Quote from JJacksET4:
It's irrelevant to say the least - every single basic laborer can be replaced by industrial robots - and the price for labor continues to rise and the price for the robots continues to fall.
People often look at companies and see what they have to offer that is tough for other companies (high entry) for example a patent or some special product or skill. The same should be looked at for countries - China just offers cheap labor and alot of it - but no specific great skills that can't be replicated elsewhere.
However the cheap labor and lots of it will be gone and the robots will be in charge of production - some will be in China - others wherever else. It is or soon will actually be cheaper to have 1000 robots in a factory in the boonies in the U.S. with one or two technicians watching over them compared to 1000 Chinese workers, when you consider 24/7 operation, no health care costs or issues, no complaints, no runaways, no suicides, no bargaining power, etc, etc. Not there 100% yet, but 5-10 years for sure.