this is a large complicated issue and it is a false argument that we just can’t manufacture anything anymore in North America.
Partly, the oft repeated rebuttal is correct: the media dumbing down to single issue in single sentence paragraphs an otherwise complex multivariate issue.
About 2/3’s down the article, Corning executive says (underline by me):
Corning was founded in America 161 years ago and its headquarters are still in upstate New York. Theoretically, the company could manufacture all its glass domestically. But it would “require a total overhaul in how the industry is structured,” Mr. Flaws said. “> The consumer electronics business has become an Asian business> . As an American, I worry about that, but there’s nothing I can do to stop it. Asia has become what the U.S. was for the last 40 years.”
Fleshed out slightly it should say “the high-volume low-margin highly competetive consumer electronics business…”. Today in North America numerous companies are profitably engaged in local design and manufacturing of low(er) volume high-margin products, most of industry specific market such as medical. This sector has been robust for decades, and seems to still be so.
It is true that high-volume low-margin highly competitive market businesses always follow the lowest possible dollar, hence China and India outsource, there is no other successful method yet developed, except a monopoly. However, it’s not always successful, it is not indicative of the entire manufacturing industry, and it is not a panacea for otherwise poorly managed or problematic companies.
It is sexy and saleable to write, unfortunately predictably and repetitivly, about Apple, Amazon and RIM, GM and Chrysler, not so much about Fluke, Smiths, Applied Bio or Boston Scientific, or other smaller non-household recognizable names.
SME, small and medium business, is often mentioned as the real driver and / or salvation of the economy: highest employment, most opportunity. It’s never mentioned that it also includes a reasonably healthy manufacturing sector servicing our local design and manufacturing companies.
And then, just to get a dig in at Apple, perhaps if your product development team isn’t required to make a major design change 6 weeks before product launch the argument for raising your 8,000 captive employees from their sleep might not be required.