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Lincolnton Furniture Co. closes after 1 year

Posted: Jan 4, 2013

This is what I call a shame. Americans want to buy American but it all boils down to they don't want to pay the price which, 9 times out of 10, costs more than products bought overseas. We need to support our small American businesses, but how? Between the costs of running a small business, regulations and taxes, how can an American business survive in these times?

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A year after President Barack Obama welcomed the CEO of a North Carolina furniture company to the White House as a demonstration of investment in the U.S. economy, the Lincolnton Furniture Company announced its closing.

CEO Bruce Cochrane confirmed to Charlotte’s WBTV Thursday that the company would shut its doors immediately, laying off 50 employee in the process.

Cochrane — whose family sold their furniture business when they could not compete with foreign manufacturers in the mid-1990s — opened the plant in 2011 and was heralded by President Obama during his “Insourcing American Jobs” forum at the White House last January.

“But in 1996, as jobs began shifting to Asia, the family sold their business, and Bruce spent time in China and Vietnam as a consultant for American furniture makers,” Obama said. “But while he was there, he noticed something he didn’t expect: their consumers actually wanted to buy things made in America. So he came home and started a new company, Lincolnton Furniture, which operates out of the old family factories.”

;

I don't see it as a tax or regulation issue - Fanatical Hypocrite

[ In Reply To ..]
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for cutting a bit of the red tape (though I also want great increases in easy to understand and implement consumer protection regulation - with our congress that's like asking for a miracle), but I doubt that furniture regulations killed this business. Our taxes are low compared to many more prosperous nations. The main problem with our taxes aren't what they take from us, but what they give back. Too much of our money goes into an abyss of corruption and bureaucracy, but I see that as a separate problem to solve. For instance, if I were king of America, I would call our troops home and cut the offense budget in half - just solved all our society's problems. Wow, that was easy.

These problems aside, however, I feel that most of the problem is with the lack of taxation. More specifically, the lack of taxation on outsourcing. While it would have to be done gradually to minimize damage to the economy, we should make outsourcing extremely unprofitable. I would do it through a combination of tax on companies who outsource, higher sales tax on imported items and regulation forcing companies to pay a living wage to all their employees, even if they are overseas. Oh, and of course product import bans for stuff produced without American level regulation.

The problem with fighting China and other countries by peeling back our own regulations is that the reason they compete so well with us is because they use what is essentially slave labor and their Barbie Death Trap(TM) now comes in cadmium flavor. Not all regulation is well-thought out or useful, but the bulk of it was designed to prevent us from becoming them and I like that.

Also, raising the minimum wage has proven to be effective in boosting the economy. The biggest barrier to buying American, as you pointed out, is cost. If you work for a furniture store that doesn't pay you enough to shop at their store and then their competition has to compete with them by lowering their employees wages too and then those people can't buy their furniture either, eventually you create an environment like we have now where no one can shop at their store.

Of course, the ultimate cause of (and, therefore, solution to) the problem is something the government can't control: The rich. As long as our society reveres and worships money and those who have it, we can't recover. Because regardless of whether we raise or lower the taxes, increase or decrease regulation, or raise or lower the minimum wage, the one factor that will always sink us is greed. The rich have to be willing to make a compromise in their lifestyles. If 1% of us take 90% of the pie, there will never be enough to go around.

The sad fact is that they are dooming themselves with their behavior. Once they've collapsed the economy with their selfishness, see how much safety or comfort their worthless currency buys them then.

Your post is very good but I hope you meant Offshoring instead of outsourcing - backwards typist

[ In Reply To ..]
If you really meant outsourcing, that would mean hospitals and physician offices would have to cut off most MTSOs and MTs that work at home would lose their jobs (not that the pay would be a great loss lately) but some MTs are unable, or live too far away from a hospital or doctor, to make the daily trip to a brick and mortar building.

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