Into the mind of etucker1959 (Mercantilism)

[etucker1959]

Deve got me to start these threads but I encourage anyone who wants to express their opinion on these very important issues to feel Free to do it. (without judgment) I don't think there is anyone out there who doesn't know about the American job loss in Manufacturing to foreign country's. Whole Industry's are gone, it was first the Japanese in electronics and cars and smaller country's doing labor intense manufacturing. Then China came out of nowhere and said we can build almost everything!!!!! In just a few more years China will have the largest economy in the world. How in the heck did that happen so quickly!!!! Even Mexico is taking more and more jobs away from the USA. Ask any Conservative (except Donald Trump) about that and they will say, "that's just the way it is!!!!" No solutions at all!!!!! It's not just outsourcing and importing that is causing huge job losses. Increased productivity (robots, driverless cars etc) are causing a tremendous loss of jobs also. Add to all this our population keeps getting bigger!!!!! Does it take a Rocket Scientist to see we are headed for a day of Reckoning.

Here's the kicker to all this, "the Conservatives don't want to do anything drastic to change the direction everything is going. Yet they are the first ones to complain about the unemployed and under employed people. Another news flash to Conservatives, there will always be a certain amount of people that manual labor is all they can do!!! So losing the manufacturing jobs is their bread & butter to a certain type of people. Donald Trump is the first Politician to be brave enough to say enough is enough we need to do something about this. The Donald is actually appealing to the fed up displaced workers. He is not doing an Obama thing with just giving them FREE MONEY!!! He wants to give them their jobs back. The easiest way to do that is Mercantilism!!!! Where the government is actually manipulating parts of the economy. (throwing out lazsie faire) The reason why these jobs left the USA in the first place was because it was cheaper to manufacture them else where. In a Mercantilist economy the government raises the tariffs from 3% to 35% or more. Now it's no longer cheaper (when you add in the tariff) to manufacture the goods overseas. People still need these goods, now with a little governmental tax incentive to reopen plants in the USA again we are back in the manufacturing game. Another aspect of Mercantilism is a favorable or at least a break even balance of trade. If Japan wants to sell us 250 Billion dollars of their products, they better be prepared to buy that many from us. If they don't they will have an import quota on how much we will buy from them. (the difference being made up by new American plants making the same goods) Thus hiring millions of Americans again. The Economic term for this is called beggar they neighbor. (I'll just call it F China) I'm an American and I want what is best for America!!!! These plants need to start making goods again here in America and doing was best for Americans!!! It will cause a little inflation, but that's a small price to pay for full employment. (that's for you DocRat) Another side benefit to a little inflation it will help water down the national debt.

That should be enough to get things rolling.

[Marley]

Changed my mind, not going to bite.

[DarkShadow]

Deve got me to start these threads.....

We have someone to blame then.

[DEVOREFLYER]

We have someone to blame then.

Eat your heart out.......

[DEVOREFLYER]

Etucker I commend you for accepting the challenge to expound on some of your beliefs and to stop with “Just Words” and “Talking Points”.

I will explain why your Mercantilism will not work in today’s world and why the lefts agenda will destroy America . In true Mercantilism a country first is required to maximize to the fullest those things it is strongest in. Examples would be natural resources (oil, natural gas, coal, timber, corn, wheat, minerals), labor (productivity and innovation) and wealth (trade, cash, gold, silver and hard assets) and a strong military.

While the USA is blessed with abundant natural resources and the left does not want us to take advantage of that potential wealth. The enviro nazi’s do not want our natural resources used to the fullest extent (Ban offshore drilling, ban fracking, no drilling in Anwar, no Keystone pipeline, timber off limits to save an Owl, corn, wheat and other crops ban GMO, pesticides and fertilizers, minerals stop mining).

While we have an abundance of labor based on the number of people not in the work force the left and big business (Chamber of Commerce) wants open borders (cheap labor) . More H1B visas issued while our own college educated students struggle to find a job and pay student debt.

