Slashdot Mirror
Rudolph the Cadmium-Nosed Reindeer
theodp writes "Barred from using lead in children's jewelry because of its toxicity, some Chinese manufacturers have been substituting the more dangerous heavy metal cadmium in sparkling charm bracelets and shiny pendants being sold throughout the US, an AP investigation shows. Charms from 'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer' bracelets were measured at between 82 and 91 percent cadmium, and leached so much cadmium that they would have to be specially handled and disposed of under US environmental law if they were waste from manufacturing. Cadmium, a known carcinogen, can hinder brain development in the very young. 'There's nothing positive that you can say about this metal. It's a poison,' said the CDC's Bruce Fowler. On the CDC's priority list of 275 most hazardous substances in the environment, cadmium ranks No. 7. Jewelry industry veterans in China say cadmium has been used in domestic products there for years. Hey, at least it doesn't metabolize into GHB when the little tykes ingest it."
Let's put these things together.... from TFA:
Cadmium is a known carcinogen. Like lead, it can hinder brain development in the very young, according to recent research.
and...
Some of the most troubling test results were for bracelet charms sold at Walmart, at the jewelry chain Claire's and at a dollar store.
So we've got a substance dangerous to kids in just the kind of jewelry they can afford on their allowance.
This stuff is absolutely something that needs regulation to control it. Sometimes "letting the market decide" just rolls off the bowling lane and into the gutter. No, knocking down pins in somebody else's lane doesn't count. That's why they put the gutter in.
So what? If it's an extremely dangerous material it doesn't matter how long you've been using it.
Also one has to wonder if the only reason they've been using it in the Jewelry industry is because they pawn it off to suckers as gold. I wouldn't be happy either if my meal ticket for ripping people off and killing them before they could sue me was taken away.
when did the CDC become an authority on this issue?
Remember, the cadmium cares more about safety than the country to which most of our manufacturing has been exported.
...combine it with nickel and you've got yourself a battery. Now that's positive... and negative.
Lemons are an interesting fruit. They are incredibly sour to the point of being inedible as-is, this makes it evolutionarily disadvantaged since more tasty fruits would seemingly have an advantage. However, here we are with literally millions of lemon trees. What can we do with these sour fruits? Lemonade!
So when life hands you cadmium, make Ni-Cad batteries!
Just saying.
Bibo Ergo Sum.
Barred from using lead ... Chinese manufacturers have been substituting the more dangerous heavy metal cadmium
They're not barred from using Cadmium? But they're barred from using Lead?
Wouldn't it make more sense to regulate the safety of products using the more harmful material first?
We shouldn't need a 'law' for each material... we should get one law about safety requirements for harmful materials, warning labels, and access by children.
For example, products for use by children must not contain amounts of cadmium or lead that are not protected by a safety measure.
Of course their toy's batteries might contain cadmium or lead, so it shouldn't be banned, but safety requirements at least as strict (such as shielding/containing harmful materials) should be applied to Cadmium as to lead, etc, etc.
There's nothing positive that you can say about this metal
It's sulfide makes for a good photoresistor. Combined with nickel, cadmium makes for a good rechargeable battery. It's also used in the heat sensitive trigger in fire suppresion sprinkler systems. In short, cadmium has probably saved more lives than it's taken.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
This sort of shit is why you don't want to buy Chinese products if you can help, and never, ever, buy Chinese food products.
When buying gifts for very young children (preschool age and down) I do my best to buy toys made in Europe or the US.
I've accepted that I can't avoid Chinese merchandise in general, but I try to be selective - not for people who don't know not to eat their stuff, and not for things I plan to eat.
I read somewhere that Chinese industry is currently at a safety level - both for their workers and their products - roughly comparable to Victorian England or America. That isn't a world I want to live in if I can avoid it.
The preferred solution is to not have a problem.
I cannot believe US of A export this waste/crap cheaply to China and they, in-turn, export it back to us as 'goods' or trinket, which has way far superior value. Talk about innovation.
Wow. You are a total and complete ass. You don't like the Chinese government, so some poor two year old should get poisoned?
