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Leaders don't make excuses for inaction.
Shut Down - Beach Boys
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A successful man is one
Be My Baby - Ronettes
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No man has a good enough memory
Trini Lopez - If I Had A Hammer
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History has demonstrated that the most notable winners
Walk Right In - Rooftop Singers
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The greatest weakness of most humans is
Bobby Darin -- You're The Reason I'm Living
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Where Have All The Flowers Gone?"- Kingston Trio
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Far and away the best prize that life offers is
I’m Blue (The Gong-Gong Song) - Ikettes
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The twin killers of success areWalk On The Wild Side - Jimmy Smith
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People are in greater need of your praise when they try and fail,
Courtesy of Jack Ohman via smerconish
Dee Dee Sharp- Gravy (For My Mashed Potatoes)
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You don't understand anything
A Swingin’ Safari - Billy Vaughn
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Every profession is a conspiracy against the laity
Walter Brennan - Old Rivers
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Courage is not the towering oak that sees storms come and go;
Darlene Love - Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)
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It is a mistake to regard age as a downhill grade toward dissolution.
The Four Seasons - Sherry
Sam Cooke Having A Party
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The brain is a wonderful organ.Al Di La - Emilio Pericoli
In the real world, the government doesn't micromanage trade. Of course, certain interventions violate the ideals of free trade, e.g., embargoes, economic sanctions, quotas, product restrictions/approvals, and high protective tariffs. To give a simple example: when I download Oracle software, I usually have to acknowledge that I will not make it available to certain foreign adversaries like Cuba, Iran, Sudan, Libya, North Korea, or Syria..Another recent example was the 2022 baby formula shortage involving the shutdown of a major Abbott facility. The FDA has multiple standards, including labeling, safety, and nutrition. Infant formula is also included in USMCA dairy quotas. Via Google:
The United States subjects infant formula to tariffs up to 17.5 percent and tariff-rate quotas (TRQs); for TRQs some level imported are subject to a tariff with the excess subject to a tariff and additional duties...[T]he FDA requires specific ingredients, labeling requirements, and mandates retailers wait at least 90 days before marketing a new infant formula. ..[NOTE: This doesn't include any recent changes under Trump.]
Free market (via Google AI)
This economic system, also called laissez-faire capitalism, operates on the belief that economic decisions by individuals and private firms lead to the most efficient allocation of resources.
Principles:
- Minimal government intervention: The role of the state is limited to protecting property rights, enforcing contracts, and providing public goods.
- Supply and demand: Market prices are determined solely by voluntary exchanges between consumers and producers.
- Competition and innovation: Competition among businesses incentivizes innovation, efficiency, and lower prices, which benefits consumers.
- Individual choice: The market is driven by consumer sovereignty, meaning consumer preferences dictate what goods and services are produced.
Arguments for:
- Promotes economic growth, innovation, and greater prosperity.
- Allows for efficient resource allocation.
- Encourages entrepreneurship and individual liberty.
Arguments against:
- Market failures: The free market can fail to provide sufficient public and merit goods like healthcare and education.
- Inequality: Can lead to vast disparities in income and wealth, as resources concentrate among a few.
- Monopolies: A lack of regulation can allow powerful corporations to dominate markets, stifle competition, and raise prices.
- Negative externalities: Unrestricted markets may ignore harmful side effects, such as environmental degradation.
- Economic instability: The market may experience erratic boom and bust cycles.
Industrial policy
In this approach, the government actively assists specific domestic industries to achieve public goals that the market alone would not accomplish. These measures have seen a notable resurgence in recent years due to geopolitical and supply-chain vulnerabilities.
Tools and methods:
- Targeted subsidies and incentives: Providing financial aid or tax breaks to specific sectors, such as green energy or semiconductors, to influence investment.
- Tariffs and protectionism: Imposing trade barriers to shelter nascent or essential domestic industries from foreign competition.
- Government-funded R&D: Supporting research and development in strategic technologies to drive innovation.
- Public investment: Directly investing in infrastructure or industries deemed critical for national interests.
Arguments for:
- Correcting market failures: Addresses issues like insufficient investment in sectors with high societal benefits, such as clean energy.
- National security: Reduces dependence on foreign supply chains for critical goods, a concern amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic and geopolitical tensions.
