Jamaican in Africa

Free Trade Agreements = Evaporated Jobs Worldwide

I disagree with you.

Please let us take the example of commercial agriculture in the United States. A single American farmer can sow seeds across thousands of acres in a day because he employs mechanization. Let us say he earns $35/hour, or in a 10 hour day $350.

In Africa our subsistence farmers with their wives and children in tow can probably pluogh a half an acre and plant seed over it over two days, and would probably never cultivate much more than a ten acre plot in a given growing season, even while keeping his children out of school during planting and harvest time.

The American farmer will use hybrid seeds, and fertilizers that will enable his fields to produce 10 - 20 times the number of bushels per acre as his African competitor; his seeds will also germinate to become crops that are disease and pest resistant.

During the growing season, the American farmer will employ sophisticaed irrigation techniques, while his African counterpart will use a watering can, ask his wife to help and tell his children that they cant go to school all the while praying for rain to prevent the threat of famine.

Well at harvest time, the American farmer cleans the combine and harvests in one day what it would take an entire village a week to harvest.

So despite working fewer hours, the American farmer will have greater yields per acre, employ fewer people and not hinder the development of the next generation.

So yes, with education, mechanization, biotechnology and sophisticated use of software you can overcome many of the advantages built into a low income workforce. Just because an African farmer earns less than $3.00 per day does not make him a competitor to the American farmer who earns $80,000 per year. Infact, in many nations, farmers complain that American agriculture is destroying thier local agricultural industry.

Because someone works under difficult conditions for a small salary does not mean they are more productive than the educated worker in a developed nation who uses the available technology to his advantage.

In the international marketplace Free trade simply rewards the most prodcutive means of producing goods and services.

Why do you think that most of the profitable movies are made in Hollywood rather than India where the actors earn a lower salary? The answer: better trained script writers, better directors, better special effects.. all a product of education, technology and infrastructure.

Ok better still, why are most of the worlds medication made in the US? Certainly, there are places around the world where they can get people to press a button and put medication into a bottle more cheaply than they can in the US. Again the same reason.

Please do not be afraid to compete, the American people are innovative and are capable of finding simple solutions to vexing problems. In the word of a great American President:"We have nothing to fear, but fear itself."
On Dec 15 01:01 PM shaunwalton wrote:

> ok..this is not difficult, one society cannot possibly have "free
> trade" with another society where the median income levels can be
> thousands of times lower...hence the move for corporate america to
> search for the cheapest labor, thus vaporizing jobs here in the U.S.A.
> This can only go on for so long, and now it catching up with us.
> As far as education and training, all that is well and good, however,
> I seriously doubt that anyone is going to move from this country
> over to India to assemble widgets. The bottom line is we have to
> bring manufacturing back to this country, some people would be happy
> with making $20/hr. working on an assembly line.
> Some people do not have the mentality to go to college, nor do they
> want to. It is time that we learn from the greatest generation this
> country has ever known, the WW II generation, they sacrificed, improvised,
> overcame and adapted, until we learn from their example, we will
> forever be chasing an illusive dream of "free-trade"...

Free Trade Agreements = Evaporated Jobs Worldwide

John, please don't look at the short term. In the long term if we hope for efficient resource allocation, and therefore minize waste, we must embrace the idea that the most efficient regions will produce the goods and services that they are most capable of producing cheaply.
For example, America produces food, movies, medication and some manufactured good more efficiently than anywhere else in the world because of our good climate, abundant water, developed cinema industry, productive farmers, heavy investment in biotechnology and educated workforce.
If Japan that produces cars more cheaply decides to stop producing cars and employ thier citizens to produce wheat, the result would be fewer cars (and the price of each car would rise as it became scarce), expensive Japanese wheat and eventually unemployment.
Multiply the effect of the example I provided thousands of times and the world would suffer from poor allocation of resources, high costs, and many more hungry hungry children than we see on CNN every night.
First we have to recognize the benefits of free trade, and how it works, and use that understanding to put ourselves in a position to utilize that knowledge when advocating government and social remedies resulting from market forces.


On Dec 15 08:50 AM john s. gordon wrote:

> this is called the race to the bottom. it's been going on for a long
> time. how many vacant textile mills exist in new england states?
> in the u.s.a corporations move operations to states that have the
> lowest labor costs and lowest standard of living (i.e., dixie).<br/>japa...
> loses jobs to china.
> taiwan loses jobs to vietnam.
> who's next?

Free Trade Agreements = Evaporated Jobs Worldwide

Goods and services produced (supply) respond consumer demand (disposable income, tastes and other factors) that is ralated to the marginal propensity to consume.
Free trade agreements reward efficiency, and force regions and countries to produce the goods and services that they have a competitive advantage in producing.
If everything is produced in a manner to maximize efficiency, then the production of goods and services minimizes waste and the cost of every product in the market place is reduced. The result is that natural resources, labor and capital are employed in such a manner to maximize return on investment.
If we are globally managing our resources in such a way to minimising waste, increase efficiency and provide the highest return we can on an investment, then all over the world consumers benefit from high quality good, produced at the lowest cost for all consumers and the highest profit for investors.
Please advise me why this is a bad thing.