Free traders must break down and admit, Globalization has done FAR more harm than good.

[Zalatix]

The numbers speak for themselves.

Why do people keep pushing Globalization even though it is killing America's middle class?

What do we have to lose by putting up tariffs? OUR JOBS? Whoops, we're losing that already.

Tariffs will only serve to STOP the bleeding.

http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/lost-middle-class-jobs-being-replaced-burger-flipping-164535060.html?l=1

NELP broke down jobs into low/ middle/and high-wage groups based on median incomes. Looking at the period from early 2008 through the first quarter of 2012, the study found:

"High-wage" occupations accounted for 19% of the jobs lost during the Great Recession and 20% of the jobs gained during the recovery.
"Mid-wage" occupations suffered 60% of job losses during the recession but only 22% of the growth during the recovery.
"Low-wage" occupations accounted for 21% of the losses and a whopping 58% of the growth.
In other words, NELP found what many Americans already know: The market for middle class jobs has shrunk and most of the jobs that have been created during the recession are in low-income areas like retail and food services.

"In short, America's good jobs deficit continues," NELP said in a summary of the study. "Policymakers have understandably been focused on the urgent goal of getting U.S. employment back to where it was before the recession…but our findings underscore that job quality is rapidly emerging as a second front in the struggling economy."

Beyond the recession itself, several factors are contributing to these trends:

Globalization, which has sent manufacturing jobs overseas
The bursting of the housing market, which crushed the construction industry
Deep cuts in state and local governments, which accounts for 485,000 mainly mid-wage jobs lost since February 2011

[a geek named Bob]

1. The larger the system

the easier it is to hack.

Local Currencies, with an entangled labor hour component. That should stop a lot of these tricks.

[valerief]

2. Not for the .001% and that's all they care about. nt

[Boxerfan]

3. Yer singin my favorite song...

Free trade is not fair trade....

You'll get told that we can't do it the pain would be too much-think of the cheap Chinese crap!!

Yea-think about it...

We have to get manufacturing back and on our terms-not "global" terms...America is a big market & some simple trade policy modifications would help immensly. That and a federal "buy American" policy...

And I have a sneeky idea to help kill the beast-get a " made in America" section in major retail stores-I wager it would be a instant success-to be copied of course!.

[limpyhobbler]

4. Yep.

Maybe there could be a good kind of globalization if we globalized clean energy, human rights, labor protections, etc.

But so far it's been crap. Especially for American workers.

Hey did you see the TPP made it into the Democratic Party Platform...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021265974

It's probably not going to be turning around any time soon since all two parties are firmly committed to the plan.

[woo me with science]

10. Thanks for the link.

[BlueInPhilly]

5. Globalization is good

Really. Because it rewards competency and efficiency. America is evolving into a service & technological economy, which it should, since the manufacturing industry is no longer efficient compared to other countries. Protectionism discourages innovation.

Economics 101

[Zalatix]

11. We are evolving into an economy of no jobs and low paying service jobs because of globalism.

Got an explanation for that?

[reformist2]

31. You quote your Economics 101 textbook like it's Biblical truth. It isn't.

[Odin2005]

33. "Economics 101" is RW propaganda.

They don't get into the real stuff until the students are already brainwashed.

[WinkyDink]

36. Why don't we just earn what an Ecuadorian does, then? Would that be "evolution"?

[datasuspect]

47. service economy =

you need a B.A. or B.S. to sell cheap chinese crap at the Apple store.

what a dipshitty comment. horseshit.

[Nye Bevan]

6. Interestingly enough, Smoot-Hawley was Republican policy.

The Tariff Act of 1930 (codified at 19 U.S.C. ch.4 ), otherwise known as the Smoot–Hawley Tariff or Hawley–Smoot Tariff, was an act, sponsored by Senator Reed Smoot and Representative Willis C. Hawley, and signed into law on June 17, 1930, that raised U.S. tariffs on over 20,000 imported goods to record levels.

.....

