More "Free Trade" Fail.

[james1906]

Probably. But it is designed and used by Americans.

I design HRSGs. All I produce is calculations and blueprints. The vast majority of the steel and manufacturing is procured from Asia for delivery all over the world. There is nothing wrong with a strong US service sector. There is also nothing wrong with a strong US manufacturing sector. The key is to allow individuals to freely choose without intervention and manipulation.

Sorry, we can't all work in R&D. Anyways, I'm sure a guy in Bangalore can do your job just as well for 1/10th the salary. Why don't you tell your boss that?

 

[Kregisen]

The Constitution calls for tariffs, not an income tax, to fund the government. Oh, and I have taken economics courses in college where I was taught the benefits of free trade. What wasn't covered was what happens when the majority of goods and services a country performs can be done cheaper overseas and that country is left with little to trade. Oh well, we still make the best movies. I guess we can keep trading those for $5 toasters.

I don't want an income tax either. All a tariff is is a very inefficient tax on consumers, where there's a hole in the moneybags as the government is walking away with it.

 

[agitator]

Germans have few natural resources. Heavy in maufacturing. Not exporting the world reserve currency to finance their budget. Why are they so sucessful? How do they handle trade in comparison to the US?

 

[Anti Federalist]

....b..b.b..bbbbut I know what's best for everyone!

Globalized free trade will have completed it's mission when the middle class is effectively destroyed, living standards in the west having been lowered to global norms and we're all living in grinding poverty, being ruled over by a "five percenter", elite ruling class, like most of the world lives right now.

Not a future I want any part of...

 

[james1906]

All a tariff is is a very inefficient tax on consumers

There are basic functions of the federal government that need to be funded, and the Constitution states this is the way to do it. The way to get out of paying the tariff is to buy domestically, which helps the economy. There's nothing wrong with that.

 

[axiomata]

Sorry, we can't all work in R&D. Anyways, I'm sure a guy in Bangalore can do your job just as well for 1/10th the salary. Why don't you tell your boss that?

If he can, and my customers would prefer to hire him, more power to him. The fact that he isn't, is pretty good proof that he can't.

 

[Kregisen]

What wasn't covered was what happens when the majority of goods and services a country performs can be done cheaper overseas and that country is left with little to trade.

lol enlighten me. Let's think about this for just one minute.....let's use logic even an 8-year old can comprehend.

If we're fucked up at one point in time (which is BS in itself), and your solution is proved to destroy wealth and HURT our consumers more than it HELPS our producers, how do you think that's gonna help us?

if we're at point negative 1000....subtracting 100 more will not help us reach 0.

 

[agitator]

The Constitution calls for tariffs, not an income tax, to fund the government. Oh, and I have taken economics courses in college where I was taught the benefits of free trade. What wasn't covered was what happens when the majority of goods and services a country performs can be done cheaper overseas and that country is left with little to trade. Oh well, we still make the best movies. I guess we can keep trading those for $5 toasters.

Look how well the economy is doing with all those who have studied economics advising the governemnt from the universities and think tanks...

 

[Anti Federalist]

Sorry, we can't all work in R&D. Anyways, I'm sure a guy in Bangalore can do your job just as well for 1/10th the salary. Why don't you tell your boss that?

And happy to get it.

For the last 20 to 30 years of this process, that I have been witnessing all of my adult life, the "hard assets" have been sold off and shut down, that took time to build a Bessemer converter in China.

All it takes now, for the remnant, is an internet connection.

 

[Anti Federalist]

If we're fucked up at one point in time (which is BS in itself), and your solution is proved to destroy wealth and HURT our consumers more than it HELPS our producers, how do you think that's gonna help us?

What was fucked up?

 

[Kregisen]

Look how well the economy is doing with all those who have studied economics advising the governemnt from the universities and think tanks...

That has nothing to do with this. That's keynesian economics....the free-trade argument is economic fact. It's like 2+2....no economist, either keynesian, supply-side, austrian, etc, tries to refute it.

 

[james1906]

If he can, and my customers would prefer to hire him, more power to him. The fact that he isn't, is pretty good proof that he can't.

Usually when people discover they can get the same product or service for less elsewhere, they gravitate to the cheaper supplier. Just because it hasn't happened yet is not proof that it won't.

 

[Kregisen]

What was fucked up?

He implied we're screwed if the majority of goods and servies produced by the U.S. can be made cheaper overseas, so I said, even assuming that was true, his argument came crashing down when his solution would only make matters worse, no matter how bad off we were.

 

[cindy25]

the founders passed a protective tariff in 1789; needed then, needed now

 

[james1906]

What was fucked up?

Ok, so I'm not the only one who isn't understanding him.

 

[ClayTrainor]

Globalized free trade will have completed it's mission when the middle class is effectively destroyed,

lmao... you think we are witnessing free trade? Do you also believe that we have free markets as well?

Do you believe the government when it tells you that NAFTA is a free trade agreement?

living standards in the west having been lowered to global norms and we're all living in grinding poverty, being ruled over by a "five percenter", elite ruling class, like most of the world lives right now.

Not a future I want any part of...

Yea, that's because of Central banks, Monopolies on money, managed trade agreements, Regulations, Taxation, War and virtually every statist policy that exists, not free markets and free trade.

 

[Kregisen]

By the way, nice of you to completely ignore my first post with the link in it, AF.

lol I better never see you rant against free trade again until you try to refute it.

 

[james1906]

He implied we're screwed if the majority of goods and servies produced by the U.S. can be made cheaper overseas, so I said, even assuming that was true, his argument came crashing down when his solution would only make matters worse, no matter how bad off we were.

So putting up tariffs that would create jobs in our own country is not the solution? The only other option is to keep printing more money so we can buy the goods and services we refuse to make domestically.

 

[Anti Federalist]

the founders passed a protective tariff in 1789; needed then, needed now

Yup.

Tariffs were in place for 150 years of this country's history.

In 150 years we became an economic and innovative powerhouse the likes of which the world has never seen before.

Post WWII and that started to change.

The final nail in the coffin driven in the early 70s by Nixon and Kissinger, letting Mao know that his 50 million dead were well spent in the Great Leap Forward, and removing the last vestige of reality to the US dollar.

 

[Kregisen]

So putting up tariffs that would create jobs in our own country is not the solution? The only other option is to keep printing more money so we can buy the goods and services we refuse to make domestically.

Keep printing money? You have me bamboozled here. I thought we were talking about trade, not our federal government spending....


Tariffs destroy wealth is fact. Tariffs hurt the consumers more than the help the local producers. Fact.

No matter HOW rich or poor your country is, tariffs will ALWAYS destroy part of your country's wealth.


That's why this is the stupidest debate I've been in.