Fucktard.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
...substituting the more dangerous heavy metal cadmium
Everybody knows a proper Rudolph is made from tritium, not cadmium. Damn imitation radioactive children's toys... buy american: We use 100% Tritium in our glow in the dark toys!
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
AC beat you to it.
Much to my chagrin, in my travels, I have met a disproportionate number of criminally stupid Americans compared to criminally stupid Chinese. (Or maybe I've become hopelessly disenfranchised).
With stories like this, and also how a whole city had been built (so some city official can say his cities economy grew at 8 percent this year) despite almost no one having moved in, questions have to be asked of trade with china.
If their government is so slack to allow the above (not to mention the melamine in milk to whiten it) and not be able to put a stop to it with out it affecting their International trade, all children goods, consumables and any other goods possibly effecting public health should be banned from China.
This probably would never happen, one of our sins is putting money before people.
The Chinese children are completely innocent, if there was justice in the world, it'd be the pathetic people, who care about making a few bucks at the cost of someone elses life, who should be getting posoined.
It is a little annoying when people trot out these scary stories without completely understanding the true threats involved. Cadmium is only considered to be carcinogenic when inhaled as a vapor. You can safely touch it without any adverse effects. While not commonplace today, there was a time when tools were frequently cadmium plated. These are safe to use provided you don't do anything to remove the plating or try to polish it up.
I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
Do you buy it anyway?
Because I don’t see it not being sold everywhere, anytime soon.
You don’t have to buy it from China, you know? ;)
But it’s so cheap, right?
When did cheap become equal too good?
I guess by the time that simple became equal to efficient...
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
I don't care about the Chinese government much one way or the other. However, if the Chinese are going to create products with poison in them, it is better for the entire world if they are domestic products.
It would also be good for Walmart executives to be forced to use these products exclusively.
The Japanese have experience with environmental pollution from cadmium mining.
They call the results itai-itai disease, which is roughly translated into ouch-ouch. Few victims actually die from the disease, they typically commit suicide to get relief from the pain it causes.
And we know the Chinese don't give a damn about poisoning their backyard or themselves.
We'll all pay for this unforgivable, mindless destruction eventually.
you had me at #!
WTF? So your dumbass logic is that Walmart wants to kill their customers and we need you, the courageous regulator to stop the murderous Walmart from going through with their evil plans!
1. The crap is made in Communist China, in a government factory.
2. GOVERNMENT agents failed to inspect it when it entered the country.
3. A private enterprise (Associated Press) discovered the dangerous toys...without government telling them how to do it.
It seems to me that in every instance Government failed and private enteprise, on its own, succeeded.
The main thing I wonder is why do they use cadmium in the first place? What's so good about it? TFA says "nothing positive about cadmium" - but I'm sure that depends on your pov. There must be something very attractive about using cadmium (it can't be just the low price, iron is also pretty cheap) that makes them use cadmium.
Actually there is another nice thing you can say about cadmium. It makes lovely yellow and orange pigments. Sort of like lead white. Van Gogh may have absorbed or ingested enough to cause or exacerbate his mental disorders.
Buy second hand toys. All the dangerous bits would have been sucked or broken off. Just rinse after purchase to remove the previous child's saliva or blood. OK so some projective parts may be missing but hey nothing a bit of welding rod, nails or acrylic rod can't fix.
This stuff is absolutely something that needs regulation to control it
There are regulations, but nobody gives a shit. Nobody follows the ones we already have!
Why don't you go up to Washington DC and add another thousands pages and wave your hand like it matters. Nobody trusts the government. Nobody believes in the justice system. Nobody believes in God and nobody believes in your dumbass socialism either.
Everything you are telling me is a lie, and honestly, its just time to divvy up the nukes among the states and let each one be on its way. The federal government is an incompetent, bankrupt tyrant, and many of us have no use for your so called progressive dictatorship.
This is my sig.
If you make everyone dumber, you'll be the smartest. EOM
When you consider the astronomical amount of products we import from China, cases like this are the rare exception ... not the norm. Problem is the media keeps digging these cases up and shining flood lights on them to reinforce the stereotype that products from China are poor quality and dangerous. Try to replace China with any country/countries and watch the prices/danger levels shoot up and quality fall. The only positive side of these stories is the public is informed of which specific products should be avoided. Problem is .. they do this only for Chinese products (and no it's not because only Chinese products have issues).
