I'm tired of poor quality stuff made overseas failing on me all the time...

[tabs]

YO HO HO...My Salvatore Espresso...is made in Solvang, CA USA...BABY...HAND BUILT by a little old Itie fellow...Nothing Beats Quality..and its used everyday...

[notfarnow]

My father in law gave us a Christmas tree stand 2 years ago. $7.99 and "made in china" sheepishly tagged to its underside. After he left I said to my wife "this this is a fking curse, and we should just throw it away now and save ourselves the grief." Of course, Mrs Notfarnow thought I was being an ungrateful pr!ck, and we used it.

This year, when I was putting the tree up I cursed it again, and was scolded again.

And so on Christmas Eve this year, I was laying on the couch with my bride and two dogs, a roaring fire in the fireplace and 3 rum and eggnogs under my belt. It was with a certain amount of glee that I watched the Christmas tree teeter, then collapse. I didn't say "I told you so", I just giggled.

It wasn't a Christmas tree stand at all, it was an imitation Christmas tree stand. It was made to look like something that would hold up a tree, but not actually perform the task for which it was purchased.

[The Gaijin]

Tabs is pretty much right about China - and living by example.

We all complain about stuff made in China - and then what do we do? Go to Walmart and buy more!

Where ever stuff is made - there is a strong case for buying quailty. Nothing is more of a waste of money and resources than stuff that does not last.

But if you think we have a problem with illegals now - try making in the USA all the consumer goods we use..

[frogger]

I actively try to purchase from 1st world nations, with the USA getting first crack at it. We bought a steam iron that was made in Germany. Every other one we saw was made in China. More recently, we tried to buy a toaster oven, and none are made outside of China. Not happy about that.

Walmart is only good for buying motor oil.

[legion]

Originally Posted by nostatic

That's not a very nice way to describe the Bush administration...

I think you are confused about which president lobbied for and obtained entrance to the WTO for China, then granted them "most-favored nation" status.

[legion]

Originally Posted by SlowToady

We make archery accessories; sights, arrow rests, quivers, and recently we're making shotgun sights, though they are plastic, no metal (except for a small mount on one or two versions of the sight).

What brand? I am in the market for shotgun sights, I would prefer some made in the U.S.

[RickM]

Originally Posted by frogger

I actively try to purchase from 1st world nations, with the USA getting first crack at it. We bought a steam iron that was made in Germany. Every other one we saw was made in China.

Interesting. We have been through more made-in-germany Rowenta irons in this household. Probably one per year for the past 10 years. Most if not all were returned because of defects.....mostly broken steam actuators and power cord connections. We put up with it because when they work they perform better than any other consumer grade counterpart. (Some of the best commercial irons are Japanese)

FWIW, Rowenta manufactures products in Mexico as well.

[frogger]

Rick, our Rowenta is still less than a year old. I'm a bit nervous now after hearing about your experience. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

[RickM]

Originally Posted by frogger

Rick, our Rowenta is still less than a year old. I'm a bit nervous now after hearing about your experience. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

Hopefully you purchased at a place that has a liberal return policy. If you find yourself wiggling the power cord to get the iron to power up then return immediately. Apparently the stress shorts out the wires at the plug (once in my hand!) and the electrical contacts at the base foul up. Maybe the latest examples have improved.

[alf]

Originally Posted by tabs

The Chinese are an internal looking society. everything they do is based upon what is good for the internal development of China. Their goal is to be able to feed everyone, and raise the standard of living from abject poverty levels. To do this they need to industrialize at any cost. They are coming from over a hundred years of western exploitation and having nothing to pulling themselves up by their bootstraps to achieve something. China only becomes aware of the outside world when it will effect China and its program of internal development. China does not follow the western model of wanting to conquer the world.

That is a very astute observation. Historically, the Chinese did not care much about conquering the world, most of their expeditions have been about trade, not conquest or offering salvation.

It was conquered twice in its history, once by Mongolians and the second by Manchurians, both times the conquerers annexed their own countries and ultimately became Chinese themselves.

[Speedo959]

I remember years ago when tools were expensive compared to todays standards. I remember my dad trading a .38 for a floor jack. I thought it was a bad trade at the time. It's lasted without fail for 25 years now and was made in the USA.
I reflected on this recently when my new, made in china floor jack failed during an engine install.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Originally Posted by alf

That is a very astute observation. Historically, the Chinese did not care much about conquering the world, most of their expeditions have been about trade, not conquest or offering salvation.

It was conquered twice in its history, once by Mongolians and the second by Manchurians, both times the conquerers annexed their own countries and ultimately became Chinese themselves.

Historically true, although I disagree that China has no interest in larger conquest based on two glaring observations:

1. Chinese imperialism - the "one China" policy that dates back to the invasion of Tibet and other autonomous regions in 1949 and more recently the flak over Taiwan. The Chinese have demonstrated a relentless desire to forcibly conquer any area they deem to have been "part of China" in the past. Where does this logic end exactly? Migrants from that area crossed the Bering land bridge and settled the Americas. Does that mean all of the Americas are therefore "part of China"? If you're the Chinese government, you could certainly use that kind of logic to your advantage, couldn't you?

