“We don’t need any more trade agreements. I have yet to see any benefit for the American economy or the American worker from the trade agreements enacted over the past 30 years. Instead we have:”
I would add this: The inability of the lower, uneducated classes to move out of poverty because the stepping stones to a middle class income have been destroyed by exporting manufacturing jobs.
The government has created a permanent welfare class unable to move out of it. A college education isn’t the answer for the majority who would thrive in a manufacturing era, but fail in an academic one.
Jobs in this country have been destroyed by an entitlement system and tax code that is completely out of control.
“I would add this: The inability of the lower, uneducated classes to move out of poverty because the stepping stones to a middle class income have been destroyed by exporting manufacturing jobs.”
I agree with you on the loss of economic and social mobility for undereducated, unskilled people. Historically taking on an unskilled job in a manufacturing plant, working hard, and being given training for higher skill jobs was a road to the middle class for millions of disadvantaged young people.
Also add the destruction of many small towns in rural America dependent on a single large or several small manufacturing operations. When the manufacturing is exported, the town’s economy is decimated and town residents become dependent on government social services. Drug addiction and crime follow breaking down the community’s social order. The community tax base erodes as inordinate social costs are added. These are all costs of free trade which the free traders are unwilling to acknowledge.