And you thought you were ripped off...

[Anonymous]

If you don't like the economy, you can all thank Congress, Unions, And Bush! Unions have been making sure that it's members are overpaid for almost a century(don't forget to pay your dues!). Congress has been getting pay raises at an alarming rate, don't forget that they gave TAX BREAKS to the RICH[:(!](so the poor and middle class people can foot the bill for everyone). And then there is Bush[:o)], Who ignored al qaida terrorist warnings( which cost millions in cleanup for 9-11),attacked Iraq(who didn't have nukes!!!)[:(!] and sent millions of $ in supplies to REBUILD Iraq, on top of buying 30 million gallons of diesel fuel DAILY [:(!] to keep our troops and equipment over there. Not to mention that he gave up on trying to find Bin Laden(who appears to be the ring leader) to go after Hussien, who's capture essentially meant NOTHING. The U.S.A. is NOT here to play babysitter to the world. Let the world wipe it's own ***!! Worry about the problems we have at HOME!!!!!!!!!
Hey Bush, Let's spend our tax $$$ at home , you F%#*ing MORON!!!!!

[Anonymous]

(mainecentral229: Don't blame it all on Bush, Bill Clinton ruined our country for several decades. I'm surprised he didn't try to sell the U.S. to Mexico or something. I would be against the Gulf War II also, but we captured Saddam, and I think as soon as we did that we should have pulled our troops out and let them morons at the U.N. handle it.)
To sum up what Bill Matthewson and others have said, the "hobby" part of our hobby is dying away. What's the average modeler going to do, custom paint and detail or buy a superdetailed model for $300 that's equipped with sound? How many of us scratchbuild structures or buy Walthers built-ups? (nothing against Walthers, they just make a lot of structures.) And now, who are we going to buy our models from, the Local Hobby Shop or Some big distributer like Trainworld or Model Expo who sell models at half price? In our country inflation has caused small companies to sell for more and large companies with the capital to do it, sell for less. I myself am partial to superdetailed models but if I ever would have enough extra money lying around, would I buy a brass model? No, I'd buy a plastic model with nice basic details and and superdetail it myself if I had the desire to. It like Terry Thomson wrote about in one issue of MR- start a progect now and then. Don't order that detailed to death Proto 2000 SD60M, buy an athearn Blue Box engine and detail it yourself if you have the skill to do so. I'm only 14 and so don't have a lot of extra money for trains, so I try to buy lower cost models when I can(if they're easy to detail or would look OK not detailed at all) And bigblow69, the one problem about "not buying products from China" now is that everything is made overseas. It would be OK if we could have a choice as to if we wanted to buy imported or domestic models, but that will never happen either. Maybe I shouldn't have focused on problem railroads have and focus on the problems MODEL RAILROADERS have.

[Roadtrp]

QUOTE: Originally posted by carpenter matt

Thank Little Billy Clinton for signing Nafta for all the overseas production and everyone leaving the US manufacturing world. And the enviro people for not drilling in the gulf for your Gas prices(@#$&^& Opec

NAFTA dealt with trade between the US and Mexico, and to a lesser extent Canada. (NORTH AMERICAN free trade agreement). It has absolutely nothing to do with jobs going overseas to China or India. Ol' Slick had his faults, but signing NAFTA was not one of them. By most accounts the United States has in fact benefited considerably from NAFTA.

As for gas prices, we drill plenty in the Gulf of Mexico. The "enviro people" have been trying to prevent drilling in the unspoiled and ecologically sensitive areas of Alaska. I'm not saying we should NEVER drill there, but I think it might be a better idea to get people out of their gas guzzling SUV's to start with.

[:)]

[Anonymous]

Roadtrp, I'm having a bad day. needed to gripe even if I was inaccurate.

[Roadtrp]

Matt,

Cool... griping is always good. I just hate to see old Slick Willy get unfairly picked on. But you certainly aren't the first person to mistakenly think that NAFTA is responsible for work going overseas. [:)]

[Anonymous]

Tell me WHO signed in NAFTA and our membership with WTO then if it wasn't Bill Clinton. AND YOU THINK NAFTA WAS BENEFICIAL??!! You mean to tell me that laying thousands of American workers off (it turned into millions when China came in) IS BENEFICIAL TO OUR ECONOMY? Look at the layed off workers point of view, or live on a $400 unemployment check every month, and tell me it is beneficial to our economy. Who thought up of this abonimation called NAFTA? It was congress and the CLINTON ADMINISTRATION! Not to start a political fight here, if I wanted that I'd watch Hardball, but that is who signed us in to Both NAFTA and WTO.

