A visit with Ron Kirk
After U.S. trade representative Ron Kirk spoke to the House yesterday, I had the opportunity to catch up with him for a short interview.
Ambassador Kirk, who is naturally gregarious and optimistic, painted a gloomy picture of what it is like to carry an unpopular message to skeptical folks in shrinking industrial America. “A lot of people are suspicious of me,” he said. “They say, “You guys only care about the new age economy.” In addition to going abroad, he spends a lot of time in the Rust Belt preaching the administration’s message. “We’re lucky if five people show up,” he said. “We [the administration] had a tin ear,” he said. “Most of the people I talk to think Ross Perot was right [about NAFTA].” Still, as he pointed out, Canada and Mexico are America’s two largest trading partners.
“The public believes that we play fair, but that other nations don’t. Seventy percent of the people I talk to think trade is bad for America,” he said. “They don’t think we have a policy that is designed to open up markets. They want us to enforce our trade agreements and to focus on job creation.”
There are a lot of misconceptions about trade, he pointed out. The benefits of trade are that it lowers the cost of imports, but people in areas where the pain is localized, where jobs have been lost, don’t see it that way. A few dollars saved on clothing hardly balances the jobs and the paychecks that have disappeared. Trade is not really the culprit, he insists. “For every job that is lost to trade,” Kirk said, five are lost to increased productivity and innovation.”
Kirk was upbeat about recent trade agreements that have been reached with Panama, Colombia, and South Korea. At the end of our interview, I threw in a question about birth rates, worldwide, and how it was affecting trade. Much to my surprise, that really lit him up. “Agriculture!” he said. “That’s the future of trade. Birth rates in Latin America are high. Brazil especially can be a great market. No other nation can come close to us when it comes to feeding the world.”
Tim says:
As a software developer this is something I grapple with every day. We’ve built the robots. They may not look like the pictures from the 1950s, but they’re taking jobs just the same.
Even in the 1950s there was talk about what to do with people once the majority of jobs became automated. I think we’re still going to eventually have to have that talk.
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Spiro Eagleton Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 1:32 pm
Yep, tell that to the buggy-whip makers. When cars came along it got rid of all the obsolete buggy whip jobs, but it didn’t mean there was a net loss of jobs.
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longleaf says:
Hamiltonian mercantilism built the U.S. into an industrial power over the first 150 or so years of our history. The post-WW II, British Empire-style free trade (unilateral, in many cases) was just as suicidal to our economy as it had been to the Brits before that.
What’s ironic is that the Republicans used to be the mercantilist, protectionist party and this was one of the factors leading to the Civil War. The planters in the South (Democrats) wanted free trade.
This country’s not coming back. It’s over. We are now managing the decline and fall of the empire.
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Pat Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 5:23 pm
Longleaf, I see you’ve been reading Kevin Phillips books. He’s got a point, and you can’t say he didn’t do his homework.
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Pri-ista says:
The truth there is no “free-trade”. All governments in way or another distort the market to their advantage. Chinese state-owned bank offer low-interest loans to its companies, and that with it’s devalued currency makes things look cheaper.
We moan about the GM bailout, but nearly all other auto manufacturers, directly or indirectly, receive assistance from their home governments.
Meanwhile the US sacrifices itself at the alter of ideology.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
From the Boston Globe. “in 1990 the US accounted for 21% of the world’s manufacturing output in 2009 it was 20%.
America’s manufacturing output in 2009 (expressed in constant 2005 dollars) was $2.15 trillion. That surpassed China’s output of $1.48 trillion by nearly 46 percent”
Do your own research and don’t buy into the gloom and doomers.
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I call BS Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 7:05 pm
so, output has increased (and I assume profit?) but they can’t afford to pay a livable wage?
Revolutionary Arabic for Beginners: Eish Hurriya Karama Ensaneyya = Bread Freedom Human Dignity
Bread, Freedom, Human Dignity
It’s fun to learn new languages!
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Spiro Eagleton says:
Good for Kirk speaking up for free trade. We don’t have enough of that these days. All of the isolationist nabobs in each party would have us enact another Smoot-Hawley tariff and shut down all trade.
