COVID-19 is not the cause but exposed symptoms of the system we have ended up building.
What happened is the beancounters figured out a way to make a very cheap pipeline to throw out widgets. This pipeline is built on monopolies (because that gets cost efficiencies) that have no built in redundancies (because that gets cost efficiencies) centered in places where the governments can exploit people (because that gets cost efficiencies).
I must step back a bit and clarify that I have nothing against beancounting - after all, I am a beancounter myself always looking for ways to tease out an extra percentage point of profit.
However, there's a price to pay for every decision and what wasn't planned for is how this very cheap pipeline behaves in the face of an expected supply model.
While we all feel that domestic production is a solution to the current issue - and it is - what we might not realize is how over decades of outsourcing, we have shifted out the knowledge, the skills, the ecosystem needed to sustain that production.
For example, if I am in Shenzhen, I can sketch out a circuit, layout the PCB, have the PCB fabricated, populated and ready for testing all in ONE day.
Due to the current very cheap pipeline we have in place however, if I am NOT in Shenzhen, instead, in Fullerton, OC for example, that's a matter of weeks when things wern't impacted.
That's because there's not one American left who knows how to help run a PCB fabrication plant - they drive Ubers now (I spoke to one of them in Kansas as he was driving me back to the airport).
Solution: bring back those skills to America.
Question 1 to the Solution: Are Americans willing to invest in themselves or they still want to continue to invest in the very cheap pipeline that allows them to buy a budget phone for $40?
Question 1 rephrased: We want change but are we willing to change ourselves?