British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer at times appeared on the verge of tears as he announced that he’d lost the confidence of the governing Labour Party and would resign, but nevertheless set a months-long departure period that will see him through to the end of the summer. The resignation of British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer could barely be heard in Downing Street as protesters outside the gate blasted Beethoven’s ‘Ode to Joy’ — the anthem of the European Union — as he spoke on Monday morning. Sir Keir boasted of the achievements he perceived he had made in office before setting out his timetable for departure, confirming he would remain on as caretaker Prime Minister during a summer-long leadership challenge. These long good-byes are becoming more common in British politics, and it is easy to see why; after the intense pressure on leaders to resign from within their own parties and the country at large, by setting a long date to go, the embattled leaders are suddenly freed from party politics — leaving that bickering to would-be successors — while they buy themselves months of legacy-building time. The Import Invasion Hollowed Out U.S. Factories Why did America’s manufacturing productivity crash as we opened our markets to the world? The trade-off with globalized trade was supposed to work something like this. Globalization would allow for additional specialization, improving productivity. We would concentrate on stuff we could produce most effectively, while importing stuff were comparatively less effective at making. But that’s not what happened at all. A new NBER working paper by Robert Gordon and Kenneth Ryu, both at Northwestern University, investigates what went wrong. Why did the rise of imports degrade America’s manufacturing capacity and efficiency? When output stagnates, plants close. When plants close, workers leave. When workers leave, supplier networks weaken. When suppliers move offshore, domestic firms lose access to parts, process knowledge, engineering feedback, and the accumulated know-how that comes from actually making things. In other words, Gordon and Ryu argue that the factory floor is not just where goods are assembled. It is where engineers learn what works, where defects are discovered, where workers find better methods, and where suppliers and manufacturers solve problems together. Workers bring this kind of knowledge with them as they shift between firms when manufacturing employment is abundant. Hollow out production, and eventually you hollow out the capacity to improve production. Look at what happened to America’s computer industry. This was America’s great productivity machine. Yet by 2018, import penetration in computers and electronics had reached 84 percent—almost as high as the allegedly low-value textile production sector. The industry most associated with American technological supremacy had become deeply dependent on foreign production ecosystems. The paper also has policy implications for today. A lot of the arguments against tariffs insist that reshoring production will mean a loss of productivity. The Gordon and Ryu paper suggests that this argument gets the problem backward. Productivity does not float above the real economy. It grows out of production itself. If bringing production home rebuilds the industrial ecosystem that globalization helped dismantle, reshoring should be seen as likely to improve productivity. Asbestos has been found in at least 1,000 wind turbines throughout the UK after components containing the banned substance were imported from China, sparking concerns about worker safety and prompting calls for a government investigation. The Times reports that the hazardous material was discovered in brake components used in lifts and hoists within 1,000 wind turbines in the UK. The parts are believed to have originated from third-party Chinese suppliers and contain chrysotile, a form of white asbestos that has been completely prohibited in the United Kingdom since November 1999. British law makes it illegal to buy, sell, or export any materials containing this substance. The GMB trade union has formally contacted the UK government and the Health and Safety Executive requesting a comprehensive account of the cleanup operation that is currently underway. Louise Gilmour, the secretary of GMB Scotland, expressed strong concerns about the situation. “Every one of the contracts sent abroad as operators chase the bottom line has cost our country jobs and apprenticeships. To discover we have been exporting skilled work while importing asbestos beggars belief,” Gilmour stated. “Our country banned asbestos decades ago because it was killing workers and their families, but we now pay for it to be ferried here from the other side of the world and then pay again to remove it? We deserve to be told exactly how this happened and what is being be done to prevent it happening again.” Ford is acknowledging the challenges it faced with AI production and design systems after the automaker recently claimed the top spot in JD Power’s initial quality ranking for mainstream brands for the first time in 16 years. According to Ford, attempting to replace highly-skilled employees with AI-powered systems was a mistake. The Verge reports that Ford has revealed that its reliance on artificial intelligence and automated systems in vehicle production and design created significant quality problems, forcing the company to bring back experienced engineers and technicians to correct mistakes made by its robots. Charles Poon, Ford’s vice president of vehicle hardware engineering, explained during a briefing with reporters this week that the automaker believed simply introducing AI and adjusting existing design requirements would automatically yield high-quality vehicles. Ford had underestimated the value of veteran engineers who had worked through multiple vehicle-development cycles and possessed deep understanding of potential problems that could emerge during production. To address this gap, Ford hired, promoted, or brought back more than 350 experienced engineers to rebuild its technical expertise base. These seasoned professionals were tasked with retraining the automated systems and mentoring younger engineers who were struggling to maintain vehicle quality standards. “That’s where some of our most experienced engineers have had experience solving and identifying those problems before they creep into the system,” Poon said.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer Resigns But Sets His Own Months-Long Timetable To Go:
Why Did Globalization Crash Manufacturing Productivity?
Green Fiasco: Asbestos Discovered in 1,000 UK Wind Turbines Imported from China:
Ford Hires Back Former Engineers to Fix Errors Caused by AI:
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