ZERO

Zero retail sales track with zero wealth in the bottom 99.9999%. Robust retail requires employed consumers or else the whole thing deteriorates into shoplifting. A nation of thieves is deflationary.

Sad, but not unexpected. If all our shit is not made here then there are no heavy industry type jobs that pay well. This then ripples down the supply chain to the clerk manning the store where there are no customers as the general populace has no excess $$’s to pay for shit above and beyond the bare necessities of food/energy/shelter. Even that is becoming harder to afford. Kicking out the light thru heavy industry is akin to kicking out the gold on exter’s pyramid. Everything was built upon that foundation and now there is no foundation. Hence the whole damn thing is collapsing cause the eggheads thought only service sector type jobs would be fine. Until it isn’t.

Brian – if Americans did not buy foreign made shit, shit, the eggheads would not make it overseas.

Who can really doubt that their is a concerted effort to destroy America? Socialists are not Constitutionalists Socialism is the great destroyer. It has destroyed Russia, China, Cambodia, and now the USofA along with the rest of the western world. Socialism enables indolence and evil of every kind. It is based on theft and not lawful exchange.

Today I talked with an acquaintance. He had major surgery and more is to come. He told me that if he didn’t have Social Security, he wouldn’t know what to do. He was finished without that check every month.

We are up against a rock and a very hard place as a nation. The politicians have squandered the monies collected and now we are broke, broke, broke. We, I fear, are going to need to rely upon the charity of our neighbors. Baring that, the future looks bleak.

Llpoh—Every person has a right to buy from whom ever and what ever they choose. The myth that ‘buy American’ would prevent the chronic decay of out economy, is nonsense. Everything that America produces and sell, whether it is Walmart or not, is put together with resources from many other countries.

Trade is good. everyone benefits from trade. Dr. Gary North give an excellent discourse on trade.

Maybe you want a cheap Chinese one use tool or an expensive Milwaukee tool. The choice is yours You know what your needs are and you should have a choice.

The corner that this nation has painted itself into is not cheap foreign made goods, but the destruction of money in their goal to obtain world hegemony along with rampant social spending. Guns and Butter.

Llpoh lay the blame where it belongs—undisciplined politicians and a greedy people. Ignorance everywhere abounds.

Llpoh–Ya! you’re right. Not much markup when there is fierce competition. I was surprised at the markup in the old days. There was a gas station that gave away a Cadillac once a month in San Pablo in the 50’s.
Even today, JC Penney’s, with their $10 off a $10 purchase or their 20% off coupons are making a profit, but very little. The whole idea was to steal customers and their meager saving from their competitors.

I heard an electronic guy, who frequented China, say that those ear buds that you can pay up to $40 dollars for in America are sold for less than $1 at the Chinese manufacturers. He never saw a pair over $1. That is a markup that is very forgiving.

James Dines, longer than I can remember, talked about the age of Robotics and the coming era or no jobs. Maybe we will have to go to some form of Bastiat’s ‘Broken Window Fallacy’. But, just again it is only a fallacy.

Zarathustra—Dr. Gary North gives a good discourse on trade and tariffs. Tariffs end up hurting the country that engages in them. Free trade and I don’t mean ‘off shoring’ is a boon for mankind. Suppose the US Congress passed in 1902, a law banning automobiles because automobiles harmed the buggy and buggy whip and equestrian industries. Think about it.

Llpoh—I agree competition does bring down prices of wages and goods. I also pointed out that the problem is not so apparent and superficial. It has to do with the destruction of money. The economy is built upon the foundation of money. Like any building a shaky foundation bring ruin to the whole building, eventually. By the time the damage is assessed it is too late. At some point, you can’t un-ring the bell.

