The New York Times (may be pay-walled) reports that Terry Gou, the CEO of Foxconn has confirmed rumours aired in December to the effect that the company is considering building an additional factory in the United States. Yahoo Finance UK says that the factory, if built, "could create about 30,000-50,000 jobs." The South China Morning Post reports that the facility, expected to cost more than $7 billion, would make dot-matrix displays (such as used in television sets and mobile phones) under the Sharp name. Mr. Gou remarked that:
While it is difficult to have a clear analysis of the economic outlook for this year, due to looming uncertainties, three factors can be seen as clues. First, the rise of protectionism is inevitable. Secondly, the trend of politics serving the economy is clearly defined, and thirdly, the proportion of real economy is getting increasingly bigger.
Speaking in November, Gou had called on the incoming U.S. leaders to refrain from protectionist policies, The China Post had reported.
Additional coverage:
Related:
Foxconn Plans to Replace Nearly All Human Workers With Robots in Some Factories
Foxconn Acquires Sharp at a Lower Price Than Previously Agreed
Sharp Accepts $6.25 Billion Takeover Bid from Foxconn, but Foxconn is Wary of Debt
Softbank to Invest $50 Billion in the US
Related Stories
Electronics maker Sharp has accepted a $6.25 billion (700 billion Japanese yen) takeover bid from Foxconn, although the deal is now on hold. The $6.25 billion figure includes liabilities:
Ailing electronics maker Sharp has accepted a takeover bid from Foxconn, the company that assembles iPhones. After the deal was announced, Sharp's stock fell more than 14 percent. And Foxconn now says it will postpone finalizing the sale due to late-arriving information.
Thursday night local time, Foxconn issued a statement in Taiwan saying that it will now delay signing the deal, because of a document that Sharp shared with it on Wednesday, according to Focus Taiwan News, which adds that the sale was previously planned to be finalized by the end of this month.
[...] The Japan Times says the proposed deal would mean the loss of one of the country's crown jewels, calling it "the largest-ever acquisition of a Japanese electronics maker by a foreign company."
[cont..]
Foxconn will take over the electronics maker Sharp for about 20% less than it was willing to pay previously.
Chinese iPhone assembler Foxconn is to swallow Japanese monitor biz Sharp for ¥389bn (£2.5bn) – around £625m less than it had previously been willing to cough up. Under the terms of the deal, Foxconn's daddy Hon Hai will gain a controlling stake of 66 per cent in Sharp.
The takeover beat a proposal by the Japanese government to bail out the ailing company with a state-backed fund. According to the Japan Times, Sharp is expected to report a loss of ¥200bn (£1.2bn) for its fiscal year 2015. Last month the long-awaited merger was put on hold after the Japanese outfit passed new info to Foxconn, reported to show a 300 billion yen ($2.7bn) liability in its accounts.
Also at BBC, NYT, and Reuters.
SoftBank Group Corp. Chief Executive Officer Masayoshi Son told President-elect Donald Trump he would create 50,000 new jobs in the U.S. through a $50 billion investment in startups and new companies.
The money will come from SoftBank's previously announced $100 billion technology fund, according to a person familiar with the matter. That investment vehicle has a $45 billion commitment from the government of Saudi Arabia and $25 billion from Tokyo-based SoftBank, which operates technology and wireless companies around the world.
[...] Some investments from SoftBank's fund, which was unveiled in October, were probably destined for the U.S. anyway, given the nation's leadership in the global technology industry. But Son hadn't previously committed to creating a specific amount of jobs through the investment vehicle.
More coverage from Washington Post and Reuters.
Foxconn, the Chinese manufacturer of Apple's iPhones and other electronic devices, aims to replace human workers with "FoxBots" and achieve nearly full automation of entire factories:
The slow and steady march of manufacturing automation has been in place at Foxconn for years. The company said last year that it had set a benchmark of 30 percent automation at its Chinese factories by 2020. The company can now produce around 10,000 Foxbots a year, Jia-peng says, all of which can be used to replace human labor. In March, Foxconn said it had automated away 60,000 jobs at one of its factories.
