I'm not saying it's economical, but anyone willing to pay 2.5x the cost of a Made-in-China phone could have their phone assembled in the United States: https://puri.sm/posts/librem-5-usa/

(No relation to the company, though I did once have a very nice chat with Todd Weaver).

And to the larger point: I agree completely that politicians opening their mouths about jobs (and also about anything else, IMO) is bad faith bullshit.

It will never be assembled by humans in the US, but we should strive for US based robotic manufacturing.

This is the key people often overlook. If we stop using our AI geniuses to develop tracking algorithms and start building automation, we can have nextgen factories in the West. The environmental factor is yet to be solved though. For the most part, developing countries are trading environmental damage for money. Not much different from harvesting oil or other resources to an economist.

Physical manufacturing doesn't have the sort of profit margins that software provides. You can't give devs the kind of pay many expect when there are 10x more people in the production chain. Investors aren't going to flock to such businesses.

Inverstors are very short sighted. I am advocating for a 100 years plan. You can't expect a bunch of greedy boys to plan for returns after they are dead....

Well let’s see, work in adtech and make $1M TC and get treated with kid gloves by the company or work in industrial engineering and make $100K and be a cost center. How do we change the incentives? Ban advertising and tracking? But making the alternative more attractive is out of the cards...

I know and I agree. It's hard. But don't tempt me on banning ads! :P

If you look from the outside, as a society we are using a lot of our best brains for very frivolous things. I wish for a more efficient way of using our minds!