MooCowzRock
Member
- Joined
- Nov 26, 2007
- Messages
- 858
Sorry, I have to go on a little rant:
During the debate tonight, Rick Santorum responded to the jobs question by replying how he would give tax breaks to businesses that have local manufacturing jobs.
What he didn't seem to grasp, which Ron Paul made sure to bring up himself, was that such actions are subsidies. Policy like this is government getting involved in the economy, betting on the winner, essentially giving money to these businesses to hopefully create jobs. It is a form of protectionism, that gives those businesses an advantage over their competition overseas at the cost of every other taxpayer, and more importantly, at the cost of efficiency.
If China does it cheaper, and better, and more efficiently, why not let them do it? Thats the whole point of comparative advantage, thats the entire point of trade. You trade when it benefits both parties, you trade when someone else does it better and cheaper and it saves you money.
What does it matter if they get American dollars from it? It only matters, as Ron Paul again perfectly pointed out, when they spend that money on our debt to them, and make even more money off of that interest, to fund our wasteful spending, or to fund our consumption. Eventually as they continue to accrue American dollars, they are going to want to truly invest it, we will make that money back, but with as much as we are paying them in interest, it is costing us more than it should.
What we NEED to do, it stop letting them make free money off of us with interest on loans we never should have taken, and the trade-off wouldn't hurt us so much.
All in all, if China does manufacturing better, we should let them do it. As Ron pointed out, you could force manufacturing jobs back into the US, but there is a reason we are paying a few hundred for computers instead of a few thousand, and thats because consumers benefit from trade. Subsidizing manufacturing jobs is only going to cost us taxpayer money, make things more expensive for consumers, and do nothing to help the fact that China is still profiting off of our debt to them.
And mainly, it is not how a free market works. That is how a government planned economy works. How is it that Republicans don't understand this?
During the debate tonight, Rick Santorum responded to the jobs question by replying how he would give tax breaks to businesses that have local manufacturing jobs.
What he didn't seem to grasp, which Ron Paul made sure to bring up himself, was that such actions are subsidies. Policy like this is government getting involved in the economy, betting on the winner, essentially giving money to these businesses to hopefully create jobs. It is a form of protectionism, that gives those businesses an advantage over their competition overseas at the cost of every other taxpayer, and more importantly, at the cost of efficiency.
If China does it cheaper, and better, and more efficiently, why not let them do it? Thats the whole point of comparative advantage, thats the entire point of trade. You trade when it benefits both parties, you trade when someone else does it better and cheaper and it saves you money.
What does it matter if they get American dollars from it? It only matters, as Ron Paul again perfectly pointed out, when they spend that money on our debt to them, and make even more money off of that interest, to fund our wasteful spending, or to fund our consumption. Eventually as they continue to accrue American dollars, they are going to want to truly invest it, we will make that money back, but with as much as we are paying them in interest, it is costing us more than it should.
What we NEED to do, it stop letting them make free money off of us with interest on loans we never should have taken, and the trade-off wouldn't hurt us so much.
All in all, if China does manufacturing better, we should let them do it. As Ron pointed out, you could force manufacturing jobs back into the US, but there is a reason we are paying a few hundred for computers instead of a few thousand, and thats because consumers benefit from trade. Subsidizing manufacturing jobs is only going to cost us taxpayer money, make things more expensive for consumers, and do nothing to help the fact that China is still profiting off of our debt to them.
And mainly, it is not how a free market works. That is how a government planned economy works. How is it that Republicans don't understand this?
