Posted on 09/18/2005 9:19:51 AM PDT by Willie Green
Angel Mills worked at GST AutoLeather in Williamsport, Md., most of her adult life. She cut, inspected, packed and shipped leather upholstery until she was laid off in June 2003 as the company scaled back local operations and shifted production to Mexico.
"It's sad. It's scary. I've been a factory worker all my life, and I didn't know what I wanted to do," said Ms. Mills, a 38-year-old Williamsport resident with a teenage son.
But by March 2004 she was taking a half-year course to become a state-licensed massage therapist. A federal program that helps workers who lose jobs owing to foreign competition paid for her training and offered extended unemployment benefits.
In July, she started working at Venetian Salon and Spa in Hagerstown, Md.
~~~SNIP~~~
Mr. Thomas said that for all trade adjustment program workers passing through the consortium, the average wage was $14.36 an hour before the layoffs, while after retraining it was $11.87 an hour, a decline that is common for factory workers who have to restart their lives.
U.S. Labor Department figures indicate that among the retrained, those that find new jobs end up making only 70 percent to 80 percent of their old wages on average.
(Excerpt) Read more at washtimes.com ...
Saying it's not in the constitution is disingenuous because I can identify all kinds of legislation that has no correlation with constitutional law. Until the Supremes challenge a piece of legislation it still remains on the books and enforced.
That's not to say that a market participant can't change his/her role from employee to employer or retrain/retool for a different market opportunity. The feasibility of that happening on a mass scale without a cost to other market participants is unlikely.
Our goal should not be to "free the market" it should be to optimize the market so that all participants can be successful and productive. In the vast majority of cases that means undoing the many things the government has done in the past. The problem is most of the free trade legislation flies through the senate while all the other important legislation that should be associated with it is held up indefinitely.
We should include health care reform, tax reform, tort reform, etc in with these FT agreements. Otherwise the deck will be stacked against American's because of our onerous government burden.
A minimum wage simply means that anyone whose labor is worth less than the minimum wage will be unemployed, and in a welfare society like ours, this means that we will be poorer both of the small value of his labor and the larger value of the relief given to him.
A minimum wage is as useless as a price control. It does more damage than welfare alone does by itself.
There are a helluvalotta Dutchmen who USED to be wealthy, until the tulips crashed.
Tulips really aren't worth that much - unless half your countrymen have temporarily gone insane and are buying all of them in sight. I personally cannot wait for the housing bubble to break. You know what the first thing I'm going to do in the event that housing prices radically go down? Well, buy a house. Me and everyone else. So I'm kind of skeptical that real estate and homes in particular are going to be selling for pennies an acre anywhere in my lifetime. Maybe speculators will get burnt for part of their investment if prices readjust to meet actual demand, but I suspect for most people a house is a good investment. 'Cause, you know, they plan to live in it?
We should include health care reform, tax reform, tort reform, etc in with these FT agreements. Otherwise the deck will be stacked against American's because of our onerous government burden.
This is insightful. As stated above, the three things hurting American manufacturing, production, and consumers are: 1.) Litigation, 2.) Regulation, 3.) and Taxation. They're all government derived. The last thing anyone needs (except the protected companies that stand to directly benefit at the cost of everyone else in America) is more government subsidies in the form of tariffs.
Who's advocating zero trade? Freedom to trade is what's being advocated here - as opposed to more protectionism. Comparative advantage will work if it's given the opportunity.
it's reasonable Tarriffs (as envisioned by the Founding Fathers) so that domestic manufacturers still have to compete, it's just that they get a small edge over foreign competition
How many taxes do you know that remain reasonable? How does protecting our manufacturers from competition help them? Finally, do you think the founding fathers envisioned our current state of corporate taxes, federal income taxes, state income taxes, property taxes, social security taxes, Medicare taxes, excise taxes, sales taxes, capital gains taxes.......
Don't you think we're taxed enough already?
Oh yeah...economic booms....like that one in 1929....what a BOOM! that was!!!
Yep, free markets just don't do anything other than just make boom, boom, boom....
I think you need to review your notes from your Economic History class...
"Free trade" will never be viable unless it also fair. For it to be fair it must be governed by a common set of rules and regulations (aka "World Government").
With World Government come all the disadvantages associated wtih any monopoly.
That's reality.
Thank you for lining up with A. Pole. Now I know where you are coming from and will not waste my time on you.
"Her job? Selling gym memberships"
But I'll bet she had a nice caboose.
Which brings us back to NAFTA, GATT, etc.
Are you saying there should be NO NAFTA, etc.? Or that the rules are unfair to the US?
Au contraire ... Friedman demolishes the argument that Government can even attempt to "manipulate the system for their own advantage". Any such attempt is self-defeating. Tariffs harm your own economy, so if other countries had high tariffs, they are the ones suffering for it; it would be folly for US to follow suit.
On the other hand the best of all worlds is reciprocal free trade, which is what USA is approximating in trade deals like CAFTA and NAFTA.
I recall 'fair' as a warm and fuzzy word Liberals like Walter Mondale used to use a lot. Like "fair taxation" (meaning: tax the rich), or a 'fair wage' (meaning: give in to the unionist demands), etc.
