Sunday, July 30, 2006

Imports are always a good, by definition

Mercantilist thinking lives on, 230 years after it should have died.

The Flemish Beerdrinker lays out the truth.

Adam Smith had it right:


If someone else can provide you with stuff you want more cheaply than you can make it for yourself, it makes you better off if the government allows you to buy it from that other source.

1 comment:

Dirty Davey said...

A caveat--this assumes either (a) that the people, acting through government, have no interest whatsoever in regulating manufacturing industries, or that (b) any desired regulation of manufacturing is for ends that have no importance if the manufacturing is abroad.

If "we" believe that things like safe working conditions, non-coerced labor, collective bargaining, and limits on factory pollution are (a) good and desirable things, and (b) good for everyone not just "us", then there are reasons

The question is whether the phrase "stuff you want" allows us to consider "a shirt made by prison labor" and "a shirt made by by willing labor" to be equivalent "stuff" or not.

Of course, in a strictly self-interested sense one could argue that "you" are better off with the low price and a government that protects "you" from coerced labor, and folks living under other regimes are Not Your Problem. Then again, conditions elsewhere may have long-term geopolitical implications, which may eventually make the true price of that shirt a bit more than what the Wal-Mart tag shows.