Threats of retaliation began long before the bill was enacted into law in June 1930. As it passed the House of Representatives in May 1929, boycotts broke out and foreign governments moved to increase rates against American products, even though rates could be increased or decreased by the Senate or by the conference committee. By September 1929, Hoover's administration had received protest notes from 23 trading partners, but threats of retaliatory actions were ignored.[7]

In May 1930, the greatest trading partner, Canada, retaliated by imposing new tariffs on 16 products that accounted altogether for around 30% of U.S. exports to Canada.[13] Canada later also forged closer economic links with the British Empire via the British Empire Economic Conference of 1932. France and Britain protested and developed new trade partners. Germany developed a system of autarky.

Both Reed Smoot and Willis Hawley were defeated for reelection in 1932, the controversial tariff being a major factor in their respective losses.

The Smoot–Hawley Tariff was a reflection of Republican Party policy. In his 1932 election campaign platform Franklin Delano Roosevelt pledged to lower tariffs. He and the now-Democratic Congress did so in the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act of 1934. As the name suggests, this allowed the President to negotiate tariff reductions on a bilateral basis, and also treated such tariff agreements as regular legislation, requiring a majority, rather than as a treaty that required a two-third vote. This set one of the core components of the trade negotiating framework that developed after World War II. The tit-for-tat responses of other countries were understood to have contributed to a sharp reduction of trade in the 1930s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoot_hawley

[pampango]

7. High tariffs were republican policy for 100 years from 1880 to 1980. Low tariffs have always been

been the Democratic policy.

Woodrow Wilson made a drastic lowering of tariff rates a major priority for his presidency. ...When the Republicans regained power after the war they restored the usual high tariff rates, with the Underwood Tariff of 1921 and the Fordney-McCumber Tariff of 1922.

When the Great Depression hit ... the crisis baffled the GOP, and it unwisely tried its magic one last time in the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930. This time it backfired ... Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Dealers made promises about lowering tariffs on a reciprocal country-by-country basis (which they did) ...

The GOP under Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush abandoned the protectionist ideology of high tariffs that it had followed since 1880. ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariffs_in_United_States_history

And the republican policies of high tariffs and restrictive immigration laws in the 1920's led to the most inequitable distribution of income the US had seen to date. That inequality was reversed in FDR's administration and subsequent ones until the 1980's and its era of tax cuts for the rich, the full-scale war on unions and the shredding of the safety net.



While the republican party may have abandoned its "protectionist ideology of high tariffs", its base certainly hasn't. A majority (54%) of republicans and an even higher percentage (63%) of tea partiers think that trade deals are bad for the US. Democrats are the only group which by a plurality (40%) think they have been beneficial.

http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1795/poll-free-trade-agreements-jobs-wages-economic-growth-china-japan-canada

[Zalatix]

12. I now await your direct response to the cited facts I've presented. Again. For the 100th time.

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/07/made-in-america-policies-hugely-popular-survey-shows/

“On the federal level if we can expose where we can see tax dollars leaking overseas we can reverse it because there is the political will to do that,” said Scott Paul, the executive director of the Alliance for American Manufacturing.

Overwhelming majorities of people from all political parties said they supported “Buy America” policies that would mandate that taxpayer money can only be used on goods that were made in America.

Nearly 9 out of 10 Republicans and Independents and 91 percent of Democrats said they support “Buy America” preferences, according to the survey,which was conducted by the Democratic-leaning Mellman Group.

Here is the consequences of America doing things your way:

NELP broke down jobs into low/ middle/and high-wage groups based on median incomes. Looking at the period from early 2008 through the first quarter of 2012, the study found:

"High-wage" occupations accounted for 19% of the jobs lost during the Great Recession and 20% of the jobs gained during the recovery.
"Mid-wage" occupations suffered 60% of job losses during the recession but only 22% of the growth during the recovery.
"Low-wage" occupations accounted for 21% of the losses and a whopping 58% of the growth.
In other words, NELP found what many Americans already know: The market for middle class jobs has shrunk and most of the jobs that have been created during the recession are in low-income areas like retail and food services.

"In short, America's good jobs deficit continues," NELP said in a summary of the study. "Policymakers have understandably been focused on the urgent goal of getting U.S. employment back to where it was before the recession…but our findings underscore that job quality is rapidly emerging as a second front in the struggling economy."

