This guy isn't seeing the 30k ft view.
You cannot simply start your own manufacturing plant, there will be far too many regulations and taxes. chinese don't have to put up with that.
He thinks people should simply focus on building something and become educated, yes this is true you do need that. But he is looking at the micro picture, not the macro picture.
It is a complex story. Even tariffs become a problem for the small guy. I cannot sell something in another country, the tariffs will be too high and very few or no one will buy it. Meanwhile we can buy shit from that country with little to no tariffs.
Here's a comment I saw:
Its really hard to compete when your competition has direct government support, a massive industrial espionage apparatus, ZERO issues with things like lawsuits, taxes, environmental oversight, government Bureaucracy, unions, workplace safety inspections and regulations. No minimum wage. You can be better and smarter all you want. China will steal the IP and leverage everything listed above to destroy you by flooding the market place with products made from your IP.
another:
I think you have the cart in front of the horse. Manufacturing, mechanical, and chemical engineering have left us explicitly because of the economic choices leaders have made over the last 50 or so years. The things you are talking about are symptoms of this problem, not the cause.
I agree. He's right that people need to try their best, but he's wrong about the prospects for our people actually succeeding. Good American engineers are designing things to be produced in China, not the USA, and it's entirely outside of the abilities of an individual entrepreneur to change that without governmental change. After the Chinese have gotten American expertise and technology, they don't need us, and won't be hiring Americans anymore when Chinese will do just as well, meanwhile Americans have been discriminated against by our own universities for decades. Of course no one's becoming an engineer or starting American companies. Why would they? Ambition and drive are necessary but not sufficient for success.
(post is archived)