I confess that the whole issue of prices and international trade boggles my mind. It reminds me of the story of the blind men and the elephant, where "all were partly in the right and all were in the wrong" because noone was able to grasp the whole picture.

My personal belief is that we're all in this together. It's when we forget that point, that it all starts to fall apart. What was the Golden Rule all about? We need to ask ourselves "What are my values?" and then make sure that our actions line up with that. If you have a bounty, share it; if you can buy it locally-grown or from a neighborhood store, do that; shop for a fair price but please understand that "fair" means that everyone along the line from farmer to factory worker to store clerk should be able to have food on their table and a roof over their head.

(Spoken from a Christian perspective but I think it's a concept that is common to other faiths as well.)

Thanks for letting us all know what is really happening. Good to hear that things will get better. In the mean time, our stashes value has gone up as well. So get sewing girls and guys. :lol: Jan

Gee, there's a surprise! We all know about "That" look!! I agree with you wholeheartedly though-just said the same thing to my DH-especially on the basics.

We need to be willing to pay a fair price for goods. I for one, choose to buy the item or goods made by my country men. Yes, they deserve to make a living. As Americans we all need to work together,unions, workers, consumers and government. The last 20 years I watched the young people in my family buy cars from other countries. I still don't understand it. They just don't get how it has hurt our country. Buy USA goods.

Cars are a bit off the subject, but some Fords are made in Mexico and our Honda was made in the US (Kentucky, I believe). And there's a Subaru plant about an hour away. It's hard to tell what is made in the US anymore with some things.

And to keep it on topic, I would probably be willing to pay more for US made fabrics, but I wonder if I could afford it. I would have to buy less fabric since I generally have a set amt to spend. But maybe then my room would be neater.

Thank you so much for sharing this information....some times it is hard to find! :thumbup: :thumbup:

Interesting thread...thanks

There is unpicked cotton all over GA=====shortage of cotton?????go figure. And yes we need to make things in the US....................then we would have plenty of jobs! Why does something that sounds so simple seem to escape the minds in the business world?

The only valid information we can derive from simply comparing wages across the world is the indication of each regional economic level. That's all. A specific wage number from one economy can only be assessed as fair (or not) by knowing where it stands relative to cost of living in the same region.

The flight of manufacturing from the U.S. to China was only possible because multi-national corporations could have the work done in China at much lower wages - then ship to consumers in America to purchase "at a bargain." The profits were huge. Like I stated before, when the U.S. economy was drained of enough jobs at reasonable wages, the profit system collapsed because that cycle was broken.

Over two decades, that event put more stress on our economy forcing more people to demand lower priced basic products. They had no choice. One consequence was that our government grew to unsustainable levels in an attempt to keep people from becoming homeless and starving - and at the same time catered to mega-business to keep the political funding coming into congressional campaigns. The result has been the slow and painful elimination of the middle-class. One of the major corporate CEO's lamented in a televised discussion of executives that his greatest career mistake was in not understanding the value of the American middle-class (in this context, it's all workers with an income large enough to keep them from requiring financial assistance, up to $250,000/family).

Credit has done more damage to the economy than all other factors combined.

I wouldnt mind so much paying the higher prices for goods if they were made here and helping to support our economy instead of an over seas one. In the end we are stil going to be paying more I would just rather it stayed here..