[Bret L]

I came across the following page on Chinese outsourced production of
a gadget financed by the US government. ((I can't make this up)).
Actually, it's a pretty well written series:

http://www.crunchgear.com/2010/05/01...factory-walls/

A small snippet:

" Adam Hocherman, 34, is an entrepreneur and founder of the consumer electronics company American Innovative in Boston, MA. Adam founded the company in 2003 with the help of the US Government’s SBA loan program and is currently the 100% owner. He holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering and an MBA, both from Cornell University. Adam’s writings can be found on his blog at DesignTheatre.net and through his Twitter feed. He welcomes your comments. Read more about sourcing in China here.

Part III of the Going It Alone series will answer the question: What
is a factory and how can I tell one from another? I will answer the
question from a consumer electronics perspective and I will assume an
audience that has little or no prior knowledge of manufacturing. The
purpose of this article will be to try to introduce the burgeoning
entrepreneur to the basic components of electronics manufacturing in
China.

I will do this in the context of manufacturing the simple electronic
product shown below – a digital kitchen timer that we call the Klip!
This is an item that we sell at The Container Store chain and at
gourmet stores across the United States. I chose this product
because, while relatively simple, it still encompasses all of the
major facets (noted in the white boxes) of manufacturing a mass-
produced electronic item of greater complexity. I’ll start with a
little background, then I’ll give a very basic overview of each
manufacturing sub-process and I’ll conclude with a summary that will
serve to make your first visit to a third-party manufacturing facility
more effective and productive. Armed with the knowledge from this
post you should be able to walk into an Asian plant for the first time
and have the basic working knowledge that you need to converse
intelligently about the creation of your item.

Although the scope of my company’s products is fairly narrow, my
personal background in manufacturing is more broad. I have visited
upwards of 50 plants both here in the United States and in China which
include facilities as diverse as the GE Locomotive factory in Erie, PA
to the Dunlop Tire plant in Buffalo, NY to the massive VTech
Electronics factory in Asia. I am knowledgeable of lean manufacturing
techniques, Poka-Yoke and Kaizan events just to name a few. I mention
these subjects only to give you a taste of how deep the topic of
manufacturing can get. As someone who is planning to contract with a
third-party rather than build a factory of your own, these subjects
are more academic in nature than you need to know about for now.

Origins of a Factory

The Exterior of a Plant. While Not Gorgeous to Look At, This Is One of
AI’s Best Partners

One of things that I like about working with the factories in China is
that big or small, I am typically interfacing directly with the owner
and director of the facility. I like these people because they are,
like I am, entrepreneurs. I respect these people because as difficult
as it is to start and run a company in a country that encourages and
embraces capitalistic activities – try doing it in a country like
China. Many a long car-ride I have spent trading war stories with
these factory owners – one entrepreneur to another. I know that many
of you who read my first two posts draw your line between America and
China, but I draw it between the entrepreneurs and the corporations.
We live in a global economy. These individuals work as hard as anyone
I’ve ever met, put people to work and make a life for their employees
and their families. To me, that is as honorable a pursuit in China as
it is in this country. More on this topic at a later date – for
purposes of this article I plan to focus on the mechanics and leave
further discussion of the culture for another post."

My response:


"Bret Ludwig - May 2nd, 2010 at 8:28 pm EDT

It is obvious a lot of people have a problem with Chinese
manufacturing. I certainly don’t have a problem with Chinese
manufacturing per se, I have a problem with wage arbitrage, and a
bigger problem with American LACK of manufacturing.

If we were a sane society we would realize that our autonomy as a
nation is more important than cheap disposable consumer goods being
ubiquitous. That autonomy depends on manufacturing.

The American Civil War and World War II were won essentially for the
same reason: the victors had the manufacturing infrastructure to
outproduce materiel and put men in uniform. (And BTW I mean men :-) )

Imposing a tax, tariff, and environmental offset system to derail wage
arbitrage would mean Higher Consumer Prices. It would also mean a lot
of jobs at American wages, and less stuff but of higher quality and
repairability.

I still have landline phone service terminating in WE 1200 and 500
series telephones. I regularly listen to music on Klipsch and Altec
speakers and Mcintosh amplifiers made from ten years before to fifteen
or so years after I was born. (I’m in my late forties). I listen to
shortwave radio frequently on Hammarlund and Collins receivers made
when Marilyn Monroe was still working. I drive a 1973 truck and a 1954
car pretty often.

Most of that stuff was bought or given to me not working and I
repaired it. The modern equivalents of those things are mostly
unrepairable. Even I-who can do a fair amount of SMT rework and own a
lathe, a milling machine and a full electronics bench-can’t fix
something where the parts are impossible to discern what they are and
unavailable if you did.

But the economics are not the deciding factor. National and racial
hegemony are. Americans think “Next Quarter”, Europeans think a little
longer, the Japanese think next quarter or half a century. The Chinese
think in terms of millennia. We are insane to build out their
infrastructure for them so that their leadership can accomplish their
long term goals, which include ending American hegemony everywhere and
eventually controlling the resources of most of the planet.

They have told us that they will take Taiwan back and that, valuing
Los Angeles as we do, we’ll do nothing to stop them. They told us this
in uniform on our own soil. Our response?
“Gee, can we have our widgets for two cents less per unit?”

Dr Revilo P. Oliver refused to ask whether a nation so craven
deserved to exist. I know it really doesn’t, but deserve has nothing
to do with it. It’s my nation, so I have no choice. I’m no hero, but
I’ve accepted that much."