China imploding, page-69

We should have pushed Aus into international trade via manufacturing rather than doing the opposite and being China's hole in the ground mine.

What's wrong with being a miner? We are among the best in the world with the miners well paid but working 365 days. FIFO miners work their rotation missing two thirds of any general or family celebration because they are on site, working. They are NOT flown home for Xmas. We are in a sweet spot getting top dollar for marginal production of gas, coal and iron ore. Watch labor blow it!!!!

Go back 30 years when our manufacturing was having its heart cut out, China was a genuine low wage country. No way could our unionised workforce compete. Since then China's wages have increased X14 in 22 years, or so I am told, so they are falling between two stools. Other Asian nations undercut them on labor cost but their larceny of ANY IP, domestic or foreign, means that no one spends private money on R&D so they are undeveloped in chip manufacturing, in the news now, and the US [where I hate to inform you it all begins] has just cut them off. Forget high tech chips, they can only make the low tech stuff for domestic appliances and even then they cannot make the machines that make the chips. There are severe penalties for any US citizen working with China to develop that industry. Meanwhile technology allows industry to move from low wage cost to low electricity and transport cost countries. Bugger! We've blown it again. But the US may be the big winner as manufacturers return they will soon has ample gas again.

Pull your head out and breathe fresh air, China is in a fight for its very survival.