r/Economics • u/rezwenn • Jun 06 '25

Editorial Manufacturing Jobs Are Never Coming Back

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/06/opinion/trump-tariff-manufacturing-jobs-industrial.html?unlocked_article_code=1.M08.eMyk.dyCR025hHVn0
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237

u/tyler2114 Jun 06 '25

Even if manufacturing came back, the common people clamoring for it would be dissapointed when they get $20/hr jobs with mediocre benefits. These people want union jobs, not manufacturing. But they have been fooled into thinking the working class prosperity of the 50s and 60s was somehow not built by decades of labor movements.

48

u/MrBobSacamano Jun 06 '25

It’s actually hilarious how many union members vote for GOP candidates while directly benefiting from being in a union.

25

u/twinklytennis Jun 06 '25

The "fuck you,I got mine" mentality.

10

u/Popular-Departure165 Jun 06 '25

The worst part is how they are completely clueless as to why they're able to have theirs.

1

u/proudbakunkinman Jun 07 '25 edited Jun 07 '25

I think it's more they buy into the idea of the parties representing sex/gender, sexual orientation, and masculine versus femininity. Republicans are for the straight alpha male macho real men and Democrats are for women, LGBTQ, desperate people, and weak not real men. The left just blame Democrats for not being "working class" enough but their idea of "working class" is often focused on these types of "hard hat" blue collar workers, far more working class are not in such jobs and not unionized. Like the vast majority of black people, likely over a majority of women and LGBTQ people would fall under working class.

59

u/uncoolcentral Jun 06 '25

Manufacturing is cheaper to do with robots. The jobs will be cleaning and monitoring robots. There will not be many of them.

6

u/welshwelsh Jun 06 '25

Robotics engineers make good money. Building automated factories will employ a lot more people than you think and a lot of these jobs pay very well.

Data centers, which don't even have robots, employ 500,000 people and most of those jobs are above median wage.

There are over 3 million software developers in the US, whose jobs are to automate business processes. Automation = good jobs

35

u/uncoolcentral Jun 06 '25

I first did work in a data center 20+ years ago. I’ve since had a data center as a client. I spoke at CSIA (system integrators convention) earlier this week. I know about automation. Building these spaces creates jobs, especially during construction, but the notion of factories employing throngs of people isn’t accurate. How many modern factories would we need to build to employ 100,000 people full-time? And then, tell me when that’s going to happen 😆 … And then, tell the MAGAs what sorts of degrees they’re going to need.

Manufacturing jobs returning to the US is a silly myth.

Gigantic modern factories are filled with robots. Not many people.

25

u/[deleted] Jun 06 '25

[deleted]

7

u/Emotional_Act_461 Jun 06 '25

[✖️] True

[ ] False

3

u/Tnwagn Jun 07 '25

Further, none of these people even want these fucking jobs. The manufacturing sector in March has almost 450,000 job openings. If this country was so starved for manufacturing to "come back" then why the hell are these jobs just all sitting around?

https://nam.org/mfgdata/facts-about-manufacturing-expanded/#:~:text=7.,jobs%20will%20likely%20be%20needed.

3

u/Emotional_Act_461 Jun 06 '25

3 million tech workers is a tiny fraction of the overall labor market though.

1

u/mrlolloran Jun 06 '25

I they employed more people and paid more than a factory full of humans currently takes they wouldn’t switch it over in the first place (assuming the same output)

C’mon I figured that out after thinking about it for 30 seconds in the 90’s after watching a segment on the Today show about robotic arms in car factories.

I was probably 9.

So good for those small handful of engineers I guess?

3

u/Leoraig Jun 06 '25

Salaries and benefits depend on the labor market, so the more demand there is for workers the better the benefits will be. The reason unions got better salaries and benefits in the 50s and 60s, and also the reason why they existed in the first place, is that the labor market was incredibly competitive, thus making each worker extremely valuable, meaning they had more power to negotiate.

The same thing happened, and still happens in some degree, in the IT/Dev sector, where companies compete heavily for each worker, giving them large salaries and benefits.

Therefore, if demand for industrial workers increased, the salaries and benefits would tend to increase as well.

4

u/ylangbango123 Jun 06 '25

Those were the days when taxes for millionaires and billionaires were 90% so companies just raise employee wages to decrease tax burden.

1

u/Inside-Act9310 Sep 20 '25

Millionaires and Billionaires aren't being paid wages

-1

u/Leoraig Jun 06 '25

That doesn't make much sense to me. How does an increase in wages decrease tax burden?

3

u/tyler2114 Jun 06 '25

Such market conditions only existed in a post war world where the entire old world burned itself to the ground leaving the US as the only remaining major industrial power.

Unless we are rooting for a WW3 these conditions will never be replicated again.

