Posted on 07/15/2003 4:09:15 AM PDT by Texas_Dawg
Edited on 04/22/2004 11:49:28 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
A group of American makers of wood bedroom furniture is preparing to seek protection from the U.S. government to stem a surge of imports from China that the companies say has ravaged their industry.
John Bassett, president and chief executive of Vaughan-Bassett Furniture Co., Galax, Va., and a spokesman for the group of 14 furniture makers, said the American Furniture Manufacturers Committee for Legal Trade intends to file an antidumping petition this fall with the U.S. Department of Commerce and the U.S. International Trade Commission.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
It's quite decent of you to permit me to have my own beliefs. I'll take your permission as an affirmative answer to my question, an answer which explains a lot in itself.
But only sometimes, I guess.
That is correct. I believe there are times and situations in which the nation's security, and mine, takes precedence over my right to choose in a few less important matters, such as how much I pay for CD players and coffee makers. But I realize that concept is foreign to libertarian dogma, as is the idea of limited immigration and secure borders.
Since the U.S. Constitution explicitly grants congress the authority to impose duties on imported goods as one of it's enumerated powers, I don't consider tariffs on imports which are deliberately underpriced in order to destroy domestic manufacturers to be a limitation on my personal liberty. It seems to me there is a long list of much more egregious infringements on our real civil liberties to be addressed before we worry about the constitutionally permissable imposition of tariffs.
If tariffs will ensure the revival of the once formidable American industrial base, the same base which was so instrumental in winning full scale wars such as WWII, the few additional dimes or even dollars I may pay for American made products is an infinitessimally small price to pay for the economic and military security of the nation. But would such tariffs ensure that revival? That was the gist of the question I posed in a previous post, and an answer rooted in doctrinaire libertarianism doesn't answer that question. But thanks anyway.
Send them to help the North Koreans farm. They (DPRK) should start dying off from malnutrition inflicted by their physcotic "ruler" in large numbers pretty soon I would imagine. Another country lucky enough to experience true socialism.
Oh wait before I misconstrue. Are you talking about all the male children China is hording up or the female ones lucky enough not to have been killed (aborted) and adpoted by foreigners? Cause iffen its the ladys I imagine they will be staying put.
Protectionism harms this country more than most other things. Free trade and respect for human rights for all people, not just some well connected thug, leads to long term abundance, progress and harmony among peoples. The moronic countries who sell products for less than they cost to produce will go out of business. In the mean time, our people spend less on those products and the money they save is put to productive use developing new ideas, products and productivity instead of supporting some labor union slob trying to make $35 an hr to sew some hems up.
But hey, if the hourly workers stay stupid while making sneakers it's good for all you intellectual elitists who peddle fear to them in return for power.
Wrong, I have already cited how John D. Rockefeller gained control of the oil and gas industry by doing exactly that. I am surprised one that claims to be expert in ecomonics does not understand.
Your world view is very simplistic, childish really. Our founding fathers gave the power to place tariffs on foriegn goods for a very good reason. I think I'll listen to them on these matters.
Except that you were wrong. The price of oil went down and all your old wives tales about it crashed and burned many years ago.
BS.
Your doctrinaire libertarian mindset has caused you to lose touch with reality, that is, if you were ever in touch to begin with. The $35 per hour sewing job you cited simply doesn't exist and it never did. Furthermore, China is not about to go out of business. The industrial revolution now well underway in China has to be seen to be believed. My nephew who is employed in the CNC machine tool business recently spent several weeks in the main industrial centers of China. To say he was impressed would be a gross understatement. I have always suspected the free trade theories were for the most part just the unrealistic pipe dreams of essentially libertarian theorists. Your posts have done nothing to change that perception.
I may not be up to speed on current economic theory, but I spent a good portion of my working life deeply involved in the nuts and bolts end of the bussiness world. I don't claim to be educated in economics theory, but I believe I know something about what works and what doesn't because I have seen the process up close and personal.
You, on the other hand, say you are a history teacher, certainly a worthy and admirable profession. But I wonder how much hands on experience you have in a competitive business environment where results count and BS is shown to be BS by hard, cold evidence. When and if you ever climb down from your insulated ivory tower and spend some time in the real hard-nosed business world instead of simply parroting the pipe dream ideas of some tweedy economic professors who are as bereft of real world experience as yourself, get back to me and we'll compare notes.
On second thought don't get back to me. Life is too short and sweet for me to waste it conversing with someone who can't or won't conduct a civil discourse without insults and derisive comments. Your abusive tactics may work to intimidate 15 year old high school students, but they have the opposite affect on adults who aren't impressed by your position of authority.
The $35 sewing job was an example. I guess they didn't do that when you were in school.
Further I have never supported the current version of trade. I believe in free trade, not government contrived schemes to benefit campaign contributors.
As to the civil exchange of opinions, you need to reread the thread. I fire back, I don't like being called names like traitor and greedy. Anytime you want to have an adult exchange look me up, but leave the personal references out and don't put words in my mouth and we will be just fine.
Text from a bio
"The Standard thus regularly lowered its prices in a given area to eradicate a smaller competitor, who could not resist selling at loss for long enough."
You are very poorly informed on this topic. A that is not a personal attack, it is a fact. I'm not very PC so I don't mind speaking the truth.
LOL, if it's text from "a bio" it must be right.
The price of oil went down and companies who couldn't provide oil at lower prices rightfully went out of business. The price of oil did not subsequently rise.
Business is tough.
You are very poorly informed on this topic.
I think that about you. And I didn't take it as an attack, just a misinformed opinion. I know an attack when I see one. And I have a thick skin about it. I am always amused when those who start them cry when they recieve return fire.
You make 2 assertions here. Neither is necessarily true.
A country may choose to sell products for less than production cost simply to drive a competitior out of business. Realize that large corporations use this tactic on smaller corporations all the time to capture market share, and it is viewed as a legal and legitimate business tactic. Of course, once the market sector is captured the corporation will then sell the good at a profit, and since they have the established economies of scale no one can easily enter and compete with them. A country, such as the PRC, can do the same thing; but additionally a country may choose to do this for perceived security reasons. Thus the country may capture a market sector but continue to sell low simply because they believe that having that industrial sector running under the control of their nation state provides military security. Therefore, your assertion that "countries who sell products for less than they cost to produce will go out of business" is not correct.
Secondly, you assert that the money saved from having cheap items to buy is then productively used for "developing new ideas, products and productivity". That ain't necessarily so. For example, Joe or Jane sixpack might simply buy 2 or 3 cheap items rather than 1 more expensive item, rather than save their money. If they saved their money, then the bank could in fact loan it out to someone who wanted to use it for "developing new ideas, products and productivity"; but in fact Joe and Jane 6-pack are more in debt today than they were 5 years or 10 years ago. Thus I suggest that your 2nd assertion is unproven, and that you have failed to provide evidence to support it.
And maybe they are. But what I'm really impressed with that you made your argument without calling me a single name or questioning my love of my country.
Regards
If we allow foriegn competitors to dump products in or market, they will not "go out of business" they will capture the market and make a nice profit. A profit that could and should stay in this country.
Why?
The question was; why should profits stay in this country? When you say "our" own companies, which ones do you mean? The ones you own stock in or the ones that have their charter registered here?
They can't get any more from me anyway, they got it all.
The people in other countries have to eat too. I guess they don't count because of the border.
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