Self-Defeating Deportations

Federal agents detain Korean workers in Georgia (Fox News)

While the majority of Americans supports border control in some form, the manner in which the policy is executed threatens to erode that support. Alleged deportation abuses of migrants from south of the border gets all the (negative) publicity, but last week's actions against South Korean workers at a battery plant in Georgia is an unforced error by the Administration.

More than 300 South Korean workers were sent back to South Korea on Thursday after being arrested in an immigration raid on a battery factory next to the Hyundai plant. “This could significantly impact future direct investment in the U.S.,” [President Lee Jae Myung] said at a news conference. South Korean companies “can’t help hesitating a lot” about making new investments in the U.S. if their workers are liable to end up in detention facilities.

Companies often bring in skilled workers to get factories up and running and to train local staff. “It’s not like these are long-term workers,” Mr. Lee continued. “When you build a facility or install equipment at a plant, you need technicians, but the U.S. doesn’t have that workforce and yet they won’t issue visas to let our people stay and do the work.”

U.S. policies can conflict with each other: 1) peaceful containment of China requires strengthening relations with Asian countries like South Korea and india; 2) building up American manufacturing involves penalizing potential and actual allies with tariffs. Deporting South Korean workers when there are not enough skilled Americans to do the work is not only self-defeating but sours a relationship with an important ally.

Ordering the Georgia plant to hire American workers when there aren't any seems as foolish as California shutting down gasoline refineries and fossil-fuel energy plants before alternative-energy replacements are on line.

The Bleeding Edge

We've been watching, not participating in, one of the technologies that's on the verge of exploding into public consciousness. 3-D printers priced in the range of $2,000-$3,000 have hit the market. These devices enable individuals to create products cheaply and quickly without sending the design to a fabrication facility. One example:

Many custom dental fittings are now 3-D printed—like the series of mouth guards, each slightly different from the last, that are used to change tooth alignment over months. After a dental technician scans the current position of the teeth, all positions intermediate to the desired end point are modeled by software and then printed out in plastic. Also, if you’re lucky enough to have a dentist who can replace a crown in a single sitting, it’s because models are 3-D printed and then the replacement teeth are milled right there in the office.

(SJMN graphic)

Another example, but potentially much more disruptive [bold added]:

Cody Wilson, a 25-year-old University of Texas law student, has made it a personal crusade to use the technology for firearms. He aims to produce and publish online a completely printable plastic gun and then adapt the design for use on printers that are getting smaller and less expensive all the time.

Current gun laws ("the federal Gun Control Act of 1968 says you don't need a license to make a firearm for personal use") are completely inadequate to address a world of downloadable firearms. Imagine also a world of downloadable and customizable food, clothes, and household products, in other words a version-1 Star Trek replicator in every home. The disruption continues. © 2013 Stephen Yuen