'Does Anybody Honestly Believe Manufacturing Is Coming Back To The US?' One Person Asked. Says, 'You'd Have To Pay Americans $40–$50/Hr'

A Reddit post questioning the future of manufacturing in the U.S. sparked an avalanche of opinions this week. The original poster was straightforward: "You’d have to pay Americans $40-$50 an hour to work inside a manufacturing building, probably higher with benefits." 

And they argued that bringing back domestic production would make consumer goods like iPhones way more expensive: "That $1,300 iPhone would easily be $3,000."

So, is a real comeback for American manufacturing on the table?

Don't Miss:

• Deloitte's fastest-growing software company partners with Amazon, Walmart & Target – Many are rushing to grab 4,000 of its pre-IPO shares for just $0.26/share!
• Hasbro, MGM, and Skechers trust this AI marketing firm — invest pre-IPO from $0.60 per share now.

Automation, Not Labor, Is the Real Trend

The most common response was that even if manufacturing comes back, humans won't be the ones doing most of the work. "If it does, it will be mostly automated," one user wrote, pointing to Canon's fully automated camera factory in Japan as a real-world example. Another added, "New Chinese car factories are just supervised robots with a few humans for quality control."

One user summed it up with a bit of dark humor: "The factory of the future will have only two employees, a man and a dog. The man is there to feed the dog. The dog is there to stop the man from touching the equipment."

Labor Costs Are Just One Part of the Puzzle

Others pushed back on the $40/hour claim. One Redditor noted that most manufacturing jobs in the U.S. pay around $17 to $25 per hour. Managers might make $30 to $35. Still, even that adds up quickly for employers compared to overseas options.

Trending: BlackRock is calling 2025 the year of alternative assets. One firm from NYC has quietly built a group of 60,000+ investors who have all joined in on an alt asset class previously exclusive to billionaires like Bezos and Gates.

Another chimed in with data: "Chinese factory workers make [around] $32,000 a year." In other words, they're not working for $5 a day anymore.

Furthermore, Gen Z is not particularly interested in factory jobs, despite the increasing number of openings as older workers retire. 

Building Factories Isn't a 90-Day Project

Even if companies wanted to bring manufacturing back to the U.S., it wouldn't be fast or cheap. "Preconstruction alone for a new facility would take about a year," said one construction worker. 

A user in project engineering added, "As an engineer, the logistics of moving production to the other side of the world presents a host of logistical challenges that would take years to resolve."

See Also: Mark Cuban Backs This Innovative Startup That Turns Videos into Games  — Claim Your Share Now

Tariffs, Politics, and Broken Promises

Several commenters pointed to policy uncertainty as a huge barrier. As one put it, "Thing is, these trade policies will be reversed in the next election with a new President. Not many companies are going to move their manufacturing back to the U.S. because it takes years to build a factory and by then, these policies will be a distant memory." 

Others saw the situation as more chaotic than malicious. "I honestly don't believe in the ‘evil genius with a decades-long plot’ thing anymore. But I get the appeal. It's comforting to think there's a plan. Even an evil plan. Because the alternative—that these people are just not very smart and it's all chaos—is even more terrifying."

Read Next:

• Can you guess how many retire with a $5,000,000 nest egg? The percentage may shock you.
• Inspired by Uber and Airbnb – Deloitte's fastest-growing software company is transforming 7 billion smartphones into income-generating assets – with $1,000 you can invest at just $0.26/share!

Image: Shutterstock