Exclusive: Sekora on Myth of Manufacturing a Superpower

Tiffany Meier
By Tiffany Meier
February 4, 2023China in Focus
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In this next part of our exclusive special series with Michael Sekora, founder and director of the Socrates Project within the Reagan White House, we revisit myth No. 2: how manufacturing is the key when it comes to countering the China threat. Previously, we covered the topic as a slight overview, but this time, we’re digging in.

Sekora notes: “It’s that immersion in finance-based planning that literally caused the problem with manufacturing. And because we’re still immersed in finance-based planning—us being the United States and the Western world, in general—that means we’re just going to make a mistake in the other direction.”

He adds that “the key is not manufacturing.”

“We didn’t lose our competitive advantage by getting rid of manufacturing. We lost our competitive advantage, and with all the financial negative impacts ahead, because we were looking financially at the manufacturing, we’re still looking at the manufacturing. That’s never where the fight was.”

“The fight is down here,” he added.

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