Blog of Q's

by William R. Hawkins
Any rational analysis of the decisions made at the recent trade meeting
in Hong Kong would conclude that the United States is being played for
a fool — by the “developing world” (which includes China and India), as
well as by the developed world (the Europeans and Japanese). While
every other WTO member country is trying to gain competitive advantage
and advance its national interests, the United States is looking out
for the “good of the international trading system” — a house of cards
built on exporting as much as you can to the American market. Trees
don’t grow to the sky, and American wealth is not unlimited. The system
will eventually collapse, bringing untold misery, unless some reality
and sanity intervene. However, don’t expect current U.S. trade
officials to be the source of that sanity, compulsively wedded as they
are to the abstract theory of free trade.