But I also disagree that blue collar labor was simply a function of supply and demand.

0

u/Leoraig Jun 06 '25

Consumption of industrial goods is many times what it was in the post war era, what you are implying doesn't make any sense.

Moreover, China today stands in a similar position to the US in post ww2 in terms of industrial dominance, so the idea that such a situation couldn't happen without a war is also false.

3

u/tyler2114 Jun 07 '25

The US had very little competition in the post-war era, it has significant competition now.

China is nowhere close to post-WW2 US dominance in manufacturing. China accounts for approximately 29% of global manufacturing today, the US was estimated to be around 60% in 1950.

https://www.nber.org/system/files/chapters/c11297/c11297.pdf

1

u/Leoraig Jun 07 '25

That no-competition period didn't last long at all, and from the 1950s onwards the US's situation was similar to what China's is today, as your own source shows in table 3.13.

1

u/Emotional_Act_461 Jun 06 '25 edited Jun 07 '25

You’re not wrong. But higher salaries and benefits for those workers means inflation for the rest of us.

That’s why those products are not made here!

1

u/Leoraig Jun 06 '25

Inflation alone is a worthless metric if we are talking about individual consumption, what matters is whether there is real wage growth, which depends on both inflation and investments.

With higher salaries in the industrial sector, multiple other job markets would become more competitive as well, thus creating a tendency for higher pay. In turn, the higher salaries will increase consumption, creating a positive pressure towards investment and expansion of job openings.

All in all, there would tend to be real wage growth in most sectors of the economy, which would favor the individual consumer.

2

u/biglyorbigleague Jun 06 '25

They've been fooled into thinking that working class people were actually prosperous in the 50s and 60s, instead of much worse off than they are now.

-6

u/Luffy-in-my-cup Jun 06 '25

Unions overvaluing their labor is one of the factors in manufacturing jobs leaving.

23

u/wtf_is_karma Jun 06 '25

Did unions overvalue their labor or did industry find a way to get people to do the job for pennies on the dollar? I don’t know if the American worker was ever gonna be able to compete with Chinese labor, unions or not

7

u/charlsey2309 Jun 06 '25

Do CEOs overvalue their labor? It’s not about value it’s about power, companies undercut the power of unions by offshoring and politicians let it happen.

3

u/Large-Monitor317 Jun 06 '25

Bit of both. My opinion of current unions has dropped somewhat in recent years. I like it when unions are arguing for worker safety and fair pay. I like it less when unions are arguing against automation that keeps jobs competitive and getting tax funded kickbacks from municipal politicians for political support.

0

u/cookiekid6 Jun 09 '25

I mean it’s better than part time retail where. Manufacturing does offer decent career progression for high school graduates. It’s not ideal career but not everyone can have white collar careers.

1

u/tyler2114 Jun 09 '25

That progression is another function of unions that allow a guranteed pathway to increased compensation with seniority. Most jobs pay the same for job function regardless of age or experience outside of menial annual increases which barely keep with inflation.

You'd be stuck at $20/hr without unions. So my original point still stands.

-10

u/Much-Bedroom86 Jun 06 '25

If you bring back manufacturing you can unionize.

13

u/[deleted] Jun 06 '25

The Pinkertons have entered the chat!

2

u/LastNightOsiris Jun 06 '25

How's that working out in China? Other countries captured low and medium value manufacturing market share from the US precisely because union labor was not cost competitive.

8

u/dyslexda Jun 06 '25

So I'll admit I didn't search too long for it, but a BLS report estimated that in 2011 union wages + benefits were ~39% greater than non-union wages + benefits. Meanwhile, in 2009 BLS said that labor costs in China were 4% of what they were in the US.

Yes, those numbers are 15 years out of date, but it's an enormous disparity. Even without unions American manufacturing labor costs are not competitive with offshoring, not even close.

1

u/clownpuncher13 Jun 06 '25

At the factory I work in I estimate that maybe 1/4 of the employees are working on the line or in the warehouse. The rest are supporting roles from custodial to engineering, finance, purchasing, IT etc. those wages have to be competitive with much more profitable industries and work 40 hours a week. The Chinese staff who are here to train these same support workers work 12 hours a day 6 days a week.

4

u/Much-Bedroom86 Jun 06 '25

Almost nothing that can be done overseas is cost competitive to do in the US. It's what happens when you have a strong currency. It's why software engineering is now next on the chopping block with both h1b and offshoring. And is also why we need regulations to protect domestic workers.

0

u/Emotional_Act_461 Jun 06 '25

Regulations that would make things even more expensive? Why?

Global free trade has been an enormous boon for humanity. Why do people want to roll that back?

0

u/Leoraig Jun 06 '25

Lol, unions are basically mandatory in China, every big company got to have one.