[...] Complicating the matter is the Chinese government, which has incentivized human employment in the country. In areas like Chengdu, Shenzhen, and Zhengzhou, local governments have doled out billions of dollars in bonuses, energy contracts, and public infrastructure to Foxconn to allow the company to expand. As of last year, Foxconn employed as many as 1.2 million people, making it one of the largest employers in the world. More than 1 million of those workers reside in China, often at elaborate, city-like campuses that house and feed employees.
In an in-depth report published yesterday, The New York Times detailed these government incentivizes for Foxconn's Zhengzhou factory, its largest and most capable plant that produces 500,000 iPhones a day and is known locally as "iPhone City." According to Foxconn's Jia-peng, the Zhengzhou factory has some production lines already at the second automation phase and on track to become fully automated in a few years' time. So it may not be long before one of China's largest employers will be forced to grapple with its automation ambitions and the benefits it receives to transform rural parts of the country into industrial powerhouses.
To undermine American manufacturing, ditch the meatbags.
For years, iPhones (or their boxes) have said that they were "designed by Apple in California. Assembled in China." But thanks to an escalating trade war between the US and China, that might not be true in the coming years. Reuters reports that two of Apple's biggest manufacturing contractors, Foxconn and Pegatron, are working to expand their facilities in Mexico with an eye toward eventually building iPhones there.
[...] This isn't Foxconn's only effort to diversify away from China. Last year, Foxconn announced plans to begin manufacturing iPhones in India, and the company is now manufacturing the iPhone SE there.
Sources told Reuters that Taiwan-based iPhone contractor Pegatron is also considering a shift to Mexico, but few details about its plans are known.
Previously:
(Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Tuesday January 24 2017, @08:28PM
This will be an interesting 4 years.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Sulla on Tuesday January 24 2017, @08:35PM
"Please don't be protectionist it will hurt our profit"
"Crap well might have to consider buiding in US to avoid tarrif"
End of the day I pay more at the register but some of the people I know might actually be able to find work.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday January 24 2017, @09:31PM
How much would it hurt profit for Foxconn to install some 'protectionist' netting around the buildings to protect American workers from committing suicide jumping to their deaths in the factories?
Infinity is clearly an even number since the next higher number is odd.
(Score: 2) by Sulla on Tuesday January 24 2017, @11:28PM
I was planning on making a comment about that before making the post that I did. While in general I like the prospect of companies opening up plants in the US, I am unsure if I want Foxconn in particular given their record.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 2) by SanityCheck on Wednesday January 25 2017, @04:00AM
Pop quiz: if you have 100000 employees, how many employees will commit suicide in a given year no matter what you do?
Bonus: At what number of suicides is it no longer your fault?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Wednesday January 25 2017, @07:14AM
I think committing suicide at work increases the odds that it is some kind of statement.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by SanityCheck on Saturday January 28 2017, @01:53AM
Yes however a lot of these people live in company dormitories... hence they would really have a hard time committing suicide NOT AT WORK.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday January 25 2017, @05:04PM
Here's an insanity check.
Suppose you have such a large number of people committing suicide that you have to install suicide nets on your building to "protect" them from ending the life of misery, pain and virtual enslavement that your workplace creates.
Suppose that you create working conditions that are appalling.
Suppose that you have a statistically significant deviation in how high your employee suicide rate is over the norm.
Could one then reasonably infer that the suicides may be the employer's fault?
Infinity is clearly an even number since the next higher number is odd.
(Score: 5, Informative) by edIII on Tuesday January 24 2017, @08:56PM
How the fuck is Trump responsible for this? Are they going to be good paying jobs, or just more slave wages? Would it have happened with Hillary too? It the facility going to be built with H1B's like Elon Musk and how wonderful he was in Northern California?
That fucking orange speaking-out-his-anus idiot is just going to take credit for anything that happens while trying to spin it to be much better than it was. He accomplishes these YUUUUGE things that nobody else could accomplish nearly half as well! That Carrier deal was a fucking travesty and one of the extremely few times I can ever see myself agreeing with Palin. No tarrifs, no holding the executives over the fires, just bribe money. Only time I've heard insightful truth out of her mouth.
