MasterOLightning said:
Economic globalization is a good thing, but it leads to cultural globalization, which is less desirable, as we seem to agree on. I guess all that can be done is to hope for a balance.
Economic globalization is not a good thing unless one is a American stockholder/CEO or one is living in India or China.
I actually receive my masters degree in economics on Fri--with a specialization in International Development; so for once, I an safely say I know what I am talking about. And I claim no ideology or stance, so I am coming at this from a unbiased opinion.
For a westerner, free Trade is a horrible idea, yes you heard me, free trade is a horrible idea. No major western country has developed because of free trade. In the last 20 years, we have gouged high paying jobs, high benefit jobs overseas. The benefit has been to the corporations and the stockholders, no one else. THey have become much more competitive, decreasing costs and shedding payroll. Our companies have pretty much done what we wanted them to do at the Bretton Woods conference following WWII--take over the world. If demand economics have any relevance, eventually enough people will be out of high paying jobs, that they will not be able to afford many things, thus stagnating the economy. Right now, we are seeing the beginnings of this problem in the US, but our economy is so robust, it is going to take some time.
For a average third world resident, Free trade has been a horrible idea. For the last 20 years, the US and Europe through the IMF and World Bank, has been forcing free trade upon the rest of the world. THey have stripped countries of their government appartatus, and replaced them with highly corrupt privatization programs. THis has been a total failure; Bolivia today pretty much went up in total riot over these programs. These programs allow Western businesses to take over, with the elites from each country. Africa, South America, Asia except for Vietnam and China, have all been touched by these programs, and been worse off for it. Basic services are cut, health etc.
Anyway, the moral of the story is Globalization is bad--very bad for westerners. And the current Privatization and Free trade schemes used in the last 20 years have totally stagnated and repressed once growing countries.
Remember, Economics is not a science. No one knows beyond very basic models what the hell is going on, especially at the macro level. Greenspan said he was confused why long term interest rates are decreasing when short term interest rates have been increased every FED meeting in the last year. This trend is counter to all principles of Economics. One can only imagine how wrong these classical liberal free trade moron have been.
