Posted on 05/31/2019 7:15:12 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
I keep reading where the Chinese are flaying us in trade. Balance of trade deficits keep going up, and the Chicken Littles scream that the sky is falling.
Seems to me balance-of-trade worries are misplaced. Supposedly, we got equal value for what we spent; it's just easier to quantify the dollars we put up than the goods they put up.
Example: Who got more out of the deal when you bought your car? All you got was a car, but the dealer got, say, $40K. Is your balance of trade with the dealer out of whack? Not at all. He got money; you got a car. Fair trade. Both sides got what they wanted at an agreed on price.
Meanwhile, a guy the next town over is selling solar equipment at $40K per average house. He bought a new car from the car dealer, but the car dealer didn't return the favor — he didn't buy solar equipment, even though the cost of solar in that specific town was artificially reduced by government tariff. In the free market, it would go at $45k. This is nice for solar workers in town, but it puts them out of work in the car dealer's town.
But the real issue isn't tariffs or balances of trade. The real issue is that the car dealer just doesn't like solar, even at special prices. By extant thinking, that's not fair. If solar guy's going to spend money in car dealer's town, then car dealer guy should spend money in his town. Right?
I'm willing to be educated on this, but in this example, nobody got shafted, and everybody did what he thought was in his own best interest. Balance of trade considerations didn't enter in at all, anywhere, even though the solar guy was "cheating."
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
There are certainly important industries a nation needs to keep in an uncertain world. Steel and iron manufacturing, ship-building, aircraft manufacturing, certain high-tech electronics, etc.
And that isn't even the entire industry, just those the government deems vital. They can do this by buying weapons from only American industry, and declaring that the weapons must contain a certain percentage of American-made manufactured and raw materials.
Now we certainly have purchased weapons from foreigners, especially Britain, France, Japan, and Sweden, but we need to ensure we keep American weapons and vital industries open. Perhaps a small percentage could be spent on "best of breed" foreign weaponry.
When Air Bus competed with Boeing for the new Air Force tanker, a lot of people thought it was a no-brainer; an American company versus a European one, however, it wasn't that simple. Much of the Boeing jet (and it won the bidding competition) was made in various foreign countries, while Air Bus committed to making their offering in the USA (Mobile, Alabama), with an equal to Boeing amount of American-made parts and materials. IMHO, both fulfilled the requirements I ever had.
Federal Government slight of hand that simply categorizes a large number of people as no longer in the workforce rather than unemployed.
RE: Zero balance of trade and ALL industries are vital ESPECIALLY if you need a job and you want your home town to not die. Get it?
OK I get it. You want EVERYTHING (toys, appliances, clothes, widgets ) made in the USA without exceptions because ALL of these are vital to you.
Do you want a law passed REQUIRING this? In other words, you can’t do business unless you make all of your products and their components here?
RE: Federal Government slight of hand that simply categorizes a large number of people as no longer in the workforce rather than unemployed
So, you are in effect, admitting that Trump’s low unemployment economy is not really all that.
The sad thing, is that China is missing the chance to be a better nation and to learn about the benefits of fair trade. If they treated American companies the way we treat theirs they would reap huge benefits.
But they still want to hold onto the communist party system.
They are better off today than in 1990, but they missed the boat on a lot of things.
I’m with you.
I want no law passed because their is no need for that. I want to start with a 10% across the board tariff. Then raise is 3% per year every year automatically until either the trade deficit goes to zero or we reach a ceiling of 35%, whichever comes first.
I agree with you on this.
If the dispute is about stealing of intellectual property, requiring businesses to give up their product design secrets to sell in China, then there would be a basis for being strict with China.
But that is not what many of those in this thread are arguing about. They complain about China trumping us on labor cost, which is a strange argument because even if we took out all manufacturing from China, that will not necessarily mean that these jobs will come back to the USA. we have other third world countries who will take up the slack and if they do, how’s that going to bring manufacturing jobs back?
The only logical and consistent answer I have is to FORCE ALL BUSINESSES to MAKE PRODUCTS HERE IN THE USA BY LAW, that is, if you want ALL of these jobs to come back.
RE: I want no law passed because their is no need for that. I want to start with a 10% across the board tariff. Then raise is 3% per year every year automatically until either the trade deficit goes to zero or we reach a ceiling of 35%, whichever comes first.
And you want this for *ALL* products we buy in the United States right?
Did you miss my post # 61?
I was replying to your post # 48.
World's largest consumer of opioids, squalid decaying cities full of beggars crapping in the streets, declining life expectancy, lawlessness increasing throughout the country, and mass inescapable poverty, that's where we are and magnifying at a rapid rate.
But, it's all good with those who are in the Free Traitor religion drinking "The US Can't Do It" Kool-Aid rather than looking at reality.
