A Question To Make You Think.

[diaperedandloving]

I'm proud to say that the steel and metal fabrication shop i work in has had its hands in the construction of several major power plants, and the part of the shop I work in is responsible for the cooling bars used in a company that supplies fiberglass for the automotive industry and many other fiberglass related products.

[tndyperboy]

I worked for a heavy manufacturing company for over 25 years; left in 2000 but they are still in business. Now own a distribution company that also does light assembly of specialized electronics. Most of the components are imported but we put it all together here. As for manufacturing in general, while the percentage of our GDP is "service" related the US is till the largest manufacturing economy, even larger then the new global arch nemesis; China. When I was starting out after college Japan was the evil country that was poised to take over the manufacturing world. Anyway, the last numbers I looked at which I think was 2009, might have been 2008, the US economy is 3 times the size of China. Mostly because we are more educated and our factories are more automated. This is not to trivalize the national debt or the impact of outsourcing to Asia, just helps keep things in prespective.

[Darkfinn]

I don't see how the US can be the largest manufacturing economy. We don't make anything besides cars and food.

Furniture, textiles, and clothing... gone to to Central and South America, China, and Vietnam

Plastics and Electronics... gone to China, Japan, Taiwan

So what does that leave us with?

[Bettypooh]

That is the general point... unfortunately a lot of people can't see it.

No nation has ever remained great without either trade (usually based on it's location more than anything else) or produced goods which other nations purchased Nowadays trade is easy and location matters much less that ever before We're on the other side of the hill now and going down and unless we return to becoming a nation of producers we're done for We don't prosper from making goods which are sold to us, we only prosper when more money is coming in from other nations than is leaving ours A service-based economy must eventually fail because there has to be money to pay for those services so when it's gone the service companies no longer have a market

The intricacies may be complex, but general economics is quite easy to understand and history proves my assessment Buying from other nations more than you are selling to them obviously degrades an economy. Buying from and selling to yourself doesn' t work because each transaction requires a profit which raises prices and causes the next transaction to cost even more for that profit cycle to continue Acquiring wealth through conquest like the Roman Empire is counter-productive after the half-way point because you end up buying from and selling to yourself with each transaction skimming a profit thus raising prices Production is the only way to continue to profit and grow as a nation and with our resources we can do it- we've done it to get where we are. Unless we do it again it's just a question of time before we're so weak that someone conquers us The party's over unless we get back to a production based economy Vote accordingly

Bettypooh

PS: I produce buildings which of course all stay here, but like YVHuce my work allows others to produce for export. It does take all kinds of businesses to create an economy but the bottom line is always export or die!