Well who does it favor to have high tariffs against China. It sure as hell doesn't favor me. In fact it hurts me and limits the choices I have as far the products I want to buy.
in the short run. but if millions of americans got off welfare and onto jobs and govt actually taxed relatively less because of it... you might be in better financial shape. We would also have more americans with skin in the game and we might not vote for such terrible politicians with such terrible results.
Manufacturing is dead in America. Guess what. It aint coming back. Can you point out a time in history when high tariffs lead to prosperity?
Sure. For most of American history we had relatively high tariffs. It was only in 1990's that "free trade" became a panacea. The British empire was built on high tariffs and merchantilist policies. Japan became a manufacturing powerhouse by favoring exporters and blocking imports. We hear from free market economists about the theoretical benefits of free trade. These theories are pure ivory tower stuff however, based largely on obsolete concepts of comparative advantages, like a climate good for growing tobacco. How can there be a comparative advantage in making iron plates for weight lifting? Aren't our steel mills every bit as efficient as China's? What's the advantage that allows them to cover the cost of transportation? No environmental regulations, no affirmative action or other labor distortions and low wages, obviously. So our choices are to maintain our own standards and watch all our manufacturing jobs leave, or impose tariffs to correct the imbalance. If so-called free trade is so great, why are we the only ones practicing it? Why is it that the Chines, Japanese, Europeans, etc all try to protect their domestic industries and export like crazy to us? Didn't they read the same econ texts our guys did? The fact is that overall worldwide prosperity is probably enhanced by free trade, at least as long as we can print the money to pay for it. Our relative advantage however versus the rest of the world is enhanced by closed trade. IOW we would fare better than the rest of the world if we dropped out of these free trade pacts. The reason is we have the biggest market. The overall level of prosperity might be lower, but we would be better off relative to them. This fact gives us the leverage to negotiate favorable trade pacts with individual countries. We forfeit that leverage however when we join these global rules-based trade pacts, which also have the effect of eroding our sovereignty and handing power over our economy to international bureaucrats. Trump may not be able to articulate these concepts in a way that Washington elites, but he surely understands them on a gut level. If he knows anything, it is how to use leverage in negotiations.
If China sold all the dollars it made from US trade and changed them into its own currency, its currency would rise and the trade imbalance would even out. So they buy Treasuries instead, which makes the politicians in Washington happy because they can please everyone and get re-elected. Of course, it isn't indefinitely sustainable. We're in for a period of austerity one way or another.
doesn't have to be tarrifs, they never work, but just an attitude nationwide that a strong middle class is worth a few inefficiencies.
Gee, because that is funny. Because there was a guy named Herbert Hoover who was the President. He made a lot of money in the private sector and was never elected to office before being the Republican nominee, does this sound familiar? He thought experts could find inefficiencies in the government and could fix them. Sound familiar? He also tried to stave off the great depression with high tariffs and public works programs? Sound familiar? He also wants to raise the highest tax rate. Sound familiar? Your big government plans have been tried and have failed. This country was made great by free market capitalism. Why dont we just return to that, and say the hell with this nanny state, fascism that Trump and his supporters want?
Of course. Do also suggest we let the government decide what is inefficient and what is not? At the same time we are promoting inefficient companies, lets shut down efficient companies. The efficient companies have a smarter, harder working workforce and having them compete against losers is just not fair. Lets shutdown Google and give money to Yahoo, because Yahoo was dumb and its not fair that Google kicked their ass.
we were an export country then. we had the great depression. Europe protected their markets and from every account I read... experienced much less pain during that period of time. Besides... a great deal of that the depression was caused by the fed's massive contraction of the money supply. Here you see Bernanke agree with Milton Friedmans analysis. That large banks were happy the small banks were getting wiped out because they were backstopped by the fed. The public one third of the money they had in banks. http://www.wnd.com/2008/03/59405/
So it is the Feds fault they contracted the money supply and today it is the Feds fault because they are increasing the money supply according to the same people. We invent new rules for new times. I am not impressed. However, Wildchild has only advocated free market capitalism and the US Constitution. I never changed. I believe in an idea that works. Its what I was about 10 years ago, its what I am about today. Its what made this country great in the first place, its what will make this country great again. Unfortunately, no one on the national stage wants to practice it.