Posted on 01/16/2008 4:01:09 AM PST by LowCountryJoe
Rochester
IN the days before Tuesday’s Republican presidential primary in Michigan, Mitt Romney and John McCain battled over what the government owes to workers who lose their jobs because of the foreign competition unleashed by free trade. Their rhetoric differed — Mr. Romney said he would “fight for every single job,” while Mr. McCain said some jobs “are not coming back” — but their proposed policies were remarkably similar: educate and retrain the workers for new jobs.
All economists know that when American jobs are outsourced, Americans as a group are net winners. What we lose through lower wages is more than offset by what we gain through lower prices. In other words, the winners can more than afford to compensate the losers. Does that mean they ought to? Does it create a moral mandate for the taxpayer-subsidized retraining programs proposed by Mr. McCain and Mr. Romney?
Um, no. Even if you’ve just lost your job, there’s something fundamentally churlish about blaming the very phenomenon that’s elevated you above the subsistence level since the day you were born. If the world owes you compensation for enduring the downside of trade, what do you owe the world for enjoying the upside?
[Snip]
One way to think about that is to ask what your moral instincts tell you in analogous situations. Suppose, after years of buying shampoo at your local pharmacy, you discover you can order the same shampoo for less money on the Web. Do you have an obligation to compensate your pharmacist? If you move to a cheaper apartment, should you compensate your landlord? When you eat at McDonald’s, should you compensate the owners of the diner next door? Public policy should not be designed to advance moral instincts that we all reject every day of our lives.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Toadster always calls for papa to show up. Rule against it? Why, are rules important to you globalists? I know silver pieces are.
I find it more amusing than anything else.
You'll have to show me where I ever objected to you posting from a conservative site.
You want your cake and eat it too....just like all good little globalists.
I like cake, but I'm not a globalist. Sorry.
Speaking of psychobabble, your typical protectionist is as vested in the notion that economic doom is just around the corner as your typical liberal is vested in defeat in Iraq.
It more of an exaggeration to the logical extreme with the idea that protectionists think everything is always better if we export more than we import.
The only pschobabble comes from free traitors, who believe that those who want to stop exporting every manufacturing job are fools, and that those who want a rational amount of self-interest on the international markets are protectionists.
Ah yes, to hell with the free market, let's get the government to step in to save us from competition. Why is it that those that whine about free trade are almost always ignorant of economics?
Speak to the content of the articles (I posted about 5 of them), if you would.
Post articles to refute the content, not attack the people, if you would.
And then we can see who it is that you look to as THE pristine people and organizations upon which to rely for your globalist ideals.
Sorry, but your posting history shows otherwise.
No, it doesn’t.
You do it all the time. You’ve probably done it on this thread. Fraud.
So what?
About 60% of China's exports come from foreign owned firms. Again, so what? All your rambling proves only that you have no idea what you're talking about.
Woo Hoo! Save the economy! Quit your job today! ;-)
Free Republic was not intended to be a place where conservatives debate liberal talking points.
Um, no, I don’t. I’m truly not like you, at all.
Uhhh, the article wasn't written by the NYT staff it was written by Steven Landsburg, a conservative economist.
Then debate what Schlafly, from the Conservative Eagle Forum states, which points HAPPEN to be backed up by other sources, including liberal sources.
Everyone needs to change in the process.
I will list the people who need to change...
1. Government. They need to lower taxes and burdens on business.
2. Business. They need to develop new products and streamline the ones they have already. If it means adding new technology to a manufacturing line so be it.
3. The worker. They need to continue learning new things such as how to operate the equipment mentioned in #2.
But the overall factor here is that the industry is still here.
If you just say 'screw it we don't need auto manufacturing anymore'.... then tell everyone to go find new jobs...that is crap and that is wrong.
The auto industry of today is different than that of 1950. And the auto industry of today will be different than that of 2050.
McCain said everyone else needs to change except himself and big government. Its tantamount to blaming the worker for something the management and more importantly the government does wrong.
Education of workers won't do crap as long as the government continues doing what it is doing.
Inanimate objects do not write articles. This article was written by a human being. According to the NYT, he’s a professor of economics. The NYT might be lying, of course.
“I know you are but what am I.” LOL
That is what you usually reduce it to.
Carry on.
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