When did cheap become equal too good?
Never. However if you are one of many people who have seen their real income decrease over the past decade or so, you find yourself choosing between buying low-quality or not buying at all. And you'll have a hard time explaining that to your young child.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
30 years from now when China is the top superpower, their population will be battle hardened by natural selection for the biochemical attacks that the terrorists will spring on them.
Your low user-ID belies your juvenile capacity for reason and empathy... Perhaps you grew up wearing Walmart jewelry and are bitter because of the recent news?
Notice Slashdot reports on kids jewelry from China, not say, tech parts from China. How are they doing on that?
You're right, we may as well all just let our kids play in traffic. Oh wait, no, you're just wrong.
--Obyron
Whatever company outsources the labor or imports/markets the dangerous merchandise should be held accountable. So if Barbie comes back with lead paint, Mattel should pay the price.
The trade may be free, but it's sure as hell not fair:
It's time to place heavy tariffs on Chinese imports until they play by the same rules as the rest of the civilized world. We shouldn't do business with Dickenonsian nightmare states.
Sorry, copy and paste fail. I intended to link to these:
you had me at #!
They are all overjoyed that the US uses trans fat, corn syrup and big pharma.
There you go...
You're right, we may as well all just let our kids play in traffic. Oh wait, no, you're just wrong.
Your argument is that they should never even be allowed to cross the street.
This is my sig.
Is it *really* made in a 'government' factory though? China has more free enterprise than you want to give it credit for. The government is a lot harsher than in the US though, and certain kinds of businesses are defacto owned by the government. If you truly believe China is 100% Communist, then you need to do a little research.
And my argument is that they should quit using lead and cadmium in paint for anything they export.
This is not about politics, this is about poison in toys.
Nothing happens. They'll be confiscated when they enter customs, or get recalled, hopefully, if they reach the shelves.
Outside of that, nothing. No reprimand to China, cause they have the U.S. by the balls and they know it. We might here some Congressmen bark about it on CSPAN and hold a hearing, but add this to the list of toxic crap coming to the U.S. from China.
This is how U.S. business operates from now on. Get used to it. I'd like to think that if enough people complain 'something' would actually be done, but sadly I've grown to cynical. Hopefully some of you haven't.
Interestingly, people accuse the US government of being run by a cabal of free enterprise, but the free enterprise and government in China have no ties?
Curious.
If that country won't take responsibility for the poisons they export to us, why are we dealing with them?
Because it's cheap.
Citation needed.
I know cadmium is very commonly used in plastics because of the bright and weather resistant colors that can be made with it, not because it's cheap. Bright yellow, red or orange plastic items that have to spend a lot of time outdoors without fading are often colored with cadmium. Plastic beer crates for example, or company logos.
Now it seems obvious that it's less suitable for children's toys, because kids of a certain age tend to put everything in their mouth, but remember that scandal a couple of years ago when lead based paint was used in children's toys manufactured in China? Everyone seems to have conveniently forgotten that the problem then wasn't in China, but in the specifications sent to them by the American company that had the toys made. I wouldn't be surprised if the same thing happened again.
If I were a parent and I had read this article, it would probably scare me shitless. What would you do to protect your children from these kinds of threats -- the ones you don't even know enough about to keep an eye out for? Even if you did know about this threat, how would you make sure that jewelry didn't contain cadmium? It's not like there's a "nutrition facts" sticker for jewelry and toys.
As one poster said, you could try to refrain from buying items made in China, since that's where the majority of the problems come from, but what else can you do? So much stuff is made in China nowadays that it seems pretty hard to not get those things for your kids, or have them get them from other people.
http://www.tenjou.net/
After all the adulterated, poisonous food, even baby formulas, manufactured by chinese companies - after dozens were poisoned and died, you're still surprised? They will sell you anything they can get away with.
Keep buying "Made in China", fuck off and die. At this point, that's really all one can say.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
If you believe Kirk Douglas's portrayal of Van Gogh in the 1956 movie "Lust for Life" (which I thought was very good) he was a very sloppy painter indeed.
