Comment by mywittyname

A lot of it stuck around. I grew up in the rust belt and tons/most of my friend's parents worked at one of the many factories that were, and are still around. Think dog food, plastic molding, car part manufacturing, and glue. Not the big stuff that people think of when they think of manufacturing though.

I think if you start to deep dive into the industries that left, you'll find the reasons were often more complicated than simple labor costs. American companies did get out-competed by foreign firms in a lot of key areas.

America is large, but they can't expect to be the best in the world at every industry. If an entire country focuses on a specific niche for long enough, it's possible they will become the best. Samsung and TSMC are incredible companies that didn't happen by accident. And yeah, the USA might not compete at that level on the global stage, but the American economy is also not so completely dominated by one megacorp either.

Also, a lot of manufacturing, especially the high tech stuff, is highly automated. So these massive factories don't generate the same number of jobs they once did. And the jobs they do generate are often technical. More maintenance and calibration of machinery, and less putting bottle caps on.