Wealth? Not anymore we are a debtor nation like it or not. $19.2 trillion National debt, gross debt to GDP ratio 105%. US Unfunded Liabilities $101.7 trillion (Social Security, Medicare part A, B & D, Federal debt held by the public, plus Federal Employee and Veteran Benefits). Current trade deficit $734.6 billion of which $366 billion is with China. We import $102.7 billion in oil yet we could be energy independent if we just used the proven resources we have in our country. And we would have to do a complete turnaround in out import to export ratio, goodbye to bananas, mango’s and papayas but we would still have Pineapples. It would take the complete confiscation of Small Business assets ($10.8 trillion) Corporation assets ($23.3 trillion) everyone’s Household assets ($88.5 trillion (home, cars, savings, investments, furnishings and toys) to pay off the combined National Debt, Unfunded Liabilities and our Trade Deficit. Sobering isn’t it, but we could always keep printing money right.

And about that Military thingy. We would need them more than ever to control the border, keep the barbarians away, enforce strict trade tariffs, smuggling and black market racketeering.

Stay tuned I got more.

[etucker1959]

Etucker I commend you for accepting the challenge to expound on some of your beliefs and to stop with “Just Words” and “Talking Points”.

I will explain why your Mercantilism will not work in today’s world and why the lefts agenda will destroy America . In true Mercantilism a country first is required to maximize to the fullest those things it is strongest in. Examples would be natural resources (oil, natural gas, coal, timber, corn, wheat, minerals), labor (productivity and innovation) and wealth (trade, cash, gold, silver and hard assets) and a strong military.

While the USA is blessed with abundant natural resources and the left does not want us to take advantage of that potential wealth. The enviro nazi’s do not want our natural resources used to the fullest extent (Ban offshore drilling, ban fracking, no drilling in Anwar, no Keystone pipeline, timber off limits to save an Owl, corn, wheat and other crops ban GMO, pesticides and fertilizers, minerals stop mining).

While we have an abundance of labor based on the number of people not in the work force the left and big business (Chamber of Commerce) wants open borders (cheap labor) . More H1B visas issued while our own college educated students struggle to find a job and pay student debt.

Wealth? Not anymore we are a debtor nation like it or not. $19.2 trillion National debt, gross debt to GDP ratio 105%. US Unfunded Liabilities $101.7 trillion (Social Security, Medicare part A, B & D, Federal debt held by the public, plus Federal Employee and Veteran Benefits). Current trade deficit $734.6 billion of which $366 billion is with China. We import $102.7 billion in oil yet we could be energy independent if we just used the proven resources we have in our country. And we would have to do a complete turnaround in out import to export ratio, goodbye to bananas, mango’s and papayas but we would still have Pineapples. It would take the complete confiscation of Small Business assets ($10.8 trillion) Corporation assets ($23.3 trillion) everyone’s Household assets ($88.5 trillion (home, cars, savings, investments, furnishings and toys) to pay off the combined National Debt, Unfunded Liabilities and our Trade Deficit. Sobering isn’t it, but we could always keep printing money right.

And about that Military thingy. We would need them more than ever to control the border, keep the barbarians away, enforce strict trade tariffs, smuggling and black market racketeering.

Stay tuned I got more.

The definition of Mercantilism as taught to me in college is the following. Governmental regulation of the economy to promote National goals. What the National goals are can be very narrow or very broad. I gave the example of Mercantilism to bring back manufacturing jobs back to the USA. It's not an all or nothing proposition!!!! Adam Smith the economist who promoted lasize faire, believed in no governmental regulations at all. (Market forces would drive the economy) We are neither in a total lasize faire economy or in an Mercantilist economy. But a combination of the two. The Trump man himself loves to promote more Mercantilist ideas. Today he announced how he would get Mexico to pay for the border wall. He would hold back money being sent from the USA into Mexico till they ponied up the 75 Billion to pay for the wall!!! (another example of Mercantilism)

I personally am not in favor of the extreme left view of the environment. But you can use other forms of Mercantilism without even going into the environment. I'm not a Trump supporter, but he is the first one to talk about WAYS you could bring jobs BACK to the USA. They just happen to be all Mercantilist ideas. Lasize faire won't bring any jobs back, in fact you will be seeing more and more of them leaving!!! Service jobs may be the next ones to leave in Mass!!! We've all had Tech support from India. What about if your doctor is in India??? Here's how they could do that. Go to a clinic and a nurse takes your blood pressure etc. A Doctor in New Deli through his computer is checking everything out and talking to you and the Nurse through the Computer and then prescribes treatment. Scary thought isn't it?????? What could protect you from that happening?????? Mercantilism!!!!!!!