However, they don't use Cad Yellow, or Lead White or Paris Green (arsenic) or Vermillion (mercury) much these days. Heck, they don't use regular paint thinner any more (my mom is an artist) since if you throw it around all day for years it *will* make you sick.
The replacements are simply not the same, but of course nobody really *wants* to die for their art...
Private enterprise failed here just as much -- the retailers had just as much opportunity to discover cadmium contamination and didn't do it . I tell you what, you name the private corporation that could handle vetting all of our imports.
While you're chewing on that -- how are those government-built roads, government-run civil services, and food quality that improved measurably after government regulation treating you? Government isn't always the answer, but neither is privatization. Anti-corporate sentiment is at an all-time high, and it is richly deserved.
Most thin film solar cells are based on cadmium telluride. Cadmium is one of the rarer metals so making children's bracelets out of it seems like a waste as well.
Our economy is dependent on trust. Despite the U.S. government's many failings, there are many things that I must trust it with, such as currency, police and fire, roads, building codes, etc. Is it my responsibility to be ever vigilant regarding the thousands of products at my grocery store, any one of which might be contaminated? To know which drugs have been recalled for safety concerns?
Modern life is full of trade-offs, and we eventually must delegate, or live like Ted Kaczynski (minus the bomb-making part), but this doesn't inherently make us complacent. I do not play with matches in my house content in the knowledge that there is a fire station close by. My apartment has a gas stove, which is, relatively speaking, pretty damn dangerous if used improperly. I am responsible for its improper use. On the other hand, if my house explodes due to a manufacturing defect in the stove, it's reasonable to expect consequences. The company could decide that the financial cost of paying off my relatives is below the cost that it would take to repair the defect. Regulation tries to reduce risks to the customer and prevent corporations from making logical yet thoroughly morally abhorrent decisions.
Woah -- no it's flipping not "better" if it's domestic, it's still people suffering. People just like you, trying to live their lives. To say that Chinese people "deserve" brain damage because the Chinese government is of questionable character is callous in the extreme. Indeed, apparently remaining domestic perpetuated their use, whereas export exposed the problem, so at least there is some awareness. That being the case I would argue it's better for the entire world if the products are exported.
No one deserves to suffer because of the actions of their government. Think about our own international image and what has happened to it over the past decade. Do you feel like you deserve to be shot because of the actions of your government? Even though you have infinitely more control over your government than those Chinese do over theirs?
Regulation tries to reduce risks to the customer and prevent corporations from making logical yet thoroughly morally abhorrent decisions.
Everyone always blames the corporation, but never the equally morally apathetic consumer that patronizes them.
It's time to place heavy tariffs on Israeli and USA imports until they play by the same rules as the rest of the civilised (sic) world. We shouldn't do business with Genocidal Torture states. There, trolled that for you.
The thing is, dickweed, it's Walmart and similar US corporations that are making the money on this kind of activity, and you're not going to put their owners and senior executives in prison, so you should just shut the fuck up with your racist rhetoric. You can stop this business by dealing with those "American partners", but you refuse, because you're too weak to stand up for yourselves and just want to point the finger elsewhere.
And as for playing by the rules, I hadn't noticed the USA fulfilling its legal requirements as stipulated by its own constitution and legally ratified international treaties. The USA manipulates its currency by launching wars on anyone trying to suppress the petrodollar. Wait, I've been trolled again myself, haven't I?
If you can't use substance A, use substance B which is cheaper to use than substance Q.
Substance Q may be completely harmless and substance B might make your eyes rot if you look at it for more than ten seconds, but if B is legal, doesn't the company have a legal obligation to their shareholders to use B instead of Q, when Q is 10 times as expensive?
I guess Van Gogh shouldn't have been eating paint, but I'm getting a bit of so much scaremongering over small exposures to things.
The problem is that if a kid swallows it (which is not uncommon), it's not a small exposure. For example:
Three flip flop bracelet charms sold at Walmart contained between 84 and 86 percent cadmium. The charms fared the worst of any item on the stomach acid test; one shed more cadmium in 24 hours than what World Health Organization guidelines deem a safe exposure over 60 weeks for a 33-pound child.
