Miracle of Manufacturing

The miracle of manufacturing is that you can take raw material and process it into a useable commodity and sell it for a lot more than the cost of the commodities you use.

Sure, you have development and labor costs, but the sales price is usually much higher and these costs can be absorbed to produce a profit.

You then take that profit and invest it in better equipment and better designs that enables you to make and sell more widgets. It is the only industry that can do this. It is the bedrock of all economies.

Before the inventions like the steam engine and electricity that made it possible to mass produce products, all products were made by craftsmen one at a time. The same rules applied. The craftsman had to manage expenses for raw material, had to be skilled, had to make a quality product and had to charge enough to make a living.

The new inventions made it possible to lower costs through mass production. This took a leap with Henry Ford’s assembly line. It took another leap automating select manufacturing processes to get perfect quality. I took another leap with high volume, high speed automation like you fine at the Huggies Diaper plants.

Even Communist countries like China have discovered that they cannot maintain their economy without manufacturing.

The complexity in manufacturing offers more opportunities than most other industries for regular people, especially if engineers are involved developing products. High School grads can enter as Assemblers and learn the product and the operations. They can advance to machine operator and then to machine technician if they acquire the necessary training. They can advance to supervision if they have leadership qualities.

Norb Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader