The problem imo is the slow deterioration of institutional knowledge that offloading the mental task of wisdom gathering to AI is causing.
One interesting comparison is to the history of manufacturing. West/America decided one day that manufacturing would be cheaper to outsource and better (short term) profit was to be made by outsourcing it all to China. The institutional expertise started to deteriorate, to the point that America simply didn't even have the capacity, or expertise anymore to produce stuff (such as grill brush [1])
I feel like you could take all the handwavy comment that are made today to dismiss this caution, and find equal dismissal back then when companies were actively outsourcing the manufacturing.
"I'm coding 10x faster"
"look at the output velocity per employee"
"we are producing much more (in China)"
"look at profit / number of (manufacturing) employers"
Seems ok if you're American / Chinese but I'm struggling to understand how the rest can be OK with allowing institutional knowledge to deteriorate while having an active dependency to the former two. We already see this with the tech dependency towards USA and manufacturing competition from China.
> I feel like you could take all the handwavy comment that are made today to dismiss this caution, and find equal dismissal back then when companies were actively outsourcing the manufacturing.
Absolutely people were extremely dismissive to anyone saying that we're losing the ability to make things in this country!
There were all these theories like Comparative Advantage that people would trot out to point out that, if you don't like outsourcing, not only are you ignorant and backwards you're also probably racist.
And they were right. American manufacturing is $3 trillion/year, second only to China, and 1/5th of the entire world. American built airliners and American built engines fly all over the world. Millions of American cars come out of factories every year. American rockets put more into orbit than everyone else combined.
The idea that the US lost its manufacturing is not based in reality. One reason people think that is because people think cheap plastic crap and consumer electronics when they think “manufacturing.” Another reason is that US manufacturing has become highly efficient and automated, so a fairly small portion of the population works in it.
Yeah, your iPhone wasn’t built in the US. But the plane that got it here probably was.
> And they were right. American manufacturing is $3 trillion/year, second only to China, and 1/5th of the entire world.
Values are 2021 because that's the most recent available for US at the same source, to keep consistent.
World Manufacturing output: 16.16 trillion <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD" rel="nofollow">https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD
US Manufacturing output: 2.5 trillion (15.47% of world)
<a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?locations=US" rel="nofollow">https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?location...
China Manufacturing output: 4.85 trillion (30.01% of world)
<a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?locations=CN" rel="nofollow">https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?location...
Whatever analysis you make, let's use the correct numbers, from which you were off by about 1/5th. Should you think that is a negligible margin, you'd have to consider the US participation in global manufacturing output as similarly significant.
Ok thank you for finding more up-to-date data for US manufacturing GDP. Let's re-do the analysis with 2025 data, because I draw the line at using annualized data for a year that has not yet ended.
World total: 17.6 trillion (<a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?locations=CN" rel="nofollow">https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?location...)
US: 2.961 trillion, 16.82% of world
China: 4.82 trillion, 27.38% of world total
So you were very much closer to the 3 trillion figure (again, 2026 annualized data is not current, it's forecast). Still quite off from the 1/5th of total. About the same as the EU - 3.03 trillions for 2025 (<a href="https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/euu/european-union/manufacturing-output" rel="nofollow">https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/euu/eur...)
In terms of participation in world total the US has come down from 22.44% in 1997 to 16.82% in 2025 losing 5.38 percentage points or a loss of over 1/5th in less than 30 years.
I'd say there is some justification to claim a decline in US manufacturing.
Again thank you for engaging productively and providing up to date data. I feel like I should offer praise as I chastised you for cursing at me for using data 4 years out of date.
There’s a decline in the relative share, but that’s down to the rest of the world growing. Adjusted for inflation, 1997 was slightly below the current figure. That’s nothing to brag about, but it’s a far cry from the “we don’t make anything anymore” narrative I see so much.
Where it has declined substantially is employment. That peaked at almost 20 million at the end of the 70s and is now under 13 million.
> The idea that the US lost its manufacturing is not based in reality.
But I disagree with your claim that people are right in being extremely dismissive of losses in US manufacturing.
>> Absolutely people were extremely dismissive to anyone saying that we're losing the ability to make things in this country!
Interpreting that as a complete loss of manufacture capacity I agree with you, with the qualification that concerns of relative decline were justified since there was a definite decline in aggregate.
I have to say that overall I don't think economies and citizens of these economies should prefer certain economic activities over others. In principle I think specialization is a good thing. On the other hand, I do think that the US has committed some strategy mistakes in terms of how much manufacturing activity was moved out of the country and how dependent it has come to be on foreign supplies of, for instance, rare earths and advanced IC.
But that analysis is predicated on US strategic goals and geopolitical intent. The coming impasse over Taiwan with China is almost completely self imposed due to the prioritization of short term corporate profit over strategic goals.
But that is a different conversation altogether. I think data from the past 30 years show that alarmism over de-industrialization was overblown as you said AND that there has been nonetheless a significant decline in the previously absolutely dominant position of the US economy in global manufacturing. If that is good or bad, to whom or to what ends, is way outside the scope of internet forum messages.
