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Just did a search for "cnn globalization mistake" and found this article[1] from May of last year. Seems pro-globlization but reasonably even handed, presenting points for and against. The elite of elites, Powell, says "There is a real possibility that globalization will go into reverse."

I bring this to your attention in the hope that it may help you expand your bubble. If you're serious about the segment where people publicly admit their mistakes and that they were "obviously stupid" then best of luck.

Personally, I think there are many voices critical of globalization from across the political spectrum. The problem, as I see it, is opponents of globalization have failed to articulate a clear, compelling alternative that will "deliver the goods."

[1]: https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/24/politics/globalization-trade-...

This is what I mean by "moving as fast as they can without having to admit they were wrong". That speed is not zero. It is still not a popular opinion. The occasional trial balloon is part of the process.

"If you're serious about the segment where people publicly admit their mistakes and that they were "obviously stupid" then best of luck."

Of course that's obviously satirical. CNN does not run actual news segments with that name or anything like it. I picked it that way on purpose, for that effect.

You said, "Nobody is talking about it because it is still politically incorrect in our overall culture" and then cited CNN as an example. I provided an example where CNN is talking about the issue seriously. What I'm saying is, you're wrong about it being "politically incorrect" and that "no elites will talk about it". In fact, Powell is talking about it and being reported by CNN!

Furthermore, Trump and Bernie both ran strong campaigns on the question of globalization. As president, Trump took steps against globalization. A far cry from "politically incorrect" or something the public isn't debating. Likewise, today steps are being taken by Biden to onshore more industries, again clearly not "politically incorrect."

As far as "it's still not a popular opinion" I guess I don't know what that means. Taking my points above, it seems like we're actively debating the subject as a society with proponents on both sides. As I argued before, I think the "anti-globalization" crowd has yet to make their case convincingly. If it's just "a little less globalization, please" -- well then how is "globalization dead?"

You seem to have missed or misunderstood the term trial balloon. Not everything you read that is presented as a serious article is actually a serious article.

edit: Apparently I should either stop trying to make points in the nuance or stop suggesting that news articles are managed because people think agreeing requires a tinfoil hat.

Hard to call the CHIPS[1] act a trial ballon if I'm being honest. Or for that matter Trump's tariffs[2]. Again, the position upthread is wrong.

[1]: https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases...

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_tariffs

I mean I think you’re both right in ways, but you seem to be equating “elites testing talking about it publicly” with “elites privately lobbying for funding that fixes it” which are not at all the same thing, and the difference is part of the point GP was trying to make.

Your references are also anachronistic to the narrative you’re constructing.

> As president, Trump took steps against globalization. A far cry from "politically incorrect"

This reads like you've forgotten how Trump was portrayed in the mainstream.

Not the person you responded to originally. When you bring up Trump and Biden and globalization I see a pretty big difference. On one hand Trump basically never stopped running his mouth about it. He would take action then tell everyone he is taking action to bring x jobs back home. Meanwhile Biden does not do that. To me it seems if you are supported by the right, beating the "end globalization" drum is beneficial. Yet if you are supported by the left, I do not see the same benefit. In fact I would argue the left as a whole supports globalization so it may actually hurt Biden to talk about steps he is taking to end it.

Also you are saying its proven it is not politically correct because its talked about and Biden has taken action for onshore more industries yet that does not even jive with the definition of politically incorrect. I think you are just responded to the original poster saying its not being discussed because its politically incorrect but that statement in itself does not make sense either. Something is politically incorrect when someone does not avoid language or actions that may offend another group. Something can be politically incorrect and still be discussed to death.

Where I got the definition: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/politically%20inc...

As for the last part about the anti-globalization crowd has yet to make a case convincingly, the same can be said on the flip said. For example the pro globalization crowd has not made a convincingly case for why we need to use slave/child labor overseas to make Nikes and electronics. If we produced these in the US, slave/child labor is generally illegal and this would not be a problem. Another example would be the fact the pro globalization crowd has not shown a convincing case for why would should be supporting other countries that commit massive humans rights abuses. Why should we send money overseas to a country that has reeducation camps they force citizens into?

>In fact I would argue the left as a whole supports globalization so it may actually hurt Biden to talk about steps he is taking to end it.

