A good friend of mine is a mechanical engineer at a company here in Tulsa that manufactures engines made to pump oil wells. They have their own line of products, but they also import stuff from China. The reject rate of parts from China averages 98%. For every 1000 parts sent, only about 20 are kept. Can you believe that? I mean, why bother putting the stuff on the ship?

The thing is, that is how things were in the 1960's and 1970's with respect to Japanese products. Nobody would have bought a Japanese television or stereo in the 60's. We were still chuckling about Japanese cars in the 70's. But at that time, the Japanese cars were getting better and better while our government imposed impossible rules on our car manufacturers who then started making really bad cars. Before you knew it, everything was from Japan and it was good stuff, to tell the truth. Philco and Zenith were gone, Sony and JVC were in. The American car in 1980 was a pile of junk but the Japanese cars were getting better all the time. By 1990, everyone wanted a Honda.

That may happen happen with the Chinese market too. Certainly their quality control will improve, their products will get better and their reputation will reflect this eventually. At the same time, America may or may not remain in a position to compete.

If American companies don't stop outsourcing everything to save a buck, and if the government doesn't stop its insane tendency towards Socialism, we'll not have any market here in America to buy things because nobody will have decent jobs. If the labor unions don't stop reaching for increasingly unrealistic wages for certain industries, all our manufacturing and technology centers will either shut down or move offshore. The best stuff will come from China and Taiwan, and only silly little stupid stuff will come from America. I hope this trend towards outsourcing, subsidizing and borrowing ends very soon, but sadly, the people in control seem bent on going this direction.

As for me, I'll continue to do what I do best and to buy from the people and companies that I think make the best products, not just where they are made the cheapest.