NalNezumi · · focus · HN ↗
One interesting comparison is to the history of manufacturing. West/America decided one day that manufacturing would be cheaper to outsource and better (short term) profit was to be made by outsourcing it all to China. The institutional expertise started to deteriorate, to the point that America simply didn't even have the capacity, or expertise anymore to produce stuff (such as grill brush [1])
I feel like you could take all the handwavy comment that are made today to dismiss this caution, and find equal dismissal back then when companies were actively outsourcing the manufacturing.
"I'm coding 10x faster" "look at the output velocity per employee"
"we are producing much more (in China)" "look at profit / number of (manufacturing) employers"
Seems ok if you're American / Chinese but I'm struggling to understand how the rest can be OK with allowing institutional knowledge to deteriorate while having an active dependency to the former two. We already see this with the tech dependency towards USA and manufacturing competition from China.
[1] <a href="https://youtu.be/3ZTGwcHQfLY" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/3ZTGwcHQfLY
jordanb · · focus · HN ↗
Absolutely people were extremely dismissive to anyone saying that we're losing the ability to make things in this country!
There were all these theories like Comparative Advantage that people would trot out to point out that, if you don't like outsourcing, not only are you ignorant and backwards you're also probably racist.
wat10000 · · focus · HN ↗
The idea that the US lost its manufacturing is not based in reality. One reason people think that is because people think cheap plastic crap and consumer electronics when they think “manufacturing.” Another reason is that US manufacturing has become highly efficient and automated, so a fairly small portion of the population works in it.
Yeah, your iPhone wasn’t built in the US. But the plane that got it here probably was.
huurtehoog · · focus · HN ↗
Values are 2021 because that's the most recent available for US at the same source, to keep consistent.
World Manufacturing output: 16.16 trillion <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD" rel="nofollow">https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD
US Manufacturing output: 2.5 trillion (15.47% of world) <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?locations=US" rel="nofollow">https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?location...
China Manufacturing output: 4.85 trillion (30.01% of world) <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?locations=CN" rel="nofollow">https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?location...
Whatever analysis you make, let's use the correct numbers, from which you were off by about 1/5th. Should you think that is a negligible margin, you'd have to consider the US participation in global manufacturing output as similarly significant.
wat10000 · · focus · HN ↗
huurtehoog · · focus · HN ↗
Four. 2021 vs 2025. Unless you have numbers from 2026 from the future.
> and you’re going to hassle me about not having accurate figures?
Merely pointing out. The subjective interpretation of the experience is entirely on you.
> What the fuck.
Get more recent numbers that show I'm wrong and your 3 trillion & 1/5th of world total is right then.
wat10000 · · focus · HN ↗
huurtehoog · · focus · HN ↗
World total: 17.6 trillion (<a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?locations=CN" rel="nofollow">https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.IND.MANF.CD?location...) US: 2.961 trillion, 16.82% of world China: 4.82 trillion, 27.38% of world total
So you were very much closer to the 3 trillion figure (again, 2026 annualized data is not current, it's forecast). Still quite off from the 1/5th of total. About the same as the EU - 3.03 trillions for 2025 (<a href="https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/euu/european-union/manufacturing-output" rel="nofollow">https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/euu/eur...)
In terms of participation in world total the US has come down from 22.44% in 1997 to 16.82% in 2025 losing 5.38 percentage points or a loss of over 1/5th in less than 30 years.
I'd say there is some justification to claim a decline in US manufacturing.
Again thank you for engaging productively and providing up to date data. I feel like I should offer praise as I chastised you for cursing at me for using data 4 years out of date.
wat10000 · · focus · HN ↗
There’s a decline in the relative share, but that’s down to the rest of the world growing. Adjusted for inflation, 1997 was slightly below the current figure. That’s nothing to brag about, but it’s a far cry from the “we don’t make anything anymore” narrative I see so much.
Where it has declined substantially is employment. That peaked at almost 20 million at the end of the 70s and is now under 13 million.
huurtehoog · · focus · HN ↗
> The idea that the US lost its manufacturing is not based in reality.
But I disagree with your claim that people are right in being extremely dismissive of losses in US manufacturing.
>> Absolutely people were extremely dismissive to anyone saying that we're losing the ability to make things in this country!
Interpreting that as a complete loss of manufacture capacity I agree with you, with the qualification that concerns of relative decline were justified since there was a definite decline in aggregate.
I have to say that overall I don't think economies and citizens of these economies should prefer certain economic activities over others. In principle I think specialization is a good thing. On the other hand, I do think that the US has committed some strategy mistakes in terms of how much manufacturing activity was moved out of the country and how dependent it has come to be on foreign supplies of, for instance, rare earths and advanced IC.
But that analysis is predicated on US strategic goals and geopolitical intent. The coming impasse over Taiwan with China is almost completely self imposed due to the prioritization of short term corporate profit over strategic goals.
But that is a different conversation altogether. I think data from the past 30 years show that alarmism over de-industrialization was overblown as you said AND that there has been nonetheless a significant decline in the previously absolutely dominant position of the US economy in global manufacturing. If that is good or bad, to whom or to what ends, is way outside the scope of internet forum messages.