Persnickety, Yes perhaps I am being general in my comments. I don’t know. I fall into the fixer category. I fix/operate equipment for a large chip maker. Many aspects of the job a monkey could do and real troubleshooting skills are not needed. However when shit goes crazy it takes a lot of skill to triage the issues and sort out where to start to troubleshoot then fix it. Perhaps I should have generalized it in that “we need to make shit in order for people to have shit”. Nearly half the people are on the take in this country. This burdens those still making shit into not giving a shit and closing down. Drilling into this issue the root cause of all of this shit is the fake money.

Zarathustra one last note—Japan and Germany and the US didn’t become industrial powers as a result of tariffs, but because they were loaned money by the bankers. Bankers have no allegiance to any country only to money.

After WWII, America was the last man standing, it didn’t need protective tariffs. Goods flowed to the bombed out world. England first then America succumbed to cheap money. The so called ‘free trade’ that was put to the people later was only a means to mitigate the rampant inflation occurring in those respective countries as a result of a depreciating currency.

Look at it this way. Add a gallon of water to a gallon of milk, walla, you have two gallons of milk. You see mathematics proves the day.

Brian – you are a fucking imbecile. Rare indeed is it that anyone knows as much about manufacturing as I do, much less a fucking repairman. I know more about the complexity of manufacturing than anyone you probably have ever met. Damn, here we go again, another knuckle dragger thinks he actually knows something. A fucking repairman lecturing me on manufacturing. Unfuckingbelievable.

Manufacturing, and all of its support group, is going the way of the dodo.

Repairmen – largely dead. Far less equipment is now needed, and it is far more reliable.

Engineers – truly on their last breaths. Computers, cad/cam etc. is killing them off, not to mention engineers can be sourced on line half- way around the world for less than a McDonalds worker is paid.

Pattern makers – truly already dead. No one hand makes patterns of any consequence anymore – 3D printing has killed them.

Tool makers have been CNCed out of the world.

Nut and screw turners are totally fucked.

Yes, the US and the world needs to make “shit”. But very few folks indeed will be needed to do so. I estimate in twenty years or so no more than 4 or 5 per cent of the world’s workers will be in manufacturing, including all the support functions of design, engineering, toolmaking, etc.

Go down to Wallymart and look at the price of a toaster. For $10 bucks they make that sucker, package it, make the raw materials, ship it half way around the world, disembark it and distribute it and stock it and sell it for a profit.

How is that possible? Because they make it in a minute or two, and have automated much of the handling. Even at Chinese labor rates it is an incredible feat.

Brian – you are in way over your head. Stick to something you know. You are a skilled tradesman, but a manufacturing expert you are not. Guys like you work for guys like me.

IS – could not let it slide.

P – well said.
Homer – some good stuff there. I have made those points more than once around here. It was good to be the one eyed man when everyone else was blind.

Llpoh when I said, “lay the blame where it belongs—undisciplined politicians and a greedy people” I was not is any way criticizing you. I was merely passing the baton. I wanted you to take up the challenge and “lay the blame where it belongs,” Those who directly bear the responsibility. Bankers are in there too, but the blame rests with the lawmakers and greedy people.

At one time I was one of Radio Shack’s “P-1” customers, since I was in the Radio broadcasting biz and seemed like every station I worked for was barely on the air with piss, string & bailing wire. I remember one time I replaced a cranky potentiometer in the control board (while trying to do my show) with a Radio Shack special. I can’t count all the hookup wire, connectors, solder, solder guns, etc. etc. I bought from Radio Shack. It was great when you needed something fast.
Then, with the advent of cellular phones, RS went off the rails, pushing out inventory stocking for the hobby folks with cell phone “accessories”. As I also recall RS was one of the first to demand ID when using credit cards. In fact the first time it happened I really got pissed ’cause I was a regular customer.
Anyhoo, they did it to themselves, so fuck ’em. I just ventured out to the local Walmart for some meds for my sick honey, and you could’ve landed an airplane down the aisles. Friday nite, 7 PM local time and hardly anyone there. BTW the Radio Shack in the adjoining strip center is cleared out/lights off. Only their sign remains and it of course was off. Sayonara.

