My, my, my, you are flummoxed. The chart proves the relation of the issues. Trade Deficit charted over time against US Dollar Value Against Major Currencies. They have been going in adverse directions in precise tandem....and I remember how 4-5 years ago the "phony trade" apologists for the deficit pooh-poohed this... where are they now?
Have we reached a tipping point with the trade deficit? One thing for sure, you haven't answered the question.
The phony traders are the ones, in effect, advocating the massive subsidy to [China's ] industry at the expense of [U.S.] consumers"...note "consumers" have to have something called "money" before they can consume. And here you are railing against protecting U.S. industry....which is the source of the consumer's money. H'mmmm. You don't sound too American to me. Anyways, as the dollar slides against the major currencies...we are all hurt...including the "consumers."
U.S. Consumers and U.S. Producers go hand and hand. You are preaching a false dichotomy.
And I note you totally blow off the explicit U.S. taxpayer subsidy of Ex-Im Bank and OPIC.
Anyways, don't try and lecture Free Republicans about competition, its benefits...and its pitfalls. One of the things you have in the current situation is a dangerous Chinese-created economic black-hole, an NEP operation. I.e., it ain't natural...and it sure as hell is not the UNSEEN HAND of Adam Smith. American industry is in a PRICE competition with Communist-controlled-and-maintained slave labor. And that is not just a figure of speech when you consider China's Laogai concentration camps. American firms have been forced into a situation where since they can't 'lick 'em so they have to join 'em. And they have.
why, pray, is the cash value of manufactured goods crashing to the point where most of the cost of what you buy is the freight?
Where is your proof for that hand-waving assertion? And how much of the so-called "crashing" is really attributable to China's low labor rates?
It's true. Since NAFTA consumers are making less and less because all the high paying jobs are being replaced by lower paying jobs.
As you can see from this chart.