Where do you buy your stuff - China or the Americas?

[US 41]

China's definitely profited from importing crap stuff here.

I only buy stuff made in North America (US, Canada, Mexico) because I trust the quality of the products from those places. Chinese stuff always seems to break and not have a long life span. I figure at the least, Canada and Mexico are our allies and I would rather see their governments get the money than some red state that isn't really our ally and tries to act like their better than us constantly. China is another country I'd be willing to put sanctions on.

[SSOWorld]

uh - North America is more than the US, Canada and Mexico.

Short answer to topic: 'bout goddam time.  In my view, keeping the sanctions is more like someone keeping a personal vendetta over something that has fizzled decades ago.

[vdeane]

uh - North America is more than the US, Canada and Mexico.

Indeed, they are but three of the 15 North American countries.

[NE2]

15? I count 23 independent countries: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_American_countries_by_population

[realjd]

China's definitely profited from importing crap stuff here.

I only buy stuff made in North America (US, Canada, Mexico) because I trust the quality of the products from those places. Chinese stuff always seems to break and not have a long life span. I figure at the least, Canada and Mexico are our allies and I would rather see their governments get the money than some red state that isn't really our ally and tries to act like their better than us constantly. China is another country I'd be willing to put sanctions on.

Why does your "buy from an ally" policy exclude such obvious places as Europe, Australia, Brazil, Japan, and parts of SE Asia like Singapore?

[US 41]

China's definitely profited from importing crap stuff here.

I only buy stuff made in North America (US, Canada, Mexico) because I trust the quality of the products from those places. Chinese stuff always seems to break and not have a long life span. I figure at the least, Canada and Mexico are our allies and I would rather see their governments get the money than some red state that isn't really our ally and tries to act like their better than us constantly. China is another country I'd be willing to put sanctions on.

Why does your "buy from an ally" policy exclude such obvious places as Europe, Australia, Brazil, Japan, and parts of SE Asia like Singapore?

I never see stuff from any of those places. Besides I would rather see stuff made in our own continent (especially in the USA) than somewhere else.

[Pete from Boston]

China's definitely profited from importing crap stuff here.

I only buy stuff made in North America (US, Canada, Mexico) because I trust the quality of the products from those places. Chinese stuff always seems to break and not have a long life span. I figure at the least, Canada and Mexico are our allies and I would rather see their governments get the money than some red state that isn't really our ally and tries to act like their better than us constantly. China is another country I'd be willing to put sanctions on.

Posting from someone else's computer, are you?  Because you don't own a computer made up of North American components.

[US 41]

China's definitely profited from importing crap stuff here.

I only buy stuff made in North America (US, Canada, Mexico) because I trust the quality of the products from those places. Chinese stuff always seems to break and not have a long life span. I figure at the least, Canada and Mexico are our allies and I would rather see their governments get the money than some red state that isn't really our ally and tries to act like their better than us constantly. China is another country I'd be willing to put sanctions on.

Posting from someone else's computer, are you?  Because you don't own a computer made up of North American components.

All I'm saying is that if there is a calculator made in Canada for $4.99 and one from China for $3.99 sitting right next to each other on a shelf, I am going to buy the one that was made in Canada.

[Pete from Boston]

China's definitely profited from importing crap stuff here.

I only buy stuff made in North America (US, Canada, Mexico) because I trust the quality of the products from those places. Chinese stuff always seems to break and not have a long life span. I figure at the least, Canada and Mexico are our allies and I would rather see their governments get the money than some red state that isn't really our ally and tries to act like their better than us constantly. China is another country I'd be willing to put sanctions on.

Posting from someone else's computer, are you?  Because you don't own a computer made up of North American components.

All I'm saying is that if there is a calculator made in Canada for $4.99 and one from China for $3.99 sitting right next to each other on a shelf, I am going to buy the one that was made in Canada.

Let's talk when there's a calculator made in Canada, and it can be had for only a dollar over China's price.

The truth is, we stopped making a lot of things here because our workers won't work cheap enough compared to China's near-slave-labor workforce.  Though Mexico makes it a lot easier to buy at least some things from the continent.  Somehow there is no shame in paying those folks peanuts because it's at least almost sort-of local.

[US 41]

China's definitely profited from importing crap stuff here.

