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Definitely, the plight of people put out of jobs, regions losing industries, it's not to be understated or trifled with. That's a major half of the problem. Th

Definitely, the plight of people put out of jobs, regions losing industries, it's not to be understated or trifled with. That's a major half of the problem. The rock on the other side of this hard place though is that there's also no lunch at all for someone who can't afford basic foodstuffs because of tariffs and quotas block access to reasonably priced goods. What's worse is that trade protections tend to be incredibly regressive, hitting those shopping for basic necessities hardest, far more than people who can buy yachts from whatever jurisdiction they like. How do we confront this dilemma? How do we thread the needle? We've never really pulled it off correctly in the past... but there is a way to do it. If you have real trade assistance programs, then you create a situation where every single person is better off under trade liberalization. The problem is we've talked a good game on trade assistance, but never done it right, and never really reevaluated what works and doesn't. It doesn't mean three year retraining programs for people five years off from retirement. It's going to include mix of solutions, including some small taxes on goods likely to be imported and straight up wealth transfers to former employees. Relocation assistance or retraining if they want it, but some people won't. If protectionism costs $800,000 per job, then this is easy. Just tax that good, give the worker their old $60k/yr salary for a few years, no questions asked, and let consumers pocket the difference. You could pay them $60k for life and we'd all still be better off, but some people might prefer a phase out, either way.

mistermann 10y ago
> there's also no lunch at all for someone who can't afford basic foodstuffs because of tariffs and quotas block access to reasonably priced goods Is that a real threat though? I mean, we've had some form of equilibrium in economies for thousands of years, some people do better than others, but people more or less "get by". Whereas now, I have the feeling that we are very quickly getting into dangerous uncharted territory. I see very little reason why China couldn't make 70%++ of everything needed by the entire planet, with some exceptions here and there. And I don't see how UBI is going to solve that problem, if entire countries essentially no longer have any income, since they no longer do anything. > If protectionism costs $800,000 per job From a quick look at that report, the quote I found is "In 2006 a Commerce Department study found that three candy-making jobs are lost for each sugar growing and processing job saved by higher sugar prices." Personally, I'd need something a bit more substantial before I'm going to believe the massive numbers thrown around on the cost of protectionism, especially considering the likelihood of them being propaganda.
- brownbat 10y ago
  > the likelihood of them being propaganda Welp, that dead-ends conversations. As a personal disclosure, I neither consider myself complicit with propagandists nor a total sucker. A partial sucker maybe... I tossed three citations out there because I'm familiar with research on the topic and found those results fairly typical. But I get it, you don't find any of them particularly persuasive. You may not be inclined to listen to any countervailing evidence at this time. That's fine. If you ever want to poke around at this topic again but are seriously skeptical about finding information you can trust, consider Googling the IGM forum. The forum surveys economists across the political spectrum on various issues of economic policy. You'll find massive splits on all sorts of issues, vast disagreements on how to best organize the economy. If you read the bios or works of the participants, the ideological differences of opinion will become fairly stark. You might find that variety of opinions more reliable in and of itself, or you might simply find some individual you consider reputable on the forum. From there you may find someone with interesting things to say that you'll trust more than me. I don't expect you'll find a radically different view on trade, since there's fairly broad agreement that freer trade helps the average citizen, and helps society more than it hurts. But who knows. Maybe I'm wrong. Best of luck either way.

mistermann 10y ago

> there's also no lunch at all for someone who can't afford basic foodstuffs because of tariffs and quotas block access to reasonably priced goods Is that a real threat though? I mean, we've had some form of equilibrium in economies for thousands of years, some people do better than others, but people more or less "get by". Whereas now, I have the feeling that we are very quickly getting into dangerous uncharted territory. I see very little reason why China couldn't make 70%++ of everything needed by the entire planet, with some exceptions here and there. And I don't see how UBI is going to solve that problem, if entire countries essentially no longer have any income, since they no longer do anything. > If protectionism costs $800,000 per job From a quick look at that report, the quote I found is "In 2006 a Commerce Department study found that three candy-making jobs are lost for each sugar growing and processing job saved by higher sugar prices." Personally, I'd need something a bit more substantial before I'm going to believe the massive numbers thrown around on the cost of protectionism, especially considering the likelihood of them being propaganda.

brownbat 10y ago
> the likelihood of them being propaganda Welp, that dead-ends conversations. As a personal disclosure, I neither consider myself complicit with propagandists nor a total sucker. A partial sucker maybe... I tossed three citations out there because I'm familiar with research on the topic and found those results fairly typical. But I get it, you don't find any of them particularly persuasive. You may not be inclined to listen to any countervailing evidence at this time. That's fine. If you ever want to poke around at this topic again but are seriously skeptical about finding information you can trust, consider Googling the IGM forum. The forum surveys economists across the political spectrum on various issues of economic policy. You'll find massive splits on all sorts of issues, vast disagreements on how to best organize the economy. If you read the bios or works of the participants, the ideological differences of opinion will become fairly stark. You might find that variety of opinions more reliable in and of itself, or you might simply find some individual you consider reputable on the forum. From there you may find someone with interesting things to say that you'll trust more than me. I don't expect you'll find a radically different view on trade, since there's fairly broad agreement that freer trade helps the average citizen, and helps society more than it hurts. But who knows. Maybe I'm wrong. Best of luck either way.