Trump BRIBED Carrier into keeping *some* of the jobs, and not all of them. But... but... but... he was supposed to be the STRONGMAN and stick it to corporations. Instead he was on his knees blowing the Carrier executives and offering them bribe money while cupping their balls.
Only thing Trump is accomplishing so far is the ruin of America. Conflicts of interest everywhere and every single cabinet nomination isn't for people to run the cabinet position well, but to destroy that section of government and obstruct all regulations and reasonable protections we had as Americans through them. The bullshit with removing millions upon millions of people's health care with no plans on how to provide it for them "better", and the elimination of Social Security will bring this country to its knees and bloody civil war.
If Trump is accomplishing anything, it's bringing corruption and malfeasance to new levels never before seen. I'm honestly curious as to how the Trump supporters are going to spin anything positive out of his actions now that they can see just how fucked they are. It's a repeat of Obama's betrayal of America, now just with a bombastic idiot and the Republicans instead of a slick used car salesman and the Democrats.
More deep fucking, just a different fist. Same shit different day..... but he's accomplishing something!!. LOL. Yeah. First major act was to bitch like a vindictive child that his inauguration day wasn't as YUUUGGGE as his ego told him it would be and the big bad media is somehow lying with 'alternative facts'.
In all fairness, he's accomplishing everything I expected he would be.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Tuesday January 24 2017, @09:10PM
By ending free-trade, he is apparently making some factories on US soil more profitable for the alternative.
I don't like the guy, but want to acknowledge when he actually seems to be accomplishing at least one of his stated goals: bringing manufacturing jobs back to the USA.
It may be that once implemented, protectionists policies harm US exports. Time will tell.
(Score: 2) by shipofgold on Tuesday January 24 2017, @10:15PM
What nobody talks about is what will happen to prices of the goods we buy.
As far as I can tell there is only one direction the prices of those items "made in the USA" will go.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Gaaark on Tuesday January 24 2017, @10:38PM
I would rather scrimp a bit more to buy 'Canadian' than to supply more Chinese people with jobs.
The only good thing I heard from Hillary was that employees should get profit sharing ( and I believe should get the same percentage as the Executives).
It's time to bring jobs back.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. I have always been here. ---Gaaark 2.0 --
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 24 2017, @11:29PM
And where are you going to "scrimp" from?
Cost of everything will go up. All the stuff that has become cheaper due to free trade is going to go up. Food, clothes, furniture, electronics. Even stuff that is still imported will go up because without tarrifs there is no way to stop 100% foreign companies from exporting cheap local-industry-undercutting products to the US.
Hey, maybe you make an engineers salary and have plenty of extra scrimpin' money.
But regular joes with blue collar jobs, they are on the edge already. They don't have scrimpin' money. And hiring robots ain't going to put any extra money in their wallets.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Wednesday January 25 2017, @12:32AM
Whoa, slow down cowboy.
I do not make an engineer's salary: I am blue collar.
I do not have a cell phone: cannot afford it.
The last decent computer I had was pieced together from new case and motherboard with old parts.
I am planning on building myself, hopefully, finally, a new computer with more than 4GB of ram... I'd love 16GB and the guts to go with it, but for my scrimping, it will probably be refurbished and more like 12GB with lower scale guts.
I've been scrimping this for over a year, and still not there.
Bills get in the way; my son is autistic and on the expensive gluten free diet BECAUSE he is so much more SANE without gluten.
I scrimp, then the money gets used for paying bills, so I scrimp some more. At the rate I'm going, it will be another year, probably, maybe two.
I do not need instant gratification of 'oooh, new Apple shite!!!!!! Gasm!'
I scrimp, eventually I get where I'm going.
And yes, I'd scrimp longer for Canadian if I felt it wasn't a rip off price just because. I believe in community.
