Buy America, weaken America

usnews ^ | 3/25/06 | Richard J. Newman

[ncountylee]

The Durabrand 10-inch portable DVD player available at Wal-Mart retails for $199.94. A group of senators would like to raise the price to $254.67. The Creative Zen Nano Plus 512-megabyte MP3 player seems like a bargain at $89.72; less so at $114.39, the price the senators would prefer that you pay. The price hikes would be the result of a 27.5 percent tariff on goods imported from China, a proposal sponsored by Democrat Chuck Schumer of New York and Republican Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and is scheduled to come up for a vote in the Senate this week.

Schumer and Graham aren't crazy, of course—they know better than most that taking money out of voters' pockets is a sure way to be sent packing. In other words, that 27.5 percent price hike won't be coming to a retailer near you anytime soon. But as an attention-getter, it's pretty good, and attention is what the two senators, and a number of colleagues who support them, are after. The chief bogeyman they want to flog is China's communist government, which—according to Schumer and the rest—deliberately keeps its currency undervalued in order to sell more cheap imports to the United States and other countries. Reasonable economists differ on that question. The tariff, if you buy the argument, would bring prices on Chinese imports closer to their unsubsidized value, leveling the playing field for honest tradespeople in, say, New York and South Carolina, who can't possibly produce goods as cheaply as the Chinese and still earn enough wages to buy all the DVD and MP players that they need.

[neutrino]

Of course not, they will raise their prices to just under the 27.5% tariff that the Chinese (really the American consumer) will be paying.

So American companies, and thus their owners, will make more money. That sounds like capitalism at its finest.

Why would anyone object to that?

[grey_whiskers]

Build your own company and then you can hire who you like.

Nice non sequitur.

First, I'm not complaining just about who is being hired, but the fashion in which the transition is being packaged. If you are engaging in wage arbitrage, at least have the grace and honesty to admit it. And when the forteign workers produce cheap crap, or burn through millions of dollars because cultural differences do not allow them to admit that they don't know something, fire their ass the way you would fire a non-performer here in the states.

Most of those doing the offshoring did not BUILD those companies. Carly Fiorina of "no American has a right to a job" infamy, came over from Lucent where as CEO she destroyed tens of billions of shareholder value.(*) Remember the proxy fight with the original founding families of HP?

Have you read my first" or my second vanitires on offshoring / outsourcing?

(And before you jump to any conclusions, let me note that I am merely reversing the arguments of CEOs, to wit: "If the stock price goes up, I did it, and I take credit, regardless of the state of the stock market or the economy. If the stock price goes down, than that is SOLELY due to external factors beyond my ability to influence or control, and I should get a large bonus because finding top, key executives in these troubled times is harder than ever.")

[grjr21]

You should have told that to Spain before they invested in Columbus. America was built by investment.




LOL. Could you have possibly picked a worse analogy. The atrocities committed by the Spanish against the natives are well documented and their financial interests ended poorly for them hundreds of years ago

[grey_whiskers]

My daughter majored in computer science with a perfect 4.0 in computer science and she and her husband retired when she was 34.

At the risk of impertinence, how long ago was that? Where was she hired? Did she go into management, or join a small startup and cash out?

Leaving those questions unanswered may give a misleading impression as to how your daughter did it, and how common / easy it is for others to do it...

Kind of like Rush Limbaugh saying, "If I can make it, you can too." There is only so much airtime on the radio: and there is room for only so many nationally syndicated hard-core conservative 3-hour shows. If he had instead a 1/2 hour show at 2:30 AM in stations in Nebraska and Oklahoma, he wouldn't be nearly so rich...but that is the position that most of his listeners would end up in...

In other words, many who have succeeded get quite nonchalant over the difficulty of reaching their success. Humility is a good thing.

Cheers!

[willyd]

When government interferes with the free market by using tariffs, you end up with artificially higher prices which harms the average consumer. Capitalism is about managing your resources effectively to deliver a quality product at a competitive price. Tariffs and isolationist economic policies erode the efficiency of the market to the detriment of the individual consumer. That is not capitalism. That is government beauracracy pushing us towards another depression.

[Liberty Valance]

27.5 percent price hike

Whatever happened to 3% or 5% or even 10%? -

[1rudeboy]

. . . Mr. Tillman gave his life for America and all Americans.

