Like Peter Sellars in that movie...."we like to look"
IMO we missed the Silicon Valley gravy train while we fiddled around on our Nokias
We tried to set up a geek based Multifunction Polis in the late 1980s to do a mini-Silicon Valley but like the notion of manufacturing aluminium castings for the EV gravy train, then as now there were the chorus of naysayers ........too high wages.... too much red tape.... tyranny of distance ...and all that jazz!!!!
And besides, Silicon Valley was. a haven for the intellectual elite which were imported from the 4 corners of the world and benefited the already uber rich via mega investment returns with little or no economic benefits trickling down to the average US worker.
Manufacturing on the other hand employs a broad spectrum of local labour and if exclusively Aussie owned, then unlike with our mining and other Multinationals' businesses , the profits can't be spirited overseas to tax havens .
44% of Australians don't complete grade 12 let alone have the mathematical/technical abilities to get into the geek world .
We have to exploit our strengths and our competitive advantages .. not try to ape others in areas where they have strengths and competitive advantage.
The world of trade is now dividing into 2 blocks : -The Pro US Block -The Pro China Block
And we are like simple Simon: We have put our economic eggs in China's basket & our National Security eggs in the US basket and then we spruik war with China over Taiwan which we endorsed as part of China in the 1970s.
IMO unless we diversify trade away from China dependance well end up "scrambled eggs" when the US inevitably bungs Russian style economic sanctions on China.
So, in summary, we (not Multinationals) can cherry pick some of our prime raw mineral and energy exports, downstream process them , add Aussie value and export to non-China aligned countries...particularly those with which we have FTAs.
We can afford $375 Billion for a handful of US Nuke Subs which we won't be allowed to control to maintain Uncle Sam's Pacific hegemony , yet we can't afford a $100 million to invest adding Aus value to a %age of our raw mineral and energy exports to economically firewall ourselves against China .
What are we?......lazy ex-colonals with a "she'll be right, mate" mantra and the laughing stock of the manufacturing world !
EVs are just in their infancy IMO, with a potential global market of 80 million units P/A . The consumer market is talking through its hip pocket by demanding 'Green" vehicles and what a better way to exploit that market than to supply green aluminium machined castings .
And don't say we can't do it....Indonesia has already jumped on this trend by supplying Apple with green aluminium products
Hello.....we are exporting raw bauxite from Tassie to China and of course Tassie has an abundance of Hydro-Electricity (so much so that its exporting it to Victoria via an undersea cable!!!) but can we put both together?????....The Canadians can:
AND WE CANT EVEN PUT 2 &2 TOGETHER IN TASSIE LET ALONE SET UP AN OBSOLESCENT NOTION SILICON VALLEY
