A national political campaign can be a good vehicle for
educating the citizenry about vital issues—whether fiscal balance
requires tax increases, say, or the pros and cons of health care
reform. By Election Day, Americans who have been paying attention
will know more about such matters than they did when the race
began.
They will know less, though, about international trade and its value to American consumers, producers and economic health. In this, Mitt Romney and Barack Obama call to mind what the 19th-century House Speaker Thomas Brackett Reed said of his foes: "They never open their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge."
As economist Daniel Ikenson of the libertarian Cato Institute says, "Both of them came to the conclusion it's easier to demagogue than to explain the benefits of trade."
Romney has run an ad asserting that the president "sold Chrysler to Italians who are going to build Jeeps in China." Like that's a bad thing? Chrysler and its workers were lucky to find a buyer with the means to turn it around, and undertaking production in the world's biggest auto market is smart business.
Romney's implication is that Americans lose when Italians invest in car production here and lose again when a U.S. company invests in car production in China. Not so. We gain employment opportunities when foreigners put money into our economy. We receive income when U.S. companies earn profits abroad.
Read more: http://reason.com/archives/2012/11/01/the-candidates-trade-nonsense
They will know less, though, about international trade and its value to American consumers, producers and economic health. In this, Mitt Romney and Barack Obama call to mind what the 19th-century House Speaker Thomas Brackett Reed said of his foes: "They never open their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge."
As economist Daniel Ikenson of the libertarian Cato Institute says, "Both of them came to the conclusion it's easier to demagogue than to explain the benefits of trade."
Romney has run an ad asserting that the president "sold Chrysler to Italians who are going to build Jeeps in China." Like that's a bad thing? Chrysler and its workers were lucky to find a buyer with the means to turn it around, and undertaking production in the world's biggest auto market is smart business.
Romney's implication is that Americans lose when Italians invest in car production here and lose again when a U.S. company invests in car production in China. Not so. We gain employment opportunities when foreigners put money into our economy. We receive income when U.S. companies earn profits abroad.
Read more: http://reason.com/archives/2012/11/01/the-candidates-trade-nonsense
No comments:
Post a Comment