Tag: Trade

Random Ruminations Amid War Drums and Wicked Weather While Working for Wages

By Doug “Uncola” Lynn via TheBurningPlatform.com

It’s been a long year. First, we narrowly avoided World War 3. At least for now.  And, currently, we are approaching peak bullshit in the arena of American politics; as if that were even possible.

War and political bullshit: Both means of blowing smoke up our collective asses prior to author George Orwell’s dystopic vision of jackboots stomping on human faces forever. Because, either the long slow collapse will usher in an era of decentralization – which would follow a period of immediate anarchy; or, a nightmare age of global centralization that may be about to commence.

Obviously, the billionaire class and their employees in human resources departments around the globe prefer centralized control – as do the Orwellian media and government apparatchiks.  And in the Hegelian view of those peering behind the eye at the top of the pyramid, chaos brings order. But no matter what happens in the end, many people will definitely die before the new cashless age begins.

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Trump’s Trade Deals Are a Futile Conceit

Guest Post by Bill Bonner

The rich man’s wealth is his strong city, and as a high wall in his own conceit.

– Proverbs 18:11

POITOU, FRANCE – We are following up on Friday’s discussion by connecting a few final dots. Then, we promise we will never mention “trade” again.

Reader Challenge

Talk about a “ball joint,” a “female end” or a “coupling” in Congress, and they are likely to get the wrong idea.

Half the members of Congress are professional, lifelong politicians. Most of the others are lawyers by trade. Then there is an assortment of dentists, psychiatrists, and car dealers. But not a single plumber.

And yet, some people think that Congress and the administration are, at least, in part responsible for our toilets. That is the assumption built into our Dear Reader Bradley J.’s challenge. He wrote:

The purpose of a nation is to defend the common interests of its citizens. Certainly the ability to earn a living at a standard of living higher than that of the Chinese worker with his family’s bathroom at the end of his block, shared with 50 other families, is part of what our nation exists to achieve.

There is no mention of improving standards of living or increasing wealth in either the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution.

And we know that, in the U.S., the private sector is responsible for toilets.

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Behind Trump’s Exasperation

Guest Post by Patrick J. Buchanan

Behind Trump’s Exasperation

At the G-7 summit in Canada, President Donald Trump described America as “the piggy bank that everybody is robbing.”

After he left Quebec, his director of Trade and Industrial Policy, Peter Navarro, added a few parting words for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau:

“There’s a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad faith diplomacy with President Donald J. Trump and then tries to stab him in the back on the way out the door. … And that’s … what weak, dishonest Justin Trudeau did. And that comes right from Air Force One.”

In Singapore, Trump tweeted more about that piggy bank.

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Reality Returns

Guest Post by The Zman

All of the usual suspects are freaking out over Trump’s decision to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum. Most of it is by hysterics masquerading as analysts. Some of it is simply the innumerate throwing yet another tantrum about the bad man who vexes them. Some of the hysteria is due to the fact that people in the chattering classes were sure they had talked this bit of reality into going away for good. Reality, however, is that thing that does not go away when you stop believing in it. The reality of trade is now back.

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Donald Trump is an Economic Ignoramus!

Guest Post by Antonius Aquinas

Trump & Trade II

Not surprisingly, Donald Trump has followed in the infamous footsteps of his presidential predecessors in the transition from candidate to chief executive.  Invariably, every candidate for the presidency makes a whole host of promises, the vast majority of which are horrible and typically only exacerbate the problems they attempt to resolve.  Among the proposals, however, there is an occasional bright spot.  Yet, once elected the stupid polices are eagerly pursued while the good ones are quickly discarded.

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Donald & the Dollar

Guest Post by Antonius Aquinas

donald-dollar

John Connally, President Nixon’s Secretary of the Treasury, once remarked to the consternation of Europe’s financial elites over America’s inflationary monetary policy, that the dollar “is our currency, but your problem.”  Times have certainly changed and it now appears that the dollar has become an American problem.

