Yes. I'm living in on the planet where in our country GDP has tripled in real terms in the last 50 years and the number of people in employment has risen in my lifetime from 24 million to 29.19 million today.



We are currently close to or in a double dip recession. When that happens output drops and unemployment rises. But recessions end and long-term growth continues.

You understand that really, don't you?

I've a feeling I'm a lot older than you. When you've seen this stuff go round a few times you'll look at it with a different perspective.



Gary, what it has to do with the price of fish is that people work hard and improve their circumstances. Over generations those improvements are compounded. That's easy to understand, isn't it?

Anyway. Essentially, your idea on this thread is that it is a disaster that an amp manufacturer was bought out and has moved its production elsewhere. I think that is a bit of a pity as far as brand loyalty is concerned but it is not a disaster, either for the brand or for the economy.

By having a very free market in our country we make ourselves vulnerable to foreign takeover, but on average we benefit because we buy more overseas companies than we lose. As I mentioned, Marshall just bought the US company Eden. Provided they run it well that is a good thing for all concerned: more profit for Marshall; more investment, development and sales for Eden. More income, more jobs.

If you feel frustrated about Vox, take encouragement from all the fine British amp companies, from small to large, right up to Marshall, the most successful amp maker in the world. We punch well above our weight at this stuff.

It's not so bad.

Cheers - C

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Gary; You've made a lot of good points. But I hope you realize this type of problem has a lot of grey area and no one right answer. If you take your view point to the extreme you would have a country that was out of date and being passed by, by the rest of the world. We have the same issues here in the U.S. Our auto industry is currently benefitting from a "buy U.S." sentiment. But if they don't deliver on features and quality the customers will be right back at the import dealers. If their unions get too powerfull and the prices get too high to compensate, the customers will be right back at the import dealers.
You say most workers would be happy to stay physically toiling in a factory job. I run my own construction company and I don't find that to be true. Most young people I hire don't want to work physical jobs and are constantly looking to cut corners to make their life easier, even if it means putting out a poor product. It's a sad situation. The world is changing, possibly not for the better. But becoming a luddite isn't a real answer.

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Hi, well i know it's a complex situation but if we give in to this farming all our manufacturing out to these Asian countries there'll be little left. As it is, despite what Ceri says, i see it with my own eyes, i'm from Scotland, Ceri is in London i believe, anyway i see manufacturer after manufacturer going to the wall unable to compete. Many jobs are ending here and being outsourced to countries like India, Korea and the like and it just isn't right.

Now going by the argument that someone made on here British and US workers should be prepared to work for the same pittance that the people in these countries are working for. Entirely different situations, you can't compare the UK and the US to India or Korea or China. What people are prepared to do in those places people won't stand for here. But yet we have someone saying that "more fool you's! you should work for the slave wages!" That kind of thinking is not on. Also what you have to bear in mind is the cost of living here in the UK and the US compared to these other places where the cost of living is dirt cheap.

As for younger people well i agree a lot of them are lazy and don't want to work hard but there are a lot of folks who do and would be delighted at the prospect of a hands on manufacturing job. The point i was trying to make to Ceri is that he quoted his father and the jobs he had done, but that is in no way relevant to what i'm talking about. I am talking about generations of people who don't have lofty ambitions of becoming a journalist or a newspaper editor, ordinary people doing ordinary jobs then those jobs are taken away because of this very attitude of always trying to undecut people constantly. I say we should keep as much work here as we can and that includes building Vox amps, cars, ships, let the Chinese, Koreans, Indians look after themselves.

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Luck won't do it and ignorance can't

George Van Eps.

Oops Well, it's still British in a way, just not corporately.

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"reach for the sky and aim for the moon, for if you miss you will end up among the stars"

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http://www.youtube.com/user/Almungo/videos?flow=grid&view=0

Everyones been making some real good points here, it is a very complex issue with very simple and real consequences for those involved.
Take James Dyson for instance, as far as i know had successful products, making money so what does he do, transfer most/all production to eastern Europe what a guy.

