STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Friday, 30 October 2015

[Demeter]

15. 'Good' Jobs Aren't Coming Back ONSHORING DEBUNKED

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/10/onshoring-jobs/412201/



In the last several years some American companies have moved their operations back to the states, but the resulting factory work isn't providing the prosperity and security that such work once did...GM is one of the hundreds of companies, big and small, that have moved manufacturing back to the United States from overseas. Outsourcing decimated American manufacturing in the 1980s and 1990s, erasing nearly six million jobs between 1989 and 2009.

But the number of manufacturing jobs has started to slowly grow again, and about 700,000 jobs have been added since 2010. “Onshoring,” as it’s called, is at this stage delivering just a trickle of new jobs, but states such as Tennessee are offering companies generous incentives to try and speed up the process, luring some big-name companies. Whirlpool in 2013 said it was moving production of commercial washing machines from Mexico to the U.S. The company that makes Otis elevators announced in 2012 that it would move production from Mexico to South Carolina. Caterpillar moved some heavy-equipment manufacturing back to the U.S.

But these are not your father’s manufacturing jobs. Many of the companies are locating their new plants in right-to-work states where it’s less likely their workers will join a union, and the prevailing wages are far lower.

In fact, nationally, the average wages of production and non-supervisory employees in manufacturing are lower than they were in 1985, when adjusted for inflation. In September, those employees made an average $8.63 an hour, in 1982 to 1984 dollars, while they made an average of $8.80 an hour in 1985, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

***********************************

There are many reasons for companies to move manufacturing back to the U.S. Wages are rising in China, and many companies find it difficult to control the quality of goods made there. It takes a long time to make something overseas and then ship it back to the U.S, so locating in the U.S. can speed up production. In the U.S., companies can make small batches of goods, test consumer demand, and quickly adjust accordingly.

NO D'UH! MORE AT LINK