Re: Small proto boxes with LCD and buttons?

Hello Spehro,

Compare on a square-foot basis, industrial land and homes. New York
isn't even in the top ten of most expensive cities worldwide. London
prices look about right if they were USD rather than pounds. Tokyo
isn't as crazy as it used to be in relative terms, but it's still
pretty expensive. A decent (but not palatial) residence for a young
investment banker I know was costing his company $200K/year. To rent a small house in Hong Kong might run $10-20K USD/month. You'd
have to compare a 500sq ft gross (maybe 400 sq ft net) microscopic
apartment with a 3-bedroom luxury condo in the Los Angeles area to be
in the same range.

Big cities isn't where young enterprises will start or settle. A couple of years ago a neighbor was able to rent a decent apartment in the Shanghai suburbs for $75 a month, utilities included.

The trend in the US is to move away from high cost cities and back to rural settings. Not a bad thing. This way SW guys are better able to compete with Indians.

Goods of international quality in stores are almost always cheaper in
the US than elsewhere, often imported goods are even cheaper than
their country of origin. Meat is not much cheaper in China than in the
US, poor people just eat a lot less of it. And it's lower quality.

I don't know. Whenever people come back from Asia their suitcases brim with custom made clothing at less than half the cost of a cheap off-the-rack version here. Then watches, electronic gadgets etc.

And income and corporate taxes are relatively low (perhaps not as low
as the PR would have you believe when they are all added up, but still
significantly lower than most industrialized countries).

Ahm, take property taxes. An engineer in NY state was very miffed one day. They reassessed the neighborhood to milk them some more. Now they pay about $10,000 a year for a rather modest home versus $6,500 before he said. Ouch. Where on earth would he get that additional $3,500 from? To add insult to injury he'll probably end up in the AMT snare because of that and then has to cough up all that dough from his net income.

Cheap energy? I paid 4c/kWh in Germany. After moving to the US I was in for a rude awakening: 12c/kWh. Ouch. Ok, gas is cheaper here. 

That's California for ya. No 30-100% tax on cars either. Insurance in
the US can be more expensive (especially liability) as is health care.

Health care cost is quite prohibitive. We pay about $5k a year for a modest package for two. When you get sick you will be socked with huge copays. So you can't get sick. If you do get really sick you probably will become a pariah via the medical database and never be able to secure a new health care plan. Use it and lose it.

Liability insurance? Depending on your field of work the number of underwriters that might take you is zilch. They consider you a higher risk than an oil tanker with an inebriated crew. Been there.

Labor regulations- very easy to get rid of people, low minimum wage
compared to cost of living, fairly weak unions, lots of cheap labor
pouring over the southern border for low-skill set work. Consumer
protection laws are probably not all that different.

Not quite. Our workers comp rates are the highest and add a huge chunk to payroll costs. I know businesses who either haven't been started or haven't hired anyone because of that. A roofer told me he had to lay off all his staff because of it. Lots of abuse has been reported yet unions fiercely defend those "rights". I have lived in The Netherlands and AFAIK it's still the same there: For a potential employer workers comp costs do not exist. It used to be a tax'em - spend it country which is why I left. That changed and now biz is booming pretty good there.

What high biz costs like this do: An engineer has a great idea. Then he realizes that he'd really need at least some local well-educated staff to do it. Instantly he dismisses the thought and moves on to the usual grunt work where he doesn't need employees.

The US is about the size of Western Europe, so you have to compare
state barriers vs. country barriers.

I found country barriers to be not an issue there. When I ordered stuff from the UK or other countries it wasn't a big deal. Businesses are VAT neutral so even that was a breeze to handle in book keeping. My sales tax reporting was a mere press of a button on the PC, print two copies and send one off. 10 minutes tops, with coffee. Now I believe it's electronic. Talking to a neighbor who has a store that can be an entirely hair-pulling matter here.

There it is a piece of cake to sell something in another country or buy something there. Always was. I can buy meds in Canada except that I don't need any. But I cannot buy a car there. Regulations pretty much prevent me

from doing that.

I think the state barriers are of more importance than the 10% extra
market north of the 49th parallel.

Same thing. Buying a car from another state can cause a bloody nose when you try to register it and they say that it doesn't have certification that it complies with this or that regulation. You may end up with a car you aren't allowed to drive.

Compare state barriers to country barriers in Europe. Yes, there are
some licensing barriers, which is more than none, but they are
relatively few and affect relatively little commerce.

That was just one example. But in all fairness, other areas of the world are also setting up regs that have zero (or rather a negative) benefit for the public. ROHS is just one example.

Labor is the big difference. India has an infinite supply of miserably
poor people to make lunch and young boys to deliver a cup of hot tea
to you from a shop for a few rupees. They are in less supply in the
US. This is not necessarily a bad thing in a developed country. 

True. And you can escape such costs here by making your own lunch.

The change now is that whereas before China and India made paper fans
and parasols for drinks, now they are doing grunt work in coding and
making light industrial goods on a competitive basis. The cream of the
crop of poor people are very smart, because they come from a huge pool
with few options. This will take some adjustment, but I don't believe
it will necessarily be all that painful. More painful for those who
don't (or can't because of age and other factors) adapt. But for our
children, and their children*, I don't see things being necessarily
worse, any more than the move off of farms caused conditions to be
worse. They are different, and better. I expect our relative wealth to
decrease, but our absolute wealth to be maintained or increase.

I don't see it negative either. But in order to make the new world work many of our liberal politicians will have to come off their high seats and realize that tax revenues will inevitably shrink and lots of pork must be cut. In California they haven't learned that yet.

I believe we will see a continued move back to lower cost areas which is probably a good thing. Children need to be taught to remain flexible and not too attached to one region, or one country for that matter.

*I believe in making the world safe for our children, but not our
children's children, because I don't think children should be having
sex.
-- Deep Thoughts, Jack Handy 

ROFL!

Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com
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