I only buy stuff made in North America (US, Canada, Mexico) because I trust the quality of the products from those places. Chinese stuff always seems to break and not have a long life span. I figure at the least, Canada and Mexico are our allies and I would rather see their governments get the money than some red state that isn't really our ally and tries to act like their better than us constantly. China is another country I'd be willing to put sanctions on.

Posting from someone else's computer, are you?  Because you don't own a computer made up of North American components.

All I'm saying is that if there is a calculator made in Canada for $4.99 and one from China for $3.99 sitting right next to each other on a shelf, I am going to buy the one that was made in Canada.

Let's talk when there's a calculator made in Canada, and it can be had for only a dollar over China's price.

The truth is, we stopped making a lot of things here because our workers won't work cheap enough compared to China's near-slave-labor workforce.  Though Mexico makes it a lot easier to buy at least some things from the continent.  Somehow there is no shame in paying those folks peanuts because it's at least almost sort-of local.

You can argue all you want with me on this, but it's the way I spend my money. If you want to buy stuff from China, go ahead. But I support workers and businesses still manufacturing their stuff in North America. You don't have to like my decisions, but it's my choice. I never meant for my comment to turn into an argument.

[corco]

You can argue all you want with me on this, but it's the way I spend my money. If you want to buy stuff from China, go ahead. But I support workers and businesses still manufacturing their stuff in North America. You don't have to like my decisions, but it's my choice. I never meant for my comment to turn into an argument.

It's a noble cause and I don't think anybody is arguing that...just...where the hell are you buying stuff that's still manufactured in North America? I try to buy American whenever possible, but that's still probably <25% of my purchases, not because I'm lazy, just because the products simply don't exist. There's just not that much manufactured on this continent.

I use a Moto X phone, for instance, and that's probably just about the most "American" piece of electronic device you can find, but even then all the components are built in Asia and then shipped to America to basically be screwed together. Finding American/Canadian/Mexican electronics is all but impossible, unless I'm missing something.

I don't think anybody is arguing that it's innoble to buy the Canadian calculator over the Chinese calculator, but I'm curious as to where you are finding Canadian calculators.

[Pete from Boston]

China's definitely profited from importing crap stuff here.

I only buy stuff made in North America (US, Canada, Mexico) because I trust the quality of the products from those places. Chinese stuff always seems to break and not have a long life span. I figure at the least, Canada and Mexico are our allies and I would rather see their governments get the money than some red state that isn't really our ally and tries to act like their better than us constantly. China is another country I'd be willing to put sanctions on.

Posting from someone else's computer, are you?  Because you don't own a computer made up of North American components.

All I'm saying is that if there is a calculator made in Canada for $4.99 and one from China for $3.99 sitting right next to each other on a shelf, I am going to buy the one that was made in Canada.

Let's talk when there's a calculator made in Canada, and it can be had for only a dollar over China's price.

The truth is, we stopped making a lot of things here because our workers won't work cheap enough compared to China's near-slave-labor workforce.  Though Mexico makes it a lot easier to buy at least some things from the continent.  Somehow there is no shame in paying those folks peanuts because it's at least almost sort-of local.

You can argue all you want with me on this, but it's the way I spend my money. If you want to buy stuff from China, go ahead. But I support workers and businesses still manufacturing their stuff in North America. You don't have to like my decisions, but it's my choice. I never meant for my comment to turn into an argument.

I'm not trying to tell you how to spend your money.   Hell, I pay extra to buy local rather from some other state or region all the time.  I'm saying economic reality means the way you say you aim to spend requires essentially going off-grid.  I admire you if you're able to even make most of your purchases domestically, because it has to require quite a lot of patience and searching. 

[bandit957]

Buy union, buy American.

[Scott5114]

I'm looking on at great amusement at this thread because I'm someone who has, myself, outsourced a job to China. The reason why? I couldn't find anyone in America to do it.

The job in question involved printing on plastic. This apparently requires specialized equipment that most print shops in the US don't have. (And the ones that do happen to be competitors.) I did a lot of Googling and contacted companies here in Oklahoma City, then Tulsa, then slowly expanded my search to as far away as California and Florida. Time and again I would get emails back saying "This is not within our capabilities" or they would simply ignore my email. One company mailed me a bunch of promotional material instead of sending an actual response to my query. I finally found a company in Chicago that could do it–by subcontracting it to China.

