If we were to restrict American companies to only hiring American programmers, writes Clifford Thies, the obvious response of the rest of the world would be to forbid American companies from selling their software and related products and services to their consumers.
Blaming free trade for the present predicament of so many workers is misplaced. But who should be blamed?
China has experienced one of the great economic transformations in the history of the world, writes Frank Shostak. But will it last?
Due to the productivity norm doctrine, writes Phillip Bagus, labor unions disturb the process of capital accumulation.
That some factors of production are mobile, says the new protectionist, "proves" that free trade is not as attractive as (supposedly) David Ricardo argued. But factor mobility is not new. It has long been accepted by economists that either goods or people (and other factors of production) move.
Harry Valentine writes that South Africa's long term economic future appears bleak due to the policies that the nation's government has already enacted.
Anti-outsourcing theories implicitly assume that high production costs are a source of wealth, argues Bill Anderson.
The trend over the past fifty years has been for a gradual reduction in the number employed in manufacturing, says Jude Blanchette, but both output and productivity have increased.
In a brilliant lecture at the Austrian Scholars Conference, Sean Corrigan chronicles the failings of growth-driven government policies that impoverish in the long run.
