Despite
having the wages of basic labors in China increased almost five times
over the last decade, model cars are still being manufactured in
China. Nowadays, the basic income of a worker in China is more than
double the basic wages of other developing countries such as Pakistan,
Bangladesh, Indonesia, Vietnam and India; many factories in China,
particularly in the garment related industry, have relocated their
production facilities into these countries, an effort to reduce their
production cost in order to be more competitive in the market.
One of the main reasons that the model car industry is still remaining in China despite much higher wages is that the work requires a lot of the fingertips maneuvering. We call it “fingercraft”, which is more sophisticated than “handicraft”. Fingercraft is unique to countries using Chinese characters (Kanji); countries using Chinese characters also using chopsticks to eat such as China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Children in these countries learn how to write Chinese characters as young as four or five years old, which at the same time, also learn how to use a pair of chopsticks to eat. Learning Chinese characters is a training of seeing a character through the eyes; then the brain commands the movement of the fingertips to replicate the contour of the characters on a piece of paper using a writing tool repeatedly fifty or hundreds of time. Throughout the primary stage of education a child needs to learn more than a thousand characters so the process of replicating is repeated almost everyday. The calligraphy art is weighted heavily in Chinese community and many Children would go one step further and learned the brush pen calligraphy which is even more sophisticated. The soft tipped brush pen is not only about movement of the pen, it is also about the delicate pressure being applied on the tip to regulate the width of the strokes.
While learning how to write Chinese characters, most children would have to master a pair of chopsticks at the same time before they would be able to pick up the food they like on the dinning table. Eating with a pair of chopsticks requires the maneuvering of a tool with the fingertips and when it comes to picking up a peanut, for example, the amount of pressure being applied is rather delicate; too much pressure and the peanut will jump out; too little pressure and it will slip out.
Chopsticks has been commonly used in China for more than three thousands years while the rest of the world only started to use forks commonly on the dinning table not more than six hundreds years ago.
The present hourly rate in China is still around US$1.40 and the workers can handle delicate processes. The same kind of process would easily cost ten times more in developed countries and the average age of the workers are much higher. Many so called Swiss made watches selling for thousands of dollars are having the cases and bands fabricated in China and then shipped to Switzerland to fit the locally made movements in order to certify the watch to be Swiss made.
For a while, the model car industry will still remain in China even though the cost of labor keeps increasing. Other developing countries where the labor cost is only half of China, is mostly limited to manufacturing handicraft products but very rarely up to fingercraft products. Whenever mass market products require a lot the maneuvering of fingertips to work with, such as watches, hand-painted porcelains, embroidery and model cars, they are mostly crafted in China.
One of the main reasons that the model car industry is still remaining in China despite much higher wages is that the work requires a lot of the fingertips maneuvering. We call it “fingercraft”, which is more sophisticated than “handicraft”. Fingercraft is unique to countries using Chinese characters (Kanji); countries using Chinese characters also using chopsticks to eat such as China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Children in these countries learn how to write Chinese characters as young as four or five years old, which at the same time, also learn how to use a pair of chopsticks to eat. Learning Chinese characters is a training of seeing a character through the eyes; then the brain commands the movement of the fingertips to replicate the contour of the characters on a piece of paper using a writing tool repeatedly fifty or hundreds of time. Throughout the primary stage of education a child needs to learn more than a thousand characters so the process of replicating is repeated almost everyday. The calligraphy art is weighted heavily in Chinese community and many Children would go one step further and learned the brush pen calligraphy which is even more sophisticated. The soft tipped brush pen is not only about movement of the pen, it is also about the delicate pressure being applied on the tip to regulate the width of the strokes.
While learning how to write Chinese characters, most children would have to master a pair of chopsticks at the same time before they would be able to pick up the food they like on the dinning table. Eating with a pair of chopsticks requires the maneuvering of a tool with the fingertips and when it comes to picking up a peanut, for example, the amount of pressure being applied is rather delicate; too much pressure and the peanut will jump out; too little pressure and it will slip out.
Chopsticks has been commonly used in China for more than three thousands years while the rest of the world only started to use forks commonly on the dinning table not more than six hundreds years ago.
Applying decal on the bonnet using chopsticks skill
Workers in
China, Japan, Taiwan, Korea and Hong Kong are all culturally
gifted with fingercraft skills, but only China remains to be the low
labor cost country among the others. When model cars are being put
together with hundreds of intricate components, the basic workers in
China requires little training and are able to handle the job with
their fingercraft skills easily. Moreover, there are 1.3 billion
people in China; factories can easily select predominately female
workers for the main reason that they like hobbies such as sewing and
nail caring which requires patience and good eyesight to work on
intricate processes.
Painting the small logo on the plates
The present hourly rate in China is still around US$1.40 and the workers can handle delicate processes. The same kind of process would easily cost ten times more in developed countries and the average age of the workers are much higher. Many so called Swiss made watches selling for thousands of dollars are having the cases and bands fabricated in China and then shipped to Switzerland to fit the locally made movements in order to certify the watch to be Swiss made.
Painting the rubber cap tips of the spark plug harnesses in black
Fitting the spark plug harnesses in the engine
For a while, the model car industry will still remain in China even though the cost of labor keeps increasing. Other developing countries where the labor cost is only half of China, is mostly limited to manufacturing handicraft products but very rarely up to fingercraft products. Whenever mass market products require a lot the maneuvering of fingertips to work with, such as watches, hand-painted porcelains, embroidery and model cars, they are mostly crafted in China.
Real leather are trimmed and upholstered on the plastic seats of model cars
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