[DEVOREFLYER]

Well government intervention, over regulation and crony capitalism (government picking winners and losers) is part of why we are in the mess we are in and is not part of the solution. While people mock Trump about his 35% duty on foreign goods President Reagan imposed a 35% tariff on Japanese motorcycles and saved Harley Davidson from eminent bankruptcy. In more recent times we hit unfair foreign completion with high tariffs on imported steel and tires although it was done too late and only after industry suffered irreversible damage. And we silently let the clothing, shoe and textile industry be decimated in this country and did nothing to prevent it. The primary reason was those industries were not strongly union and did not have the muscle or money to lobby DC.

While in this country and many others we have strong laws against monopolies and unfair trade/business practices we allowed OPEC to operate with impunity because they held the strong hand. Remember President Carter starting the Dept of Energy after the OPEC embargo and gas rationing, well that wonderful governmental agency has done absolutely nothing to solve the problem it was created for.

Now if you really want to go into the weeds and solve the trade disparity and solve the debt issue at the same time, quickly although extremely painful “Devalue the Dollar”. This would cause imports to be more expensive, exports to be cheaper, debt would be paid in cheaper dollars; savings would take a loss as would hard assets, hard assets under a mortgage and credit would be paid in cheaper dollars. But if we don’t do something soon to control out of control debt and deficits we will ultimately get inflation or stagflation and devaluing will not be of our choice.

Population control what a twisted web that is, the left wants open borders and immigrants have a much higher birth rate. Doesn’t that fly in the face of your argument? In life as in physic’s; for every action there is an equal reaction. Think of supply and demand, whether it is in labor, goods or services, short supply and/or high demand has an effect on prices, labor, wages and over supply and low demand has an equal and opposite effect.

Raising the standard of living for everyone is easily accomplished by either cheap goods and services or higher wages. You can’t have both and we as a nation to our detriment have chosen cheaper imported goods. I remember the days when you saw constant ads on TV touting look for the “Union Label and Made in the USA”. Where are those ads today?

Tell me one thing that the government does well, at low cost, efficiently and without waste, fraud and corruption that private industry couldn’t do better.

[etucker1959]

Well government intervention, over regulation and crony capitalism (government picking winners and losers) is part of why we are in the mess we are in and is not part of the solution. While people mock Trump about his 35% duty on foreign goods President Reagan imposed a 35% tariff on Japanese motorcycles and saved Harley Davidson from eminent bankruptcy. In more recent times we hit unfair foreign completion with high tariffs on imported steel and tires although it was done too late and only after industry suffered irreversible damage. And we silently let the clothing, shoe and textile industry be decimated in this country and did nothing to prevent it. The primary reason was those industries were not strongly union and did not have the muscle or money to lobby DC.

While in this country and many others we have strong laws against monopolies and unfair trade/business practices we allowed OPEC to operate with impunity because they held the strong hand. Remember President Carter starting the Dept of Energy after the OPEC embargo and gas rationing, well that wonderful governmental agency has done absolutely nothing to solve the problem it was created for.

Now if you really want to go into the weeds and solve the trade disparity and solve the debt issue at the same time, quickly although extremely painful “Devalue the Dollar”. This would cause imports to be more expensive, exports to be cheaper, debt would be paid in cheaper dollars; savings would take a loss as would hard assets, hard assets under a mortgage and credit would be paid in cheaper dollars. But if we don’t do something soon to control out of control debt and deficits we will ultimately get inflation or stagflation and devaluing will not be of our choice.

