Is everything you've been told about trade, wages, debt and household income by the left and the MSM a lie?

Question

http://www.nypost.com/seven/11072007/postopinion/opedcolumnists/the_truth_on_trade_424240.htm

Sure looks like it according to this article.

To Samantha Stickers - Feel free to point out any incorrect facts in that article.

Meg - I'm glad you at least acknowledge that wages are going up. Most liberals say the poor and middle class are losing ground. MSM = Mainstream Media like NY Times, CNN, CBS News, Washington Post, Time, etc.

Answer 1

The sky is always falling. Good luck with that post. You can show them facts, and they will counter with name calling or some Brookings Institute or Michael Moore study.

See? They brought up other unrelated issues (what do WMD's have to do with the economy?), and some just discredit the source. It's a waste of time trying to discuss anything with people who have staunch beliefs.

Answer 2

What is MSM???
I think you are misunderstanding the complaints of the left, no one denies that the net income and the average income of households or per capita have increased over the last 10 or 30 years. The compliant is that wages of ordinary people have increased much slower than productivity gains, that is the only a small fraction of growth of the economy has "trickled down". The average wage for working people has been growing only about 1/2 of a percent a year (averaged over 30 years) after correcting for health care and other benefits and using a realistic measure for inflation effects.
http://www.visualizingeconomics.com/2007/11/04/has-middle-americas-wages-stagnated/

edit: Johnny 2 Times has stated the conservative point of view very well.
"Workers do not deserve wage increases because they have not contributed to productivity growth."
Compare this to your article and judge whether the right or left is more dishonest. All the left does is use data corrected for inflation using the CPI, which the BLS publishes. It show average wages dropping 4% over the last 30 years

Answer 3

For the most part yes.

But if free markets and free trade were free of controversy, how would the left differentiate themselves and attract votes? Somebody has to appeal to the populist class envy crowd.

BTW, follow a vast majority of the disinformation to the source, and you might learn a thing or two.

When it comes down to it, who has the most to gain from protectionist policies and the most to lose from free trade?......Unions. Not union workers, unions.

Edit: Meg, those may be your complaints, but I can assure you that a vast majority of the left make the outrageous claims that real incomes have shrunk.

Regarding productivity gains, that may indeed be true, but consider where those gains come from. Most of the gains are a result of new machinery/technologies, which were provided from investments by the capital providers (ie, the owners). Why is it that you think that workers should benefit from improvements that they have had no impact on? SHOULD they get paid more for pushing a button instead of manually performing a task?

Answer 4

I wouldn't say it's a lie. I'd call it bad information from people who understand very little of what they are talking about and don't seem too interested in learning.

I knew a couple of people in media - TV news. Their main areas of expertise was in making themselves look good for the camera and properly pronouncing words like Boutros Boutros Ghali.

Their political and economic views were reflexive and flavor of the month. To be fair, I've experienced the same from some on the right.

It's easy to identify such people. Just ask them why their belief works the way they think it does. If they try to change the subject, they don't know have a clue why they believe what they believe.

Answer 5

I don't know why this would surprise anyone. The left is notoriously wrong on all important issues. Here is just a few. Tax cuts cost the government money, they say that even while revenue goes up every time marginal rates are cut. Darwin's myth of evolution is science, just too funny. AIDS is every ones problem, still waiting for the explosion of hetero AIDS. Global climate change is caused by man, and what was it that stopped the last ice age. Christian fundamentalists are just as dangerous as fundamental Muslims, try this one out by showing up with a cartoon of Mohamed in Iran. The only thing that the left and the MSM can be counted on to do, is to retain their allergy to the truth

Answer 6

No you are wrong, everything that Bush says is like the WMD and the imminent danger Iraq presented to America.

I can clearly see the faulty intelligence in that report.

Answer 7

i can speak for myself and my constituents,yes for the most ,except for energy costs devaluing my spending power.

Answer 8

Getting your information from an isolationist Conservative tabloid might not be the wisest thing that you have ever done.

Answer 9

WELL, THE LEFT CERTAINLY ISN'T RIGHT BUT I SERIOUSLY DOUBT ALL THE ISSUES YOU BRING UP ARE WITHIN THE SCOPE OF A SINGLE WEBSITE

Answer 10

you bet ye