[Anonymous]

Think happy thoughts"TRAINS" not politics Trains Oh but the voices! Trains I say[:D]

[BRAKIE]

I work Union..And I thank God for that..I would hate to try to live on minimum wage with todays prices-just ask the millions that do work for or just a little above minimum wage.I fully believe a worker should get a good days pay for a good days work-and not bee exploited by greedy corporations that makes millions of dollars off the workers sweat and pays their workers very little with no benefits.[8] But then I realized that is a old and out dated thought to todays Corporate America where greed and cut backs is the norm.
Now for you that believe Corporate America loves you ask the millions of white and blue color workers that are out of work due to cut backs..Yes,Coporate America loves you so much they are sending YOUR jobs over seas.Can you learn to say "Welcome to McDonald's.May I take your order?
Its not Wal-Mart,The Government ,but Corporate America's greed that is causing the down fall of America.
Every President has play a roll in what we see today..The current President has us in a war we can no longer hope to win but all to sadly body bags are being filled every day.He and congress has done nothing to help the economy,the lost of both white and blue collar jobs.

As far as the robber baron prices we are paying for our model trains we need to blame nobody but our selves.You see if we are not modelers enough to add the details we want on a locomotive and car then of course the model manufacturers will do that for us at a premium price..Some cry" I don't have time to do that or build a simple car kit."..Really? Spend less time watching TV.
Now what really gets my goat is when I see modelers cheering on the higher prices by saying the cost of manufacturing went up..Of course it did you ninny..Look at all of those added detail parts you could have easily added yourself.

[Roadtrp]

cjm89

Please repeat after me...

NORTH AMERICAN FREE TRADE AGREEMENT. Last time I checked China was not in North America. NAFTA involved trade regulations between NORTH AMERICAN countries only.

Yes, Clinton did sign NAFTA, and I never disputed that. I disputed the assertion that NAFTA resulted in jobs going overseas, which is totally and completely false.

P.S. I could point out that it is in fact the Bush administration that has changed regulations making it much easier to trade with China, but I won't bother. Facts have never convinced a Republican of anything. [;)]

[Anonymous]

I MEANT CHINA IN THE WTO (World Trade Org.) The NAFTA agreement didn't send jobs overseas, it sent them north and south of the border. Look how many tools and car parts are made in Mexico. Now, lets stop acting like we're all politicians on HARDBALL or JOE SCARBORUOGH and get back to the main point of this post. WE, as model railroaders, are gettin' ripped off by high prices and not much choice except for models made in China with a few exceptions. We're getting a little off topic here with Bill C. and NAFTA woes.

[Anonymous]

Slick Willy may have signed NAFTA, but Bush 41 put the whole deal together on his watch and basically pointed at the spot on the document for 'ol Slick to sign. NAFTA has nothing to do with China making model trains, dress shirts or power tools; its charter was/is to reduce trade barriers and tariff costs across borders with Mexico and Canada. The hope was for US manufacturers to 'farm out' a lot of the unskilled labor content especially to Mexice and to encourage increased importiation of USA made goods in return, with the hoped -for costs reduction making USA made goods more affordable (and more profitable for the maker). Maybe some of those really upset with this "model railroad stuff from China thing " should vent their anger on Athearn, Broadway, Life-Like, Bachmann, and even Walthers.. Just don't buy their products if it is so upsetting. Vote with your dollars. When I purchased my first Proto 2000 diesel quite a few years ago (Alco FA/FB in GE/Alco demo paint I didn't realize at first where it was made until I got beyond all the incredible attention to detail that was, at that time, more likely to be found on a Korean or Japanese brass unit costing several times more that still needed to be painted. My reaction is still clear as a bell today- I couldn't believe that the unfairly stereotyped Chinese workers could have done such incredible work, and how could Life-Like have priced it so low. I wondered how they could do all that fine error- free hand application of details, get the paint shades and markings so accurate and mass produce such a smooth running ,troublefree mechanism. It was obvious that they had sweated the details. It was even more amazing that it was a Life-Like product which previously ranked right in there about half way between Athearn and the very bottom of the chart. I promptly picked up three more A units and another B unit. When the next Proto 2000 release came out I bought two. And then I sold my AHM and IHC E units, all my Athearn 'blue box GP and F units and asking myself why couldn't Athearn do this-heck their GP7 still had a way too wide body shell to enclose their old-tech monster motor. I remember buying my first Athearn rubber band drive F unit in the fifties-its the same body shell still found in their blue box. I was dismayed at how we couldn't even make a similar high quality modeldiesel right in the LA area. When the Proto 2000 E units arrived I got rid of all my brass. Beautiful stuff but saw no reason to keep it except for bragging rights, which I could care less about. If you like brass great. Getting accurate models that look right ,run great at a fair price is most important to me. Am I angry at Life-Like ? Why should I be - their stuff is a bargain and their quality is superb. Would I rather buy American? You bet , but who's making it? Maybe if we considered that American companies are essentiallly subcontracting out the part of their manufacturing process that would be cost prohibitive to do in the USA, and I believe that is exactly what most of them are doing. The profits that enable them to continue to develop more quality products, are staying in this country. FYI - Big Blue (IBM) has been doing this for years and their stuff is still expensive!

