Thursday, June 21, 2007

Globalization gone bad

A growing number of product recalls are making their way back to products made in China. Currently 60% of recalls nation wide are related to products made in China. Now adding to the recent recalls of pet food, pharmaceuticals, and toothpaste, add children's toys.

According to the June 19th NYT, Chinese manufactured toys are being recalled due to the use of toxic ingredients.
Over 1.5 million Thomas & Friends trains were recalled due to the use of lead paint and last month a fake eyeball toy was recalled after it was found to be filled with kerosene.

8 comments:

K T Cat said...

I also saw that China passed us in carbon emissions.

I hope they enjoy the current prosperity. With an aging population, lousy sexual demographics and a hideous environment, it ain't gonna last.

FreakyNick said...

The thing that bothers me about China is not their inferior products. In the 70's. Japan also had cheap, easily broken products flooding the US, then, in the mid 80's, they became the standard for quality products.

The thing that bothers me about China is that most of the U.S. debt is "borrowed" from China. They own us, and could easily cause economic calamity if we don't "cooperate" with them. Luckily, they need us to grow their economy, also, so failure here, would cause disaster for them also.

I'm ashamed at how easily the Bush Administration sold the U.S. to China to pay for his perpetual "WAR ON TERROR" aka "Keeping the U.S. Scared" So his friends can get rich.

BLAH, BLAH, BLAH

The enemy is us.

K T Cat said...

Dig this:

http://www.autoblog.com/2007/06/22/brilliance-bs6s-adac-crash-test-is-anything-but/

As for borrowing from China, well, if you didn't want to do that, you'd elect politicians that didn't spend like Blondie Bumstead. The Democrats don't even recognize it as a problem and outside of a few stalwarts, the Republicans give it lip service only.

The good news about the debt is that we owe them so much. When you owe the bank $100,000, the bank owns you. When you owe the bank $100,000,000, you own the bank.

They can't afford to have us default.

Dr. Zaius said...

I don't understand what the problem is. I always fill my fake eyeballs with kerosene.

Kelly the little black dog said...

The moral here is that there is a danger inherent in blindly allowing globalization to follow its course.

No matter what side you fall on, its critical we have that discussion.

K T Cat said...

Kelly, I agree with you completely. This is a case where the libertarian side of the argument falls apart and I'm a pretty strong economic libertarian. While the free market is great for some things, like trouncing the PlayStation III or setting the price of crude oil globally, it's no good for things like this.

It's unrealistic to expect the consumer to know that some products are potentially deadly. That's why we have an FDA, so we don't have to find out that our food is filled with machine shop waste by observing our next door neighbog being rushed to the emergency room.

I don't know if I'd blame globalization or a lack of standards on imported products.

Do you feel a similar amount of scrutiny is required on products from, say, New Zealand?

Kelly the little black dog said...

Do you feel a similar amount of scrutiny is required on products from, say, New Zealand?

I'd say not, but because they have a tradition of rule of law. China has become a pseudo-capitalist wild west. If it makes money, screw the consequences. Their government is the worst offender.

This is a case where the libertarian side of the argument falls apart and I'm a pretty strong economic libertarian. While the free market is great for some things...
Unfortunately it fails horribly when there is a tension between cost cutting and reserve capacity. The health care system is a prime example. There is enough capacity for typical needs. Should there be a national emergency, the system won't have the reserve to come anywhere near what will be needed.

K T Cat said...

I just returned the volley on my blog. Your turn.