But if your reasoning abilities lead you to conclude that since both salt and cadmium can be harmful, therefore salt and cadmium are equally harmful, then by all means feel free to munch down some of these trinkets.
NOT flamebait, slashdot mods, YOU are flamebait!
I see. So, where does it rank on their list of the 500 most hazardous substances in the environment?
The subject who is truly loyal to the Chief Magistrate will neither advise nor submit to arbitrary measures (Junius)
According to the list (http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/cercla/07list.html), cadmium is #7, but lead is #2... So what?
People like you voted for Nader and inflicted Bush the Younger on yourselves, our country, and the world.
If Al Gore and John Kerry can't beat an ape by a significant margin with the rank and file democrat votes then they didn't deserve the job. It's pretty pathetic to blame the swing voters and the far left for the problems of the world. 59M people voted for Kerry out of 215M possible voters. There were 92M voters who really did throw their vote away by not even showing up. Why don't you attack them instead of the roughly 1.1M who voted outside of the two main parties. Barely half a million for Nader.
I think I'll blame the Bush catastrophe on the 59M democrats for not picking someone better in their primaries, at least that sort of unreasonableness has some logic to it.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Our debt is the greatest national security issue we face.
Since 1913 it's also built into your monetary system.
Working class Americans are caught in a suckers game. Don't expect that game to change though, it's been the same in Britain (where the system originated) for 300 years; the ruling class do very well out of it.
However, the problem that specifically America faces is that the US dollar is the world reserve currency. This has a subtle but massive effect on the economy... It makes American goods and services too expensive for the rest of the world and requires that the US government create and spend vast sums on something (military).
Example of the effect:
Lets say a loaf of bread costs $1 and your average American earns 365 dollars per year and can afford a loaf every day. Now the Dollar becomes the world reserve currency and half the dollars are bought by other countries in order to trade.
Half of the US dollars in existence in the USA have just vanished to outside the country. So half the money has vanished but people still expect to be paid 365 dollars per year and to charge $1 for a load of bread. Now, in the rest of the world, 1 loaf of bread locally costs e.g. 1 Euro. But international trade is done in dollars, so you have half the US dollars in existing representing the value of 95% of the loaves of bread in existence (95% of the world is outside America). This inevitably means that loaves of bread outside America are cheaper in dollar terms than loaves of bread within America. It makes economic sense therefore to buy bread and import it into America.
So what you get in America is a tendency for recession and deflation as the money is exported. Wages and prices tend downwards because the money is being exported, however, nobody likes a falling wage, or falling prices for their goods. What you get to force this is unemployment and bankruptcies. A reserve currency tends to make the citizens and their products unreasonably expensive compared to the rest of the world.
Now, politicians try to counter this effect by printing more money to replace that which is exported, but to do this they have to spend it into the economy, and what do you spend it on? Well, an easy answer is the military. America spends more on it's military than the next several nations combined.
Then you have the original feature I mentioned. In America, money isn't simply printed into existence. It is borrowed into existence from the Federal Reserve. So to create more money, politicians have to increase the national debt.
Americans at the lower end of the economic scale are basically fucked. They are too expensive to compete with the rest of the world in terms of wages, products and services, and the government is inflating the money supply on the other hand and making their earnings worthless compared to wealthier Americans. It's like importing the developing world into America, but only for the lower classes.
Deleted
From the EU DG Environment:
STUDY TO ANALYSE THE DEROGATION REQUEST ON THE USE OF HEAVY METALS IN PLASTIC CRATES AND PLASTIC PALLETS
Apparently, it takes AGES to get rid of the Cadmium from beer crates, but on the other hand it doesn't leech out easily, either. In 150 years we should all have crates that are below the norm :-)
And my argument is that they should quit using lead and cadmium in paint for anything they export.
I'm actually against all imports from China and want free trade to be ended. But I also hate the lie behind this argument - its a "Chinese things are unsafe", and as a rule, that's actually not true and leads to a sort of racism that "Chinese are unsafe". I have nothing against them. I just don't want to import their stuff.
This is my sig.
