From: David Sterner
Date: 2003 June 16
To: David K. Mesecher

Your keynote articles on the profession are interesting, certainly wide-ranging. They certainly invite us to think about our future.

A possible long-term effect of our military-technology priorities is a Russia/USSR style economy, characterized by:
1) loss of high-volume-manufacturing expertise
2) decline in quality of domestic consumer goods
3) reliance on imported consumer goods

As a result of our US tax structure and foreign labor/overhead subsidies, stateside manufacturing cannot compete once a consumer product becomes a 'commodity item' (the US subsidizes exports of agricultural products and weapons, but not consumer goods). Although manufacturing would return to the US if the dollar continues to fall, a cheap currency also has major drawbacks.

National priorities are set at very high levels (Federal Reserve, Defense Dept., Treasury Dept., etc.). Although Congress 'reviews' these priorities, its ability to effect change is minimal.

Bringing commodity manufacturing back to the USA does not seem practical at this time. Maybe we should study the Russian Federation's engineering education system; they had a 'post industrial age' economy with emphasis on military technology for at least 40 years.

Having participated in '74-'85 semiconductor bubble (calculators, wristwatches, TV games, PCs) and the '85-'95 LAN bubble (NICs, hubs, switches), the trend is fairly obvious; exploit a niche, then exit before the commodity phase.