Theoretically, you are right about this. What you're worried about is that nothing but a bunch of headquarters with few workers will remain in the US. But I'm saying that that is simply not being born out. There is simply no decent evidence for this. In fact, let me give you another line of evidence to show what I am saying: our unemployment rate, though we are on a borderline recession, is actually quite low as recessions come and go. Now, if the economy were in such dire employment straits as you maintain, why is employment so high? And, by the way, employment is high even though we have millions of illegals employed over here anyway. The real truth is that the U.S. is a job manufacturing machine. I doubt there's any other country in the world with this healthy of a job situation. Seriously, what other country in the world has 5 or 6% (+ the 2% fudge factor) and employs millions of illegals?? And how many of them can do that in the middle of an economic slowdown?!?
Btw, going back to one of your previous posts, look at the earnings growth that we have in IT and industrials: http://seekingalpha.com/article/83974-second-quarter-earnings-expectations Again, I'm just pointing out that a lot of our high tech is doing quite well in the middle of a semi-recession. And, please, don't tell me that IT has all gone overseas. I work in the field and there's nice job strength right now in the field in the U.S. Things have actually improved employment-wise since the tech bust and not the opposite as you have surmised.
I'm not looking at a snapshot of today nor a snapshot of this decade, but the big picture and trend of decades of policy. We are on the path from making everything here and exporting to the rest of the world to making nothing here and importing everything at the expense of our fellow countrymen. And these morons want to spend even more of our money on job training for the displaced workers. The federal government uses our money to send the jobs offshore while the state and local governments spend more of our money to attract jobs (economic development departments, for example). There is no way the replacement jobs will pay the same, there will never be continuity in pensions, etc., and there is no legitimate reason to send the jobs offshore in the first place.
Oil refining included in "industrials"? At $145/ bbl for the oilmen from TX it's no wonder it's not higher!
You know this reminds me of debates over global warming. Everyone agrees that there is increased CO2 in the atmostphere. But when you look at historical global temperatures, there has been no warming trend whatsoever. And that's when someone who believes in global warming will say, "Well, it's going to eventually. Just wait and see." That's the same thing here: there is no evidence for what you are saying and that's why no economists are worried about it at this point. However, many economists are critical of Greenspan and now Bernanke. Consider this article by a former Democratic leader arguing for free trade. If he can see it, I think you should at least be open to the idea that restricting trade exacerbated the Great Depression: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article4289389.ece "At a time of growing financial uncertainty, the trading system established by the WTO provides an important source of economic stability for governments, business and consumers. It is vital that international trade in goods and services keep flowing. In 1930 the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act helped to turn a stock market crash into a large-scale depression as sharply increased US tariffs provoked retaliation around the world. Only in 1945, with the end of the Second World War, was there a determined international attempt to reopen markets. Erecting new tariff barriers now would do little to protect jobs and improve living standards. The worldwide escalation in food prices in recent months has badly hit developing countries that are net food buyers or rely on imports. Completion of the Doha Round would help to mitigate the impact of high prices by tackling systemic distortions in the international market for food, in particular by lowering barriers to trade in agricultural products and by reducing subsidies in many developed countries. "
Re the global warming issue, I was in graduate school 4 years ago when our historical geology professor stated that the earth goes through warming and cooling cycles and nobody can figure out why we are so COOL at this point in time as we are supposed to currently be much warmer then we are. This past winter was one of the coolest in decades. Call it global cooling/ global warming/ whatever you want. This rock has been here 4.5B years. What we have done in the past 100 years is moot. Everyone wants to blame Greenspan for our depression. Greenspan did not create the USAID program which has sent all the US dollars offshore. It's quite simple - if you send greater then your income out, you are broke. Same thing with our country. Send more money offshore then we bring in and we are broke hence the Bush dynasty depression part duex. As to the mortgages going bad, that's not rocket science. Lenders lent 100% LTV at a time when there was a housing shortage (from the storms) and skyrocketing housing prices (supply/ demand). Then demand dropped and along went the prices. Not to mention the predatory lending. Now it's all biting them in the ass. Live and learn. Lenders should and will fail as a result. Let them crash and burn. They made an investment that went bad. If I bought CFC at $45 and got $4 from BAC, I'm screwed, right? So why then don't we let BSC and others crash and burn? It's because Hank the criminal is T-Dept Sec. I wonder how much GS would have lost if BSC crashed and burned? As far as people in industrialized towns loosing homes, that's been going on as long as the USAID program has been shipping jobs offshore and shutting down American factories. It's nothing new in this present depression. The Bush's have been the biggest proponents of using your tax dollars to put your fellow countrymen out of work in the interest of big business.
This IBD article expresses, better than I have been able to do in this thread, how free trade and exports have saved us. It also talks about how we are now actually manufacturing more than we are losing with our free trading partners! And it also explains how exports with free trade partners has raised the average income of all Americans significantly. This link also says the same thing that I have been: exports have been just about the only engine of growth and recovery for the drunken Greenspan orgies of our economy. Again, anti-globalization will kill what little growth we have been experiencing! http://www.ibdeditorial.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=302138403720589 With all the jeremiads about the trade deficit and the millions of supposed "lost jobs" due to imports, you wouldn't know that the reverse actually is true: Soaring U.S. exports are helping keep America's economy afloat, and creating hundreds of thousands of jobs here in the U.S. Sure, a weak dollar helps. So does a renewed interest by companies and their workers in pursuing business overseas. But most of the credit should go to all the free-trade deals the U.S. has signed â which are now proving their worth. Exports have been rising at a remarkable 11.1% annual pace since 2000 (see chart), nearly doubling average nominal GDP growth of 5.8%. It's no exaggeration to say trade has become a key underpinning of our economy's growth. Recently, the National Association of Manufacturers noted that we now sell more manufactured goods than we buy from all those countries we have free-trade agreements with. The first-quarter surplus with our free-trade partners was a half-billion dollars â compared with a deficit of $176 billion with the rest of the world. In short, free trade has become a major boon to American makers of everything from jetliners and earth-moving equipment to movies and financial services. As we said, trade looks increasingly like a life preserver for the U.S. economy. In the second quarter, estimates for GDP growth range from as low as just below 1% to as high as 3%. Different as they are, most estimates agree on one thing: Trade will push growth in the second quarter, making up as much as two-thirds of GDP's rise. This belies the notion that has become common of late: that trade is somehow a drag on the economy. Certainly right now it isn't. Nor is it in the long run, as recent studies show. Since World War II, trade has been our silent partner in growth. Free-trade deals signed by the U.S. have added millions of high-paying jobs to our economy and moderated the length and frequency of our recessions. Thanks to free-trade, the average household since WWII has seen its income rise by $10,000, studies show. And getting rid of remaining trade barriers would lift household incomes as much as $12,000 more, according to economists Gary Hufbauer and Matthew Adler of the Peterson Institute. Nor is the U.S. alone in reaping benefits from freer trade. The World Bank says reducing trade barriers, subsidies and tariffs would boost the developing world's income by $350 billion by 2015. In short, nothing is so falsely maligned in economics as free trade. It's made all of us wealthier and more secure. Remember this as we enter a new election cycle, and charlatans on both the left and right use free trade as a scapegoat for our current economic ills.