Let's be real here. You say China produces shit goods but then why did you not get a BMW? This is because it's within your affordability as no one else can make anything cheaper. I once owned a restaurant and my chef would always buy kitchenware made in China because they were cheaper and did the job. Certain things, say a blender cost HK$120 each so he bought 2. If one broke down, he would just discard it and use the standby. A blender from the US would be more durable and last 6 times longer (blenders do take a beating in a professional kitchen environment). The US blender would cost HK$3,600 each, 30 times more than the Chinese blender but they do the same job. Same as your motorbike. You can just dump your motorbike and buy a new one anytime because it is affordable.

Chinese products are constantly improving and to think that they would not improve as with products from Japan and Korea is unfair. If you want to boycott Chinese goods that's fine but you better have lots of money to buy those premium products made in Germany and the US to replace the Chinese goods.

[ Last edited by  geoduck at 11-6-2010 09:13 ]

Yes, quality issues exist, but generalizing all companies in China as utter shit is wrong. Think about it, some pf the best products in the world are manufactured here in china like your notebooks and the Apple Iphone.

Its not about the quality always being bad, its about how much the buyer is willing to pay the manufacturer, or what his requirements are. Accordingly, the manufacturer will have to make the product within the budget, which isnt much. Hence cheap products!

Normal people cant afford BMW's, so I guess China products arent for you, but then again, I guess you own an iphone or an apple product??

Could you tell me what is manufactured in Hong Kong today that is of shit quality?

Not quite you are comparing the wrong sorts of things and coparing top end with low end.

BMW doesn't make 125cc bikes China doesn't generally make much over 200cc

Compare Japanese to Chinese companies and the anology is closer.

A case in point is the CG125 a pretty small cc common bike around the world (disco in 2006 due to emissions) it is made in brazil in a factory with lots of Japanese QC. OTR it used to cost £1450.

A Chinese copy, i.e. a Hongdu, Honga, Honfa, Hinfen, or whatever they call them these days made copies of it OTR they are £1200 a price differential of £250, they are absolute pieces of shit and when they say they are made from steel I don't believe them more like iron.

The CG125 will last for DECADES it had 296000 miles on it after a friend took it round the world 3 times I had a 1981 version and it started on the 2nd kick, this for a price differential of £250. While copies barely last 6 months if that.

And the if it breaks get a new one isn't applicable to motorbikes, if it breaks while you are riding it you tend to end up in the morgue.

My dad was very pro China and on the small price differentials and the fact he is a crazy commie nut used to buy made in China all the time, but he noticed his screw drivers would break after first use, I also remember the time when he tried to use a tin opener, in ONE day he went through 6 tin openers until finally he borrowed my made in Germany tin opener.

The made in China ones were 89p each, my German one was £4

Yes IPODs, dell or whatever make good stuff and it is labeled made in China, but these things are made in factories where Japanese/Americans or Europeans heavily supervise the factory floor and perform decent QC on the stuff.

The Honda Plant in Shenzhen for example had tons of Japanese engineers who were paid much more than their Chinese counter parts which caused them to go on strike.

The problem is the conditions do not exist yet for a native Chinese firm to build in quality of things this is changing as above people are buying them on small price differentials and thinking this is a piece of shit. Once they start losing business hopefully they will learn to self improve.

Honda did this in the 1950s and 1960s Hondas were absolute pieces of shit, they were saved by the honda Cub. With the old you meet the nicest people on Hondas slogan. The current attitude right now still hasn't changed in the 10 years since Chinese bikes first came to the UK and Chinese made tools which break on first use.

The philosophy of oh if it breaks buy another one has long gone, Ford and GM used to make bumpers and car parts that broke if you looked at them too hard. Especially since the price differences once it gets to market are not huge.

You can con a customer once or twice but then the reputation is ruined for a very long time, my dad first bought a FORD in 1981, it was a piece of shit he never ever bought ford again even though they eventually improved, Hyundai still has reputation issues too even though they have ironed it out.


I'd note there are some big technical hurdles too which cheap labour cannot be used to make!