Beyond the recession itself, several factors are contributing to these trends:

Globalization, which has sent manufacturing jobs overseas
The bursting of the housing market, which crushed the construction industry
Deep cuts in state and local governments, which accounts for 485,000 mainly mid-wage jobs lost since February 2011

We've tried things your way. It has failed.

You need to accept that your way of low tariffs has failed.

[pampango]

27. I accept the poll you cited regarding "Buy America" policies. Do you accept the poll I cited

showing that Democrats are the group that is most supportive of low-tariff trade policies?

If both of our polls are valid, Democrats are supportive of low-tariff trade and of "Buy America" when it comes to how government funds are used. I don't see anything inconsistent in those views.

"We've tried things your way. It has failed. You need to accept that your way of low tariffs has failed."

Of course, we have tried things your way before, as well. High tariffs have been tried - always by republicans - and they failed. That is why FDR and every other Democrat since has stayed away from a return to a failed republican policy.

The progressive countries in the world all have low-tariff trade policies. Indeed, they are all governed in a way that FDR would have recognized and agreed with - strong support for unions, high/progressive taxes, strong safety nets, an equitable distribution of income and low tariff trade (indeed, no tariffs in much of Europe).

[Zalatix]

29. Your poll is outdated and inaccurate. Your poll is outdated and inaccurate.

Once again: your poll is outdated and it is laughably inaccurate.

My poll DIRECTLY contradicts yours. You know this. But you keep doing the same thing and hoping that you get traction here. You never do. Even Paul Krugman is turning against your side on this issue. Even HE is calling for tariffs on China! Obama has slapped tariffs on China, and kicked their asses in WTO disputes to boot - what do you have to say to that? Absolutely nothing.

We have tried things your way now and it has led to total economic failure. At what point do you recognize this?

We have low tariffs and we have a MONSTROUS non-oil trade deficit. At what point do you recognize this?

No amount of strong support for unions can beat offshoring. In fact, offshoring is what KILLED the unions. At what point do you recognize this?

Offshoring also killed American jobs. It destroyed our wages, too. This is a cited and well known fact.

http://businessfinancemag.com/article/economic-amp-business-focus-global-labor-arbitrage-resets-wages-0401

Offshoring will flatten wages in the United States and other advanced economies.
Global labor arbitrage -- the practice of constantly replacing expensive labor in one location with cheaper labor in another -- has been a cornerstone of corporate strategy for more than a century. This strategy matured over the past decade as technology and higher levels of development in the low-wage nations enabled their workers to take on service jobs and knowledge work; no longer is the practice limited to low-level production jobs. As developing countries provide an increasingly skilled workforce, developed nations' ability to differentiate themselves is dissolving, and the companies operating in those countries no longer need to pay their workers a premium. The most widespread and lasting impact of the maturation of global labor arbitrage is the decline in real wages in the developed nations. CFOs of U.S. companies can prepare now for a permanent resetting of wages for many workers in the upper salary ranges.

Increased global competition and low pricing power are driving the more aggressive forms of arbitrage: overseas sourcing, offshoring and foreign direct investment. In the IT industry, these practices are already moving into their second generation; Indian companies that took work from the United States and Europe are now offshoring less-skilled jobs to lower-cost locations such as China and Malaysia. IT wages in the United States dropped by an average of 3 percent in 2004.

At what point do you concede that offshoring has reduced the wages of American workers? It is cited right there in black and white for you to see. It's right there! Why don't you ever address this?

We cannot maintain strong safety nets when we don't have good jobs. We can't have strong labor unions when companies can just move overseas. At what point do you recognize this? This is your way - letting companies move overseas. You support this. Admit that this hasn't worked.

As for no tariffs in Europe? Hello, have you seen their exploding trade deficits and budget deficits? Have you been asleep while austerity has been stalking the Eurozone like a psychopath ex-spouse? At what point do you recognize this?

Get off your talking points and deal with reality.

[pampango]

34. Fine we'll play the Zalatix game of accepting the polls we agree with and rejecting those we don't.

"Obama has slapped tariffs on China, and kicked their asses in WTO disputes to boot - what do you have to say to that?"

