So what do you guys think about the government bailing out businesses in danger?

[Rouger2]

Originally Posted by Ardentfrost

Being a first world nation doesn't mean we give ourselves expensive and inefficient means of protectionism. How do you expect we can maintain being so awesome ( ) if we choose economic devices that slow our economy?

And the only way we can continue to increase our standard of living and economy is by letting other nations take industries that are no longer economically viable. Our limited labor force requires that (being able to buy, say, alarm clocks from taiwan allows the American alarm clock workers to be freed up for other industries that we are more successful in).

It seems you have it backwards... globalizing allows us to better ourselves more efficiently. It does also allow other nations to better themselves, but we wouldn't do it if it f'd us up. People are scared of offshoring, but the fact is offshoring has helped increase our average pay and standard of living, and will continue to as long as we don't take away too many people's incentive to work.

(sorry if some of my post randomed or seemed discontinuous... I'm usually pretty good about it, but I'm sick today and my head feels funny)

We are being taken to the cleaners by holding on to free trade practices. We need fair trade and that is going to include tarrifs. If other contries have an unfair advantage in trading with us, should we just let them have their advantage and see our companies and workers suffer. China keeps their currancy at a artifically low level to gain an advantage in trade with us and they use the resouces of a entire country against our companies, they are still a mostly socialistic country. We have a gigantic trade deficit with them and almost every country in the world. You know trade is suppose to be tit for tat, or trade should be at a balance between countries or at least ones over all trade should balance. If a country has a deficit they are losing and if they have a surplus they are winning. If the deficits are not paid by trade with a country they must be paid in other ways. Others countries that have a trade surplus with us, which is almost every country we trade with, get paid by buying our debt so we owe them even morre money, and our land, factories, resorts. This ownership also gives them clout in our government so foreigners are influencing our congress and probably even the president.

[Ardentfrost]

Originally Posted by Rouger2

We are being taken to the cleaners by holding on to free trade practices. We need fair trade and that is going to include tarrifs. If other contries have an unfair advantage in trading with us, should we just let them have their advantage and see our companies and workers suffer. China keeps their currancy at a artifically low level to gain an advantage in trade with us and they use the resouces of a entire country against our companies, they are still a mostly socialistic country. We have a gigantic trade deficit with them and almost every country in the world. You know trade is suppose to be tit for tat, or trade should be at a balance between countries or at least ones over all trade should balance. If a country has a deficit they are losing and if they have a surplus they are winning. If the deficits are not paid by trade with a country they must be paid in other ways. Others countries that have a trade surplus with us, which is almost every country we trade with, get paid by buying our debt so we owe them even morre money, and our land, factories, resorts. This ownership also gives them clout in our government so foreigners are influencing our congress and probably even the president.

Quick answer (to should we let our own workers suffer when another country has an advantage): yes.

We should not be worried about losing in one industry because another country is better at it than us. That is a GOOD thing. As I previously mentioned, that allows our resources to be spent in industries we are good at. If we forcably keep the X industry alive, then the industries in which we excel hurt because fewer of the would-be available resources can be dedicated to them.

Plus, our methods of protecting our industries are God awful... The whole Cuba embargo is based on sugar. Fidel told us how he was going to subsidize sugar in his country, thereby becoming a competitor with us. Our gov't didn't like that because it would push down our prices, so they start sanctions that end up with an embargo. But that doesn't HELP our industry. Sure our prices of sugar would have gone down, and as a result our sugar industry would have made less money, but that is such a short-sighted way of looking at it. What if all those farmers that couldn't have competed in the new sugar market had turned around and gone into barley, allowing us to be a greater producer of that crop? The money lost in the sugar industry wouldn't have just been gone forever, it'd have been transferred into other industries... and with a better barley industry, maybe our beer industry wouldn't suck so much

Being scared of globalization and losing in certain industries is short-sighted and saving those troubled industries hurts everyone: the consumer (he has to pay more for the goods) and other industries (who are losing resources that could be dedicated to them, as well as revenue from consumers who can no longer afford their products)...

And your worries about trade deficits are borderline Our government officials wouldn't be so affected by trade deficits if they allowed free trade.