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Globalism made us sell out domestic strategic industries for quarterly profits and move them out of our reach. And now it is hitting back. I don't see how we ne

Globalism made us sell out domestic strategic industries for quarterly profits and move them out of our reach. And now it is hitting back. I don't see how we need to make a more complex analysis than that.

ddingus 5y ago
I don't either, but I do want to riff on your clear and simple comment. The source of wealth is labor. The people who make stuff will have an advantage because they will have leverage and position due to chronic interdependency. This is nothing new or even complex at it's core. The tangled mess is complex. And there is a big difference between using money to make more directly and using money to make more via labor of some kind. Everyone, to some degree, is accountable to others they need stuff from. This can be mitigated somewhat by mutual dependency, and military prowess, among other things. But there are limits. Should bets be called? Mostly, it ends up being quite painful to a lot of people who do not deserve it. One could say democracy carries a burden here, but that can be countered, depending on corruption, money in politics too. Was church and state causing grief in the past. Still is in parts of the world. Today it is banks, markets, big industry, very wealthy people causing it now. To be really clear, I am not intending to cast judgement, blame or the like. And yes, I oversimplified. I just want to point out ordinary people just do not have much agency in all of this. Their general preferences would be to labor to make their homeland strong, prosperous and see their government, and in the US the idea was self governance in the form of peaceful democracy being more just and true in return for some degree of personal freedom lost so that which remains may be vibrant and empowering relative freedom, --see their government perform reasonably in return. All that was decided to be better than the old world ways: divine right, bigger army, more gold, nobility... to form a reputable ruling class. Everything costs something. And the people expect to prosper for their labor and will live with decisions made by leaders they elected, again this idea checked by corruption, poor representation. And I am speaking generally here. Globalization was pitched to people and the promise of prosperity has not been fulfilled in the eyes of many, in some places, majorities. Naysayers get marginalized, ignored and the outcome today is here for all to see. People will weigh all that and I expect they see promises fall well short of the mark more than not. Where do we go from here? How does this unwind to a better state? Can it even?
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  > The source of wealth is labor. The people who make stuff will have an advantage because they will have leverage and position due to chronic interdependency. This is nothing new or even complex at it's core. “Making” order from disorder is also making stuff. A predictable society with overall working courts and trustable populations is a resource in and of itself. Hence the value of the USD, Euro, etc and foreign oligarchs parking their wealth and spending time living in developed countries.
  - ddingus 5y ago
    Ultimately, those are all dependent on basic labor and the making of things. Without them, and the wealth they bring, those made things degrade, rot from within.
stjohnswarts 5y ago
I think globalism was a nice thought and now we've seen the havoc it can bring when unchecked. We need to pull back a bit and reassess depending on the likes of Russia and China for critical items like chips, natural resources, etc. By all means promote trade amongst friendlies (western and certain SE countries) but we need to be very careful of the others, and balance it out with security at an input to the system, whereas currently we depend on relatively peaceful nations. Recent belligerence points out that that can never be taken for granted. On the flip side, if we were to completely abandon trade with China that is probably a bad idea as well, as they have no incentive to not take over Taiwan, Australia, Japan, etc.

ddingus 5y ago

I don't either, but I do want to riff on your clear and simple comment. The source of wealth is labor. The people who make stuff will have an advantage because they will have leverage and position due to chronic interdependency. This is nothing new or even complex at it's core. The tangled mess is complex. And there is a big difference between using money to make more directly and using money to make more via labor of some kind. Everyone, to some degree, is accountable to others they need stuff from. This can be mitigated somewhat by mutual dependency, and military prowess, among other things. But there are limits. Should bets be called? Mostly, it ends up being quite painful to a lot of people who do not deserve it. One could say democracy carries a burden here, but that can be countered, depending on corruption, money in politics too. Was church and state causing grief in the past. Still is in parts of the world. Today it is banks, markets, big industry, very wealthy people causing it now. To be really clear, I am not intending to cast judgement, blame or the like. And yes, I oversimplified. I just want to point out ordinary people just do not have much agency in all of this. Their general preferences would be to labor to make their homeland strong, prosperous and see their government, and in the US the idea was self governance in the form of peaceful democracy being more just and true in return for some degree of personal freedom lost so that which remains may be vibrant and empowering relative freedom, --see their government perform reasonably in return. All that was decided to be better than the old world ways: divine right, bigger army, more gold, nobility... to form a reputable ruling class. Everything costs something. And the people expect to prosper for their labor and will live with decisions made by leaders they elected, again this idea checked by corruption, poor representation. And I am speaking generally here. Globalization was pitched to people and the promise of prosperity has not been fulfilled in the eyes of many, in some places, majorities. Naysayers get marginalized, ignored and the outcome today is here for all to see. People will weigh all that and I expect they see promises fall well short of the mark more than not. Where do we go from here? How does this unwind to a better state? Can it even?

lotsofpulp 5y ago
> The source of wealth is labor. The people who make stuff will have an advantage because they will have leverage and position due to chronic interdependency. This is nothing new or even complex at it's core. “Making” order from disorder is also making stuff. A predictable society with overall working courts and trustable populations is a resource in and of itself. Hence the value of the USD, Euro, etc and foreign oligarchs parking their wealth and spending time living in developed countries.
- ddingus 5y ago
  Ultimately, those are all dependent on basic labor and the making of things. Without them, and the wealth they bring, those made things degrade, rot from within.

stjohnswarts 5y ago

I think globalism was a nice thought and now we've seen the havoc it can bring when unchecked. We need to pull back a bit and reassess depending on the likes of Russia and China for critical items like chips, natural resources, etc. By all means promote trade amongst friendlies (western and certain SE countries) but we need to be very careful of the others, and balance it out with security at an input to the system, whereas currently we depend on relatively peaceful nations. Recent belligerence points out that that can never be taken for granted. On the flip side, if we were to completely abandon trade with China that is probably a bad idea as well, as they have no incentive to not take over Taiwan, Australia, Japan, etc.