> the growth we see in other countries is just laggards catching up to us. But it's something that needs to be examined, too. This was documented in the 1990s

> the growth we see in other countries is just laggards catching up to us. But it's something that needs to be examined, too. This was documented in the 1990s [0] with a smaller sample of OECD members (OECD only expanded significantly in the 2000s) as well as in the CEE within the EU in the 2010s [1]. And you can see this anecdotally as well in industries ranging from Electronics Assembly to Resource Refining to Pharmaceutical Manufacturing. The US hasn't gotten poorer - other countries have gotten WAAAAAAY richer and increasingly skilled. > the ranking of countries in manufacturing productivity Imo, Calculating Manufacturing productivity has issues. For example, there's a bit of an assumption that it was Chinese factories that took jobs from factories in the Midwest when it was mostly movement to the South and then Mexico in the 80s-90s. Then they left for China, and then the lower value chain producers there began offshoring as well by 2015-16. I think there are a lot of well read (but not necessarily smart) HNers who think manufacturing is singular and it's easy to train someone used to assembling toys to helping assemble LTO batteries. [0] - https://www.commerce.gov/sites/default/files/migrated/reports/internationalcompetitiveness_0.pdf https://www.commerce.gov/sites/default/files/migrated/report... [1] - https://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/scpwps/ecbwp992.pdf https://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/scpwps/ecbwp992.pdf