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Tim says:
Re: JohnBernardBooks
That’s really the crux of the problem. If the amount of our exports hasn’t really dropped, then ultimately what we’re seeing is an increase in efficiency and automation. Which means that even if we capture double the amount of the market, we won’t necessarily bring back a single job.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 4:17 pm
I hope we got more efficient.
What we have to address is countries who subsidize fuel etc creating an unfair trade advantage. We’ve been strangely silent on this matter, I suppose it may have something to do with who holds our debt.
Another matter which affects trade is taxes. Europe pays much more in taxes for gasoline, something democrats envy. Our corporate tax rate is 35% many we trade against have lower rates.
Doesn’t that place us at a disadvantage? How does that help to handcuff our producers?
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longleaf says:
What has also changed is that “economic nationalism” is a dirty phrase. There are a couple of hundred “global corporations” who call the shots in the world and tell the governments of the world what to do (or at least try to). The well being of the U.S. taxpayer, almost needless to say, is NOT one of their top priorities.
They are using the U.S. military for their benefit and charging the tab to the rest of us who, by and large, do NOT benefit from the interventions. Instead, we are now being subjected to a soft totalitarian police state because “we” are so hated by much of the world for the constant interventions done in our name.
In a similarly parasitic way, the Wall Street banks used us to offload all their bad debts a few years ago and that process is continuing. The actual U.S. citizens walking around might as well all have “Kick Me” signs on our backs.
You mentioned Ross Perot, which reminds me that I read in the Dallas News five to 10 years ago that he would NO LONGER comment on politics. The scuttlebutt is that he struck some sort of deal with his nemesis (aka the Bush family) to just shut up about politics in exchange for certain favors. I have no idea if that’s true, but it is a fact that you don’t hear Ross talk about the “giant sucking sound” or anything else like that anymore.
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Spiro Eagleton Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 2:51 pm
Longleaf,
Do you listen to Alex Jones’ radio show a lot? I highly doubt anyone did anything to make Perot be quiet unless you think the Republicans planned to disrupt his daughter’s wedding again.
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longleaf Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 5:10 pm
As a matter of fact, I do listen to Alex Jones. I didn’t get that from him, though. It just seemed very strange that, with the enmity and antipathy that obviously existed between him and G.H.W. Bush (remember, he accused G.H.W. Bush of DELIBERATELY allowing Vietnam POWs to remain in Vietnam, or wherever else they had been taken, after the war had ended), in 2000 he unenthusiastically endorsed G.W. right before the election in an interview with Larry King and then basically refused to discuss politics anymore whenever interviewed after that.
Alex Jones is WAY out there sometimes on some issues, in terms of the conclusions to which he jumps, but you CAN learn a lot of facts listening to him. You may not like the way he interprets the facts, but he looks UTTERLY SANE compared to Glenn “The Islamic Caliphate Is Forming Before Our Eyes in a Perfect Storm” Beck.
Plus, I like the fact that Rick Perry despises Alex. And I like the fact that Ron Paul likes Alex. As for Charlie Sheen, his most famous big buddy these days, I really don’t care since I don’t watch TV.
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Emeyekaye says:
Did the Ambassador happen to mention labor in his conversation? The demise of the industrial base in America coincided with the demise of the unions.
It’s no accident that the social democracies, Sweden, France, and Germany, which kept on paying high wages, now have more industry than the U.S. or the UK. …
http://www.slate.com/id/2266025/entry/2266031
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crazy uncle says:
It is the same old story that the left does not want to hear. Low taxes, ability to contract, minimum regulation, and flexibility to react to change, access to capital are necessary to prosper. The rust belt has none of these necessities. The present administration is attempting to deprive the entire country from these essential economic liberties. The best example is the left believed that you could not kill the golden goose (California) but they did.
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I call BS Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 4:26 pm
crazy uncle conveniently overlooks the fact that other industrialized nations faced similar pressures but often embraced different policies, resulting in far less income inequality.
You can’t power the US economy on third world wages brah. Until the labor issue is addressed honestly and intelligently (cough, cough… crazy uncle… cough cough), this will not change and all the increased profits will still translate into a declining civilization.
It is in our collective interests to have a vibrant labor movement.
