Donald Trump wants to bring back jobs. Frankly, I don’t understand the concept of bringing them back versus creating new ones here. I mean, countries tend to evolve from manufacturing to services to high-tech and so on. We were just trying to stay on the frontier, and that’s good. It’s said there’s a strategic advantage in being first. We were first to the moon, and that’s given us an advantage. We were first to invent cars, which was rather high-tech at the time, I’d say. If we weren’t the first, we would have watched a different economy grow via the car and other advances, and we would have owned those cars if we paid the purchase price rather than the manufacturing cost. Therefore, there are advantages to being first, and we can’t do everything, which means we have to let other countries do some work. I say “let” because, if done correctly, we outsource jobs to countries we can trust, whom we want to help, and whom aren’t really able yet to do so well in the area in which we’re outsourcing without our help. Currently, most of those jobs have been outsourced to China, who isn’t willing to work with us unless that’s a way to get close enough to hurt us. However, done right, outsourcing is a great way to help others grow and free up resources to help your country expand and continue to be first and then outsource what you’ve created, and then the cycle continues.
However, I don’t think Trump is really thinking about all of these issues. He’s more focused on hating everyone that’s not American and, domestically, most Americans. However, a realignment of globalization is necessary. We’ve given most of our jobs to the wrong country. Not really the wrong people, but the government that controls those people. The theory that economic development brings about change that leads to democracy is one that with which I’ve disagreed for my whole life, but many corporations agree with it or claim it when they’re really just looking for lower costs. I think China is proof that either this theory implies a revolt must take place to make the theory valid in areas where a theory of government that directly competes with democracy exists or that this theory isn’t true. It’s just a theory, not a law. Theories need proof to become a law, and I think China is proof that this theory is not valid.
However, when you repatriate jobs, there is one thing that does clearly happen. You get more money. Now, this can be debated, but the United States has a trade deficit, a huge one, with China. Since most jobs have gone there and since it’s clear Trump will try to get jobs back from there, that deficit will narrow. Additionally, he’s said he’ll partner with Jack Ma (Ma Yun or 马云) of Alibaba to sell to Chinese consumers, which would send money from Chinese consumers to the United States. Therefore, China exports fewer goods to sell here and we export more goods to sell there, creating a sealed bilateral tube through which money and products will flow in reverse from the direction it’s been flowing massively since China joined the WTO. Trump thinks this is better than forming a trade pact like the TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership) that would divert money away from China, slowing their GDP growth, though still outsourcing U.S. jobs but to allies. Trump doesn’t want to outsource any more jobs. None. He’s talked about taxing products from China 45%. I don’t know whether this is going to happen, but I do know that Trump has talked about a direct relationship with Alibaba to bring jobs back from China, a direct relationship that tethers U.S. jobs not to China’s ability to assemble U.S. designed goods but to China’s actual labor management. China will be able to tell U.S. workers that they should produce in a certain way and claim that Chinese consumers want it that way in order to control our workforce. If you read Job Growth In America (With Chinese Characteristics), you’ll see that this partnership won’t “Make America Great Again.”
1 comment