FREE TRADE vs. AMERICA

I will not be on the air this evening. I am very sick. Liz may be doing the program on her own, but I am not sure.

FREE TRADE ON PALEO RADIO

PALEO v. STATE OF THE UNION (Part 1)

This is the first of a two-part series. The first deals with immigration and the economy. The second will deal with military interventionism and the so-called War on Terror.

BUSH: Claims that we have a "healthy, growing economy, with more Americans going back to work."

PALEO: Economic indicators point towards anything but healthy. The growth we do have is in service jobs with the food industry and janitorial services leading the way. Americans, contrary to the president's claims, are losing jobs left and right. In fact, the job growth we did have doesn't even match the rate by which Americans are entering the job market.

BUSH: "Now we must add to these achievements. By making our economy more flexible, more innovative, and more competitive..."

PALEO: The problem here is with free trade agreements and government regulations and taxation. We are not competitive because the deck is stacked against us. How can American producers choosing to stay stateside compete with third world countries? The cost of production resulting from regulations, taxation, and the quotas placed on our good by foreign countries makes it virtually impossible for us to compete on a level (or semi-level) playing field.

BUSH: "To make our economy stronger and more dynamic, we must prepare our rising generation to fill the jobs of the 21st century."

PALEO: We have people going through college at an alarming rate. Many of these are in the sciences and technology. Unfortunately, these happen to be at the top of the pecking order for offshoring and outsourcing. As I have said on my program as well as on this blog, the jobs being projected as highest in demand over the next 10 years are hardly the kind that requires an education. In fact, only three of the top 10 jobs mentioned by Forrest Research require college education. This means that seven of the 10 can be taken by low-skilled workers, many of them here illegally.

BUSH: "America's immigration system is outdated - unsuited to the needs of our economy and to the values of our country."

PALEO: It is not so much that the system is outdated as it is that it is not being enforced by you and those in Congress. Furthermore, your not having made good on your obligation to enforce the laws of the land has resulted in an economic crisis, whether it is the level of unemployment for American workers or the deflation of wages resulting from illegal immigrants working in our system.

BUSH: "We should not be content with laws that punish hardworking people who want only to provide for their families, and deny businesses willing workers, and invite chaos at our border."

PALEO: We would not be punishing anyone for hard work. We would be punishing people for knowingly and willingly violating the laws of the United States of America. We would not be denying businesses of willing workers, we would be denying them the right o hire people who have broken our laws in order to come and work here for wages that pit them against American citizens. We are not inviting chaos on our borders, we are wishing for people to respect our laws and asking that they follow the appropriate channels to live, work, worship, and play here legally.

BUSH: "It's time for an immigration policy that permits temporary guest workers to fill jobs American workers will not take."

PALEO: The problem with this is that the numbers don't add up. Most of the people involved in these services just so happen to be Americans. If Americans will not take these jobs, why are so many of them doing so? And it isn't that they won't take these jobs, it is that they will not (and cannot) work for the same low wages that illegals can.

BUSH: We need an immigration policy that "closes the border to drug dealers and terrorists."

PALEO: You say this how many years after 9-11? How do you plan to do this? The border wall you promised? Why not our national guard? And what of those terrorists that the Border Patrol and Homeland Security believe have already slipped through the wide open border? Furthermore, and not to get ahead of myself, but didn't you say that we are fighting terrorists "over there" so that they won't be "over here"? If so, why would you even insinuate that terrorists are taking advantage of our porous borders?

GREAT VIDEO ON IRRATIONAL TRADE

My friend Blake on the irrational attack of libertarian purists against those of us who support free trade under the proper conditions but do not believe that those conditions are currently being met in light of burdensome regulations, taxation, and fiscal policies. Great video!

PRECIPICE IN FRONT, WOLVES BEHIND

Miss American Pie bids farewell to the Working Class Jack as companies downsize, outsource, and offshore what were once American jobs. This once great nation of producers has run out of steam somewhere between Pauperism and the ghost town of the eternal Proletariat. Our microchips are now potato chips, our steel manufacturers are now McDonald's. All the while our politicians and economists whistle away the day, not knowing for a second what it feels like to be on the receiving end of the pink slip.

