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Thread: The Youth Unemployment Bomb

  1. #31
    Quote Originally Posted by Being View Post
    I consider a lack of environmental regulation to be a trade barrier.
    Uh, technically the unnatural barrier to trade would be the environmental regulations, not the lack of them. A lack of such regulations does nothing to manipulate or interfere with trade, and those are the WTO's remit.
    Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"

  2. #32
    How is it going with you finding a full-time job in your chosen career field, Fuzzy?

  3. #33
    Quote Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy View Post
    Uh, technically the unnatural barrier to trade would be the environmental regulations, not the lack of them. A lack of such regulations does nothing to manipulate or interfere with trade, and those are the WTO's remit.
    Technically it doesn't matter which side puts up the barrier; the barrier exists and allows flow easier in one direction than in the other. That has led to our massive trade imbalance. There are two ways to solve the problem: get rid of environmental regulation or financially balance out the effects of a lack of environmental regulation. The WTO wouldn't have grounds to take issue with removing our environmental regulations so why should it see anything different in financially balancing the effects of lacking of them?
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  4. #34
    When did you become an orthodox economist, believing that imbalances can arise solely due to trade barriers?

    And FYI, the biggest reason for our trade deficit is the price of oil. Are we going to stop purchasing oil on environmental grounds?
    Hope is the denial of reality

  5. #35
    Senior Member Flixy's Avatar
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    It wouldn't be a bad idea to decrease oil consumption for numerous reasons!

    Regarding environmental regulations: I think one of the issues with capitalism and a free market is that not all costs, like environmental damage, are included. For the system to 'work' there should be a price on damaging the environment, e.g. environmental regulations. If another country does not have these regulations, they do not include the 'cost' of damaging the environment in their price, which does give them an unfair advantage. Ideally, consumers would know this and buy less of their products, and prefer buying more environmentally friendly products, and even more ideally all countries would have similar environmental regulations. Either way I don't think it's the WTO's place to do anything about it.
    Keep on keepin' the beat alive!

  6. #36
    Quote Originally Posted by Loki View Post
    And FYI, the biggest reason for our trade deficit is the price of oil.
    What leads you to this conclusion?
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  7. #37
    We spent $340 billion on oil imports in 2010 (a number that will surely rise in 2011). The US trade deficit with China is $270 billion. Even if China was to allow its currency to appreciate, our trade balance with China would change by perhaps 10% (i.e. less than $30 billion), and most of those "savings" would end up shifting to another similar country (e.g. Vietnam, Bangladesh).

    Regarding the type of new jobs that will be created: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/10-Ind...99741.html?x=0
    Last edited by Loki; 03-08-2011 at 05:36 PM.
    Hope is the denial of reality

  8. #38
    Quote Originally Posted by Loki View Post
    When did you become an orthodox economist, believing that imbalances can arise solely due to trade barriers?

    And FYI, the biggest reason for our trade deficit is the price of oil. Are we going to stop purchasing oil on environmental grounds?
    There's no easy substitute to importing oil. But there is to other junk.

    Regarding that yahoo article, every single item on that list except maybe "teachers" and "doctors" could be considered a low-skill job.

    GGT: economics, nearly 4 years ago.

  9. #39
    Quote Originally Posted by Being View Post
    Technically it doesn't matter which side puts up the barrier;
    It certainly does matter, at least for the WTO's free trade regime.

    There are two ways to solve the problem: get rid of environmental regulation or financially balance out the effects of a lack of environmental regulation. The WTO wouldn't have grounds to take issue with removing our environmental regulations so why should it see anything different in financially balancing the effects of lacking of them?
    The WTO doesn't have grounds to take issue with our environmental regulations because the entities being hurt by the trade barrier are the ones which enacted them and they're not complaining to the WTO about it. If somehow they did complain about it, the WTO's remedy would be simple, take down those barriers. The World Trade Organization has no interest in whether trade financially balances out. It is interested in whether trade is unfettered, or at least that no country is enacting barriers which are inimical to another country's trade. It's certainly not going to demand that one country, like China, be penalized because one of their trade partners *like us* has decided to shoot itself in the foot.
    Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"

