Deputy Travis Junior said:

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This is head in the sand stupidity. They're profitably churning out high tech, $15k cars that have the CEO of ford's jaw on the floor, and you're pretending that they're hand turning screwdrivers to make cheap crap by candlelight.

https://fordauthority.com/2025/07/ford-ceo-jim-farley-says-chinese-vehicles-have-higher-quality-than-western-cars/

While speaking at the 2025 Aspen Ideas Festival, Farley once again touched on the subject of Chinese vehicles, stating that "their cost, their quality of their vehicles is far superior to what I see in the west."

We can't keep pretending that we have a decade+ lead on them. We need to get competitive fast, not enact a bunch of tariffs that remove competitive pressures and continue giving longshoremen sweetheart deals for manual labor while the rest of the world automates.

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Let's not forget about port operations where we are also behind China and have made the decision to stay that way since Trump got involved in the last union walkout dustup at beginning of year. He took the side of the unions against automation + higher pay for them, so we will continue to bring up the rear here.

I guess if he gets his way with more domestic manufacturing then that would be an offset in his favor, but that's years away, if ever.

Ragoo said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

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This is head in the sand stupidity. They're profitably churning out high tech, $15k cars that have the CEO of ford's jaw on the floor, and you're pretending that they're hand turning screwdrivers to make cheap crap by candlelight.

https://fordauthority.com/2025/07/ford-ceo-jim-farley-says-chinese-vehicles-have-higher-quality-than-western-cars/

While speaking at the 2025 Aspen Ideas Festival, Farley once again touched on the subject of Chinese vehicles, stating that "their cost, their quality of their vehicles is far superior to what I see in the west."

We can't keep pretending that we have a decade+ lead on them. We need to get competitive fast, not enact a bunch of tariffs that remove competitive pressures and continue giving longshoremen sweetheart deals for manual labor while the rest of the world automates.

---

I've been in a massive Chinese manufacturing center. I have seen it with my own eyes. Are you calling me a liar?

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So have I, some are high tech some are not what difference does it make? FORD seems to be worried

Oh FFS, don't start the message board macho man "are you calling me a liar!?" bull*****

I don't know if you've been in a Chinese factory or not (and I don't know what industry or what parts they produced) but there is an overwhelming amount of reporting and information on automation and robot density in China versus the US and the averages all say that China leads us by a significant margin. Plus, it's a country of a billion; 1 factory in 1 sector doesn't exactly represent the whole of their capabilities.

samurai_science said:

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Ragoo said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

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This is head in the sand stupidity. They're profitably churning out high tech, $15k cars that have the CEO of ford's jaw on the floor, and you're pretending that they're hand turning screwdrivers to make cheap crap by candlelight.

https://fordauthority.com/2025/07/ford-ceo-jim-farley-says-chinese-vehicles-have-higher-quality-than-western-cars/

While speaking at the 2025 Aspen Ideas Festival, Farley once again touched on the subject of Chinese vehicles, stating that "their cost, their quality of their vehicles is far superior to what I see in the west."

We can't keep pretending that we have a decade+ lead on them. We need to get competitive fast, not enact a bunch of tariffs that remove competitive pressures and continue giving longshoremen sweetheart deals for manual labor while the rest of the world automates.

---

I've been in a massive Chinese manufacturing center. I have seen it with my own eyes. Are you calling me a liar?

---

So have I, some are high tech some are not what difference does it make? FORD seems to be worried

---

that's a ford problem. Think Mercedes in Alabama is worried? Toyota in San Antonio?

Deputy Travis Junior said:

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Oh FFS, don't start the message board macho man "are you calling me a liar!?" bull*****

I don't know if you've been in a Chinese factory or not (and I don't know what industry or what parts they produced) but there is an overwhelming amount of reporting and information on automation and robot density in China versus the US and the averages all say that China leads us by a significant margin. Plus, it's a country of a billion; 1 factory in 1 sector doesn't exactly represent the whole of their capabilities.

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They are definitely ahead of us in robots and automation in factories, that's well known

Ragoo said:

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samurai_science said:

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Ragoo said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

---

This is head in the sand stupidity. They're profitably churning out high tech, $15k cars that have the CEO of ford's jaw on the floor, and you're pretending that they're hand turning screwdrivers to make cheap crap by candlelight.

https://fordauthority.com/2025/07/ford-ceo-jim-farley-says-chinese-vehicles-have-higher-quality-than-western-cars/

While speaking at the 2025 Aspen Ideas Festival, Farley once again touched on the subject of Chinese vehicles, stating that "their cost, their quality of their vehicles is far superior to what I see in the west."

We can't keep pretending that we have a decade+ lead on them. We need to get competitive fast, not enact a bunch of tariffs that remove competitive pressures and continue giving longshoremen sweetheart deals for manual labor while the rest of the world automates.

