Does America Need Manufacturing?

Jon Gerner laug
You can drive anywhere in Michigan
Select a point randomly and start moving
You will soon see the remains of American industry.
If you happen to drive on the outer edge of Midland, you will also encounter a 400,000 square foot steel beam and plumbing cave.
When the plant, built by Dow kokam, a new enterprise owned by the Dow Chemical section, comes into production early next year, it will produce thousands of advanced lithium-
Ion batteries for hybrid and electric vehicles.
It is also important that it will provide about 350 jobs in a state with the highest unemployment rate.
In the past two years, the federal government has paid nearly $2.
About 30 companies involved in advanced battery technology are provided with $5 billion in stimulus money.
Many of these businesses do not seem to be as good as the landscape in political photography --
Where President Obama can visit repeatedly
Like he did earlier this month)
Demonstrate his efforts in creating jobs
But actually, the battery started.
Ups is more legal and controversial than that.
As one White House official said, they represent the \"distant edge\" of where the president or Congress might go to create jobs.
For decades, the federal government has refusedand its money —
Behind specific industries.
If the market kills jobs in manufacturing, there is no point in fighting it.
The government is not picking the winners.
For a long time, many economic theorists believe that countries inevitably pursue their own natural or unique advantages.
Fertile farmland or abundant mineral resources may bring some advantages;
Other reasons may be the high educational rate of their citizens.
As Lawrence Summers, a former White House economic adviser, said, the role of the United States is to provide food for a global economy that increasingly relies on knowledge and services rather than products.
So even if the Chinese and Japanese governments provide assistance to industries they see as important, factories in the United States are closed or moved abroad.
Washington\'s belief is that there should be no special exemption for manufacturing.
Even now, because unemployment is rampant across the country, so-
The so-called industrial policy is still politically toxic.
Lawmakers will not debate this;
Most people don\'t even name it.
It can almost be said that in the past two and a half years, the White House has lagged far behind in creating jobs.
But motivated by a skilled, blue potential double reward
Collar work and dynamic cleaning
Energy industry-
The government is trying to stop this trend with lithium. ion batteries.
It must start from scratch. In 2009, the U. S.
Less than 2% world lithium productionion batteries.
By 2015, the Department of Energy expects the United States to be able to produce 40% of that, thanks to the government\'s recent generosity.
No matter which country has come up with how to lead in lithium production
Ion batteries will capture \"a large part of the world\'s future economic boom,\" said Arun Majumdar, head of the Department of Energy\'s senior research program. Energy (ARPA-E).
He stressed that batteries are critical to the future of the world --
Transportation business and various cleaning-
Energy industry.
Advertising we might be amazed at the hardware and software of the phone and laptop, but the battery doesn\'t get the credit they deserve.
No lithium-
Your iPad is like a battery.
The new Chevrolet Volt and Nissan Leaf rely on lithium on big shelves-
Ion battery batteries to keep their charge and some new models
Including Ford and Toyota using battery-like technology
They are on their way to the showroom in the next 18 months.
The campaign of advertising was carried out against a frustrating backdrop.
Over the past decade, the United States has lost about 5 million manufacturing jobs,third.
Coupled with the same brutal decades before that, this decline has left large areas of the country, particularly the Great Lakes region, without a clear economic future.
When I drove through the hollowed
Earlier this year, outside the towns of Michigan, it was hard to say how some of these places survived.
However, in several battery companies I have visited, people are in a very different mood.
Many companies are working on batteries.
Packaging design for dozens of models.
Johnson Controls the plant in the Netherlands, Michigan.
Ray Shemanski, who is in charge of the company\'s lithium, said
Ion operation said, \"We now have orders to fill this factory.
\"Each company I visit is not only planning to have their main plant run at full speed by 2012 or 2013, but also planning to build or expand other plants.
Jennifer Granholm, Michigan\'s former governor, predicts that advanced batteries will create 62,000 jobs over the next decade.
It is tempting to see the bud of the Industrial Revolution.
Today, confidence is a rare and precious fuel in itself. in Michigan\'s fledgling battery belt, confidence is not lacking.
As China\'s unemployment rate hovers above 9%, will the recovery in manufacturing become part of the job crisis?