  10. #40
    That's an awfully long-winded way of saying that if the USA wants to compete it needs to get rid of environmental regulation. The proper response is to enforce environmental regulation on producing countries who benefit from not having any. And I'd just like to point out that this argument extends way beyond environmental regulations, I'm merely trying to keep it to one item that is representative of the rest (ie. China has no problem allowing unfettered worker exposure to toxic substances). And you can argue all you want that WTO fights trade barriers but in fact they enforce them.
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  11. #41
    Quote Originally Posted by Loki View Post
    We spent $340 billion on oil imports in 2010 (a number that will surely rise in 2011). The US trade deficit with China is $270 billion. Even if China was to allow its currency to appreciate, our trade balance with China would change by perhaps 10% (i.e. less than $30 billion), and most of those "savings" would end up shifting to another similar country (e.g. Vietnam, Bangladesh).
    Really? Your argument is that we should consider something that can't be produced in the USA as a major factor of our trade imbalance?
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  12. #42
    Paul Krugman's articles become increasingly pathetic by the day. He is becoming the caricature of a whiny, shallow Upper West Side weenus. I mean, just read this shit.

    As the article points out, software has also been replacing engineers in such tasks as chip design.
    Who the fuck does he think designs the software?

    And somehow he concludes that the inevitable march of progress means we should all join labor unions and get free healthcare. How pedantic can he get?

  13. #43
    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadnaught View Post
    Paul Krugman's articles become increasingly pathetic by the day. He is becoming the caricature of a whiny, shallow Upper West Side weenus. I mean, just read this shit.



    Who the fuck does he think designs the software?

    And somehow he concludes that the inevitable march of progress means we should all join labor unions and get free healthcare. How pedantic can he get?
    Any review worth merit would contrast the good points against the bad. But it's nice to know where you stand.
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  14. #44
    His basic thesis -- if you can even call it that -- reads like a 1700s rants on how mechanical looms will end the textile industry. It's bonkers, do you really believe that technological progress puts people out of jobs in the long term?
    Last edited by Dreadnaught; 03-09-2011 at 12:54 AM.

  15. #45
    Quote Originally Posted by Being View Post
    That's an awfully long-winded way of saying that if the USA wants to compete it needs to get rid of environmental regulation.
    If it wants for there to be no trade barriers impinging on its trade, then it needs to remove the trade barriers it set up. Right now, it's eating the cost of those barriers. I'm ok with that, you're the one who apparently has a problem with it.

    The proper response is to enforce environmental regulation on producing countries who benefit from not having any.
    To enforce environmental regulations, there has to be a regulatory agency with the capability to develop them in the first place. I'm not aware of any environmental regulatory agency operating on the global level. It's a matter for the diplomats. There is a regulatory agency working on trade, but environmental regulations are not its bailwick and insofar as direct trade is affected by environmental regulations, they place that agency on the wrong side for what you want as a matter of principle, and completely unconcerned with them as a matter of real-world relevance.

    And I'd just like to point out that this argument extends way beyond environmental regulations, I'm merely trying to keep it to one item that is representative of the rest (ie. China has no problem allowing unfettered worker exposure to toxic substances). And you can argue all you want that WTO fights trade barriers but in fact they enforce them.
    Because the WTO has to work with sovereign states, which are ostensibly free to pull out of its free trade regime or ignore it, it has developed an enforcement mechanism primarily composed of supporting/endorsing countering trade barriers on behalf of injured parties to redress the consequences of the actions by the injuring party. I have no clue what general argument you are making, so I don't know if you merely picked a piss-poor example or whether your argument itself is based on flawed grounds. I do know that in your example the injured party and the injuring party are the same entity. The redress for self-inflicted injuries is to stop inflicting them. What you are seeking is an entirely new regulatory regime. I wish you the best of luck with it, but it as nothing to do with the World Trade Organization.
    Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"

  16. #46
    Quote Originally Posted by GGT View Post

    We're lucky enough to still have great music and art departments (orchestra, string symphony, jazz band, marching band, choir, ensembles, drama) but the inner city schools don't. When budgets get tight those are the first things to go. Students who thrive in English, Literature or History don't have the same number of advanced classes (or AP offerings) as Maths.
    Good?