Just think... the Chinese shit you pay low prices for: what does it add to your life?, And how much cheaper would it be if the CEO and high executives didn't take such big salary's and bonuses.
And how much better would life be if the profits made were shared by ALL the company employees who LIVE and WORK and SPEND their money in YOUR community.
Think looong term, not short term "oooh, shiny!"
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. I have always been here. ---Gaaark 2.0 --
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @12:34AM
> Just think... the Chinese shit you pay low prices for: what does it add to your life?
Food, clothing, furniture. Pretty much all the daily stuff.
> And how much cheaper would it be if the CEO and high executives didn't take such big salary's and bonuses.
I don't see anyone trying to fix that.
(Score: 2) by Sulla on Wednesday January 25 2017, @01:59AM
The prices for food would not change all that much with a greater level of protectionism, especially when in competition with China. It was only in the past few years when the FDA okayed the processing of chicken in China, but they still had to be American chickens.
I do not have a lot of money. Two infants and a wife, life with a family member with dementia to take care of her. Wherever I can I buy American, even if it costs more money. I buy local and shop at family owned shops when they are within reason. Depending on the product you are better paying vastly more for American over cheap imports. I saved up 400 and bought a pair of Whites Smokejumpers, a boot which is completely rebuildable and made in the USA. With moderate use I have gone three years without any issues or repairs except for applying oil, I imagine it will be another three before I need to get them resouled at a cost of 70 bucks. This is a much better deal than a new pair of tennis shoes for 15-20 bucks once a month.
We can compete, people just need to think about it harder.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @08:02AM
I guess I have to be explicit - "china" is a proxy for "all other foreign countries" take a look at the labels of your food, not just chickens. Lots of frozen vegetables come from outside the US. And if there is not a "made/grown in usa" label then it is definitely of foreign origin.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @03:46AM
You're not saving if you're buying clothes and furniture daily.
As for food you really don't want to eat the Chinese shit (in some case this might literally involve shit). In 2011 the Chinese Gov claimed that 10% of farmland was contaminated, more recently they said it was 20%. What is the real figure by USA standards?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by sjames on Wednesday January 25 2017, @12:56AM
It probably won't be as much as you think. Do you really think that iPhone is lovingly soldered by hand over an 8 hour period? I suspect the plant will be highly automated. Nevertheless, it will provide jobs and also improve things for other businesses that provide parts, support, and supplies for the factory.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @12:21AM
Trump BRIBED Carrier into keeping *some* of the jobs
1) Trump showed up late to the game.
(All the decisions had already been made.)
2) The jobs that were going to Mexico are on their way there, as was always the plan.
3) The jobs that were NEVER slated to go to Mexico haven't gone to Mexico.
4) Carrier got tax breaks to do exactly what they were going to do anyway.
To make ZERO CHANGES to Carrier's plans cost the taxpayers of Indiana $700M.
All hail Trump!
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @12:37AM
Ugh. Enough with the conspiracies.
At least offer a shred of evidence.
Carrier officially announced the plant was closing that spring.
If that was some kind of game of chicken they took a huge PR hit for it.
(Score: 2) by Sulla on Wednesday January 25 2017, @01:24AM
Carrier still ended off "worse" than they would have been had they moved manufacturing to Mexico. Because of all of the bad PR they decided to stay and opened themselves to the highest bidder. If I recall it was Indiana that gave them the best tax offer with additional bonus of not needing to move anything.
Then Trump claimed credit. Carrier made their bet that if he had won between PR and possible tarrif they would be better off just staying. Trump only gets credit for seeming serious enough to actually do it. The state gets credit for making them the offer to stay. Any other state could have done the same.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @08:04AM
The state made them the offer because Pence was governor.
So for all practical purposes, Trump gave them the 7M
Its not obvious that any other state would have made them that level of offer for just 700 jobs.
(Score: 4, Funny) by EvilSS on Wednesday January 25 2017, @02:50AM
It the facility going to be built with H1B's like Elon Musk and how wonderful he was in Northern California?