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paulburka Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 5:41 pm
The labor movement was successful because the decline of agriculture coincided with the coming of the industrial revolution. Millions of Americans could, and did, go straight from the fields to the factories. The transition required no new skills. Now the industrial age is over, and the main source of jobs is services, particularly financial services. To work in the specialized service industries requires a high-level education. American public schools are overwhelmed by the task of educating the melting pot, and Texas is about to cannabalize its own future through a crisis that is the result of irresponsible budgeting. Our nation and our politics are ensnarled in partisanship and sideshow issues like immigration and abortion and, and are not engaged in looking to the future.
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bnrtn Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 10:30 pm
Not a bad analysis, but how do we “educate the melting pot” when 1. a significant number of citizens & non-citizens seem to have no interest in “melting”; and 2. a large number of public school attendees seem to have no interest in acquiring any education, probably because their parents (functional or otherwise) have no real interest in them being educated? Dealing with these issues require hard choices which in turn requires a broad community consensus which doesn’t currently exist. Just budgeting more money for the existing public education system (as hard as that would be to accomplish) won’t cut it.
JUICE says:
“Do you listen to Alex Jones’ radio show a lot?”
I don’t know about that poster, but I’ll bet a few of the new House members do.
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Censustaker says:
Burka, I’m amazed that another publication broke this story about PKH.
As for your Ten Best/Ten Worst now being written by yourself and Nate, you will never be able to live down the accusation of liberal bias.
With Nate’s Texas Observer credentials, receiving “Ten Best” will put a conservative bullseye on your chest in the Republican primary. If you truly like a Republican, leave them off Ten Best or better yet – make them Ten Worst.
PEOPLE MOVING AROUND IN THE WORLD OF JOURNALISM
Changes at Texas Monthly, Houston Chronicle and even in our own backyard
Long time Texas Monthly Senate watcher Patti Kilday Hart will be hanging up her Ten Best/Ten Worst hat to move over to the Houston Chronicle. Replacing her will be TM investigative reporter Nate Blakeslee. Blakeslee gained national repute for his work on the Texas Youth Commission scandal. Prior to Texas Monthly, he was editor at the Texas Observer.
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paulburka Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 5:27 pm
Censustaker:
After seventeen sessions, I am accustomed to accusations of bias, liberal and conservative. Nate Blakeslee’s reputation as a reporter and as a writer speaks for itself. The Best & Worst story would not have endured through the years if it were seen as biased by our readers and by the Capitol community. Last session seven Republicans and three Democrats made the Ten Best list.
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T-Party Death Squads are a bummer says:
Censustaker ought to choose his words more carefully… judging from Gabby Giffords, the Palin Goonies are more the headshot type. They don’t cotton to the whole “sniper’s triangle” theory.
They like it up close and personal.
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Briscoe Democrat says:
Burka, I heard that Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert (R) resigned yesterday to likely focus on a Senate campaign.
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Pat Reply:
February 25th, 2011 at 5:25 pm
True and true. It was confirmed in the Morning Snooze today.
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Censustaker says:
You fail to miss the point – with Nate and his Texas Observer background it will be viewed as hopelessly biased towards liberals.
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John Johnson says:
I am in the wholesale food business. I deal both nationally and internationally. What I know to be true is that our trade tariff deals with foreign countries is a farce.
Want to send a frozen, upscale sandwich to Common Market member countries. Forget it. They won’t accept the meat. Want to send a sugar and cinnamon coated “crisp” to the UK. Forget about it. There’s a deal killing duty.
They can send the same products into us without duty.
I heard Donald Trump say the same thing about how the U.S. works out trade daals with the Chinese.
Couple this with the subsides the U.S. affords mega food corps to promote their products overseas and, once again, small business guy takes it in the shorts.
Are we better off paying more for domestic products to create jobs and keep small businesses functioning, or are we better off making it easier for the Big’s to move operations overseas and continue to allow anyone and everyone with favored nation status to load us up with their government subsidized, cheaper goods?
Small business guy can write letters, make phone calls, send emails and all he gets in return is the typical form letter and instructions to contact someone else.
The individual worker and the small business person will soon be working for one of the Big’s here in the U.S. The company might be U.S. owned, but could just as easily be based in China.
I bet Ron Kirk has no idea how out of wack our trade tariffs are when it comes to common everyday items that small U.S. businesses produce.
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Briscoe Democrat says:
John, Kirk could have gotten a relevant cabinet gig like Housing and Urban Development or Education Secy, but he’s the Trade Rep, a worthless position to me.
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