Precisely. He did not give his life for the Schumer-Graham tariff bill.

[neutrino]

No - capitalism is generally defined as meaning private ownership of the means of production, which are used for private profit. There is nothing in the common definitions about delivering "a quality product at a competitive price."

Note that a variety of laws and regulations discourage monopolies and so-called anti-competitive practices. These result in greater competition, and, presumably, lower prices. So capitalism is restrained by regulation. As a consumer, you benefit - but as an owner, you lose.

And if tariffs and isolationist policies are bad for the market, they why is China - which does restrict access to its markets - growing so fast? Hmm?

Free trade is a dagger in the back of America!

[neutrino]

He did not give his life for the Schumer-Graham tariff bill.

So you want even higher tariffs, to better eliminate free traitin'?

Glad to hear it! Welcome to the side of good and truth!

[investigateworld]

>>>And if tariffs and isolationist policies are bad for the market, they why is China - which does restrict access to its markets - growing so fast? Hmm? <<<

(Awaiting the answer bump)

[willyd]

Capitalism is an economic theory which stresses that control of the means of producing economic goods in a society should reside in the hands of those who invest the capital for production. Private ownership and free enterprise is supposed to lead to more efficiency, lower prices, better products. Adam Smith popularized this theory in his 1776 book The Wealth of Nations.

Second website on google...

China is Communist, so they have an interest in limiting free trade. They are also going through an industrial revolution that is fueled by their manufacturing boom. They have a billion people whose average income and standard of living has been dramatically increased in recent years through technological advances and world demand for their consumer goods. Even China is starting to open their markets up to US Retailers. This is the first time that they have had a population that expressed a strong demand for the goods they produce domestically and they are reaching out to US developers and retailers in order meet the increased demand.

Anti-trust laws are the opposite of tariffs. They protect free trade and competition while tariffs discourage competition. If you are China and have a system where the government owns the businesses, you don't want free trade because you lose money. China's individual consumers are still hurt by their government's protectionist strategy though.

Free trade has provided this country with one of the highest standards of living in the world despite the best efforts of the unions and the minimum wage crowd. It has provided you with the myriad of options that you have in your every day life.

[1rudeboy]

You might think it's funny, but your use of Corporal Tillman's death to promote your own political agenda is tasteless.

The Pat Tillman Foundation

[JABBERBONK]

The point being is the Adv. Chinese are getting more wealthy, you go to Bejing and you will not see masses with their Army caps with red stars riding bicycles all over the city.

[monkeywrench]

China has been an irresponsible power for quite awhile, now. They've been gearing up for war with us, but, then I'd bet you know that. Not to mention, they're the largest nuke weapons proliferators on the planet. Here, get up to speed, and drop the chicom talking points. http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20060316-114755-3306r.htm

[neutrino]

Free trade has provided this country with one of the highest standards of living in the world despite the best efforts of the unions and the minimum wage crowd.

No - protected industry is what did that. We're now squandering the national wealth we accumulated during the period when we protected our industry.

[neutrino]

but your use of Corporal Tillman's death to promote your own political agenda is tasteless.

If the facts are against you, argue the law.
If the law is against you, argue the facts.
And if both are against you, pound on the table.

And you, 1rudeboy, are merely pounding upon the table.

Free traitin' - treason, one dollar at a time.

[Philistone]

Besides what use do the Senators have in mind for the money extorted from the taxpayers by such a tax?

Most likely subsidizing union-dominated (read Democrat controlled) industries in their own states.

[Nowhere Man]

pingaroonie!

[buglemanster]

Based on my travels to China, I'm afraid there's a great deal of hatred for the US in China. They don't want to be like Americans, except in one respect - they want to be rich. The general sentiment appears to be that China is destined to fight a nuclear war with the US, after which China will emerge triumphant, at the head of the table. The mind boggles, but that's what they really think.

Anecdotal evidence means absolutely just that, anecdotal, and doesn't increase the strength of your argument one bit. Many Frenchmen don't want to be Americans either, they want to be French. I dont' even need to go to France to tell you that. Give me some hard facts, like where you traveled, when, whom you met, what you asked, what they said (in quote), etc etc.

[Kokojmudd]

Ya ya put tariffs on everytink. make us economy like japan with ruxery tax on all cheap china product. ya ya unemproyment up to 15%? who care we patriot! ya ya