What is "fair"? Isn't it "fair" to allow willing sellers and buyers to go about their business without the Government making it illegal?
Oh yeah...economic booms....like that one in 1929....what a BOOM! that was!!! Yep, free markets just don't do anything other than just make boom, boom, boom.... I think you need to review your notes from your Economic History class...
I have and unless you were educated by socialists like John Kenneth Galbraith, you'd know that the 1930s depression was brought about by GOVERNMENT POLICIES of 'beggar thy neighbor' protectionism and gold hoarding, and a HUGE TARIFF INCREASE in the US called Hawley-Smoot.
Smoot-Hawley Tariff raised taxes on imported goods as high as 60 percent. Not only did this burden American consumers with another tax, but it effectively killed international trade. Soon all nations were raising tariffs and rushing behind the walls of protectionism. The subsequent collapse of international trade caused a global depression... this depression was made worse by further Government mismanagement, namely monetary tightening, a TAX INCREASE in 1931, and later FDR's flawed attempts to inject socialism to 'cure' the depression.... this cascade of mistakes created the Great Depression.
Let's review: Tax cuts, free market economics pursued under Coolidge: Result, prosperity. Tax and tariffs increases, global protectionism, Government mismanagement and socialist schemes: Result, great depression.
This doesnt debunk the value of free-market economics. It re-affirms it!
"Our government is doing little to protect our labor market"
The whole idea that government regulation could 'protect' jobs is absurd. In Europe, they 'protect jobs' by making it impossible to fire people ... all those 'protections' make the labor market stagnant and cause companies to do anything they can to avoid hiring in the first place. Result? Germany has 11% unemployment while we have 5% unemployment.
So much for 'protecting jobs'.
"but they seem to be fine with a free-flow of outbound foreign investment"
would you want USA to be like a tinpot dictatorship and forbid people from moving capital outside the country?
Dont you realize that it would stop US from being a global power to restrict that?!?
" and massive inbound illegal labor."
truly a govt failure that we should fix, but one that speaks to how HEALTHY our job market is, that we attract millions of people to get jobs.
I would add anti-trust laws, progressive estate tax and restoring the traditional tariffs.
Government DOES create wealth. I will give you one key example:
It was the government ie kings and the feudal aristocracy which built the legal order, suppressed the banditry, civilized the barbarians, created the stable money, safe roads, defeated foreign enemies, protected the cities and merchants on the roads.
Thanx to the above merchants became prosperous and powerful, removed the king from power and demanded that market becomes the highest standard. Merchants want state to exist only in the aspect of protecting their wealth ie police, courts, prisons and military. The rest of society to be damned.
But it does not work that way, the revolutionaries have seen the opening and the Communism and Fascism filled the vacuum. Merchants are not fit to be the guides for the society, left to their own devices they will wreck it.
The kings of the world are grown old, inheritors they shall have none. In childhood death removes the son, their daughters pale have given, each one, sick crowns to the powers to hold. Into coin the rabble breaks them, today's lord of the world takes them, stretches them into machines in his fire, grumbling they serve his every desire; but happiness stills forsakes them. The ore is homesick. And it yearns to leave the coin and leave the wheel that teach it to lead a life inane. The factories and tills it spurns; from petty forms it will uncongeal, return to the open mountain's vein, and on the mountain will close again.(Rainer Maria Rilke from Book of Hours. Translated by Albert Hofstadter as part of Heidegger's What Are Poets For?)
What are the "traditional tariffs" you're talking about, specifically?
Setting the minimum wage is a measure of the same type like anti-trust laws. It prevents the market from ruining itself it is not intended to provide jobs.
James Watt used the so-called "flyball governor" to regulate the speed of his steam engines. You free market guys must hate him, Watt wasted so much power, unregulated engine would go much faster!
"mercantilism, socialism, fascism and communism" etc are real things caused by real reasons. If you do not learn from history you will repeat it in a worse way.
The best way to prevent the sins of oligarchy as practised in Latin America is to support *limited Government* and *free enterprise*, niether of which have been popular in Latin America, unfortunately.
How do you know it? From the books of Milton Friedman?
"mercantilism, socialism, fascism and communism" etc are real things caused by real reasons.
All false ideologies and belief systems may be called 'real' but they are still false and wrong. When tried, they failed.
... why do you defend these notions that history has shown to be failures? Why dont you take your own advice? "If you do not learn from history you will repeat it in a worse way."
The best way to prevent the sins of oligarchy as practised in Latin America is to support *limited Government* and *free enterprise*, niether of which have been popular in Latin America, unfortunately.
How do you know it? From the books of Milton Friedman?
History is, again, a great teacher. I gave examples, like Marcos regime, of where despotism and corruption collide. It's common. The least corrupt countries are those with strong property rights, limited Government, and freedom. Countries like USA and Switzerland come to mind. With limited Government comes *efficient* Government - it's not powerful enough to be corrupt.
Friedman, Hayek, Sowell - they and the classical economists are right ... open your mind, you might learn something.
You cannot separate people from their labor and people should not be treated as commodity. The system that treats working people as commodity is evil.
I know you're not a rookie, but that made me smile. Welcome to your daily dose of FR "economics."
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.