John Deere has NOT shut down all of it's American plants. There are still plants in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Iowa that I know of and I'm sure there are others.
Deere still has US based operations and manufacturing, but have increased the percentage of imported products used in their product for years, and have become part of the problem as the loss to other US based manufacturing concerns due to switching to imported parts has eliminated or reduced the income of the workers at those other plants supplying Deere who were previous consumers of the products made by those buying Deere products.
What so many seem to fail to acknowledge is that there is a domino effect to all these increases in imports, and when a single manufacturer either moves their plants overseas or changes to an imported product supplier the negative results jolt much more deeply than the immediate players.
Changing something as simple as going with an import hardware product has ongoing effects, and other larger changes like plant closures go so deeply that they have caused the need for creation of entire new industries and jobs to replace them.
The problem with the many replacement industries and jobs are that they are greatly government based or funded, or low paying positions.
Everything from fast food, and credit cards, and insurance to education and banking have picked up some of the slack from jobs lost in manufacturing, but the majority of the positions do not have the same levels of income and have lead to a reduced amount of wealth, quality of life, and so many others.
Sure all the new or replacement industries have their members who have seen large incomes and some even larger than previously possible in the manufacturing sector, but even these increases have come at a cost, and that cost is carried on the backs of the workers.
Just the loss of union membership of the replacements have allowed workers to see reductions, and combine this with labor changes made by members or both parties supporting employers over the years and some have even made the point of comparing many of these workers to modern day slave labor or free slaves etc.
Not that I fully buy into the whole free slave idea, but I can see why or how some could come up with it. When you consider that ultimately the purpose of workers in general is to perform the work needed to produce the various products that are offered by the employer to create a profit it is somewhat easier to realize that when there are more workers than work by an ever increasing margin the company or employer gains a large advantage which it can use to manipulate its labor costs.
So sure Deere and many others who were once US power houses in manufacturing are still alive, and doing business in the US, but the game has changed and the value of it all is still on the decline.