I fully support Obama. That is the advantage of having any country belong to the WTO. It gives you a forum to prove your case and get punitive tariffs or other penalties imposed as a result. That is something the Bush never did and Obama has done effectively.

Of course, the US has lost many cases in the WTO and have more punitive tariffs charged against us than any other country has, so we are not totally innocent when it comes to this. (I suspect that our history of being penalized by the WTO is one of the reasons that republican base wants us to withdraw from the WTO.)

"We have tried things your way now and it has led to total economic failure. At what point do you recognize this?"

You never seem to recognize that we have tried high tariffs before many times and always under republican-run governments. You just keep proposing that they will solve our problems when they never did in the past. At what point do you recognize that?

"We have low tariffs and we have a MONSTROUS non-oil trade deficit. At what point do you recognize this?"

And our trade deficit with 'free trade' countries is practically nonexistent. At what point do you recognize that?

"No amount of strong support for unions can beat offshoring. In fact, offshoring is what KILLED the unions."

Germany, Sweden and many other progressive countries have very strong unions and trade more than the US does. At what point do you recognize that? (And no I have not seen Germany's exploding trade deficit, have you?)

I understand that you seem to want to blame all of our problems on trade even though it is a much smaller part of our economy than it is of any other country this side of North Korea.

I am sure your belief in this will not change, but that does not mean that I will accept that high tariffs are anything but a failed republican policy from the past. They have never worked and Democrats have always had to clean up the messes that republicans made with them.

And high tariffs are today promoted by the extreme right (and opposed by the left) in countries all over the world.

[Zalatix]

40. Let's play the pampango game of repeating polls that have no substantiation in real life.

You claim that more Republicans than Democrats oppose offshoring. Yet I guarantee you that everywhere you go, and not just here, you find little support AMONG WORKING CLASS PEOPLE, regardless.

So, essentially, your argument isn't with me, it's with all of working class America, who by and large wish offshoring would go away... along with those who support it. *hint*

Also, Republicans are not the only ones who want to withdraw from the WTO. Leftists despise the WTO, too, especially because of the fact that they've struck down sensible environmental and animal protection laws. You know this. But you are too emotionally invested in the system that rips off American workers to admit it.

As for punitive tariffs... you do realize that we are running a monster non-oil trade deficit, right? If we embargo the nations that have punitive tariffs against us, we put a serious end to the flight of jobs out of the country. Why? Because we kill the trade deficit, IMMEDIATELY. No trade deficit means no jobs leaving the country. You know this. But you are too emotionally invested in the system that rips off American workers to admit it.

"And our trade deficit with 'free trade' countries is practically nonexistent. At what point do you recognize that?" You mean like Mexico and Canada? They're free trade nations. NAFTA, anyone? We're running deficits with both.

http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c1220.html
Trade in Goods with Canada:
2012: -17,418.3 (so far)
2011: -34,456.9
2010: -28,542.5

http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c2010.html
Trade in Goods with Mexico:
2012: -33,923.4 (so far)
2011: -64,486.9
2010: -66,434.9

"And our trade deficit with 'free trade' countries is practically nonexistent. At what point do you recognize that?" Really, now? Let's look at our balance of trade with Europe, shall we?

http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c0003.html
Trade in Goods with European Union:
2012: -51,866.3
2011: -99,881.0
2011: -79,611.5

Now you can brag to your friends that your "our trade deficit with 'free trade' countries is practically nonexistent" argument has been DISPELLED and you've learned something about trade.

Germany, Sweden and many other progressive countries have very strong unions and trade more than the US does. At what point do you recognize that? (And no I have not seen Germany's exploding trade deficit, have you?)
Germany has quite a few protectionist policies. And they're getting their asses kicked by China over solar panels.

How can you be so wrong so often? Your claims about us not running a deficit with 'free trade' nations was particularly embarrassing. I'm sure, of course, that you won't admit being wrong there, even though the US Census Dept. showed you that you were wrong.


And now you understand why low tariffs are killing America, and why your arguments run contrary to the very survival interests of America's working class.