Or is this simply an expensive government bet on a failed cause?
About 30 minutes northwest of Detroit, right next to the interstate, in Livonia, at the headquarters of the modern red brick car at A123 Systems, beneficiaries of approximately $0. 375 billion in federal stimulus funds and corresponding state grants.
A123 provides batteries for new electric vehicles called Fisker Karma and various electric bus and truck projects around the world.
A123 is also the first big-scale lithium-
Although its pedigree is international, its domestic business is starting and running ion manufacturers.
Its battery technology is in M. I. T.
The company has been producing lithium for the past few years
Ion batteries in factories in Korea and China.
When I asked Jason Forcier, the head of a123\'s automotive department, why he was going to produce products in Asia, Jason er said he had no choice.
\"The supply base is there,\" he said . \"
\"This is the place to know --how was —
It does not exist in the United States. S.
\"Repatriation of a high
Technology manufacturing plants in the United States are not just about hiring local talent.
Need good
Old Foreign knowledgehow.
\"We call it \'exact replication\',\" Forcier said \'. \".
\"We acquired a company in Korea that owns this battery technology and developed manufacturing processes there.
We basically bring it here, copy it exactly and zoom in on it.
\"A123 also brought in a team of six Korean engineers to help transfer the technology to the United StatesS.
A team of Americans were sent to study in South Korea.
I heard a similar story at LG Power.
Battery start-
And the American subsidiary of South Korean company LG Chem.
LG Chem is building a factory in Mich, Netherlands.
Make batteries for Chevrolet Volt.
Production depends on copying the company\'s lithium
In the smallest detail, ionic plants are abroad.
\"In fact, we use it as a copy --
Cut and paste from Korea here, \"C Prabhakar PatilE. O.
LG Chemical Power said.
Neither will Forcier Patil make any apologies.
Everyone told me that moving to Michigan provides them with a skilled workforce and operating expenses, which is largely competitive with foreign factories. (
Patil told me that 5 to 10% of the cost of the battery comes from the labor force;
Materials account for most of the cost. )
Both sides believe that his company\'s strategy to import manufacturing technology into the United States is essential. A state-of-the-art lithium-
The ion battery factory is as different as the car factory, just like the science lab and the gymnasium. Cell-making —
Automatic Management of thin chemical coatings on internal components of batteries;
Mechanized cutting and folding of metal parts;
Workers wearing a sanitary \"rabbit suit\" supervise the conveyor belt, which moves the original cells through a sealed assembly room --
Painstaking precision
A stray hair or a drop of sweat can ruin a lithium --ion cell.
\"Don\'t touch anything,\" Forcier told me when we started to cross the factory at a123. Lithium-
Ion batteries like A123 are probably not like any of the ones you \'ve used.
They\'re hard, rectangular, metal.
The colored envelope, roughly the size of a thin trade paperback, has two small labels.
Alone, these batteries are of little use to cars;
They must be stacked with other modules or packages.
Chevrolet Volt, for example, has a pack of 288 batteries that are connected together and travel along the center of the car.
Packaging is the most expensive and complex element in a car and, to a large extent, the processor is the most important element of a computer.
Everything about cell packaging
Its internal chemistry, its uniform electrons, its cooling system
Is the variable and sorted in order. “With G. M.
We have been working for their exact requirements for the future for two years.
\"Generation V\", Michael Sinkula, founder of the battery
The component company called Envia Systems, explained.
\"They said, \'We want it to behave in this way.
Is it possible?
We will let them know if possible.
\"Volt is, of course, just a car --
People with low sales
Nevertheless, the global car market is so large that even if the market share increases slightly, it may trigger a huge increase in battery --makers.
\"If you look at 2016, you say, \'Only 5% of the market is powered on?
This is a $14 billion lithium market.
Ion batteries . \"
\"Reaching 5% is a huge quantity.
And the business of making lithium.
5% of cars around the world use ion batteries, which is a huge business.
\"After the 80 s, the Patil of LG Power works at Ford in an attempt to build a pure electric vehicle
A battery car called ETX can\'t be found anywhere.
What he used was more primitive.
