we rely on Chinese goods for all our cheap Temu products or what the fuck ever
Their argument is that we buy a lot more than Temu shit from China and often it gets washed through some American billionaire supply chain, hugely marked up in the process. When I buy a Standley FatMax tape measure that has a proud USA flag on it and says “Made in the USA from global materials” that means most of it was made in China and another underpaid sod in the USA put the parts together. Then I pay 100% markup which goes to the billionaire behind Stanely Black & Decker. We (US, Canada, EU, etc.) are critically dependent on Chinese production in virtually every sector and our firms aren’t interested in re-shoring that manufacturing. Therefore buying from them means we’re contributing to some billionaire’s trust fund instead of helping our fellow worker. @UnspecificGravity@piefed.social correct me if I’m wrong. This fucking problem is way WAY bigger than cheap shit sold on TEMU and can’t be solved by individuals consumers buying shit. It wasn’t individual consumers who decided to move prod to China. Prod got moved by corpos and prices remained the same. There was no - buy local for $10 or buy Chinese for $1. Firms always sell at the highest possible price while reducing their costs to the minimum. So our problem isn’t China or whomever makes something cheaper (China isn’t the only outsourcing dest). Our problem is our own billionaires and the market and political power they’ve amassed that lets them make shit offshore and sell it back to us without our consent. In this status quo, our best course of action is give as little money to these billionaires as possible, for example by buying straight from the source, while we organize to take back power from them domestically, as that COSTS FUCKING MONEY.
Their argument is that we buy a lot more than Temu shit from China and often it gets washed through some American billionaire supply chain, hugely marked up in the process. When I buy a Standley FatMax tape measure that has a proud USA flag on it and says “Made in the USA from global materials” that means most of it was made in China and another underpaid sod in the USA put the parts together. Then I pay 100% markup which goes to the billionaire behind Stanely Black & Decker. We (US, Canada, EU, etc.) are critically dependent on Chinese production in virtually every sector and our firms aren’t interested in re-shoring that manufacturing. Therefore buying from them means we’re contributing to some billionaire’s trust fund instead of helping our fellow worker. @UnspecificGravity@piefed.social correct me if I’m wrong. This fucking problem is way WAY bigger than cheap shit sold on TEMU and can’t be solved by individuals consumers buying shit. It wasn’t individual consumers who decided to move prod to China. Prod got moved by corpos and prices remained the same. There was no - buy local for $10 or buy Chinese for $1. Firms always sell at the highest possible price while reducing their costs to the minimum. So our problem isn’t China or whomever makes something cheaper (China isn’t the only outsourcing dest). Our problem is our own billionaires and the market and political power they’ve amassed that lets them make shit offshore and sell it back to us without our consent. In this status quo, our best course of action is give as little money to these billionaires as possible, for example by buying straight from the source, while we organize to take back power from them domestically, as that COSTS FUCKING MONEY.