Believe me, I really wish I could have had it done in America. We had to scrap two and a half print runs because the quality was unacceptable, and the freight to send the completed product to the US was $3,000. I'm sure the difference in cost to get it done in the US would be less than $3,000, and the quality better because there would be fewer delays and communications issues. But I couldn't find anyone who wanted to do the work. Maybe I didn't look hard enough, but I really shouldn't have to look under rocks for print shops.

And this job wasn't for a big corporation. This was for my one-member LLC. All the profits go to me, the American small business man. And yet just because I outsourced to China, you'd rather spend your money with a mega corporation run by seven-figure executives that can afford to build their own factory in the US. Interesting.

[NE2]

I fly to China to buy my stuff. Much easier than driving to South America.

[riiga]

I prefer to buy Swedish, and if not possible, European (within EU). Japanese stuff is usually good too. It's hard to avoid stuff that hasn't got some Chinese-made parts though, so I tend to not think much about it, and put my focus on buying only Swedish meat and other groceries where it matters more.

[NE2]

Swedish meat and other groceries

bork bork bork

[jeffandnicole]

You can argue all you want with me on this, but it's the way I spend my money. If you want to buy stuff from China, go ahead. But I support workers and businesses still manufacturing their stuff in North America. You don't have to like my decisions, but it's my choice. I never meant for my comment to turn into an argument.

Where the stuff is made is only half the story.

Let's take Walmart for example.  They're heavily criticized for their many goods from China.  But they are also America's largest employer.  The employees are usually people that live in or very close to the town the store is in.  While the products may not be imported, the people making the money there aren't.  You are still helping the local economy.  You are still keeping locals employed.  And any large boxstore has distribution centers, truck drivers, delivery men, etc that work behind the scenes.  They all add to the overall workforce, so you're still keeping plenty of people employed.

Don't like Walmart?  Then we'll say "Let's take (insert any large boxstore name here) for example".  Walmart gets the criticism because they're the largest, but hardly the only one.

Let's look at other large employers:

Yum Brands and McDonalds:  Two companies that employ many people from the local area.  You may not like their food, but your neighbors may be earning a living on others that do.

IBM: A company with the brains behind the technology that you are probably utilizing right now to read this.  But yet, many of the parts in their products come from overseas.

UPS: A delivery company employing many US citizens.  No doubt delivering many goods made in China.

Target:  See Walmart.

After that, there's Kroger, Home Depot, HP & GE.  All have their plusses and minuses.

Look, in the end, I have no problem where people buy their stuff.  It's the arguments for or against that often times don't really make sense.

[3467]

We can make it simple . Do you avoid Chinese stuff . Well I try because they stole some of my Intellectual Property. But its hard to avoid it all because some stuff was never made here or elsewhere -like the Apple stuff . Some stuff mostly textiles left the US a long time ago.  It went to a number of third world countries and China knocked them out.
China makes up a quarter of our manufactured imports of 1.8 trillion . I have a hard time getting to 100 billion in manufactured imports from the developing world outside China and Mexico. Also a part of our imports of 280 billion from Mexico.
Most of the Chinese deficit has happened since 2000 Imports went from 100 billion to 400 Billion. The economic Policy ins. did a study last year that estimated a loss of 2 million US manufacturing Jobs or about half the losses since the 2008 crisis
Now the future should be interesting China admitted its labor force is shrinking which means it probably has been for a while. So how long will it stay Cheap? How will the massive pollution affect its population and productivity? And will the US just keep taking it ?

[Laura]

You can argue all you want with me on this, but it's the way I spend my money. If you want to buy stuff from China, go ahead. But I support workers and businesses still manufacturing their stuff in North America. You don't have to like my decisions, but it's my choice. I never meant for my comment to turn into an argument.

It's a noble cause and I don't think anybody is arguing that...just...where the hell are you buying stuff that's still manufactured in North America? I try to buy American whenever possible, but that's still probably <25% of my purchases, not because I'm lazy, just because the products simply don't exist. There's just not that much manufactured on this continent.

I use a Moto X phone, for instance, and that's probably just about the most "American" piece of electronic device you can find, but even then all the components are built in Asia and then shipped to America to basically be screwed together. Finding American/Canadian/Mexican electronics is all but impossible, unless I'm missing something.

I don't think anybody is arguing that it's innoble to buy the Canadian calculator over the Chinese calculator, but I'm curious as to where you are finding Canadian calculators.

Why has this question gotten lost in the shuffle? I want to know where you buy things.

