I know economists still have soft spots in their hearts for Smith and Ricardo, but how, in 2010, could anyone honestly cite comparative advantage in support of free trade when the markets for land, labor, and capital have gone global? No nation has an inherent advantage over any other in producing a particular good or service. The idea that we should specialize in producing what we're best at producing and trade for everything else makes less sense in a world where raw materials can be mined in Africa, refined in India, and assembled into a finished product by workers in China to be sold abroad at a 98% markup by a multinational corporation. All too often the primary "comparative advantage" other nations have over us is their lax labor and environmental regulation. And even if we were to follow the tenets of free trade and specialize in what we're best at, what, again, would that be? Economists told us that high-tech jobs would replace the outgoing manufacturing ones. What will replace the high-tech jobs?

I also thought it was amusing to see Tyler suggest that we could learn something from those countries in East Asia eating our lunch. Apparently he is unaware that those countries all have neomercantilist systems that favor exports over imports, encourage personal saving, and discourage consumption.

As for the original article, the claim that no nation ever got rich by engaging in protectionism is ridiculous. The US pursued a protectionist trade policy from its inception (The American System) up until Smoot-Hawley and even then continued to and still continues to in certain sectors (see the US Sugar Program as a prime example). Great Britain became the most powerful empire on Earth while engaging in protectionism, starting with the infamous Navigation Acts. This is not to say that America and Britain became prosperous because of protectionism, only that it is not as absolutely fatal to an economy as some suggest. Thriving European countries today engage in protectionism against us by putting a VAT on American exports.

Lastly, though this post may have seemed like a defense of protectionism, it isn't. The problem with protectionism is that its antonym is not "free trade" but "free markets." Doctors, lawyers, dentists, and many other white collar professionals enjoy immense economic protection in our system. Rather than adding even more, on behalf of engineers, why not reduce the protection of other professions? If people stopped seeing society throw engineers to the wolves of the market while guaranteeing doctors, lawyers and others comfortable, upper-middle class lifestyles, more people might go into engineering.