Those hit worst are the young, the poor, and those without a college education.

The young could work these jobs, believing that it was a stepping stone to something better. They knew that while the job may be tedious and redundant, it looked excellent on a resume. And with wages superior to Taco Bell, they could save up for a home or higher education.

The poor are hit especially hard here. Many of these people are willing to work long hour on the line in order to meet the demands of a meager life. These jobs may not have the skill level of the medical field or law, but it put food on the table, clothes in the closet, and checks in the bill statements. And with enough savings, little at a time, they had a greater chance at social mobility.

For those without a college education, jobs of this nature were a way to feel the pride of work and private ownership without having a degree to their name. They may have gotten married right out of high school. They may have had difficulties that would be difficult to overcome in a college setting. They may have come from a family without sufficient funds to send them to college. Maybe they simply wanted to dodge the bullet of student loans that so many spend years paying off in full. Whatever it may be, they had their reasons, and now their hopes are dashed to pieces.

And let us not forget the elderly. While I did not mention them before, it would be foolish to ignore the impact downsizing, offshoring, and outsourcing has on them. Many of them, ripe in age, have hit hard times. Social Security just isn't what it was made out of be. Health risks increase and insurance is hard to find. There may have been a death of a loved one, leaving them with less money and more bill. These people often find themselves back on the line, working tough hours, but it allows them to get by, and with some sense of accomplishment.

All of these people are hurt by the absurd faith based economics of so-called free trade. Each of these groups have been hit hard by executives who would rather benefit from slave labor and wages that work out to pennies on the dollar compared to the pay given to their fellow Americans. The almighty dollar is their creed, capitalism is the executive's national anthem.

Still, our politicians hold their breath in hope that their faith based economic theories will benefit America in the long run. We are assured over and over again that the loss of these jobs will result in the creation of other jobs. This may be true, it may not. The bigger question is what kind of jobs will be created. As it stands right now, the fast food industry and janitorial services are leading the way.

ANOTHER JOB BITES THE DUST

A dear friend of mine just informed me that her husband lost his job. What kind of job? Manufacturing. What state? Michigan. Typical, all too typical.

Free trade advocates may wish to minimize this as mere collateral damage in the pursuit of some globalist utopia, but it was what put bread and butter on the table for this Michigan family. Hope the worker in China, India, Mexico, or any other beneficiary to free trade trade policies enjoys the work and wages this Michigander once did... well, at least the work.

NEW LOOK AT OLD VIEW ON JUST WAGE

Most libertarians insist that just wages are fixed by nothing more and nothing less than the free consent of the hireling. If it is agreed upon, then all is well. So long as there is no coercion involved, then we have a just wage

I do not believe that this is .satisfactory. While the wage may be agreed upon, it leaves out a few important factors. It ignores the fact that when one works he or she is doing so in order to obtain what is necessary for self-preservation. As Pope Leo XIII pointed out in Rerum Novarum, a man's labor has two characteristics that must be considered by employers wishing to provide a just wage. The first is that work is personal. Someone is exerting time and energy. Secondly, labor is necessary for self-conservation. The person is not merely working for the sake of work; a person is working in order to live, move, and have his being.

With these two factors in mind, the libertarian notion of just wage is lacking. It's being voluntary, in and of itself, does not make it just. Justice requires that the employer provide for the employee the means necessary to live while the latter contributes valuable (and finite) time and effort to the betterment of the former.

The libertarian may respond by asking what is necessary for a man to live. The issue here is not with luxuries but with frugal living. No laborer has a right to luxuries. But the dedication of their time and effort is most certainly worthy of the sustenance necessary for self-preservation. This would be a living wage; a wage that allows man to live, move, and have his being. It should be sufficient for housing, food, and clothing.

Now, I am by no means endorsing federal wage laws. America is rather diverse, and different regions have different costs of living. This should be dealt with at a local or regional level. Even the state level would be ineffective, given the fact that the cost of living greatly varies from city to city or region to region.