The Palin/Beck supporters and tea partiers are the ones most likely to be in agreement with the "progressive left" on regulating the shit (pun intended?) out of Chinese goods like this.
http://www.allbyer.com/ Hi,Dear Ladies and Gentlemen,Here are the most popular, most stylish and avant-garde shoes,handbags,Tshirts, jacket,Tracksuit w ect...NIKE SHOX,JORDAN SHOES 1-24,AF,DUNK,SB,PUMA ,R4,NZ,OZ,T1-TL3) $35HANDBGAS(COACH,L V, DG, ED HARDY) $35TSHIRTS (POLO ,ED HARDY, LACOSTE) $16
thanks... For details, please consult http://www.allbyer.com/
Shipped to you directly from the factory, in far-away, exotic China! Act now, and get a free gift of children's jewelry, made from pure, precious cadmium!
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
Better off with LEAD toy soldiers.
jr
Made from materials which are toxic to a body's health, any product made from these materials should at minimum be labeled as a bio-hazard, at worst the companies making them should be treated as bio-terrorists...
and fuck chinks.. that is all
Children are not supposed to be seducing anyone or looking hot. They are supposed to be playing outside. Jewelry would get snagged on tree branches and so forth.
I piss off bigots.
Which is why you should always buy American!
Oh wait...we don't make anything anymore.
The US has a manufacturing sector that produces over $2.6 Trillion annually - larger than any other country on earth including China and larger than the GDP of all but 5 countries. Total imports into the US are just over $2.1 Trillion (16% of those are from China) while US exports are around $1.3 Trillion. (only China and Germany export more)
But we don't make anything anymore... Right... Never let the facts stand in the way of a good sound bite.
Reminds me of cigarettes. Cheap & available but watch out later in life. The delayed costs out weight the present benefit.
IANAL but the U.S. has a court system that can enforce criminal negligence. If Walmart starts selling exploding landmine toys, they can be sued for putting people in danger. Additionally, parents should do the due diligence of investigating the safety of toys before buying them. Do we really need a giant bureaucracy funded by tax payers to literally go through every product sold in the U.S. and go through a rigorous safety inspection? Do you have any idea how much that would cost? Why not just let private safety rating agencies do the job? Or how about buy only American toys made locally? Finally, there's always going to be ignorant parents that don't do their homework. What ever happened to the idea that having kids is a RESPONSIBILITY. Well, be responsible and don't buy cheap Chinese toys from Walmart.
If the dollar is an "I owe you nothing", then the Euro is a "Who owes you nothing." - Doug Casey
Because everyone knows that Wikipedia is a great source and has a wonderful staff that is totally devoted to producing an unbiased, accurate website *eyeroll*.
Fine. Find me a source that proves the data wrong.
"A total of 3.2 million – one in six U.S. factory jobs – have disappeared since the start of 2000."
And yet the US is manufacturing more than ever. How could this be? The answer is that US manufacturing productivity has risen. Fewer people are needed to do the same job. Same thing happened in the farming sector. Fewer people work there and yet its among our most productive and important industries. The jobs shift elsewhere in the economy. Job losses doesn't mean that manufacturing is shrinking - it just means that it is changing. The US doesn't manufacturing labor intensive goods because labor is too expensive here. QED you should expect to see the quantity of labor drop in the manufacturing sector. This does NOT mean that manufacturing is disappearing.
Damn, now I can't wait for Easter to come around so I can get some of those delicious Cadmium Eggs.... /drool
This presumes that there is always an ethical alternative. I think that the lobbying actions of the petroleum industry against environmental initiatives are terrible. Who should I buy my gasoline from, then?
Are you prepared to research everything that you buy to determine whether the corporation that sells it is involved in hazardous business? (and if so, I can only presume that that is your job) I'd love to buy exclusively from reputable businesses with ethical practices, but it is entirely impossible, especially given that most products are sourced from many companies.
Sometimes, it's almost impossible to not deal with certain companies, whether we'd like to or not. I'd challenge you to eliminate all products in your house that have association with Archer-Daniels Midland, a company convicted of one of the most notorious cases of international price-fixing.
Markets are great for some things, but they require laws. Regulations exist to force companies to behave more ethically than the market requires of them. The most effective regulations incentivize ideas that the market is unwilling or unable to support but that may be important for long-term growth. Try abolishing the FDIC and then stating that customers will just have to find a bank that will always make good decisions...