---

I've been in a massive Chinese manufacturing center. I have seen it with my own eyes. Are you calling me a liar?

---

So have I, some are high tech some are not what difference does it make? FORD seems to be worried

---

that's a ford problem. Think Mercedes in Alabama is worried? Toyota in San Antonio?

---

How would I or you even know why don't you ask them?

samurai_science said:

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Ragoo said:

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samurai_science said:

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Ragoo said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

---

This is head in the sand stupidity. They're profitably churning out high tech, $15k cars that have the CEO of ford's jaw on the floor, and you're pretending that they're hand turning screwdrivers to make cheap crap by candlelight.

https://fordauthority.com/2025/07/ford-ceo-jim-farley-says-chinese-vehicles-have-higher-quality-than-western-cars/

While speaking at the 2025 Aspen Ideas Festival, Farley once again touched on the subject of Chinese vehicles, stating that "their cost, their quality of their vehicles is far superior to what I see in the west."

We can't keep pretending that we have a decade+ lead on them. We need to get competitive fast, not enact a bunch of tariffs that remove competitive pressures and continue giving longshoremen sweetheart deals for manual labor while the rest of the world automates.

---

I've been in a massive Chinese manufacturing center. I have seen it with my own eyes. Are you calling me a liar?

---

So have I, some are high tech some are not what difference does it make? FORD seems to be worried

---

that's a ford problem. Think Mercedes in Alabama is worried? Toyota in San Antonio?

---

How would I or you even know why don't you ask them?

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the tenor of the thread is now hanging in the balance of the ford ceo. Guess we will just take one automaker at face value and characterize across the entirety of global manufacturing.

Ragoo said:

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samurai_science said:

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Ragoo said:

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samurai_science said:

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Ragoo said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

---

This is head in the sand stupidity. They're profitably churning out high tech, $15k cars that have the CEO of ford's jaw on the floor, and you're pretending that they're hand turning screwdrivers to make cheap crap by candlelight.

https://fordauthority.com/2025/07/ford-ceo-jim-farley-says-chinese-vehicles-have-higher-quality-than-western-cars/

While speaking at the 2025 Aspen Ideas Festival, Farley once again touched on the subject of Chinese vehicles, stating that "their cost, their quality of their vehicles is far superior to what I see in the west."

We can't keep pretending that we have a decade+ lead on them. We need to get competitive fast, not enact a bunch of tariffs that remove competitive pressures and continue giving longshoremen sweetheart deals for manual labor while the rest of the world automates.

---

I've been in a massive Chinese manufacturing center. I have seen it with my own eyes. Are you calling me a liar?

---

So have I, some are high tech some are not what difference does it make? FORD seems to be worried

---

that's a ford problem. Think Mercedes in Alabama is worried? Toyota in San Antonio?

---

How would I or you even know why don't you ask them?

---

the tenor of the thread is now hanging in the balance of the ford ceo. Guess we will just take one automaker at face value and characterize across the entirety of global manufacturing.

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Take from it what you will but when it comes to automation in factories, they are ahead of us.

You were in a massive Chinese factory, so I guess we'll apply that to the entire industry as well.

Dude. The numbers are all over the internet. It's not just 1 CEO.

https://www.trendlinehq.com/p/china-s-automation-edge-over-us
China has 470 robots per 10K manufacturing employees vs. 295 in US

https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/world-news/technology-world-news/chinas-industrial-robots-are-changing-manufacturing/
China currently holds over 50% of the world market share in industrial robots capable of assembly, production line handling, service tasks, machine feeding, palletizing, packaging, and more... China installed around 290,000 new industrial robots in 2024, nearly twice as many as the European Union, the United States, and Japan combined. Around 86,000 industrial robots went onto the market across the EU last year, while Japan implemented 43,000 and the US around 34,000.


Just take the loss. You don't know what you're talking about. Chinese manufacturing isn't a bunch of blinkered engineers giving orders to slave labor assembling cheap crap by candlelight.

samurai_science said:

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Ragoo said:

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samurai_science said:

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Ragoo said:

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samurai_science said:

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Ragoo said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

---

This is head in the sand stupidity. They're profitably churning out high tech, $15k cars that have the CEO of ford's jaw on the floor, and you're pretending that they're hand turning screwdrivers to make cheap crap by candlelight.

https://fordauthority.com/2025/07/ford-ceo-jim-farley-says-chinese-vehicles-have-higher-quality-than-western-cars/

While speaking at the 2025 Aspen Ideas Festival, Farley once again touched on the subject of Chinese vehicles, stating that "their cost, their quality of their vehicles is far superior to what I see in the west."

