[TheForge] Second Rate USA?

Thu Jun 12 13:41:58 EDT 2008

What Ries says is very true.  Sometimes it is hard for us here in the USA to 
understand that to sell into a world market in many cases you have to have a 
percentage of content manufacture in the country you are selling to.  This 
is not always the case -- and lots of things have moved offshore because of 
a low cost labor -- but it isn't always the driving factor.  Boeing is 
another company that has to have offshore content to sell planes in some 
countries or the EU.

Dave

--------------------------------------------------
From: "ries" <ries at riesniemi.com>
Sent: Thursday, June 12, 2008 12:06 PM
To: "Blacksmithing List Sponsored by ABANA" <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: Re: [TheForge] Second Rate USA?

> Cat has had a joint venture factory in Japan since 1962.
> Cat has had a joint venture with mitsubishi to make forklifts together 
> since 1972.
> Cat has a dozen factories in China, as well as factories all over the 
> world.
> So the globalisation of CAT is far from a new thing.
>
> But I wasnt saying that american companies were not global- Lincoln 
> Welder, for example, has many more factories in China, Europe, and 
> overseas than they do here-
>
> What I was saying was that CAT still does make a lot of machines here  in 
> the USA, and exports them to other countries.
> We were discussing whether ALL american manufacturing jobs were gone-  and 
> I was simply saying, no, companies like CAT still do make things  here, 
> big, heavy expensive things, and export them.
>
> However, by CAT standards, your backhoe is probably pretty small 
> potatoes- the bigger items the make here, the small stuff they ship in 
> from overseas.
> They exported $12.6 Billion dollars worth of machines in 2007. Thats  just 
> CAT.
> Many of them were things like D-11's, Off Road Dump Trucks, and  Scrapers, 
> which can easily cost more than a million bucks each, are  the things they 
> try to make and sell here.
>
> Similarly, there are a pair of John Deere 9030 500hp tracked (not 
> wheeled) tractors in the field across from me today. Those puppies, I  am 
> pretty sure, are still made in Waterloo- but all the small John  Deere 25 
> hp tractors are actually rebadged Yanmars from Japan. This  has been going 
> on for at least 20 years or so.
>
> Sad, but true, economic facts of life.
>
> Ries
>
>
>
>
>
> On Jun 12, 2008, at 8:39 AM, Ekaterina Harrison wrote:
>
> I disagree.
> In recent years I have personally seen Caterpillar go down the road of 
> having much of their equipment components manufacture overseas.
> Some years back I was working at a sawmill and and realized the 
> Caterpillar forklifts had started using Mitsubishi engines.
> We currently own a Caterpillar backhoe and I must say Caterpillar's 
> service has gone way down hill. It used to be that no matter how old a 
> machine you could get parts in the next day because because they were 
> manufactured and stocked here, in the States ( out of superior  steel),- 
> not so now days. The mechanics were exceptional (even  legendary), not 
> often the case now. Some of the Caterpillar mechanics  we encountered 
> could best be described as sloppy backyard mechanics!   Sad!
> Our recent backhoe, needed to have a cylinder replaced. We were told  it 
> would be several months out because it had to be manufactured in  Germany! 
> How many business can afford to be down for months!
>
> Ekaterina
>
> On Jun 9, 2008, at 10:18 AM, theforge-request at mailman.qth.net wrote:
>
>>
>> Message: 2
>> Date: Mon, 9 Jun 2008 08:56:08 -0700
>> From: ries <ries at riesniemi.com>
>> Subject: Re: [TheForge] Second Rate USA?
>> To: Blacksmithing List Sponsored by ABANA <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
>> Message-ID: <76B4163A-CEE5-4CAD-9B03-4B8A4186F4D4 at riesniemi.com>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed; delsp=yes
>>
>>
>> On Jun 9, 2008, at 8:09 AM, craig.schaefer at verizon.net wrote:
>>
>> "....that we would become a second-rate industrial player? "
>>
>>
>> I disagree.  We are on par or better than anyone in the world,
>> technologically.  It's costwise where we have trouble competing.
>>
>>
>>
>> Craig
>>
>>
>> I would say that in a lot of ways, we compete just fine.
>> A few examples-
>> Caterpillar and John Deere both export hundreds of millions of dollars
>> worth, if not billions, every year.
>> Not cheap, but miners, roadbuilders, and construction companies
>> worldwide gladly pay for the best.
>> Ditto for Kenworth and Peterbilt, Terex, and other construction
>> equipment.
>>
>> Boeing, of course, sells airplanes by the bushel. Less of them are
>> made here than used to be, but in my little area, there are still
>> plenty of subs to Boeing- machine and fab shops, including Janicki,
>> which, from a standing start less than 10 years ago, now employs over
>> 500 people, has the largest milling machines in the world, and is
>> selling tooling to Airbus, among others.
>>
>> The US auto industry exported Billions of dollars worth of cars and
>> trucks last year- not enough to overcome structural problems in the
>> big 3's business plan, but they units were still made and sold. We
>> send Honda's to Japan, BMW's and Mercedes to Germany, and so on.
>>
>> Haas is the largest manufacturer of machine tools in the world- based
>> in Ventura Ca.
>> They sell more than 100 CNC machines a month to the chinese.
>> We have probably 50 more machine tool manufacturers here, making
>> oddball, expensive machines, that they ship worldwide. Giddings and
>> Lewis, for instance, sends metal to china as well.
>>
>> Everybody in the world knows the difference between a real designed in
>> the USA I-Pod, and a cheap chinese knockoff, and they all want the
>> real thing.
>>
>>
>> If you subtract the oil imports from our balance of trade, it isnt
>> half bad. Not as good as it could be, but nowhere near as bad as
>> people say it is.
>>
>> Where we dont compete is on low priced commodities that are mass
>> produced by unskilled labor.
>> But we do very well, especially considering how small our population
>> is, on things that require brains.
>>
>>
>> Ries Niemi
>> Industrial Artist
>> http://www.riesniemi.com/
>>
>>
>
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> http://www.riesniemi.com/
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