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Your argument here is sound, if you assume this is true: "It's sort of like saying that if we want to avoid global extinction we need to acquire space travel a
by codingslave 7y ago
Your argument here is sound, if you assume this is true:
"It's sort of like saying that if we want to avoid global extinction we need to acquire space travel and populate distance worlds. Not knowing how to get to space, let alone travel to distance worlds, doesn't change the logic. The alternative is that we accept extinction."
My point, and the point of the economics article, is that this is not the case. We created this situation by shipping jobs over seas and enacting NAFTA/pushing for trade with China. Economic policies as well as other measures can protect and mitigate the devastating effects of offshoring all jobs. As the world becomes more connected wages will converge to an equilibrium, so the point of non free trade is to stop the equilibrium. If you don't, the USA becomes something like a third world country. It's that simple.
- pas 7y agoAt the same time free trade happened because specialization (comparative advantages) help everyone. The decrease in US wages is offset by the decrease in prices (due to the increased efficiency of the whole global and local economy). The problem is that individual workers are not strongly incentivized to relocate, retrain, rethink their life. Just look at Appalachia. There are still villages/towns where people sit around on welfare and do basically nothing plus moan about how that particular mine has run out. This has been going on forever. Humans are not that strategic masterminds when it comes to planning for the future. See also how paradigm shifts coincide with a new group rising in power because the old guard is too wedded to their ideology.