A smartphone is probably the quintessential "Chinese only" product.

Nevertheless, there is one smartphone made in the USA (Librem 5). None of its parts appear to be sourced by Chinese companies, but some of the parts manufacturers have factories in China (I would not be too surprised to find out that the Samsung front-camera is made in China, for example). I can't say for sure that it's lacks any china-manufactured items in it, but it's at least pretty darn close.

I don't have one because I don't want to spend $1300 on a phone. If that's not me choosing cheaper Chinese goods, then I don't know what is.

> I don't want to spend $1300 on a phone

It is worse than that. The regular Librem 5 is $1300, but the one made in the US is $2000.

If you take that point of view you deprive yourself of agency.

I sure didn't vote to permit labor and environmental arbitrage, to usher in Dutch Disease. It was painfully obvious what would happen, who would win and who would lose, but the money swooped in and demonstrated who really owns the country.

It's wild to watch the people who pushed for it slide down the Narcissist's Creed. It's fine! Oh, it's not fine? Then it isn't a problem. Oh, it is a problem? Then it isn't a big deal. Oh, it is a big deal? Then it's not my fault. Oh, it is my fault? Well, I didn't mean it. Oh, I did mean it? Well then you deserved it.

I wasn't included in the many and various board meetings across all companies to make the decision to move production... In fact, I wasn't in any. And to be quiet frank, I probably was born yet for many of them or still shitting myself in a diaper.

Sure, but you can today buy more expensive products that are not made in China if that's of concern to you. Of course there are some products for which there are no alternatives right now, but that doesn't stop you from making economic decisions that align with your stated values. Continuing to buy Chinese products and then saying you have no agency because some nebulous entity made a decision for you is just cognitive dissonance.

Did you learn nothing from the Prisoner's Dilemma?

We don't actually have any options that leverage massive economies of scale and manufacture in the US, because our masters chose to ship the manufacturing overseas. Individual agency is trumped by control of the rules, that's the whole point of PD. Pretending that our wallets have agency is a con to fool us out of using the tool that would actually be effective: regulation.

You can enact regulation (which takes time, and which I support) and also buy things that aren't made in China right now. This same thing applies to environmental considerations as well. You don't need to wait for the government to ban plastic bags for you to stop using them. Both can happen together.

Such regulation doesn't just take time, it's basically politically unfeasible given how both entrenched interests (businesses) and the individual voter are incentivized towards cost-savings. It's essentially like calling for raising taxes- not literally impossible, but virtually so.

You're setting up an ethical dilemma that is always going to default to one direction, and castigating those who don't go the impossible route. This is "If you don't like this government, why don't you move to another country?" or "If you don't like this platform, why don't you build one?" levels of impracticality.

But what to do or how to fix it?

All I see is the cognitive dissonance of worshipping the free market, except in this case where corporate America sold the future of US away in exchange for higher profit margins today.

Plus the cognitive dissonance of government action being unpalatable yet also required, since maximum profit-seekers (the highest motive possible in the system we have set up) aren't incentivized to do anything else.

So all you’re telling me is “you have no options, there’s nothing that can be done, and nothing will change”. What’s the point of that? If that’s the case why bother caring?

If it’s politically impossible to do something that’s all the more reason for personal change. Sure you can’t buy a MacBook that isn’t made in China, but you can spend more money and buy other things made outside of China.

> If that’s the case why bother caring?

I don't know, you're the one who started with the "And basically everyone here is choosing cheaper Chinese goods so we're all complicit too" defeatism in the first place! And then turning around and condemning people for buying Chinese goods when 1) legislation for reducing trade dependence on China is very difficult, leading to 2) few consumer choices that have non-Chinese made alternatives in many product areas.

Everyone choosing cheaper goods is just an observation. And yea, most people were very happy to buy cheap stuff from retailers and they are in fact complicit because they want their cheap goods. And yea, most people even today would choose cheaper goods over goods sourced in western countries.

As a point of contention, I don't like the grandstanding I'm observing over stuff "made in China", especially here where we can all choose to buy products made in western countries and pay more money for those. Are there exceptions? Sure! But just because Apple makes the iPhone in China doesn't mean you can't buy a barbell made in Ohio or cast iron skillets made in Tennessee.

What agency do we have? Consumer choice only goes as far as the options available. What computer or phone can you buy that isn’t made under dubious or known-bad labour conditions? The option of no phone or no computer is only generally an option if you have the money to not require a job at all