Why Not To Buy Local!

My boys really like the Argentine Daki which is the stickle brick stuff and has lasted 3 months so far. They also love the Industria Argentina marble run stuff which is competitively priced. Don't get me started on locally produced Spidermen though!
 
camberiu said:
I think this is more of a symptom of "Shadow Inflation" then actual ineptitude. The manufacturer is seeing his production costs rise, but he knows that he can't pass all of the cost increase to the consumers, or his sales will plummet. So what he does is he starts cutting corners, using cheaper material, lower production standards to lower his costs.
This was very common in Brazil during the high inflation years back in the 80s. It is funny to remember how much the quality of Brazilian made products jumped once there was no more inflation.
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It's not just that. In Argentina, there are not many manufacturers that produce the raw materials. Let's say I produce screws. There is only one company that produces tin in Argentina, and the tin that they produce is absolutely awful. You put it in the machines to grind it, and it breaks. So, the only other option is to import the material. But Moreno doesn't let anyone import even the raw materials. So the public is stuck with screws that break with minimal stress and your building collapses on top of you. And you paid three times more for something that is not even worth it.
 
prettejohn said:
Don't get me started on locally produced Spidermen though!
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Is that the version that fights the British Pirates but then his web doesn't work properly, gets a bit cold in his over priced red suit and decides that its better to stay home and be Pedro Parker and drink mate?
 
Tex said:
It's not just that. In Argentina, there are not many manufacturers that produce the raw materials. Let's say I produce screws. There is only one company that produces tin in Argentina, and the tin that they produce is absolutely awful. You put it in the machines to grind it, and it breaks. So, the only other option is to import the material. But Moreno doesn't let anyone import even the raw materials. So the public is stuck with screws that break with minimal stress and your building collapses on top of you. And you paid three times more for something that is not even worth it.
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This is a good point. The up side of closing off free trade is that it gives local manufacturers an edge to do startups. The down side is not only the aforementioned unavailability of raw materials, but also that there is no incentive to maintain competitive world class quality levels. This must surely hurt exports in the long run as well.
 
EricLovesBA said:
This is a good point. The up side of closing off free trade is that it gives local manufacturers an edge to do startups. The down side is not only the aforementioned unavailability of raw materials, but also that there is no incentive to maintain competitive world class quality levels. This must surely hurt exports in the long run as well.
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On top of it, in Argentina, there are only 2 or 3 manufacturers for most products, so industry is almost a monopoly. There is no way these people are going to invest in infrastructure--they are just going to ride the wave while they can, because the next person that comes into power will change everything up. So they just try to milk the system while they can with antiquated manufacturing processes and crappy products--it sells because it's all there is. No one wants to do startups because of the tremendous difficulty in starting your own business in this country, and the lack of credit to create businesses. So things stay in the dark ages and now we have a grinding recession.
 
I doubt anyone here will care, but this thread is timely enough. I bought several boxes of Heredia brand "Pu erh" tea on sale, and even gave one to my Chinese doctor (from China). When I ran out of my stash from Chinatown, I tried this tea, and it's nothing like Pu Erh at all! I checked on the box, and sure enough, it's from Argentina (I assumed the "Industria Argentina" meant that loose leaves were imported and then bagged here).

I called the company to complain and the manager would not budge! They said "It IS Pu Erh tea, it says right on the box" and "Red tea IS Pu Erh tea, and this one is from San Juan"... Seriously. We argued for 5 or 10 minutes, it was absurd! I told her that 1 minute on Google would show her that she was wrong, but you know how it is to argue with people here most of the time... The total lack of shame is the worst part, I think. I feel for the people who buy it for health reasons, without knowing that they are being duped.

On another note, I caught a professor here at the UBA plagiarizing the entirety of his slides from the internet and passing it off as his original work! The hilarious part is that he'd spend a good portion of the class bitching about the US, and how Americans are all so stupid etc... and the original text was written by an American (it was already translated into Spanish, he didn't even do that part himself), from my university no less!
 
Re. the Daki stickle-bricks, I bought this once and it wasn't too bad. However it doesn't stick together well and it's impossible for the kids to play with anything they've made, the bits are constantly falling off. The sad truth is we're getting used to the inferior qualitty and starting to find it acceptable.
 
Accept the truth into your hearts and minds Komrades, the world is in crisis and you are lucky to be enjoying the finest industria argentina products in a paradise of low unemployment and 5 year plans.

If it breaks it is because you are using it wrong.

Poor rest of world. If only you new of the glories of sub standard power supplies, creaking infrastructure, poor quality raw materials, endemic corruption and spiralling inflation then you too would isolate yourself economically and diplomatically.
 
One big upside to all this is how easy it is to get stuff repaired, which perhaps in another country might well have been tossed in the trash.
In spite of the fact that I'm a slave to gizmos,gadgets and shiny things I have radically changed my attitude to ditching things.
 
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