6 hours ago, Stick486 said:

 

how about a declared great deal for a 2½'' fostner bit for a whopping 7 bucks...

I'll pass.

The only answer

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

I agree, but I think most woodworkers do a balance of $/ amount of use/ quality of cutting wood. It has always been that way ,Miller Falls were the cheaper ones, Stanleys and Baileys were the better,more expensive.

Herb

On 6/7/2017 at 2:08 PM, Dadio said:

Go ahead an slap me Stick,

 

Ouch, I deserved it.

Herb

On 6/9/2017 at 0:54 PM, Dadio said:

Go ahead an slap me Stick,

Herb

 

I'm just too pro-American to let this lay.

 

Pocketbook thinking can leave you empty handed.

Why would you want to buy from China? Why intentionally support China and not America? Seems pretty un-American to me. China is definitely not America's friend.

We are in debt to them up to our eyeballs, so, why do we continue to do business w/ China? Every time you buy Chinese, the debt gets worse. Presently, the trade deficit between our country and China is at 4:1 in their favor.

https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html

This has resulted in a loss of an estimated 2.7 MILLION jobs since 2001

https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/08/24/report-america-lost-27-million-jobs-to-china-in-10-years

There has been a history in the last decade plus of China buying up real estate and businesses in America. How can they do this? Easy, the American people have financed this with the purchase of their cheap and inferior goods. The profits due to the trade deficits have swelled the coffers of the Chinese.

We’ve lost real estate to China, so they can build their manufacturing sites, employing Chinese nationals on American soil. Here is an example of how they are slowly slipping into our country.

(http://www.eutimes.net/2011/06/china-wants-to-build-a-50-square-mile-city-in-the-us/

Just one of many examples. Others include; general construction and road contracts, transportation, and infrastructure projects across the country.

Although not all bad. Some Chinese companies have recognized that despite the cheap labor pool available to them at home, it is cheaper overall to manufacture here. Land, utilities, cost of transportation, and tax incentives make it appealing to set up shop here, instead of China.

http://archive.fortune.com/2010/05/06/news/international/china_america_full.fortune/index.htm

At first sight, this is great! However, when you dissect the end result, you have to ask the questions…what are the quality of the goods, how much of the profit goes off-shore instead of being reinvested and growing our economy, and are they really invested in just making a profit or contributing to an ultimate positive impact?

Every time they get a contract to do work here, they screw over Americans here at all cost: They use their own people, their own companies, their own materials and their own transportation.

Ever since the 1994-ish expansion of NAFTA, the door was left open for the Chinese invasion

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2014/jan/02/china-crashed-nafta-party-free-trade.

NAFTA allowed for a tsunami of goods to be imported easily into the US. Outfits like Amazon got in bed with them (mysteriously 4 years ago) and the flow of counterfeit goods entering the US has expanded exponentially, and the US has done nothing to stop it.

The flood of Chinese goods is so voluminous that it is impossible to inspect, catch and stop the illegal imports. American made goods have suffered as Chinese knock-offs and out-right forgeries flood the market. US makers like Garrett Metal Detectors have devoted entire web pages on their sites on how to detect forgeries

http://www.garrett.com/mediasite/counterfeiting_en.aspx.

Patent infringement robs Americans of billions or perhaps trillions of dollars every year.

Unsuspecting American consumers buy these products every year without realizing how they have been cheated. All they know is that the price was right, for them.

The American people have little or no recourse against faulty Chinese products. Everything from soup to nuts is copied. The inferior and yes, sometimes very dangerous, products are dumped onto the American consumer market.

Tainted, dangerous/deadly/mislabeled counterfeits of poultry, beef, fish, dairy products, automotive, pharmaceuticals, dog food, children’s toys, metals, construction materials flood the market. It is virtually impossible to stem the flow. Discover and stop the goods from being sold and something else pops up. Also, there is no way to easily, in fact it's next to impossible, to hold the Chinese manufacturers accountable for these dangerous goods. Do your homework – investigate for your own health and welfare and for that of your family.

The Chinese philosophy appears to be that stupid Americans will buy anything without question as long as the price is right, aka – cheap.

I already know what you’re going to say... “But I can’t find a comparable priced product made in the USA.” Have you even really looked? Probably not any further than your local Walmart, Target, Home Depot, Lowe’s, or Menards.

Back in the early 70’s I remember the influx of Chinese made nails. Unlike the ones made in the USA, one strike with a hammer and they would bend. Soon, all you could find were these Chinese-made nails in the stores. Why? There was a greater profit margin…more money to be made. Soon we came to accept the quality and price of the nails as normal, because that is all we could find in the stores. Did we stop making good quality steel nails in the USA (or Canada)? NO we didn't, they’re still being made. It is just that there is a higher profit margin on the Chinese product(s) that puts them on the self ahead of American products.

If you look around you can still find American made w/ much higher quality hardware, nails and screws. They are priced about the same or in some cases less than what is being offered in the big box stores. They are just not right in front of our noses!

Why do we not support our own economy and communities? One word... convenience. (and laziness too).

