Just down right pissed off. 72 jobs in my town of 2500 people. Gone. Born in my small town 20 years ago was a composite company who makes softball/baseball bats, helmets, golf club shafts ect. That company was sold in its infant years to a couple investors. Who then sold to Rawlings sports. Then bought up by an investment group and the MLB. Major League Baseball. The helmets the MLB uses are made in my small town. Well not anymore. Sounds like they gave the plant 12 months and then are moving production to China. MLB, Major League Baseball "Americas past time" "baseball is as American as apple pie." How disgusting. Said they could make the bats $40 cheaper in china. Helmets about the same. Give me a break. Screw baseball. I am so sick of people selling out America. All this "woke" culture and screaming for living wages and what not. Well that factory was paying a good wage to 72 local people. People moved to town to work there. So much more I want to say but I will end it with this. The hypocrisy in the American consumer is so rampant. Wanting to pay slave reparations and "living wage" and all this crap while everything they own or wear is produced in a foreign country with slave labor. You don't think the MLB in this example can afford an extra 40 bucks a helmet? Give me a break....
China claims another one. Hometown factory now owned by MLB moving to china
- Thread starter slimcake
- Start date
ICT Sledder
Active member
Your MLB-supported jobs off to a country with known, significant human rights issues, but you know keeping the All-Star game in Atlanta just wouldn't have been right.
Spot on you are slimcake! This crap all started hot and heavy 35 years ago! Investors GREED eh, Vulcher Capitalism! Hurray for me, and to **** with you, is how a good elderly friend of mine would say? This with no repercussions! F'ing SUCKS!
30 years ago I worked for Northern Tool and Equipment. They were Northern Hydraulics back then, and was started out of the owners garage building and selling pressure washers and log splitters. Then they ventured into catalog sales heavy when I was there. The sales people would be flying over to China regularly, to set up deals for all sorts of junk, and I mean JUNK. The returns department went from a hand written sheet that would be filled out weekly, to me coding an electronic version with a whole section of the warehouse designated for returns. The volume they were selling, was more than enough to offset any "throw away" product they would get back from knowledgeable customers. Those who don't know any better, didn't care, and they already made coin on them, which quite honestly was the vast majority of customers.
Sad part to alot of this is its consumer driven, we know the difference but joe blow consumer doesn't care, all they are worried about is how much more it will rack up their credit card or how much they will have to take out of their pocket. I have quit taking that box store throw away crap in, not worth working on or wasting time trying to track down parts. its really sad what most us consumers expect when buying products and it all starts with..."How much?" I love the "assembled in america" decals...is that supposed to make us feel better about the product? some certain person was right on track with the maga movement but again the average joe blow consumer just doesn't care.
Probably be for sale at Lowes next to Craftsman for 50 cents in a year.
It was sad to see the Radisson Hotel group now majority owned by Jin Jiang who is ultimately a Chinese government owned company.
Bear
SledTL
Active member
No idea when it flipped, but I sense that it happened sometime around when the whole 50's family picture dissolved too along with caring. People don't give two you know whats about where something comes from or how it got there. They just want it at a low price and right now. I work in mfg, I am aware of the constant battle with this. Luckily Graco has very strong MN roots and goes out of its way to make sure that continues. We are also in a failry niche industrial market so not many players in what we do. So many other things are just a commodity now (autos, electronics, etc.). Country is built on making the investment happy, small or big guy. If you want it to change tell people their 401k doesnt matter and that milk is $10/gallon.
highhertel
Member
China owns Smithfield Foods. Isn't it concerning that China now has control over a segment of the US food supply? Just read China also owns 200,000 acres of US farmland. Thought I had to learn Russian language, but now think Chinese might be better served.
just better hope they never put their hand out and say, Pay up! otherwise we will all be learning it. Haven't understood yet why we haven't learned our lesson yet.
WorkHardPlayHrd
Active member
The only part on our brand new John Deere 8 row ridged planter made in the USA is the seed boxes. Found out after we got it that it was assembled in Mexico. It has been a nightmare. If. My husband got 20 acres planted before something went wrong every time we were lucky. Then they wouldn't have the parts so we were shut down till the next day. It was an absolute disaster. Not looking forward to next spring. Told the dealer that if we had known it was 99% made out of country we never would have bought it.
Deere is very good at this. They are not any where close to the Company they used to be. However, they are very good at "buying out", to rid the the competition, cross border/across the pond, and increase the cost/pricing. The engine line that used to be in Dubuque, Ia., was the most reliable engine line Company wide. More so than even the Waterloo/Cedar Falls engines. From the foundry castings, to the finished engine product, most all in Dubuque. However the moved the Dubuque engine line to Mexico. Those engines are now widely known to be unreliable, as are the other component parts Deere produces, or obtains from foreign sources. Unlike the past, Deere sells a lot of junk now days! And at a premium price, eh! Kinze, Case/IH, and White planters now are as good, and better than Deere planters. Thank the Lord, Agco, obtained Precision Planting Sytems, and not John Deere!
LoveMyDobe
Active member
My Hubby retired from Deere in Waterloo IA in 2007. The new hires don't get the benefits or pay like the old boys did back then, Deere in Waterloo can't even find people to hire now, go figure............
I know exactly what you're saying! Many of the "new low wage employees" quit as they can find more reliable, better paying, better health care and retirement benefits elsewhere! Some years back, we figured the total compensation of the new hire, figured at max KIP pay available, and compared it to the CEO compensation from the year prior. The big dog's compensation was over 1700 times greater! Unreal, and absolutely F'ing egregious! I was there when Deere could not wait to get into China and crank up the factories! They willingly forked over anything, and everything the Chi Coms demanded. And in doing so, SOLD the USA OUT! Just more of the "GIANT SUCKING SOUND" we were so well warned of by H Ross Perot.
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favoritos
Well-known member
Doesn't it really all just come down to the money?
It's no fun to admit, but it drives these decisions. It also drives our buying. I like my money and I have a hard time parting ways. It's hard to find a list of examples where decisions were made without first considering money. Profits drive decisions for business. Saving drives decisions for consumers. Right in between those two sit the skilled worker and craftspeople that are proud of their work.
I try to find products that have a close connection to the workers. It is not easy. I do find it easier to part with my money when I see it going to the people that made and refined the product. Pride doesn't show up in a paycheck or corporate earnings, but it deserves my money.
It's no fun to admit, but it drives these decisions. It also drives our buying. I like my money and I have a hard time parting ways. It's hard to find a list of examples where decisions were made without first considering money. Profits drive decisions for business. Saving drives decisions for consumers. Right in between those two sit the skilled worker and craftspeople that are proud of their work.
I try to find products that have a close connection to the workers. It is not easy. I do find it easier to part with my money when I see it going to the people that made and refined the product. Pride doesn't show up in a paycheck or corporate earnings, but it deserves my money.
Not just "the money", but it's all about the next quarterly report. All the focus is on short term profits, there is, and has been for some time, pathetically little interest in the long term.
G
G
Guest
As far as tools go what is left to buy that isn't junk? Snap On and what else?