Ot: Mia

[Too Tall]

Made in America

Just for giggles browse the link below after doing an brief inventory of the major furniture and appliances in your home.

Still Made in USA.com - American-Made Home Appliances

Very interesting exercise esp. if you have ever looked for an label of origin before you purchased.

[bikinchris]

It's way past time for us Americans to look for "Made in USA" labels as often as possible.

[Brandon White]

Weird - there is a washing machine manufacturer in my hometown where I lived for 18 years and didn't know it.

I can see this possibly killing a kitchen remodel budget.

[Clyde]

Just bought a speed queen after viewing thAt site, nice product.

[swt]

I prefer to buy furniture from countries where workers have basic rights, such as indonesia.

[dave1215]

BaileyWorks and IFab both made the list on the sporting goods page

[fmbp]

man, and I thought this thread was going to be about Mia Hamm.

[Too Tall]

man, and I thought this thread was going to be about Mia Hamm.

American made. What?

The bile began to reach my throat a few yrs. ago when one of our dogs was made sick by tainted chow. Unethical products and lousy quality control were to blame. That follwed by seeing discarded foreign made children's toys out on curbs destined for the landfill sealed the deal.

Now, I've crossed the line and am officially grumpy about this.

[dave1215]

BaileyWorks and IFab both made the list on the sporting goods page

btw, what does american made really mean, american assembled?

in these two cases for instance
where is the fabric made that baileyworks sews?
where is the steel made that independent fabrication welds?

it really is a global market and aren't we really better off for it?
sure there are quality control and other issues that need to be mitigated

but how much more expensive would everything be if we made it all ourselves?
standard of living increases with specialization - baker, butcher, cobbler, tailor, etc.

[Too Tall]

We can't and should not make everything ourselves that is wrong on so many levels. None the less I'm keen to buy and use quality where ever it comes from.
Buying well made goods from USA makers warms my heart and should do the same for foreign buyers who import our goods non?

[dave1215]

...Buying well made goods from USA makers warms my heart and should do the same for foreign buyers who import our goods non?

yes, the better our goods
the warmer their hearts

[WanderingWheel]

btw, what does american made really mean, american assembled?

in these two cases for instance
where is the fabric made that baileyworks sews?
where is the steel made that independent fabrication welds?

it really is a global market and aren't we really better off for it?
sure there are quality control and other issues that need to be mitigated

but how much more expensive would everything be if we made it all ourselves?
standard of living increases with specialization - baker, butcher, cobbler, tailor, etc.

I remember speaking to the CEO of Gillette a few years ago. He said he had a program that would tell him everyday how to make the cheapest razors. Where to buy the steel, where to cut that steel into razor blades, and where to assemble the blades into finished products. Every day it would change based on the costs materials and labor in each location and the cost of transportation. He originally was a ship builder like myself and we were mostly discussing how modern transportation made this business model possible, but underneath it all was the question of "what happens when shipping prices go up and make this model untenable?" In the next 10 years I expect transportation costs to go up dramatically for a number of reasons, and it will be interesting to see what places are best able to bring all parts of the manufacturing process back to their shores.

[Dorman]

Very cool site even if they did omit my LyfeTyme Pit made in Uvalde, TX.

[Ben]

This topic -- particularly the home appliance part -- is close to my heart. In 1985, my father started a glass fabrication business that made parts for the home appliance industry. Refrigerator shelves, stovetops, microwave doors, that kind of thing. To raise capital, he mortgaged everything he and my mom had, and sold stock to his friends and family.

They competed with Chinese and Mexican firms on every piece of glass that went out the door. They were successful for three reasons: 1. The stuff they made was the highest quality in the market. 2. Their customer service was second to none. and 3. My father was a damn genius, and figured out how to produce the parts as efficiently as possible. But it was a never-ending struggle being an American manufacturer. He aged in dog years the last half-decade.

That American manufacturing business fed me.
It put a roof over my head and clothes on my back.
It bought my first two bikes.
It put me through college.

