since Ca is earthquake territory, i have a feeling the state is very vulnerable to an earthquake
right now.
on the other hand, if there were an earthquake, once the riots stopped, would it end up creating
jobs ? the state would be belly up financially, and the US gov. would have to step in to finance
infrastructure repair.
i have worked in R&D about 95% of the time, but i have always liked manufacturing environments.
i didn't like to see Calif. factories shut down & sent offshore. i think pick & place factories are
totally cool. i got a chance to tour the Convergent Technologies factory in the mid '80's, one
of the first surface mount tech. factories in Calif., besides Solectron. ConvTech made an early
laptop.
i also got a chance to work as a design engineer at Wiltron/Anritsu and Litton Electron Devices, both
in Silicon Valley & both vertically integrated, when i worked there. Wiltron designs & manufactures
microwave equipment; i was there when they developed the K-connector and vector network
analyzer. Litton made radar tubes and radar systems, everything from making their own magnets
to assembling the metallized ceramic structures that became vacuum tubes.
so when people talk about "localizing manufacturing" i remind them, it's re-localizing, not so long
ago WE ACTUALLY MADE STUFF. you could not have a degree and work in manufacturing and make
$20 an hour - enough to buy real estate in Silicon Valley when $40K a year would buy a house near
your job. the other thing about it was - (almost) EVERYBODY MADE MONEY.
i think part of California's unemployment is related to the dis-assembling of the manufacturing
industries. i guess one of the final steps there was the shut-down of Clark Foam in Irvine (or
thereabouts) CA a few years ago. they made most of the surfboard blanks (like 1.5 million
polyurethane foam blanks a year); one of the main reasons they shut down was because Clark
was tired of hassles related to TDI, where the I stands for Iso-cyanate, one of the primary components
of surfboard foam.
maybe under President Obama California manufacturers will have a chance to play around with
more organic material choices (including hemp fiber based) and some of that manufacturing will
be re-patriated.
wow, i went from talking about earthquakes to talking about surfboards & hemp fiber. i must be a Californian !
