Member Since: 29 Sep 2006
Location: MIDLANDS
Posts: 8138
China WILL take over the world....
A frustration that I saw coming having worked in China for a couple of years back in 2008/9 and saw a 'village' go from c.100,000 inhabitants with 'cattle-transport' into a sprawling industrialised area of around 3 million people and animals replaced by push-bikes replaced by 2-wheeled scooters/small motorbikes to cars and vans 'everywhere', and all in a couple of years.....
Fast forward to 2022 and I'm contracting on purchasing services for a few clients.
I am trying to 'give' the business to UK based engineering specialist companies but I just can't justify it, and its not just on price......
Example this week (repeated regularly). A suite of 15 small CNC machined components in steel or aluminium and supplying 3-off each.
UK company offered by me to split delivery as time was the critical feature of the quote if it helped get us one set earlier, Chinese company can't do that due to shipping requirements really.
UK company took 4 days to respond to quote request. Quoted 26 days from receipt of order and would be ex-works (i.e. us to arrange delivery speed/cost - say one day). Quoted cost, including VAT, circa £4900. Split delivery would add 10% to the quote
Chinese company responded to quote request in 12 hours (but I had to wait 3 more days to compare it to UK response). Will be shipped to my door by air and arrive in 9 days from receipt of an order or an 'OK go' email (they have done these sort of delivery periods many times now). Cost will be around £2200 but I will have to factor in around £650 for VAT and custom duties. All parts received to date have been 'perfect'.
I am more than aware of China often using 'cheap steel' or finishing process but previous parts have passed inspection and salt-spray tests, etc. carried out in UK
I cannot convince clients to source in UK when I get these examples. I keep work in UK on what I deem to be 'critical' components and/or to keep a local working presence for some last-minute-fag-packet-engineered potential items but go forward 6 months for a 'bill-of-materials' review and you can see what the outcome will be......
Its quite disheartening at times I have to say
17th May 2022 2:21 pm
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73085
And then the Chinese standard of living will reach the point where they all want a car, a conservatory and two weeks in Benidorm as a 'uman right 'innit and their prices will increase to the point that somewhere else looks cheaper. In the unlikely event that the Chinese embrace health and safety, working time regulations and all the rest, thiat process will be slightly quicker. What manufacturing capability we do have in this country is the tail-end of being the 'workshop of the world' (when conditions and wages were rubbish) and we are allegedly a service-based economy with high-tech, value-added services prevailing (CNC being an example). This means tax (and lots of it), regulations, insurance and all the rest. JLR would be made to have all their cars assembled in the UK.
Even companies like Airbus outsource manufacturing (wing ribs, etc.,) to China. By all accounts, the work is above criticism and often with fewer defects detected than when us Brits were doing it. Not quite a win-win situation as the Chinese are learning how to do things - and then do it better.
Lots of tax...
Too few people with the skills / experience...
Too few people interested in that sort of work...
Shipping subsidised by the Chinese government...
Whether the paperwork that comes with it is bona fide or not is another matter. A 'CE' stamp just means "Chinese Engineered", doesn't it?
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17th May 2022 5:05 pm
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73085
CE = Chinese Exports.
17th May 2022 5:21 pm
RRSTDV8
Member Since: 07 Apr 2014
Location: Here
Posts: 13553
Exactly. They're taking over the world because they're supplying stuff cheaper than everyone else. And they're doing that because the workforce does not have access to levels of protection that the workforce in countries such as the UK. They are also paid way less.
We can compete with them but it means people not driving around in cars they rent for £800+ / month, going on nice holidays, eating out, buying the latest gadgets, etc..
So the question is: do we want to compete with China? Because the reality is that we'll go back to the equivalent of Victorian Britain. Nice for those at the top but bloody for the rest.Visiting from rrsport.co.uk
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"When you fire that first shot, no matter how right you feel, you have no idea who's going to die! You don't know who's children are going to scream and burn. How many hearts will be broken. How many lives shattered. How much blood will spill, until everybody does what they were always going to have to do from the very beginning: SIT DOWN AND TALK!"
17th May 2022 5:23 pm
maxbasscat
Member Since: 03 Jan 2016
Location: Cambridgeshire
Posts: 1267
I am of the view now that we are soft, we can produce nail bar specialist, hairdressers and fast food delivery drivers by the class load beat that ChinaD3 2.7 Zermatt silver (not another one)
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17th May 2022 10:48 pm
defector
Member Since: 23 Feb 2009
Location: Greater Manchester
Posts: 1471
I cannot be sure but i recall some economist saying that China is already first when comparing GDP with the PPP (Purchasing Power Parity) metric.
For each American scientist working on -lets say - defence projects, you could probably employ 5 Chinese scientists (who were probably educated at MIT, Yale etc anyway).
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for the rest.
