The difficulty of buying American

Now there are movements toward buying American and buying natural fibers for several different reasons — self-reliance, reducing environmental impacts and health reasons as it relates to plastics. I recall Jackie Speier, now a member of the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors, pushing for American made when she was our representative in Congress. President Biden also pushed for silicon chips to be produced here to reduce our reliance on foreign governments that may not have our best interests in mind. And, of course, it’s also part of President Trump’s agenda of American self-reliance.

A recent article in The Wall Street Journal outlined how a company, “American Giant,” produced an American-made $12.98 T-shirt for Walmart. The piece was to show how it could be done, and it was mainly through a bulk commitment from the retail giant. American Giant’s T-shirts are typically $40-$50, but are considered premium. They are American made, also mainly cotton. The story had the vibe of a quest, in that it showed that buying a 100%, American-made T-shirt is still possible in this day and age.

Those familiar with American history will know that cotton production was a big, though negative, part of our nation’s origin. Yet, it remains a very large industry to this day with us being the third largest cotton producer in the world. So the issue is manufacturing, of course, and there has been a well-documented slide into those jobs going overseas. After all, it was Steve Jobs who told President Obama, “Those jobs aren’t coming back.”

Trade, division of labor and seeking cheaper resources is nothing new but, as the world shrinks through technological advancement, globalism takes on new meanings depending on perspective. There was a time when globalism signified ways to bring up working people in emerging economies, however, others saw it as exploitation. World Trade Organization meeting protests and the disruption of the 1999 WTO conference in Seattle featured a wide and diverse range of protesters from labor, student and even anarchist groups. Many of those participating evolved their actions into the black bloc movement, Occupy Wall Street and Antifascist, or antifa, movements centered around Marxist theory. Some correlation can be drawn to the recent college protests over U.S. support of Israel. While these are all seen as leftist movements, rising on the right was the populist movement of which Trump took hold.

Those in the business sector saw this dissent and imagined environmental, social and governance as an investing principal as well as an oversight and regulation mechanism. The idea was to create a way for average folk and companies to be responsible with their money and create positive impact. It went OK for a while, but money must follow for it to be successful. The concept stumbled in the last couple of years as the practicality of strenuous movement toward electrification and other well-meaning but financially nascent goals didn’t result in positive cash flow and lost public support. This lent credence and movement toward protectionism, and thus the political flow went right.

Will we be able to rediscover an America where $13 T-shirts made here with natural fibers becomes a regular thing? With PacSun selling John Deere and Budweiser T-shirts and country music emerging in blue states, there is a trend toward this idea in a very superficial, and possibly incredibly fleeting, way.

Seeing a return to U.S. manufacturing on a larger scale, however, is a worthwhile goal, especially for particular products related to national security like computer chips — without which our military would be largely disabled, but also for the purposes of environmental sensitivity. Purchasing fewer items with natural fibers that have minimal shipping requirements is gentler for the environment and better for us overall. Even if that means always looking at labels.

But will this replace the global economy? Not right now. Tariffs can only do so much and there will always be a push for cheaper labor and manufacturing elsewhere as the relatively high cost of living and soft-and-easy American lifestyle make that difficult here.

There may be a tipping point around the corner, however. As artificial intelligence starts to eat up tech jobs, manufacturing may also be a way to maintain American employment — perhaps even more so when the economic and environmental cost of moving goods far distances becomes too great. So, anything you want to build around here?