The bottom line is once large industries are shut down, farmed out or just run out of steam whole communities never really recover prosperity wise.
Least not the ones where the main industries employing tens of thousands were the only industries in these areas.
As for me my employer is now Indian, they also own Jaguar Land Rover etc etc. Were currently losing (depending on whos figures are nearest) between 20 - 30 million pounds a month and if we hadnt been bought out a few years ago id have been on the scrapheap job wise!
One things for sure........never ever ever believe politicians!!!!!

.... Al

I don't know if it is an encouraging sign or not but, I understand that many manufacturing giants in the US are looking to re-open plants back home. I suspect that it has as much to do with quality issues overseas combined with the current public perception of companies that choose to do their business that way.

I, too would prefer that Vox-es and Marshalls to be built in the UK and my Fenders to be built in California...and Gibsons built in Kalamazoo, etc.

But time and business move forward, and very little of that will be true.

I'll leave the economical debate to those with a greater grasp on it, but while I wish things were like they were "before", it just isn't going to happen. (As the old saying goes, "Wish in one hand...")

Since the "modern" economy doesn't allow my wishes to become true, I'll deal with it. The only thing I am concerned about is the human rights and environmental/ecological abuses that are rampant in China...as well as product safety (lead paint? C'mon...)

I try not to buy products made in China for those reasons...however, I know I will eventually do so. I've had my eye/ear/heart on an AC15 for a few years, and I assume the new Excelsior and Greta amps (both of which I'm interested in) are probably built in China, too.

I guess that makes me a hypocrit.

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Good Vibes To Y'all!



Screamin' Armadillos
Texas Roadhouse Music
Guitar/Slide Guitar/Harp/Vocals

It doesn't really make you a hypocrite SA. If you are happy to buy the amp and you know it's Chinese made then it's ok as far as i'm concerned, as it's down to the individual. Now for me i won't be buying any of those chinese made Vox amps as i don't want to encourage work being lost from British shores to shore up the chinese economy. I would rather be paying money for a british made product which would help the british economy. I'm not going to be a goody two shoes and say i care for what happens to the chinese or indian economy, i don't. At this moment in time the way things are i have more than enough concerns regarding folks here having work and me condoning this transference of labour by buying a chinese AC30 or AC15 is not right as far as i'm concerned.

For the money Vox are asking for these Chinese AC30's i could buy a proper USA made fender amp still made in the US and still with some heritage and prestige. If i bought the Vox i would be buying it more for the clean tones, so a fender would more than cover those bases, taking into consideration the Vox situation. I think there are many people who feel as i do and don't want to encourage this sort of thing.

OR what they should have done when they sold the company, Vox that is, or Rose Morris, depending on what way you look at it , is they should have insisted that the amps be renamed in some way to let people know that this is a Chinese amp, not a British one. When i bought my AC4TV i was under the impression at the time that these amps were made in Britain, if i had known that they were made where they are would i have bought it? i don't think so. I'm not that bothered about that situation because the amp was not expensive so it's not that big a deal but there are still many people who don't know that Vox was bought over and the rights to build their equipment was sold down the river to the chinese.

This part of the Vox situation is kept very quiet, the Chinese connection if you like. Looking at ads for the amps here the AC15, the AC30 on looking at the descriptions nothing is mentioned about the amps being built in China, why not? You have a situation where they are using the past prestige of the British company to promote chinese amps all the while with union Jack stickers on them! Why are they using union jack stickers on Vox amps when they are made in China and all the british rights to the brand don't exist?

At the end of the day i don't blame the chinese, they are seeing an opportunity and grasping it. I blame the previous owners of Vox, who instead of considering their obligation to their own british workforce, could only think about their pockets and decided to sell the company. That gets back then again to what i'm talking about as regards letting people know right from the outset "this is no longer a proper AC30 built in the UK, this is a chinese approximation of an AC30."

None of that is done and ads all over the place continue to have the Vox brand and the British heritage is pushed super hard with the union jack all over the place, when it no longer applies! they're made in China! why not have the chinese flag on them if everyone is being honest?

