Tellus liber sit...

Wow, so no one has posted in quite a long while. I don't want this place to die, so let's just think of something to discuss here, shall we?

Globalization. What do you all think about it? Collin and I discussed it a little bit at the Christmas party a few days ago, but would love to hear everyone's thoughts about it.

First, the abstract, "big idea" way in which I think about globalization is that its goal is to make the rest of the world more like the United States. This is, to me, unequivocally a good thing.

Second, the vast majority of people in the world benefit directly from globalization. You can take all the shots at Wal-mart you want, but they demonstrate all the positive aspects of globalization: lower prices for people here (especially low-income people) and a way for Third World workers to make money. Companies don't go overseas and engage in slave labor; they go overseas and offer people more money to work for them than they could make otherwise. Wal-mart may not pay typical American wages to workers in Honduras, but their jobs are keeping a lot of Latin Americans on their feet.

One complaint about globalization is that it causes America to lose jobs. Considering how many more jobs, even in manufacturing, we get from foreign companies than we lose to other countries, that's simply not true. Yes, America imports more than any other nation. Which nation is the world's biggest exporter? Also America. The fact is that America's going to have to stop artificially inflating the value of our labor; we have to curb labor unions and repeal environmental and minimum wage laws that force employers to pay workers more than their productivity would dictate. Right now, companies have to pay American workers more than they return in productivity; they still do it, for now, because American workers truly are much more productive than workers from other countries. But a market-based approach to making our workers more competitive is to bring our labor closer to its true market value by fighting labor unions.

The best strategy right now, I believe, is not simply to open up trade with everyone completely. America's exports and imports, not to mention our Treasury bonds, are important for every other country on the planet, and no one right no moreso than China. We should begin a new treaty organization that invites only those nations that abide by a certain code for humanitarianism and liberalism. Only nations that uphold freedom of religion, freedom of speech, guarantee fair trials, and so on can join. Nations that join will have complete free trade with us; nations that do not will have an embargo against them. This will be a powerful incentive for humanitarian and liberal nations to liberalize trade and for illiberal, cruel nations to improve their human rights.

Anyway, let me know what you think!