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Politics : Right Wing Extremist Thread -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: craig crawford who wrote (26181)	5/16/2002 12:52:31 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 59480

i am not suggesting that free trade necessarily leads to a net loss in jobs. it's the type of jobs that matter. productive jobs in manufacturing are hurt by free trade, and replaced by relatively useless and unproductive jobs at wal-mart and in the government. Free trade increase productivity because it allows resources to be allocated to their most efficient use by the market rather then by some government decision. The US manufacturers more then it did in the past, even if it uses less people to do so. >> You would choose the steel industry, one of, if not THE, most powerful and protected industry interests in the country << absolutely right! you got something right for once. yes, the steel industry in s korea, indonesia, brazil, russia, and japan is heavily protected! so protected that nearly three dozen american companies have gone bankrupt in the last several years. so protected that steel imports have well more than doubled in the past decade. Yes and all of this protection makes the whole world less efficient at producing steel. It costs the companies that need the steel to have higher expenses and it hurts the consumer who buys goods with a good portion of steel content (like cars). It also usually costs jobs because the extra jobs that are "protected" by steel import barriers are much less then the extra jobs that would be created by lower costs and higher sales in the industries that consume steel. The barriers go up and does the industry in the US hire more workers to expand production? No mostly they have just raised prices and enjoyed the extra profit which has been handed to them by the US government. Tim