If i buy another amp, which is in doubt because of the economical situation i think i will be buying a hand made one that is made right here in Glasgow. The company concerned will build versions of all the Fender classics and at least i know then that i'm getting what i pay for and not a copy of the real thing.

You have people on here who and they're from the UK, think this is progress, that british firms selling the rights to their business to foreign companies is progress, all the while the workers here lose their jobs. That's deemed ok by some as they can be retrained! what if they were happy doing what they did before? what if they're getting older and they've reached that point in life when they don't want to be re-trained?

There's a whole lot more issue's on this road than the person on here who proposes this thinks, or maybe they just like to ignore them because it's progress?

Progress in whose eyes? certainly not mine.

_________________
Luck won't do it and ignorance can't

George Van Eps.

To me this is part of the problem with the attitude of so many people at the moment. Times are hard and regardless of whether you're happy or don't want to retrain, sometimes you have to. Too many people think they deserve to have a job where they get to do whatever they want getting paid £100,000+ a year. That's not the way it is and it's not the way its ever been.

They decided to sell the company, the name copyright and the right to use it is the company. After all if Vox amps are made in China, with all their components, what part of that is in any way related to the original company? you got it in one : the copyright and the permission to call their amps Vox. So let's not split hairs they sold the company end of story otherwise they'd still be making them in the factory in England.


Maybe more than you think. I'd rather pay that than play through an amp made in China calling itself a Vox. But once again you're looking at it from a personal point of view instead of seeing the big picture. Why not keep the work done here? if that leads to a reduction in the workforce then that would have to be looked at but it's better to keep the product made here instead of in China. At least that way we keep some of our own folks in work instead of supporting the Chinese economy. Let them look after their own.

_________________
Luck won't do it and ignorance can't

George Van Eps.

I didn't want to go back to college or move away from the home I had lived in for 20+ years (and 40 years in the same town!), but my addiction to eating made both of those things necessary when I was laid off in 2010.

I laugh when I hear politicians claim that the minimum wage needs to be increased...they feel that "everyone" will have greater buying power. They ignore the fact that if the kid flipping burgers were to make $8/hr (not a living wage by any stretch of the imagination), the burger he's flipping would increase in price (significantly)...that would spread to every level of the economy, and eventually it would make the poor even poorer. They're obviously trying to appeal to the poor (who are making minimum wage or barely above it) for support and votes.

One thing I wonder about, though. If everyone gets a Bachelor's degree, wouldn't that make it equal to the education level of an Associate's degree now? Likewise, if everyone gets a Master's, would that be considered equal to a Bachelor's? Somewhere along the line somebody's gotta go out there and start building, designing, servicing or delivering something. Even if everyone could afford college (which isn't going to happen), everyone couldn't afford to take four or six or eight years to finish it...

An education only proves that you can finish something you started. Most of the "knowledge" I've acquired in college I'll never use again (after passing the test for that subject); however, my work experience wasn't enough to get a job, so I'm back in school (and I'll graduate in late March/early April!).

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Good Vibes To Y'all!



Screamin' Armadillos
Texas Roadhouse Music
Guitar/Slide Guitar/Harp/Vocals

Not if you have some money in the bank to fall back on you don't

But anyway where do you get that £100,000 crap from? is that just an arbitrary figure you pulled out of thin air or do you have some evidence to back that up? where i live no one earns anywhere near that, no one. You're saying that people expect to get a wage like that that's absurd. You're trying to make headlines with that claim.

_________________
Luck won't do it and ignorance can't

George Van Eps.

Hyperbole.

Is that like the Superbole that's gonna be in Indiana next week? (Just kidding)...

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Good Vibes To Y'all!



Screamin' Armadillos
Texas Roadhouse Music
Guitar/Slide Guitar/Harp/Vocals

Hyperbole.[/quote]
Is that like the Superbole that's gonna be in Indiana next week? (Just kidding)...[/quote]
Yes. But better.