American Steel needs help.

[kroner]

If I ever become president (which is never ) I would ban products made in China from America due to those reasons. But if I did that I wouldn't be president too long. But I guess people are willing to sacrifice morality for money these days. Such a shame.

Banning products made in China is a great way to destroy relations, destroy China's economy, cause massive inflation, lower the average American standard of living, cause retaliatory tariffs that will hurt the US economy, and generally screw stuff up.

Protectionist economic policies have proven to cause many more problems than they solve. First, people are forced to buy from the less competitive domestic producers at higher prices. The cost of living rises, causing inflation and lowering the standard of living. The second problem is that other countries impose their own protectionist policies as retaliation which hurts US exports in a big way. The third problem is that you screw over the developing countries that you impose tariffs and such on. For instance, US farming is so highly subsidized that foriegn countries who would normally be able to thrive by growing food are flooded with artificially cheap US products and no one there can make a living. But of course this isn't a problem if you don't care about people just because they live under a different flag and have different cultures that make them hard to relate to (a common attitude, it seems, in the US)

The economics of trade, including on the international scale, works as follows. If you have two groups and two products and group A can make more of product 1 compared to product 2 than group B can, then the most efficient arrangement is for group A to make product 1 and group B to make product 2. Protectionist policies discourage trade and essentially force both groups into a less efficient arrangement of both making both products. This hurts group A and hurts group B.

Here's what the US needs to do instead. First, people need to get into the fields where the US can compete (like many service jobs). Second, the US should work on improving work conditions in foreign countries. Third, the US needs to become more competitive with emphasis on inovation and better technology. But protectionist policy is a very bad solution (or lack there of).

[Meh]

And where are the toys going to come from?

My kids where curious of the little letters on all there toys.

C-H-I-N-A (some Hong King, maybe a S Korea here or there, and some USA replete with Red-White-and-Blue flag)

That is where Santa helpers are.

Am I in the wrong topic again?

[Meh]

First, people need to get into the fields where the US can compete (like many service jobs).

The rest I can agree with. But on this one. Which field? All of those jobs are going to India with the exception of WalMart greeter.

[kroner]

mmm...... i was hoping no one would mention that . yeah, that's tough. i guess becoming more competitive is the only answer.

but Americans are still much more competitive in service jobs then, say, manufacturing. And we do export a lot of services despite India.

[Meh]

There is a speck of light at the end of the tunnel. There should be improvement is the quality of teaching, policing, and geractric care. These will be the high paying jobs of the masses. Not that income in the fields will go up. It will go down. But they will still have higher pay than the rest. We may be poorer but things may be nicer. Not that the people who do it now are idiots. It is just that the idiots will be rolled out of those jobs to go make the fries and it will be all top people.

Have you noticed that the quality of fast food service is up? When we were near full employment it sucked. Maybe I want a Phd taking my order.

[rklenseth]

As I said, it I wouldn't stay very long as president. But you can't say that China and companies that uses China's workforce are wrong in what they are doing. Those people don't have a chance in hell at something better or gaining anything better at all for their children. I don't see how it would ruin China's economy. The only people that benefit from China's economy are those high ups in their government that live in luxury and those companies that deal with them. The Chinese people never see a cent of that money at all. China in my opinion is just another example as to why Communism and socialism in general won't work. Personally, I think the closest government that ever got to Lenin's ideal of Communism is Cuba but most Cubans don't want to live under the current government that doesn't allow elections or certain freedoms (main two are freedom of speech and the press) but are forced to under the elite of the government. Pretty much rule by the minority rather than the majority.

And to use culture as an excuse as to what is, is totally wrong. Clear and simple, the people in China are slaves to an elite few (which is the government in this case). They have no right of freedom of speech or to even practice a religion if they want to. They live everday with the knowledge that they can never have anything better than what they already have. Clear and simple in my mind is that is slavery and too often do I hear it as an excuse to keep people where they are in life. The Southern States used culture as an excuse for the forced enslavement of African-Americans. Read the book Amistad. I personally think that John Quincy Adams makes the best argument as to why culture is never an excuse for enslavement. And the thing that I think is wrong is that America deals with this country. That is wrong and goes against our own values as a society and the very thing that generations of American fought and died for.

