Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

But globalization isn't a big economic issue, it's just political cover.

Sure, in the 1980s manufacturing moving to low wage jurisdictions (as much Alabama as Mexico) hurt the Rustbelt. That was a long time ago. But wages in much of the world are way up compared to then, and have stayed flat in the US in manufacturing, meaning moving saves a lot less money, and more importantly automation means wages are also less critical, since the plant that used to take thousands of employees to run now takes hundreds. So you get a lot of political hay closing the borders but it doesn't actually help and probably hurts by killing foreign markets for stuff we do well.

Read the thing I linked to yesterday, and then say why the author is overstating the effects of international trade on the political economy.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Not to those hit with the costs.

The textbook case for international trade is that it makes the country better off in the aggregate, and the gains can be redistributed so that no one is worse off. But when you have a political party in this country dedicated to opposing redistribution -- and, hey, you don't identify as a Republican but you just scorned Democrats for thinking that redistribution is a solution to anything -- and it can block it from happening, then you have to come to grips with the fact that international trade has winners and losers, and the losers pretty rationally will try to block it.

I'd favor a guaranteed income. Redistribution via govt (agencies doling the $$$ out in a complex fashion) I do not favor.

I'd pay a lot more in taxes if I could simply give it to a poor person directly.

My objection is to the apparatus used, not redistribution.

As usual, I desire an option Not On The Menu.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

The entire rest of the economy - and it's a lot - has not and won't really. Either because it can't - e.g. personal services, stuff that's expensive to ship - or it's not worth it - relatively small product markets, consumer goods that reflect local preferences, etc.

Two thoughts.

Give automation some time to work on those items. The professional classes' day of reckoning is coming, quickly. If not here already.

The service sector is comprised of a ton of shit, low pay jobs. Its growth outpacing all other sectors since 2008 is not something to be celebrated.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I'd favor a guaranteed income. Redistribution via govt (agencies doling the $$$ out in a complex fashion) I do not favor.

I'd pay a lot more in taxes if I could simply give it to a poor person directly.

My objection is to the apparatus used, not redistribution.

As usual, I desire an option Not On The Menu.

As always, the perfect is the enemy of the good.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

As always, the perfect is the enemy of the good.

Do you understand how insulting this should be to you and all the others posting here?

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I'd favor a guaranteed income. Redistribution via govt (agencies doling the $$$ out in a complex fashion) I do not favor.

You understand that guaranteed income is redistribution via govt (agencies doling the $$$ out), right?

What you really mean is that you think the efficiency of just handing out cash is preferable even though it comes without the political compromise involved in assisting the poor and advancing the interests of food producers and owners of housing.

I do too in the abstract, but I also live in the real world where the fact the food stamps also benefit agribusiness makes them significantly more politically viable.

I'd pay a lot more in taxes if I could simply give it to a poor person directly.

1. Liar.

2. No one is stopping you from giving those dollars over to a poor person right now. Heck, we're actually subsidizing you to do it.

As usual, I desire an option Not On The Menu.

You know that this does not absolve you of anything, right?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Do you understand how insulting this should be to you and all the others posting here?

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Give automation some time to work on those items. The professional classes' day of reckoning is coming, quickly. If not here already.

You're responding to comments about globalization. So sticking with that, no, your tax preparer isn't going to be in India nor is your wife's nail salon. The former could, but why? The latter can't. There are many other similar businesses.

And of course automation is another reason some of those won't move overseas. Yes, it's going to make literally everything different, but not nearly as quickly as you think.

The professional classes will spend less time reading and drafting documents. But the job of senior lawyers and investment bankers is to hold clients' hand as much as anything. A machine can't do that.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Read the thing I linked to yesterday, and then say why the author is overstating the effects of international trade on the political economy.

today is a no-scroll day. I don't remember the article, but if you want to link I'll see.

I have no doubt trade has many effects, but many of them, and an increasing number today, are very positive.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

On a different note, and conceivably of interest only to me, is this (via Matt Levine's email):

Over the last few decades, with minor cyclical interruptions, the supply of safe assets has not kept up with global demand. The reason is straightforward: the collective growth rate of the advanced economies that produce safe assets has been lower than the world's growth rate, which has been driven disproportionately by the high growth rate of high-saving emerging economies such as China. The signature of this growing shortage is a steady increase in the price of safe assets; equivalently, global safe interest rates must decline, as has been the case since the 1980s.

One of the drivers of the financial crisis was that the demand for safe assets outstripped supply and so the finance sector tried to create new supplies of safe assets, which weren't, as it turned out. The above suggests to me that the imbalance is structural and that the problem will recur.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

today is a no-scroll day. I don't remember the article, but if you want to link I'll see.

I have no doubt trade has many effects, but many of them, and an increasing number today, are very positive.

Henry Farrell at Crooked Timber; the thing he's responding to is worth the time too.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I do tend to favor third rails. But I could do it with almost anything.

"It's all grey. It's all subjective."

Brilliant! And you can do this with almost anything? What's your secret?

TM

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Henry Farrell at Crooked Timber; the thing he's responding to is worth the time too.

My god, that is some truly atrocious and obtuse writing. I am convinced of nothing other than that the writer is a very serious academic tool who is unlikely to ever convince me of much.

That should be part of a "how not to write" seminar.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

One of the drivers of the financial crisis was that the demand for safe assets outstripped supply and so the finance sector tried to create new supplies of safe assets, which weren't, as it turned out. The above suggests to me that the imbalance is structural and that the problem will recur.

Time to raise the debt ceiling and grow the deficit!

Although I guess I had understood that China's savings rate has declined as it's grown more prosperous overall. If that's true, it's a bit of mitigation.

I'm no longer close enough to Wall Street to know whether new products have been created to pose as safe assets the way mortgage and asset-backed products grew a decade ago.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

My god, that is some truly atrocious and obtuse writing. I am convinced of nothing other than that the writer is a very serious academic tool who is unlikely to ever convince me of much.

That should be part of a "how not to write" seminar.

I wasn't that troubled by writing, but I did get bored and stop reading, so...