Homer, all playing aside, ask me a question. I can give you a direct answer. This ain’t rocket science. I am directly attacking north’s “ideas”. You can get those same “ideas” from any article in forbes or the economist, written by some twenty something pakistani. Those “ideas” are a con job. You are a sucker. And you will be poor the rest of your life for not grasping that. Any question. I stand ready.

starfcker–I have read a lot of published material written by North and attended some of his lectures. I agree with much that he says and I also like his Cristian bent. I also like his commentary on the bible and economics. I feel these are truism having passed the test of time. But this post isn’t about North, but about the crisis hitting American retail institutions.

Llpoh makes a good point about our exports. I believe it is tit for tat in the export trade. Tariffs are more a political tool today not economic one. See: sanctions on Russia. This has been true always. Even FDR used tariffs against the Japanese, which fomented a war.

Either goods cross borders or troops cross borders.

Well Llpoh, I see I have irritated a brilliant PhD’ish know it all. I don’t claim to know everything, because I don’t. I see things evolve from rumor to reality because they don’t tell us much and from that limited information I can reasonably deduce what is going on in most cases. I do a little more than being a simple “repairman”, but so be it if that makes you a MAN on here.

Yeah great, China makes super products that last no more than 1-2 years. Yet my 37 yr old microwave still functions normally. There is no more quality in anything. The larger point is what are people going to do if there are no jobs out there that employ large numbers of people, pay decently, and are productive not parasitic by its nature? Go back to farming? Do you have any ideas or are you just going to call me names to pump up your ego?

My direct manager’s bosses are dim bulbs who are more worried about definitions of words on useless documents than getting the job done. So I hope your not like them.

Brian – you are not capable of irritating me.

If you think China is not capable of manufacturing world class quality products, you are sadly mistaken. They make some of the best high tech products available anywhere. They make a lot of shit, too, but not just shit. They are gaining rapidly on all fronts.

No, I do not know what, if any, industry is going to emerge to provide high paying, or even low paying jobs. I just know it will not be manufacturing.

And no, I am not one of the dim bulbs to which you refer. I make those sorts cry.

Re quality, depending on the definition used, in general the quality of manufactured products has never been so high as it is now.

One key reason for it is that we no longer rely on high paid unskilled labor to tighten bolts, weld,etc. those functions, and many others, are done via automation, which is vastly less likely to fuck up. Mistakes are now measured in very few parts per million, depending on the industry. Manufacturing workers cannot meet those tolerances.

I object when folks talk shit and know not of what they speak. You were fitting into that category.

A basic fallacy is that living wage or decently paid jobs are a right. No such right exists. Only by adding sufficient value can folks earn a living wage or decent pay. By and large, only a smallish percentage of the population can add sufficient value to so earn. That is the way of the world.

Low skilled and low ability people have little to trade, and much competition. The bulk of people fall into those categories, and shall struggle to live what is currently known as a middle class lifestyle.

High skilled folks with ability will do well. The bottom 80% are truly screwed. They have nothing of high value to trade. Screaming that there is wealth inequality will not change this. Stripping wealth from high skill high ability folks to give to low skill low ability folks will fail.

“As is happening currently in the US the elderly(retired) are outweighing the younger working class which is a big reason we are seeing a lot of change in the US. By change I mean jobs are being sent out of country and health care is being formed to eliminate the non producers in society.

With China’s one child policy, they are looking at the worst humanitarian apocalypse known to man kind.”
Jessie

Brian – welcome. And I mean that. Trial by fire around here.

The US has funded China’s rise via debt. The US has borrowed trillions and has spent it on Chinese products, among other things, and the Chinese thus grew in ability as you rightly point out.

Homer says folks have the right to buy from whomever they want, which is true.

That said, buying shit from China was extremely stupid. I said it 20 and 30 and even40 years ago, and I say it again. Buy local made product. Otherwise you are helping the competition, and will rue the day.

We are rueing.