Some of it is small timers trying to make the big time. Something that makes sense economically for me as a hobby would be interpreted as economic suicide for a goal oriented company. Can't run a business like a hobby.
For example, say I order PCBs from China. Takes seemingly forever, but thats OK, I can hang out with family and play minecraft or post on HN. For a hobby that's fine, especially if I save $50. For a company thats economic suicide if you lose 4% of your annual combined salaries waiting for delivery of a prototype. Even financially, dropping your revenue per year might be more expensive than just paying an extra couple percent to the locals.
Another typical smalltimer way of thinking is I make a mistake on a PCB, who cares, its the rare PCB that can't be fixed with some cut-n-solder by hand. That solution doesn't work on a qty 5 figures production run. You'll get much better cooperation with locals, which is irrelevant if your time is free and quantities are single to double digit, but is crucial once you reach consumer kickstarter type scales. Maybe one way to phrase it is problems at the single digit quantity level are interesting anecdotes or minor customer service challenges, but problems at the 10K level are disasters, and problems don't happen at the 10M level because the cost of your onsite overseers stationed in China rounds down to zero per device.
For example, say I order PCBs from China. Takes seemingly forever, but thats OK, I can hang out with family and play minecraft or post on HN. For a hobby that's fine, especially if I save $50. For a company thats economic suicide if you lose 4% of your annual combined salaries waiting for delivery of a prototype. Even financially, dropping your revenue per year might be more expensive than just paying an extra couple percent to the locals.
Another typical smalltimer way of thinking is I make a mistake on a PCB, who cares, its the rare PCB that can't be fixed with some cut-n-solder by hand. That solution doesn't work on a qty 5 figures production run. You'll get much better cooperation with locals, which is irrelevant if your time is free and quantities are single to double digit, but is crucial once you reach consumer kickstarter type scales. Maybe one way to phrase it is problems at the single digit quantity level are interesting anecdotes or minor customer service challenges, but problems at the 10K level are disasters, and problems don't happen at the 10M level because the cost of your onsite overseers stationed in China rounds down to zero per device.