> Those countries have costs of labor far far below Western countries That could be for some labor, but not all. The US is still in the game when it comes to a

> Those countries have costs of labor far far below Western countries That could be for some labor, but not all. The US is still in the game when it comes to automobiles. Well, when it comes to Tesla, it looks to me Tesla is eating everyone's lunch. The US is still in the game for other very high tech things, like military hardware. Or industrial trucks (think Caterpillar). Where the US and other Western nations are a bit hopeless is the costs of megaconstructions, be they nuclear power plant or high speed rail, or simply skyscrapers. But nuclear power plants could be more like Caterpillar than like "massive cathedrals", as you call them.