Introduction and Cheap labor

Welcome to my blog.
I want to start off with my thoughts on cheap labor.
When US manufacturers looked at reducing costs, they focused on moving plants to Latin America to take advantage of the cheap labor. As things always happen, the cheap labor there began to slowly grow, but now with an even greater problem, because of the attitude of throwing bodies at a problem instead of resolving it, the plants now had more people than normal, making a higher wage. So what did manufacturers do...

Instead of looking at their processes and improving, they began to seek out cheaper labor elsewhere. So they began exporting jobs from Latin America to China where labor is very cheap and companies do not have to worry about safety. What do you think is going to happen when Chinese workers demand an increase in wages and safety, or the Chinese people gain more purchasing power and now what is made in China gets sold there and an export tariff is added to anything leaving the country. Are manufactures going to look for cheap labor elsewhere? If cheap labor is truly the answer, then manufacturers would all move and build plants in Bangladesh. That is obviously not the answer.

So what is the answer. Improving current operations and helping people grow to maximize all of ones assets. Nothing replaces the value and productivity of a well organized system and a highly competent and motivated workforce.

With that said, that is what this blog is all about. How do we go from where we are, to being the best we can be? It is most certainly an endeavor worth pursuing, and one that will reap great rewards.

I look forward to the exchange of challenges and solutions on this road to having the most productive plants in the Americas. Robert