Editor's note: In April, the White House announced sweeping tariffs to revitalize American manufacturing. But will production indeed return to U.S. soil as the Trump administration hopes? CGTN has launched a five-part "Return of American Manufacturing?" series to explore this question. The fifth installment examines the labor costs in bringing manufacturing back to the United States.

Josef Gregory Mahoney, a special commentator on current affairs for CGTN, is professor of Politics and International Relations at East China Normal University and concurrent professor of Marxism with the Institute for the Development of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics at Southeast University. The article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

The U.S. did lead the world in manufacturing by many estimates, before declining precipitously. Many Americans believe that "Making America Great Again," in essence, returning to former glories, is both possible and essential for national revival. Some point to the highly successful post-war industrialization experiences of Japan and Germany as proof they can rebuild with the right mix of policies and determination.

It is clear the U.S. can reestablish a significant amount of manufacturing and should do so, above all to support America's position as a producer of core technologies and to ensure the baselines of strategic autonomy essential for national security and emergency preparedness, and can do so without broad decoupling, technology blockades or trade wars.

What is less clear however is how much manufacturing can return to the U.S., realistically speaking, and whether returning as a manufacturing powerhouse, however defined, is achievable and would serve America's best interests or the American people's dreams for themselves.

First, let's confront the ahistorical nonsense of those who point to the experiences of Germany and Japan as indicators the U.S. can do the same. Germany and Japan already had a substantial industrial working-class culture. For those surviving the war, many were satisfied to work in factories, perhaps even a solace following such a defeat.

Labor movements were suppressed at that time as the West moved towards the Cold War, with both Japan and Germany serving as frontline garrisons against America's adversaries. It was also the case that much of the world was still working to realize the second industrial revolution while also taking steps towards the third industrial revolution.

It ought to be obvious but let's state it clear: none of these historical conditions exist for the U.S. today.

Additionally, there are some advantages to having the slate wiped clean. One can create broad institutional alignments, ensuring national planning, investments, infrastructure development, and cultural values are all moving in tandem, along with strategies guiding diplomacy and international trade. One does not have to protect legacy industries, like American politicians pandering to automakers in Detroit, and can instead embrace the latest technologies and production methods.

Furthermore, it is more likely that many all of the "strengths" the U.S. enjoys may prove to be traps.

Take the dollar, for example. Today, the U.S. economy is a house of cards that depends on global dollar hegemony. The U.S. deficit spends to meet its needs, and has fallen into the habit of externalizing costs associated with its own governance failures onto the rest of the world, as it did during the global financial crisis in 2008 and again during the pandemic, given extraordinary interventions by the Federal Reserve.

In short, the U.S. depends on the dollar, and yet, most economists agree the U.S. cannot be a global manufacturing powerhouse and sustain the dollar, neither its relative strength nor its position as the global reserve currency. Nevertheless, to abandon either risks total collapse.

Let's assume the U.S. could rebuild a massive manufacturing base while ignoring existential concerns like climate change, which was instigated by unchecked industrialization in the first place. Let's assume Trump can simultaneously achieve major structural reforms to U.S. political and economic systems despite America's system of divided government and polarized electorate. Let's assume that people in the U.S. and around the world would actually be able to afford many of the products produced in the United States, and that these products would be at the cutting edge despite the risks protectionism brings to innovation.

We would still be left with another concern: would a sufficient number of Americans be willing to work in factories, and do so for wages that are globally competitive?

Presently, labor shortages remain a key challenge for U.S. manufacturing. For decades, American factories have found it difficult to meet staffing needs, even in times of recession and contraction.

In 2023, the National Association of Manufacturers reported 700,000 unfilled manufacturing jobs in the United States. In 2024, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported approximately 622,000 vacancies. Also in 2024, the Census Bureau reported approximately 20.6 percent of manufacturing plants in the U.S. failed to produce at full capacity due to insufficient labor supply.

While some of these shortages are being worsened by policies like mass deportations of foreigners living in the U.S., they also correspond to longer-term trends, including significant declines in the national labor force participation rate since the 1990s.

Furthermore, only 25 percent of young Americans surveyed prefer jobs in manufacturing, according to research from the Cato Institute. Consequently, while some estimates suggest the U.S. could theoretically create 3.8 million new manufacturing jobs by 2033, current trends indicate many perhaps would remain vacant.

This is a cultural problem in part. Young Americans today dream of getting rich and famous being outlandish TikTok influencers and having the latest model of iPhone: they do not dream of making iPhones or accepting the sort of political or economic discipline that such an economy requires.

A simple comparison: the average monthly wages for manufacturing labor in Vietnam this year is roughly $320. The median monthly earnings for workers in the U.S. is more than $4,700, which is too high to be globally competitive except in protected industries but still too low to attract enough Americans to work.

More to the point, we have already passed a Rubicon, one in which most countries, high-income countries especially, can no longer focus on the old paradigms of mass industrialization to actualize or sustain development. Instead of approaching this reality in a retrograde and reactionary way as the Trump administration is doing, the U.S. should better grasp the economic realities it and the rest of the world actually face and explore real cultural and political innovations to realize sustainable development policies.

(If you want to contribute and have specific expertise, please contact us at opinions@cgtn.com. Follow @thouse_opinions on X, formerly Twitter, to discover the latest commentaries in the CGTN Opinion Section.)