Ok, but he is in fact taking those steps, and going beyond what Trump did in the process.

I don't think both parties are the same, but I do think both parties are having public, ongoing debates about globalization. Their answers vary over time and candidate. It's not being controlled by shadowy elites, nor is it being shamed as "politically incorrect" speech. Using your definition -- no one thinks this discussion is "offensive."

It's hard to see the major legislation being passed or presidential campaigns being run and say otherwise -- I think the onus is on you or the OP to submit evidence wherein the elites or whatever shut down the conversation or react with indignation. I've provided my evidence in this thread already.

As for globalization versus not. Again, what is the alternative? Be concrete. To me, globalization is capitalism or free marketism. Put another way, it's a market based economy.

Once upon a time, people believed that planned economies were an alternative to globalism, but I'd say the jury is in and no one really believes that anymore. So, seriously, what is the alternative?

I imagine most people agree that child / slave labor are abhorrent and that we should add safety rails to globalization to address those issues. But that's still globalization.

It is not my definition. It is the definition according to webster. You and OP are using the term incorrectly and I pointed that out. You and OP can make up your own definition of it, but unless one of you tells us what definition you are working off, the rest of us just are left guessing.

I never once said the elites shut down discussion yet you ask me to provide evidence for a point I never made? Its pretty hard to have a real discussion when one person decides to make stuff up out of thin air. If you read my last commit I even mention the OPs claim of no discussion because its politically incorrect does not make sense with the linked definition. Would this not be me providing evidence against the point you are asking me to prove? It seems like we both agree the OPs statement is incorrect so why are you trying to force me onto the other side of the argument?

As for the solution, I do not know a good solution. I use to think globalization was the answer but not anymore. That is why I asked you to explain why you are okay with globalization causing these serious issues. Based on your last sentence it seems like you agree these are bad and we should do something about them. Yet you don't mention the fact we have had a WTO for almost 2 decades that could address them and not one single country has tried too. For example WTO on child labor: https://www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/minist_e/min99_e/englis...

In my eyes when decades have passed, its a pretty clear sign the safety rails are not wanted or going to be added by those that have the power to add them.

Setting aside semantic debates, I agree that progress is slow. In my opinion progress like this is always extremely slow and hard fought. People rarely give up power or resources out of the goodness of their hearts.

For example, on these pages I see plenty of debate about whether we should expand healthcare, tax the wealthy, enforce stricter environmental laws, and so forth. If the netizens of Slacker News can't reach consensus how can we expect the wide world to come together?

Personally, I try not to get swept up in all these currents. I'm just another worker ant in the colony. So I try to focus on what I can do myself and around me.

I mean the question we are both trying to address "what alternative to globalization is there that doesn't have x and y issues but still keeps the world running" is really trillion dollar question at this point. If one of us had the answer I would hope we would out trying to implement it and not on HN.

I would argue that the slow progress on human rights/labor issues coupled with the failure of globalized supply chains during covid really point towards us needing to rethink our current system. Maybe modifying the current system will be enough, I do not know. However in my eyes our current form of globalization is problematic and that needs to be addressed.

I'm suspicious of any theory that requires every reporter and every producer to both remember everything anyone has said and adhere to a code to avoid contradicting it. These are younger, lower paid, liberal arts majors. To the extent there's any selection bias in the content, it's based on what the audience wants to read, not any long-game strategy to ensure alignment with what was written in the past.

I believe the idea is that the content bias isn't needed because you get the employment based on the belief that you already align with the employer.

The post you're replying to appears to be trying to sidestep your "across the political spectrum" by blaming "elites" instead in a way that suggests they're party-agnostic.

I think this is still inaccurate, "Made in the USA" was an early version of this and has been non-marginal and found supporters amongst both "elites" and "regular" people for decades, in my experience.

They also slide towards another fallacy at the end - the one we saw a lot during Covid, of "changing your mind as new data arrives means you originally acted in, or are acting now in, bad faith." What's stupid is to assume that anything this complex is "obviously" a black and white must-do or must-not-do, versus something that will get adjusted over time.

It depends how often you end up on the end of this flow:

Completely organic self-thought based on logic is counter to information from official sources.

The official source says your specific example is a conspiracy flavour of the month.