In addition, final assembly of Toyota, Honda, BMW, and Kia cars != building cars in the US.
Actually yes it does. Your assumptions about where parts are made are wildly out of date. In many cases it's just not economical to produce parts overseas, especially if you are producing in a Just In Time system like Toyota uses.
I've been an engineer in the auto industry and have been in parts plants throughout the US for virtually every major auto manufacturer myself. Most of the cars assembled here in the US have most of their parts made here too, even for the "foreign" brands. Those Hondas they make in Ohio usually have well over 50% and sometimes over 80% of the parts made here in the US or in Canada. I own a Honda that was assembled in Alabama and over 70% of the parts were made domestically.
A car is just the sum of its parts. If all the parts are made outside the USA, then the car can't really said to be, "Made in the USA."
Good thing the parts usually aren't made outside the US then.
The full quote:
"USA is the leading manufacturer in the world with a 2007 industrial output of US$2,696,880 millions. Main industries are petroleum, steel, motor vehicles, aerospace, telecommunications, chemicals, electronics, food processing, consumer goods, lumber, mining. A total of 3.2 million - one in six U.S. factory jobs - have disappeared since the start of 2000"
petroleum, food, lumber, mining do not count for "manufacturing" in my book. Besides, our internal prices are higher. The truth is you go to the store and you can't find anything made in the US.
Dipping it in mercury would make it nice and shiny, but there's the poisonous thing.
What's wrong with using mercury? We happily stick it in our teeth?
(Oh, look at what's number *3* on the hazardous substances list.)
is this the same charm that was found to have high cadmium content?
it's on sale now on walmarts website
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=13057362
oldhack: "Security is a waste of money until shit hits the fan. 5 minutes later, it becomes waste of money again. "
petroleum, food, lumber, mining do not count for "manufacturing" in my book.
Then you know virtually nothing about those industries. You think gasoline comes straight out of the ground ready to be pumped into your car? No, it has to be processed and that is manufacturing. Ever use a plastic bag or nylon fabric or PVC pipe? Manufactured petroleum products. Want to talk lumber? How do you think all those boards you buy at Home Depot are produced? You think they just grow that way? No they have to be made ready for sale and the term for that is manufacturing. Ever buy a processed food? Guess what? That's manufacturing too. I've never seen a farm that harvested cookies. Do you think all the equipment they use in mining and farm is just in the ground waiting to be discovered? Do you think that the iron ore comes in the form of steel I-beams?
You seem quite confused about what manufacturing actually is and clearly haven't given it much thought. Manufacturing is "the use of machines, tools and labor to make things for use or sale." It's everywhere and is critical to the US economy.
Besides, our internal prices are higher.
Of course they are. The US has one of the highest per-capita incomes and are thus its citizens able to pay more. Study Purchasing Power Parity sometime.
The truth is you go to the store and you can't find anything made in the US.
Think so? You haven't actually looked then. Yes a lot of stuff is made elsewhere. It's a global economy after all. But if you are in the US it doesn't have a country of origin label, odds are it was made in the US. The US produces over $1 Trillion worth of goods for domestic consumption. If you can't find them you aren't looking very hard.
Manufacturing less now than in the past is not the equivalent of manufacturing nothing at all!
That's the myth though. The US is NOT manufacturing less. US manufacturing output has grown in the last 10 years. It's down in 2009 because of the crappy economy but that's true everywhere, not just in the US.
The ONLY thing that is changing is that the US is losing labor-intensive manufacturing to places with cheaper labor. The capital-intensive production continues to grow as productivity increases.
If you are concerned about the loss domestic manufacturing of jobs and and industrial capacity (as I am) the source of a product should always be part of the consideration of whether or not to purchase it.
The number of manufacturing jobs is GOING to shrink as long as cheaper labor is available elsewhere. Trying to fight this is like trying to prevent the tides from coming in. It's not just futile, it is wasteful. The good news is that this does NOT mean US manufacturing is going to shrink. Very much like farming, US manufacturing is simply going to have more produced by a smaller percentage of the population. It also means that the products produced in the US will change. In the long run that is not a bad thing.
remember this is also the same country that has practically everything pass for food.