Made in China

Steel Horse Rider said:

As long as the consumer is buying on a low price basis without regard to quality the Chinese will prosper. You can blame corporations all you wish but it is the consumer who drives the market in a capitalist system.

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American automakers moved a lot of their production outside US to cut down manufacturing costs. And yet car prices have not dropped. And, a lot of foreign auto makers built factories and R&D centers in the US.

Dean1818 said:

If i can get a similar product, made in america, I will pay 20% more maximum.

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I prefer to pick quality first. Then I would use your rule.

I really wish National Magazines would give a damn about my email regarding one of their products...

The thing that struck me funny though was the US was and always has been a nation built on the cheap. Cheap land (Homestead Act), cheap whisky, cheap energy (Westinghouse as well as Edison), cheap fuel (Rockefeller, Standard Oil), cheap transportation (Ford), cheap steel (Carnegie), cheaper transportation (railways), cheap freight hauling, cheap postage, cheap shipping (UPS) and yes cheap firearms (Colt, Remington, Savage, and Mr. Smith and Mr Wesson).

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The interesting thing is if you read more into it, being CHEAP has done nothing but benefited the lives of Americans because it freed up income to buy more luxuries to improve the quality of life. Ford made it so normal folks had affordable transportation. Vanderbilt dropped the price of travel so it was no longer the realm of the wealthy. Carnegie's mass produced steel made it so America could build it's infrastructure. Rockefeller had competition and he outmaneuvered them with technology and sold his oil for less so everyone could afford oil to keep their lamps lit at night, which also eliminated the mass slaughter of whales for lamp oil. Railways are still, pound for pound, the cheapest method of transporting goods across the country. There would be no other way to transport petroleum and coal today required to keep the country running.

No one in their right mind will argue the quality of life today is WORSE than it was 50 or 100 years ago. The middle class today compared to the middle class of the 60's? Almost everyone on my block has jetskis and motorcycles, a driveway full of cars. The purchasing power of Americans has never been so high.

Even on the consumer electronics front, you used to be rich if you simply had one TV. Very rich if you had more. Today, even a low income family can be found with a 50" plasma hanging on the walls of their apartment. How expensive was your first computer? Mine was an AST Penium 90Mhz. $2500. $300 today will buy me a computer that fits in a paper sack. Cheaper, faster, better...that is the general trend of things.

Yesterday I stopped by a local Ford dealer as I had some free time and wanted a look at the 2012 Mustang. I was surprised to see the sticker that stated the transmission came from China. I was disappointed that a car with a sticker of $37,000 had been "outsourced" for a main drivetrain component. You guys have me wondering if perhaps that transmission was of decent quality. I guess I'll wait and see how they hold up. Sure put me in a sour mood the rest of the afternoon though.

I personally wouldn’t buy a gun made in China, Russia, Turkey or South America but as long as there’s no attempt to hide country of origin then they should be available to those who want them.

I agree with you 100%. Everything that you said is completely true. One huge difference between now and 50 years ago. Most people now live beyond their means.

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True, and it's insanely easy to do. Relative wages have dropped since their 1970's peak, but the costs of living have relatively dropped even more. It's incredibly easy to spend money when you never need physically touch it to have it. I caught myself spending too much money quickly because I use a check card, it was at first very hard to think of my account displays as being anything other than numbers. It wasn't until I ran the numbers and earned some really nice money over the break, and put my wallet in a drawer than I finally cut my spending. It's tempting to spend money, especially when it seems like you can get anything you want ordered from the internet to you. A lot of my classmates are having money problems because they never physically interact with their money, so it remains an abstract concept. Has anyone found it harder to spend money if they have the physical cash on them instead of just entering card numbers into Amazon?

Yesterday I stopped by a local Ford dealer as I had some free time and wanted a look at the 2012 Mustang. I was surprised to see the sticker that stated the transmission came from China. I was disappointed that a car with a sticker of $37,000 had been "outsourced" for a main drivetrain component. You guys have me wondering if perhaps that transmission was of decent quality. I guess I'll wait and see how they hold up. Sure put me in a sour mood the rest of the afternoon though.

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And Ford is the most reliable domestic brand and overall ranks very well on JD Powers and Consumer Reports compared to all other vehicles. If you are concerned and apprehensive, I'd check out similar publications. I certainly would if I had that kind of money to drop into a car. They also didn't take a bailout which, in my mind makes them more American than the likes of Chrysler or GM. The term for outsourcing to a foreign country is offshore. We outsource to local vendors for things that can't be done in-house. We offshore when its outsourced outside the country. As long as the quality control is there to verify every casting, bolt, and assembly, it shouldn't matter if a monkey or someone from ubekistan put the thing together. That's from a manufacturing standpoint. A political standpoint might differ. If it brings you any comfort, many aerospace parts are manufactured with titanium sourced from Russia. Hell, we fooled the Russians for a while importing titanium from the USSR to manufacture the SR-71 so we could spy on them.

Folks living beyond their means sounds like a personal problem and lack of fiscal education at home. I agree it is a widespread issue but it isn't the fault of a functioning economy. I don't know the root of the problem because I can think of freer economies than the US and cash is still king there. One thing we did 50 years ago that most of the world still does today is pay with cash or use a layaway program. Today its click click click, brown box shows up.

While I do not support all the goods coming from china, their steel can be as good or as bad as the buyer wishes..

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I'm going to disagree with this. Two examples...

