Signpost on the Highway to Hell
Yesterday our President proudly announced the arrival of multiple tons of baby formula from Europe. He appears to believe it to be an appropriate response to the shortage created by the FDA. In defense of Biden, he has people who are paid big bucks to monitor that kind of thing. He cannot track every action taken by every one of our three million-plus federal employees. I made this same argument in defense of Trump when he was vilified for actions taken by a low-level clerk in the federal procurement system.
According to Business Insider, April 27, 202, we make only 12% of the computer chips needed to run sophisticated machinery. China manufactures the most, followed by Taiwan. Will we send a plane somewhere to fix the imbalance between requirements and domestic production?
According to Medpac.gov, we import 35% or more of our implantable medical devices due to a lack of US manufacturing capability. Will we send another plane to heroically bring in the implantable medical devices on which we depend?
According to multiple sources, we import about 80% of our flash memory devices. Is there another flight in the future?
We are playing whack-a-mole with critical items we no longer manufacture. Most were invented and designed in the US. China manufactures nearly 100% of our I-Phones. When Face Time is replaced by Face Plant, will we dispatch another aircraft?
The flight in with baby formula was not a success. It was a signpost on the highway to hell. Until we get over our idea that we still are all-powerful and -relevant on the world stage, we will continue on to our destination on the highway. It’s almost impossible to comprehend how a country built over nearly two-and-a-half centuries could be on its way to becoming a third-world country in less than 18 months of utter corruption and incompetence.
There is no supply chain problem. There are problems in policy and hubris.
Ofttimes I ponder those who remind us that we built the Interstate highway long ago so why can't we <your item here>. I must then say in those times were weren't doling out more than half our federal outlays in transfer payments to individuals, all for a worthy purpose you see. Now I do receive some of that outlay as my Social Security check, a return on some 'insurance' policy the government forced me to have. And many believe those checks are a return on their 'investment'. Except it wasn't an investment at all simply another tax with a funny name and no there is no lockbox, just a computer entry. If it were an investment, it was a mighty poor one. I can be happy that some really need those funds and in some, not many, places they can actually live on them. The bottom line is we slowly but steadily started being dependent on Uncle Sugar and less on ourselves.
Same with R&D, once the cornerstone of every important business. Bell Labs and RCA created via their investments great products. Indeed some of that was because of government contracts toward highly risky technologies usually for the military. But since those days the commercial labs are largely gone. Most government R&D still flows to the military (also once NASA) but few commercial products arrive that way. We depend on venture capital for R&D with near term payoffs directed toward manufacture elsewhere.
So we arrive at not manufacturing much. In many cases we have lost the skills and tools for advanced manufacture. Where we still have plants they often involve foreign companies that build here for tax reasons. And even those companies often need the global supply chain for essential items. That was amplified by Covid shutdowns worldwide.
Truth is we have a system devolving into services not real wealth creation. A lot of that relates back to how much resource we devote to individual transfer payments. Real soon now we will need to address that issue and it won't be pleasant.
While it is easy to dismiss Biden as a mindless shell; the strategy of causing a shortage of baby formula in the USA and then accepting CARE Packages from Europe was sheer WOKE genius.
It reinforces the need for a one-world government and that the USA is no longer independent or capable of running itself.