A discussion on free trade

Obfuscate said:
None, long term gains and short term gains. China was a controlled economy and it's citizens some of the poorest. Then they promoted free trade and many other economic changes and now the citizens are much better off.
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THat really depends on if you're a Party Member or a slave laborer.
Of course thier GDP will grow fast as they are coming from a communist economic plans to more free market. Our GDP is growing you said right? Until someone can give disprove comparative advantage I'm not going to be concerned when other countries citizens are getting out of poverty at a fast pace. We may have a concern about our education system but that's another topic.
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It's not a matter of "disproving" 'comparative advantage' it's "you need to weight the value of cost cutting and efficiency against other considerations, such as national security, jobs for non slaves, the moral problems of slavery itself, economic dependancy, lack of self reliance. etc."
"Free trade" as it's espoused today is merely the removal of business considerations from the healthy traditional context of other rational considerations. It's a form of nihilistic dimentia.
 
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blackascoal said:
Quite often those who think themselves most versed on what free trade is often don't know themselves. They celebrate Goldwater, the most failed presidential candidate in modern history.



Untrue, and US products from cars to refrigerators flowed all over the world. If they close trade with us that does not necessaryly mean they will be poorer. We need the world more than it needs us.



Feel free to believe that if you wish .. but life in America will become drastically different.

Iran, Venezuela and Russia already demand payment for oil in euros and the Chinese are next in line to demand payment in euros. If the rest of the world follows suit, the dollar has lost its position as the world standard and it follows the path of the british pound.
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BAC, I can't disagree with anything you said here :clink:
 
uscitizen said:
WRL have you always been a protectionist ?
It has been a while since I read many of your posts.
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No, I've deferred to the 'experts' on economics, I do know a little through school, but economics wasn't my major, or minor, but given my major I took a few economics classes.

I've just been looking at the results of our 'experiment' on free trade and in some instances it's absolutely the correct policy, it just seems to lack, for less of a better word, a referee, judicial oversight, to make sure certain nations don't cheat the principles. Otherwise it's a race to the bottom. I believe in free trade, and in some instances, where Americans businesses have to compete with subsidized goods, tariffs, or small subsides as well.
 
WRL said:
No, I've deferred to the 'experts' on economics, I do know a little through school, but economics wasn't my major, or minor, but given my major I took a few economics classes.

I've just been looking at the results of our 'experiment' on free trade and in some instances it's absolutely the correct policy, it just seems to lack, for less of a better word, a referee, judicial oversight, to make sure certain nations don't cheat the principles. Otherwise it's a race to the bottom. I believe in free trade, and in some instances, where Americans businesses have to compete with subsidized goods, tariffs, or small subsides as well.
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I have to agree with that. But some very noticable decline of the US lifestyle is most likely inivetable imho.
 
uscitizen said:
WRL have you always been a protectionist ?
It has been a while since I read many of your posts.
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Protectionism starts with "protect". That's good.

It really sucks as a "smear" word. the globalists have gotten careless. Their propaganda machine is breaking down.


And keep in mind, nobody is suggesting complete autarky. We're saying let's not incentivize totalitarianism and fascism, and let's not force American workers to compete against slaves. Only recently have basic approaches like this been called some form of retrograde "socialism", or "nativism" or "anti-semitism" or "racism", or whatever other desperate label still won't stick.
 
I do believe the decline of the dollar is the second biggest problem we face today though...
 
uscitizen said:
I have to agree with that. But some very noticable decline of the US lifestyle is most likely inivetable imho.
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It's not just about that. It's about being OWNED by other countries as we max out all our own personal credit lines to fatten china, our biggest threat militarily. This slave imbalance will flip incredibly fast if we don't cut ties with this economic system tethering us to this toxic fascist machine called china.
 
WRL said:
And with all that said, no one supporting (unfettered free trade with currency manipulators) really tried to engage and defend their arguments, I heard a lot of insults, but not much in substantive reason.

hummmmmm....
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I told you why it does us no harm and why it would be quite insane to pressure them to dump US currency.
 
blackascoal said:
Quite often those who think themselves most versed on what free trade is often don't know themselves. They celebrate Goldwater, the most failed presidential candidate in modern history.
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What has Goldwater to do with it? Are you attempting to imply that trade is only supported by extremist libertarians? That is idiotic and untrue.

Every president since Hoover has sought to expand trade. No one but a few leftist (e.g., Nader) and america firsters (e.g., Perot, Buchanan) have opposed trade and they did far worse than Goldwater.

blackascoal said:
Untrue, and US products from cars to refrigerators flowed all over the world. If they close trade with us that does not necessaryly mean they will be poorer. We need the world more than it needs us.
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They flowed because people wanted them not because they "needed" them. They were richer for trade and that will continue.

blackascoal said:
Feel free to believe that if you wish .. but life in America will become drastically different.
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Feel free to believe a proven fact. Okay, I will. A declining dollar will lower our trade deficit. No serious economist will tell you anything different.

blackascoal said:
Iran, Venezuela and Russia already demand payment for oil in euros and the Chinese are next in line to demand payment in euros. If the rest of the world follows suit, the dollar has lost its position as the world standard and it follows the path of the british pound.
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Ummmm, the discussion here is about the Chinese manipulating their currency by buying dollars. The argument is that we should pressure them to stop that. You are arguing that the result of them not stopping that policy is them stopping that policy. Do you not see how silly this is.

The US dollar will decline against foreign currencies. It is going to happen. As long as it happens in an orderly fashion it's not so bad for us and it is certainly better for China. We should not lean on China to accelerate at unnatural level. That could do real damage to both of us.
 
AssHatZombie said:
It's not a matter of "disproving" 'comparative advantage' it's "you need to weight the value of cost cutting and efficiency against other considerations, such as national security, jobs for non slaves, the moral problems of slavery itself, economic dependancy, lack of self reliance. etc."
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What slavery are you talking about? Quit using hyperbolic propaganda.
 
WRL said:
You mean the T bills?
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I don't think you even understand the issue of Chinese currency manipulation. They buy up US dollars to inflate it's value against yuan. What you and the other morons are advocating is that we pressure them to dump US dollars.

As I mentioned before, things would be better if there people were free to buy foreign currency as they desire. Then the market would set a natural exchange rate rather than having government manipulation.

But China IS going to start to sell off their dollar holdings at some point. To continue the policy they have undertaken could well leave them holding a bunch of dollars that have greatly declined in value. It does not benefit them.

Further, indefinitely trading REAL assets for a bunch of pieces of paper is not very bright.
 
uscitizen said:
I have to agree with that. But some very noticable decline of the US lifestyle is most likely inivetable imho.
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No, it is not. That's nonsense.

Our lifestyle will not decline, so long as we continue to trade. It will decline in relativistic terms. That is the average American's wealth in relation to the average Chinese' or Indian's wealth will not look so great. Eventually, they or some others might pass us. Who gives a crap?

Your children will be better off than you thanks to trade.
 
RStringfield said:
No, it is not. That's nonsense.

Our lifestyle will not decline, so long as we continue to trade. It will decline in relativistic terms. That is the average American's wealth in relation to the average Chinese' or Indian's wealth will not look so great. Eventually, they or some others might pass us. Who gives a crap?

Your children will be better off than you thanks to trade.
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"Your children will be better off than you thanks to trade."

I think not.
 
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