Acid battery technology
Car engineers tend to use two different methods.
Power and energy-
Evaluate the chemical composition of the battery.
The power is related to acceleration;
Energy is related to how far a car can travel before it needs to be charged.
ETX is not good no matter which standard.
\"The car runs at a speed of 0 to 60 in 12 seconds,\" recalls Patil . \".
\"On a good day, it has a range of 60 miles. ” The lead-
The acid battery is too heavy, and the car is nicknamed the lead sled.
Since performance and range are not as good as typical petrol vehicles, how can you expect consumers to pay extra?
It was about $10,000. for it?
Ultimately, leadership
Acid battery produced by nickel
Metal hydride was added to Toyota Prius and later a series of hybrid cars.
At the same time, lithium-based battery chemistry is more promising
There is greater potential in power and energy.
Developed by different scientists, especially John Goodno of the University of Texas.
At the beginning of 1990, Sony was the first company to widely use lithium technology in the factory;
The company has been improving its products and has begun to incorporate them into consumers
Electronic equipment.
But automakers don\'t know how to reduce costs.
Adapt to technology effectively.
Patil recalls a \"chicken\"and-
In the 1990 s, when he tried to build a Ford Escape Hybrid, the egg problem \".
\"I was kicked out of C. E. O.
\"There are often battery offices,\" he said . \".
\"They said, \'Show me the market.
Otherwise, leave.
Patil knew there would be no market in the United States without a sharp drop in battery prices and a substantial increase in performance.
But this is a problem. 22.
Unless the company takes manufacturing seriously, it is impossible to increase the price and performance.
Federal agencies like the Department of Energy have long funded scientific research.
For example, through university funding
Technology like lithiumion batteries.
But a fundamental feature of government policy is to allow businesses and entrepreneurs to pick through the results of this study, commercialize promising ideas and let the market solve problems.
In other countries, it often works differently.
The government is more willing to help companies gather information about a new industry or technology, and (
Especially in Korea and China)
Assist early shift-
The phased commercialisation of the products, including the construction of the factory.
When Patil was fired from Ford\'s executive office, Asian companies, in some cases driven by the government, focused on streamlining the manufacturing process.
The battery performance is steadily improving and the cost is declining. By the mid-
2000, obviously, if lithium-
Ion batteries continue to get better at the same speed, and this product may fit into the car soon.
On January 2009, two weeks before Obama took office, Senator Levin of Michigan sent a letter to Obama and his advisers.
Ram Emanuel, David akcelrod and Lawrence Summers
Commitment to lithium-ion technology.
\"Countries or regions that control and dominate battery production will also eventually control green --
Levin said in a subsequent speech to the Senate.
Levin\'s efforts actually laid the foundation for battery grants to become part of the $787 billion US Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
\"This is a calculated risk --
There\'s a lot of money, of course, but given the risks, I think it\'s a very thoughtful bet, \"said Ron Bloom, who recently served as President Obama\'s manufacturing policy assistant.
\"If, as many think, car electrified does take off and we are not one of them, then we may lose our leadership in the global automotive industry.
This will be disastrous.
It is estimated that up to 20% of all manufacturing jobs are directly or indirectly related to the automotive industry.
Bloom noted that the United States is not the only country to bet on batteries;
Some Asian countries have done the same.
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On both sides of the world, the fundamental appeal of expanding manufacturing is employment.
Information companies can create extraordinary social chaos and huge shareholder wealth, but there are relatively few jobs, which is a curiosity in modern life.
Facebook has about 2,000 employees worldwide.
Google has about 29,000.
Even in its new, slim
General Motors is a significantly lower-value company with about 200,000 employees.
More importantly, this number represents only a small number of people who produce G. M. car.
\"When you make anything, even if the work is done by robots and machines, it involves an incredible value chain,\" M. president Susan HawkfieldI. T. , says.
\"Manufacturing is a huge engine for job creation.
\"For batteries, the value chain will include scientists studying improved materials from companies that mine metal ore;
Contractors who build machines for factory work;
Designers, engineers and machine operators perform actual factory work.
It is estimated that about 65% of scientists and engineers are employed in American manufacturing.
