Is the 2520 made in the US?

[JDTank]

I have to say, what absolutely blows my mind is how some Americans still make a huge deal out of where things are made.

This is 2013. The days of having all your items "Made in the U.S.A" is over, and for good reason. American workers want high wages, large benefit plans, and sweet retirement packages. Who's to blame them? The problem is, those exact same people expect low prices when they go to purchase anything.

How do you expect consumer goods to be cheap, when your paying individual workers $80,000 a year just to operate an assembly line? That tractor you paid $15,000 for that has parts on it from all over the world, would be a $22,000 tractor if all of its components were made in the U.S.A.

Quality on overseas products is determined by the company producing them, not by the workers. The workers are only building items the way they were told to, using methods and materials that are provided by a company concerned with nothing but final profit.

I'm not insulting Americans, but I have seen this go on for years and years. Get over it, this is an international world with international goods and products. Some of the overseas products I have seen in my lifetime are superior to previously made in the U.S.A versions anyways.

 

[mikehaugen]

I'm not insulting Americans, but I have seen this go on for years and years. Get over it, this is an international world with international goods and products. Some of the overseas products I have seen in my lifetime are superior to previously made in the U.S.A versions anyways.

you obviously don't work in manufacturing, probably never have, nor know anybody that supports their family by working in manufacturing. For some it is not so easy to say "get over it." It's the people that don't care that is driving all of the work out of the US. I am no economist, but I can't understand how a country is supposed to bring new money into a country when they don't manufacture anything, don't export anything, and import everything. Yes, some people make money from services, but that money has to come from somewhere. Tourism cannot support a country, not this size anyway.

 

[dclynch]

"How do you expect consumer goods to be cheap, when your paying individual workers $80,000 a year just to operate an assembly line? That tractor you paid $15,000 for that has parts on it from all over the world, would be a $22,000 tractor if all of its components were made in the U.S.A."
WOW!! If the assembly line worker is making 80,000 what is the CEO making? I bet the assembly line worker puts in a lot more hours for his pay. The whole problem with the US is the people on top want to keep the people on the bottom right there. It that worker took a pay cut would the price of the tractors come down. I highly doubt it

 

[barry1me]

I have to say, what absolutely blows my mind is how some Americans still make a huge deal out of where things are made.

This is 2013. The days of having all your items "Made in the U.S.A" is over, and for good reason. American workers want high wages, large benefit plans, and sweet retirement packages. Who's to blame them? The problem is, those exact same people expect low prices when they go to purchase anything.

How do you expect consumer goods to be cheap, when your paying individual workers $80,000 a year just to operate an assembly line? That tractor you paid $15,000 for that has parts on it from all over the world, would be a $22,000 tractor if all of its components were made in the U.S.A.

Quality on overseas products is determined by the company producing them, not by the workers. The workers are only building items the way they were told to, using methods and materials that are provided by a company concerned with nothing but final profit.

I'm not insulting Americans, but I have seen this go on for years and years. Get over it, this is an international world with international goods and products. Some of the overseas products I have seen in my lifetime are superior to previously made in the U.S.A versions anyways.

What do you do for a living? I ask this because as an amerian I try to do everything I can to support american companies. I may not be the norm but I expect to pay more an american product if it helps keeps jobs in America. I do this with every aspect in my life. I dont search products for price, I search for quality, performance and where its manufactured(or where is the revenues going back to). Im sorry you have faced the fact that most jobs have left the US, and cant understand why someone would want to buy american or care to put the effort in trying to find an american product. Im an engineer for a Tier 2 (100%) amercican vertically integrated company for automotive industry. I can tell you that Ford, GM, and Chrysler are our primary business. Most of the asian companies will not give us business. We are american made, the best pricing, performance on the market place. They dont give us business because we are an american company. They give there business to our competitors that are out of Japan and they pay a premium for an asian product over our product.

So Im proud to be a consumer that works for americans, for american made products and will do my best with my family to buy products made in the US.

