New S.F. Bay Bridge Being Made in China
#1
Quote:SHANGHAI — Talk about outsourcing.

At a sprawling manufacturing complex here, hundreds of Chinese laborers are now completing work on the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.

Next month, the last four of more than two dozen giant steel modules — each with a roadbed segment about half the size of a football field — will be loaded onto a huge ship and transported 6,500 miles to Oakland. There, they will be assembled to fit into the eastern span of the new Bay Bridge.

The project is part of China’s continual move up the global economic value chain — from cheap toys to Apple iPads to commercial jetliners — as it aims to become the world’s civil engineer.

The assembly work in California, and the pouring of the concrete road surface, will be done by Americans. But construction of the bridge decks and the materials that went into them are a Made in China affair. California officials say the state saved hundreds of millions of dollars by turning to China.

“They’ve produced a pretty impressive bridge for us,” Tony Anziano, a program manager at the California Department of Transportation, said a few weeks ago. He was touring the 1.2-square-mile manufacturing site that the Chinese company created to do the bridge work. “Four years ago, there were just steel plates here and lots of orange groves.”

On the reputation of showcase projects like Beijing’s Olympic-size airport terminal and the mammoth hydroelectric Three Gorges Dam, Chinese companies have been hired to build copper mines in the Congo, high-speed rail lines in Brazil and huge apartment complexes in Saudi Arabia.

In New York City alone, Chinese companies have won contracts to help renovate the subway system, refurbish the Alexander Hamilton Bridge over the Harlem River and build a new Metro-North train platform near Yankee Stadium. As with the Bay Bridge, American union labor would carry out most of the work done on United States soil.

American steelworker unions have disparaged the Bay Bridge contract by accusing the state of California of sending good jobs overseas and settling for what they deride as poor-quality Chinese steel. Industry groups in the United States and other countries have raised questions about the safety and quality of Chinese workmanship on such projects. Indeed, China has had quality control problems ranging from tainted milk to poorly built schools.

But executives and officials who have awarded the various Chinese contracts say their audits have convinced them of the projects’ engineering integrity. And they note that with the full financial force of the Chinese government behind its infrastructure companies, the monumental scale of the work, and the prices bid, are hard for private industry elsewhere to beat.

>>>Rest of NY Times Article<<<
Reply
#2
I know you people don't like this but I just don't see how you can maintain one pricing and labor scheme in one country and pretend you can be an island outside of the general world economy. Unions wlll have to get used to this fact, I believe.
Reply
#3
(06-26-2011, 04:31 PM)PonderThis Wrote: I know you people don't like this but I just don't see how you can maintain one pricing and labor scheme in one country and pretend you can be an island outside of the general world economy. Unions wlll have to get used to this fact, I believe.

That's outsourcing for yah.
Reply
#4
I needed a part made a few years ago, that I was going to buy by the 1000. I wanted to buy American if possible, and I priced several U.S. manufacturers - the lowest price I was quoted was $16 apiece. I priced an Asian source, and was quoted a price that equaled less than $3 apiece including shipping and customs. I called the American supplier and he told me rather snidely that his employees liked to make more than $1 a day. While that may be true, the economics were compelling for the Asian source. Since then they've gotten several reorders. The American company probably went broke for all I know.
Reply
#5
I wonder if stimulus money is being spent on this.
Reply
#6
(06-26-2011, 04:31 PM)PonderThis Wrote: I know you people don't like this but I just don't see how you can maintain one pricing and labor scheme in one country and pretend you can be an island outside of the general world economy. Unions wlll have to get used to this fact, I believe.

Who are 'you people'? Unsure
There is an answer here, I just have to come up with it.
Part of the problem that I can see is business owners, such as yourself, always look for the cheapest price, which is understandable.
And, yes, profit is king...but, somehow, the profits are great for a certain few and the rest of us are either remaining stagnant or going backwards.
There is a large union movement in China...perhaps the answer will be for Chinese workers to wake up and get a living wage.


Reply
#7
(06-26-2011, 04:54 PM)GoCometsGo Wrote: I wonder if stimulus money is being spent on this.

