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Originally Posted by Ericlobster
I remember when Ford and GM were regarded as the best in the world.
What has changed? Is it our education system? The number of students who completed Algebra has declined severely over the years. Yet it increases in Asian countries.
So what if there are tons of resources online like Math.com or StudyPug. There needs to be a fundamental change in our education system from the ground up or we'll continue to slip. It's getting kind of scary guys. What can we do to start innovating like North Americans use to.
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I never lived in a time when Ford or GM were ranked higher than Toyota/Honda.
Education is a good start and America is slipping very hard right now, it's a huge issue that needs to be taken seriously, but the biggest hurdles imo are cultural. Countries hungry for wealth and success go to great lengths to get there. Americans aren't hungry, and no cracking of the whip will change that, but I don't think that means the country is doomed, it just explains the rise of Asian countries recently, just like how USA rose in the early part of the 20th century to challenge the technological lead Europe had.
IMO modern Western business practices of chewing up and spitting out any warm body that doesn't have a business degree is unsustainable. Worker wages have stagnated as industries are lead by people who's only interest is maximizing their payout in 3-5 years at the expense of all else. That mentality flows all the way down the chain to just about anyone with skilled labor not in a union, it's weird to NOT have 3+ jobs by the time you're 30. I see very few companies visibly making meaningful efforts at long term sustainability, it's all talk about growth and market share, overhyped product launches and claiming "innovation". Some days it seems like 'employee retention' is synonymous with 'laziness' as beloved CEO's brag about high turnover.
I think that's one of the strengths of Japanese manufacturers, it's still normal for employees to work their entire career for one company like Sony or Toyota, but they have other cultural problems that stifle meaningful improvements in their product. Hell Honda had to flop HARD with the Civic to get a wake up call even though there were probably early warning signs during development.
It's so common to see big projects steered into "uncharted waters" that were actually charted years if not decades ago, if you had kept that pensioners phone number instead of laying him off at 55 you would have a 2 page list of all the pitfalls within an hour. But nope, cut the fat and cook the books, "look how deep in the black we are and our projected savings over the next 2 years!"
Brilliant people are being born everyday, a shitty school system won't stop them, but having no tools at all to do something great is an insurmountable problem, there are no fewer genius being born per capita in rural Africa than the heart of Silicon Valley.