Think I finally figured out where the anti-government mindset comes from

[badtoworse]

42. I don't look at things in terms of a ruling class

To me, that is just an excuse for not analyzing the real reasons why things happen. The period from the end of WWII up until the early 1980's we're good times in the US. There was no developing world in which to locate manufacturing and Europe and Japan were recovering from the destruction of the war. The US was the only game in town when it came to producing things and as a result, there were plenty of jobs here and things were good across the economic strata.

After Japan and western Europe recovered, things began to change. Japanese cars competed with Ford and Chevy for the lower end of the car market, while BMW and Mercedes competed with Cadillac for the high end market. It was a lot cheaper to manufacture electronics in Japan and Sony took market share from RCA and Zenith (who eventually moved to Japan). Similar forces affected other industries, such as steel and textiles. These changes accelerated in the 80's and by the 90's, our economy was very different. Reagan is largely blamed for this, but I do not believe that is accurate - the economic forces that drove it began before his presidency and were not within his control.

The free trade agreements that started with NAFTA made our economic problems worse, as did MFN for China. I don't think we can duplicate the "good times" of the 50's - 70's because that was driven by a lack of competition as much as anything. I do think the government should adopt policies that protect us from unfair competition and make the US a more attractive place to do business.