Did it ever occur to you that it might just have been union clout that drove the manufacturing offshore in the first place?
A manufacturing business-owning acquaintance of mine recently attended a conference which included a number of similar and larger businesses to discuss the local impact of the current state of world wide trade and economic affairs.
The following story from that session was chilling in its implications -
Someone developed a new alloy that had unique properties of strength and light-weightedness. This metal is going to be very useful in reducing the weight in cars and SUV's. The developer took it to Asia for the process of developing it into auto frames/floors.
However, it is also a little harder to form than current metals in use, and it will not stand up to the multiple hits currently used to form floors and body members. The Asian technology was not getting along with it very well and going through quite a lot of this expensive material without achieving good results.
Someone suggested taking it to Detroit were the existing expertise and infrastructure would have a better chance of bringing it into production.
The automaker's response?
"We're not going back to Detroit".
In other words, once it's gone, it's gone because the labour and tax environment in North America is too unfriendly for business to be attracted here any longer.
Those who were employed by the all-too-generous system of the past will need to re-learn how to make a living.