4WD
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Russia wants them - may as well - they make their own military planes …
Mack Truck laying off 100s in PA & MD
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Volvo trucks used to use printed circuit boards in the dashboard feeding gauges and computer components like cars and pickups. They would work fine when new but after a couple of hundred thousand miles they would start having problems because of the vibration and roughness of class 8 trucks. All brands have issues. Some more than others.
Can these tariffs help American companies, farmers and energy? Absolutely by leveling the playing field. These tariffs are retaliatory tariffs for what American products have been having to pay for decades. The one sided tariffs are the reason for the decline in American manufacturing and the import/export deficits. If your business is set up to buy the cheapest products you can find for the cheapest price, then yes your business is going to suffer. The US has gotten to the point of importing just about everything we need to be operational while companies continue offshoring manufacturing and jobs.
4WD
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This touches on who’s who in the OTR theatre of operations
https://www.ttnews.com/articles/class-8-truck-sales-july-24
https://www.ttnews.com/articles/class-8-truck-sales-july-24
Check out:
https://www.thelayoff.com/
Read what employees are saying about the layoffs / economy at many different companies.
Lots of insider info and comments that only folks working for the company know.
Tariffs is an easy explanation and excuse for job cuts / slowing sales / downsizing / corporate restructuring / cost cutting, etc…
If companies want to immediately trim their payroll….. they simply say TARIFFS.
To an extant, but not a major driver across the board. What has caused the export of the mostly commodity manufacturing has been primarily the costs of domestic production, as well as our long burdensome regulatory environment, tort liability and risk environment, and to some extent the whipsaw effects of differing administrations' economic policies every 4 or 8 years. US labor is very expensive, especially in the States with the strong economies, and some industries have been stagnated if not all but driven out of the US by environmental regulations over the past 25 years or so
We cannot afford to produce many consumer and other low priced goods domestically, just cannot. No amount of tariffs (or tax increases mostly on the individual consumer, that is what tariffs really are) will completely reverse that. The numbers do not work, 3-5x for an iPhone for example. We can and do still make key goods, critical machinery, defense, etc. and, much more important than just manufacturing, we innovate.
Tariffs are a useful trade tool but used as a scalpel, not a cudgel.
I've had executive positions in several global companies, large and small, and 'made my bones' back in the day leading early offshoring and outsourcing efforts....didn't personally enjoy it, but it was necessary and the right thing to do benefiting the Companies and our US (and global) workers through increased profitability allowing better comp, benefits, opportunities for advancement and equity appreciation.
Let's all read up on Smoot-Hawley again.
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So you don’t think the US should have a level playing field concerning imports/exports of goods and keep our intellectual properties in country because they can be manufactured cheaper abroad?
China has already said that. But it’s political posturing.
Look, both Boeing and airbus have sold every airplane that they are able to build for the next several years. There’s no magic there. The order books are full.
So all the Chinese airlines say, under pressure from their government, “we are not buying Boeing”.
OK well, then you’re not getting any airplanes, because you can’t simply turn to Airbus and buy any of their airplanes because they’re already spoken for.
The next several years of production is already sold.
So, for those Chinese carriers, “not buying Boeing” equals, “not getting any new airplanes” unless they were already ordered from Airbus.
There is no way that Airbus can increase capacity enough to fill those Boeing orders with their product. There will be pressure to increase the output on the Comac 919. But it’s a narrow body and not a replacement for many of the Boeings currently on order.
The Chinese government can direct “no Boeing” as policy, but the Chinese airlines had a plan to grow, and the Chinese people and economy need them to. The policy will ultimately hurt only China.
Competing airlines that step in and take those canceled orders will be able to grow, and profit - and everyone in the industry knows it.
I'm a mechanic at UPS. Volvo bought Mack from Renault over 20 years ago. Volvo and Mack shares a lot of components, Mack renames the Volvo engine and transmissions and the true Mack engines haven't been around for years. We largely replaced our Mack trucks with Kenworths. Mack seems like a dead brand but I still see occasional New(er) Mack cabovers used for concrete pumper trucks and garbage trucks.
At heart I am a free-trader, but I also recognize that is idealistic, simplistic and will not work.
There cannot be a completely level playing field as nations each have their different economies, native industries, natural resources, access to markets, etc. as well as cultural and political variables. The various trade treaties in place seek to address this and that is where these matters should be settled. What even is a level playing field in this space?
We are still and will be for the foreseeable future the world's major economy, so we don't need a level playing field....we're not a victim. Yes, we have some industries to protect, and we must assure strategic security of our manufacturing base, but we do that.
As far as IP, there are protections in effectively all major markets including China, but more on that. One does need to file patents to effect those protections and it is costly, but the protections are there. China is still a bit of the Wild West (East?) as we called it. IP protection has gotten much better, but still not great and they still have the rather onerous requirement for establishment of local JV's in most cases...clouds the IP picture somewhat. That said, just don't send the keys to the kingdom IP wise to China or develop a 'China Light' product if you intend to sell to the local market there.
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does not make sense to me:
~ 2022 I was exploring buying a 20 foot medium duty cab on chassis : all the makers had at least 2 year waiting lists and could not even lock in a price.
My line of work uses a lot of LTL and EUV trucking. Rates are still 50-100% higher than pre RONA
~ 2022 I was exploring buying a 20 foot medium duty cab on chassis : all the makers had at least 2 year waiting lists and could not even lock in a price.
My line of work uses a lot of LTL and EUV trucking. Rates are still 50-100% higher than pre RONA
AZjeff
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It probably is quite a surprise to the blue collar worker who flies the flags off the back of his pickup that he’s getting (or got) laid off because of tariffs. It’s happening.
And like it or not the American worker won’t or couldn’t pay what items would cost if they were made by people who make their wage. Not dissing the worker I was one.
And like it or not the American worker won’t or couldn’t pay what items would cost if they were made by people who make their wage. Not dissing the worker I was one.
AZjeff
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And makes it’s first airplane in 3 years? 5?
Like all the manufacturing coming back to the US, when and how?? Factories aren’t instant.
Example: the giant microchip factory in phoenix broke ground in June 2021 and started production last year.
Maybe. And that's fine but that is not going to happen very quickly is it? Same thing here. Gonna take some time. For us No Pain No Gain. I'm willing to pay more and cut back to make this country self sufficient. Keep your Chinese [garbage] products [some of it toxic] in your own country. We will get by somehow. Lets invest in ourselves not the Global markets.
AZjeff
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What are you telling the workers losing jobs right now?
That plan works until the next election cycle when Mr & Mrs America look at the price of an iPhone, PC, car, you name it, look at their cratered 401K (because the market tanked due to missed earnings) and their retirement horizon marching steadily away, high interest rates, and promptly vote for the other party....
We are participants in a global economy and that will not change....it cannot change.
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The ones who will be getting on unemployment, not buying durable goods or any discretionary purchases, not frequenting local restaurants and other local businesses causing them to cut back, and those laid off folks will not be.....
I do not want to sound like an academic, but we really need to make basic or even not so basic economics mandatory in high school. No one should be able to graduate without at least a basic understanding of what led to the last two centuries economic crises and wars, which are interrelated. Off my soapbox now
Broke ground June 2005. To compete for the USAF tanker.
First aircraft delivered 2015.
Ten years.
Doesn’t change a thing I said.
4WD
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