During the 2000s, companies lost interest in IT as a source of competitive differentiation and focused on trying to make it more efficient by shifting basic functions to lower cost countries.
FORBES: As Corporate IT & iPad Demand Rise, Dell's Up, HP's Down
Moreover, as the yuan strengthens against the dollar, some Chinese and US multinationals manufacturing there could shift production to lower cost countries, meaning the overall trade deficit would not be changed, the US China Business Council said.
And we have to balance the costs against the risk that purchasers will turn to other, lower-cost countries.
They point out that America's manufacturing base has been cut down by years of competition from China and other lower-cost countries.
Leather-goods maker Coach Inc. plans to gradually move some production out of China, where labor costs are rising, and into lower-cost countries, such as India and Vietnam.
Cambodia is a major producer of clothing and shoes for Western buyers, and has benefited in recent years as rising wages in China have pushed some companies to shift orders to lower-cost countries.
Making heavy losses, stuck in state hands and with over-manned, expensive factories, it dragged its feet over the conversion of Airbus into a company, fearing that this would lead to a loss of French jobs as work was contracted out to lower-cost countries.
For example, Folbre notes that men constitute more than 71% of the workforce in manufacturing (which was hit hard in the recession, and also hit with outsourcing to lower cost labor countries, increased automation, and increased foreign trade) and they make up less than 25% of the workers in health and education services (where jobs have risen slowly, but steadily).
FORBES: The Declining Demand For Jobs Men Have Traditionally Held
Ironically, to counteract this, the Big Three automakers have increasingly moved production from the U.S. to lower-labor-cost countries like Mexico.
NHS's basic cost efficiency: it delivers health care of surprisingly high quality at far lower cost than other rich countries have managed.
But smaller firms that make up the backbone of Germany's famous Mittelstand have also been packing up and moving abroad, especially into lower-cost and more flexible countries to Germany's east.
Many Danes switched instead to lower-cost house brands but not healthier alternatives, and others crossed borders into Germany or other countries with lower food taxes to purchase their favorite products.
FORBES: Is 2013 a Watershed Year for the Anti-Obesity Movement?
The biggest is whether or not to allow lower-cost drugs to be imported from Canada and other countries.
If a buyback raises the debt-to-equity ratio, it can lower the firm's overall cost of capital (because in most countries interest payments, unlike dividends, are tax deductible).
The bulk of a burger's cost depends on local inputs such as rent and wages, which tend to be lower in poor countries.
But other countries accept that risk, he says, because it is usually outweighed by the lower cost of borrowing in a more liquid market.
The Treasury said many countries, such as Canada, New Zealand and Russia, have already moved towards lower-cost coinage as a way of reducing spending.
World Steel Dynamics, a consultancy, reckons that the cost of building steel plants in China may be up to 60% lower than most other big steel-producing countries.
应用推荐