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Globalization, Trade And NAFTA: A Defense of Trade Agreements | 76 comments (76 topical)

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My interpretation of them? (none / 0) (#36)
by Big Tent Democrat on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 01:33:25 PM EST
Let me ask you a question, can you read English?

If you can, then how in blazes can you argue that Blinder and Krugman do NOT support my thesis?

Seriously, are you really unable to read?

Alan Blinder: WSJ and WAPO (none / 0) (#41)
by jerry on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 02:21:57 PM EST
I can't tell when your quote from Blinder was written.  That's one thing that really irks me about many websites.  GRRR!

But in the spring, lots of people were talking about Blinder and Free Trade and Fair Trade.  That's why I said that I am not sure he would agree with you.

Blinder says he's not for protectionism.  Fair Traders are not for protectionism either.  Fair Traders are for fair trade, that is, not providing the wrong incentives to industries and governments through the use of subsidizing inefficient behaviors.

Fair Traders aren't trying to protect jobs by saying, let's tack on a tariff on automobiles to protect Detroit.  Fair Traders say that we shouldn't subsidize foreign manufacturers by ignoring the costs of pollution, worker safety, and living wages that we basically demand of our local manufacturers.

That's not industry protection.  If a foreign manufacturer can provide worker safety, is not polluting their environment, is not using child labor and providing a living wage, then hell, competition is fair and good.

But if they are failing to do that, then what is happening is we are subsidizing their products at the cost of our own ability to manufacture.

It's the same argument for carbon taxes in the United States so that we have a fair competition in the United States between oil and other forms of energy production.

Anyway, onto Alan Blinder who says he is a free trader, just like Dani Rodrik, and who says he is worried about outsourcing, just like Dani Rodrik, and he says he is trying to save free trade from itself, just like Dani Rodrik.

Is Blinder a Free or Fair Trader?  Beat's the hell out of me.  I am just not certain that he is the free trader he is or was made out to be in your clip.

Same goes for Krugman, but double.

today Mr. Blinder has changed his message -- helping lead a growing band of economists and policy makers who say the downsides of trade in today's economy are deeper than they once realized.

Mr. Blinder, whose trenchant writing style and phrase-making add to his influence, remains an implacable opponent of tariffs and trade barriers. But now he is saying loudly that a new industrial revolution -- communication technology that allows services to be delivered electronically from afar -- will put as many as 40 million American jobs at risk of being shipped out of the country in the next decade or two. That's more than double the total of workers employed in manufacturing today. The job insecurity those workers face today is "only the tip of a very big iceberg," Mr. Blinder says.

Free Trade's Great, but Offshoring Rattles Me

By Alan S. Blinder
Sunday, May 6, 2007; Page B04

I'm a free trader down to my toes. Always have been. Yet lately, I'm being treated as a heretic by many of my fellow economists. Why? Because I have stuck my neck out and predicted that the offshoring of service jobs from rich countries such as the United States to poor countries such as India may pose major problems for tens of millions of American workers over the coming decades. In fact, I think offshoring may be the biggest political issue in economics for a generation.

When I say this, many of my fellow free-traders react with a mixture of disbelief, pity and hostility. Blinder, have you lost your mind? (Answer: I think not.) Have you forgotten about the basic economic gains from international trade? (Answer: No.) Are you advocating some form of protectionism? (Answer: No !) Aren't you giving aid and comfort to the enemies of free trade? (Answer: No, I'm trying to save free trade from itself.)

[ Parent ]

And? (none / 0) (#43)
by Big Tent Democrat on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 02:36:26 PM EST
Explain to me how that contradicts his previous writings?

He seems to emphatically deny it.

[ Parent ]

Yes, he does seem to emphatically deny it (none / 0) (#47)
by jerry on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 02:48:07 PM EST
Just as fair traders deny that they are opposed to free trade too, and just as fair traders deny that what they are engaged in is protectionism.

Apparently you don't believe the fair traders, why do you believe Blinder?  If you believe Blinder, and he says he is a free trader and not asking for protectionism, how come you don't believe the fair traders?

[ Parent ]

Because I read what he wrote (none / 0) (#48)
by Big Tent Democrat on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 02:53:58 PM EST
which I just quoted to you.

Do you read the links you provide?

[ Parent ]

Near as I can tell, by reading (none / 0) (#49)
by jerry on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 03:19:36 PM EST
DeLong, Krugman, Rodrik, and the links that DeLong provides, the common view today is that Krugman and Blinder are coming around on free vs. fair trade.

I think DeLong himself is a lot more wobbly on NAFTA and has said so.  (Though perhaps for different reasons.)

Certainly Blinder's two articles caused a big hue and cry and regardless of his statements that he is a free trader till the end, lots of people questioned his sanity or questioned his commitment.  Just as you question the fair traders that say they are not for protectionism.

And fair traders change (as in the population of fair traders change) over time.

When I got my MBA, I was pretty much a free trader too.  That's what is taught in our ivory towers.  And so I understand and agree that industry protection, and protectionism is not a good thing.  Which is why I was not an industry protectionist then.

But my actual real world experience as an engineer, along with my micro-econ understanding of incentives, along with my understanding and support of the carbon tax leads me to today's fair trade positions: we are in a race to the bottom, destroying all of the wage, health, retirement, safety, vacation, environmental protections that our fathers and grandfathers literally died for.  And we're doing that because our system is providing the wrong economic incentives, because we allow our higher costs that we see as a reasonable cost of production forced to compete with the lower costs of productions of populations that do not get the benefits of worker safety, living wages, environmental protection, 40 hour weeks, health care, etc.

