4 ms·

It is funny that the US intelligentsia complains about China as being dominated by government, but there is nothing really big done in the US without huge costs

It is funny that the US intelligentsia complains about China as being dominated by government, but there is nothing really big done in the US without huge costs for American tax payers, frequently without any retribution. This is clearly the next step: the US corporations created the "big enemy" China by exporting jobs there during the last 40 years, now they want the same taxpayers to pay for rebuilding the US industrial base that they destroyed, because they're afraid of the competition. It is really a con business.

smithza 5y ago
A cynical take... considering how short-sighted public corps are with quarterly shareholder valuations, this is an unintended side-effect at best. At worst, it could be that your comment "the US corporations created the 'big enemy' China" was intentional.
- coliveira 5y ago
  Intentional or not it doesn't matter. If you do something wrong and lose money, they won't save you if you declare that it was all unintentional. But big companies have bad policies (sometimes criminal) and use this excuse all the time.
ErikVandeWater 5y ago
> US corporations created the "big enemy" China by exporting jobs there during the last 40 years I've noticed that for the most part every time a corporation export jobs it's the corporation's fault. Whenever a corporation brings jobs to the US the politicians get credit for good policy.
- djenendik 5y ago
  Ah yes, blame the faceless free market or the bumbling gmen.
- rsj_hn 5y ago
  It is better to blame culture and values. From the cultural left, if you believe that nationalism is immoral and everyone is a global citizen with nation-states being obsolete and even illegetimate ideas, you can't expect someone to have a sense of loyalty to his fellow citizens and not outsource. After all, why deny good jobs to the poor in other countries who benefit from them? Isn't it bigoted for a company to want to keep jobs in America? So that's why the left is strangely silent on these trade deficits, and attacks anyone who raises concerns about them as "nativist". On the economic right, if you believe that profit maximizing behavior leads to pareto-maximizing outcomes, why would you interfere with a company that decides to boost profits by outsourcing? It is the cultural right, economic left that remains shaking their heads at what are obviously foolish, self-destructive policies, but they are generally locked out of power in this country, and so the national firesale continues.
rebelos 5y ago
It's getting really tired to blame companies for acting like rational agents against the natural laws of competitive global markets. Being against free trade works for an economy right up until it has fully squandered its competitive advantage (derived in great part in the modern world by leveraging comparative advantage) and then GDP and the tax base start collapsing. And then capital flight happens when the combination of protectionism and necessarily increased taxes to sustain government programs makes it prohibitive to conduct business, compounding the vicious contractive cycle. Retarding an economy with protectionist policies is a losing strategy in the long term. The only way to win is education and retraining. That's it.
- cma 5y ago
  If we narrowly pursued our comparative advantage without government investing in tech all along we'd be just trading in furs and stuff. We did just like China starting out, rather than be stuck undeveloped, enslaved to comparative advantage, we stole trade secrets from the more powerful nation, heavily subsidized R&D, and education (as you point out as a good thing), etc. See for instance "Slater the Traitor" as the British knew him: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Slater https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Slater If the WTO existed back then we might have gotten invaded and blockaded over it. All the Asian tiger countries avoided almost all of our free trade advice and did heavily protectionist policies in order to achieve their rapid development. Most of the countries that bought into it remained third world, pursuing their comparative advantage as an undeveloped nation against developed ones, which seems to basically be shorthand for having their natural resources looted. The book Bad Samaritans goes into how that development occurred in S. Korea, and other similar countries that successfully broke out of the comparative advantage trap: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003Z9L4NA https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003Z9L4NA
  - rebelos 5y ago
    > If we narrowly pursued our comparative advantage without government investing in tech Why are you holding government R&D as mutually exclusive of free trade policy and an open economy? > we'd be just trading in furs and stuff. Asinine straw man. > rather than be stuck undeveloped, enslaved to comparative advantage, we stole trade secrets from the more powerful nation, heavily subsidized R&D Either/or fallacy once again. > All the Asian tiger countries avoided almost all of our free trade advice and did heavily protectionist policies in order to achieve their rapid development. This statement is laughably false. Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan are practically famous for having leveraged free trade and open economies to catapult to economic stardom. On the whole, this is a stunningly poor counterargument. It's so lacking in sense that it reads like it was generated by GPT-3.