    Math and science are way more important then History, Literature and English.

  17. #47
    Quote Originally Posted by Lewkowski View Post
    Good?

    Math and science are way more important then History, Literature and English.
    How far did you get in math?
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  18. #48
    Pretty sure more firms care about an employee's ability to read, write, and speak than they do about their ability to multiply and divide.
    Hope is the denial of reality

  19. #49
    Quote Originally Posted by Loki View Post
    Pretty sure more firms care about an employee's ability to read, write, and speak than then they do about their ability to multiply and divide.
    Translated for Lewk.
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  20. #50
    Quote Originally Posted by Loki View Post
    Pretty sure more firms care about an employee's ability to read, write, and speak than they do about their ability to multiply and divide.
    That is done in Elementary and Middle School. AP classes are in High School. If you can't read, write and speak by high school something has gone terribly wrong.

    We know most Americans have an utter lack of financial education and a big portion of that comes into play due to a lack of mathematical ability. Compound interest and what that means in regards to credit card debt or retirement planning? Pssh.

    To give a common example: If I go to McDonald's the cashier can understand what I tell them they can read an order display. How much do you want to best most of them are going to have difficulty providing correct change without register?

    Math is so important to personal finance as well as every day tasks. So is reading and writing. However advance levels of English do what exactly? Teach you how to write essays no will care about after college? I mean really you can and will use math all of your life or face a lot of difficulties. A failure to learn match means you doom an entire generation to playing the lottery, taking pay day advance loans, not fully funding their retirement and being raked over the coals by credit card interest.

  21. #51
    Quote Originally Posted by Being View Post
    That's an awfully long-winded way of saying that if the USA wants to compete it needs to get rid of environmental regulation. The proper response is to enforce environmental regulation on producing countries who benefit from not having any. And I'd just like to point out that this argument extends way beyond environmental regulations, I'm merely trying to keep it to one item that is representative of the rest (ie. China has no problem allowing unfettered worker exposure to toxic substances). And you can argue all you want that WTO fights trade barriers but in fact they enforce them.
    Trade between countries makes it possible for consumers in a country with strong labor, workplace safety, and environmental laws to buy from a country that has weak laws in those items at a lower price... if the WTO encourages that to happen (and it does), then if you consider that a barrier to trade is e.g. strong environmental laws (which raise prices), then the WTO does reduce barriers to trade.

    I think what Being might be saying is this--

    Indirectly though, there is the side-effect that countries with e.g. strong environmental laws cannot export as many of their products on the world market anymore because the price is too high. (assuming that both countries have the same technology but one has lax environmental laws)

    Also:
    * Many industries have economies of scale, so a reduced amount of competitors in the industry in the same area (eg: country) further reduces competitiveness.
    * Associated industries that gain a competitive advantage from having their supplier/buyer be close to them also suffer.

    If the lax-environmental-regulations country gains free trade with both the stingent-environmental-regulations country and the rest of the world, you could argue that free trade is itself a barrier to trade, at least for the stingent-environmental-regulations country.

  22. #52
    Quote Originally Posted by Lewkowski View Post
    That is done in Elementary and Middle School. AP classes are in High School. If you can't read, write and speak by high school something has gone terribly wrong.

    We know most Americans have an utter lack of financial education and a big portion of that comes into play due to a lack of mathematical ability. Compound interest and what that means in regards to credit card debt or retirement planning? Pssh.

    To give a common example: If I go to McDonald's the cashier can understand what I tell them they can read an order display. How much do you want to best most of them are going to have difficulty providing correct change without register?

