Hooverism: Protectionism on the Rise

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And no one seems to consider that a nation without a manufacturing base is a militarily weak nation---whether it "knows" or not.

Muser of NM 10:06AM February 07, 2009

Instead of mindless ideology, analyze what the opposite of protectionism, consumerism, has done for us.
Made us thrall to China for production while we are transformed into a nation of malls and low tech service and information jobs. We have become poorer and poorer shipping jobs, technology, money, and manufacturing to China until we have reached an equilibrium point where we are in too much debt to take on any more credit and China stagnates unable to squeeze any more blood out of the US turnip. Consumers will in general favor goods at low prices, which means goods made by Chinese labor; so consumerism is at the expense of the US worker and business, while protectionism favors workers and businesses at the expense of the consumer. Since most Americans are both consumers and workers, what does it serve a man to save on consumer goods if he loses his job or business?
As far as retaliation for protectionism, we can't compete with China anyway because of our high labor costs and have enormous trade deficits without protectionism. I don't know if there is any answer to competing with low wage labor, but protecting major manufacturing sectors like autos and airplanes might be advisable. If you lose manufacturing, you lose R&D also.

Luther of IL 11:19PM January 29, 2009

It is constantly surprising, the lack of economic insight Capitol Hill repeatedly demonstrates. Not only is trade protectionism incredibly dangerous in delicate economic times (Smoot-Hawley), but other countries retaliate. The "Buy American" provision may just be for steel, but as a punitive measure, other steel producing nations may begin placing trade tariffs on US products. The net result: we may Buy American more often, but the rest of the world does not. When production in this country has slowed with consumption, the last thing we should do is shrink the market for our products by shunning our trade partners. Add to this the fact that we may be forcing our businesses to by more expensive inputs domestically and we have saddled the economy with inefficiency.
Do these lawmakers read history books?
http://ultimaratioliberarum.blogspot.com/

Publius of NY 1:36PM January 29, 2009