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Manufacturing has a history of high growth and employment. Services do not. Economically, service domination means an overall slow-growth economy. Even highly i

Manufacturing has a history of high growth and employment. Services do not. Economically, service domination means an overall slow-growth economy. Even highly intellectual services do not come close to the historic growth / employment curve the nation enjoyed when it was dominated by manufacturing. Wealth distribution is also heavily-weighted toward to the top with services. Generally democracies fare better when wealth is more broadly-held.

nickbauman 10y ago
Not sure why this is being down-voted: it's pretty well established that service economies have limited potential to export or achieve economies of scale, and thus unable to benefit from expanding global trade.
- guyzero 10y ago
  The plus side of service economies is that they're a lot harder to outsource - you can't open a Manilla call-center to handle a nursing home.
  - brianwawok 10y ago
    You can bring in h1b nurses for half pay.
    - JBReefer 10y ago
      That's not how that system works
      - brianwawok 10y ago
        Have you been to a nursing home lately? I see a lot of nurses that are fresh in the country. Not sure if h1b or work visa or what. There is definitely some shady things going on around foreign nurses in nursing homes.
      - imtringued 10y ago
        It doesn't matter how it's supposed to work. If it produces the wrong results then that's how it works in reality. After all if it's not working how it's supposed to work why not change it? If nobody is going to fix it that means the true intention was to produce that "wrong" result in the first place. H1Bs are bound to the employer and a transfer costs $1k - $3k in legal fees. There's even an optional premium fee to ensure that it will be processed within two weeks instead of two to six months. Sure the new employer may cover this but it's obviously going to be priced in the salary. Such a system pressures the employee to stick with their current employer even though it may be a suboptimal choice.
  - Turing_Machine 10y ago
    If your local hospital doesn't have a vastly disproportionate number of nurses from the Philippines, it is... atypical.
    - guyzero 10y ago
      And they pay taxes, buy things from local businesses, pay rent to local landlords, etc. Quite unlike foreign call centers. Great news all around.
titanomachy 10y ago
Good points. However, the macroeconomic benefits of manufacturing don't necessarily require people to be employed in manufacturing, do they? If America builds enough productive, highly-automated factories, the country is still generating wealth. As long as some of this wealth is captured for the people, then standard of living can increase.
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  > However, the macroeconomic benefits of manufacturing don't necessarily require people to be employed in manufacturing, do they? "Macroeconomic benefits" as usually measured by aggregate output measures, clearly not. Distributional benefits, OTOH... well, not a strong requirement. But... > As long as some of this wealth is captured for the people, then standard of living can increase. The challenge is establishing the mechanism for that capture outside of employment. A fairly fundamental premise of the existing economic system is that the prime manner of that capture to provide distributed benefits will be employment, and there is fairly strong resistance (including from the people who would retain the benefits in the absence of employment without some knew capture mechanism) to changes to the structure.
  - titanomachy 10y ago
    That resistance is strong, but not universally or globally. It's not the kind of social innovation likely to come from America. But that doesn't mean it's a doomed prospect at the outset.
    - nickbauman 10y ago
      If I am an American, then, the prospect is likely doomed. And likely doomed for my daughter, too, who has had a terrifically difficult time with her post-college life even though both her parents are college educated and gainfully employed.
- crdoconnor 10y ago
  >Good points. However, the macroeconomic benefits of manufacturing don't necessarily require people to be employed in manufacturing, do they? Pretty much. The stuff you buy from China wasn't shipped 3000 miles because they have better robots than us.

nickbauman 10y ago

Not sure why this is being down-voted: it's pretty well established that service economies have limited potential to export or achieve economies of scale, and thus unable to benefit from expanding global trade.

guyzero 10y ago
The plus side of service economies is that they're a lot harder to outsource - you can't open a Manilla call-center to handle a nursing home.
- brianwawok 10y ago
  You can bring in h1b nurses for half pay.
  - JBReefer 10y ago
    That's not how that system works
    - brianwawok 10y ago
      Have you been to a nursing home lately? I see a lot of nurses that are fresh in the country. Not sure if h1b or work visa or what. There is definitely some shady things going on around foreign nurses in nursing homes.
    - imtringued 10y ago
      It doesn't matter how it's supposed to work. If it produces the wrong results then that's how it works in reality. After all if it's not working how it's supposed to work why not change it? If nobody is going to fix it that means the true intention was to produce that "wrong" result in the first place. H1Bs are bound to the employer and a transfer costs $1k - $3k in legal fees. There's even an optional premium fee to ensure that it will be processed within two weeks instead of two to six months. Sure the new employer may cover this but it's obviously going to be priced in the salary. Such a system pressures the employee to stick with their current employer even though it may be a suboptimal choice.
- Turing_Machine 10y ago
  If your local hospital doesn't have a vastly disproportionate number of nurses from the Philippines, it is... atypical.
  - guyzero 10y ago
    And they pay taxes, buy things from local businesses, pay rent to local landlords, etc. Quite unlike foreign call centers. Great news all around.

titanomachy 10y ago

Good points. However, the macroeconomic benefits of manufacturing don't necessarily require people to be employed in manufacturing, do they? If America builds enough productive, highly-automated factories, the country is still generating wealth. As long as some of this wealth is captured for the people, then standard of living can increase.

dragonwriter 10y ago
> However, the macroeconomic benefits of manufacturing don't necessarily require people to be employed in manufacturing, do they? "Macroeconomic benefits" as usually measured by aggregate output measures, clearly not. Distributional benefits, OTOH... well, not a strong requirement. But... > As long as some of this wealth is captured for the people, then standard of living can increase. The challenge is establishing the mechanism for that capture outside of employment. A fairly fundamental premise of the existing economic system is that the prime manner of that capture to provide distributed benefits will be employment, and there is fairly strong resistance (including from the people who would retain the benefits in the absence of employment without some knew capture mechanism) to changes to the structure.
- titanomachy 10y ago
  That resistance is strong, but not universally or globally. It's not the kind of social innovation likely to come from America. But that doesn't mean it's a doomed prospect at the outset.
  - nickbauman 10y ago
    If I am an American, then, the prospect is likely doomed. And likely doomed for my daughter, too, who has had a terrifically difficult time with her post-college life even though both her parents are college educated and gainfully employed.
crdoconnor 10y ago
>Good points. However, the macroeconomic benefits of manufacturing don't necessarily require people to be employed in manufacturing, do they? Pretty much. The stuff you buy from China wasn't shipped 3000 miles because they have better robots than us.