The ideology of "Free trade" is Killing America's Economy

The one dimensionality bores me

You're ignoring the failure to protect property rights. Its either ignorance or hypocrisy, take your pick

Both countries have high poverty and low social mobility. Your innate right wing nature keeps on peeking out

 

Don't fib now. You've adopted Plagiarism 101 for some time. I don't mind that. I do mind your failure to progress. You might as well be the fake libertarian you were 2 years back

 

The price of labor is already determined by the market and you will never have this "perfect world" whether it's labor or any other commodity. What one contributes to a company will never be relevant to wages because it's really impossible to determine. Let's say your labor on a widget is valued by a company at $30/hour and the cost of your employment (which may be much higher than wages) is $15/hour. The company sets that value by determine what the loss is if you are absent from work. However, your actual contribution may be much lower given all the other contributions by others within the company such as marketing, executives, entrepreneurial costs, etc.

So, in a perfect world of supply and demand for labor, we'd see wages more in line with the value to the company, I agree. Who outside of the company making hiring decisions can determine the productive value of the labor and are you ready to accept huge differences in wages for those employees who produce more versus those who produce less?

 

Inane attempt again. Take the minimum wage. Apparently a blunt instrument that will necessarily create unemployment as it will be above productivity rates. The reality? A means to eliminate inefficiency: be it underpayment of the individual or wage differentials incompatibly with human capital criteria

 

Like I said from get start, even if I accept the premise the problem is transition, something you're desperate to avoid discussing.

Now, yes. That wasn't always the case.

99% of what you post is banter with folks that are woefully uninformed, jargon is jargon and economics is bloated with it. Maybe if we spent less time agreeing on stuff like trade liberalization and progressive taxation there'd be more diversity.

2 years ago I was a rabid conservative with a gross misunderstanding of how markets work. My desire to overcome your attempts at alienation lead me to seek out knowledge, fortunately for me I'm afforded a substantial amount of time to hike up that plateau.

 

Empty comment! You either support the protection of property rights or you don't.

Evidence when it wasn't and try to ensure consistency with your original remark?

You're again sounding like the standard right wing anti-intellectual. Most of it is just obvious stuff. There's nothing really complex, for example, in orthodox economics (despite the attempt to suggest otherwise with the maths obsession).

You're still years back!

 

Never mind the path to get there, quit ducking it. There's not peaceful path, discussing property rights and endorsing violence is, as I already said, absurd.

That indictment is almost completely based on cross sectional data, panel data tells a different tale but I'll have to get back to you on the empirical evidence.

It's true and it bugs you. The profession is absolutely bogged down in language and mathematics that discourage most folks from taking it seriously, it's little surprise your so poorly received. I don't fault you for it though, you're vested so it's self interest that drives it.

Oh? Then why do so many struggle with it?

Says the guy endorsing a school of thought ignored by virtually everyone. Hell, half the folks you cite outright condemn it.

 

The path doesn't change: protection of property rights. The only change is the end of a hypocrisy.

i.e. you have naff all

Given I'm not an economist, why the heck would it bug me? I just find it a pathetic claim

Dissonance.

What school of thought is that then? You again come out with nonsense

 

Sure doesn't. Violence and/or revolution.

So to be clear, you're denying that the social mobility argument isn't based on cross sectional data? Truth is you know that panel data paints a different picture, but it's late here and most folks aren't going to read anything either of us post anyway and if you're as well read as you say you are you know good and well what I'm talking about.

And you accused me of fibbing? Consultancy is one of the few paths outside of education for those with formal training, something that I can smell from here.

Socialism, but you knew that. No idea why you decided to play coy.

 

Simple protection of property rights. You merely want to suggest the removal of hypocrisy is some sort of heinous departure.

Of course it isn't.

Go ahead and defend that!

I'm a social scientist who self-trained in economics because of its value for my career. Aint difficult at all.

Socialist political economy encompasses numerous economic schools of thought. I myself will refer to all of them. You were talking cobblers

 

Socialism involves the violation of the property rights of the current owners of the means of production.

 

An ignorant response given the value of a firm, without workers, is often negative (given sunk costs)

 

An ignorant response given that a firm can hire workers willing to freely exchange their services for compensation from the firm.

 

It amazes me that people actually think that workers are anything except interchangeable cogs available for a dime a dozen.

 

Repetition of ignorance, nothing more. If we could characterise the labour market purely in terms of exchange we wouldn't see underpayment, by definition. Economic rents therefore show that coercion is at play. Its an inefficiency ignored by the right wing as they have a corrupt understanding of property rights.. They welcome traditional ownership despite the theft involved.

 

What meaningless, silliness you babble on about. No one has claimed "we could characterise the labour market purely in terms of exchange".

 

There is no other form of ownership. Either the individual owns it, or the State owns it. Where the individual owns, prosperity reigns for most. Where the State owns, there is no prosperity. Only corruption and rent seeking on the part of special interests.

Next you'll try to convince us that profit is economic rent and that all profits should be spread out to the workers instead of the man who provided the capital and the idea in the first place.

Workers are just cogs. You fire one, and replace him with another if necessary. Without the capital and the idea, there is nothing for the worker.

 

Your approach is a little tiresome: make things up and hope people do not notice. Socialism does not require state ownership. Indeed, its easy to embed a socialist result within an Austrian understanding of individualism. The truth is that you support coercion and twin it with a deliberate perversion of capitalist result. I don't find that interesting

 

No, to be analogous, I'm suggesting your acting like a travel agent selling me a trip a beautiful island but neglecting to tell me about the wall of fire we have to fly through and the layover in hell.

Still trying to find the paper that uses the panel data, but regardless:

Ferrie, Joseph P. "History Lessons: The End Of American Exceptionalism? Mobility In The United States Since 1850," Journal of Economic Perspectives, 2005, v19(3,Summer), 199-215.

For those who won't bother to read it, the TL;DR is that socio-economic mobility was substantially higher in the late eighteenth, early century (much higher than in Britain) and that since then it's been in decline. The argument is constructed around longitudinal data that compares the type of work done across generations.

So what? It's still a marginal heterodox school that is largely ignored when it's not being directly attacked.

 

Can't bothered to read it. What international comparison is made? The vague reference to Britain suggests not much.

Repetition of error. Socialism isn't a school. The political economy involved encompasses numerous schools.

 

Census data comparing occupation over 10, 20 and 30 year periods using four categories: 1) white collar 2) farmers 3) semi-skilled (craft workers) 4) low/no skill. Occupation had to be used since income data isn't available until 1940, but it works fairly well since income levels have been fairly consistent amongst these job types. It compares a set of 25,000 males in the Britain to a similar sized set (40k IIRC) in the US.

 

So its a waste of time then. We've always known that the UK suffers from immobility. Suggesting it can be used to go "oooo like at our historical mobility rates" takes uncunning to the nth order

 

Even if we ignored the comparative analysis, the point I was trying to make is still true: social mobility in the US hasn't always been as low as it is today.

 

That mobility rates cannot be a constant is pretty obvious. Without the comparative analysis you don't have any means to define 'low'. You only have 'its been better'

 

Which is what I said and what you demanded I defend. Done and done. G'day.