Population control what a twisted web that is, the left wants open borders and immigrants have a much higher birth rate. Doesn’t that fly in the face of your argument? In life as in physic’s; for every action there is an equal reaction. Think of supply and demand, whether it is in labor, goods or services, short supply and/or high demand has an effect on prices, labor, wages and over supply and low demand has an equal and opposite effect.

Raising the standard of living for everyone is easily accomplished by either cheap goods and services or higher wages. You can’t have both and we as a nation to our detriment have chosen cheaper imported goods. I remember the days when you saw constant ads on TV touting look for the “Union Label and Made in the USA”. Where are those ads today?

Tell me one thing that the government does well, at low cost, efficiently and without waste, fraud and corruption that private industry couldn’t do better.

I want to respond to your last quote. But you did make a lot of good points I totally agree with!!!!!

Tell me one thing that the government does well, at low cost, efficiently and without waste, fraud and corruption that private industry couldn't do better.

I think I know where you are going with this, "that old tried and true Conservative belief." That the governments role should be to provide a strong military but not much else. Private industry should do the rest. Why for the all above stated reasons!!!!!!

I'm not disagreeing that private industry for the motivation of profit does not do things more efficiently. However, there is still a big role for the government to tackle big monumentally task that private industry would probably ignore for lack of profit. The government then takes on these task for the betterment of Mankind. Let me give you some good examples of this!!!

1. At the turn of the Century a private French company came up with the idea and made an attempt to build the Panama Canal. It failed badly and they abandoned the whole project. The US government stepped in and took over the project and then completed the Panama Canal.

2. Starting in the 1920's (even a little before that) and going wild in the 1930's the government started building Dams for electrical power. They started with the Hoover Dam and then went crazy in the depression building the TVA. Would private enterprise have built those Dams??? Maybe Maybe not, it would have just depended if there was enough profit involved for them to do it. To think maybe Lake Mead wouldn't be there, "if it wasn't a government folly to build Hoover Dam." (think about that the next time you're fishing there)

3. Wars are fought and paid for by governments. But would the development of Nuclear power been possible if it wasn't for the governments effort to fund the Manhattan project. Private Enterprises wouldn't have had the resources to complete a project of that magnitude in such a short period of time.

4. HERE IS MY FAVORITE!!!!!. The Eisenhower administration passed and funded the Interstate Highway Act. 40,000 miles of good roads built to the same standard and absolutely FREE FREE FREE!!!!!! Private Enterprises would have made a hodgepodge of the quality of the roads and DRUM ROLL PLEASE................. and turned everyone of them into a toll road!!!!!!! Next time you get on the ole open highway to go to your favorite hunting and fishing spot, remember you don't have to keep stopping and throwing coins into a toll booth. Why because your government loves you enough not to let private enterprise stick it to you!!!! lol

5. I'll end with one of Mankind greatest achievements. "PUTTING A MAN ON THE MOON!!!!" Do you think private enterprise could or would even thought about doing that 40 years ago. Some people in the private industry now think they can do that again!!!! (I think it's just a pipe dream)

In Conclusion, yes private enterprise could and should do many things. But to think the government shouldn't be an active player in our society taking on great monumental task "is just plain foolishness!!!!"

[John Harper]

Tell me one thing that the government does well, at low cost, efficiently and without waste, fraud and corruption that private industry couldn’t do better.

There's perfect efficiency, low cost, no corruption nor fraud, and no waste in private industry?

We privatized the electricity market in CA, and got......Enron. We deregulated banking and got.....the S&L collapse, requiring a NEW govt organization, the RTC, to clean up the mess. We put profits over safety regulations at the UBB mine in WV and got.......29 dead miners.

It's certainly news to me. And the families of those dead miners.

John

[DEVOREFLYER]

We've all had Tech support from India. What about if your doctor is in India??? Here's how they could do that. Go to a clinic and a nurse takes your blood pressure etc. A Doctor in New Deli through his computer is checking everything out and talking to you and the Nurse through the Computer and then prescribes treatment. Scary thought isn't it?????? What could protect you from that happening?????? Mercantilism!!!!!!!

Not to worry we got 0bamacare..............if like your doctor you can keep your doctor, if you like your plan you can keep your plan......thanks 0bama.