. The reason it has worked is because the capital that these companies made before free trade was invested back inside the borders of our country in factory expansions and modernization and the building of new factories which in turn created more jobs.
You cannot create new jobs of any kind without capital to invest. That money is gone, overseas, it's not hear building factories,it's creating jobs in Red China and elsewhere. That's where the jobs are going. Jobs follow the money, always have, always will.
If you want your business to grow you have to put money into it. If you want your checking account to grow you have to put money in it.If you want your country to grow you have to put money in it.If you keep taking out more than you put in you're going to come up empty.
Those of you who laugh and say it can't happen to me, well I can introduce to about 9,000 people who where saying the same thing about 7 yrs ago.It started in the early 70's before some of you where born.
We watched the others go for 25yrs. before they got to us, the steel mills, oil companies, appliance manufacturers,the textile, the shipbuilding, the auto workers, all the support industries ,parts and equipment makers and the construction trades etc. etc. they're gone and the fraction that's left of these skilled workers, that are working, are doing so at greatly reduced wages and benefits.
The reason they're getting to the high tech is because they already got most of the good paying blue collar workers. If you are making good wages with good benefits you can bet one thing you're next. If they can get it done cheaper, and they can, they will. If you're in you're late 20's early 40's and have a good paying job, better start reducing you're debt load if you can, you're in the crunch zone .
One problem with your analysis is that the money is not static, and more is being generated each year. There are many companies who went abroad for cheaper labor only to discover that human error (Mexico) and low productivity (India) more than even out the cheap labor. They are now evaluating whether the job move was a smart one.
Its easier to move phone answering jobs offshore, because the cost of capital is much less and long distance phone costs have come down. So some jobs may go overseas and stay. But the world was not a static thing when you and I started work. I remember a book on the accelerating rate of change by Alvin Tofler, Future Shock. We don't hear much about this anymore, but the times change with amazing rapidity due to the internet and employment will just have to change with it. Have a little faith that our country has the means to compete despite what the socialist unions are doing in our schools.