re: "The Golden Days Are Over"

Dave Schuler at The Glittering Eye looks at economic, immigration, and trade policies.

Money quote(s):

"I think that trade and immigration policies must conform to actual needs and realities rather than some ideological view. The reality is that we have millions of unemployed unskilled or semi-skilled people here in the U. S. already and wages for unskilled and semi-skilled workers have been stagnant or falling for decades, a sure sign of flagging demand. Our immigration policy wih respect to Mexico should reflect that reality; sadly, it does not."

The current (our second annual) "recovery summer" is driving this point home to the point where even Congress may catch on to what everyone who isn't Mexican (and petitioning for their under-educated and unskilled relatives) already knows: unlimited (which is the result of lax enforcement) immigration of under-skilled workers does nothing but pull the rug out from under our own (U.S. citizen) labor pool.

"China poses a unique challenge for American economic policy. I trace many of our economic woes to three events, all involving China: China’s 1979 abandoning of its official policy of autarky, China’s pegging of the yuan to the dollar in 1993, and the admission of China to the WTO in 2001. I think that these actions eroded manufacturing jobs in the U. S., increased our imports from China to the detriment of American-made goods, and drove money into housing construction with the results that we see around us today. Our trade policy with respect to China should reflect the unique challenges that China presents; it does not."

Not being an economist, I'm unable to discern the linkage between the three Chinese developments cited and increased U.S. housing construction. Anyone care to spell this out for me?

JG - Mendicancy revisited

From my archive of press clippings:

Jamaica Gleaner

Mendicancy revisited

published: Sunday July 13, 2008

Robert Buddan, Contributor

When Dr Kenneth Baugh, the deputy prime minister, made his administration's maiden speech at the United Nations on October 3, 2007, a month after coming to office, there was no difference evident between his administration's position and that of the previous administration's position on international trade negotiations. Dr Baugh said that the new government would continue to pursue the widely accepted principle of special and differential treatment for developing countries under the DOHA Round of WTO negotiations, and that the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) being negotiated with the European Union was inequitable and violated the principle of global partnership.

Read the whole article here.