For me, when I'm really trying to "buy local", I'm doing it on the craft level. Instead of automatically going to Target to buy Christmas decorations, I went to craft shows and Etsy. Sure, maybe the products they have assembled are from China, but the craftiness is American.

I like to crochet as a hobby. One day, I'd like to have the money to buy the really nice organic yarn spun by locals here in Baltimore, but that's not in my budget right now. So, my yarn is either from my late great aunt's stash, or from Michaels, meaning that it's most likely from China. I don't sell my wares, but if I did, the pricing would reflect the cost of materials. As much as we'd like to say that everyone would pay $50 for a scarf crocheted with Baltimore yarn, it's far more likely people will pay $25 for a scarf with Michaels yarn because it is more affordable.

Since the average person is going to vote with their wallet and not by the production process, it would be really hard to bring mass-scale manufacturing back to the states.

[corco]

One thing I look at is the change in the automotive industry over the last 50 years.

50 years ago, you bought a car built in Michigan by labor that was making enough money to live a sound, middle class life. The profits from the purchase of your car went to Ford or General Motors, which are American companies that pay taxes in America and contribute to the American economy.

Today, you buy a car built in Tennessee by labor that makes $12-$15 an hour, hardly enough to support a family. The profits from the purchase of your car go to Toyota or Honda, which are Japanese companies that pay taxes in Japan and contribute to the Japanese economy. The factories in this country are usually built on tax abatement deals where multiple towns compete against each other so those factories usually don't pay much if anything in property tax, all while the citizens of whatever community foot the bill for the infrastructure upgrades for said factories. America gets screwed in this deal. Toyota and Honda then do charitable shit to make them look like they're contributing to their community, but it's a drop in the bucket compared to the tax dollars they should be paying.

Yes, we're employing labor in this country, and yes, dealerships and car sales are part of the industry that America still benefits from, but at far less money than we were before, with the profits going across the ocean. Depending on your worldview, you can either blame the unions for strangling Ford/GM/Chrysler or blame the government for not requiring foreign manufacturers to honor the same union deals the domestic manufacturers were required to.

The flipside is that cars are probably a bit higher quality than they would have been otherwise, but at what cost? I'll only buy a new Ford or GM car built in the USA or Canada because I know the workers are getting paid more to build my car and the profits from building my car benefit a company headquartered in this country.

[3467]

I expect some manufacturing to return to the US because nowhere else is there a more productive workforce for a cheaper price than the US . I think the GM wage in the 50s was like 40 now compared to the Wal Mart minimum wage.
The Chinese air pollution is like nothing the human race has ever seen and its fertility is also the lowest ever by some measures . I think we are at peak China and after that I see the best alt is to come back to the USA and automate as much as possible

[vdeane]

One thing I look at is the change in the automotive industry over the last 50 years.

50 years ago, you bought a car built in Michigan by labor that was making enough money to live a sound, middle class life. The profits from the purchase of your car went to Ford or General Motors, which are American companies that pay taxes in America and contribute to the American economy.

Today, you buy a car built in Tennessee by labor that makes $12-$15 an hour, hardly enough to support a family. The profits from the purchase of your car go to Toyota or Honda, which are Japanese companies that pay taxes in Japan and contribute to the Japanese economy. The factories in this country are usually built on tax abatement deals where multiple towns compete against each other so those factories usually don't pay much if anything in property tax, all while the citizens of whatever community foot the bill for the infrastructure upgrades for said factories. America gets screwed in this deal. Toyota and Honda then do charitable shit to make them look like they're contributing to their community, but it's a drop in the bucket compared to the tax dollars they should be paying.

Yes, we're employing labor in this country, and yes, dealerships and car sales are part of the industry that America still benefits from, but at far less money than we were before, with the profits going across the ocean. Depending on your worldview, you can either blame the unions for strangling Ford/GM/Chrysler or blame the government for not requiring foreign manufacturers to honor the same union deals the domestic manufacturers were required to.

The flipside is that cars are probably a bit higher quality than they would have been otherwise, but at what cost? I'll only buy a new Ford or GM car built in the USA or Canada because I know the workers are getting paid more to build my car and the profits from building my car benefit a company headquartered in this country.

This is why most countries tax based on money earned in the country instead of by citizenship.  As far as I know, the US is the only country to tax by citizenship.

