Comment by xaa | Hacker News Reader

Comment by xaa | Hacker News Reader

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> market trends and phenomenons can be controlled somehow, that they are simply choices that people make, and those choices can be controlled

This double standard galls me. If a trend is detrimental to American workers, it's market trends, like the hand of God, irresistible. If it's beneficial, it's a historical fluke (post-WWII boom).

I might buy this if the U.S. government had been a neutral bystander in this process of globalization and the hollowing out of the middle class. In that case, we could say that it was just economics. But, in reality, the government:

- Incentivizes and fails to do anything about offshore tax havens

- Doesn't bust trusts

- Has low tax rates on capital

- Sets immigration and trade laws favorable to corporations

- Spends tons of money on pork, including the porkiest pork of them all, the military

and so on, ad infinitum. Would this process have happened anyway? Maybe. But our government, and the companies running it, actively accelerated it in every way they could. If these trends can't be controlled to some extent, why have so many lobbying dollars been spent to accelerate them?

So basically you think the US government has been highly influential in developing 'globalism' and it's not entirely a natural phenomenon as a result of air travel, telecommunications, mature financial markets, lack of global war/conflict, the opening of the east to global markets, etc?

Most of the things you mention, poor enforcement of tax havens, immigration policy, low taxes on capital, massive military spending, coincided with the development of globalism or were a reaction to it.

But regardless I disagree with your thesis, as I hardly see globalism as something that's detrimental to America as a whole. That may be the mainstream narrative but it's largely inaccurate. The thing about capitalism is that it goes throw booms/busts and it evolves. This is just another phase and we've all been pretending we're in control but the reality of the situation has become apparent recently.

So the dichotomy between historical fluke and market trends doesn't really exist. Historical flukes are market trends.

> So the dichotomy between historical fluke and market trends doesn't really exist. Historical flukes are market trends.

On further thought, you're right about this. I was rather inarticulately trying to remark on the fact that the supposed "inevitability" of market trends is always used as an excuse to avoid pro-labor legislation, but never pro-business legislation.

> I hardly see globalism as something that's detrimental to America as a whole

Well, we're increasingly seeing that there's no such thing as America "as a whole". There's capital, who it's good for, and labor, who it may be good and bad for in various ways, but a net bad, I'd say. Good for your 401K and the cost of your iPhone, not so much for your salary or employment prospects.

If you take "good for GDP" to mean "good for America as a whole", then yeah, it's probably good. Problem is where that GDP growth is going.

> you think the US government has been highly influential in developing 'globalism'

Yes and no. I think the gov't has been highly influential in ensuring the gains from it go to capital and that its negative effects on labor are not reined in. Globalization would have happened anyway but the govt's approach to it has resulted in more inequality and dislocation than was necessary.

As for whether the government could have slowed or did hasten the process, hard to say, but I think so.

> Yes and no. I think the gov't has been highly influential in ensuring the gains from it go to capital and that its negative effects on labor are not reined in. Globalization would have happened anyway but the govt's approach to it has resulted in more inequality and dislocation than was necessary.

This is most certainly true. And I think dmix hit on a very important point when he mentioned that its hard for politicians to sell a future thats not all rosy and prosperous for everyone.

Off the bat, one of the things the US Govt. could most certainly have done is provide Universal Healthcare and some kind of funding for expanding basic education. I think about all that money earned by US corporations lying abroad...if you think about it, if we had a better taxation system, the strength of US corporations, their ability to generate such profits from around the globe could have been deployed to make all (or most) Americans have better healthcare and education.

> I think dmix hit on a very important point when he mentioned that its hard for politicians to sell a future thats not all rosy and prosperous for everyone.

I couldn't find where he made that exact point, if he did, I would reply to it by saying that what politicians sell and what they actually do are two completely different things. Both sides of the aisle have been selling rosy futures and working towards the exact opposite for decades. I'd say that Bernie & Trump were evidence that the message "your future isn't all that rosy unless we change substantially" resonated this election.

dmix and I agree globalization is here to stay. I was just a little irritated by his implication that the way we need to respond is by "developing new industries" and "adapting to the global marketplace" and all that jargon. I'd say the S&P has adapted just fine to the global marketplace. The problem is that the median American is worse off anyway. Your second paragraph is apt about some potential solutions.

Seems like the OP was saying that globalization may have been inevitable, but it's current extant structure and nature have been shaped by US governmental policy to directly benefit a limited segment of society, those who benefit from the policies they listed.

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