In a recent interview with the Wall Street Journal, the soon to be 45th President of the United States believes that the greenback’s strength – up some 25% against a broad basket of currencies since 2014 – is now “too strong,” “killing us,” and has hurt companies trying to compete overseas.* A top Trump economics advisor, Anthony Scaramucci, reinforced his boss’ sentiment adding that “we must be careful of a rising dollar.”

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The Real Crisis Trump Will Face With Trade

Guest Post by Martin Armstrong

world-tradeThe entire problem with trade and jobs has been its focus on only the job and not the consumer. David Ricardo developed his principle that nations should pursue their own competitive advantages. In other words, just because I might want to be a brain surgeon does not mean that (1) I might be very good at it, and (2) that I am entitled to state protectionism to prevent others coming into the field who could expose me as second-rate.

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The High Cost of Free Trade

Guest Post by The Zman

The Wall Street Journal has a story on the troubles facing Chinese tech giant Huawei as it tries to enter the US mobile phone market.

A Chinese technology giant, whose telecom networking equipment is shut out of the U.S. due to security concerns, is bringing its high-end smartphone to American consumers for the first time.

But a number of obstacles are blocking Huawei Technologies Co.’s path to success in the U.S. smartphone market.

U.S. carriers, which distribute more than 80% of handsets in the country, are reluctant to work with Huawei—the world’s third-largest smartphone maker by shipments behind Samsung Electronics Co. and Apple Inc.—because of its low brand recognition and security concerns associated with its networking equipment, people familiar with the matter say. A 2012 congressional report recommended that U.S. carriers avoid using Huawei gear in their networks for fear that China might use it to spy on Americans. Huawei has denied such accusations, saying it operates independently of Beijing.

Much of what goes on in the modern age requires people to deny observable reality. China is an authoritarian state, run by a military government, that is highly paranoid of the outside world. Paranoia about the non-Chinese world is a feature of Chinese culture, a permanent feature. The type of government can change, but the Chinese elite will always view the rest of the world as smelly barbarians that must be kept under control. China is probably the most chauvinistic society on earth.

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An ‘America First’ Trump Trade Policy

Guest Post by Patrick J. Buchanan

Donald Trump’s election triumph is among the more astonishing in history.

Yet if he wishes to become the father of a new “America First” majority party, he must make good on his solemn promise:

To end the trade deficits that have bled our country of scores of thousands of factories, and to create millions of manufacturing jobs in the USA.

Fail here, and those slim majorities in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin disappear.

The president-elect takes credit for jawboning William Clay Ford to keep his Lincoln plant in Louisville. He is now jawboning Carrier air conditioning to stay in Indiana and not move to Mexico.

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Trump Right on Trade Predators

Guest Post by Patrick J. Buchanan

Is America still a serious nation?

Consider. While U.S. elites were denouncing Donald Trump as unfit to serve for having compared Miss Universe 1996 to “Miss Piggy” of “The Muppets,” the World Trade Organization was validating the principal plank of his platform.

America’s allies are cheating and robbing her blind on trade.

According to the WTO, Britain, France, Spain, Germany and the EU pumped $22 billion in illegal subsidies into Airbus to swindle Boeing out of the sale of 375 commercial jets.

Subsidies to the A320 caused lost sales of 271 Boeing 737s, writes journalist Alan Boyle. Subsidies for planes in the twin-aisle market cost the sale of 50 Boeing 767s, 777s and 787s. And subsidies to the A380 cost Boeing the sale of 54 747s. These represent crippling losses for Boeing, a crown jewel of U.S. manufacturing and a critical component of our national defense.

Earlier, writes Boyle, the WTO ruled that, “without the subsidies, Airbus would not have existed … and there would be no Airbus aircraft on the market.”

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WORLDS MADE BY HAND

Having recently finished reading The Harrows of Spring, the fourth and final novel of Jim Kunstler’s World Made By Hand series, I couldn’t help but compare and contrast his dystopian post economic collapse America versus our current warped egocentric pre-economic collapse America. His world made by hand is forced upon Americans who have survived some sort of conflict resulting in the destruction of Washington D.C. and Los Angeles by nuclear blasts.