I expect some manufacturing to return to the US because nowhere else is there a more productive workforce for a cheaper price than the US . I think the GM wage in the 50s was like 40 now compared to the Wal Mart minimum wage.
The Chinese air pollution is like nothing the human race has ever seen and its fertility is also the lowest ever by some measures . I think we are at peak China and after that I see the best alt is to come back to the USA and automate as much as possible

China's pollution is like US pollution was 100 years ago.  Many of the jobs "returning" are assembly jobs - the low level manufacturing occurs in China, some parts get put together in the US, the rest of the parts get put together in Mexico, and the thing then gets sold in the US.  If it gets too expensive to outsource to China (like it did with India), they'll probably move to Africa next.

[3467]

US and Europe did have bad coal pollution a hundred years ago but nothing like the PMI 500s that cover the entire north China plain on a regular basis . Since the Chinese Gov admits that lung cancer (smoking plus pollution) is the leading cause of deaths and a million excess deaths I suspect it may be even worse.
China has tried Ethiopia and had serious productivity problems. Africa has serious issues mostly disease that will prevent it from being the next China. I just don't see another China

[J N Winkler]

This is why most countries tax based on money earned in the country instead of by citizenship.  As far as I know, the US is the only country to tax by citizenship.

Country of citizenship matters for personal income tax--i.e., tax on income earned by a physical person, rather than a juridical person such as a corporation.  Since the US requires its citizens to pay taxes on all income regardless of where it is earned, US citizens by default have double tax liability on income earned overseas.  Eliminating this double-charging is one reason the US has bilateral tax treaties with a number of countries.

Things work a little differently for corporations.  Most multinationals handle business in countries that are foreign to them through subsidiaries chartered in those countries, which may be privately held (as I believe GM now does with Opel) or left publicly quoted in order to satisfy any local ownership requirements that may apply.  It is then the subsidiary, not the parent company, that bears corporation tax liability in the foreign country.  There are ways to shield locally made profits from liability by treating transactions between the subsidiary and the parent corporation as expense payments, which are capital flows and are not taxed.  Various credits and deductions apply since every country uses its tax code as a mechanism for administering economic incentives, so it is actually fairly rare that a company's ultimate tax bill in any jurisdiction is more than a small fraction of net income multiplied by the marginal tax rate.

The dynamic Corco describes--cities competing with each other for new factories, so any new factories tend to be tax-abated and contribute nothing to the local tax base--also applies internationally, except that--unlike us--other countries don't pretend they don't need a regional policy, so the national government gets involved in buying employment through tax incentives.

In the US we have created some of our own problems by keeping our auto market pretty wide open, with minimal local-content requirements.  In the 1980's Nissan more or less freely sold cars manufactured in Japan in the US market--my 1986 Maxima rolled off the line at Oppama in Yokohama prefecture, with a sea of kanji labeling under the hood and no US-sourced parts.  In contrast, Nissan was able to sell a very similar model, the Bluebird, in Britain only by shipping knockdown sets from Japan to a new factory in Washington New Town (near Newcastle) for local assembly, to meet stringent EU requirements designed to protect employment not just at European car manufacturers but also at the European subsidiaries of American car manufacturers (in Britain, Ford used to have a big plant at Dagenham, and GM had another at Luton).  Later years of the British Bluebird had locally manufactured sheet metal as well as more use of locally manufactured installable components, such as Lucas generators.  The tradeoff was that Japanese cars never acquired the same reputation for reliability in Europe that they did in the US.  (Taking the generators as just one example:  Lucas' long-standing corporate motto is "King of the Road," which some wags subtitle "Prince of Darkness.")

Put simply, compared to our international competitors, US trade policy tends to favor the domestic consumer at the expense of the domestic worker.  This is partly because private-sector unions are now quite weak--in recent years it has been the public-sector unions that have led the fight to protect collective bargaining rights--and partly also because our political system does not favor an orderly approach to regional issues.  Whenever a big multinational talks about putting in a new factory in the US, any region that wants to land that factory has to build a coalition with players from local, state, and federal government.  Since the US is a big country, any such coalition is immediately engaged in a "race to the bottom" with similar coalitions from other regions.  This has even prompted US companies to move factories just to arbitrage labor costs and tax incentives:  for example, Boeing is shuttering its Wichita plant to move work to lower-cost Oklahoma City and San Antonio, and the 787 tail is now made in South Carolina.  Our political system doesn't vest any single party with the power necessary to curb the waste that results from this game of musical chairs.