When we got sample gears from them (other post) we specified what steel we wanted. They made them out of cheap junk. 2nd example....

My SIL used to be an engineer with GM (now works for CAT). GM built a huge iron foundry in China that was state-of-the-art and designed to put out a specific amount of product based on getting quality. After the GM big wigs left the Chinese cranked up the production, screwed with the iron chemistry and basically upped the production at the expense of good castings. They made junk and GM soon sent their "team" back to straighten things out. After re-training them and insisting they run the factory the way it was designed they left. Not long afterwards the same thing occurs. GM closed it down and moved out all of the equipment (probably to Mexico).

What other companies are finding (golf clubs as an example) is that when they have China make their products there are soon Chinese "versions" of their product being sold. The workers toss a casting out the window to cronies who take it to a factory almost as big as the original for them to make and market illegal counterfeit copies. Serves the outsourcing companies right.

They made junk and GM soon sent their "team" back to straighten things out. After re-training them and insisting they run the factory the way it was designed they left. Not long afterwards the same thing occurs.

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Just goes to show that they do have the ability to do it right.

Bet you don't consider the computer you're typing on junk or your television, or many many other thing in your daily life that you use.

I don't like it, but the facts are they do have the ability. Check out the latest NIKON camera next time your in the store.

Oh I know China can do it but not on their own. They need the experts to come in and "set them up". Nikons made in China. Oh my God.

I think we're somewhat deluding ourselves if we make the assertion that a gun made in the US is always going to be of higher quality than one made overseas. We've all seen a plethora of recent complaints about the quality of several domestic gun producers products (ie new production Marlin, Remington, etc). Doing a quick mental count, less than 20% of my firearms are domestically produced and those that are tend to be surplus or "vintage" firearms. All of my firearms have lived up to my expectations, but that's because I do extensive research before every purchase to look up reliability/accuracy/etc. Like with anything, some companies will do a better job, and some product lines will be better than others within a given company's production. Am I proud when I have domestically produced firearm that I love? Heck yes! But do I also recognize that other countries can do as well or better on certain guns? Heck yes as well.

I know the OP was disappointed to see Made in China on the NEF shotgun, but have we heard any complaints about NEF quality recently? For that matter, who knows how long that component has been outsourced to China and proved reliable. Is it nice to buy domestic, sure, but does that immediately imply a higher standard, not always. There's American produced crap and foreign produced crap, but there's also firearms "gold" from both sources.

I love the 20% rule idea. I have been making it a point to buy American as much as possible, and from local vendors if i can and no it doesn't make the products any better. However the guy at the grocery store, gun shop, shoe store etc seems to begrateful for it,and if my locally bought American made product fails i probably wont wind upon holdwaiting for some guy in india to tell mehow sorry he is. I buy what ineed when i need it, but i try to keep itclose to home.

Btw i have heard about a lot of tranny problems onnew mustangs on thier forums

I'm Canadian and I love purchasing quality firearms for the most part however the US government since 9/11 has made it extremely difficult or nearly impossible.
I own a Savage 10BA, A Springfield Armory Stainless Loaded 1911, an HK P30-L (ULM proof mark) among other things European.

I wanted to purchase an HK45.
No problem you would think but it is made exclusively in the USA now and there has been an export ban slapped on it.
I wanted to purchase a nice American made AR-15. A Noveske none the less.
Since the lower receiver is stamped 5.56 and it is a military caliber it is not available for export. If it was stamped .223 there would have been no issue.
I can buy a Bushmaster with a pinned M4 style butstock a minimum 16" barrel which is either non threaded or threaded and pinned with a muzzle brake. God forbid the USA allow the export a rifle with a flash suppressor to their friendly northern neighbors who stood beside them fighting in Afghanistan.
If you want to know what the going price is for this gem of a rifle it's $1450.00 and our money is at par with yours.

I purchased a Norinco CQ-A which is an M4 style rifle in 5.56 with a 14.5" hammer forged chrome lined barrel, (we don't have a minimum barrel length limit in Canada since AR rifles have the same restrictions placed on them that handguns have), A2 flash hider, etc. for $675.00.

There are thousands of these rifles in Canada and I can honestly tell you that even though their finishing can be a bit better they're not too bad.

I also know of many people who build high quality M14's on Norinco receivers here because of the refusal of the US Govt to allow the export of American receivers.
A complete Norinco M305 (M14 clone) goes for $395.00

None of these ITAR regulations seem to do anything to keep American weapons out of the hands of Mexican drug cartels but it does a lot to keep them out of the hands of law abiding Canadians.

On a side note I'm joining a rod and gun club in the USA and even if my Norinco had a minimum 16" barrel I'm not allowed to bring it into the country to shoot since it made in China.

The quality of Chinese steel is not where many of you think it is these days but the quality of their workmanship is only as good as they want it to be.
If they can get away with sub standard workmanship to save a dollar they will.

I have no problem paying good money for quality american firearms but don't send us your bottom of the barrel firearms and expect us to pay high prices due to export permits etc.

I think the only thing America makes well and isn't outsourced is stupidity..

Well I don't see a big deal in this. China has a global share in economics. Its own population is such that foriegn investment pours in. For foreseable future I don't see any hinderence in China's growing economy.

Buying local is always a good idea, but it should not be hard and fast rule reflecting our biases. If you see something you like, go for it.

I had a Norinco .45 and loved it. It shot very well and was a well made handgun. I kick myself in the butt for selling it for the next piece of gun eye-candy that came along.