Murray Hunter
Back in the late 1980s, the relocation of American manufacturing to China, labelled the ‘factory of the world’ became the latest trend in strategic management. As environmental laws tightened around industry, governments implicitly encouraged American industry to pack up and leave.
From the corporation perspective, relocating manufacturing to China made good sense. This led to bumper profits of corporate America, due to the dramatic cut in manufacturing overheads. Additional flexibility in production allowed corporations to focus almost totally upon marketing, sales and logistical operations.
As corporation profits soared, the towns and cities that once supported these corporation’s factories became desolate wastelands. America is full of ‘almost’ ghost-towns that have become ghettos for the unemployed. Total micro-economic eco-systems were destroyed, that no longer shared in the well-being of once manufacturing-based corporations.
However, on the aggregate US front, consumers benefitted from the super-low prices of garments, footwear, home appliances, and other miscellaneous merchandise.
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