We can't keep pretending that we have a decade+ lead on them. We need to get competitive fast, not enact a bunch of tariffs that remove competitive pressures and continue giving longshoremen sweetheart deals for manual labor while the rest of the world automates.

---

I've been in a massive Chinese manufacturing center. I have seen it with my own eyes. Are you calling me a liar?

---

So have I, some are high tech some are not what difference does it make? FORD seems to be worried

---

that's a ford problem. Think Mercedes in Alabama is worried? Toyota in San Antonio?

---

How would I or you even know why don't you ask them?

---

the tenor of the thread is now hanging in the balance of the ford ceo. Guess we will just take one automaker at face value and characterize across the entirety of global manufacturing.

---

Take from it what you will but when it comes to automation in factories, they are ahead of us.

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because we told them how to do everything and then they iterated on it.

Hopefully smarter people realize how dumb that was and we do less going forward.

Kansas Kid said:

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BusterAg said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

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BusterAg said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

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China isn't beating us because they have cheap labor. They're beating us because their manufacturing processes are better, higher tech, and more automated.

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Is it your contention that Chinese innovation around manufacturing is superior to US innovation around manufacturing?

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Correct. They're significantly more automated than we are + use a lot more robots.

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And it was Chinese companies that invented these robots and automation techniques?

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In many cases yes. They have a lot of brand new plants that have great economy of scale while many of our steel plants have outdated technology which is why US steel being purchased will be great for keeping those plants going because they will invest to make them better but likely they will still be less efficient.

Go see how many engineers and scientists China graduates a year vs the US where a lot of our degrees are in areas like gender studies and philosophy and you will see why they are out innovating us in many areas. They also steel IP as well which helps (don't think for a minute our companies won't also try to reverse engineer Chinese technology).

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1) I think focusing on steel is likely myopic. No one would be surprised that Chinese Steel is more modern than US steel. My understanding is that these are 40 year payback investments due to the environmental challenges of handling a lot of molten metal.

2) I will take US innovation over Chinese innovation every day of the week, and four times on Sunday.

3) If "steel IP" was a pun, you get the dad joke of the day award. I love a good pun.

4) China doesn't have to reverse engineer most of the IP we give them. An American business goes over to China, builds a plant in China for cheaper labor, gives the Chinese the design on how to build a plant, and the Chinese just walk with the plans across the street to the new Chinese government funded plant.

Deputy Travis Junior said:

---

This is head in the sand stupidity. They're profitably churning out high tech, $15k cars that have the CEO of ford's jaw on the floor, and you're pretending that they're hand turning screwdrivers to make cheap crap by candlelight.

https://fordauthority.com/2025/07/ford-ceo-jim-farley-says-chinese-vehicles-have-higher-quality-than-western-cars/

While speaking at the 2025 Aspen Ideas Festival, Farley once again touched on the subject of Chinese vehicles, stating that "their cost, their quality of their vehicles is far superior to what I see in the west."

We can't keep pretending that we have a decade+ lead on them. We need to get competitive fast, not enact a bunch of tariffs that remove competitive pressures and continue giving longshoremen sweetheart deals for manual labor while the rest of the world automates.

---

Are we getting caught up on semantics here?

I have no doubt in my mind that Chinese are putting more UI tech in their cars than every other manufacturer in the US other than maybe Tesla.

Is that the most important thing to US consumers? The amount of "tech" (read, connectivity and entertainment technology) in their car?

BusterAg said:

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Kansas Kid said:

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BusterAg said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

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BusterAg said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

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China isn't beating us because they have cheap labor. They're beating us because their manufacturing processes are better, higher tech, and more automated.

---

Is it your contention that Chinese innovation around manufacturing is superior to US innovation around manufacturing?

---

Correct. They're significantly more automated than we are + use a lot more robots.

---

And it was Chinese companies that invented these robots and automation techniques?

---

In many cases yes. They have a lot of brand new plants that have great economy of scale while many of our steel plants have outdated technology which is why US steel being purchased will be great for keeping those plants going because they will invest to make them better but likely they will still be less efficient.

Go see how many engineers and scientists China graduates a year vs the US where a lot of our degrees are in areas like gender studies and philosophy and you will see why they are out innovating us in many areas. They also steel IP as well which helps (don't think for a minute our companies won't also try to reverse engineer Chinese technology).

---

4) China doesn't have to reverse engineer most of the IP we give them. An American business goes over to China, builds a plant in China for cheaper labor, gives the Chinese the design on how to build a plant, and the Chinese just walk with the plans across the street to the new Chinese government funded plant.

---

I've seen it too where American company takes design and manufacturing drawings to china. American company teaches, inspects, oversee production until the quality is acceptable and then hand Chinese company a PO for an allotment. Chinese company doubles the qty and sells the other half on the market.

