So why are we still buying from Asia?
The latest product recalls of Chinese-made products (it’s toys this time) makes me wonder how much Americans will take before we wake up and start boycotting all of that cheap plastic crap and inferior food products and rolling crap boxes (otherwise known as Toyota, Honda, Hyundai, etc…) from Asia. All of the local news shows are absolutely giddy that they report shoddy merchandise – it fills every one-hour news broadcast at 6 and 11 and the standard ads “Why your child is turning purple – details at 11”.
I’ll grant that if your child is sucking the lead paint out of his toy cars, you probably have bigger worries than lead poisoning right now, nonetheless….
I’ve written before that my grandfather wouldn’t buy anything that said “Made in Japan” on it – but it was more than the fact that he still remembered Pearl Harbor. Everything that came out of Japan was crap. Toys made there broke before the first day ended, tools were absolutely useless and would strip bolts before they’d loosen bolts, their cars were tin cans on wheels that stalled every time they came to a traffic light.
If you want to see what Toyotas and Hondas used to be, go to Central America – the cars they sell there are still crap boxes. The equivalent of a Corrolla sells for about $9000 new compared to the $15,000 price tag here – but it’s little more than a thin metal shell on four wheels with indoor/outdoor carpet strips glued to bare metal floor boards and barely enough power to get up to 45 mph.
Hardly a day goes by that I don’t read about or hear about our huge trade deficit with Asia. Mostly from people who are driving those overpriced Toyotas and Hondas (called Lexus and Infinity) in their parking spots. “But”, they tell me, “most of those are made in the US.” Oh, yeah? Then why is it when I’m at Miami Beach I see these huge cargo ships with “Honda” and “Toyota” painted on their sides pulling up to the dock with a new shipment of crap boxes? If most of the cars with those brand names are made in the US, why is it profitable to bring more by boat?
Cough syrup from China killed 60 Panamanians in 2005 because they put antifreeze in the cough medicine. Anti-freeze. Toothpaste from China was found in Dollar Stores in the US with anti-freeze in it. Anti-freeze. Was there someone in China that thought anti-freeze was safe enough to put in cough syrup and toothpaste?
Wheat imported from China killed several pets in the US this year. Wheat? Why are we importing wheat? Don’t we grow enough wheat in our country that we have to import it from a third world backwater?
Just last month it was discovered that China was putting anti-biotics in their shell fish exports. The danger there was that taking the anti-biotics made us resistant to the anti-biotic working when we really needed the anti-biotic to defens against disease later down the line. In other words, the Chinese were making sure that a biological attack would be more successful against us. Hyperbole? Perhaps.
Ever read “The Sum of all Fears” by Tom Clancy? The 1995 book ended with a Japanese pilot flying an airliner into the Capitol Building during a Presidential address – prophetic enough for you? But the book was about a war between the US and Japan that began with product defects – cars the Japanese were importing here were killing people – and Americans got angry that inferior products were being imported and a trade war turned into a shooting war.
Well, that’s fairly far-fetched, however, we’re apparently numb to the thought of intentionally defective and potentially dangerous products being inflicted on the American marketplace. We’re outraged at the thought that American companies would engage in business with these economic roques, but how about if we hold entirely responsible the actual cuprits and not accept the occasional “suicide” of various Chinese CEOs as proof that they’re cracking down on quality control. How many people will die in the next defective import disaster?
The world sees the US as a huge cash register, how about we hold them to the same standard we hold domestic companies? It’s not our government’s fault that defective merchandise makes it to the shelves – it’s the fault of the consumer for not holding manufacturers and improters accountable – with our wallets.
Category: Economy, Foreign Policy, Society