I am sure your misinformed beliefs will not change, but that does not mean that you will stop losing supporters in the Working Class. Your ideals are a proven failure. You tried to prop up Europe and won't even acknowledge that the Euro itself is in danger of collapse because of the austerity plague that they're suffering.

History is dictating, right now, that low tariffs are killing America's working class.

Do not concern yourself about my stubbornness. Do concern yourself with the fact that your ideals have earned the total emnity of ALL of America's working class - Democrats and Republicans alike.

[Zalatix]

18. Nice to see you gave up. Again.

[Elwood P Dowd]

23. You're dealing with brainwashed free trade worshipers who keep copies of the same

corporate talking points and then post them here over and over and over. They have posted the Smoot-Hawley talking point/lie on here hundreds of times even though numerous DUers have shown them that Smoot-Hawley had almost zero effect one way or another on The Great Depression. They even want to go back as far as Woodrow Wilson. Next thing you know they will be saying that high tariffs caused the Mexican War of 1846.

They simply refuse to admit that since we went whole hog for free trade and outsourcing in the 1980s that millions of middle class jobs have left the country, wages and wealth for the middle class are falling like a rock, and the few jobs we are creating are low-wage service jobs with no benefits.

They also refuse to admit that these so called "free trade" deals are not "free trade" at all: They are nothing more than outsourcing/investment scams masquerading as "free trade" and designed to benefit the rich at the expense of American workers.

[Zalatix]

25. Pampango in particular is a habitual drive-by who disappears when his drive-by point is refuted.

Still, though, it was worth your hilarious and spot-on analysis in the first paragraph!

[pampango]

30. FDR campaigned against Smoot-Hawley and lowered tariffs when he was in office. No one here

is arguing that S/H caused the Great Depression, but FDR thought its high tariffs impeded the US' recovery from the Depression. That is why he worked to overturn S/H's high tariffs. If FDR believed that high tariffs made economic recovery more difficult, that is good enough for me.

"They simply refuse to admit that since we went whole hog for free trade and outsourcing in the 1980s..."

Of course we did many other things starting in the 1980's - cutting taxes for the rich, slashing the safety net, destroying unions among many other Reagan legacies. Are you of the opinion that those Reagan legacies have had no role to play in the economic problems that our middle class has suffered? Is it all to be cast at the feet of "free trade"?

And, if you do blame our economic problems on 'free trade', how do you square that with the fact that the progressive countries in the world have maintained high/progressive levels of taxation, strong unions and effective safety nets, even though trade (and, yes, 'free trade') represents a much greater share of their economies than it does in ours?

Or is it just easier to blame our problems on those darn Chinese or Indians or Mexicans or Kenyans or Argentinians than it is to raise taxes on our rich, pass legislation supporting strong unions, convince politicians that effective safety nets and health care are worth the expenditure of necessary tax dollars? (If the Germans and Swedes can do it, why can't we?)

And is it easier to just blame foreigners because we can get some 'bipartisan' support in that from right wing populists like teabaggers who are suspicious of foreigners to begin with, while those same RW populists will fight us on progressive taxation, support for strong unions and effective safety nets?

[Zalatix]

32. And look what lower tariffs have gotten us.

A ruined job market, unions being destroyed by offshoring, stagnated wages.

When do you acknowledge that YOUR policies have failed?

You once again use the tired old canard of Europe benefiting from free trade. When do you acknowledge that EUROPE is suffering under the ravages of budget shortfalls and an austerity plague? When do you acknowledge that the Euro is facing the threat of collapse? Free trade isn't helping Europe, either.



Of course, we know, you don't have an answer to any of that. You used these arguments on me downthread and they got trounced then, too.

Ultimately, you know that your arguments are of ZERO BENEFIT to America's working class. They have no reason to care what you say.

Your arguments are at odds with America's working class.

