Right, and I don't have to pay tariffs if I don't drink coffee, listen to the Rolling Stones, eat chocolate, play a good guitar, or use any retail computer to post on the freerepublic...
Posted on 12/25/2010 10:21:26 PM PST by Cardhu
There is a theory in statistics that says different methods used to tabulate and analyze the same set of data will yield different results. This applies perfectly to international trade.
For some time now, the United States has been pressuring China to reduce its "huge trade surplus". But do the methods used to tabulate and analyze data give us the true picture of China-US trade? Let facts speak for themselves.
Rules of origin are widely used today to determine a product's country of origin for purposes of international trade. But the rules of origin method, which originated in the 1940s, has little room for processing trade and transshipments, which are rampant in the international market today.
That is why the analyses of data through rules of origin fail to give the true picture of international trade. And that is why China has a huge trade surplus with the US.
Several experts have said that if China-US trade figures are analyzed using a method other than the rules of origin, China's trade surplus with the US would drop by at least 40 percent.
An article in Paris-based Le Figaro has quoted the World Trade Organization (WTO) as saying that China's trade surplus with the US is over-estimated by about 50 percent. WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy has said that the most important part of international trade is not the imbalance but value addition.
The use of rules of origin to analyze processing trade tends to distort the true picture and produce erroneous results, which has been the case with China's foreign trade. Value addition in China's exports is very low because most of the materials and spare parts used to make them are imported. But the US ignores this and counts the whole product as made in China.
(Excerpt) Read more at chinadaily.com.cn ...
How much should we shrink our economy to keep those darn furriners from building stuff here?
Right, and I don't have to pay tariffs if I don't drink coffee, listen to the Rolling Stones, eat chocolate, play a good guitar, or use any retail computer to post on the freerepublic...
You have that slave mentally I just posted about
[West Australian] company to build US navy warshipsWe actually have a free trade agreement with Australia, as opposed to China. In any case, the comments on that thread are rather entertaining.
And I'm off to drink some imported vodka and watch the Bears. I'll be sure to tell the bartender that you think the U.S. government is picking up the tab.
Good movie.
... Here in America, as we reflect on the many things we have to be grateful for, we should take a moment to recognize that one of the key factors behind our nation’s great prosperity is the open trade policy that allows the American people to freely exchange goods and services with free people around the world.
The freedom to trade is not a new issue for America. In 1776, our Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence, charging the British with a number of offenses, among them, and I quote, “cutting off our trade with all parts of the world,” end quote. And that same year, a Scottish economist named Adam Smith launched another revolution with a book entitled “The Wealth of Nations,” which exposed for all time the folly of protectionism. Over the past 200 years, not only has the argument against tariffs and trade barriers won nearly universal agreement among economists, but it has also proven itself in the real world where we have seen freetrading nations prosper, while protectionist countries fall behind. - Ronald Reagan, 1988
American factory in China, payroll $9, profit $1. We're doomed.
Sounds good. Taxes are for either raising revenue or for making it hard to do something, but not both. I you're proposing tariffs for revenue than we want lower rates. If you want to protect domestic markets then you don't want revenue.
Which is it?
Nice speech pre-NAFTA and Pre-Chi Com sellout. What would Ronnie say now?
I don’t believe in corp taxes, because those are just passed on to the consumer. And I don’t believe in trade deficits. A tariff cures both ills. It’s consumption based and it strengthens domestic production, a national security issue to me. There are plenty of right-to-work states for production here. There is no reason to offshore.
Have you been to china? Do you know any chinese People from China? Or do you just have a knee-jerk response to anybody not agreeing with your POV?
Our biggest problem is not China, Russia, nor any other entity. Our biggest threat is domestic and getting worse every day. We have a rabble-rouser for prez who is trying to bait the conservatives into revolt.
I am fully committed to America. I am a VN Vet and long time supporter of Conservatives. I bought a $1000 seat to meet Dan Quayle and Jesse Helms. I think they would probably be on President Reagan's team. Both VP Quayle and Senator Helms was against the Communist regime, not the trade aspect!
... Quayle said China is not ready to enter the World Trade Organization because it has not fully established the rule of law - those rules and regulations that assure investors that their interests can be protected legally. The US should continue to develop trade with China, but with an eye toward encouraging political and social change, he said. “Our goal should always be not just to engage China but to change China,” he said. - Source: Michael White, Associated Press Jul 24, 1999
You won't change anything from the outside without gaining access to the inside.
It is all a lie and BS, the Chinese still live in slavery and our trade deficit has ballooned to amazing proportion. Keep waving you flag somebody might by what your selling.
PS: Nixon was a liberal idiot.
PPS: Every Christmas present I bought this year was made overseas. The only domestically produced item I bought was the actual Christmas Tree, grown in western VA.
So, IOW, you do not practice what you preach. I visit WalMart on a regular basis, and have no problem buying many American made products, They are the largest seller of American goods in the WORLD!
Nixon was no idiot, but you are showing signs. The Chinese are freer than you and I, in reality! You obviously haven't ever been there, done that. Armchairs do not educate...
