For understanding

[kurt]

When political and economic issues get defined by sound bite idiocies (Solyndra, Wall Street Protests, accusations of "class war", etc.), brain cells get killed off. It's depressing to see otherwise intelligent people seeking to understand economic events by such drivel.

I dragged this out of the library to possibly provide understanding of what's actually happening in the world, and why. Note the date of authorship, well before most Americans "discovered" China and the Asian manner of doing business.

It doesn't point the way, but it provides the correct sort of alternative understanding for making sense of what our news organizations can't seem to comprehend.

It's long. Read all of it. You'll understand things a lot more when you're done.

Download Attachment: Fallows- What is an Economy For.pdf

140.14 KB

[Les]

Worth the read, but has some curious assumptions. Especially the first couple pages.

[John Kogel]

I think it is a good read. He is making the point that we can't expect Asian trading partners to operate the same way the western nations have in the past. We lost control of the game when we opened our doors to free trade with them. They can artificially manipulate their economy so that they always come out ahead. The workforce is completely under state control.

They can put lead in the paint and gypsum in the baby food, and we'll keep dealing with them, because we love their cheap products.

[kurt]

The assumptions are not curious; they're fairly well stated. Fallows might be described as many things, but curiously disengaged is not likely one of the things. He's a pretty smart cookie.

Yes, John, we are stuck in there. It's not just that we love their cheap products, it's also that we imagine it being the next great outlet for our garbage, which we are now finding out is unlikely. Take as an example the recent closing of all the Wal-Marts in Chongqing, on entirely trumped out silliness about some organic labeling on meat, or the business negotiations of an outsider where, to show dissatisfaction with the American's aggressive approach, they took his belt, snipped his buttons, and forced him to stand there holding up his pants while trying to negotiate.

In a word, they're nuts. That becomes apparent while traveling and looking at things most tourists don't look at.

The multiple points made portray an extremely nationalistic bent in all business matters, wherein no outside player is ever going to be allowed to prosper unless the governing cadre benefits, and even then, roadblocks will appear keeping the playing field completely unlevel.

Of course, not one administration of the last 20 years has chosen to recognize these blatant indictors, resulting in a significant amount of stupidity in our economy, and an entirely misdirected trade negotiation strategy that leaves us standing with our pants around our ankles then, now, and in the future.

The next 10 years are going to be, as they say, interesting.......

[Les]

The assumptions are not curious; they're fairly well stated. Fallows might be described as many things, but curiously disengaged is not likely one of the things. He's a pretty smart cookie.

Because they are "curious" they can't be valid? I rather like his paper, but do not have to swallow the mega assumptions that mix economics and culture and society and geography. Fallows is a smart guy and so was Geo Marshall.

me thinks this is going political.....

[Chad Fabry]

I read it yesterday. I already believed almost all of what Fallows wrote, but I had yet to assemble the various concepts into a coherent theory.

[kurt]

me thinks this is going political.....

It can't go political........neither side gets it.

[Les]

agreed!