I was thinking (always a bit scary). If there are some ideas that we think of to empower the public with this information we may want to PM them. Ol sour **** will end up trying to dominate the thread with his doom and gloom for those of us that still believe there is room for the personal touch. I really like what you all (most) are saying here.
I have wondered at times, is this about offshore outsourcing or out of town outsourcing?
Is gw much different to a local lab than china? Not to me. Once the crown/denture ships out of my area that patient has lost the personal touch only a local tech can give. I'm sure some dentists like that anonymity. My local clients work with me because I am local and they like the close relationship we have developed over the years. They feel it gives their patients better service. IMO
i do feel a little different about it.
(sorry, this is about to go way to long..)
for me anything made in the USA by our citizens is understandable and fair competition. it may not seem fair sometimes to have to compete with the big boys inside our borders but i have to believe that it is.
i have no real problem with it. to a large degree we have to play by the same rules. (sorta) and truly.. there is nothing stopping any one of us from becoming one of them. (if that happens to be the grand plan in someones life). uuug..
the problem i have is china’s currency manipulation.
it makes the yuan artificially cheap. that provides a subsidy on chinese exports. it
is what makes their products so cheap. its basically a big ole bs lie about what the yuan is really worth. most people think the problem is the cheap chinese labor, but in the grand scheme of things that has little to do with it.
so we end up in a huge trade deficit (about a 300 billion dollar difference last year alone). and thats just scratching the surface of all the bs thats going on right now.
for starters
we have to shell out big to fund our manufacturing R&D departments..
they just blatantly copy and steal whatever they want. thats just one example of why our prices end up higher with less profit, and theirs get to be lower with more profit. pretty hard to compete if you are the one paying for the innovation and selling,.. while they are just stealing and selling.
and then they flat out deny us any access to their massive chinese market. keep in mind thats almost 1.4 billion consumers. (we only have around 300 million in the US.)
because of policy (their policy) we are not really allowed to own anything or make a profit over there, but they are allowed to buy us up and make huge unprecedented financial gains. they blast our economy with unfair trade practices so the prices we charge for whatever we make has to go lower and lower and lower. i think tom covered this in one of his recent yada yada. but of course with the same ole tired spin that could only come from living the life of a profiteer. he actually likes to paint the picture as if 'it is a fair and good thing'. as if competing with china is (and should be) just the same as the lab across town.
i know that allot of peeps are probably thinking.. well its our fault for letting them do that to us. cant we just stop it with our own trade policies?
not so simple..
so how do they get away with it? in a word.. blackmail. keep in mind they now have stuff we dont have.. and we really.. really need.
you know,. kinda like the oil in the middle east.. but different. (and it changes).
right now its something called rare earth minerals. we need it. they have it.. we dont. why?
because in the recent past they intentionally paid off the right people so they could corner the market. they intentionally and systematically created a strategic advantage by pressuring non chinese downstream producers to move their mining operations, jobs and technologies to china.
what is it? its a range of essential base elements used in high tech manufacturing. and it is absolutely critical for our national defense. its used in products from tanks and ships to radar systems and night vision goggles. as well as much needed green energy products like wind turbines and batteries for electric vehicles.
right now.. china is restricting the export of these minerals to the US. its their way of saying F.U. and keeping the united states over a barrel. just because right now we are trying to say "come on.. cant we be at least somewhat realistic in our trading agreements? because of their calculating mafia tactics china now produces over 97% of the rare earth minerals on the planet. these current restrictions blatantly go against all the world trade organization rules... that china has agreed to.
thats just a few examples of whats really going on.. as we speak.
pretty much the chinese government will flat out just ignore whatever international trade rules and formal agreements they want.. and according to "you know who" if your an out of work american, or a struggling lab owner your supposed to just bend over, take it... and say thank you so much for the lesson in the new world economy.