Probably concrete and steel actually. I don't think H1B's would make a good construction material.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @03:56AM
How the fuck is Trump responsible for this?
Foxconn wouldn't even be publicly considering this if Clinton had won. Same for Apple. Once they saw there was a chance that Trump might win, they started getting more serious. I'm sure such companies already have considered such options, Trump winning just makes them prepare more to do so.
A vote for Clinton was a vote for "same old same old". A vote for Trump was "let's spin the wheel/revolver".
So I'm not surprised that Trump won.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @04:13PM
I suppose the real issue here is that the fact that foxconn is considering a plant in the expensive America means that hey either believe or have reason to believe that it will soon be as cheap or cheaper to operate a plant in the USA compared to China. Might be something to think about.
They are a company. They don't choose to make things more expensive for themselves.
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Thursday January 26 2017, @01:56AM
Someone didn't get their "Runner-up" trophy in the mail yet!
(Score: 2) by edIII on Thursday January 26 2017, @09:13PM
I notice you devolved into kindergarten like behavior and are obsessed with who won and who lost instead of the objective facts of where we are.
You stupid, stupid, stupid fuckers. Did you notice that I was as hard on Obama (Democrat) as I was on Hillary (Democrat) as I was on Bush (Republican) and Trump (Hitler reborn)?
There were no fucking good choices this election. At all. Buffoons like you that childishly delight in the alleged tears of this alleged Democrat/Liberal/Communist/What-the-fuck-ever completely miss the fucking point.
Enjoy being so far up the Republicans ass, that you can't see the dangers around you :) Enjoy being betrayed. That is what Trump is currently doing, betraying all of your stupid fucking asses that voted for him. I'll walk that back, because I'm willing to believe that the bulk of you voted out of fear, not stupidity. Your fear put him in office, because you couldn't stand Hillary and the old Democratic party. I forgive you and understand, I was close to voting for Trump too, but only as a vote for Armageddon and inevitable Civil War. You know, through the fires and ashes we would rise again.
I never got to vote for Obama, but I felt just as bad about his betrayal over 8 years as you will about Trump and his 15 minutes of of fame. I don't even think he will last the full 4 years. He doesn't have the mental or emotional stamina to be a President anyways. You'll be left with Pence. Pence. Let that sink in :)
Meanwhile, we get to watch Trump crash and burn as President, which the majority knew would happen. Enjoy your illegitimate "win" while completely missing the forest for the trees. Sad.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Friday January 27 2017, @09:22PM
"I notice you devolved into kindergarten like behavior"
Ahahahaha
"You stupid, stupid, stupid fuckers."
Do tell, Euthyphro!!!
"Did you notice that I was as hard on Obama (Democrat) as I was on Hillary "
No, because you're not important, and the quoted sections of your statement are the only ones that are worth a read.
Signed,
America - #1 Country on Earth, forever and always, because we have lots of guns.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Friday January 27 2017, @09:49PM
Well, you're still a stupid fucker that can only throw around insults and taunts and are unable to form any real arguments against what I said.
Truth hurts :) Enjoy having only taunts to give people, and nothing of substance..........
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 24 2017, @08:38PM
Speaking in November, Gou had called on the incoming U.S. leaders to refrain from protectionist policies
I wonder why... oh wait, they want to be able to export stuff from US too.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 24 2017, @09:37PM
> the factory, if built, "could create about 30,000-50,000 jobs."
Right, I don't believe that for a minute. A flat panel display factory in a low wage country might still be built that way, but in a developed country it's going to have most of those jobs automated.
The new giant Solar City solar cell plant in Buffalo, NY is going to employ less than 1500 people, http://www.wgrz.com/news/solarcity-adamant-about-buffalo-job-creation/238504629 [wgrz.com] and I think the number has been dropping ever since the plant was announced.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday January 24 2017, @09:59PM
They're counting all the construction jobs ($7B isn't a small place), the automation-supplier jobs, the security and delivery guys, and the hundred guys actually doing what's not automated.
Then multiply by five to ten, depending on how many tax breaks you're expecting to extract from the yet-unnamed local and state governments winning the upcoming bid.