[girl gone mad]

39. You've been corrected about this dozens of time on DU.

By brentspeak just a couple of months ago:

http://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/users/08/ajb/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Reciprocal_Tariff_Act.html

The Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act (enacted June 12, 1934, ch. 474, 48 Stat. 943, 19 U.S.C. § 1351) provided for the negotiation of tariff agreements between the United States and separate nations, particularly Latin American countries. The Act served as an institutional reform intended to authorize the president to negotiate with foreign nations to reduce tariffs in return for reciprocal reductions in tariffs in the United States. It resulted in a reduction of duties.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt was authorized by the Act for a fixed period of time to negotiate on bilateral basis with other countries and then implement reductions in tariffs (up to 50% of existing tariffs) in exchange for compensating tariff reductions by the partner trading country. Roosevelt was also instructed to maximize market access abroad without jeopardizing domestic industry, and reduce tariffs only as necessary to promote exports in accord with the "needs of various branches of American production.".


Therefore, FDR's trade policy was the opposite of today's free trade agreements, which are authored deliberately to relocate domestic industry to overseas facilities and which are not required at all to consider domestic American production.

As I told you in that thread, pampango, FDR learned from his mistakes. Reversing the Smoot-Hawley tariffs failed to grow foreign trade or bring economic growth so he shifted to better strategies. I guess when you only have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. "Free Trade" is your hammer. Our economy is bleeding out and needs to be sutured. The hammer is useless.

[Zalatix]

13. And low tariffs have gotten us in the mess we're in now. Any response to that?

[Nye Bevan]

14. Got a link to where a reputable economist makes that assertion? (nt)

[Zalatix]

16. No need for an economist to make any assertion. History is dictating it.

BUT!!! If you really need an authority figure to validate the dictations of history, here ya go.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/04/off-and-out-with-mitt-romney/

And recently the Washington Post added a further piece of information: Bain invested in companies that specialized in helping other companies get rid of employees, either in the United States or overall, by outsourcing work to outside suppliers and offshoring work to other countries.

The Romney camp went ballistic, accusing the Post of confusing outsourcing and offshoring, but this is a pretty pathetic defense. For one thing, there weren’t any actual errors in the article. For another, it’s simply not true, as the Romney people would have you believe, that domestic outsourcing is entirely innocuous. On the contrary, it’s often a way to replace well-paid employees who receive decent health and retirement benefits with low-wage, low-benefit employees at subcontracting firms. That is, it’s still about redistribution from middle-class Americans to a small minority at the top.

In short: outsourcing, both domestically AND offshore, is meant to do one thing: lower wages.

You want another source? Here ya go.
http://businessfinancemag.com/article/economic-amp-business-focus-global-labor-arbitrage-resets-wages-0401

Offshoring will flatten wages in the United States and other advanced economies.
Global labor arbitrage -- the practice of constantly replacing expensive labor in one location with cheaper labor in another -- has been a cornerstone of corporate strategy for more than a century. This strategy matured over the past decade as technology and higher levels of development in the low-wage nations enabled their workers to take on service jobs and knowledge work; no longer is the practice limited to low-level production jobs. As developing countries provide an increasingly skilled workforce, developed nations' ability to differentiate themselves is dissolving, and the companies operating in those countries no longer need to pay their workers a premium. The most widespread and lasting impact of the maturation of global labor arbitrage is the decline in real wages in the developed nations. CFOs of U.S. companies can prepare now for a permanent resetting of wages for many workers in the upper salary ranges.

Increased global competition and low pricing power are driving the more aggressive forms of arbitrage: overseas sourcing, offshoring and foreign direct investment. In the IT industry, these practices are already moving into their second generation; Indian companies that took work from the United States and Europe are now offshoring less-skilled jobs to lower-cost locations such as China and Malaysia. IT wages in the United States dropped by an average of 3 percent in 2004.

Need more information?

[Nye Bevan]

20. Some good stuff in that article. Thanks.

Real wages will grow rapidly in the developing countries at the forefront of the offshoring movement, according to Robert E. Kennedy, executive director of The William Davidson Institute and professor of business administration at the University of Michigan's school of business in Ann Arbor. "But this is good for the United States," he notes. "Ask yourself: Is the U.S. better off if the average Indian makes $500 per year or $5,000? The obvious answer is $5,000 -- India's cost advantage would be lower, and Indians would have more income to spend on U.S. goods and services. If you walk around offshoring complexes in India, China and Indonesia, you see that they are filled with U.S. computers and telecommunications equipment, that the workers spend the day surfing U.S. Web sites, and that they aspire to U.S. educations and holidays."

