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Damaged Brands

The past few weeks have not been good ones for products manufactured in China and financial instruments created in the United States.  The “Made in China” brand is now an un-trustworthy brand to millions of American consumers.  New, mortgage backed debt instruments, highly rated by U.S. bond rating agencies are now being questioned in financial capitols around the world.

In an earlier column entitled “Made in China” I discussed certain historical forces and timelines that are to some degree at cause for the recent rash of dangerous products being produced in China.  In a historically …

Made in China

Fifteen years ago, when Americans went shopping and came across the  phrase “Made in China” it usually was on small, inexpensive trinkets, toys and souvenirs.  Ten years ago we started to see these words on apparel.  Five years ago we started to see these words seemingly everywhere.  During the last five months, if we saw these words it might have meant the death of our pets, food borne illness or perhaps poisoning. [My favorite editorial cartoon on this subject showed two people holding the same product.  One was saying “A great dessert topping!”  The other saying “Cleans even the toughest …