It doesn't have anything to do with Chinese manufacturing. For instance, iPhones have exceptional build quality, and they're made in China...

...but the availability of outsourcing in general allows companies to sell lower-quality goods at lower prices. Production has not directly moved from quality to quantity so much as it has realized that people are willing to buy cheap goods even at the cost of quality.

Naturally it is not difficult to get a good chair, supposing that you are willing to pay for one.

Posted by Lili~ ♥

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Posted by Kironide

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...but the availability of outsourcing in general allows companies to sell lower-quality goods at lower prices. Production has not directly moved from quality to quantity so much as it has realized that people are willing to buy cheap goods even at the cost of quality.

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It doesn't help though if companies in western countries reduce salary to Chinese standards to compete with China. So while goods might be cheaper, you earn less too and so basically nothing has changed at all, except for the quality.

I realize though that this is a serious topic which shouldn't be debated on in here.

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It's unlikely that salaries of domestic workers would be reduced; the gap between wages here and wages in China are too great. More likely is the loss of jobs.

However, unless you're working in the manufacturing sector, this should hardly be an issue; the vast majority of the population gets access to cheaper goods at cheaper prices. Both the low-quality stuff and the high-quality stuff is less expensive overall due to outsourcing, it's just that if you still buy the cheapest possible then you'll end up with low-quality goods.

International trade (which includes the "trade" of human labor, i.e., outsourcing) generally makes most people a little better off even if it makes a small group of people worse off.

Anyway I'm not sure what the sense is in stifling discussions, "serious" or not, wherever they might happen to arise.