4 ms·

Humbly and politely disagree. Factorio taught me about supply chains, manufacturing bottlenecks, and tooling dependencies. These concerns don't really crop up

Humbly and politely disagree. Factorio taught me about supply chains, manufacturing bottlenecks, and tooling dependencies. These concerns don't really crop up in day-to-day programming, but they reveal a lot about why we struggle manufacturing anything in USA anymore.

rendaw 1y ago
Factorio is often described as a game for software developers (i.e. it feels like you're programming when you play). Are those really the critical skills that allowed China to grow in manufacturing so quickly? I'm not sure shop classes fill that need either...
alnwlsn 1y ago
To be able to design any manufacturable item, you have to know that a wrench is used to tighten bolts, and a screwdriver must be able to reach the screw. There are people who don't. Some of them graduated engineering school with me.
- iancmceachern 1y ago
  Second this, I have stories...
Cthulhu_ 1y ago
If it's about supply chains and the like, Eve Online might be a better fit, it's got the factor of time, deal-making, social interaction, theft, war, blockades, undercutting, etc in there as well. like, I can see a high school class set up their corporation, get mining set up, maybe own a station, get production running... but then a nullsec alliance is like haha fuck you and completely undercuts them, or the recurring player event where they block / destroy anything coming into or out of the main trade hub starts. Factorio is pretty predictable... or maybe I've played it too often so I know what to consider for the long term. I should get some mods or change some settings to create calamities like in the old Sim City.
troyvit 1y ago
I think you're both right. If the wood shop class was a class in how to run a wood shop (not just in how to run a lathe) it would be the best of both worlds.
korse 1y ago
Do you work in manufacturing?
Workaccount2 1y ago
But we don't have a shortage of people who understand those things. You can learn them with a passive interest while hanging around with your laptop on the weekends. We have a shortage of people who understand how to actually make things in a non-copy/paste environment. There are so many ways that mother nature says "fuck you, fuck your work" that you never get contact with in virtual environments. In fact the whole point of virtual environments it to remove that brutality. We have a dramatic shortage of young people who are interested in learning how to wrangle with mother nature OS rather than computer OS.
- _DeadFred_ 1y ago
  When I did IT in manufacturing, we outsourced most of the 'understand how to actually make things' tooling type people jobs. We didn't need them full time and could get way better experts via outsourcing than we could hire. What we needed were wage slaves paid low enough to make the economics work, even in our small town without many employers that was the tricky bit. Especially every year when health insurance premiums went up. You want to help American manufacturing, move healthcare costs off their back and to the government.
  - nebula8804 1y ago
    >You want to help American manufacturing, move healthcare costs off their back and to the government. This would be a big help but maybe too little too late. Maybe we just enjoyed an era of living off the backs of Chinese labor. Now with their increasing wealth, their own desire to move up the chain and their abysmal birthrates, that era is ending. India also does not have a great birthrate and other structural problems while other asian countries dont have the numbers to completely replace China. It might be that many products we enjoyed just dont make sense anymore if no other country is willing to pick up the slack or there isn't some amazing innovation in automation. Other products might survive with massive inflation. Watch how this simple bluetooth speaker is made: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFYxSX6xP2U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFYxSX6xP2U Look at how many people are there to assemble the speaker at MSRP ~20-25$ per speaker. Does that make sense in a world where those folks aren't being paid the wages that they are or they don't exist anymore because they have retired?
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
UncleEntity 1y ago
We manufacture plenty of stuff in the good ol' USA, what we struggle with is manufacturing cheap things which require large labor input.

rendaw 1y ago

Factorio is often described as a game for software developers (i.e. it feels like you're programming when you play). Are those really the critical skills that allowed China to grow in manufacturing so quickly? I'm not sure shop classes fill that need either...

alnwlsn 1y ago

To be able to design any manufacturable item, you have to know that a wrench is used to tighten bolts, and a screwdriver must be able to reach the screw. There are people who don't. Some of them graduated engineering school with me.

iancmceachern 1y ago
Second this, I have stories...

Cthulhu_ 1y ago

If it's about supply chains and the like, Eve Online might be a better fit, it's got the factor of time, deal-making, social interaction, theft, war, blockades, undercutting, etc in there as well. like, I can see a high school class set up their corporation, get mining set up, maybe own a station, get production running... but then a nullsec alliance is like haha fuck you and completely undercuts them, or the recurring player event where they block / destroy anything coming into or out of the main trade hub starts. Factorio is pretty predictable... or maybe I've played it too often so I know what to consider for the long term. I should get some mods or change some settings to create calamities like in the old Sim City.

troyvit 1y ago

I think you're both right. If the wood shop class was a class in how to run a wood shop (not just in how to run a lathe) it would be the best of both worlds.

korse 1y ago

Do you work in manufacturing?

Workaccount2 1y ago

But we don't have a shortage of people who understand those things. You can learn them with a passive interest while hanging around with your laptop on the weekends. We have a shortage of people who understand how to actually make things in a non-copy/paste environment. There are so many ways that mother nature says "fuck you, fuck your work" that you never get contact with in virtual environments. In fact the whole point of virtual environments it to remove that brutality. We have a dramatic shortage of young people who are interested in learning how to wrangle with mother nature OS rather than computer OS.

_DeadFred_ 1y ago
When I did IT in manufacturing, we outsourced most of the 'understand how to actually make things' tooling type people jobs. We didn't need them full time and could get way better experts via outsourcing than we could hire. What we needed were wage slaves paid low enough to make the economics work, even in our small town without many employers that was the tricky bit. Especially every year when health insurance premiums went up. You want to help American manufacturing, move healthcare costs off their back and to the government.
- nebula8804 1y ago
  >You want to help American manufacturing, move healthcare costs off their back and to the government. This would be a big help but maybe too little too late. Maybe we just enjoyed an era of living off the backs of Chinese labor. Now with their increasing wealth, their own desire to move up the chain and their abysmal birthrates, that era is ending. India also does not have a great birthrate and other structural problems while other asian countries dont have the numbers to completely replace China. It might be that many products we enjoyed just dont make sense anymore if no other country is willing to pick up the slack or there isn't some amazing innovation in automation. Other products might survive with massive inflation. Watch how this simple bluetooth speaker is made: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFYxSX6xP2U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFYxSX6xP2U Look at how many people are there to assemble the speaker at MSRP ~20-25$ per speaker. Does that make sense in a world where those folks aren't being paid the wages that they are or they don't exist anymore because they have retired?

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

UncleEntity 1y ago

We manufacture plenty of stuff in the good ol' USA, what we struggle with is manufacturing cheap things which require large labor input.