> Microsoft’s decision to shift Surface Hub manufacturing to China highlights the difficulty in bringing manufacturing jobs back to the United States. It’s not just a question of opening a factory and hiring employees. There are supply line considerations, source costs, and the simple fact that American companies now produce many more products with far fewer employees than they used to require in the 1970s, thanks to automation and improved productivity.<p>Like with climate change, it's already too late.
It isn't mentioned in the article, but I think it would be reasonable to suggest that a 25% tariff on nearly every component that goes into these devices might have impacted the decision. The alternative is to manufacture the device outside of the US and then importing the completed device with no tariff applied.<p>Trump's economic policies are doing the exact thing everyone suggested they would, forcing modern manufacturing in the US to move elsewhere or face a 25% increase in component cost across the board.
The documentary The Thirteenth mentions Microsoft (among many other companies) US uses prison labour - which allows the company to pay workers a pittance which is viewed as being a type of exploitation. After this was exposed, a few similar companies (Victoria's Secret) stopped doing this. Has Microsoft?