Do you really think their current holdings (plus Taiwan) would slake their lust for conquest and control? C'mon. The government there is ALL about control, centralized power and keeping things closed down. If there's one thing a control freak wants, it's a broader scope of control and authority. . . A little common sense here. . .

2. The stated agenda by Marx (and later by Mao) that communist control of the entire world was an eventual goal. Has this suddenly just "gone away" overnight?



Can we really afford to sit back, hand over control of our own country to a foreign power and simply hope that they'll choose not to destroy us with it? That's what the masses are doing.

It seems utterly foolhardy and reckless. I'm not trying to be xenophobic here, but I have a very hard time trusting a government that seems so reckless in pursuing its own goals and agendas, and which has such a deplorable record of treating its own citizens.

Want to have trade? Fine. Implement a 1:1 trade restriction. For every $ that goes to China, $1 comes back to the U.S. in terms of U.S. products bought by them. And I don't mean military hardware either. China is the LAST country I'd be wanting to sell military technology to! Isolationist? Anti-"free-trade"? Yes. Fine. It'll fix the problem.

[The Gaijin]

#1 - Tibet is a sad situation, mostly diven by fear of India - I think. Taiwan, well nobody is shooting yet. They are all too busy making money., The Americas as "part of China" - crazy logic indeed.

#2 - They are less marxist than a few city governments around the US. It is a way to keep the peace and remain in control. Yes, it has "gone away". Ask Castro.

Otherwise, how is China going to buy oil? From us? No, we buy consumer goods and they in turn buy oil, and the folks that sell oil buy all kinds of things. And around it goes. A 1:1 trade balance is never gonna work..

[SlowToady]

The DELL servers seem to actually be pretty good these days, especially for the price point they are at. I remember a few years back, they didn't have a great reputation; but, like I said, these days they seem to do pretty well.

Completely agree on the new Motorola stuff, quite horrible. It didn't always used to be that way, but over time I guess the almighty bottom line won over quality and dependability. They've also sold basically all their other divisions; now about 85% of their business is cell phones. I hear just the keypad for the Razr series of phones is actually very good, but the other bits are suck-tastic. As an aside, all the text messaging stuff runs on Motorola software. Oh yea, that 8420 minicomputer I had? So old it was running UNIX System 5 Release 4 (SVR4)! Awesome.

After years of toying with all manners of computers, with varying degrees of age, brokeness, and so on, I'm now much more willing to pay for reliability and quality over outright speed.

Originally Posted by Wayne at Pelican Parts

The DELL servers that run the Pelican website - I think they are made in the Philippines. I guess that's better than China...

-Wayne

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Originally Posted by The Gaijin

#1 - Tibet is a sad situation, mostly diven by fear of India - I think. Taiwan, well nobody is shooting yet. They are all too busy making money., The Americas as "part of China" - crazy logic indeed.

#2 - They are less marxist than a few city governments around the US. It is a way to keep the peace and remain in control. Yes, it has "gone away". Ask Castro.

Otherwise, how is China going to buy oil? From us? No, we buy consumer goods and they in turn buy oil, and the folks that sell oil buy all kinds of things. And around it goes. A 1:1 trade balance is never gonna work..

Yea, I deal with some of those city/county governments regularly. I know exactly what you mean. . .

Castro has been an irrelevant blowhard for the last 30 years.

China has big oil agreements with Iran and Russia right now, that I agree with. If it all just "goes around", then why is more and more investment in the U.S. going to China? That's the part I'm most concerned about. When we start bartering off our kids' future in the name of cheaper iPods, it's very disingenuous to them. I don't see the U.S. buying investment stake in much of the ROW, but I certainly see the ROW taking bigger and bigger bites of the U.S.

I do not trust China's motives. Not for a second. (you can cue up that Monty Python song about them being "cute and cuddly" if you want though.)

[jluetjen]

The outright bigotry on this thread leaves me speechless (and that says something!). Shoddy products are shoddy products where ever they're made. There isn't anything innate in China that means that you're getting sloppy workmanship, nor anything special about "Made in the US" that means that you're getting excellent quality. If there was, none of us would be driving "Foreign" cars. Having been to China and Malaysia, and having spent time with people who've been to factories in the Philippines and Korea, I don't see anything that suggests that in general the workers in China are being treated any worse then in those countries.

The responsibility lies with the company who's name is on the product. If they allow crap through in order to save a buck, that's their fault. There are some companies making quality products in China, and some companies making crap in the US.

[tabs]

Originally Posted by Porsche-O-Phile

Historically true, although I disagree that China has no interest in larger conquest based on two glaring observations:

1. Chinese imperialism - the "one China" policy that dates back to the invasion of Tibet and other autonomous regions in 1949 and more recently the flak over Taiwan. The Chinese have demonstrated a relentless desire to forcibly conquer any area they deem to have been "part of China" in the past. Where does this logic end exactly? Migrants from that area crossed the Bering land bridge and settled the Americas. Does that mean all of the Americas are therefore "part of China"? If you're the Chinese government, you could certainly use that kind of logic to your advantage, couldn't you?