[quidit]

Hear Hear and Amen!

[kroner]

Alrighty. First off, I didn't mention culture at all except to say that it shouldn't affect how you treat people. Read it again. There are no justifications for strict governments, just a side note that people outside the US are still people and they matter too.
Second, thie following completely baffled me:

I don't see how it would ruin China's economy. The only people that benefit from China's economy are those high ups in their government that live in luxury and those companies that deal with them. The Chinese people never see a cent of that money at all.

Let me try to say this a bit clearer. Chinese companies make things and then sell them for money. Then the companies pay their workers, with that money. The workers buy things with the money that they need to live. Then suddenly no ones buys the Chinese products anymore. Now the Chinese companies don't get money. Now they can't pay workers. Now the workers get fired and they don't get money. Then the workers can't buy things they need. See how that works?
China's economic system has been continually moving more towards capitalism, but even under Communism it's hard to deny that depriving a country of income tends to hurt, not help people. Under Communism, the goevernment provides what people need to live. Where does the Chinese Government get the money to do this? A lot of it comes from exports.

[David]

Um... ya China isn't really Communism. It is a hyper-subsidized Capitalistic strict statist society. Names are decieving. A lot of terrible human rights policies, but not really Communist, some Socialist elements though, which is changing. China is going through something similar to 1890s to mid twentieth century America. Huge infastructure expansion (3 gorges dam, modernization) and massive export increases.

And Quidit, Walmart does not create jobs. For every job Wal-Mart creates, 3 jobs are lost in the local economy that were higher paying and more secure than jobs at Wal-Mart. An extensive study was done on Wal-Mart's effect on the world and the U.S., which I cannot find right now... damn. They gut local economies on the backs of the Americans and low-income to mid-income countries like China. Hopefully, this virus won't spread to Europe, unless it already has.

[new.vogue.nightmare]

Wal-Mart puts everything into one place, which is much more efficient. And we all know that the more efficient something is, the fewer people are needed. So it's great for the Wal*Mart executives and murder for your average American worker.

[Sho]

The other side of the Walmart problem is its effect on consumers. Obviously the consumers find something good in Walmart, or they wouldn't go there. Adam Smith's "invisible hand" may not always work for the benefit of the workers, but it does tend to help consumers.
And as for the China thing, I agree with kroner. A U.S. embargo on Chinese goods (or even protective tariffs) would tend to hurt the global economy, ultimately with impacts coming back to hurt us. It would help American industry in the short term, but it would, in the long term, hurt everyone. For one thing, I think that if we restricted Chinese imports, China would have to dump those goods somewhere else, like Europe. European industries would be hurt. The ripples would spread through the world, with the end result being reduced trade worldwide. Second, and this point is much clearer, the reason Chinese goods have a large market share is primariliy because they are cheap. Blocking Chinese goods would raise the prices of American goods. Third, whatever happens as a result of the aforementioned effects will have a good chance of pushing the American economy back into the morass it just emerged from.

[David]

While I think in some respects Teddy Rosevelt was a deranged madman, that is why we need someone like his "smashing hand" in this case. Not with respect to market protectionist (ceasing trade with China), but eventual monopoly control by Wal-Mart. Yes, vertical and horizontal integration can be very efficient, but their are other considerations, which is why no industrialized nation truly lives under a free market system.

China is just doing the same thing American (really multinational) corporations does in Latin America, flooding markets with subsidized goods. In this case, I don't think the full effects of neo-colonialism will take place, though. China is not going to buy up all of U.S. industry or change the heads of state in the U.S. government using their secret service or military like what happens in South America.

Oh, Europe is no saint either (even still) they bang Africa mostly. China, Japan and Russia, divide Asia among themselves (there is of course American influence and European influence there to) (Philipines, Pakistan, India, Iraq, et cetra...)

