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Mon 17 Feb, 2003 01:48 pm
Last week I ordered new sheets and bath towels from L.L. Bean, in Maine.
They arrived today, in the snow storm!
Guess what? The sheets were made in Israel and the hand and bath towels were made in Turkey. The same towels, from Bean, a few years ago were made in Columbia.
The other day I bought oranges, not noting the sticker on them. Source?
South Africa.
What's made or grown in the USA today?
Know what you mean. A recent brief case from L.L. Bean was from Vietnam.
We still make our own oat bran, though.
I'm not gonna touch that one.
Well, I hold in my hands a Marlboro box. And I read: "Made in USA under authority of the trademark owner" Ironically, Philip Morris Products, Inc. has already relocated to Switzerland (maybe, to be as far as possible from the people that start smoke themselves, and then sue the tobacco manufacturers), but its manufacturing facilities are still in the USA.
One more American product: assault rifle M16A, I usually get the one when I perform my active reserve service.
Ah, some more U.S. products I have seen or heard about: Anti-aircraft missiles Patriot, Apache attack helicopter, main battle tank M1A1 Abrams, F-15 and 16 aircrafts, Pershing and Tomahawk cruise missiles.
I didn't see them in the Bean's catalogue!
What goods does Bean's sell? Does it deal weapons and munition?
You're using an M-16? Could we unload a few M-60 MGs on you poor devils.
L.L.Bean sells clothing, outdoorsey stuff, and the occasional household item.
Oh, my router bits are made in Isreal, by Amana. Thought you might be interested.
MG-60, I guess is a machine gun, and M16 is an assault rifle, these are different types of weapons having different functions in the battlefield. Israeli army uses domestically manufactured Negev machine guns, while part of the assault rifles are the U.S.-made M16s. Part of the soldiers, mainly in tanks and artillery, are armed with domestic Galil rifles that are the bad copy of Kalashnikov (they are much heavier than their prototype), and the new Tabor rifle (also manufactured domestically) is on its way to replace both M16 and Galil.
So far we have concluded that the U.S. makes tobacco and weapons. I hope we come up with something else!
And last, the Social Security Administration, one of
FDR's central government devices for entrapping a
dependent constituency, just celebrated its 65th
anniversary. SSA employees were given small boxes
with stylish memorabilia pins emblazoned with the
propaganda casting, "Social Security, An American
Cornerstone." Ironically, the back of the boxes
stated -- more accurately -- "Made in China."
I've got a couple of pairs of Dexter's boots that were made in the States, but there was a definite cost premium to that.
That one tickled me, dys. Back when I was beating out a living as a machinist, I bought a set of Brown & Sharp dial calipers and, big as life, the box said 'made in the USA.' The calipers were made in Switzerland, so I suppose only the box itself was American made.
I have to admit an obvious thing: American labor is very expensive (the same refers to European), therefore more and more goods will be manufactured in "cheap" countries, like Turkey, Thailand and China. U.S. people will make their money from R&D, business services, banking, tourism, investing abroad, etc.
I was made in the US as well, but then I was adopted by Canada :-)
I recalled some more American goods (this time non-military) -- Boeing civil aircrafts, cars and trucks of GMC, Ford Motor and Buick, agricultural machinery of John Deere.
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