- Strategic competitiveness: Allows a country to foster specific high-tech industries and compete with other nations that use similar policies.
- Coordinating complex challenges: Helps coordinate efforts to tackle large-scale challenges like climate change.
Arguments against:
- Government picking winners: Governments may not be able to identify which industries will be successful, leading to wasted resources on "picking losers".
- Political capture: Policies can be distorted by politically influential firms seeking to manipulate rules for their own gain rather than for the public good.
- Economic distortion: Interventions can misallocate resources away from more productive uses, harming overall economic efficiency.
- Trade tensions: Unilateral policies can provoke retaliatory measures from other countries, potentially undermining the global trading system.
- Implementation difficulties: Executing these policies can be challenging, and they can often be difficult to end once the initial need has passed.
Key difference: underlying philosophy
The fundamental distinction is rooted in the respective beliefs about the efficiency of markets versus the necessity of government action.
- The free market perspective holds that markets are inherently efficient and self-correcting, with government intervention causing distortions.
- The industrial policy perspective argues that markets are not always optimal and that targeted government intervention is necessary to address specific failures, promote strategic industries, and achieve national goals.
The current economic climate, with its geopolitical tensions and focus on climate and technological transitions, has led to a major revival of industrial policy in many countries, including the U.S., making this debate increasingly relevant.
The evolution of U.S. tariff policy from 1790 to 2019 can be divided into three distinct periods, each characterized by a different primary objective: revenue generation (1790–1860), import restriction (1861–1933), and reciprocity through trade agreements (1934–present).
Multiple factors drove the Republican Party's shift toward favoring free trade after World War II, a dramatic reversal of its historical support for protectionism. The primary motivations were the devastating economic consequences of protectionism in the 1930s, the Cold War geopolitical climate, and the evolving interests of American businesses.The failures of pre-war protectionism• Worsening the Great Depression: The infamous Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, passed by a Republican-led Congress and signed by Republican President Herbert Hoover, severely raised tariffs on imports. The bill provoked retaliatory tariffs from other countries, causing a collapse in world trade and deepening the economic crisis of the Great Depression. This was a powerful lesson that protectionism could destabilize global economies and harm American interests.• The Democratic shift: Following the Smoot-Hawley disaster, Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt championed a new, more open approach to trade. In 1934, his administration passed the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act, which laid the foundation for post-war liberalization by allowing the President to negotiate tariff reductions.Cold War geopolitical strategy• Strengthening allies against communism: After World War II, the United States assumed a new role as a global leader. Policymakers from both parties, including Republicans, saw open trade as a key foreign policy tool. Integrating the economies of Western Europe and Japan with the U.S. was viewed as a way to promote stability, rebuild war-torn economies, and prevent them from falling under the influence of the Soviet Union.• Building a global trading system: The U.S. championed international trade institutions like the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), the precursor to the World Trade Organization (WTO). Creating a more predictable, rules-based global trading system was considered essential for securing international peace and U.S. power.Changing economic interests of businesses• Rise of American exporters: With its manufacturing sector largely undamaged by the war, the U.S. became an export powerhouse. American manufacturers and corporations became increasingly interested in expanding their access to overseas markets and supported trade agreements to lower foreign tariffs.• Institutional incentives: The Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act changed the political calculus for businesses. By tying domestic tariff reductions to reciprocal foreign cuts, the law incentivized American exporters to advocate politically for lower tariffs, counteracting the traditional pro-tariff influence of import-competing firms.The realignment of party platformsBy the 1970s, the parties had largely reversed their traditional stances on trade.• Republicans increasingly aligned with pro-business, free-market principles, with figures like Ronald Reagan advocating for open trade as an extension of economic freedom.• Democrats, whose base of support was increasingly defined by organized labor, grew more concerned with the impact of imports on American workers and moved toward a more protectionist position.
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Do good by stealth,
Norman - Sue Thompson
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The man who does not read good books(Note: This debate actually dates back to the end of Trump's first term, but obviously remains relevant. Of course, I sided with Gene Epstein's presentation.)
Bruce Channel - Hey! Baby
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For some kind word I do not say A heart goes lonely on its way.
Brenda Lee - You can Depend on Me