Furthermore, one could make a case that such living wages could be procured by labor associations. These associations should by no means seek anything beyond what is necessary. It is due to the stupidity and selfishness of various labor unions that employers and employees end up with far less than they could have were they to seek only that which would provide for sensible housing, food, and clothing. In lacking the kind of moderation and self-restraint that would be advantageous to such associations, labor associations have possibly done more harm than good to those they are bound to assist. A return to sensible leadership and modest requests would do much more than absurd demands and political pandering.

Unfortunately, we live in a day and age where unions are more interested in political power than the basic needs and wellbeing of their members. We also live in a time when everyone turns to the federal and state governments to do for them what they should be able to do for themselves. Until we begin looking at this issue from a more personal, local, or regional perspective, I don't see the American worker making any significant movement towards a just and living wage any time soon.

THE DISTRIBUTIST MANIFESTO

1. Distributists propose to go back to fundamentals, and to rebuild society from its basis in agriculture, instead of accepting the industrial system and changing the ownership.

2. Distributists affirm that the evils which Socialists trace to private ownership of property do not flow from the institution as such, but from the maldistribution of property which has come about as a consequence of laws favoring large ownership at the expense of small, and the absence of laws to prevent the misuse of money and machinery.

3. Distributists would not only restrict the use of machinery where it stands in the way of widespread distribution of property, but also where it conflicts with what they are accustomed to regard as the permanent interests of life.

4. Distributists insist that the interests of society, religion, human values, art and culture come first, and that machinery should be prohibited wherever it runs counter to them.

5. Distributists believe that the only legitimate use of money is to use it as "a common measure of value," and that all the problems of money, which so often people to believe in the existence of a kind of economic witchcraft, arise from the fact that there are so many people in the world who do not want to use money as a common measure of value, but to make more money.

6. Distributists believe that the way to make money a common measure of value is to fix prices, wages, and rents at a just level... [this would be] the first step towards a general restoration of property by destroying the power of the capitalists to undersell small men.

7. Distributists seek a return of a Guild system. They advocate such regulative Guilds (over against productive Guilds) is that the enforcement of standards, moral conduct, and workmanship, over industry, would operate to take the control of industry out of the hands of the financier and place it in those of the craftsmen and technicians.

8. Distributists believe that they key to the problems of property, usury, and credit are seen to be found in the fixation of prices, wages, and rents at a just level.

9. Distributists believe that in a perfect society people are held together by personal and human ties, and not by the impersonal activity of the state. The state is "to enable good men to live among bad."

10. Distributists believe that a society is only in a stable and healthy condition when its manufacturers rest on a foundation of agriculture and home-produced raw material., and its commerce on a foundation of native manufactures.

11. Distributists are opposed to Free Trade theory even more than its practice, recognizing in it the principle of social disintegration... It stands to reason that nations which pursue a national self-sufficiency will have less reason to quarrel with one another than those which follow international policies; while nations with normal and mixed economic will better understand each other than nations of specialists.

12. Distributists do not attempt the formation of a new political party, but seek to attain their ends through the permeation of existing parties, the platform, the Press, and other organizations.

13. Distributists restrict their activities to urging upon the public the necessity of reviving agriculture, to the end of making this country as self-supporting as possible as regards to essential foodstuffs; while in connection with this revival it advocates the fixation of prices at a just level (standard prices), organized marketing, and the control of imports.

Popular Distributists: Hilaire Belloc, Cdr. Herbert Shove, George Maxwell, G.K. Chesterton, Arthur Penty, H.J. Massingham, Eric Gill, Harold Robbins, Father Feeney, Father Coughlin, the contributors to I'll Take My Stand and Who Owns America?

FREE TRADE MEETS DETROIT

From Paleo Radio, January 11, 2008.

THE ILLS OF FREE TRADE

Forrest Research projects these being the top-10 jobs in demand over the next 10 years:

1. Waiters and waitresses
2. Janitors and cleaners
3. Food preparation
4. Nursing aides, ordinaries, and assistants
5. Cashiers
6. Customer service representatives
7. Retail salesperson
8. Registered nurses
9. General and operational managers
10. Postsecondary teachers

As Lou Dobbs rightly points out, only three of these require a college degree.