[Anonymous]

If the price of a model railroad item is the only concern for some, wait until its been on the shelf for a while and look for it at a discount on the internet or from a mail order house. ( Isn't that the same thing?) Just don't complain when your local friendly hobby shop closes its doors. Or, you can work out a deal, like I am with a local shop to order most all of my stuff from him if he'll be competive. Make it easy on the retailer -ask for a copy of his order form from his distributor or manufacturer and fill it out for him. You might be pleasantly surprised-it works with your more motivated hobby shops. **** Hay mainecentral229-who are you going to vote for? Excuse my sarcasim, but your understanding of what we've all been debating or venting about is a bit twisted. May I make two suggestions-stop watching CBS news-try FOX and get your facts straight , and the other is to please refrain from vulgar expletives, even if you have carefully inserted other characters-young kids are on this Forum and although I'm 58 and hardly a prude, there's another time and place for that; you obviously let the water - level drop below your crown sheet. Perhaps it's still too cold way up there in the Maine woods, or you've just attended a Kerry rally nearby. Sorry to be so harsh, but like this topic, you really got under my skin.. Now can we please go 'play with our trains' and suffer the ridicule for doing so from our wives or significant others? "It's time to call it a day. . ."

[Anonymous]

bill matthewson, you made a very good point there... now it comes into my mind that the remote-control cars I used to have when I was 8 were $70-$100, made in China, and Shorted Out after a year of running- boy, that used to make me mad! Maybe it would help if we knew who was making our model trains- I'm sure there's some nice folks in the bunch. I suppose you're all right.. we still have it better than any other country here and our hobby although definetly not cheap- is still lest costly than other hobbies with fine quality equipment. There's still a lot of our models made in the USA too.. you just have to look around for them. PLEASE... IF YOU'RE GOING TO POST, DON'T INCLUDE ANY POLITICS OR ANY INDUSTRIES AND COMPANIES IN THEM- IT WILL JUST ALL GET US INTO AN ARGUEMENT! I WOULD HAVE LEARNED NOT TO DISCUSS POLITICS WITH OTHER MODEL RR'S OR ANYONE ELSE SOONER OR LATER ANYWAY.. MIGHT AS WELL LEARN IT HERE AND NOT IN PUBLIC![;)]

[Anonymous]

Bill Matthhewson is talking about there's kids on this post-look at me I'm 14 and started the whole thing! Probably what sparked me off is when I ordered 3 Intermountain boxcars because I thought they're products were made here and I knew their cars were good quality, then I found out Intermountain R-T-R was made in China! I couldn't believe it! It kinda made me mad, as you understand by now. I hate it when I buy something, thinking I was supporting my country, and it's imported.

[Anonymous]

Although I got all caught up in this topic because it really torks me when people seek to blame, especially blaming the wrong party (not nesessarily a political 'party'), you're absolutely correct. We did get a little far afield from model trains on one hand, but obviously it opened up a few wounds and may have caused a few more. Maybe we all understand each others point(s) of view a little better after this, maybe not. But it did get one thinking, didn't it. Got to go- Hannity is on the tube. . .Subterrainian homesick blues"

[Anonymous]

I have no problem with a company looking to increase its profits. I'm sick & tired of people who think companies or this country owes them something. People need to adapt their skills and stop complaining.