US On Road To Third World — Paul Craig Roberts

Paul Craig Roberts (via Zerohedge) ^ | 10/29/15 | Paul Craig Roberts

[central_va]

Trump’s Presidency is going to kill you isn’t it? Hahahahahahaha

[SeeSharp]

Will that make American shoemakers competitive with Vietnamese shoemakers who work for $2 per day?

Yes. An American shoe factory would be largely automated. If you think Americans are ever again going to have three bedroom houses and put their kids through college on manual labor jobs you are delusional.

If the neighbors of that still mill in this country demand it not pollute like that, how is it supposed to compete with a mill that has no such constraints?

Depends on who was there first. Move next to a shooting range and you can't complain about the noise. But if someone wants to build a shooting range next to you you have a case against them. Liability from pollution should work the same.

[driftless2]

Good article. I’m not economics expert, but when people start talking about inhibiting free trade, red flags go up for me.

[SeeSharp]

The USA was self sufficient in manufacturing up until the gloBULL maddens took off in the 1980's.

Try to be serious. The US has never been self sufficient in manufacturing. We have always depended on both imports and exports. Always.

[Riflema]

Er, the article above was published in October 2015.

[SeeSharp]

Indian software engineers are 10% the cost of American software engineers and 1% as productive.

As a software engineer myself I can say that is true for experienced American programmers. But most of the the kids coming out of school with CS degrees nowadays have no idea what they are doing. They just whine "whyyyyy can't we use jaaaaaaaaaaavvaa?"

[DuncanWaring]

Again, you’re claiming that if I want to build a steel mill, I’m subject to the environmental concerns of my neighbors, while someone in China, if they have the favor of the Chinese Communist Party, can build a steel mill with no environmental protections at all, and my mill has to compete with the Chinese mill, even though the Chinese mill has a great cost advantage?

[SeeSharp]

You can build your mill somewhere else. Or, if you were there first you can tell the neighbors to go pound sand. And don't forget, anything the Chinese make has to be shipped across the Pacific. You already have a home court advantage.

And in the final analysis if removing the environmental regulations (but not property rights), and removing bad labor laws, and reforming the tort bar, and removing our corporate taxes (the highest in the developed world) doesn't make a steel mill competitive the maybe it really should go out of business.

[Chgogal]

In 2014 38% of all American workers made less than $20,000; 51% made less than $30,000; 63% made less than $40,000; and 72% made less than $50,000.

Whoa! This can't be true? On top of that we have the largest labor penetration in years. WTHeck!

[Chgogal]

Why not start with decreasing government regulations? Bring down the cost of manufacturing and manufacturers just might want to open up shop.

[Chickensoup]

I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are.

I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are. I’d go one further and suggest this is actually taking us back to something closer to Feudalism. A narrow strata at the top living very well, supported by the masses, with no care as to who the masses are.

______________________

I have been saying this for years. We will have a narrow band of very wealthy and small crafts class and everyone else would be essentially a slave of whatever patronage they can find. Thrown out of their land and goods. The current healthcare system is a way to separate goods from people for the maw of the healthcare industrial complex.

Had a middle age woman in my living room yesterday, a liberal, who told me that she cannot own anything and get healthcare.

[GOPJ]

Of course, if one looks only at the situation of an isolated group, such as software engineers or radiologists, the decline in income is far more pronounced than any decline in the prices the members of these groups must pay. But by the same token, in every such isolated case the immense majority of Americans gets the benefit of some reduction in costs and prices with no reduction in income for example, all the patients who earn their livings other than as software engineers or radiologists and who can now get their MRIs less expensively.

Half the people in the country are not in the labor force.

Quality of life isn't just based on cheap stuff... that's where this breaks down... It's as silly as the premise of 'What's wrong with Kansas' or whatever the name of that book was... based on ' why don't people give up their identification and values in in order to 'get' an extra $60 a year.... it's nuts.

[SeeSharp]

Quality of life isn't just based on cheap stuff... that's where this breaks down...

What is "quality of life" based on? And should your definition of it be imposed on everyone else?

[LoneStar42]

Nailed it. Dell “awarded” me over 20k shares in options, providing I vested. Over that vesting time the price tanked.

Hindsight ...

[LoneStar42]

I’ll add my vote and prayers.

[GOPJ]

Liberals are the people who want to ‘impose’ their horrible beliefs on others... Don’t confuse the good people with the two bit liberal elite liars.

[Enlightened1]

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts is considered to be the father of Reaganomics, and he even ran the Editorial of the Wall Street Journal a while back.

He nails it on the head with this article.

[central_va]

Try to be serious. The US has never been self sufficient in manufacturing. We have always depended on both imports and exports. Always.

In 1930 import/exports were 4% of the entire GNP. 4% that's all. I am sure the USA could have managed without that 4%. And that 4% INCLUDES minerals and agriculture along with manufacturing. So do you get it now? OR are you still under the Free Trade spell?

[Mr. Jeeves]

The single biggest factor in the scarcity of jobs is the increased productivity and elimination of entire classes of jobs that has resulted from automation.

I've mentioned it before, but the emergence of Google (and the Internet in general) rendered a whole lot of office know-it-alls redundant. And they are just the kind to complain the loudest without understanding what actually happened to them.

[SeeSharp]

In 1930 import/exports were 4% of the entire GNP. 4% that's all.

Smoot-Hawley killed 90% of our foreign trade.