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To reduce dependence on China, more of us need to work in factories
(www.politico.eu)
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this post was submitted on 26 Jun 2023
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There’s definitely work to be done so that production of goods becomes once again an esteemed endeavour. It’s problematic that factory work is as undesirable as locally made things are desirable. It’s a cultural thing now and it’s silly.
It's not inherently undesirable, but often enough extremely unattractive.
Low pay, bad working condition, no sense of accomplishment, hardly any upwards mobility. Why would I do that, if I have better options?
Here in Germany, people used to take pride (and sometimes still do) in working for VW or Daimler, they had a sense of belonging, pay was good and there was at least a feeling that your company took care of you. That is pretty much gone.
I know a lot of people that work in union manufacturing jobs that have a real sense of pride and feeling of accomplishment about it. Gotta say, having time off, extra money, and voice in how the company treats you probably goes a long way, because some of those same people hated their non-unions jobs before.
Absolutely. But for some reason, capitalism hates if workers are happy, so you have to press them harder and harder.
These jobs you're describing are becoming rarer, and not only in manufacturing. I'm a software developer office drone and I'm financially very well off and have pretty good working conditions, but my work is mostly meaningless, if I'm honest. Not that the product I'm building is useless, far from it, but there's so much that removes me from actually feeling valuable, that I might as well just dig a hole and fill it up again.
Alienation real for sure, I have to fight that my job all the time. One for me is all of pencil pushing signature block owners I have to talk to. Like I hate to say it, but theres gotta be a better use of both our time then them being road blocks on peoples paths to production.
I kind of agree with the lack of career options for factory workers, but in many factory jobs there are several upsides.
For example many places allow you to listen to music/podcasts all day, while you are working. The work itself is often not mentally taxing and it doesn't follow you home when you leave. Also there is no reason not to feel pride in being able to complete relatively complex tasks with care and speed.
We need to put more effort on automating factory jobs, but having them be supervised by techs 24 hours. It makes for nice monitoring and maintenance jobs, as long as they are paid according to the value their machine brings.