6 months pass and the information now matches your own.

Everyone knew, it just wasn't a big deal. A big nothing burger!

It is so tiresome.

> Nobody is talking about it because it is still politically incorrect in our overall culture [1] to admit that globalization is collapsing.

Arguably it is politically in vogue in the US to be against absolute globalization.

For example, the EV tax credits in the IRA are exclusively for US assembled vehicles.

This caused a great deal of upset among foreign carmakers who don't have significant assembly operations in the US. The IRA went even further in requiring the key component of the EV, the battery, to have it's materials sourced in US free trade partners.

Vehicle manufacturing is among the most politically visible and sensitive of industries.

The consensus across the right, left, and center is towards rebuilding domestic industrial capacity in strategic industries.

"The consensus across the right, left, and center is towards rebuilding domestic industrial capacity in strategic industries."

The quiet consensus of those taking action, yes, absolutely. That's part of my point. The adjustments are being made all over the place.

Those who have banked a lot on talking up globalization for the past 20-30 years will get there too. It will just be a slow process of very gradually tweaking their position a little bit every year at the maximum speed they can get away with while making it look like it's just little tweaks and they were never at any point actually wrong.

There was also never 100% globalization; tariffs never went to zero, etc. But a lot of that would still fall under the class of quiet actions under the hood, while the loud rhetoric was all about free trade. I've actually interacted with plenty of people on HN over the years who didn't realize that tariffs were in fact a thing, always had been, and were engaged in by all countries in the world to at least some extent, depending on their local needs. The rhetoric was "free trade! free trade! free trade!", but the reality has always been more complex.

You seem stuck on hostile score keeping. This is not a productive way of being. Also, you met some ignorant people on the internet and extrapolated that into something you thought was meaningful?

Fighting a deceitful propaganda machine with individual deceitful propaganda seems like fair game to me.

You and many others seem to take this system seriously, as if it is genuine and legitimate. A lot of other people disagree, and some will act accordingly (prompting more deceitful propaganda, and so forth and so on).

May we live in interesting times.

What is so unserious, disingenuous, and illegitimate about the “system”? I’m sure it isn’t perfect, but here I am using the “system” and living my life.

Where would you rather be and what is your improvement on the “system”? Sorry to pose questions at you but I see so many strange comments on the internet that sound like “red-pilled” nonsense. If you have a good personal value proposition to society and aren’t completely entropic, life is good. If you aren’t, it’s hard. That’s been modern western life for a while now and it’s not bad. Could it be better and is there room for improvement? Absolutely. But living in parallel red pill reality is an absolutely unhelpful endeavor.

I’m reminded of the Oracle at Delphi. “Know who you are” which means know your place in society (father, son, farmer, king etc and your responsibilities) and “everything in moderation”.

Red pillers ignore that ancient wisdom and live in and obsess over an alternate almost completely fabricated virtual reality of no real value. Hanging out with suspicious and cynical strangers on the internet who share deep distrust of reality is depressing and isolating. After-all, you use the real system to have a life and so does everyone else. Might as well face that fact and truly engage with flesh and blood in the meat space rather than whatever or whoever is on red pill virtual land.

> What is so unserious, disingenuous, and illegitimate about the “system”?

Some examples (I could write indefinitely):

https://mattstoller.substack.com/p/ponzi-hospitals-and-count... (section "Bank Error In Our Favor" is particularly offensive, to me)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War (this sort of thing (which is fairly common) is offensive to me, as is our culture's complacency towards it)

How it is (in part) perpetuated, in my estimation:

- I’m sure whatever the system is it isn’t perfect. But here I am using the “system” and living my life. [rationalization]

- I see so many strange comments on the internet that sound like “red-pilled” nonsense. [training-based heuristic pattern matching to ~bad/dumb/wrong]

- Could it be better and is there room for improvement? Absolutely. But living in parallel red pill reality is an absolutely unhelpful endeavor. [training-based heuristic pattern matching to ~bad/dumb/wrong + cultural normalization of hallucination of reality (in this case: the future)]

- After-all, you use the real system to have a life and so does everyone else. Might as well face that fact and truly engage with flesh and blood in the meat space rather than whatever or whoever is on red pill virtual land. [Stay within the Overton Window of ideas and behaviors one has been trained on]

> Where would you rather be and what is your improvement on the “system”?

a) How about something like "The contents of the tin (upon substantial, fine-grained inspection) matches what's on the label"?

b) we shall see, maybe

> If you have a good personal value proposition to society and aren’t completely entropic, life is good. If you aren’t, it’s hard.

