Reply #16: I get your point, but actually we still make more than anywhere else [View All]

The thing too many people will not and cannot seem to get a handle on is that manufacturing continues to become less and less labor intensive all the time. Of course it isn't labor free, but for generations we've been automating. Combine a growing population with a stagnant/decreasing need for skilled labor in manufacturing and you don't even need to point to offshoring for the problems.
For example, more vehicles are made in this country than ever with foreign assembly plants here. Still, there are are fewer people working the assembly lines than in the 50s and 60s. Computers, robotics, and a host of related technologies have significantly lowered the number of skilled people required to put each vehicle together...that means that those skills will become devalued (basic supply and demand). This is a big factor in the success many businesses have had in breaking/weakening unions. Those jobs were not shipped overseas--they simply went away.
I don't know what the next step is, but the U.S. economy is not going to be "fixed" by bringing back the manufacturing jobs we've sent overseas. The crisis is worse than a shift in job location--the jobs are disappearing.