Lower labor costs abroad will continue to drive trade, foreign investment and offshoring, despite protests by the workers who are displaced in the developed nations. "Everyone who uses a General Electric product benefits from the fact that GE employs high-skill, low-wage workers in India doing everything from answering phones to software development," says Kennedy. Although the overall benefits of global labor arbitrage vastly out-weigh the costs imposed on displaced workers, the costs are more visible because they are borne by an easily identified group, he notes.

[Zalatix]

21. Those "U.S. computers and telecommunications equipment" were all MADE IN CHINA.

You still have yet to explain why so many Americans are unemployed and why the American jobs that are being generated now are all low-paying service jobs.

Can you address this? Can any free trader address this?

[Nye Bevan]

22. "The Number of Export-Supported Jobs Increased By 1.2 Million between 2009 and 2011".

On the two-year anniversary of the signing of the Executive Order creating the National Export Initiative (NEI), the U.S. Department of Commerce today released data showing that jobs supported by U.S. exports increased by 1.2 million between 2009 and 2011. Building on strong growth in 2010, exports supported approximately 9.7 million jobs in 2011 and the value of U.S. exports of goods and services exceeded $2.1 trillion for the first time in U.S. history.

“Two years ago this week, President Obama set an ambitious goal of doubling U.S. exports over five years. The numbers released today show that our exports support an increasing number of American jobs and we simply cannot afford to let up on our efforts to help U.S. businesses build it here and sell it everywhere,” said Commerce Secretary John Bryson. “We must maintain the track record of the past two years and continue to support U.S. companies in selling their goods to the 95 percent of the world’s consumers who live beyond our borders by helping to create opportunities and a level playing field. We know that when American businesses and workers get a fair shot, they can compete and they can win.”

In 2010, President Obama announced his NEI goal of doubling U.S. exports by the end of 2014 to create more good-paying jobs. Through the NEI, the administration is increasing trade advocacy and export promotion efforts, removing barriers and expanding access to markets, and enforcing trade rules. These efforts strengthen our economy and boost job creation. President Obama recently announced a series of efforts to open up markets for American goods and services and level the playing field for American companies.

Efforts to expand markets for American businesses include the U.S.-Korea Trade Agreement that will enter into force this Thursday, March 15, and is expected to increase U.S. exports by approximately $11 billion. The agreement will support tens of thousands of American jobs, while opening up Korea’s $1 trillion economy for America’s workers and businesses.

http://www.commerce.gov/news/press-releases/2012/03/12/us-commerce-department-releases-data-showing-number-export-supported-

[Zalatix]

24. Okay, and? President Obama is not entirely a Free Trader. Do you know what our trade deficit is?

We are gaining jobs against S. Korea, but we are totally losing a larger number of jobs to Mexico, China and India.

Your cite shows that Obama is not letting yet another country screw us over by adding to our trade deficit. Obama isn't opening us up to another flood of imports. You just proved that. Obama is part of the solution. Your case - low tariffs against cheap labor countries like China and India - is part of the problem. Our trade deficit with China is EXPLODING, because we don't tariff the HELL out of Chinese cheap labor goods. We're losing jobs to India and Mexico, more than we're gaining.

Most importantly, you fail to understand what our balance of trade is. Do you know what that is? Go ahead and Google it. Factor out oil imports while you're at it.

That trade deficit means we are bleeding out more jobs than we are creating.

[Zalatix]

17. And here's another reputable fact to support my claim.

[img][/img]

See that graph? Tariffs have gone down since the 1930s to almost nothing.

What has the Middle Class done since then? Shrink, about just as fast.

Any further questions?

[jeff47]

8. Globalization has been great

for everyone except the US. I'm sure we'll get a thank you card from China real soon now.

[sad sally]

15. Workers all over the world have been hurt by corporate globalization.

In foreign factories bosses pay starvation wages, they force employees to work unpaid overtime, workers are denied bathroom breaks and sick leave, and workers who seek better treatment are retaliated against.