[rklenseth]

The other side of the Walmart problem is its effect on consumers. Obviously the consumers find something good in Walmart, or they wouldn't go there. Adam Smith's "invisible hand" may not always work for the benefit of the workers, but it does tend to help consumers.
And as for the China thing, I agree with kroner. A U.S. embargo on Chinese goods (or even protective tariffs) would tend to hurt the global economy, ultimately with impacts coming back to hurt us. It would help American industry in the short term, but it would, in the long term, hurt everyone. For one thing, I think that if we restricted Chinese imports, China would have to dump those goods somewhere else, like Europe. European industries would be hurt. The ripples would spread through the world, with the end result being reduced trade worldwide. Second, and this point is much clearer, the reason Chinese goods have a large market share is primariliy because they are cheap. Blocking Chinese goods would raise the prices of American goods. Third, whatever happens as a result of the aforementioned effects will have a good chance of pushing the American economy back into the morass it just emerged from.

But should we save our economy and the world's economy on the backs of quarter of the population of this world. Kroner, we both agree that the Chinese government is not very good but by trading with them we are only supporting that government and allowing that government to keep the Chinese people in the place they are in society. Alot of the money that goes to the Chinese governement is used on their military or security forces which is used to mainly to keep the people from revolting. China fears America and that is one reason why they have built a large military but they fear their people even more. But the problem with China is that if you try to revolt against the government or do something that is considered to go against China then not only do you lose everything and end up in jail but does so your family, including extended, whether or not they were involved. It is one thing to sacrifice yourself for a cause but if you have to sacrifice everyone you love in doing so then that defeats the purpose because that is who you are fighting and sacrificing for in the first place.

But the questions here is should a quarter of the population of the world live working for the another quarter of the world (probably less than a quarter though) and have no right whatsoever and no chance at something better? The difference between modern China and 1890's America is that the people in China don't have a damn chance at a Progressive Era like America did. The second question here is should we support that government by buying these products? Yes, by buying these products we put food on the table for these people but at the same time we erase any hope for them to gains any rights or a better life. The third question here is should we worry more about our economy than the rights and liberties of other human beings? And I think most people would answer that question in the same manner or at least I hope they would.

[Darth Tiberius]

There is practically no need now in the current economic situation to import steel from other countries. The dollar is improving, the steel is readilyt available and both George Bush and the other candidate Howard Dean have excellant plans for homeland distribution of products. I think now could be a good time for steel if other countries wouldn't sell their steel to America. Breakl the habit. But it's hard due to contracts and trade agreements.

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The economy is improving but it has a bit of while tio go but I think it will naturally do better than the Euro since the Euro was a horrible idea and another way of ecomic dictatorship where Europe can dictate exactly what the EU wants on other Europian country's economies. An dthe laws to a certain extent. It's a very sad bleak Europe that is out there or here (cause I live in the UK, used to live in America but proud to be American/Finnish). The dollar will naturally over time conquer the Euro.

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That's what countries like UK, Norway and a couple others get right. Thumbing their nose down to the EU. The WU should be a Europian giude and a center for communication. Not a governing board where the EU would blackmai countries to do what they want.

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Many countries like Finland fought long and hard against countries like Russia to maintain their wonderful independance. And we did it with style. And what does the current socialist party do? And mistakingly some other party member support? They join the Euro and sacrifice the currency they worked long and hard to maintain. THE socialist party has some good points but their Europian stance and the intentional letting in over of many refugees from Russia is unexcusable. Vote Keskusta!!! (That is the Finnish Central Party). The longest running and biggest supported government in Finland for a good reason.

That's all for now.

[kroner]

rklenseth>

One word: Cuba.
Do embargos ever work? No. Do embargos sink the general population into poverty? Yes.

When a government like Cuba's has it's income cut down, it's the common people who are the first to hurt by it. Why should Castro give up one of his cars when he can just feed people less?
But then again, this is hardly a valid analogy, because China isn't really comparable to Cuba anymore, like you seem to think. China today is not China 30 years ago. Mao is dead. The economic system is mostly capitalism and China is slowly industrializing. Many predict that China will become the most power country in the world economically. The government is still very controlling, but the shift towards capitalism makes it hardly necessary or possible to stop individuals from prospering.