When he sold it to a private equity fund in January, it made the people who had had faith in him a whole lot of money. These were people in my hometown. By and large, not rich people, but middle-class folks who entrusted my dad with good-sized chunks of their life savings.

It paid a shitload of property taxes in one of the poorest counties in one of the poorest states in the union.
It employed a whole slew of people who would probably have otherwise been unemployed.
It supported charities and schools and community events.

For the 75 or so hourly people who worked in the plant, it meant:
* A living wage
* Health, dental and vision insurance (The guy who'd worked there 90 days had the same BC/BS insurance as the CEO.)
* Profit-sharing (10% of pre-tax profits, paid monthly, and 5% of post-tax profits, paid annually. When they established their profit-sharing 401(k), the IRS initially red-flagged it as being top-heavy. Either the IRS didn't read the plan very closely, or had never seen a plan that was set up to be disproportionately favorable to the hourly folks instead of management.)
* Life insurance
* Paid holidays and vacation

You've never heard of this business. And you've never heard of the thousands of other American manufacturers who do exactly these same kinds of things for the people in their communities. But what you buy determines whether they keep doing these things, or give up the ghost and admit defeat.

Made in America matters. It absolutely matters.

[Too Tall]

Ben - Goosebumps. Your dad goes to heaven twice. Thanks, great reading this.

[Ben]

Thanks. If you can't tell, I tend to agree.

[shanerpvt]

Very cool site even if they did omit my LyfeTyme Pit made in Uvalde, TX.

Why they do that?

[Dorman]

Why they do that?

Oh, I'm sure it wasn't intentional. The company is probably just a little too small to be on their radar.

[shanerpvt]

Oh, I'm sure it wasn't intentional. The company is probably just a little too small to be on their radar.

They make good pits. That's a good part of the state.

[jim in pc]

Face it, it's no longer about out-dated notions like "American" versus "Chinese" or "Mexican." The owners of large manufacturers went global. They don't care about people or the well-being of society, with rare and small-scale exceptions they are sociopaths intent on arbitraging tax and regulatory regimes to enrich themselves. They won't pay living wages unless they absolutely have to. And then they will spend money figuring out how to get out from under that situation. It's time for working stiffs to go global, too.

Buy from responsible manufacturers regardless of origin. Europe is by and large the most responsible. For mass-market stuff, buy from the lesser of available evils. Id' rather not buy US products from companies like Koch Industries. Nobody is more intent on destroying my standard of living than them and buying something from them, whether it's made in the US or not, is a stupid use of my money.

Ben, props to your Dad, that's truly admirable. But it is no way indicative of how US goods are manufactured. (I don't see how you square that fundamentally liberal way of life with your avowed conservatism). Consumers can't drill down to that level. No doubt a lot of the end product got sold at WalMart, one step forward, two steps back. Most large scale US manufacturers are plowing a lot of money into corrupting government into reducing labor and manufacturing costs in the US by gutting unions, relaxing OSHA and EPA enforcement and laws, and anything else they can think of. The only thing they are more preoccupied with is tax evasion. Pay these guys money at your own peril. The "America" they live in is not the same "America" I live in, there is no solidarity, no cohesive society, no common ground. We are not all in it together. Buying anywhere but the US is as good a way as any to defund the class warfare being waged against you (and by "you" I mean people who work by necessity, I realize that's not true for everybody on this board). The heyday of American manufacturing was the 25 years post-WWII - a time of high marginal tax rates, strong unions and strict regulation. How many CEOs are advocating that these days? (More important, though, we had no competition, Europe and Japan having recently been blown to bits.)

The problems are social injustice and environmental destruction. Globally. A "Made in USA" sticker is not a guarantee that the manufacturer is not actively working towards making those two problems worse. It doesn't, of course, guarantee that they are, but in today's climate of conservatism it's far more likely they are. Eschew simple, wrong answers to complicated problems.