That's a subsidy we provide, not a tariff we charge.

Fair trade is about stopping those subsidies by recognizing the externalities.

I understand little of it beyond seeing jobs in my occupation wither over 20 years and the four courses I took getting my MBA and beyond reading DeLong, Krugman, Rodrik, and others (*) on a daily basis and try to glean what I can out of their jargon.  (Which is what I was doing when apparently you felt I should have been reading the race/iq blogs.)

* Black, Sawicky, Drezner, Cowen, Crooked Timber, Calculated Risk, you know, all those guys.

[ Parent ]

Delong? (none / 0) (#52)
by Big Tent Democrat on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 03:27:08 PM EST
The Rubin defender?

Dude, do you read these people?

Sawicky definitely. And Stiglitz is the leading economist in that school.

And? They also do not deny what was written.

they argue for other reasons, the optimal efficient trade policy is not the right one.

See, you never got my point.

The point here is let's move past the ignorqance on trade and discuss the REAL reasons why you oppose free trade.

Some people have good ones worth discussing.

You decded to cite Krugman and Blinder. Silly of you.

[ Parent ]

Actually, you cited Blinder.... But... (none / 0) (#54)
by jerry on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 04:07:01 PM EST
You cited blinder with an old reference, I brought you up to date on the current state of Blinder, and even though it's clear that many people now understand he is not the free trader he once was (which was my point) you have to force his newer views into your old frame of reference.

But more astonishingly, this is just like the iq/race thread.  I tell you, complete with links, exactly why I have come to the conclusion I have come to, and you still stand there and say project some agenda of your own on me.

Last time, I was a racist, and so was everyone else who thought the various questions weren't settled yet and worth looking into, regardless of any of their statements or behavior.

This time, you have me, contra to any post I have made, into still not willing to tell you my real reasons.

I've given you everything you've refused to give me, my reading list, my "credentials", citations, my experience, and you don't like that you can't force me into your neat little boxes so you refuse to believe what I have written.

So let's see the score:

Blinder, you believe although everyone else tells you different, and even reading his article should tell you different.

The fair traders you don't believe, though their rhetoric and behavior matches their statements.

Me, who you can actually engage in a conversation with, you don't believe.

Stop playing e-psychiatrist BTD, you're not very good at it, and it's a disingenuous way to argue.

[ Parent ]

When I read the fair traders (none / 0) (#50)
by jerry on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 03:20:46 PM EST
I read that they are not for protectionism, and they're not!  Why don't you believe that?

[ Parent ]
Oy (none / 0) (#51)
by Big Tent Democrat on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 03:24:20 PM EST
Because they support trade barriers.

Did Blinder? No. He expressly said he did not.

Honestly, I hope you are better at your job than you are at reading articles.

[ Parent ]

Indeed (none / 0) (#44)
by Big Tent Democrat on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 02:44:20 PM EST
Blinder now is in sync with Krugman:

What else is to be done? Trade protection won't work. You can't block electrons from crossing national borders. Because U.S. labor cannot compete on price, we must reemphasize the things that have kept us on top of the economic food chain for so long: technology, innovation, entrepreneurship, adaptability and the like. That means more science and engineering, more spending on R&D, keeping our capital markets big and vibrant, and not letting ourselves get locked into "sunset" industries.

In addition, we need to rethink our education system so that it turns out more people who are trained for the jobs that will remain in the United States and fewer for the jobs that will migrate overseas. We cannot, of course, foresee exactly which jobs will go and which will stay. But one good bet is that many electronic service jobs will move offshore, whereas personal service jobs will not. Here are a few examples. Tax accounting is easily offshorable; onsite auditing is not. Computer programming is offshorable; computer repair is not. Architects could be endangered, but builders aren't. Were it not for stiff regulations, radiology would be offshorable; but pediatrics and geriatrics aren't. Lawyers who write contracts can do so at a distance and deliver them electronically; litigators who argue cases in court cannot.

But even if we do everything I've suggested -- which we won't -- American workers will still face a troublesome transition as tens of millions of old jobs are replaced by new ones. There will also be great political strains on the open trading system as millions of white-collar workers who thought their jobs were immune to foreign competition suddenly find that the game has changed -- and not to their liking.

That is why I am going public with my concerns now. If we economists stubbornly insist on chanting "Free trade is good for you" to people who know that it is not, we will quickly become irrelevant to the public debate. Compared with that, a little apostasy should be welcome.

Like me, and Krugman, Blinder understands the failure of the Bush policies on non-trade issues is the problem. I MUST ask again, did you read my post?

[ Parent ]

Uh Armando... (none / 0) (#62)
by ctrenta on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 08:55:47 PM EST

I think you can conduct yourself better than that. Talk Left can do without your zingers and quite frankly, that's not something I expect from this site.... or from a lawyer with your background.

Please show respect for people you disagree with (no matter how ill-informed they are).

[ Parent ]

Whoa (none / 0) (#65)
by ctrenta on Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 09:07:52 PM EST

Let me ask you a question, can you read English?

Seriously, are you really unable to read?

Wow. Hey, go ahead and disagree with him all you want but let's stay away from Bill O'Reilly reactions BTD. It does readers no benefit to react to us like that.

[ Parent ]

Globalization, Trade And NAFTA: A Defense of Trade Agreements | 76 comments (76 topical)

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