Nixon was an insane, corrupt liberal. If you think China is freer than the US I can't help you. Seek professional help.
I bought my wife a leather coat, Italy. My son, a new x-box which was made overseas. The next time I need a flannel shirt I will certainly consider going to wally world.
If you are what passes for a conservative on Free Republic we are farther down the S-hole than I thought.
You may be in a hole, but you dug it!
I am a Constitutional libertarian! I am conservative socially and financially, and believe the individual is the key to life. When yoked with others, the power grows. Look what your beloved emperor and his minions have done to our way of life. We are in crisis, not because of China, Russia, or Inner Boinkovia, but because our country has been taken hostage by radical socialists from within supported by unions of government and "service industries". "Conservatives" have been too busy smelling the roses around the McMansions. We have been so busy shuttling kids to soccer games, that we allowed the teachers to take control of their minds. Add your token video games, and we are in trouble from within. Free Trade is necessary for all of us. I buy shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico, or the coast of North Carolina. I recently bought a side of beef from Virginia, but I don't live in any of those places.
Pray for America. We need a leader. I have one I support. I think much like she does and continue to donate to SarahPac! I ran for WV State Senator, but was defeated in the primary. I have been to DC three times with fellow FReepers and Patriots to protest the Gum't. I'm not worried, nor concerned about your opinion of me. God knows me best and is the ONLY Judge I respect!
What are you doing besides bitching? You can buy American or quit belly-aching about other people trying to make a dime!
Elect Sarah Palin for President 2012
Re-Elect President Sarah Palin 2016
Have a nice day. Free Trade is a religion, there is no question you have bowed to the statists highest alter. Congratulations. Cheers.
Communism, as classically defined by its practitioners. was a system intended to have several characteristics:
1) I was intended to be a classless society
2) The “means of production” was to be publicly owned.
3) “Social goods” (items of consumption, education, vacations, etc.) were to be provided without cost irrespective of social class.
4) Private property (at least of land, structures, and the like) was eliminated.
5) Private employment, both wage and barter, was to be eliminated.
6) In most of its forms, it was hostile to religion.
Probably the best “Modern” example would be someplace like Cuba, during its more purist stages.
Often, communist ideology became fused with various sort of indigenous authoritarian and/or totalitarian traditions and/or system and with “Cults of Personality”, but at least lip service was generally paid to most or all of the principles above.
Communism can be usefully distinguished from a variety of other leftist ideologies, of which the most influential as mature ideologies were probably the various sorts of European Socialism as practiced post WWII, for example the various experiments with nationalism of industry in the UK.
Obviously, “communism” (or “Marxist-Leninism”) as practiced in the USSR or China were very different economic and political systems from “Democratic Socialism” as practiced in Europe or from Modern European Welfare States, or from whatever you want to call the “Democratic Multi-National State Capitalism” practiced in today’s USA, and it’s misleading and confusing to refuse to recognize that these were and are different sorts of systems and try to subsume some of these very different systems under the same name.
It’s even more confusing and inaccurate to describe any aspect of our current system as “communism” or even very “communistic” as a Marxist would understand either term.
For instance, Social Security is somewhat “redistributionist”: lower wage earners will receive a somewhat higher proportion of their contributions as benefits compared to higher wage earners.
But is SS “communism”?
Redistribution is a characteristic of communism, but not all redistributionist systems are communism (in fact, most are not).
Instead, SS is probably most characteristic of “Social Democracy” as practiced in Western Europe, and if you think that’s the same thing as “communism”, you might ask people living in Cuba if they think they are living under the same system as the US or the Netherlands.
And for it to make sense to complain about communism” in the US you would have to be advocating the overthrow of the “Dictatorship of the Proletariat” (or more likely, the overthrow of some sort of dictatorship based on a cult of personality) or re-legalizing private ownership of property, or the like.
Fortunately, we’re not.
And IMO, it’s best to use such terms as “communism” in their generally accepted meanings, and if necessary to construct new terms if you are describing novel aspects of a system.
They kept us from building the U.S.S.R. into an economic power. "The Greatest Generation" was still in charge back then and they told the "free traders" not only no but hell no! you are not "free tradin'" our wealth to the commies!
To wit, there were internationalist "free traders" and just plain com-symps during the time of the Soviet Union. These "Americans" wanted to help the "moderates" in the Soviet Union build the Soviet economy; if we did not help the "moderates" we would be playing into the hands of the hardliners, there will war and it will be our fault, they said.
The internationalist "free traders" were absolutely wrong back then and this generation of "free traders" were wrong, IMO, to enable Red China -- though with the corruption and all plus lacking a domestic market for two-thirds of their population may, hopefully, lead to the Chi-coms downfall. In that case the internationalist "free traders" will be geniuses -- unless what follows is worse than the Chi-coms. :)
I've seen no "union tax'n'spenders' on this thread, and the fact that you've summoned your host of Free Traitor economic frauds is evidence that you have no argument.
The reality of communism, or collectivism, by whatever name it is called, is that the majority of wealth gets redistributed into the hands of a few, and poverty get redistributed to the masses. The forms of government used as the tools to accomplish this task may vary, and do.
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