Simplistically, and largely only in theory (as I don't doubt you'd agree with if we were to dig into the nitty gritty details, which we won't as that is contrary to well-established cultural norms, at least).

> That’s been modern western life for a while now and it’s not bad.

Not bad for a subset, of Westerners....but we are only a minority slice of the whole.

> I’m reminded of the Oracle at Delphi. “Know who you are” which means know your place in society (father, son, farmer, king etc and your responsibilities) and “everything in moderation”.

I will decide my place in society, despite where society [has been trained to] believe I "should" fit in, and behave. I like the "Oracle at Delphi" idea though, perhaps there's some unharvested utility there.

> Red pillers ignore that ancient wisdom and live in and obsess over an alternate almost completely fabricated virtual reality of no real value. Hanging out with suspicious and cynical strangers on the internet who share deep distrust of reality is depressing and isolating.

Know what's interesting about this: you don't actually know who red-pillers are, or what they are or believe. And you do not know you do not know, because of culture (which is composed of many things, most of them sub-perceptual, and many of them downright taboo).

Possibly relevant:

https://youtu.be/lnA9DMvHtfI

https://www.bobdylan.com/songs/times-they-are-changin/

None of this is a pragmatic approach to life whatsoever! And again proves my points.

You and I are peasants in the last western empire, you have to deal with that reality. Not everything is a fraud. Simply go to the grocery store and look around. Do you know how each of those products is produced from field, processed, packaged, and shipped? Do that for ICE and EV vehicles and anything else you want.

Also I absolutely know who red-pillers are and it’s trivially easy to identify them. I couldn’t “white pill” you here.

Did you watch the video?

https://youtu.be/lnA9DMvHtfI

Did you understand the video?

> Those who have banked a lot on talking up globalization for the past 20-30 years will get there too. It will just be a slow process of very gradually tweaking their position a little bit every year at the maximum speed they can get away with while making it look like it's just little tweaks and they were never at any point actually wrong.

Is there a list of specific people here, who have aggrieved you so? Who are you even talking about?

> The consensus across the right, left, and center is towards rebuilding domestic industrial capacity in strategic industries.

They will need it for the next war that will be required to get us out of the coming recession.

Globalization also isn't really collapsing but it definitely is changing. Is Apple now making their iPhones in the US? Nope, but they are moving production to other countries so it doesn't only take place in China.

This will result in higher prices short-term, but will likely result in more globalization and supply-chain resilience in the longer term.

Yeah, I think of it more as a pendulum swing than an absolute. As a deliberate extreme example, shipping your entire industrial base to another country is obviously stupid. (The US did not literally do that. By most measures our industrial output has been flat, rather than necessarily "declining", over the previous couple of decades. It's just our needs grew as our output didn't.)

But on the flip side, demanding that everything be sourced from within your "own" economy (however you'd even define such a thing) is going to be stupid on roughly the same time frame too. Any self-contained economy is going to have a hard time competing with one using a larger base.

We went too far in one direction. It doesn't take a very deep knowledge of history to expect we will overcompensate too far in the other direction. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

Well that is the big advantage the US has. Is that we have the population for it, in comparison the US population is around 300 million whereas the entire EU is only 350 million. So the US has enough of a market, and it also has the resources to be able to manufacture most things locally, honestly a long with Canada and Mexico NA could be largely self contained without too many issues inside of NA.

It's the rest of the world that has benefited from globalization, from the raising the standard of living in Asia to getting cheap goods to Euorpe, but things can and will change.

It’s 332M USA vs 447M EU. And be assured, nobody benefits from isolation. Chances you outcompete everybody at everything are slim. I would also argue that SV would never grow so much without relatively free trade.

Even in the unlikely case that you do outcompete everybody, free trade is still a significant benefit. Many don't understand the economic principle of comparative advantage, it is counterintuitive.

Because globalization is not dead, nor will it ever be. The only thing changing is countries trying to bring production of strategic items or high value products to keep all the profits.