The film disclosure explores this very well, where microchips are built with such close tolerances you have to use machines to build them, similar thing with some funky engines coming out of Japan, the bore/cylinder tolerances are so incredibly fine there is no way you can use a handtool or a hand controlled machine in which to make them.


There are lots of hurdles for China to jump over still and they are still playing the cheap labour game, the cheap labour game is begining to end. In 10 years time all of your improving quality suggestions will happen but currently on things which aren't that much cheaper the goods MIC are rubbish.

We said this about Japan in the 1970s and thus I would rather wait for some more progress than buy substandard junk which is only a bit cheaper. (heh my dad's Lenovo note book broke after 1 year while my Irish made dell from 2006 is still fine!)

[ Last edited by  Kennichi at 11-6-2010 09:40 ]

The major problem with Chinese companies is that they are not innovative, and I completely agree with the fact that they mostly copy the latest selling product and try to make a quick buck. The only way they can get ahead is to offer a very low price, which is only possible if the parts are cheap, and hence shitty products.

However, the very same companies are capable of producing very good products. If the demand is for cheap products, why build an expensive one?

I work for a chinese company which is supervised by my boss who is American Chinese, and yes it does make a difference in quality, that I agree with you. Also, Another lock company which I help out is completely run by a chinese family, and so far none of my customers in the US or europe have had any problems, and we sell them at 1/3rd of what the price is in those places.

What I dont agree is the mentality that just coz its made in China, its shit and will break 10 mins after u use it.

There are factories in china that make cheap products as well as factories that make expensive and better products. You cant generalize them as one.

Agreed not all made in China is shit, the problem is a stereotype has developed where people automatically think such a thing is poor quality based on their prior experiences.

And stereotypes and mentalities are hard to change and or get ingrained.

My dad for instance bought a Ford in the 1980s, he was so frustrated by it he never bought ford again, and told me my sister and all his family never to buy ford again, Ford has never recovered from this bad reputation even though today it probably makes decent cars. This reputation is very hard to shake!

My uber negative thoughts as you may have noticed are when I did an engine swap using such tools a 20 hour job took me 5 days due to the need to replace tools where the soft steel bolts of the engine kept breaking the tools.

I was nearly driven nuts when in Siberia last year and bought a set of spanners to repair something on the bike and the steel bolts on my bike broke EVERY spanner in the set, which made me livid!

i c your point as well as aidafan's point.. didn't know India had so much religious problems.. oh well... good for China than and good for us as long as girls continue to participate in prostitution on their own free will (for some)

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/06/10/foxconn_restructuring/

Foxconn – the massive Taiwan-based contract manufacturer whose clients include Apple, Dell, HP, Intel, Sony, and others – will shutter its mainland China operations in a restructuring that could move as many as 800,000 workers into the ranks of the unemployed.

This news comes by way of the Chinese-language news site ON.CC — a Google translation is available here — and couldn't immediately be independently verified.

The announcement came at a shareholders meeting of the Hon Hai Group, Foxconn's parent company. Chairman Terry Gou said that production would be withdrawn from mainland China and shifted to Taiwan, Vietnam, and India. There are currently 800,000 Foxconn workers on the mainland, and if all Foxconn manufacturing there eventually ceases, they would all be out of work.

Foxconn has been under fire recently for a series of suicides at its Shenzhen, China factory. Gou said that the Chinese government had sent 200 inspectors to the plant, which employs somewhere between 270,000 (Financial Times) and 400,000 (Steve Jobs) workers, and that Foxconn management had been exonerated.

Guo also said that the ongoing rash of suicides could be of the copy-cat variety, fueled by media coverage. He also noted that the company had suspended death benefits to remove that impetus for jumping, the favored method of suicide not only at Foxconn's Shenzhen plant, but in urban China in general.

In another bid to improve conditions at its mainland Chinese factories, Foxconn announced two substantial pay raises: a 30 per cent across-the-board raise announced last week, and a 66 per cent performance-based raise to go into effect in October.

According to ABC News the company provided no details on how performance would be evaluated. ®
Bootnote

Performance based would be those workers willing to do two shifts a day, 7 days a week. This is how most factory workers bump up their salaries in China.

