Definitely an interesting thesis that the tariffs are designed to enable a transition from cheaper offshore labor to US manufacturing automation.
Would anticipate a lot of short term pain during this transition, particularly because of the massive upfront investment and employee retraining required to pull it off.
One major headwind to this transition is the fact that imported components to enable flourishing US manufacturing are subject to the same tariffs as finished goods. As a result, inadequately capitalized US manufacturers will go out of business and lay off their employees.
China also has a massive advantage compared to the US when it comes to this transition to automated manufacturing. Automated manufacturing benefits from much of the same inputs as more labor-intensive manufacturing: a large pool of skilled and relatively cheap engineers, developed regional supply chain, excellent transport infrastructure (e.g. high speed rail).
It won't be easy transitioning a services-based economy to a manufacturing-based one, even if it is mostly automated. For one, with a factory-based job, there's no way to work from home.
And the truth is, the age of soveign AI is coming , given the rate of technological advancement
We can either keep the status quo, and go the way of every other late stage empire
Or we can choose a deterministic future, take the short term pain to secure our future
The truth is, we are not prepared for the 21st century
Our supply chains have single points of failure, we don’t have enough energy, and to your point, many of our people expect $75,000+ to create PowerPoints from their apartments
We take the medicine now or we end up like Italy and Spain
Previous empires slowly getting left behind, their best and brightest leaving for places where they can apply their ambition
Well if Microsoft controls the dollar, the military and the legal system; I’ll have my gold, in my bomb shelter along with my arsenal every second Wednesday of the month after the updates came down Tuesday night. What a frightening concept!
Definitely an interesting thesis that the tariffs are designed to enable a transition from cheaper offshore labor to US manufacturing automation.
Would anticipate a lot of short term pain during this transition, particularly because of the massive upfront investment and employee retraining required to pull it off.
One major headwind to this transition is the fact that imported components to enable flourishing US manufacturing are subject to the same tariffs as finished goods. As a result, inadequately capitalized US manufacturers will go out of business and lay off their employees.
China also has a massive advantage compared to the US when it comes to this transition to automated manufacturing. Automated manufacturing benefits from much of the same inputs as more labor-intensive manufacturing: a large pool of skilled and relatively cheap engineers, developed regional supply chain, excellent transport infrastructure (e.g. high speed rail).
It won't be easy transitioning a services-based economy to a manufacturing-based one, even if it is mostly automated. For one, with a factory-based job, there's no way to work from home.
you raise some excellent points
And the truth is, the age of soveign AI is coming , given the rate of technological advancement
We can either keep the status quo, and go the way of every other late stage empire
Or we can choose a deterministic future, take the short term pain to secure our future
The truth is, we are not prepared for the 21st century
Our supply chains have single points of failure, we don’t have enough energy, and to your point, many of our people expect $75,000+ to create PowerPoints from their apartments
We take the medicine now or we end up like Italy and Spain
Previous empires slowly getting left behind, their best and brightest leaving for places where they can apply their ambition
Well if Microsoft controls the dollar, the military and the legal system; I’ll have my gold, in my bomb shelter along with my arsenal every second Wednesday of the month after the updates came down Tuesday night. What a frightening concept!
100% that's why open source and competition is so important