From the article:

The new Bay Bridge, expected to open to traffic in 2013, will replace a structure that has never been quite the same since the 1989 Bay Area earthquake. At $7.2 billion, it will be one of the most expensive structures ever built. But California officials estimate that they will save at least $400 million by having so much of the work done in China. (California issued bonds to finance the project, and will look to recoup the cost through tolls.)
Reply
#8
"You people" was aimed collectively at union supporters on the forum who'd like to ignore worldwide pricing costs and trends and pretend we can exist as an economic island instead. (I also realized it was an inflammatory statement, and I expected to catch flak for it.) Smiling

Interesting comment on unions and Chinese workers. That might indeed be an answer.
Reply
#9
(06-26-2011, 05:03 PM)PonderThis Wrote: "You people" was aimed collectively at union supporters on the forum who'd like to ignore worldwide pricing costs and trends and pretend we can exist as an economic island instead.

Interesting comment on unions and Chinese workers. That might indeed be an answer.

Yes, and, at the risk of eliciting forum ire, we could perhaps look at some of our trade agreements which seem to give the U.S. the shaft. Just sayin'. Smiling

Reply
#10
Nobody in the rest of the world is going to pity the U.S. for becoming less of a world power. I hate to say we have it coming, but we have it coming.
Reply
#11
(06-26-2011, 05:09 PM)PonderThis Wrote: Nobody in the rest of the world is going to pity the U.S. for becoming less of a world power. I hate to say we have it coming, but we have it coming.

BRIC, baby.
Brazil, Russia, India and China.

These are our new world super powers.
Reply
#12
(06-26-2011, 05:09 PM)PonderThis Wrote: Nobody in the rest of the world is going to pity the U.S. for becoming less of a world power. I hate to say we have it coming, but we have it coming.

Why do we have it coming?
Reply
#13
(06-26-2011, 05:03 PM)PonderThis Wrote: "You people" was aimed collectively at union supporters on the forum who'd like to ignore worldwide pricing costs and trends and pretend we can exist as an economic island instead.

Who the hell would they be?
Reply
#14
(06-26-2011, 06:04 PM)tvguy Wrote:
(06-26-2011, 05:09 PM)PonderThis Wrote: Nobody in the rest of the world is going to pity the U.S. for becoming less of a world power. I hate to say we have it coming, but we have it coming.

Why do we have it coming?

You of all people would never understand. Smiling

But here's a link you could start with: http://pewglobal.org/2007/03/14/americas...s-project/
Reply
#15
(06-26-2011, 06:11 PM)PonderThis Wrote:
(06-26-2011, 06:04 PM)tvguy Wrote:
(06-26-2011, 05:09 PM)PonderThis Wrote: Nobody in the rest of the world is going to pity the U.S. for becoming less of a world power. I hate to say we have it coming, but we have it coming.

Why do we have it coming?

You of all people would never understand. Smiling

Wow you are really arrogant aren't you, too bad I can't say you are a prick in this section. You know damn well that I'm against the Iraq occupation.
And hell yes I know that much of the world looks down on us because of the Iraq war.
That doesn't mean we have anything coming. I strongly believe that most of the people in favor of what we are doing in the middle east have good intentions and believe we need to protect our selves from terrorists by being there.

Just because our image from some other countries is not as good as it used to be doesn't mean we have anything coming. Maybe you forgot Saddam Husein was a brutal mass murderer? or how much money we spent on Iraq and Afghanistan's infrastructure and schools.
You go ahead and hate this country and the vast majority of what you call "low level humans" and it's people all you want.
From your lofty perch you already look down on soldiers hunters and fisherman but now just by being a freaking American we have something coming?



Reply
#16
[Image: 51VHV75VZYL._SL500_AA300_.jpg]
Reply
#17
I wanna shave my stash like that
Reply
#18
[Image: stash_hero.jpg]
Reply
#19
(06-26-2011, 05:02 PM)Crone Wrote:
(06-26-2011, 04:54 PM)GoCometsGo Wrote: I wonder if stimulus money is being spent on this.

From the article:

The new Bay Bridge, expected to open to traffic in 2013, will replace a structure that has never been quite the same since the 1989 Bay Area earthquake. At $7.2 billion, it will be one of the most expensive structures ever built. But California officials estimate that they will save at least $400 million by having so much of the work done in China. (California issued bonds to finance the project, and will look to recoup the cost through tolls.)
Yes its 6 bucks now. $120 a week if you commute to work daily from the East Bay.
Reply
#20
(06-26-2011, 08:03 PM)cletus1 Wrote: Yes its 6 bucks now. $120 a week if you commute to work daily from the East Bay.

California has 10 days in each week?
Reply


Forum Jump:


Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)