Low labor cost production has been fleeing China for more than 5 years as labor costs in China started escalating. Textiles, shoes, that sort of stuff started moving to "new" cheap labor areas such as Bangladesh and Vietnam.

The tariffs introduced a level of uncertainty into the supply chains that nobody had ever accounted for in their production costing spreadsheets. Now this corona thing. Two black swan events in less than two years.

The move to China, 30 years ago, started with some low costs manufacturers, and then it became fashionable. It would not surprise me if the new fashion will become "supply chain hardening", where companies no longer allow any country (or even region) to dominate / control their supply chain. It would be the logical strategic next "in" thing to do.


Sic Semper Tyrannis