gnomic says:

Also, in the interest of disclosure, I feel obligated to point out that the story is in a canadian newspaper and presumably, the complianer in canadian (canuckian?).

Americans like to complain. And if we can do it about those damn foriegners, so much the better becasue we;re better than them in every possible way. Never mind that many countries have better educated workers, workers that work harder for much less pay and no benefits, etc. And our products are all better, ehich leads me to

Does anyone remember all the toys back when they were made in america? Most of it was crap that would fall apart (the exception was tonka trucks). Sure, it was batter than the stuff from JHapan which didn’t work out of the box, but it wasn’t good. And ir wasn’t just the toys. Cars. Kitchen appliances. NOne of it lasted as long as most stuff today. Sure, you can find exceptions, but on whole, the good old days weren’t really all that good.

ANd I remember houses being painted with lead paint and remember cribs painted with lead paint. I remember getting sprayed with bug spary - today its called DDT. I remember playing with mercury and sitting under asbestos-wrapped pipes in school.

Sure - America is a great country and I don’t wan’t to live elsewhere, but if we don’t face up to our realities and live in an imaginary world where we’re perfect and can’t learn from the rest of the world, we won’t be for long.

OH - and americans aren’t the only country that buys cheap - just about everry country does so. We just promote the fact and have a system that encourages it

Jeff St Real says:

If we were a country where everything was handcrafted by artisans in the tradition handed down from generation to generation, well, we’d be making Black Forest clocks or something. The thing the United States is best at is making money churn. Most of it is imaginary, like insurance claims, stock transactions, and credit card purchases.

Andrew, once again you’ve hit the nail on the head. Last night we went to a pool party with a buffet line. As soon as the dinner bell rang, the line formed and those first in line piled up their styrofoam plates six inches high. Those of us who chose to enjoy the evening, converse, and have a cocktail before eating were left with celery sticks and tortilla chips.

I’m as guilty as anyone, I’m sure, but the only way to describe American culture right now is recklessly gluttonous. There is little that saddens me more than an obviously poor family with their cart stacked high in Walmart. Inevitably, much of what they are buying they don’t really need.

lionemom says:

Oh my god, this pushes my biggest hot button! The American disease of consumption! I just had a conversation about it last night with my friend Lou. Her mom is the queen of efficiency at home, specifically in terms of cleaning out the house of perfectly good, usable items and DONATING THEM to truly needy places that can distribute them to people who can use them. I was discussing this in contrast with my parents who never throw anything away (which is an entire post in and of itself on a whole different subject, so let’s not go there.)

There are people in my neighborhood that THROW AWAY perfectly good things - clothing, furniture, lumber, strollers, desk chairs, kids toys - you name it, they have put it out at the curb for the garbage crews to schlep into the trucks on Wednesday mornings. It makes me want to start a service that will go around, even just my neighborhood, and pick up the stuff people don’t want and truck it to donate somewhere. Free, no charge, just don’t throw that stuff out!

I have never been a big “consumer” and I am trying to be even less so at home, with energy and waste. It drives me crazy to see people mindlessly buying crap they don’t need just because it’s cheap. I like my “stuff” as much as the next guy, but I will not stoop to the lowest price just so I can load up on MORE stuff.

One of the reasons that the US was never as good at manufacturing as other countries was that we were focused on space technology (and weapons technology) for a good portion of the time following WWII. “WERE” being the operative word here. Now we aren’t nearly as invested in that (space) technology as we could or, in many people’s opinions, should be. And we aren’t picking up the ball in terms of other manufacturing either. We are farming EVERYTHING out to the rest of the world. Great, I have no problem helping the growth of other industrialized nations. But when we don’t manufacture ANYTHING anymore, what happens?! We have financial planning companies, we have oil companies, we have entertainment conglomerates, we have sports conglomerates. We make money. We don’t make things anymore. (Disclaimer: I am generalizing here, not making an all inclusive statement.)

Back to the original subject, “Recklessly Gluttonous”. Perfectly phrased. It’s why poor families in the US still fall prey to obesity. They don’t have money to live in a better place, but they can buy McDonalds meals because they are so damned cheap! They can buy a cart full of crappy plastic toys and furnishings, but they can’t educate themselves or their kids anywhere but below par, inner city schools where the education is more street knowledge than book learning.

The whole state of these things gets me very upset when I think too much about it. I simply live my life and do what I can to contribute positively to the problems I see and try not to add to the negative as much as possible. I will write what I feel and tell my politicians what I think and vote my conscience when I elect my local lawmakers. That is what I can do in my life at this point. I hope I can do more and encourage others to do more too.

Great post Andrew!

sonja says:

It’s not just cheap walmart junk that’s made in China. Try finding upscale clothing not made in China or light fixtures or knick-knacks. It’s ALL made in China!

JOSEPH says:

Made in China–some people say junk,some people say poison than why do you buy.
It seems many chinese the ones that comes directly from China told me that I should
not speak out about THE JUNK we are paying with our hard earned money.Than I asked
the ones that told me to shut-up a simple question.Why is it I see that you are driving
Japanese cars,Sony TV,& everything Amercian of quatity & value.Why not made in China.
Their answer is “DO YOU THINK WE ARE STUPID”.
The real reason why Chinese products are inferior is most of their products they manufacture
are made from recycle materials.I know this for a fact.Also the commuist government in China
do not permit thier people to import new raw material.They do it by levying very high taxes
up to 65%.Also there are a lot of thievery from foreign own factories.The form of stealing
is done by exchanging materials.

JOSEPH says:

Look at Japan today they copy everything we make.They are wise & smart,they use the best materials,improve the designs etc,etc.That is why we dump “Made in America”we buy “Made in Japan”
Countries like Singapore,& Malaysia do not impose Tax on raw materials used for export.They also
offer tax rebates.Look at them to-day.The Singapore $ 30 years ago was $3 Sing to buy one $1 GREEN BACK.To-day it is almost PAR.The Central goverment in China are BULLIES.This the simple explanation of Cummunism.I am very aware of this because when I was a very young Lieutenant my peers could not understand how I single out the commies.”BULLIES”.It seems from at my job in
electronics I found Sony & Toshiba have several failures it always cause by components that are
“MADE IN CHINA”.The reason is simple some “commie” stole the silver use in “NO LEAD SOLDER”.They subsitute it with ZINC.Panasonic shaver made do not hold up because “MADE IN CHINA”.If you were to dismantle the shaver—where are my panasonic parts.Someone changed them and keep them for their own use.Denon is pulling out of China.This practice is very common in China because the goverment levy high Taxes for imports of raw materials into the country.The virus that “MAO” left will one day destroy China.

Mike says:

All I want to know is: Is there a site that has lists of consumer items available to the American public that are made in America, or at the very least “not made in China”?

Thank you

Gnomic says:

Mike, Try Google: http://www.madeinusa.com/ was hit 1 of 356,000,000 for “made in america”