ABC News made an attempt to wake up the American people with an ongoing news segment, called, Made In America. They attempted to highlight what I just wrote above, but apparently it fell on deaf ears as they no longer highlight the available AMERICAN products.

As for you Harbor Freight addicts: It is a storehouse of poorly made knockoffs. How many times have you bought something from China that failed, right out of the box, when you needed it it performed poorly or mandated modifications?

If you don’t understand that there are tangible/intangible costs to everything, stop reading. If your time is worth nothing, what I’m saying won’t mean a thing to you and you won't care. It sure hurts to buy an item more than once too.

In reality, Chinese products cost a lot more than what you paid for them. If you think strictly with your wallet and you are hopefully paying attention, it won’t take long for you to realize that what you bought wasn’t such a good deal after all. If you buy the best you can, without losing sight of your wallet, the savings are huge. You might even save yourself a trip to the ER or at worst, the morgue. Certainly, you’ll save yourself one or more trips back to the store to get a Chinese item replaced. Don't forget to add the intangible costs to the ''good deal's'' price. More often than not, goods not from China are more durable, last longer and are more cost effective.

There is a lot to be said for free trade and buying goods from the cheapest sources anywhere in the world. Different parts of the world have different relative advantages, so we naturally want to buy oil from places where the oil is cheapest to produce, and buy our manufactured goods from places where it is cheaper to manufacture. But this kind of thinking is not the end of the story.

What this kind of thinking ignores is politics and the supremacist dreams of countries and political movements that hold American ideals in contempt. For them, economics is not a game. Instead, economic laws are simply rules in a much larger game, which is the pursuit of power and ''end game''.

Lenin said, “Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them.”

That strategy is with us just as much today as it was when Lenin said it. So the next time you decide to buy something, ask yourself: “When I buy this, will it help America and its true allies? Or will it strengthen countries whom we know despise our way of life? Are we paralyzing our own ability to act if a war breaks out?” Keep in mind that China is still a Communist nation.

For more than two decades, America has stood by while North Korea has pursued a nuclear ICBM program, despite the fact that North Korea is a small country with no strategic depth and an economy too weak to support a sustained war.

Why have we put up with this? The answer, in one word, is China.

Right now we are so dependent on China for manufactured goods that we don’t dare stop North Korea unless China gives consent. China is now in control of America’s foreign policy toward a country that makes videos about blowing us off the map.

If America’s economic relationship with China were to break down due to war with North Korea, China would be hurt. They would lose one of their biggest customers. But we would be far worse off. Aside from possibly dealing with the damage of a nuclear attack, we would be economically chopped off at the knees because we would be cut off from our biggest supplier of manufactured goods. Prices would skyrocket, our economy would go into a tailspin, and it would take years to develop alternatives.

We have been cornered politically, and most people don’t even realize it. Even worse, North Korea knows it and is getting more aggressive. Our passivity encourages them, just as Neville Chamberlain encouraged Hitler to take over Europe. In both cases, passivity is the gateway to a war of greater proportions than anything imaginable at an earlier phase.

Think about WHO you are buying from the next time you go to the store. It is more important than most people think.

When you vote w/ your wallet, merchants and manufacturers are quick to react. Push back, they'll listen or go out of business.

Counterfeit_products.pdf

Podcast: Dangers of Counterfeit Goods

 

There is nothing political in my statement, intentionally or unintentionally.

I will put up my soap box now.

EOS

 

On 6/7/2017 at 2:08 PM, Dadio said:

Go ahead an slap me Stick,

 

are you satisfied now???...

Thanks, Stick! That needed to be said.

John

3 hours ago, Stick486 said:

 

are you satisfied now???...

Yeah, now off to Harbor Freight,have to get some things I need.

Herb

2 hours ago, Dadio said:

Yeah, now off to Harbor Freight,have to get some things I need.

Herb

  

As much as we would all love to be purists in the Buy American mantra, nobody is above it. Look around your homes, we all have China, India, Taiwan, Mexico, in our homes. If your on your computer, reading this, you are doing it on a foreign born PC. While I do my best to support American business, somtimes it's impossible.

5 minutes ago, John Morris said:

As much as we would all love to be purists in the Buy American mantra, nobody is above it. Look around your homes, we all have China, India, Taiwan, Mexico, in our homes. If your on your computer, reading this, you are doing it on a foreign born PC. While I do my best to support American business, somtimes it's impossible.

 

I agree, it does seem impossible. However, we could make and effort  to do better. It didn't get there overnight, and we won't fix it any faster. We just need to start somewhere.

A few years ago, I did a couple of focus groups with a local tool manufacturer.   It was about the same time as I read, "The WalMart Effect."  And I had some friends that worked for P&G, who told me selling to Walmart was really holding a tiger by the tail.  Walmart demanded a cost reduction in the items they sold from each vendor.   The cost reduction amounted to something like 1/3 price M reduction to customer, 1/3 to profit increase to Walmart and if they could figure out a way to cut costs, 1/3 to vendor.    The mfr. I was talking to said they sold to Walmart and got to the point of having to outsource to China or give up the account.