All imports. All products at not imported (yet). Actually all imports for '18 were $1.5T/year. The entire economy in '18 was $21.5T. Imports were only 1.5/20.5 = 7.3% of the entire economy.
RE: All imports. All products at not imported (yet).
And you don’t mind the price increases ( and the ensuing inflation and the ensuing increase in interest rates ) that will result from this I gather.
RE: World’s largest consumer of opioids, squalid decaying cities full of beggars crapping in the streets, declining life expectancy, lawlessness increasing throughout the country, and mass inescapable poverty, that’s where we are and magnifying at a rapid rate.
And all of the above is caused by our trade deficit with China?
If China is exporting opioids to the USA, can you show me a reliable link that reports this?
He said he did it because he knew they’d buy Ford autos.
A myth that Ford was happy to promote when he realized the good publicity, The truth was that the Ford line was a horrific grind, and employees were quitting after a few months to go to competitors, taking their training with them. In 1913, for example, Ford had to hire 52,000 workers to keep 14,000 positions filled. There were also a lot of requirements to get that wage. The Ford "Sociology Department" would visit the homes of workers to make sure they were upstanding people, didn't drink or gamble, and didn't have wives who worked outside the home. Otherwise it was back to $2.25 for you.
By the 1930s, the Sociology Department had evolved into a police force where workers were punished for just talking to each other, and men would be fired if they drove a non-Ford auto to work. There was something called "Fordization of the face," where workers learned to talk without moving their lips.
Like I said imports are 7.3% of the economy. You could DOUBLE(which I am not calling for) the cost of imports and it would only be 1.5/22 = 8% ONE TIME inflationary adjustment providing the rate stays the same.
Disagree. There’s a reason he paid top dollar (compared to all else) for workers.
As far as the monotony and boredom of assembly work, true, but a nice paycheck helps ameliorate that.
Now, as the years rolled on, Ford’s pay was no better than the rest. But the fact that he started it all is simply true.
And sure, he pat himself on the back in what you call a myth. Similar to Trump giving himself a lot credit for his hotels, golf courses, etc. It made him a man of his times, bigger than life.
Ever heard, "Idle hands are the Devil's workshop"?
It's all compounded at a furious rate due to unemployment and low wages. Furthermore, no significant block of power and money will push the government to solve any of those problems as well as the abysmal state of education in this country as long as they can simply avoid it all by moving their factories overseas.
Business and Industry lobbied and worked on their own to improve the quality of education and life in general for Americans as long as they were dependent on American labor.
Now, OJT for Chinese, Vietnamese, Thais, Indians, etc., and large debts for useless degrees for Americans.
If you don't see the connection between the social problems in this country, unemployment and underemployment, then everything you say about the wonders of Free Trade really is just BS Kool-Aid you're sucking down then regurgitating without any connection to reality.
RE: Ever heard, “Idle hands are the Devil’s workshop”?
I have no arguments with the above statement. The issue is — what is causing these idle hands?
You mentioned the opiod crisis. How is this related to China?
As for unemployment (your idle hands) and low wages, I thought post after post in FR tout the historically unemployment rate in this country under Trump with some reports telling us that businesses are actually crying out for workers.
This was already true even BEFORE the tariffs imposed against China.
Ever since Clinton walked into the Whitehouse they've methodically increased the number of people they list as "no longer in the workforce" which dramatically alters the numbers of unemployed they report.
Furthermore, crying out for workers and finding workers who can pass a drug test and/or have the equivalent of a ninth grade education are two different things, both of which have in large measure caused by corporations no longer caring about a US workforce because for fifty years they could just ship jobs overseas where the government would make sure they had what they wanted. Extra profit margin and no bother with doing what they had done until then in the way of investing in training workers and hiring them right here at home in the US.
That, in turn, means people can see by the time they're fourteen that they're on a dead end track if they aren't in the top 10% of the class instead of facing the fact that they'll have to work in a manufacturing job which requires that they be clean and able to meet a minimum standard.
Not a lot of people will bother with either the minimum standard manufacturing jobs require or staying straight if they know damn well their future is flipping burgers and remembering to ask if the customer wants fries with that after pushing the proper color of button no the cash register.
You obviously believe Americans are mostly stupid and incapable of competing with the rest of the world when the reality is that Americans aren't walking Tootsie Roll Pop suckers who can't see down the road a few years in their own lives. The game is rigged and the people who aren't being sucked down the drain yet are brainwashed to cheer for the very things that are destroying our society.
If you really believe your own BS start lobbying to send all government jobs not an elected position over seas to the lowest cost labor nation available. Then I might believe you aren't just regurgitating BS you've been fed since you personally are profiting by shipping US jobs overseas and don't give a damn about Americans other than yourself.
Have a lovely day.
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