slo
Subsidizing and protecting industries, however, is not an investment I'm often willing to make.* If China or anyone else wants to subsidize their goods, so be it - I'll gladly take up the cheap goods and put my savings into more stuff or stash it away for my kids' education
And the difference is, that for the neo-mercantilist Asian tigers, they
were willing to subsidize the industries for a couple of decades. In order to attract the industry. (Try and find American made displays or computer peripherals) They weren't subsidizing the industries against American competitors. They were subsidizing them against American workers. Workers who were told then to go find jobs in the service industries...or in knowledge based industries. Generally these workers settled for lower paying jobs.
So, although you get cheaper goods for a while, in not too many years, fewer people can afford those goods. You have to look at this economic dislocation as one of the reasons that the middle class has done so poorly in the last thirty years. Now, subsidizing and protecting an inefficient industry doesn't make a lot of sense. However, perhaps acknowledging that the playing field isn't level and adapting laws and policies to account for competition with foreign governments attracting industry with incentives makes sense. And that doesn't have to be direct but could be with tax laws that make the flexibility with which corporations moved capital for instance.
The point being, you're displaying the "grasshopper attitude". I'll take the cheap tube socks as a reward for giving away technology sectors.
There is no reason why Finland should be a power house in the communications field. No reason except that government policies decided that they wanted their labour force to have an opportunity to work in high value, knowledge based industries. And enacted nurturing policies. South Korea built their own Internet and computer industries with the same kinds of policies. Good for them. But this wasn't a win win Slo. The industries they now dominate in manufacturing, were once US dominated.
And the most telling reason is that the South Korean work force had a government willing to intercede to advance their interests, where the US governments have generally let the markets decide . And they decided that the US labor force would be long term losers. (But have access to lower priced consumer electronics. Although after awhile a smaller number of them could afford even the cheaper goods.
Look, I'm not big on intervention. But intervention in
reaction is just common sense. Sitting back while your competition steals your jobs isn't sensible. That's what laissez faire capitalism, as practiced in the 80s and 90s was. Caving in, by failing to react to
artificial conditions in some industries created by foreign governments. And covering that with the ideology that the market never makes mistakes...
The market never does. But the effects of the wisdom of the markets aren't pleasant. Is the american labour force a disposable group?
The attitude that it isn't the government's job is still prevalent on the right in the US. Witness Romneys cure for all those houses under water. "Let foreclosures commence."
Now, in the true sense that the markets knows that houses are over valued in the US (thank you unregulated mortgage market), But he's saying to everyone who's mortgage is under water that they are on their own. if this were a handful of irresponsible individuals that would be one thing.
But an enormous percentage of Americans are under water on tehri mortages. He'd cut them loose the same way many people saw their jobs relocate in India or China in the 80's and 90s without regard to where they are suppossed to continue their careers...
People elect goverments to act in their best interests. Corporatism has not worked out to the benefit of most people. And thats what laissez faire capitalism ends up being. Corporatism that benefits only the excutives consistently. Sometimes even they have a conscious. The President of Cisco was once quoted as saying when ask about all the jobs he was relocating.. "I do sometimes wonder what my grandchildren will do for a living..."
Know what? In the Asian tigers and a lot of countries there are govnerments working towards a goal where they know what their grands children will be doing. And that means corporate quarterly profits are not always dominate in decision making...