(Score: 5, Touché) by DECbot on Tuesday January 24 2017, @10:06PM
When you bribe a politician, do you get to count him as one of those jobs that were created?
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday January 24 2017, @10:17PM
Depends on whether you're employing his toddler and his cat (job creator!), giving him campaign contributions (outstanding citizen!), or forgetting your bills-packed briefcase in his secondary house (distracted friend).
Prostitutes as gifts are only temp jobs, regardless of gender, but they do count in the total.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 24 2017, @10:18PM
> When you bribe a politician, do you get to count him as one of those jobs that were created?
Can't count the politician until they leave government and the company hires them as a "consultant".
I'm being sarcastic, but in many cases it's so transparent that this must be true.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 24 2017, @09:46PM
Foxconn already has 10 "lights out" (fully automated) production lines in China. [digitimes.com]
They have officially announced that their goal is to make all of their factories fully automated.
It would be dreaming to believe that they would build a brand new factory, in a country with some of the highest labor costs in the world, that was not maximally automated.
If this factory is gets built it will probably employ on the order of 50-100 people full-time. You need a couple of security guards, a robot repair crew and some general purpose monitors and troubleshooters and that's about it.
And that's the problem with all of these new factories. Its all about automation. Even Trump's signature deal with Carrier, where he saved ~750 jobs in exchange for $7 million in tax dollars from the Indiana government is actually about automation. The Carrier CEO literally came out and said [businessinsider.com] that he's taking the $7M plus $14M of the company's own money and investing it in automation. Mexicans won't be stealing those 750 jobs, but in a few years robots will.
Meanwhile the US economy creates a net 200,000 new jobs per month [bls.gov] (and a gross of ~5M new jobs per month [bls.gov]). So unless Trump plans to be making deals like this every waking second 365 days a year, he's going to have a negligble impact on jobs.
MAGAFR -- Make America Great Again for Robots.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by lgw on Tuesday January 24 2017, @11:19PM
In a world of increasing automation, all the talk of unskilled manufacturing jobs in the US is just hot air. We all know there won't be any in a few decades. Still, better to have the robot factories on US soil than otherwise.
Skilled manufacturing, OTOH, is a different beast. There are over a million skilled manufacturing jobs sitting unfilled in the US right now. If Trump wants to make a real dent in unemployment, he'd focus on the problem of providing training for those jobs. Those might not be forever (but what is), but skilled work seems likely to be with us for at least the rest of the working life of the currently unemployed.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 24 2017, @11:23PM
If Trump wants to make a real dent in unemployment, he'd focus on the problem of providing training for those jobs.
Haven't you heard?
He's been working on that problem for years.
Trump University.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2017, @10:58PM
The 10 Dogs and 9 Bones analogy [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [alternet.org]
"The way I go about demonstrating that fallacy is a dogs-and-bones example."
What's needed is Joe Average spending money into the economy and goosing The Multiplier Effect. [wikipedia.org]
He can't do that without a job.
What's needed is infrastructure spending.
...on a yuuuge scale.
That already worked once to pull USA out of an economic depression within 4 years (1933 - 1937).
Back then, the plan was called The New Deal.
Franklin Roosevelt and his advisor John Maynard Keynes are who you have to thank for the USA not still being in a depression.
Today, we are in need of people who are that wise.
Instead, a yuuuge number of you folks (among the small number who bothered to show up at the polls at all) chose Donnie Tiny Hands.
...especially in the states that have the biggest unemployment problems.
In that same presidential race, Jill Stein of the Green Party offered A Green New Deal.
You folks rejected[1] her/that and here we are, still in the doldrums.
[1] This assumes that you bothered to become informed and were even slightly aware of Dr. Stein and her ideas--rather than plopping down in front of your TeeVee and allowing Lamestream Media to fill your head with horse-race nonsense and watching The Orange Clown get his $5B of free media.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday January 25 2017, @12:38AM
Yes, the plan, that's been in the works since 2014, has always been a maximally automated facility to take advantage of cheaper shipping.
