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847 points kick | 3 comments | 20 Nov 19 15:44 UTC | HN request time: 0.707s | source
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mc32 ◴[20 Nov 19 16:11 UTC] No.21585110[source]▶
>”It’s economically productive for the 1% to maintain a trade relationship with China. The financial incentives don’t help any Americans, and in fact, most of us are hurt by this relationship...”

So true, since its inception with GHW, its execution and realization through Clinton and then once fully engaged the timid, supplicant responses from GW and BO, China has contributed to the stagnation of the blue collar worker on America with the full complicity of Democrats, Republicans and most of Industry and even unions who didn’t oppose their cozy politicians. They all only saw starry dollar signs...

That’s where we are now. People have had enough. That’s why they put up with the guy no one likes because he’s willing to sever that codependent relationship.

Now, if you ask any pol running for the nomination who the greatest threat to America is... it’s not going to be China...

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koube ◴[20 Nov 19 16:30 UTC] No.21585323[source]▶
The article focuses on human rights abuses which I think is a cogent criticism of China-US trade.

On the economics issue though, readers should know he disagrees with economists, who nearly universally agree that trade with China benefits Americans as a whole, with the caveat that there are concentrated losses in certain populations. Economists are highly certain on this, with uncharacteristically few people responding "uncertain" on the survey [0]. You can go through the other surveys on the IGM Forum to see what more common distributions looks like.

[0] http://www.igmchicago.org/surveys/china-us-trade

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keiferski ◴[20 Nov 19 16:34 UTC] No.21585361[source]▶
I’m not sure these economists have spent time in the Rust Belt, then. Entire cities were economically destroyed from the offshoring of jobs to China and other low-cost areas.
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bachmeier ◴[20 Nov 19 17:43 UTC] No.21586247[source]▶
Umm...economists know all about this. I taught international trade classes out in North Carolina. Talked to numerous people affected by the loss of textile manufacturing. There's a massive literature, going back decades, on the topic.

I wish there was a way to raise the level of discussion on HN. Instead, completely uninformed comments like this get upvoted.

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keiferski ◴[20 Nov 19 18:22 UTC] No.21586715[source]▶
Perhaps my comment was a bit dismissive, but I think the general point stands: academic economists don’t live in the places that have been economically ruined by offshoring jobs. University professors are white-collar professionals and don’t live in run-down, economically-dead towns.

It’s easy to draw abstract analyses from afar, but without actual hands-on experience, you end up with unexpected side effects - like the current rise of populist protectionism.

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sangnoir ◴[20 Nov 19 18:35 UTC] No.21586885[source]▶
Your comment seems very anti-intellectual, which is surprising to find on HN. Academics do not need to live in a place in order to study it rigorously.

Not being blasé, but the rust-belt is the trade-off for globalization. The US asked the rest of the world to open up their markets for American goods and services and promised to do the same.

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1. riversflow ◴[20 Nov 19 21:59 UTC] No.21589029[source]▶
>Academics do not need to live in a place in order to study it.

I mean, pretty sure biologists would disagree. Maybe economists need to rethink their trade if that’s the prevailing mindset. The idea that you are modeling a social structure that you don’t think you need to have ever been a part of or experienced is pretty rich.

Also, correct me if I’m wrong, but my impression is that the US opened its arms to free trade and the rest of world shrugged and took advantage. Non-reciprocal free trade might be good for the US economy on the whole, but when a handful of people control half the wealth, and their half is the part of the economy that reaps the benefit while everyone else sees full time employment harder to come by and inflation adjusted wages stand still for 3 decades, I think it’s probably a bad policy for a democratic republic.

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2. sangnoir ◴[21 Nov 19 16:12 UTC] No.21595658[source]▶
> my impression is that the US opened its arms to free trade and the rest of world shrugged and took advantage.

The rest of the world also took hits in some industries - US farm subsidies destroyed corn farming in poor countries

Different US industries fared differently - without globalization, Silicon Valley (and American tech in general) as well as Wall street wouldn't be as globally dominant as they are

> I think it’s probably a bad policy for a democratic republic.

I think it could work great for a democratic republic with sane corporate tax and safety net policies to more evenly distribute the upside

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3. riversflow ◴[21 Nov 19 18:42 UTC] No.21597737[source]▶
>I think it could work great for a democratic republic with sane corporate tax and safety net policies to more evenly distribute the upside

True. But how would modern medicine have faired?

I think the bigger issue with globalization is that it has a huge environmental impact and makes our species more susceptible to the effects of climate change.

We ought to at least enforce free trade policy better; I can tell you first hand that competing against unregulated competitors in manufacturing is hilariously unfair. If we really cared about the Environment or Human rights we would at least level the playing field in markets we control. It’s cheaper to buy from China largely because of our regulatory environment.