So I needed a new cordless drill that I use to take injectors apart.
I spent I don't know how many hours at Lowes and Home Depot (the only places anywhere near here with cordless drills) only to find ALL of the cordless drills are now made in China.
The only brand I could not find a definitive origin was Bosch, which said something in spanish about Mexico. But it wasn't even close to what I wanted so I didn't consider buying it.
Otherwise ALL are MIC: B&D, Skil, Dewalt, Hitachi, Porter Cable, Makita, Ryobi, Milwaukee, Rigid, you name it.

A very sad day when it's IMPOSSIBLE to buy a specific product made in the USA.



Oh, and to make things worse, I need new work boots, too.
It ruined my week totally to see that the USA brand Redwing is now MIC as well.

WTH......

 

Yeah I know your feeling. I spend $700 on Milwaukee cordless V18 kit and couple days later I saw CHINA label I was SO MAD

That was 3 years ago. Now I need cordless power tools badly but I know dealer sell USA but that EXTRA $300 what a rip off.


Anyway Santa got me BOSCH power cordless I think 18V lithesome. It make in china but does MUCH BEST than my 8 years old MAKITA cordless drill 14.4 ahm.

My exp with makita when I bought first I feel it flimsy it wasn't REAL Makita that my Dad had for 20 years. But been use until last winter that killed 2 batteries.


Milwaukee
Bosch
Panasonic
Makita
Dewalt

Are still good cordless tool for me.

 

Can't help with the drill,

But look up Matterhorn.
The Official Corcoran and Matterhorn Footwear Website
Made in the U.S.A.!

 

Some Red Wings are made in china, some are made here.

If you wanna spend some money , Get some Arcadia's from Danner. They are made here in the US and our Military wears them. They are high tech gear.

I run Hitachi or Makita stuff, both high quality products that have never been made here. Just cause its oversea's doesn't mean its not quality.
My Milwaukee drill was made here in the US though. It's corded though.

 

Matterhorns are decent boots as well.

 

Damn, that sucks Jim. Hopefully one day we can crawl our way out from under china's heel but I don't see that happening any time soon.

 

FWIW, Snap on still makes their tools in the US, if you're willing to pay the price. That seems to be the case pretty ,much every time. You can get it made in USA if you're willing to pay a premium. I guess that's why they're MiC....

 

My main gripe,i have said all the time ,that if we keep sending our job to foreign companys,there would come a time when nobody would have a job to buy the foreign junk and i think the time is about here but our politiicians dont care as long as it doesn,t effect them
Jim

 

Think about it....we are becoming more and more a service economy; meaning that we provide services to each other. So I pay you to do this for me, you pay me to do that for you, which in theory would work fine except that every once in a while one of us buys something that is produced by someone else. So as time goes on, we are passing fewer and fewer dollars back and forth because we send some of our money somewhere else. When we are sending more dollars out of our system (ie. imported goods) than we are bringing in from outside (ie. exported goods) our system has a leak and eventually we run dry. It is amazing how many things we could buy American if we would just do our homework and pay a few cents more. Even our food....

 

Thats the thing though, we've been made to believe that it's "paying a premium" when it's actually not. The price diferrence is the fact that the china crap is made by 13 year old kids earning a couple bucks a day, instead of a union man making 20 bucks an hour. And that's not a knock on unions, but a fact is a fact. I went to the Nike factory in Hong Kong when I was in the Navy back in '92, that's all there was there was child labor.

 

I see a business opportunity here. I hope someone with money sees the potential. I would pay a premium for "Made in America". I don't think I'm alone.
I know a few businessmen that almost went belly-up when all the manufacturing was sent to china. Well.....their businesses are picking up as the buyers of the crap that comes out of china aren't usable or will pass inspection.
One in particular went from 300+ employees down to 19 over a year and a half period when out of the blue,.......he received a phone call from the bastages that sent his work overseas. "They wanted him to repair the crap from china then set his shop for more production. He now has 150+ employees and rising.
Go team!

Steps down off soap box

 

I wonder how many of you own a business? China has been running mine into the ground bad for years. The ONLY reason I keep at it is so I can keep my wholesale pricing for ME. I have to charge people a premium and most would rather buy a copy of what I make made in China. It doesn't matter that there is a very well documented track record of the chinese copy being so far out of spec it's a wonder all of them haven't blown up. Still cheap is cheap. That's what the majority of people in this country want.

BTW, Hitachi is pretty nice. I've been using their compound sliding miter saw for a long time, also their drills. Sorry but on things like this if you want good get Japanese, Hitachi is Japanese ya know, not Chinese. BIG difference! Taiwan made usually means high quality also.

 

I feel your pain, Jim. You guys all bring up good points. Some of you have read my rants about MiC before, too.

Do your homework, buy MiUSA whenever possible. As you know, it keeps your money here. If that's not possible, buy from the nearest country like Mexico/Canada. It makes our closest neighbors (like Jose!) standard of living better and that's good for us, too. Step further if you have to: Japan and Germany. They make high quality items and they pay workers a fair wage. Next would be Korea, other Asian countries and Taiwan. Taiwan is a notch above mainland China in many regards. Make MiC your last choice as a rule. Quality is generally abysmal. Slave/prison labor are the normal practice. The government is oppressive and dissent is usually crushed. I hate feeding that machine.

Be wary of MotorCraft parts. Many are MiC.
Toyo makes tires in China, Japan and the USA.
Bosch makes stuff here, Mexico and Germany.
Try not to patronize the company if they have nothing but MiC. Let your dollar feed someone else's business.

Most people blindly stare at their MiC shoes as they shuffle through life. Don't be one of those! Make informed choices and decisions (just like reading FTE!)

When I am at the market, I look at the fruit and vegetable origins, I buy only US grown stuff. Talk to your friends about it too in a non-pedantic way. If you rail on them all the time about it, they'll tune you out. Pick your moments. Help to educate them. The point is to get more people to default to this type of behavior of choosing MiUSA.

Pretty soon we'll be talking about India like this.
.

 

I've been trying harder and harder to just buy made in usa stuff. I pay a lot more attention to it than I used to. As far as cordless drills, I own my own carpentry business and use makita. I've had the best luck with them compared to dewalt and milwaukee, haven't tried anything else. Thought about switching to bosch, just haven't.

 

I feel your pain.

The good news is, I'm seeing more and more folks start searching out made in the USA stuff and trying to avoid some of the MIC crap. I've tried to buy US products for years. I don't have an issue with Canada or Mexico products, but sometimes MIC is the only choice you end up with. When that happens, I usually just go for the cheap stuff. I'm not going to pay a premium for some brand name if it's MIC.