Why are we buying foreign products and letting foreign companies import so much?

Question

without charging high tariffs, and we cant import our stuff.Somebody screwed up this whole deal. Foriegn countries have hit record profits for the 5th year straight and AMERICANS are losing jobs in record numbers.Pretty soon it will be like the great deppression unless something is done now. Mark my word i see it coming.And for you people that buy foriegn cars thanks for putting 10 guys and girls out of a job.Laugh now but watch when deppression happens.

If people in the U.S are not working their not buying stuff at wal mart get it, You have to understand the big picture people.

Let me give you the big picture in simple terms. You import goods, Americans get layed off, they dont have money to spend, Companies in the U.S go bankrupt because nobody is buying there stuff get it now.I could explain it in depth but i tried to make it simple.

What companies are hiring the railroads, longshoreman, truck drivers, inventory clerks,Ups, fed ex,distribution centers. Some are good paying jobs but im sorry this trade agreement is not working its an even playing field. I didnt put this question out their without any knowledge.You want people buy lower taxes and fix this NAFTA deal.

What companies are hiring the railroads, longshoreman, truck drivers, inventory clerks,Ups, fed ex,distribution centers. Some are good paying jobs but im sorry this trade agreement is not working its not an even playing field. I didnt put this question out their without any knowledge.You want people to buy lower taxes and fix this NAFTA deal.

What companies are hiring the railroads, longshoreman, truck drivers, inventory clerks,Ups, fed ex,distribution centers. Some are good paying jobs but im sorry this trade agreement is not working its not an even playing field. I didnt put this question out their without any knowledge.You want people to buy lower taxes and fix this NAFTA deal.

I tried to fix spelling on a word and my paragragh got sent again.

I guess to solve the problem then, companies that have these higher paying jobs need to offer apprentiships, because alot of people cant afford 40000 or whatever for a college degree. And lower taxes to boost the economy.

Answer 1

I agree with you. Exactly what you said, if American people aren't working, their not buying anything. I don't understand how so much could have changed in such a short time. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it wasn't all that long ago that WalMart only sold American made products. Now, all of the sudden, no one would be able to afford them? Sounds strange to me. Did prices go down as all of our manufacturing jobs were sent to sweat shops? No. Why would they go up if Americans were to produce products? In my opinion, it is a matter of greed and profits, not prices. The companies charge the same for the product, but pay less labor so they have greater profits. It's nothing that's seen by everyday average Joe consumers. I don't buy the brainwashed idea that my prices would have to go up. Maybe a CEO or two would make a piddly million less a year.

Sorry, but I have a thing about this, being one that lost a manufacturing job to outsourcing. Also, being one that is for all people's human rights to not be treated like slaves and have to work in a sweat shop. It makes me sick. Greed.

(edit) Sorry, I don't know anything about how tariffs work and I might have gotten off the subject a bit.

And, I drive a Dodge, but they say that even American brands are all made overseas anyway. I don't know if it's true.

(edit) Can other countries make products more efficiently? I would like to know the theory behind that. Cheaper, definately. But I don't get why or how it would be more efficient. They have the same number of hands and fingers that I do. Maybe I'm missing something here.

As far as other countries competing better, well a lack of labor and environmental laws will do that I guess. That's unethical, I think.

And, Americans moving to higher-value jobs? For one, I'm not positive on the numbers, but are there really enough of those jobs to employ everyone? I would argue that some Americans have had to take lower-value jobs. Maybe the unemployment rate is low, but that doesn't mean that everyone is making a decent living wage or receiving good benefits. Lots of people are working at places like WalMart, and it's worth looking into how they treat their employees if you don't already know. There are over 23 million Americans working that don't have health insurance. I would be willing to bet that some of them once had a nice manufacturing job with health ins. and now had to take a crappy job because there's nothing in their field here anymore (I'm one of them).

Answer 2

Americans want low prices on everything. If we made our own products, they would be more expensive. If we have little indian children payed 1cent an hour, making our products, we can sell stuff for cheaper.

People don't understand this.

People complain about things made in other countries, but if companys like wal-mart switched to made in america products, they would have to raise their prices (they wouldn't have to ofcourse, but would have to in order to maintin profits). And what happens if prices are raised? PEOPLE START COMPLAINING AGAIN!

So, do I think stuff should be made overseas? No. But the fix is not making stuff in america, and increasing the jobs, the fix is in limiting the profits of these type of companys. Except for Quixtar. When Quixtar becomes the worlds most profitable company, it will be a great day!

Anyways, Wal-Mart is almost a monopoly. They are the largest, and most profitable business in the world. People get confused though. They arent the largest and most profitable because of overseas products. Sam Walton just elimated some steps in the process of getting products to the consumer. K-Mart had way to many steps, from getting the product from the manufacturer, to the customer. Walton took out about 3 steps, and was able to cut down prices. The overseas profits came way later.

Answer 3

We have the same problem here our farmers commit suicide because they are in debt on account of subsidised european products in our shops, we are not allowed to subsidise our stuff, don't blame the corporations, it's the buying public that are at fault they all want something for nothing and while they are buying foreign goods they then wonder where their jobs have gone because our own people can't produce it that cheaply, can't sell it and then go under. Its all because our trade unions think productivity is a dirty word they want to be paid a fortune for sitting on their backsides doing nothing all day instead of churning out stuff we can buy.

Answer 4

because we have unions that inflate our prices and we can import them for cheaper.

Also the jobs we are losing are mostly the low end jobs. We should use our taxes to train low end workers that lose their jobs so that they can get better higher paying ones.

So we raise tariffs, then the cost of the products we do make are even more expensive (since we get the materials from overseas), and then American's companies have to lay off even more people since no one will be able to buy our products and we "close shop" and America goes out of business all together

Answer 5

Whoa! Hold on there.

We are buying foreign products because they can make them cheaper and more efficiently than we can. That means we pay less for them. Imagine how much your clothes would cost if they were all made by American union labor instead of by the Chinese. Your blue jeans would be $50 a pair instead of $19.99 a pair. Sure, we'd all have a bunch of factory jobs, but we couldn't afford nearly as much as we do now.

Americans are NOT losing jobs in record numbers. We actually have been gaining jobs very nicely ever since people began complaining about the trade deficit in the 80's. Sure, you see headlines about Ford laying off thousands, but you don't see news stories about the hundreds of other companies hiring even more than that.

Look at the theory. We buy Japanese cars and Chinese plasma TVs, and they get pieces of paper. In order for them to get any value from those pieces of paper, they have to eventually use them to buy something from us, or use them to buy something from another country, who will eventually buy something from us.

Tariffs do nothing but restrict trade in both directions. We slap a 50% tariff on Japanese cars, and then they slap a 50% tariff on US Software. We both wind up losers, as resources are used less efficiently all around.

Free trade involves change and pain, but overall, it benefits us all than protectionism.

Additional Info: The Big Picture as you describe it, is that we American's produce so much wealth, that we can afford to spend what we do on imported goods, and still manage to keep ourselves employed. There's nothing terrible going on here.

A hundred years ago, most people were employed on the farms. 50 years ago, most people were employed in factories. Today, most people are employed in the other industries, like Health Care, Finance, Retail, B2B, Transportation, etc. Foreigners are undercutting us on manufacturing because they've learned how to compete. So American's have found higher value jobs, and let the now low paying manufacturing sector be dominated by countries like China.

Why are you so hell bent to fight for jobs that are just going lower and lower in wages globally? Wouldn't you rather American's move to higher value jobs?

If all our jobs are going overseas, then why has American employment been going UP the last 25 years???