“This is the new model, where you work in these plants for the rest of your life, and your kids work here, and your grandkids work here,” U.S. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick says.
I actually don’t want to work at a factory. I want robots to do that for me and I want the products to be cheap so I can buy cool stuff to do more interesting things.
Like I don’t want to weld parts and stuff, I want to make lasers from those parts.
I don’t want to melt glass. I want to use lenses to make images.
I don’t want to dig for shit. I want to use that stuff to make rocket fuel.
We don’t want factory jobs. We want technology jobs.
If you are clever enough for that creative work, why don’t you use that creativity to make those jobs?
The uncomfortable problem is that manufacturing jobs dind’t move to China for the cheap workers but for the cheap engineers and managers who run the factories.
Production won’t come back because there are not enough clever people in the USA.
A little correction there buddy. I happen to be a highly skilled person of the levels you mention. We were mid design of a new product when the tariff on aluminum hit and fucked us up real good. Depending on market conditions and client requirements we order from the US (for made in the USA) from Canada (for no China content ) and from China (for competitive markets). Parts get here, the same USA people assemble the parts, the same USA people calibrate the full production and the same USA people QA, package and ship the product. The tariffs hit right after trying to finish design, but we design with China as fall back and that’s gone. Now Canada is bidding parts but with tariff uncertainty we don’t know if those prices are real. So we’re shopping things here and of course here all shops ask for an arm and a leg. Its like 3 to 10 times the cost. So there’s no profit to be made and the investors are asking to see the final expected price before commiting. What will happen is that we will eat the cost and we’ll have to let our engineers and high skilled people go (since we’re done with our part) so that the company can survive. So I’ll be out looking for a job soon. The company already had a general layoff. So you know its going to be a fun orange Christmas.
But someone, somewhere is doing the grunt work. We’re nowhere near replacing manual labor. Hell, a robot with 10x our current capabilities couldn’t do my dumbass job at Lowe’s, and it certainly couldn’t talk to customers with decades of DIY and plant experience.
And BTW, I’m with you on all the above. Bet we’d be tight.
I actually don’t want to work at a factory. I want robots to do that for me and I want the products to be cheap so I can buy cool stuff to do more interesting things.
Like I don’t want to weld parts and stuff, I want to make lasers from those parts.
I don’t want to melt glass. I want to use lenses to make images.
I don’t want to dig for shit. I want to use that stuff to make rocket fuel.
We don’t want factory jobs. We want technology jobs.
If you are clever enough for that creative work, why don’t you use that creativity to make those jobs?
The uncomfortable problem is that manufacturing jobs dind’t move to China for the cheap workers but for the cheap engineers and managers who run the factories.
Production won’t come back because there are not enough clever people in the USA.
A little correction there buddy. I happen to be a highly skilled person of the levels you mention. We were mid design of a new product when the tariff on aluminum hit and fucked us up real good. Depending on market conditions and client requirements we order from the US (for made in the USA) from Canada (for no China content ) and from China (for competitive markets). Parts get here, the same USA people assemble the parts, the same USA people calibrate the full production and the same USA people QA, package and ship the product. The tariffs hit right after trying to finish design, but we design with China as fall back and that’s gone. Now Canada is bidding parts but with tariff uncertainty we don’t know if those prices are real. So we’re shopping things here and of course here all shops ask for an arm and a leg. Its like 3 to 10 times the cost. So there’s no profit to be made and the investors are asking to see the final expected price before commiting. What will happen is that we will eat the cost and we’ll have to let our engineers and high skilled people go (since we’re done with our part) so that the company can survive. So I’ll be out looking for a job soon. The company already had a general layoff. So you know its going to be a fun orange Christmas.
But someone, somewhere is doing the grunt work. We’re nowhere near replacing manual labor. Hell, a robot with 10x our current capabilities couldn’t do my dumbass job at Lowe’s, and it certainly couldn’t talk to customers with decades of DIY and plant experience.
And BTW, I’m with you on all the above. Bet we’d be tight.