smithza 5y ago

A cynical take... considering how short-sighted public corps are with quarterly shareholder valuations, this is an unintended side-effect at best. At worst, it could be that your comment "the US corporations created the 'big enemy' China" was intentional.

coliveira 5y ago
Intentional or not it doesn't matter. If you do something wrong and lose money, they won't save you if you declare that it was all unintentional. But big companies have bad policies (sometimes criminal) and use this excuse all the time.

ErikVandeWater 5y ago

> US corporations created the "big enemy" China by exporting jobs there during the last 40 years I've noticed that for the most part every time a corporation export jobs it's the corporation's fault. Whenever a corporation brings jobs to the US the politicians get credit for good policy.

djenendik 5y ago
Ah yes, blame the faceless free market or the bumbling gmen.
rsj_hn 5y ago
It is better to blame culture and values. From the cultural left, if you believe that nationalism is immoral and everyone is a global citizen with nation-states being obsolete and even illegetimate ideas, you can't expect someone to have a sense of loyalty to his fellow citizens and not outsource. After all, why deny good jobs to the poor in other countries who benefit from them? Isn't it bigoted for a company to want to keep jobs in America? So that's why the left is strangely silent on these trade deficits, and attacks anyone who raises concerns about them as "nativist". On the economic right, if you believe that profit maximizing behavior leads to pareto-maximizing outcomes, why would you interfere with a company that decides to boost profits by outsourcing? It is the cultural right, economic left that remains shaking their heads at what are obviously foolish, self-destructive policies, but they are generally locked out of power in this country, and so the national firesale continues.

rebelos 5y ago

It's getting really tired to blame companies for acting like rational agents against the natural laws of competitive global markets. Being against free trade works for an economy right up until it has fully squandered its competitive advantage (derived in great part in the modern world by leveraging comparative advantage) and then GDP and the tax base start collapsing. And then capital flight happens when the combination of protectionism and necessarily increased taxes to sustain government programs makes it prohibitive to conduct business, compounding the vicious contractive cycle. Retarding an economy with protectionist policies is a losing strategy in the long term. The only way to win is education and retraining. That's it.

cma 5y ago
If we narrowly pursued our comparative advantage without government investing in tech all along we'd be just trading in furs and stuff. We did just like China starting out, rather than be stuck undeveloped, enslaved to comparative advantage, we stole trade secrets from the more powerful nation, heavily subsidized R&D, and education (as you point out as a good thing), etc. See for instance "Slater the Traitor" as the British knew him: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Slater https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Slater If the WTO existed back then we might have gotten invaded and blockaded over it. All the Asian tiger countries avoided almost all of our free trade advice and did heavily protectionist policies in order to achieve their rapid development. Most of the countries that bought into it remained third world, pursuing their comparative advantage as an undeveloped nation against developed ones, which seems to basically be shorthand for having their natural resources looted. The book Bad Samaritans goes into how that development occurred in S. Korea, and other similar countries that successfully broke out of the comparative advantage trap: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003Z9L4NA https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003Z9L4NA
- rebelos 5y ago
  > If we narrowly pursued our comparative advantage without government investing in tech Why are you holding government R&D as mutually exclusive of free trade policy and an open economy? > we'd be just trading in furs and stuff. Asinine straw man. > rather than be stuck undeveloped, enslaved to comparative advantage, we stole trade secrets from the more powerful nation, heavily subsidized R&D Either/or fallacy once again. > All the Asian tiger countries avoided almost all of our free trade advice and did heavily protectionist policies in order to achieve their rapid development. This statement is laughably false. Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan are practically famous for having leveraged free trade and open economies to catapult to economic stardom. On the whole, this is a stunningly poor counterargument. It's so lacking in sense that it reads like it was generated by GPT-3.