Surprise! Is Right: Elmo is contaminated with lead.
Fisher Price has recalled nearly 1 million toys produced by a Chinese manufacturer, for what? High levels of lead in the paint. Lead at low levels is a serious threat to the central nervous systems of infants and children. Learn more about lead poisoning here.
This follows closely on the heels of the Thomas the Train recall, the pet food contamination fiasco, and news that China commissions at least one new coal-fired power plant each week…
Maybe offshoring (outsourcing) from China isn’t so cheap after all? I have to wonder what the real cost of doing business this way is? What do you think? Tweet
I think the US workforce has priced themselves out of the market. When US wages are adjusted to world sustainable levels, then the option to move business back into the country, might exist, if you all don’t spend yourselves into bankruptcy first.
Joshua – that’s an interesting response. Where in the world are you living? It sounds as though it’s not the US.
Joshua, I mostly agree with you (apart from generalising quite so much).
I see the weakening of the US dollar not as a blip but more as a correction and the amount of national debt isn’t going to help you guys going forwards either (I think last time I heard it had reached record levels under the current administration).
I don’t think the US approach of pressuring china to increase the value of the Yuan is going to get them anywhere very soon either. I think a valid approach would be for imports (AND home produced goods) to have taxes applied relative to their environmental impact. Then there would be an incentive for chinese companies to reduce emissions which levels the playing field somewhat. But they’ll still have most countries (UK included) easily beaten on wages.
(I’m currently looking forward to my couple of weeks learning mandarin in shanghai next month.)
Oh, the chinese government seems to be (at least superficially) taking some steps to clean up their act.
I’m completely against corporal punishment but its mildly refreshing to see some government officials somewhere being held accountable.
http://civilitas.wordpress.com/2007/07/11/former-chinese-fda-minister-executed/
Lloyd, enjoy China. Cities like Shanghai are quite enjoyable. Like you, I’m very concerned that our current government expenditures are $1.7B per DAY in deficit and that the national debt is a record $7+ TRILLION dollars, something like $28,000 for every person in the states.
I agree that pressuring China will not help. Unfortunately, a sound government policy of living within our means and paying down the debt is the way out. I don’t see any leadership on this issue from our current or aspiring candidates…
I was sure it was a lot more debt than that and but it looks like it comes down to accounting. http://usatoday.printthis.clickability.com/pt/cpt?action=cpt&title=USATODAY.com&expire=&urlID=22498576&fb=Y&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.usatoday.com%2Fprintedition%2Fnews%2F20070529%2F1a_lede29.art.htm&partnerID=1660
more standard accounting practices (such as ones you’d use to try and balance the books in the real world) show it at 500k per household.
Lloyd, I wrote a separate entry referencing your source.
$516,348 per US household