From a US wood working site
or is that a lie?
There is one factory in France that keeps a stock of marking dies of a wide range of countries so that they might stamp a product with a country of origin that the buyer wants. This practice began when reduced control within the European common market made it possible. The day we were in the plant, they were producing a line for a German company and cheerfully stamping every one "Made in Germany". They asked if we would like to have ours stamped "Made in Canada". We declined.
Some years ago, when plug cutters first started coming in from China, someone noted that a line coming out of Austria had all the machining idiosyncrasies of the ones coming out of China. A spectroanalysis of the steel (a form of metallurgical fingerprinting) showed that the alloys were exactly identical, indicating that it was almost certain that they were made from the same batch of raw material. Given the other matching features, it also indicated that they were being made in the same factory. Either the Chinese were buying theirs from Europe or the Europeans were buying theirs from China and remarking them. You can imagine which was the case.
For some years now, it has been impossible to correctly identify country of origin of goods coming out of Asia. Often "Made in Taiwan" and "Made in Hong Kong" really meant "Made in China".
Some years ago, when plug cutters first started coming in from China, someone noted that a line coming out of Austria had all the machining idiosyncrasies of the ones coming out of China. A spectroanalysis of the steel (a form of metallurgical fingerprinting) showed that the alloys were exactly identical, indicating that it was almost certain that they were made from the same batch of raw material. Given the other matching features, it also indicated that they were being made in the same factory. Either the Chinese were buying theirs from Europe or the Europeans were buying theirs from China and remarking them. You can imagine which was the case.
For some years now, it has been impossible to correctly identify country of origin of goods coming out of Asia. Often "Made in Taiwan" and "Made in Hong Kong" really meant "Made in China".
or is that a lie?
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