So Much for the Cheap 'China Price'

...... As purchasing manager for the North American arm of Japanese auto supplier Takata, Fred Heegan used to feel pressure to shift manufacturing to China. But when a customer pointed to a lower-priced Chinese part, Heegan would talk about the added challenges of quality, logistics, and engineering changes. "There are significant hidden costs to having supply lines that extend to China," says Heegan, whose company manufactures auto parts in the U.S. and Mexico.

Heegan now looks like a visionary. A growing number of companies are moving beyond the usual considerations of labor and raw material costs in deciding where to produce goods to calculate the "total cost of ownership." That means tallying expenses associated with things such as storage and delays. By this light, the so-called China price, which always seemed to be at least 40% below U.S. costs on everything from bedroom furniture to telecom gear, isn't so low. In fact, China's once-formidable edge in manufacturing has all but disappeared in some industries, according to a new study by Southfield (Mich.) firm AlixPartners, which researches and consults on outsourcing.

AlixPartners studied five categories of machined products, ranging from large engine parts requiring significant labor to small plastic components that need little. The cost shift has been dramatic. In 2005, AlixPartners found that by the time the items had arrived at a U.S. port, Chinese-made parts were 22% cheaper on average than those produced in the U.S. By the end of 2008, however, the average price gap had dropped to 5.5%, which often isn't large enough to merit the hassle of manufacturing halfway around the world.

...... The biggest factors behind the sharp shift are currency fluctuations and labor costs. The yuan has appreciated by around 11% against the dollar since late 2005, and wages have risen 7% to 8% a year. To rein in polluting industries, furthermore, Beijing has stripped away tax breaks for exporters of some heavy industrial products.