 

But then again, I've been working on furniture from China, Viet Nam, Malaysia, and Indonesia for move than a decade.  Some of the crap I see is just incredible.   I've talked to several people who have visited Chinese furniture factories and their stories were incredible about the working conditions, lack of health and safety concerns (Q: How do those people breathe with all those fumes ?   A: they usually get sick in a couple of years and go back to farming."

 

I occasionally watch Shark Tank and very often the candidates are encouraged to move mfg off-shore to cut costs.

1 hour ago, schnewj said:

I agree, it does seem impossible. However, we could make and effort  to do better. It didn't get there overnight, and we won't fix it any faster. We just need to start somewhere.

We can and many of us do Bill, and those of us who are sensitive to this plight, do our best, I know I do, I sleep well at night in that regard.

One of the biggest falsehoods that folks like to say is, "Nothing is made in America anymore". Big lie, not true. We'll shop union made clothing websites for some of our apparel, we've found some great quality clothing that is American Made by union hands. There are grades of clothing as well, some are 5 star grade meaning that 100 percent of the clothing is made in the USA, from the cotton farm grown here to making the fabric on the power looms that were made in USA. Those are 5 star garments, keep an eye out for those, then there is the 2 or 3 star garments, fabric is imported but the apparel is made in the USA. There are varying degrees of US Made, it's fun to learn it and purchase it. I have bought union made t-shirts, just google "Union Made Tshirts" you'll find a ton of hits. Our tshirts that we used for our first run of Patriot Woodworker T's were made in the USA. 

Yes, we all need to do our part, the resources are out there to buy American, from clothing to tools.

 

This discussion has spurred me to create a Made in America page, I will do it. We had one up on our old community site, but it went by by with many other assets we lost during the big migration to this software. I'll work on it. After all, we are The Patriot Woodworker! Made in the USA!  

 

 

 

 

 

Just got got back from HF, Man ,I forgot it was Sunday afternoon. Sure was a crowd there,those sales and discount coupons sure draw the crowds. I can't seem to get out of there for less than a $100.  Best prices I have ever seen. Every time I leave that store I say a big Thanks to tricky Dick Nixon for opening up China for trade, the best thing he ever did. I think I over spent my little pension , but good thing that this week is the end of the month, and I put a big Bean and Ham soup on to slow cook before I left, that will last me most of the week.. Really got some good buys too, never have enough screw drivers and pliers. And those digital calipers too, I have 3 or 4 already but can't pass them up for that price,can't sesm to find them when i lay them down, eventually I will have enough for one by each tool.

 

Herb

6 minutes ago, Dadio said:

Just got got back from HF, Man ,I forgot it was Sunday afternoon. Sure was a crowd there,those sales and discount coupons sure draw the crowds. I can't seem to get out of there for less than a $100.  Best prices I have ever seen. Every time I leave that store I say a big Thanks to tricky Dick Nixon for opening up China for trade, the best thing he ever did. I think I over spent my little pension , but good thing that this week is the end of the month, and I put a big Bean and Ham soup on to slow cook before I left, that will last me most of the week.. Really got some good buys too, never have enough screw drivers and pliers. And those digital calipers too, I have 3 or 4 already but can't pass them up for that price,can't sesm to find them when i lay them down, eventually I will have enough for one by each tool.

 

Herb

Good on you Herb! Another point we have to touch on, what's in our budget. Just because a guy can't afford "Tool A" Made in America, does that mean he should never have "Tool B" imported, thus in turn denying the pleasure of working the wood?

I think not. If I cannot afford "Tool A" but I can "Tool B" import, guess which one I have to have, I most certainly am not going to do without!

2 hours ago, John Morris said:

This discussion has spurred me to create a Made in America page,

 

thank you John...

54 minutes ago, Dadio said:

Just got got back from HF, Man

 

that's a new level of sarcasm even for you Herb....

I guess when you get slapped you get just plain ole ornery...

Edited June 26, 20178 yr by Stick486

I guess i don't see "American made" versus "union made" in the same light as you John. While I am fervently pro American (despite what some may assume here) I am not at all supportive of unions. To elaborate more on that last sentence would just start a whole new round of debates (might even go border line political), so I'll just leave it at that. Point being, not all (or even most) of the good American made stuff is union....at least in my humble opinion.

18 minutes ago, Fred W. Hargis Jr said:

I guess i don't see "American made" versus "union made" in the same light as you John. While I am fervently pro American (despite what some may assume here) I am not at all supportive of unions. To elaborate more on that last sentence would just start a whole new round of debates (might even go border line political), so I'll just leave it at that. Point being, not all (or even most) of the good American made stuff is union....at least in my humble opinion.

The only reason why I used the term Union Made Fred, is because in the apparel industry, that is what it is, they are filled with Unions, I could have just said American Made and it would have meant the same thing when it comes to the American garment industry unless you are buying from the small family owned shop that is non union. The fact of the matter is, when I buy under garments as I have from American Made companies, 9 times out of ten, they are union, it's the only reason why I used the term, union made and most of the websites I purchase from state their garments are Union Made, so it's just a term I have adopted for discussion purpose regarding the purchase of apparel..

As far as unions, well I have my opinions, and you're right, lets not go down that rabbit hole.