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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!
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