    Math is so important to personal finance as well as every day tasks. So is reading and writing. However advance levels of English do what exactly? Teach you how to write essays no will care about after college? I mean really you can and will use math all of your life or face a lot of difficulties. A failure to learn match means you doom an entire generation to playing the lottery, taking pay day advance loans, not fully funding their retirement and being raked over the coals by credit card interest.

    You need a resume to get a chance at exhibiting your mathmatical skills. To write that resume and focus it on the specific requirements the employer is looking for requires skills that don't include mathmatics. If you use words that don't mean what you think they do, it doesn't matter how good you are at math because you won't get an intervue.
    Last edited by Being; 03-09-2011 at 06:57 AM.
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  23. #53
    Quote Originally Posted by agamemnus View Post
    Trade between countries makes it possible for consumers in a country with strong labor, workplace safety, and environmental laws to buy from a country that has weak laws in those items at a lower price... if the WTO encourages that to happen (and it does), then if you consider that a barrier to trade is e.g. strong environmental laws (which raise prices), then the WTO does reduce barriers to trade.

    I think what Being might be saying is this--

    Indirectly though, there is the side-effect that countries with e.g. strong environmental laws cannot export as many of their products on the world market anymore because the price is too high. (assuming that both countries have the same technology but one has lax environmental laws)

    Also:
    * Many industries have economies of scale, so a reduced amount of competitors in the industry in the same area (eg: country) further reduces competitiveness.
    * Associated industries that gain a competitive advantage from having their supplier/buyer be close to them also suffer.

    If the lax-environmental-regulations country gains free trade with both the stingent-environmental-regulations country and the rest of the world, you could argue that free trade is itself a barrier to trade, at least for the stingent-environmental-regulations country.
    It completely depends on which side of the trade you are on. WTO enforces trade restrictions on those who, by mass (such as USA agriculture), can swamp the output of countries who can barely make ends meet. Can anyone reconcile that with Loki's claim that trade barriers undermine the WTO?
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  24. #54
    Quote Originally Posted by Lewkowski View Post
    Good?

    Math and science are way more important then History, Literature and English.
    Is that why your spelling is atrocious?

    Quote Originally Posted by Lewkowski View Post
    That is done in Elementary and Middle School. AP classes are in High School. If you can't read, write and speak by high school something has gone terribly wrong.

    We know most Americans have an utter lack of financial education and a big portion of that comes into play due to a lack of mathematical ability. Compound interest and what that means in regards to credit card debt or retirement planning? Pssh.

    To give a common example: If I go to McDonald's the cashier can understand what I tell them they can read an order display. How much do you want to best most of them are going to have difficulty providing correct change without register?

    Math is so important to personal finance as well as every day tasks. So is reading and writing. However advance levels of English do what exactly? Teach you how to write essays no will care about after college? I mean really you can and will use math all of your life or face a lot of difficulties. A failure to learn match means you doom an entire generation to playing the lottery, taking pay day advance loans, not fully funding their retirement and being raked over the coals by credit card interest.
    Making change is taught in elementary school as part of basic math. They start pre-algebra and algebra by 4th grade. Statistics, trigonometry, and calculus are electives in HS. Finance is taught by the history department as part of economics. History is also where kids learn about government, politics, and law. They don't teach about the US Constitution in math classes.

    There's much more to advanced English than writing essays. It's the foundation for all communicating, whether writing grant proposals, corporate SOP, or journalism articles. Public speaking or debate uses both language and history --- plus the ability to organize, analyze, and communicate concepts. (Some schools call it Language Arts and would include foreign languages, too.)

    I'd say it's more important for all students to have a grasp of the world's comparative histories, with an ability to communicate, than it is to know advanced or specialized math. But then, you have a simple black-or-white view of most things, and don't even know the difference between than and then.

  25. #55
    Quote Originally Posted by agamemnus View Post
    If the lax-environmental-regulations country gains free trade with both the stingent-environmental-regulations country and the rest of the world, you could argue that free trade is itself a barrier to trade, at least for the stingent-environmental-regulations country.
    Things aren't that relative. Sure, you can make that argument but it's fairly torturous and with similar effort you can make almost any act or series of actions which interfere with trade turn free trade itself into a barrier from the perspective of the agents taking those actions.

