Sorry, Tim, you are a one trick pony. Trade is not the only solution to a problem.
What an odd statement. It certainly isn't a response to anything I said.
Of course trade isn't a solution to every problem. There are problems where its irrelevant except perhaps in the most indirect way. I never suggested it as a solution to every problem.
While it isn't (and nothing is) a solution to every problem, its beneficial, and reducing it in the name of "X independence" is expensive, both to the people who would have been buying X and those who would have been selling X.
Does the fact that trade isn't a solution to every problem mean you want to be "food independent" not going to grocery stores, or restaurants, but growing everything yourself? Of course not. You benefit from trade with places that sell food, even if buying food from them is hardly a solution to all of your problems.
And those who are very dependent on that rare resource are in danger of suffocating their economic growth.
We aren't talking about rare resources. Which is why I said "economically scarce" rather than just "scarce" which can mean "rare". In the situations most people find themselves in, air is not an economically scarce resource, but common things like safe drinking water, crude oil, bread, iron, and all sorts of other things are. Scarce, as its used in economics, just implies that its not so freely available as to have zero value in trade, not that its rare.
if murder was rampant but could be reduced considerably by gov't intervention, you will still opt for free trade.
Government intervention against murder is not reasonably seen as a restriction in international trade.
If I was prone to making such caricatures of other people's opinions, I could say that you would be against free trade between states, or between towns, and it would probably be closer to the truth than your comment about murder. |