MemphisAg1 said:

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But Trump says there's no inflation!

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That number would be considered frictional. Biden's 9.3% inflation not so much.

Ragoo said:

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BusterAg said:

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Kansas Kid said:

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BusterAg said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

---

BusterAg said:

---

Deputy Travis Junior said:

---

China isn't beating us because they have cheap labor. They're beating us because their manufacturing processes are better, higher tech, and more automated.

---

Is it your contention that Chinese innovation around manufacturing is superior to US innovation around manufacturing?

---

Correct. They're significantly more automated than we are + use a lot more robots.

---

And it was Chinese companies that invented these robots and automation techniques?

---

In many cases yes. They have a lot of brand new plants that have great economy of scale while many of our steel plants have outdated technology which is why US steel being purchased will be great for keeping those plants going because they will invest to make them better but likely they will still be less efficient.

Go see how many engineers and scientists China graduates a year vs the US where a lot of our degrees are in areas like gender studies and philosophy and you will see why they are out innovating us in many areas. They also steel IP as well which helps (don't think for a minute our companies won't also try to reverse engineer Chinese technology).

---

4) China doesn't have to reverse engineer most of the IP we give them. An American business goes over to China, builds a plant in China for cheaper labor, gives the Chinese the design on how to build a plant, and the Chinese just walk with the plans across the street to the new Chinese government funded plant.

---

I've seen it too where American company takes design and manufacturing drawings to china. American company teaches, inspects, oversee production until the quality is acceptable and then hand Chinese company a PO for an allotment. Chinese company doubles the qty and sells the other half on the market.

---

Rinse and repeat a hundred times a year for 3 decades.

I don't think I've seen it mentioned on here, but the tariffs aren't just to curb our debt. Clearly we can argue the merits of that.

The tariffs are also and I believe, primarily, a foreign influence tool. The Trump admin is clearly trying to reshape global influences and realign the US in global supply chains. This is a much more efficient way to do that, than the usual alternative of war and boots on the ground. Getting counties and their largest corporations to invest in the US gives us leverage in future potential negotiations.

I think American companies need to eat the tariffs to play along since they've been allowed to thrive in our markets.

flown-the-coop said:

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How are tariffs impacting Caterpillar when tariffs are nothing but an additional tax paid for by the customers?

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perhaps they're in a fixed price contract in the short term. A single tear is running down my eye for their lost profits while I get ass-raped every time I go to the grocery store.

Lord if that was happening to me at the grocery store I could maybe muster up more than a tear.

And it was being facetious about the guys who say only the end user pays the tariff and it's nothing but another tax on the poor man.

YouBet said:

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Deputy Travis Junior said:

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This is head in the sand stupidity. They're profitably churning out high tech, $15k cars that have the CEO of ford's jaw on the floor, and you're pretending that they're hand turning screwdrivers to make cheap crap by candlelight.

https://fordauthority.com/2025/07/ford-ceo-jim-farley-says-chinese-vehicles-have-higher-quality-than-western-cars/

While speaking at the 2025 Aspen Ideas Festival, Farley once again touched on the subject of Chinese vehicles, stating that "their cost, their quality of their vehicles is far superior to what I see in the west."

We can't keep pretending that we have a decade+ lead on them. We need to get competitive fast, not enact a bunch of tariffs that remove competitive pressures and continue giving longshoremen sweetheart deals for manual labor while the rest of the world automates.

---

Let's not forget about port operations where we are also behind China and have made the decision to stay that way since Trump got involved in the last union walkout dustup at beginning of year. He took the side of the unions against automation + higher pay for them, so we will continue to bring up the rear here.

I guess if he gets his way with more domestic manufacturing then that would be an offset in his favor, but that's years away, if ever.

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The unions definitely hurt us. One of the issues with the ports was the unions didn't want an automated gate so they literally employ people to manually operate a gate. They're probably making $100k+ per year to do so.

MemphisAg1 said:

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Logos Stick said:

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doubledog said:

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So Tariffs are responsible for 0.3% increase and not government spending or interest rates. Got it.

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I don't care what the cause is. Rates should not be lowered right now, but I expect they will do it anyway because of Trump's tantrums.

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There is no credible case for lowering rates right now with core inflation essentially at 3% and GDP at 3.3%.

The economy is doing just fine, and the unemployment rate is low.

Trump's political interference in the Fed is going to come back to bite him. Short term rates are moving down due to his political pressure but long term rates are moving up due to loss of confidence in Fed independence and a fear the Fed won't keep inflation in check. Longer term rates affect things like housing and long term investment loans, big drivers for economic activity.

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I've had no confidence in the Fed for quite some time. You shouldn't either.

END THE FED