Quality control goes down in an attempt to lower variable/fixed cost. Free trade has made it very hard to maintain the cost of high quality control and be competitive with product pricing.
I dont disagree with that, but it will take some frustration with crap
to get this to change. Many companies are finding some success with
taking that stance. I'm actually releasing a bunch of tools today to
different vendors (all in the U.S. and local I might add) and they were
not the cheapest bid by a longshot, however the president of the
company is open minded and if I can justify it and the 50% greater
investment in cost, he will buy into it. My good vendors will survive
because I can consistently rely on them to produce good parts for me.
The ones that have not, are no longer supplying parts.