Posted on 02/13/2011 4:06:39 PM PST by Cringing Negativism Network
It is time to face up to the elephant in the living room, which for some reason conservative Americans are desperately determined to ignore.
"Free trade" is destroying America.
A generation ago, America was the world's preeminent power. We led the world in manufacturing. Technology. Space. Innovation. In every way, America was the best.
In a single generation, we have squandered that heritage, and now are deeply in debt to a communist nation which just one generation ago - rode only bicycles.
WTF will it take, to wake Americans (particularly conservative Americans, who should know better) up to the very real danger of stripping America of everything which made her great?
Don’t forget our trade surpluses of the 1930’s, and the economic prosperity we enjoyed then.
I knew it, Harding, Hoover, the 20’s and 30’s era GOP were Marxists!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fordney-McCumber_tariff
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoot%E2%80%93Hawley_Tariff_Act
True, but we can’t force foreign companies to comply with all of those laws. Lacking that, we have to impose some kind of penalty to make up for their refusal to comply.
Who cares? Why shouldn’t a high tech Polish company get the contract? Why shouldn’t a Polish airline buy a Boeing with a P&W engine? Who made Pratt property of the People’s of The American Demokratic Republic?
Thanks.
That reminds me, I have to charcoal the backyard smelter I have going to eventually cast some drum break drums. It isn’t costing me a cent. I should have it done in 5 more months!
/s
I’ve never seen you drink water.
This time it’s different.
/s
That’s a good start. You covered our two most problematic imports. Chinese goods and oil+oil byproducts. Good tariff plan you have. Most of the posters here are basking in libertarian BS. Plus much as I dislike Federal regulatory agencies we could get rid of EPA and OSHA and still not be able to compete against Chinese slave labor wages
>>I’ve never seen you drink water.<<
Dang, the invasion wasn’t supposed to be until 2012! Now we have to have move up the timeline and have that hot chick talk to everyone before we have all the players in place!
Some people just have to ruin it for all us invaders...
Probably so, but what if we fail first.
Let's say you have a guy and he's not eating, but he gets to punch you in the head one time every day. Now of course he will starve to death. But you might die of head trauma before that happens.
Then you should be condemning government for creating an environment of high taxes, stifling regulation and a tort system run amok instead of whining about freedom, lower taxes, lower prices and smaller government.
I suppose it never occurred to you that what you're whining about has been going on for hundreds of years.
You find the concept of smaller government, lower taxes and lower prices for consumers (so they can get more bang for their buck thereby providing more for their families and raising their standard of living) ignorant?
In what fever swamp are those things considered ignorant?
If it is required, how come we don't have countervailing tariffs imposed right now against China?
No one wants to take your job away. I think you should have to create value and compete just like everyone else does/should. Why do you deserve protection while others don't? Or, do you believe government can protect everyone from possibly losing their job....if we just make government big enough and powerful enough?
Last I heard, our standard blows theirs away.
Anyway, over the past 30 years or so, at a frightening pace, Americans have run up credit cards, high loan-to-value mortgages, new car loans, student loans, and personal loans (for big-screen TVs and a zillion other toys) all for the purpose of living high on the hog today with the idea that it will eventually be paid for sometime in the future. In other words, people are enjoying TODAY the fruits of TOMORROW's labor (make that the fruits of labor 20 and 30 years from now) and in so doing have stolen from their children and grandchildren, who will ultimately end up with the bill.
Sound familiar?
Governments at every level have operated in exactly the same way.
How could anybody have thought this scheme would be sustainable forever? It is my opinion that the time to pay the piper is closer than most people are willing to believe. And none of this is the fault of the freaking Chinese.
(( ping )) to my post at #236.
I meant to include you in the “to” section.
FRegards,
LH
It never happened! It wont happen now, either.
Trade protectionism never works. Its primary effects are on the consumers who have to pay higher prices for inferior products. Gov’t loves protectionism as it puts more money in its pocket in the form of import duties. Unions love it, too, as it protects their high wage rates. It is a tax on consumers who can only buy what they can afford, ie., most of us.
If the Chinese can make a shirt & ship it all the way to America, yet it is still cheaper & better quality than anything an American manufacturer can produce, then who is better qualified to make the shirt, & more importantly, why can they do this & we cannot?
If we want to have a shirt industry, don't we have to make it cheaper & better than the competition? Or, should the gov’t subsidize that industry by trade restrictions & tariffs?
The biggest part of our trade deficit is imported oil & natural resources. This could quickly end if the gov’t would unleash our oil & mining industries to produce the resources to power our economy, feed our industries, & create jobs. The trade deficit, for the most part, is created by the reluctance of the Left & the NIMBY crowd to “drill baby, drill”, & not because we buy T-shirts & TVs from the Far East.
Trying to cut our trade deficit by encouraging trade restrictions & tariffs, crafted by the ninny/nanny pols in WDC, is beyond dumb. How about we make some high quality, low cost products that people in other countries will buy? And if we can't, whose fault is that?
The solution is less gov't. Fewer & lower taxes. Simpler taxes. Less bureaucracy & paperwork. A total rethink of minimum wages.
This thread has been an interesting read.
I laud you for standing by economic principles in your assessing of the merits of the implied protectionism that some here have touted as the fix for our trade “woe”.
As I read the thread, I couldn’t help but think of a parallel with our State Department’s handling of Egypt and the utter incompetence on display. Stating an opinion on how someone ‘thinks’ it (free trade) should be without a firm grasp of the fundamentals of economics is much the same.
This is FreeRepublic.com; There are too many here who bring their A game to the argument (”A” game being facts and figures and definitions, etc)
By the way, the answer to your first question is the difference in shifting the entire demand curve versus movement along the curve. Just throwing that in there so you know I didn’t sleep through my Econ classes at college.
Minimum Wage laws have driven young, inexperienced people out of the market. They also drive all wages higher, & prices, too.
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