They’ve been manufacturing abroad since at least the 1960s.

>so good riddance.

They are not leaving the US...?

Why do we want so many garment shop jobs to be done in America?

We probably don’t care about these jobs. But the political and cultural care over manufacturing jobs is twofold (1) manufacturing in America ensured we can sustain ourselves in a war with another manufacturing nation (eg china) and (2) it’s a politically savory thing.

Today, we have pretty low unemployment so jobs isn’t as big a concern as other times. BUT jobs are not evenly distributed across the nation. If you visit the rust belt, those cities and towns are losing population as they lose jobs. That makes for an angsty population - staying in your hometown means fighting over the shrinking job pool. No one really wants to be a coal-miner or factory worker, but when that was the last big employer in your shrinking town, you get nostalgic for “good days” of high employment numbers, and a growing population.

Garments aren’t coming back unless American shopping habits change. We’ve started spending a smaller % of income on clothes, while buying more units of clothing per year. That favors clothes made by fast fashion under terrible work conditions - which will never be local. Unless you want to buy a $200 pair of ethically made jeans, you’re not getting it American.

Origin Maine/Origin USA might have some interest to you. They've been buying back clothing manufacturing equipment that was sold overseas decades ago and using 100% USA labor and materials to make a range of clothing and boots.

People look at all manufacturing jobs disappearing as part of the reason the middle class is dead. Unfortunately, even if all of these jobs came back, few people want to pay $70 for a made-in-America shirt.

hm. i wonder. made in usa plain tees are not that expensive (american apparel) and if you mean button up shirt, i paid $100 for a shirt made abroad.

i recently bought made in usa undergarments and the quality was better than am undergarment i bought from abroad and the price was comparable

While you can get T-shirts made in USA for reasonable prices, there's not a great selection out there, and you might want to check to see where those American Apparel T-shirts are being made. While they were known in the past for being USA made, they heavily outsource now.:

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91Y+xeS+HoL.jpg

I think people might if they offered good quality. But that doesn’t seem to be the case with a lot of things “Made in USA”.

in the 1970s or 1980s if a nice dress shirt was $10-15, then it's not entirely a different thing from $70-100 today.

it's not a question of "want to pay $70", we'll want to pay the lowest price possible for the equal goods. if the cost of shirts doubled, you might buy less of them and wear them longer. i remember my dad probably had 5 nice dress shirts, two suits and a sport coat.

i'd rather have $70 (or $100) shirts and a functioning middle class.

Because it's a job for people who aren't good at math and science can do. It's great that people can be doctors and chemists and software engineers but people who don't have those kinds of smarts to do those things, still need to have jobs. UBI ain't happening, so without jobs that don't take an advanced degree, the people without them don't have jobs. Without a job, how're you going to survive under capitalism?

It builds character