I am sure there are truths to what you say & what people are saying as well.  Like how China has evolved, it won't be an overnight change.

http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealti ... n/?KEYWORDS=vietnam

http://greaterchinamarket.wordpr ... -gaze-beyond-china/

everything starts with "greedy".

when people wants more, vendors provide more. then competition begins, and everybody wants it cheaper and cheaper.

for example while a computer in 286/386, every vendor can get at least 30% for components or reselling.

but today, it comes with 1000+ power for computing but less 7% profit each.

everyone wants to survive, everyone wants to keep job, everyone wants cheaper, but still need it better.

China minister shrugs off labour unrest concerns
June 19, 2010 - 3:54PM
               
China's commerce minister has shrugged off concerns that recent labour unrest in the so-called "workshop of the world" will scare investors away, state media reported Saturday.
Factories in run by foreign firms such as Toyota and Honda have recently been hit by a wave of labour unrest that has forced some companies to raise wages for their workers.
"A small proportion of the contracts may be transferred to countries with lower costs but China has yet to lose its labour cost advantage," Chen Deming was quoted as saying by the official China Daily newspaper.

The unrest has sparked fears of a snowball effect that could signal the days of cheap Chinese labour are over for foreign investors, who might start transferring their manufacturing contracts to cheaper countries.
Chen told Hong Kong-based Pheonix TV that the recent strikes were "isolated cases".
"We want to ensure workers get an appropriate wage increase but also want to pay attention to the capacity of enterprises to bear the burden (of rising personnel costs)."
Japan's Toyota Motor, which became the latest company to be hit by strikes this week, said Friday its largest assembly plant in China had to be suspended due to work stoppages.
Honda has also been impacted. The firm offered a 24 percent pay rise to staff at its main parts factory to end a strike while employees at another plant have agreed to go back to work as wage talks continue.
And in response to 11 suicides among its Chinese work force, Taiwanese firm Foxconn -- which counts Apple, Dell and Sony among its clients -- doubled salaries.
Link here:
http://news.smh.com.au/breaking- ... -20100619-ynn2.html

Production is definitely mobile and no doubt companies will seek the lowest cost providers.  If china is still way below other options there is room to move to pay more for price of labor. Companies will profit less.  Demand is not present to pass increases along to consumers at this point.

As mentioned, it will be difficult to move to any other country with such economies of scale as China. The infrastructure in China cannot be beat and other emerging countries just do not have the money to invest in the infrastructure.

I've once visited a computer components factory in DG and it was an eye opener for me. Everything was integrated. When you're in the US and want to order a component, you just click on the item on a website and pay by credit card. The Dell website is an example but the factory I had visited produced much more sophisticated and specialized components.

When you confirm the order by clicking the ORDER button this order immediately shows up on the screen across the world in China (which is in the middle of the night because of the time difference). The order is passed on to another worker down the line who immediately processes this order. This worker has 50 pigeon holes loaded with components at his workstation. He takes the components from the pigeon holes with a bar code that was passed to him from his PC. He then assembles the parts together right on the spot. He then weighs this component to determine it is the right piece of component (each component has a different weight). Once his computer verifies this component it is passed down the conveyor belt for packing. This takes no more than 5 minutes and the component you had just ordered several minutes ago has been assembled is ready and waiting.

Come morning time there is intense activity at the factory as all the FedEx and UPS trucks come and collect the components and head straight for the airport on these superhighways. It is loaded on a plane and shipped to the US that same morning. The US also has great logistics and you would usually get this component within 48 hours after you clicked the ORDER button on your PC.

All this takes a lot of investment and I've visited India and seen factories there. Nothing seem to work including telephones but this has gotten better over the past 5 years. Also, there seem to be a lot of brownouts and factories just have to take a couple of days off when this happens. The highways have huge potholes which no one bothers to repair and the airports have very poor access.

China has been gearing up to be the factory of the world for the past three decades with construction of huge airports, superhighways and power stations and it won't be easy to just move your production facility elsewhere overnight.

[ Last edited by  geoduck at 20-6-2010 11:54 ]