“Note: I’m not taking a position on this issue, I honestly don’t have a strong opinion about it.”
I agree...free trade has its benefits to consumers with well paying jobs - if trade wars materialize, look for prices to double (at least) for most things at Walmart and Amazon, for example. This will bite people hard further down the economic ladder.
On the other hand, the economy will adjust and well-paying jobs by the millions will be created here, so lots more people can move up.
The key variable is WHAT ELSE will be done. If you do nothing about the state of regulations in this country and the power of labor unions, then people here will suffer BIG TIME as they lose access to foreign-made goods. Thankfully Trump appears to understand that, so he’s going to work that angle too. It’s important for people on our side to understand that the reason so many US companies off-shore is NOT to get exotic trips to China...that’s the last thing executives want to be wasting their time with, not to mention the risks of being arrested due to business partner’s complaint over there (in China) or being kidnapped (Mexico and elsewhere). They ONLY go there because they cannot afford to build things here, given the costs from regulations and unions...so hopefully that all gets fixed.
On the balance, I kind of get concerned when we cannot run our tractors to harvest our crops without spare parts (electronics and probably other stuff) from China, or cannot replace a large power transformer, without transformers from China, and likely cannot build war ships, battle tanks, or fighter jets without foreign parts...so we DEFINITELY need to at least get that capability back home.
Hey Bob for the umpteenth millionith time WE ARE IN A TRADE WAR NOW. We are just not fighting back.
That’s what I’m saying. The globalists call their policies “free trade,” but its not. It’s managed trade managed in a way to protect certain special interests and not others. Taxes and regulations are a major problem with the business climate here. It’s hard to untangle the various causes of job losses. At the same time, the free trade fanatics are like communists. They won’t admit that trade liberalization has costs as well as benefits and try to have opponents blacklisted and silenced.