The committee was convened recently by Hockfield. I. T.
Investigate the state of manufacturing in the United States and provide plans for its future.
\"It is estimated that in the next decade we will need to create 17 to 20 million jobs to recover from the current recession and meet the upcoming employment needs,\" she said in the past
\"It\'s hard to imagine where these jobs will come from unless we\'re seriously busy re-inventing manufacturing.
\"GE\'s C. Jeffrey Immelt has endorsed that logic. E. O. ;
Andy Grove, former Intel chairman;
Andrew livis of Dow Jones chemicalE. O.
2009 Harvard Business Review article-
Gary Pizano, two Harvard professors, and Willie Shi\'s \"Restoring American competition\"
It has become one of the touchstones of the manufacturing debate.
In this article, Pizano and Shi believe that the United StatesS.
Over the past few decades, by outsourcing a lot of manufacturing work, enterprises have weakened our ability to improve our living standards and restricted the development of new high-tech technologies.
Technology industry.
When I spoke to Pizano, he pointed out industries like semiconductor chips
The heart of computers and consumer electronics
There is a need to build \"industrial commons\", a skill shared by a large group of interrelated workers in universities, companies and governments.
If its key parts, such as factories or material suppliers, move abroad, the House of Commons loses its energy, as is the case with semiconductors.
The factory left at the beginning;
Researchers and development engineers followed up quickly.
However, the most punitive effect of advertising may not be measurable --
Due to the degradation of the industrial ecosystem, there are no technological and employment opportunities created.
The semiconductor industry, for example, led-
Lighting and solar
The panel industry, both of which are currently mainly located in Asia.
\"Battery is another interesting example,\" Pisano told me . \".
\"The focus is on Asia. But why?
If you go back to 1960, he says, American consumers --
Electronics companies think they are better off in Japan, then in Korea, where the cost is lower.
\"Then you have to ask: Who has the power to make the battery smaller, stronger or longer?
Not the automotive industry. The consumer-
The electronics industry did.
This explains why the United StatesS.
Playing catch now. With lithium-ion batteries.
This also highlights the vulnerability of manufacturing-shrinking economies.
\"When an industry changes, there may be other industries in the future that you can\'t even anticipate,\" said Pisano.
Even in the battery industry, there are doubts.
Menahem andman, California
The company\'s advisers say it will transform 10% of the world\'s cars
Hybrid cars or electric cars will become Dreams by 2020.
His forecast is less than 2%. U. S. -
The factory at the headquarters is at a disadvantage, he said. The U. S.
He told me that industry \"is not ready to get $2 billion from the government and spend wisely.
So now we are going to build a lot of factories, we are going to build excess capacity, and a lot of companies will fail.
He added that he has no ideological opposition to the federal government\'s support, \"but the position of technology and the market is incompatible with the government\'s desire to create manufacturing jobs.
Especially for pure electric vehicles, which may need to replace expensive batteries in 10 years, andman still sees the plight of Patil in the post-90 s Ford, when he questioned whether consumers would pay more than $10,000 for a bad car.
As andman said: \"In the modern history of capitalist countries, has there been a new product where mainstream customers pay more at a lower price?
According to his calculation, to produce the plug, the price of gasoline must reach about $7 per gallon. in electric-
Hybrid cars attract consumers.
Gas prices will have to rise in order to create demand for all-electric vehicles.
This means that the government has provided generous subsidies for the purchase of these vehicles.
At present, Chevrolet Volt owners have received tax benefits, reducing the cost of the car from $33,500 to about $41,000.
In Washington, I have been told by several people that unless demand continues to grow, taxpayers will help build an industry without any use.
This concern has led many politicians and policymakers to oppose industrial policy in the first place.
When the government
The businesses that support have failed and taxpayers are in trouble.
At present, battery manufacturers think they can reduce costs quickly enough to be competitive.
Improvement in manufacturing process
For example, apply a better chemical coating on sensitive elements inside the battery, or slightly increase the conveyor speed of the factory --
Improve quality and efficiency.
I heard about start too-
Ups in California is working on new costs
Effective chemistry.
\"We see prices drop 50% over the next five years,\" Forcier of A123 told me . \".
