Lloyd Lofthouse

ABC News reported, “Some 98 percent of the clothing purchased in the United States is imported from abroad. Just two percent of clothing bought in this country is manufactured on U.S. soil.”

Plunkett Research.com says, “China’s textile and clothing exports soared from $16.89 billion in 1990 to $206.74 billion in 2010 (China doesn’t sell products only to the United States—it sells to the world). According to the World Trade Organization, India is a distant second in this category, at $24.12 billion in 2010 (up from $4.71 billion in 1990). Other nations in the top ten for global apparel and textiles exports in 2010 included Turkey ($21.72 billion), Bangladesh ($16.92 billion), the United States ($16.96 billion), Vietnam ($13.50 billion), the Republic of Korea ($12.58 billion), Pakistan ($11.78 billion) and Indonesia ($10.97 billion).

Note: In 2011, China exported to the world US$1.897 trillion and imported US$1.664 trillion in good from other countries. Twenty percent of those exported goods were sold to the US while only 7.66% of imported goods arrived in China from the US. Imported goods include: Electrical and other machinery, oil and mineral fuels, optical and medical equipment, metal ores, plastics, organic chemicals.

What does this mean? “To consumers in Europe and North America, this growing reliance on China as a low-cost producer has meant very low retail prices for goods of reasonable quality.”

There is a hunger in China for “Made in America”

One American company that makes its clothing in the US is “The North Face” in San Leandro, California.  Another company is “Round House Workwear” in Oklahoma (108 years old) and it claims all of its material is made in America.

Here is a site that lists other American clothing companies that manufacture in the US.

Why did many American companies move manufacturing outside of the US?

“Clothes can be manufactured more cheaply in developing countries due to the low cost of labor. Imagine that you are a t-shirt manufacturer. You can have your t-shirts made in a developing country with abundant cheap labor—workers who you only have to pay the equivalent of pennies an hour. This allows you to maintain large profit margins (by not spending so much on paying workers), and to sell your product at a cheaper cost (making consumers happy as well).” Source: Globalization101.org

The Chinese did not put a gun to the heads of Americans and force them to move manufacturing out of the country. Besides, Americans have a choice and may buy clothing from American companies that still manufacture in the US such as “The North Face” and “Round House Workwear”—that is if those companies make what American consumers want to wear and at a reasonable price.

And don’t forget, the US exported almost US$17 billion worth of American made clothing to other countries in 2011 MADE in the UNITED STATES. How many jobs did that support?

Return to Sick of Motor-Mouth Politicians – Part 1

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Lloyd Lofthouse, a former U.S. Marine and Vietnam Veteran, is the award winning author of The Concubine Saga.

His latest novel is Running with the Enemy. Blamed for a crime he did not commit while serving in Vietnam, his country considers him a traitor. Ethan Card is a loyal U.S. Marine desperate to prove his innocence or he will never go home again.

And the woman he loves and wants to save was trained to hate and kill Americans.

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