    Quote Originally Posted by Being View Post
    It completely depends on which side of the trade you are on. WTO enforces trade restrictions on those who, by mass (such as USA agriculture), can swamp the output of countries who can barely make ends meet. Can anyone reconcile that with Loki's claim that trade barriers undermine the WTO?
    The US and Russia still have nuclear arsenals. Can anyone reconcile that with the disarmament treaties they've signed? Same issue. The WTO is, in part, a negotiated process. It works toward free trade, but does not presume to have achieved it yet.
    Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"

  26. #56
    Quote Originally Posted by GGT View Post
    Is that why your spelling is atrocious?



    Making change is taught in elementary school as part of basic math. They start pre-algebra and algebra by 4th grade. Statistics, trigonometry, and calculus are electives in HS. Finance is taught by the history department as part of economics. History is also where kids learn about government, politics, and law. They don't teach about the US Constitution in math classes.

    There's much more to advanced English than writing essays. It's the foundation for all communicating, whether writing grant proposals, corporate SOP, or journalism articles. Public speaking or debate uses both language and history --- plus the ability to organize, analyze, and communicate concepts. (Some schools call it Language Arts and would include foreign languages, too.)

    I'd say it's more important for all students to have a grasp of the world's comparative histories, with an ability to communicate, than it is to know advanced or specialized math. But then, you have a simple black-or-white view of most things, and don't even know the difference between than and then.
    The conservatives in the US want to create a barely literate under-class of helots fueling the furnaces of Corporate America. They need to have basic literacy and arithmetic skills, but educating them beyond that is against the goals of the wealthy over-class. So skills with literary interpretation and historical insight are bad things that need to get thrown out the window. It's the only way they can keep buying elections; so long as people are dumb and don't have critical thinking skills, they'll vote based on the sexiest or most vocal sound bytes they're exposed to before the elections.
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  27. #57
    Quote Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy View Post
    Things aren't that relative. Sure, you can make that argument but it's fairly torturous and with similar effort you can make almost any act or series of actions which interfere with trade turn free trade itself into a barrier from the perspective of the agents taking those actions.
    You gotta look at significant sides of the coin... not one side, not all sides, but significant sides.


    Quote Originally Posted by Nessus View Post
    The conservatives in the US want to create a barely literate under-class of helots fueling the furnaces of Corporate America. They need to have basic literacy and arithmetic skills, but educating them beyond that is against the goals of the wealthy over-class. So skills with literary interpretation and historical insight are bad things that need to get thrown out the window. It's the only way they can keep buying elections; so long as people are dumb and don't have critical thinking skills, they'll vote based on the sexiest or most vocal sound bytes they're exposed to before the elections.
    Round and round we go... Can you not say that about liberals in heavy [D] states? Replace "sexy and vocal" with "bread/circus and vocal".

  28. #58
    Quote Originally Posted by agamemnus View Post
    Round and round we go... Can you not say that about liberals in heavy [D] states? Replace "sexy and vocal" with "bread/circus and vocal".
    I am not familiar with liberal legislation creating a helot underclass, can you point me to some examples?
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  29. #59
    Stingy DM Veldan Rath's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Nessus View Post
    The liberals in the US want to create a barely literate under-class of helots fueling the furnaces of Big Government. They need to have basic literacy and arithmetic skills, but educating them beyond that is against the goals of the wealthy over-class. So skills with literary interpretation and historical insight are bad things that need to get thrown out the window. It's the only way they can keep buying elections; so long as people are dumb and don't have critical thinking skills, they'll vote based on the sexiest or most vocal sound bytes they're exposed to before the elections.
    fixed.

    wow this is fun
    Brevior saltare cum deformibus viris est vita

  30. #60
    Quote Originally Posted by Nessus View Post
    I am not familiar with liberal legislation creating a helot underclass, can you point me to some examples?
    I'm going to hate saying this but. . . "affirmative action"
    Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"

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