots not made in China, and since robots have the same productivity
everywhere, it doesn't make sense to manufacture in China since it can be done
back in the US.

While saving labor costs is an important reason for moving manufacturing to
China, there are other equally important factors as well. Access to a labor
pool of workers that do higher level designing that cannot be automated, much
lower local taxes (and even subsidies), proximity to other manufacturing
centers already in China are just some of the other important reasons.

I wish journalists would do a little more research before writing inane
articles with sensationalist headlines.

------
rdlecler1
The question really boils down to: will people be buying goods from Chinese
companies or US companies. If the former, then manufacturing will likely be in
China. If the US, then it doesn't make sense to outsource automated labor to
China just to ship it all back to the US while simultaneously risking IP
theft. Chinese consumers will likely buy Chinese made goods or foreign luxury
brands. In the US people are more likely to buy US branded goods.

------
sandworm101
No mention if China's other headache, the fractious legal system. Things like
land title, equity rights or non-expropriation (government's taking/buying
private assets) are centuries old doctrine in the west. Those looking to
invest billions into 'next-gen' manufacturing facilities want legal stability,
stability measurable in decades. China isn't there yet.

~~~
bubo_bubo
"Things like land title, equity rights or non-expropriation (government's
taking/buying private assets) are centuries old doctrine in the west. Those
looking to invest billions into 'next-gen' manufacturing facilities want legal
stability, stability measurable in decades. China isn't there yet."

There are stories in the news from time to time about situations where you
have an old woman who's been living in the same place for decades (see the
movie "Up" for a fictional example), and she's the last person on the land to
accept payment for the land and move. The builders - either a company or the
government, wind up having to build around. The way they do it is very
passive-aggressive, but there /is/ law over there when it comes to land
ownership. It's not all state property.

Further, do you really "own" your land here in the US? Nobody I know does. You
either pay rent (taxes) to the government on the land or the land is taken
from you.

There is no such thing as totally private land ownership.

WRT manufacturing plants:

Every new company in China has to be majority Chinese-owned. The government
has smartened up over the decades and left behind the "everything is owned by
the state, even your toothbrush" to something in between total private
ownership and public ownership. So they have rules like the above which anger
US investors, but are geared to the interests of the Chinese public.

They take care of their own. We used to do that here in the US, but it's all
become "fuck you, the free market fixes everything!!!" wharrgarble.

~~~
sandworm101
>> Further, do you really "own" your land here in the US? Nobody I know does.
You either pay rent (taxes) to the government on the land or the land is taken
from you.

Don't get legal theories from fringe websites. That line of thinking is a
stone's throw from "US citizens don't have to pay taxes" and "Driver's
licences are unconstitutional". Such websites are what got Wesley Snipes in so
much trouble. Read some actual legal texts at your local law library

Property ownership is a thing in the US (and canada, france, the UK and the
rest of the western world). The government cannot take your land without full
value compensation, even if you don't pay your taxes. They can condemn your
land and sell it to pay your debt, giving you all that is left, but that is a
long legal process where the rights of the landowner are given much
consideration and ample opportunity. They are not a landlord reclaiming
property.

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SaveClyde
Big question is if the manufacturing moves back to US...will China allow US
imports. This will be interesting, every country might start their
manufacturing operations and I believe the big winner will be the one
manufacturing robots :)

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sharemywin
I agree that with automation production will become more and more local but
the article assumes most consumption will happen in the US.

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asitdhal
the author has completely ignored the fact that Chinese skill improves over
the years, Americans grow, but Chinese grow faster.

------
known
"China is now low-cost, high-quality" \--Jack Ma

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thedonkeycometh
Same old American rhetoric. "Oh, the chinese are only good at copying. They
can never create". Yawn.

~~~
bubo_bubo
I've seen the same stupid crap said about the japanese, koreans, etc., over
the past 40 years. The story remains the same: Corporate US management sits on
its hands and watches the rest of the world innovate. Because thinking is too
hard and investing in R&D and capital equipment is too expensive.

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andrew_wc_brown
Have to enter email to read? Forget it.

~~~
sndean
When I click to read it redirects me to subscribe.washingtonpost.com. Probably
because I've read to many WaPo articles recently... Opening the link in
incognito mode works.

~~~
bubo_bubo
If you hit the 'stop loading' button early enough, the stuff you're talking
about doesn't have a chance to load.

It's slow enough to do this because web pages load enough crap to run a Quake
game.

~~~
sndean
Thanks, that worked. You're right, it's surprisingly slow.

------
known
With rising salaries, labor unrest, environmental devastation and intellectual
property theft, China is no longer an attractive place;