Do you really think their current holdings (plus Taiwan) would slake their lust for conquest and control? C'mon. The government there is ALL about control, centralized power and keeping things closed down. If there's one thing a control freak wants, it's a broader scope of control and authority. . . A little common sense here. . .

2. The stated agenda by Marx (and later by Mao) that communist control of the entire world was an eventual goal. Has this suddenly just "gone away" overnight?



Can we really afford to sit back, hand over control of our own country to a foreign power and simply hope that they'll choose not to destroy us with it? That's what the masses are doing.

It seems utterly foolhardy and reckless. I'm not trying to be xenophobic here, but I have a very hard time trusting a government that seems so reckless in pursuing its own goals and agendas, and which has such a deplorable record of treating its own citizens.

Want to have trade? Fine. Implement a 1:1 trade restriction. For every $ that goes to China, $1 comes back to the U.S. in terms of U.S. products bought by them. And I don't mean military hardware either. China is the LAST country I'd be wanting to sell military technology to! Isolationist? Anti-"free-trade"? Yes. Fine. It'll fix the problem.

When did they let you out of your rubber room? Hey Lubby ya got some of those little pills for this guy? Geezus you got this a$$ backwards. The Chinese crossed the Yalu River into N Korea in 1950, because they were afraid of losing the power generating dams on that river.

Tibet and Taiwan...They consider that those are part of China, as having once been part of China...Taiwan is a cash cow...they want the GNP that Taiwan produces. Taiwan is a hugh investor in the mainland. The Chinks hope that in time the distinction between Taiwan and the mainland disappears and they just naturally become one. Only when Taiwan threatens to formally become a nation do the mainlanders rattle the saber.

The Chicoms are Chinese FIRST and commies 2nd...so any analogy you make is flawed at the conceptual level.

As Alf said everybody who has ever taken over China became Chinese and the same is true for the Communists. YOu now truly see the Communist system has adapted to being Chinese.

[alf]

Originally Posted by tabs

As Alf said everybody who has ever taken over China became Chinese and the same is true for the Communists. YOu now truly see the Communist system has adapted to being Chinese.

That is an interesting insight, I never thought of it that way. Come to think of it the ChiCom system has become a sort of democratic imperialism with a rotating emperor. It is basically a totalitarian government with a free market economy, just like the Chinese were for most of its 3000+ year history.

[jyl]

The China issue is very complicated and tricky. China is a rival and a threat to us (the USA), also a partner and a benefit for us.

Just a couple things that are important, when thinking about this -

China faces huge economic, social, resource, and environmental challenges to lift itself from a poor country to a rich one. Demographics mean it has a fairly short time window to do this, before the population ages too far. If China doesn't become a high-tech, rich country in about 3 decades, it will be a disaster as the average age climbs past 50 and retirees far outnumber workers. For more on the demographic issue, see http://www.oecdobserver.org/news/fullstory.php?aid=40

China has a longer history than almost any other civilization/culture, but for much of that history it was torn by civil war, a patchwork of warring fiefs, invaded by neighbors, or otherwise unstable. The transitions between dynasties was not orderly, it was usually accomplished by assassination, war, treachery, and revolt. Any central government in China knows the long precedent for Chinese central governments to be violently brought down.

China is rather poor in natural resources, relative to its population and growth. The country is no longer self-sufficient in oil or metals, and the scale of its needs is large compared to the global supply of these things.

So you have a large country, under tremendous internal pressure to industrialize and develop, increasingly dependent on external resources to grow, a long history of past regimes that have been violently ended, and a limited amount of time before it becomes demographically weakened.

This might be a starting point for thinking about how the US should deal with China. We ultimately dealt with the USSR by escalating Cold War spending until they went bankrupt - at least, they were bankrupt until oil prices started rising. Is that a feasible approach to China? Is it the best approach? What are the other choices? Is there a win-win outcome, or only a win-lose outcome?

Basically, I think it would be interesting to step back and coldly think about our China options, in a strategic way.

Wailing on about shoddy tools and dirty fish is entertaining but I'm not convinced it gets you very far.

[alf]

Originally Posted by jluetjen

The outright bigotry on this thread leaves me speechless (and that says something!). Shoddy products are shoddy products where ever they're made. There isn't anything innate in China that means that you're getting sloppy workmanship, nor anything special about "Made in the US" that means that you're getting excellent quality. If there was, none of us would be driving "Foreign" cars. Having been to China and Malaysia, and having spent time with people who've been to factories in the Philippines and Korea, I don't see anything that suggests that in general the workers in China are being treated any worse then in those countries.

The responsibility lies with the company who's name is on the product. If they allow crap through in order to save a buck, that's their fault. There are some companies making quality products in China, and some companies making crap in the US.

Very well put. We are barking up the wrong tree by complaining about China.