 

[JimRB]

Last time I bought socks I looked for the made in the USA label. Silly when I am buying from a last chance store like TJ MAx but the socks are lasting forever. I bought a few small pry bars and instead of buying the $5-8 made in China bars I bought the $10-12 bars made in the USA. Maybe the cheaper bars work ok. I did not do so swell getting network jacks and plates. I had a choice of Mexican or Chinese and I chose Chinese. Part of the price difference is not just wages but pollution controls. Have you gone to China to drink the water, eat their chicken or breathe their air? One of the luxury items Chinese are purchasing are air filters, face masks and back yard tents. The air is so filthy they do not even want to be in their own 30x30 back yard. Sure they may be paying $4-5 an hour while in some factories in the US may pay from $7-40 an hour depending on the industry and skill set but wages are not the only reason US manufactured goods cost a bit more. People may hate the EPA but if you were awar/alive during the 1960's and 1970's the back yard and creeks were dumping grounds for many manufacturing by products. Rivers would catch on fire from the crap they were dumping. Plenty of HAZMAT sites around from dumping on site or off site. The EPA has helped somewhat mitigating that blatant pollution.

As far as place of assembly. My assembled in Germany VW has the bulk of it assembled and manufactured there but it has parts from other neighboring countries. Same as GM, Ford or Dodge who has subassemblies made in various states and countries. My JD Yanmar has served me well over my 13 years but it doesn't even have 600 hours. It was used a lot when the pastures needed fences and weed control, not so much now that things are under control.

 

[MessickFarmEqu]

IMO... I think much of the reason why jobs like this have gone over seas is our government. Products like the tractors we're talking about have 15-25 man hours of labor on them. The cost of labor is minimal in the end. Speaking for our business, the cost of government is what really makes the difference.

 

[kevin37b]

IMO... I think much of the reason why jobs like this have gone over seas is our government. Products like the tractors we're talking about have 15-25 man hours of labor on them. The cost of labor is minimal in the end. Speaking for our business, the cost of government is what really makes the difference.

There is the winning reply .

 

[JDTank]

My point is when you need/want something badly, and you refuse to buy the one in the store because it isn't made in the U.S.A, that is definitely part ignorant.

I won't walk the aisles in 10 different stores looking for "Made in the U.S.A"

As a consumer, I want low prices. I don't want to pay $22,000 for an American made machine, if the EXACT same machine made overseas is $15,000. I am not willing to pay $7,000 more just to say my machine was made on a different patch of soil on the same planet earth.

Most American labor workers earn at least $20 an hour. I guarantee you no other manufacturing area in the world is getting that except Europe. CEO's won't take the hit off their own pay, so they increase the retail price of the product.

If supporting local means losing my own shirt, I won't give you anything at all.

 

[barry1me]

My point is when you need/want something badly, and you refuse to buy the one in the store because it isn't made in the U.S.A, that is definitely part ignorant.

I won't walk the aisles in 10 different stores looking for "Made in the U.S.A"

As a consumer, I want low prices. I don't want to pay $22,000 for an American made machine, if the EXACT same machine made overseas is $15,000. I am not willing to pay $7,000 more just to say my machine was made on a different patch of soil on the same planet earth.

Most American labor workers earn at least $20 an hour. I guarantee you no other manufacturing area in the world is getting that except Europe. CEO's won't take the hit off their own pay, so they increase the retail price of the product.

If supporting local means losing my own shirt, I won't give you anything at all.

I wont refuse to buy something non US made, but if Im going to purchase something I will do my best to try and support a US made product. I wouldnt pay a 50% increase of a US made or Engineered tractor over a Jap made/engineered tractor. But I wouldnt even consider any tractor made in China. At some point people have to decide what buying american made is worth to them. For me I can afford to pay a 10-15% premium to support my neighbor or fellow american over a non us made product. I feel obligated to support an american made product if at all possible. If everyone always goes for there pocket book then jobs will continute to leave this country. I ended up finding a used 2520 anyhow so I let someone else take the initial price drop.

 

[KennyG]

I probably should just let this go, but I get really frustrated when people parrot the old "we don't manufacture anything anymore" crap. The US is still no.1 in manufacturing, we just make high value things instead of low value things. That's why there is very little US made stuff in Walmart. And that's how it should be. Sure, unemploymennt is around 8% but if we had to make everything we use in this country, where would we find the people to do it? And the prices would either be really high or Americans would have to be happy with China wages.

Here is an interesting graphic http://dailycapitalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Manufacturing-graphic.jpg

It shows that the US has more manufacturing than any other country. We produce more than China but we do it with only 1/3 of the workers. Why? Because we're very productive. We're even much more productive than Japan, in spite of all the hype about the Japanese miracles.

We're never going to see an increase in manufacturing jobs. Efficiency will see to that. Even China is losing manufacturing jobs as productivity increases. The future is in "knowledge work" and service. And "service" isn't McDonalds. There are lots of high paid professional jobs emerging in the so called service industries.