2008 Woodie Awards
Free trade policies key to keeping low prices
Aanston Frazier
Issue date: 1/23/08 Section: Editorials
Monday night, during the Democratic presidential debate in South Carolina, candidates Barack Obama and John Edwards repeated the usual populist attacks against The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and other free trade policies, claiming that they were devastating for the economy. In this case it was the textile industry in South Carolina, and therefore, these agreements need to go away.
Once again the usual populist rhetoric about how bad free trade agreements are only focuses on the small number of people who lose jobs. Such agreements fail to pay attention to the jobs created, increases in standard of living and overall benefit to the economy as a whole that result from such agreements.
While it is indeed unfortunate that some individuals can be severely impacted by such agreements, economic decisions that seek to protect them at the expense of everyone else is silliness. The nation's economy is not just about one group of individuals, it's about the entire country.
Trade agreements such as NAFTA and others have resulted in great benefits to our economy by reducing tariffs and other economic restrictions that result in lower prices for American consumers. Focusing on protecting those jobs impacted by such agreements - as economic populists such as Edwards and Obama have stated - results in the costs of such actions being passed on to everyone else. Sure some jobs are saved, but what are the costs of such actions?
Yet, ignoring those costs is what the economic populists do best. All they focus on are the "benefits" of saving jobs in an industry without caring what it costs the American people.
Economist Walter Williams points to the sugar industry as a perfect example of this. He states that economic protections on the U.S. sugar industry cost the country more than $800,000 for each job saved every year because of the higher prices we as consumers are forced to pay to protect these jobs.
This nation has grown and prospered because we have recognized that we are better off by importing things instead of manufacturing everything in this country. All this populism will accomplish is to make a few people better off by saving their job while making the rest of us worse off through higher prices that we have to pay for goods that could have been cheaply imported. Higher prices are not the way to economic prosperity. These economic populists should realize this.
- Aanston Frazier, a former Marine Corps intelligence analyst, is a junior economics and political science major and a Mirror columnist.
Once again the usual populist rhetoric about how bad free trade agreements are only focuses on the small number of people who lose jobs. Such agreements fail to pay attention to the jobs created, increases in standard of living and overall benefit to the economy as a whole that result from such agreements.
While it is indeed unfortunate that some individuals can be severely impacted by such agreements, economic decisions that seek to protect them at the expense of everyone else is silliness. The nation's economy is not just about one group of individuals, it's about the entire country.
Trade agreements such as NAFTA and others have resulted in great benefits to our economy by reducing tariffs and other economic restrictions that result in lower prices for American consumers. Focusing on protecting those jobs impacted by such agreements - as economic populists such as Edwards and Obama have stated - results in the costs of such actions being passed on to everyone else. Sure some jobs are saved, but what are the costs of such actions?
Yet, ignoring those costs is what the economic populists do best. All they focus on are the "benefits" of saving jobs in an industry without caring what it costs the American people.
Economist Walter Williams points to the sugar industry as a perfect example of this. He states that economic protections on the U.S. sugar industry cost the country more than $800,000 for each job saved every year because of the higher prices we as consumers are forced to pay to protect these jobs.
This nation has grown and prospered because we have recognized that we are better off by importing things instead of manufacturing everything in this country. All this populism will accomplish is to make a few people better off by saving their job while making the rest of us worse off through higher prices that we have to pay for goods that could have been cheaply imported. Higher prices are not the way to economic prosperity. These economic populists should realize this.
- Aanston Frazier, a former Marine Corps intelligence analyst, is a junior economics and political science major and a Mirror columnist.
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