Comments on: Reader Mail: Manufacturing is Not a Dirty Word http://www.dailyreckoning.com.au/manufacturing/2008/05/08/ An independent perspective on the Australian and global investment markets Thu, 18 Mar 2010 14:20:38 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8 hourly 1 By: How to Prepare for the Coming Devaluation | Bear Market Investments http://www.dailyreckoning.com.au/manufacturing/2008/05/08/comment-page-1/#comment-64097 How to Prepare for the Coming Devaluation | Bear Market Investments Tue, 03 Feb 2009 04:53:59 +0000 http://www.dailyreckoning.com.au/?p=2628#comment-64097 [...] Reader Mail: Manufacturing is Not a Dirty Word [...] [...] Reader Mail: Manufacturing is Not a Dirty Word [...]

]]> By: John http://www.dailyreckoning.com.au/manufacturing/2008/05/08/comment-page-1/#comment-21855 John Thu, 08 May 2008 16:07:11 +0000 http://www.dailyreckoning.com.au/?p=2628#comment-21855 To the reader (Bob M): You can't build an economy on service alone because most needs are material based: food, houses, cars, TVs, etc... If as a country you want all those material things and all you do is service, you have to export your service in exchange for the material things. The problem with this strategy is that most services are geographically restricted and thus cannot be exported. Think about all the service jobs off the top of your head: laywers, doctors, waiters, taxi drivers, etc... How many of those services can you export to people in another country? Very few. So in exchange, you will get very few material things, unless you have a trade deficit (ring a bell?) So the only way to obtain products as a country is to either have manufacturing (and then trade for the products you want) or to borrow money to buy the products from other countries. The latter is not sustainable, which is why manufacturing is important. Make sense? To the reader (Bob M): You can't build an economy on service alone because most needs are material based: food, houses, cars, TVs, etc... If as a country you want all those material things and all you do is service, you have to export your service in exchange for the material things. The problem with this strategy is that most services are geographically restricted and thus cannot be exported. Think about all the service jobs off the top of your head: laywers, doctors, waiters, taxi drivers, etc... How many of those services can you export to people in another country? Very few. So in exchange, you will get very few material things, unless you have a trade deficit (ring a bell?) So the only way to obtain products as a country is to either have manufacturing (and then trade for the products you want) or to borrow money to buy the products from other countries. The latter is not sustainable, which is why manufacturing is important. Make sense?

]]> By: Dr Richard Weeks http://www.dailyreckoning.com.au/manufacturing/2008/05/08/comment-page-1/#comment-21816 Dr Richard Weeks Thu, 08 May 2008 08:53:05 +0000 http://www.dailyreckoning.com.au/?p=2628#comment-21816 Morning to all, The answer to the question in my view is quite simple - it is not an either or but an and - by that I mean industry manufacturing and the services economy are in effect two sides of the same coin - most products have a services element attached (think of marketing, after sales services and maintenance). The manufacturing and services component are two strands of a rope that are inter-twined, the other being the support services provided by IT, technology and the human factor - intellectual capital. The problem is one of skills - integrating the skills and knowledge associated with services and manufacturing - we think in silos, not in terms of how the two function as an entity. The services world is complex and engineering world tries to work on a rationalistic analytical basis - this is part of the problem. My few cents worth. Richard Morning to all,

The answer to the question in my view is quite simple - it is not an either or but an and - by that I mean industry manufacturing and the services economy are in effect two sides of the same coin - most products have a services element attached (think of marketing, after sales services and maintenance). The manufacturing and services component are two strands of a rope that are inter-twined, the other being the support services provided by IT, technology and the human factor - intellectual capital.

The problem is one of skills - integrating the skills and knowledge associated with services and manufacturing - we think in silos, not in terms of how the two function as an entity. The services world is complex and engineering world tries to work on a rationalistic analytical basis - this is part of the problem.

My few cents worth.

Richard

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