Posted on 03/09/2016 6:41:38 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Claude Frederic Bastiat (1801-50) — a French classical liberal theorist, political economist and member of the French National Assembly — wrote an influential essay titled “That Which Is Seen and That Which Is Not Seen.”
He argued that when making laws or economic decisions, it is imperative that we examine not only what is seen but also what is unseen. In other words, examine the whole picture.
Americans who support tariffs on foreign goods could benefit immensely from Bastiat’s admonition. A concrete example was the Bush administration’s 8% to 30% tariffs in 2002 on several types of imported steel. They were levied in an effort to protect jobs in the ailing U.S. steel industry.
Those tariffs caused the domestic price for some steel products, such as hot-rolled steel, to rise by as much as 40%. The clear beneficiaries of the steel tariffs were steel industry executives and stockholders and the 1,700 or so steelworkers whose jobs were saved.
But there is no such thing as a free lunch or a something-for-nothing machine. Whenever there is a benefit of doing something, there is a guaranteed cost.
A study by the Peterson Institute for International Economics, predicted that saving those 1,700 jobs in the steel industry would cost American consumers $800,000 per job, in the form of higher prices. That’s just the monetary side of the picture.
According to a study commissioned by the Consuming Industries Trade Action Coalition, steel-users — such as the U.S. auto industry, its suppliers, heavy construction equipment manufacturers and others — were harmed by higher steel prices.
It is estimated that the steel tariffs caused at least 4,500 job losses in no fewer than 16 states, with more than 19,000 jobs lost in California, 16,000 in Texas and about 10,000 each in Ohio, Michigan and Illinois.
(Excerpt) Read more at investors.com ...
You are talking past my comments because you seem to have conflated what I said with, well, I just don’t even know what!
I agree.
I’m not convinced that shirts made here have to cost $100 bucks
Wages are vastly over rated when you study their impact on the actual cost of a product.
If a person makes $15.00 an hour and makes 1 shirt, that adds $15.00 to the cost of the shirt.
In truth, the shirt is probably put together in a manner that produces five shirts per hour.
The plant costs are more too, but I’m not buying the idea that a decent profit on volume can’t be made for $30 bucks a shirt.
One of my favorite examples of the counter-productive nature of tariffs is our tariff on Chinese-made tires. The tariff cost US consumers about $900,000 per job saved and mainly lined the pockets of tire producers here and abroad.
https://www.piie.com/publications/pb/pb12-9.pdf
I use to think our people were fools. I don't believe that anymore. I think our State Department, CIA, NSA, etc are 'giving speeches'... in exchange for bad deals.
In short they're taking bribes.
"Legal' bribes, but bribes none the less.
It never ceases to amaze me how Freepers, who are supposed to be conservatives, continue to trash serious conservative icons like Williams, Sowell, Rush, Levin, etc. -- people who have been passionate, thoughtful, articulate and reasoned advocates of conservatism for decades -- just because they disagree with Trump, who is arguably not a reliable conservative at all.
I don't know what it is with Trumpers, but their over-the-top nastiness is appalling.
Funny thing. Yesterday I posted a thread reporting on a comment by Rush, and it got 134 responses, most of which were full of bitterness for Rush. The funny part is that of the 134 responses, mostly from Trump supporters, almost all of the respondents proved that they either didn't read the actual article or else that they misunderstood the point if they did.
Honestly, when I read the comments from the usual gang of Trump supporters here, I see very little but blind, cult-like devotion. The bitterness against those who question or disagree with Trump on any issue is stunning, and is turning FR into a swamp like DU.
My point is, you can support Trump without being a vituperative, bitter, sarcastic pucker hole. Try it sometime.
DISCLOSURE: I voted for Cruz in the primary, but will certainly vote for Trump if he wins the nomination.
My simple answer is there are billions and millions to be made in “free trade”. Just ask the owners of Home Depot, Amazon and Walmart. Walmart which really kicked off the Chinese import surge.
Retard hacks in DC got the crumbs and the run-off. Meanwhile the American sell out capitalists made their billions and millions
Honestly, I’ve seen so many phony baloney studies in my life, that I get a better laugh than I get watching a sit com when I read them.
Let’s look at one aspect of this article.
They address the loss in residual jobes because folks won’t have money to spend on other things.
They don’t mention that these workers would be unemployed. They don’t mention that their suppliers would be unemployed. They don’t mention that all the people they support and purchase things from would be negatively impacted.
The local economy would be negatively impacted and local regional state and federal tax revenues would be negatively impacted.
Further, I’m not totally convinced their assumptions on total outlays per person are on the up and up either.
Everybody has an ax to grind, and they do their best to move opinion with whatever they can come up with.
You should read some of the convoluted logic in union presentations.
“It is estimated “
Estimated, but never concluded.
“I’m not buying the idea that a decent profit on volume can’t be made for $30 bucks a shirt.”
Then you should go into the shirtmaking business in the US. I would love to buy a good-quality, US-made shirt for $30. I can’t find one.
As for labor costs in US manufacturing, they have declined dramatically in the past 25 years because of increased productivity, but they still comprise over 50% of all costs:
http://blogs.piie.com/realtime/?p=4843
Liar, what does Dr. Walter E. Williams know about economics. Trump’s gonna magic away the numbers. Common sense is no match for magic.
What you might want to do, is climb down off your high rocking horse and grasp that what I said was true.
Oh, there is that...
How do you think our government was financed before income taxes in the early 1900s?
Like Williams, you now attribute our founding fathers to be Leftist idiots.
For the record, neither am I.
Ah, no...
Great, then you’ve just confirmed that a shirt doesn’t cost more than $7 bucks or so to make.
RE: Estimated, but never concluded.
That’s why they call Economics the dismal science. We have men like Milton Friedman, Friedrich Hayek and ... Paul Krugman who have won the Nobel Economics Prize.
We live in a country where 10’s of millions of people are paid to vote and not work!!
“Smoot-Hawley might not have CAUSED the great depression, but it did a lot of damage to the economy.”
Smoot-Hawley wasn’t much different than the Fordney-McCumber Tariff of 1922. Which was followed by the Roaring Twenties.
The collapse of the American banking system from 1930-33 was the cause of the Great Depression. Smoot-Hawley didn’t help but it wasn’t the cause.
Trump is not a genius. He is a superb panderer to the electorate. He supports, and pledged to increase the highly destructive ethanol mandate. Damaging first to our economy, damaging second by manipulating the energy market by forcing a product on consumers, and damaging third to the environment for many reasons, the primary being that it is a very fuel consuming product to produce.
Trump is just another very loud mouthed extreme politician that knows how to dominate the airwaves with outlandish behavior and statements. He is a boor. He would never be allowed in my home—but I will support this very flawed man as the nominee.
Smoot-Hawley only effected trade which was a fringe part of the economy in the 1930’s.
It would be nice if these types of issues were discussed with the candidates, instead of body parts, insults, or if a candidate is Hitler or not..
Well said. What we need is a discussion that is long overdue. We do not have to take what ever is given in these trade agreements without understanding the consequences. Winners and losers? What is the greatest good for the common middle class citizen?
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