From: jlacoss@isi.edu (Jeff LaCoss)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,alt.sex,soc.culture.usa,soc.culture.african.american,sci.electronics,misc.consumers,misc.education,misc.entrepreneurs
Subject: Re: DOES AMERICA SAY YES TO JAPAN? - Off track!!
Date: 17 Dec 92 03:52:18 GMT
Reply-To: jlacoss@paddington.isi.edu (Jeff LaCoss)
Organization: USC-Information Sciences Institute
Summary: Jeff rants at head-up-the-ass net boob

> dhesi@cirrus.com (Rahul Dhesi) writes:
>In <1992Dec15.214210.19181@oakhill.sps.mot.com>
>rvkl60@aus18a25.sps.mot.com (Tom Mathes) writes:
>
>>Let's get this discussion back on the REAL message of the
>>original post: the Japanese coordinated attack on industry
>                   ^alleged

 You aren't watching "Frontline" on PBS. Or reading any newspaper
business section. "Alleged" is quite incorrect.  "Proved" is closer to
the mark.

 As PBS has shown in reruns over the last few nights, the Japanese
used illegal trade practices to capture the market and pay for the
production-engineering of their products. Production engineering costs
a LOT.

 THEIR government allowed THEIR industries to place an economic burden
on THEIR consumers to subsidize predatory pricing, or "dumping."
People in the US (and hence most of the chicken-shits in government)
would never stand for being screwed so business could wax fat. Dumping
is illegal in the US. US courts have ruled that TVs, DRAMs, and VCRs
have been dumped in order to kill US competition.

>Do you know when the US will get back on track?  When it stops blaming
>Japan.

 YOHO!
 There IS something to be said for the statement about "blaming."
 What's needed is to stop the bitching, pull in the collective belt,
get down to competing on a LEVEL FIELD, and kick 'em in the ass.

 However, the US continues to just point the finger. Me, I would have
cut their economic nuts off. I still would:
 - 15% tariff on all consumer entertainment electronics. Being able to
   buy cheap new VCRs isn't really that important considering
	- how many people are unemployed
	- how many working people are on a survival basis in the US
 - have an industrial policy: use the bucks to fund consumer-product
   R&D just the way good ol' MITI does.

 The judgement against Japan for dumping TVs was NOT collected by the
government and the US TV industry did not thereby recoup its' losses.
As a result, the US TV industry bit the big one and the "cheaper and
better" Japanese TVs became the "only" TVs. The continued transfer of
profits from the US to Japan, plus their domestic subsidies, funded
the development of new products, which in turn crushed the US consumer
electronics industry.

>The US owes Japan a lot.  Why do Americans buy Japanese products?

 We helped them rebuild after the war, we've been their defense for
nearly 50 years, we've funded their rise to domination of the world
electronics market. Nope, the US doesn't owe Japan jack-shit.

 Americans probably buy most Japanese products because there no longer
is any choice. TV? VCR? CD? STEREO? Are there any of these made in the
US?
  No.

>Because they are inexpensive and work well.  This means that consumers

 Over the last 10 years, I've had 4 19" TVs:
 - Sony. Tube blew after coming out of warranty. Died after 4 years.
 - NEC. Stopped showing blue after a year. Died after 2 years use.
 - Panasonic. Died in 2 years.
 - RCA. Still working after a year.

 That Sony was pretty expensive - the top of the line at the time. The
NEC was about $40 cheaper than the equivalent (near-top 19") Sony. The
Panasonic was pretty cheap, but died fast.  The RCA was the cheapest;
I don't hold out much hope. Maybe I'm just lucky.

 I had a $350 Sony CD with just 70-80 hours on it over a couple years
- it croaked. No suprise that I don't buy Sony any more.

 TVs et. al. are designed to be cheap to manufacture, cheap to sell,
and reliable enough to get a couple years beyond warranty so people
can't bitch. (Cars are more of the same.)

 These things are NOT cheap to fix. Is this substantial progress for
consumers?
 When I was a kid, we had a Packard Bell that worked for over 10 years
before the first tube blew. I was 12-13 when that happened - I took
all the tubes to the local supermarket, found the bad one on the
tester, and had the thing working again in a couple hours. I didn't
know anything about TVs except it was probably bad practice to mess
inside while they were running.
 Yeah, TVs provide better pictures now, but they're designed with too
little margin to really last.

>in the US have to spend less to buy the same thing, or they can spend
>the same and get better quality.  This means that consumers in the US
>have more money to invest, and they can invest more in industry in
>their own country.  The low price of Japanese products HELPS consumers
>in the US spend less and save and invest more.

 Yes, but...
 - the PROFITS (wealth) created by the products leave the US
 - jobs that manufacture goods generally pay better than jobs that
   sell or distribute goods

 That's part of the reason why there is less actual wealth in the US
to invest. (I don't defend the shitty savings rate of Americans,
although there is more than a casual relationship between small (or
no) paychecks and savings.)

>And they would have a LOT to save and invest if they were not paying
>around 60% of their earnings in taxes.  THAT is a real problem.

 Well, yes, we DO pay a lot in taxes. There are problems to be fixed
by making hard choices.

 Invest? Look at the moral abuses of the investment tax credit and
you'll see that isn't what US business does with money. Save? People
with crappy service-industry jobs can't save much - they're usually
just over the subsistence level. Most of the over-paid folks that I
know are even now more concerned with flaunting it than saving it.
 If you're saying that lower taxes will lead to investment that works
it's way down the economic chain, I'll puke in my hat. That crap has
had 2 tries and put us in the shit each time.

	Jeff