Many of these factories are subsidiaries of US companies and I do believe if they could go back wards in this country - and many like Walmart try - and treat Americans workers the way millions of poor starving other-than-US workers are treated they would return.

Globalization has been very very good for a few very very wealthy...not for the majority of inhabitants (both human and non-human) of Planet Earth.

[jeff47]

19. Actually, it's better in foreign factories than it was.

The fact that it's utterly awful and inhumane now just demonstrates how bad it was before.

[Zalatix]

26. New and improved! With suicide nets!

[WinkyDink]

37. Environmental destruction. Armed thugs. Child labor. Great.

[Populist_Prole]

9. It only works in the theoretical macro sense and for those who are insulated from its negatives

All depends on whose ox is getting gored. The majority of us whose ox is getting gored have simply not yet wrested the soapbox from the pollyannas; therefore it's still pushed by the corporate media, limousine liberals, or neoliberals. Some of those even post on DU

[Cleita]

28. They are not into free trade but laissez faire business practices.

True free trade is competitive. It's played on a level playing field with rules. Most participants have varying degrees of success and some failures. Main street understands this and this is how it operates. The Globalists don't like that because they don't want to share success. They want to own it all and will use any means to justify the ends. It's like when Wal-Mart comes in and takes over killing all the main street businesses. They don't play fairly and they don't compete but undercut profits so hard that the other players have to quit and leave the playing field.

[WinkyDink]

35. It is working as planned.

[bhikkhu]

38. That meme is too often an excuse to keep the world beyond our borders poor

Looking at global poverty:



"Although world population has increased by about 80% over this time (World Bank 2009), the number of people below the $1 a day poverty line has shrunk by nearly 64%, from 967 million in 1970 to 350 million in 2006. In the past 36 years, there has never been a moment with more than 1 billion people in poverty, and barring a catastrophe, there will never be such a moment in the future history of the world."

http://www.voxeu.org/article/parametric-estimations-world-distribution-income

Inasmuch as the global war on poverty was fought by opening borders and markets to regulated trade, the trade agreements we are involved in have had a massive impact on world poverty. That's not to say that all things went fine here - of course they didn't - but the other side of the coin is literally billions of people who have better lives.

Looking forward might be different from looking at the past, but there's no need to rewrite history and deny all the good that has been done.

[Zalatix]

41. You have given no reason why America's working class should listen to you.

America's working class has been destroyed by Globalization.

Please explain why they should accept this. You can't. Have a nice day!

[reformist2]

43. Oooo, $1 per day!

[Zalatix]

44. Anyone wanna guess what Bhikku has to say to this?

Our "right" to cheap goods overseas comes because of actions like this:

http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-06-03/news/30003110_1_minimum-wage-haitians-garment-workers

A Wikileaks post published on The Nation shows that the Obama Administration fought to keep Haitian wages at 31 cents an hour.

(This article was taken down by The Nation due to an embargo, but it was excerpted at Columbia Journalism Review.)

It started when Haiti passed a law two years ago raising its minimum wage to 61 cents an hour. According to an embassy cable:

This infuriated American corporations like Hanes and Levi Strauss that pay Haitians slave wages to sew their clothes. They said they would only fork over a seven-cent-an-hour increase, and they got the State Department involved. The U.S. ambassador put pressure on Haiti’s president, who duly carved out a $3 a day minimum wage for textile companies (the U.S. minimum wage, which itself is very low, works out to $58 a day).

All hail Globalization!

[girl gone mad]

45. Statistical garbage.

These think tankers are attempting to reduce the problems and and the plight of billions of impoverished people into one easily quantifiable number. Then the globalist think tankers can proclaim that poverty has been solved (miraculously enough, by the very policies which have enriched the elites).

In fact, if people could really solve poverty in this manner, we would have done so centuries ago.

[marmar]

42. They'll never admit it. Friedman reptile brains are not salvageable.

nt

[Yuugal]

46. K&R nt

[librechik]

48. Free traders will never break down.

They are hard as nails. We must criminalize what they do again--it used to be criminal behavior before they bought the governments and changed the laws in their favor. Governments must reject the usurious and impossible loans forced on them and start over with the globalizers in harness, not the other way around.