The Federal government has ceased to exist. The nation has splintered and varied factions are vying for power in autonomous regions of the country, but the small community of Union Grove, New York has been left to fend for itself. The four novels detail the trials and tribulations of average Americans in a small rural town after the implosion of modernity, as the world is stripped of its technological oil based comforts, devastated by terrorism, racked by epidemics, and having endured the ravages of economic collapse.

Kunstler’s dystopian future isn’t as bleak as the dystopian visions of 1984 or Brave New World. If dystopian means a world characterized by dehumanization, totalitarian governments, environmental disaster, or a cataclysmic decline in society, then Kunstler’s World Made By Hand series doesn’t match that characterization. There is more humanity and hope in his novels than you would expect in a dystopian vision of the future. The novels focus on various types of societal segments who represent the different courses society could chart after a breakdown of modern social norms, enforced by central authorities. Living through a national catastrophe and stripped of the modern conveniences provided by cheap plentiful oil, the citizens of Union Grove see their community falling apart from neglect, natural decay, disease, and lack of hope for the future.

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Four Maps Showing China’s Rising Dominance in Trade

Via Visual Capitalist

We often use big, overarching ideas to help us understand the world and the opportunities contained within. These narratives, which can change over time, are used to create context. They give us a frame of reference for comprehending the news and events that affect our outlook on things.

China’s economic prowess is one of these new paradigms that has emerged, but many people still can’t really wrap their heads around the scale or scope of it.

It’s happened suddenly, and the ramifications are extremely relevant to our investments and understanding. Here’s four maps on China’s trade dominance that will help you think differently about the world:

China is the world’s #1 trade partner

China trading partners outnumbers US by a factor of two

Image courtesy of: Connectography

The United States is the number one trading partner for 56 countries, with important relationships throughout North America, South America, and Western Europe.

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Is Trumpism the New Nationalism?

Guest Post by Patrick J. Buchanan

Is Trumpism the New Nationalism?

Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore

Since China devalued its currency 3 percent, global markets have gone into a tailspin. Why should this be?

After all, 3 percent devaluation in China could be countered by a U.S. tariff of 3 percent on all goods made in China, and the tariff revenue used to cut U.S. corporate taxes.

The crisis in world markets seems related not only to a sinking Chinese economy, but also to what Beijing is saying to the world; i.e., China will save herself first even if it means throwing others out of the life boat.

Disbelievers in New World Order mythology have long recognized that this new China is fiercely nationalistic. Indeed, with Marxism-Leninism dead, nationalism is the Communist Party’s fallback faith.

China has thus kept her currency cheap to hold down imports and keep exports surging. She has run $300 billion trade surpluses at the expense of the Americans. She has demanded technology transfers from firms investing in China and engaged in technology theft.

Disillusioned U.S. executives have been pulling out.

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On a Fast Track to National Ruin

Guest Post by Patrick J. Buchanan

In the first quarter of 2015, in the sixth year of the historic Obama recovery, the U.S. economy grew by two-tenths of 1 percent.

And that probably sugarcoats it.

For trade deficits subtract from the growth of GDP, and the U.S. trade deficit that just came in was a monster.

As the AP’s Martin Crutsinger writes, “The U.S. trade deficit in March swelled to the highest level in more than six years, propelled by a flood of imports that may have sapped the U.S. economy of any growth in the first quarter.”

The March deficit was $51.2 billion, largest of any month since 2008. In goods alone, the trade deficit hit $64 billion.

As Crutsinger writes, a surge in imports to $239 billion in March, “reflected greater shipments of foreign-made industrial machinery, autos, mobile phones, clothing and furniture.”

What does this flood of imports of things we once made here mean for a city like, say, Baltimore? Writes columnist Allan Brownfeld:

“Baltimore was once a city where tens of thousands of blue collar employees earned a good living in industries building cars, airplanes and making steel. … In 1970, about a third of the labor force in Baltimore was employed in manufacturing. By 2000, only 7 percent of city residents had manufacturing jobs.”

Put down blue-collar Baltimore alongside Motor City, Detroit, as another fatality of free-trade fanaticism.

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