It was in the news at the time, maybe even posted here. Foxconn Weighs Plan for U.S. Plant (Jan. 26, 2014) [wsj.com]
So I guess the news is that they continue to mull.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday January 25 2017, @01:41AM
They were weighing, now they're mulling.
I love how the article is almost exactly 3 years old, although I couldn't confirm the automation details due to the WSJ paywall.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @08:07AM
So its not just me.
I used to be able to go right through their paywall due to all my privacy extension in firefox.
But in the last month I've hit it a couple of times.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday January 25 2017, @09:25AM
My best bet for WSJ has been to search the text and try to find some other site reprinting the story. This is all I got:
http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2014/01/27/foxconn-considers-high-tech-manufacturing-plant-in-usa.html [foxnews.com]
http://macdailynews.com/2014/01/26/apple-assembler-foxconn-considering-building-large-screen-display-manufacturing-plant-in-u-s-a/ [macdailynews.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Wednesday January 25 2017, @03:42PM
"There are 10 lights-out (fully automated) production lines at some factories, including table one in Chengdu, AIO (all-in-one) PC and LCD monitor lines at a factory in Chongqing, western China, and a CNC line in Zhengzhou, Dai indicated."
https://9to5mac.com/2016/12/30/foxconn-fully-automated-factories-robots-automated-production/
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Wednesday January 25 2017, @02:53AM
(Score: 3, Touché) by Gaaark on Thursday January 26 2017, @12:29AM
No, the buggy whip makers were all forced to be dominatrixes!
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. I have always been here. ---Gaaark 2.0 --
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @02:02AM
Europe has a 20% or so VAT while the US has 6% or so sales tax. Doesn't this put US exporters at a disadvantage?
Example: GM builds a car for 20,000 in the US and sells it in the EU for 25,000 which leaves 1,000 profit after VAT.
BMW builds a car for 20,000 is Germany and sells it for 25,000 in the US which leaves 3,500 profit after sales tax.
So BMW profits a lot more than GM for doing basically the same thing and has a big incentive to export while GM might not bother for a measly 1,000. Yes, I've seen the argument that we should compare GM sales in the EU to BMW sales in the EU, and separately BMW sales in the US to GM sales in the US. Those cases do seem fair, but having a high sales tax / VAT amounts to a big incentive for exports.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @04:12AM
It's more probable that both brands sell the cars cheaper in USA, or more expensive in EU. Many EU countries also have extra taxes for cars. Both brands manufacture all over the world, so sooner or later they have to import/export anyway (BMW X5 is USA made, IIRC, so any X5 in EU is imported; GM has Opel/Vauxhall in EU).
But if you selected other product where only VAT/sales tax mattered, it would be pretty much that: USA price < EU price (in same currency). Sometimes even beyond what taxes contribute to the sticker price (Rip Off Britain, same prices all over EU even when local income is crappier for a big zone of EU, etc). Also small companies don't handle the paperwork, so they also apply VAT to exports (stupid, but they do it so no real incentive for foreign buyers, even worse as the tax is higher, the shipping insurance will be higher, and tariffs go on top of the VAT... all meaning EU exports could be better).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 25 2017, @08:13AM
In the US sales tax is not collected on components that are destined for resale. So all the raw materialss and parts that go in one end of the factory and come out the other as an assembled vehicle are untaxed. But in Europe VAT would still be collected on them. So cost of manufacturing in europe is higher.
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Wednesday January 25 2017, @10:16AM
This statement is somewhat misleading. Every resale indeed contains VAT but the VAT due to the tax collector is the difference of the VAT for the sale minus the VAT paid for parts/services upstream (bought to make the product/service sold). This way the VAT collected in the end exactly equals the VAT of the final product (what seems to be paid by the vendor of a consumer product in the US) but it is distributed over the production chain proportionally to the earnings of every step. This strikes me both as a more logical and fair solution as compared to what is seemingly implemented in the US.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Wednesday January 25 2017, @03:49PM
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