Industry Trend
In 1960s and 1970s Carolina was considered the textile capital of the U.S. with thousands of clothing manufactures and hundred thousands of workers but in 1980s the textile industry left the U.S and moved to Mexico, China, Bangladesh and Thailand wherever people would sew clothes for a few dollars a day. The well-known brands of Gaffney, National Textiles, and Cherokee etc. main productive engines of the Carolinas fabric and textiles trade disappeared due to the impact of globalization then suddenly, all textile mills and clothing manufacturing in the Carolinas are gone.
Few years ago, Parkdale Mills, the country's largest textile mill reopened and then hundreds of large and small manufacturing begin to reappear as indication of the resurgence of U.S manufacturing and the “Insourcing” trend. For example, just last year, most clothing makers were buying clothes from factories in India, Thailand and Vietnam but now, it is cheaper to buy them from the U.S. Although there are now many clothing and textiles manufacturing companies in Carolina but these companies do not hire many workers because their factories are operated mostly by robots. A company owner explained: “Clothing is simple and easy to automate. Our robots work 24 hours a day and all week, they can made all kind of clothes depending on the computer programs and we have over six thousand programs for different types of clothes, from simple T-shirt to complex Tuxedo. By made in the U.S we have several advantages. We do not have to pay for transportation costs from shipping overseas. When fashion changes, we can change quickly by replacing the program instead of retraining workers. We do not have to worry about workers go on strike like some events happened in China and India few years ago. Robots do not go on strike or ask for raising wages, the overall costs of automation is high is the first few years due to investments in robots and automation but now it is lower than overseas. Our factories have changed everything to automation and so modern so we do not worry about work safety or fire hazard as what happened in Bangladesh, Thailand. Of course, the U.S government supports us as everything is made here. Beginning this year, we export our clothes all over the world because we have the best materials and high quality.”
In 2012, U.S. textile exports were $22.7 billion and continue to grow about 30% per year. The textile and clothing industry is thriving as an indicative of a broader trend about manufacturing in the US. A recent government survey found that more than half of American companies with manufacturing overseas said they were considering bring back production due to difficulties overseas such as increasing wages, low quality and transportation costs. A manager said: “Twenty years ago, lower cost was important but today with automation, we have better cost, better quality, and better price by made in the U.S. Now we can export our clothes to other places instead of import from them.”
With robots and automation, these factories do not hire labor workers as many as the scale there was before, because machines have replaced humans at almost every point in the production process. However they are hiring software engineers, and computer programmers to control these robots and machines. For example Parkdale manufacturing produces 2.5 million pounds of yarn a week with about 140 workers. In 1980, that production level would have required more than 2,000 people. Apache clothing produces five thousand shirts a week with only 25 workers, twenty years ago they need over 800 people.
What happened to textiles and clothing manufacturing in India, Thailand and Bangladesh? Many are closing when business are gone away with hundred thousand workers getting laid-off. Their economies are beginning to shrink as fast as their factories are shutting down. A factory owner complained: “Globalization is a curse; my business was doing well so I borrow money to expand the company but now everything is gone and I had a huge loan with bank that I cannot pay back. It is a very bad situation that I wish I knew.” A Bangladesh government officer said: “We never suspect it can happen that fast, suddenly many companies stop outsource and left us with a dilemma that we cannot solve. No one explain to us about “Insourcing” and automation as we all believe that this business will last for many years. We should have known better.”
Sources
- Blogs of Prof. John Vu, Carnegie Mellon University