\"It\'s easy to say that because our offer is 2014 and we know what the price is.
It is unclear whether this will increase jobs in the United States.
Hope it\'s lithium-
The ion plant will build a network for new chemical and equipment suppliers.
This has already happened to some extent.
Some Japanese and Korean companies have opened stores in the United States and local universities are offering training courses for aspiring lithiumion-
Battery Factory Workers
But this is a fragile ecology.
Compared with the large factories in Detroit in the past, there are very few jobs.
As Robert Rich, the former Minister of Labor, pointed out,
Technology manufacturing is becoming more and more automated.
In capacity, lithium-
The ion plant in Michigan will employ 300 to 400 people, respectively.
Even the most optimistic forecastenough hybrid-and electric-
Need dozens of factories for cars
This shows that the battery industry does not significantly offset the decline in US manufacturing.
That doesn\'t mean it\'s a bad investment.
In addition, the Obama administration\'s efforts in Michigan have once again awakened discussions about industrial policy.
To a large extent, this is an old war between politicians in Washington.
In the 1970 s, there was a fierce battle around the federal government\'s bailout of Lockheed and Chrysler.
A few years later, in the debate about whether the country needs to help domestic companies try to gain Japan\'s advantage in the semiconductor industry.
George H. W.
After Bush took office, the change from industrial policy was obvious.
Senator Levin said: \"All you have to do in the 1980 s is say, \'This is industrial policy\' and it kills anything thrown, \"He, along with Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio, is now one of the most outspoken advocates of such policy.
\"That\'s the kiss of death.
This has set us back 10 to 20 years in manufacturing in the United States.
What is different now, Levin believes, is that \"our company is not competing with companies in Korea and Japan.
They are competing with governments that support them.
It\'s naive to believe that we only need to make the market work and we can have a strong manufacturing base in the United States.
In his opinion, lithium
Investment is fixing a market failure.
The battery executive I interviewed thought the stimulus was one time. in-a-
Opportunity for a lifetime
No one seems to think the unexpected accounting of the federal government is coming again.
No one thinks their business activities are political or ideological in nature.
No one seems to believe that they can survive if they don\'t reduce battery costs and prove they can compete with the best lithium
Ion factory abroad
\"My own feeling is that this will happen when government incentives disappear,\" Patil told me . \".
\"It must be a self by then
To maintain the business, we actually see the sight of getting there.
\"If the battery stimulus program is ultimately successful, does it indicate that it is no longer a viable strategy to expand the US economy simply through knowledge and services?
\"All the great new American companies in the last few decades,\" said Suzanne Berger, chairman of M. I. T.
\"US manufacturing future group focused on R & D and product definition --
Apple, Qualcomm, Cisco.
These tech companies can make the most of what she calls the \"Modularity\" of the global economy \".
Their genius lies in the design of their gadgets and information systems;
Outsourcing of industrial work did not put them at a disadvantage.
On the contrary, it greatly reduces the cost and increases the profit.
\"Now I think we are at a very different time,\" Berger said . \"
\"We have seen a wave of new technologies such as energy, biotechnology, batteries, where research, development, design, product definition and production must be more closely integrated.
\"One of the challenges in this direction may be that our banks, hedge funds and venture capitalists are all inclined to invest in financial instruments and software companies.
In such efforts, even a modest investment can generate very rapid and huge returns.
Financing brick-and-
In contrast, the sand mills are expensive and tough, and the potential for quick returns is much smaller.
Berger believes that in order for the economy to get \"full value\" from our lab\'s ideas on energy or biotechnology \"--
Not only the new company headquarters, but also the industrial position.
We must pursue a business model that is different from what we appreciate.
That is, companies that have similarities with Mich Livonia\'s A123 System.
Or with a more familiar example, a business that doesn\'t look like Google, it\'s more like Ford. Jon Gertner (
@ Gmail. com)
Is the editor of Fast Company
His book Creative Factory: Bell Labs and the great age of American innovation is about to be published.
Editor: Dean Robinson (d. robinson-
The New York Times. com)
A version of the article was printed on page MM42 of Sunday magazine on August 28, 2011 with the title: Make or make.
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