In addition to any vagueness about the (untested or unexamined) multiplicity of ways to bring jobs home, the challenge of thinking clearly about and succeeding is compounded by vagueness and ambiguity of some other key concepts central to bringing jobs back to America (or anywhere else, for that matter).
More Than One Way to Bring Jobs Home
However moot and confusing the data and conflicting claims and counterclaims, what is more certain is that, as Cheng points out, there is more than one way for jobs to "return": In addition to the literal return of companies and jobs, there is at least a second way—foreign direct investment and location of new or replacement operations, e.g., in the U.S.
However, because this process can provoke angst at home about foreign "takeover" of U.S. properties and infrastructure, control of American workers livelihoods and workplace practices (such as compulsory morning exercises or language lessons), foreign political lobbying and other influence, regulatory and corporate jurisdictional disputes, siphoning off of profits to a foreign power, etc., as a jobs option, it is unlikely to be as vigorously and openly advanced or discussed as ticker-tape paraded reshoring.