They may bring chip manufacturing back to USA, but all the flags, hats and freedom merch for Fourth of July will still be produced in China and that is never changing no matter how hard you try. People don’t like paying more money and that is not going away.

Unless you live in Minnesota:

https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/2022/cite/325E.65

> To say globalization is dead is to say our elites were grotesquely, systematically, and with great consequences to all, wrong.

This is not a good take at all. It shows a very static view of the world, as if globalization (or anything) is either eternally right or eternally wrong.

Horses are dead as a means of local transportation. Does that mean our elites were grotesquely wrong about the value of horses... in the 1800's?

The gold standard is dead... does that mean our elites were grotesquely wrong through most of history?

> But don't hold your breath for CNN or someone like that to air a one-hour special on Why Globalization Was A Big Mistake And Everyone Advocating For It Was Obviously Stupid.

That's because it is terrible take. For one, globalization completely dissolved the threat of nuclear war. Also, globalization is the only reason why the economy hasn't stagnated. Our biggest economic successes operate in globalist spaces (tech and finance), but the biggest failures operate in heavily protectionist spaces (healthcare, construction, and the auto industry prior to rise of foreign subsidiaries).

For one, globalization completely dissolved the threat of nuclear war

That's simply untrue. Europe outsourced its natural gas needs to Russia in an attempt to strengthen ties (ostensibly to avoid nuclear war, among other things). Despite that, no one would be surprised if 2023 had at least one nuclear warhead detonated at some point.

> no one would be surprised if 2023 had at least one nuclear warhead detonated at some point.

I would. I would be incredibly surprised.

Didn't you hear the news: correlation is causation after all!

>Europe outsourced

Europe also outsourced the security of the entire continent to the United States.

Globalization may be the reason that the economy hasn't stagnated, but it's also the reason the economy hollowed out, with the working-class jobs disappearing, with pretty heavy societal damage.

Were we better off with the economy growing but the blue-collar jobs disappearing? That's at least debatable.

Yep, and angry populism is the completely predictable result.

>For one, globalization completely dissolved the threat of nuclear war.

This is an interesting assertion to make given the very strong argument that can be made that we are closer to nuclear war right now than any time in human history.

...as the system of globalization that deterred nuclear war is deteriorating

The use of the term "elites" does not give me confidence in the person using it.

You believe there is no power gradient in the world? You think you are as capable of setting international policy as anyone else?

An intriguing view. How you square it with the real world I do not know.

There's a big difference between between acknowledging the existence of power gradients in the world and expressing the belief that the many opinions expressed in mainstream media consist of a single 'elite' view on globalization.

How you square that with a real world in which some of the most influential people and publications in international policy in recent years in many countries have focused on attacking trade deals, demanding withdrawal from supranational organizations and implying that entire systems are rigged in favour of specific rival countries, I do not know.

would you prefer "oligarchs"? (I would.)

Maybe we should skip the foreplay and go straight to “lizard people”.

You are incorrect. It is "crab people, crab people." Just ask South Park

> To say globalization is dead is to say our elites were grotesquely, systematically, and with great consequences to all, wrong.

dead != wrong

I would also argue that it isn't dead but it is in a decline because of some disturbing moves toward nationalism and fascism all over the world over the last five years

I can see why you might think that but I disagree that it's not 'PC'. I don't even think it's hugely controversial really. There's been chatter for some time and it's not even a 'sided' political issue really there seem to be a variety of opinions.

It's hard to call something politically incorrect when the last American presidential election was a contest between explicitly protectionist, anti-globalization candidates. Morris Chang wasn't predicting the future so much as recognizing a fait accompli.

> Nobody is talking about it because it is still politically incorrect in our overall culture [1] to admit that globalization is collapsing.

True. It's been collapsing since at least 2015. The political upheavals in the US and the UK were backlashes against globalization. Since then, both countries have moved way from the late 20th century global vision that developed in the post WW2 era.

For a while, in the US, there was the narrative that this was purely about Trump, but Biden is walking in the same direction re trade. It's a big change and it seems like it will endure across many administrations.

Great analysis.

Some Washington cynic once said, "Never believe anything until it's been officially denied."

Also apropos: "Watch what they do, not what they say."