Is that headline dramatic enough for you?

Since writing the four part series focusing on trade and manufacturing jobs (one, two, three, four), Jim Dicks at American Thinker added some interesting political information to the mix.

Steve Bannon, Jim Dicks wrote, has begun an

epic confrontation between the multinational corporations on one side (and their congressional politicians, to whom they have lavishly contributed) and the newly emerging Republican Party of the Little People on the other — the forgotten working class, championed by Donald Trump in his successful presidential run.

It is a crucial struggle, where, as stated best by Sundance of The Conservative Treehouse, “trillions of dollars are at stake.” It is a battle that will determine who controls the future wealth of the United States, where the manufacturing sector and portions of the service industry sector of the U.S. economy have been eroded, stripped from the United States and moved to cheap-labor countries, leaving behind a massive loss of jobs and wealth.

The goal of the Trump agenda is simply to “generate an economic renaissance with a dramatic infusion of wealth for middle-class workers,” Dicks wrote. President Trump “rejects the notion that the demise of U.S. manufacturing is inevitable and irreversible.”

Bannon believes that if we are to revitalize our moribund Obama economy and safeguard our future against the implications of profound technological advancements coming over the horizon, this economic and political reformation is essential. Corruption through bribery of our political class by multinationals must be stopped. Macro-level decisions concerning our national wealth must include the workers who build it and whose very future is at stake.

Bannon asked what’s more powerful: “the money of the corporatists or the muscle of the people”? His bet is on the people.

In part four, in my article I hyperlinked the words “creative destruction” to a definition of it at the website of the Library of Economics and Liberty. I’ve bolded the text on a key passage:

[Creative destruction] has become the centerpiece for modern thinking on how economies evolve.

[Economists who adopt the summary] of the free market’s ceaseless churning echo capitalism’s critics in acknowledging that lost jobs, ruined companies, and vanishing industries are inherent parts of the growth system. The saving grace comes from recognizing the good that comes from the turmoil. Over time, societies that allow creative destruction to operate grow more productive and richer; their citizens see the benefits of new and better products, shorter work weeks, better jobs, and higher living standards.

Herein lies the paradox of progress. A society cannot reap the rewards of creative destruction without accepting that some individuals might be worse off, not just in the short term, but perhaps forever. At the same time, attempts to soften the harsher aspects of creative destruction by trying to preserve jobs or protect industries will lead to stagnation and decline, short-circuiting the march of progress. … The process of creating new industries does not go forward without sweeping away the preexisting order.

It seems to me that the question of how many people will be permanently worse off is key. The page goes on to give helpful examples of how progress did away with jobs as technology evolved.

In a nutshell, cars wrecked the horse and buggy industry, planes lowered the number of people travelling by train, and “all this creation did not come without destruction.”

“Each new mode of transportation took a toll on existing jobs and industries”:

What occurred in the transportation sector has been repeated in one industry after another—in many cases, several times in the same industry. Creative destruction recognizes change as the one constant in capitalism. Sawyers, masons, and miners were among the top thirty American occupations in 1900. A century later, they no longer rank among the top thirty; they have been replaced by medical technicians, engineers, computer scientists, and others.

Technology roils job markets, as Schumpeter conveyed in coining the phrase “technological unemployment” E-mail, word processors, answering machines, and other modern office technology have cut the number of secretaries but raised the ranks of programmers. The birth of the Internet spawned a need for hundreds of thousands of webmasters, an occupation that did not exist as recently as 1990. LASIK surgery often lets consumers throw away their glasses, reducing visits to optometrists and opticians but increasing the need for ophthalmologists. Digital cameras translate to fewer photo clerks.

Companies show the same pattern of destruction and rebirth. Only five of today’s hundred largest public companies were among the top hundred in 1917. Half of the top hundred of 1970 had been replaced in the rankings by 2000.

That’s all easy to understand. What’s not easy to understand is — what happens if not enough new industries arise to provide the kind of good-paying jobs that are lost with the elimination of the old jobs?

Change is happening faster and faster — technology no longer creeps forward, it leaps, leaving many behind. We all know and live that. But many of those manufacturing jobs lost over the past few decades weren’t lost due to technology or progress. Many were just shipped overseas.

It is a fundamental fact: manufacturing is an important aspect of a nation’s wealth. Equally important is the fact that our nation’s policies should be geared towards benefiting our nation’s people. Like it or not, there is a segment of the population who will never write computer code or start a small business. What do we do about them? I don’t pretend to have the answer. The search for that answer is why the Illinois Family Institute decided to bring attention to John Westberg’s proposal. It is also why IFI provides this list of articles for anyone who wants to learn more on the topic.

As noted, click here for the rest of the articles on Trade and Manufacturing that I easily collected for about two years. Depending upon the value of anything new that I see, I will add links to the list.

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“Creative destruction” is a common phrase used in economics. One simple example that’s in the news a lot lately, is the phenomenon of Amazon.com. Since it launched in 1994, countless small books stores have been put out of business, and at least one large chain, Borders, has closed. That’s the destruction part. The creative part is the locating of new distribution centers all over the country — Illinois has been trying to land one as this article gets posted. The benefit to consumers is that within minutes, customers can find the book (or whatever) they want online and have it shipped in days.

When the American textile industry was decimated a few decades ago, the jobs were sent overseas due to free trade policies. Clothing prices dropped, but not without many Americans losing good paying jobs.

One common argument from the pro “free” traders is that trade, unrestricted by tariffs, raises the standard of living. For example, the middle, lower middle class, and the poor can afford things they wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford. I have no doubt that’s true. For example, the last time I was in a Walmart I was shocked at just how inexpensive those foreign-made massive flat screen TVs are these days.

Of course, it’s not just clothes and TVs that are less expensive with free trade, but computers, furniture, clothes, and food (though evidently not meat).

Maybe there is someone out there who supports fairer trade who wants Americans to be priced out of necessities of life basics. If there is, I haven’t met them.

But is it just me or is the storage unit business a growing industry? Maybe I didn’t notice many of the Public Storage, Self Storage, and U-Haul Storage facilities when I was younger. I have noticed many new ones being opened, however.

It’s reasonable to surmise that what fills up many of that storage space is furniture and other items that could be afforded because of “free” trade. It’s also not unfair, it seems to me, to wonder about the impact on the average standard of living by having so much affordable stuff that a person winds up paying monthly storage fees.

That said, my assumption over the years has been that “free” trade is to be preferred. Only in recent years have I begun to read articles from serious men and women who are not pro-big government or economic isolationists making the case for a fairer trade.

While “creative destruction” leads to innovation, my concern is that the creative part doesn’t keep up with the destruction part. Factories close, towns die, and a lot of men and women who earned a good living working in manufacturing cannot find work that will allow them to maintain a decent standard of living.

It has been widely noted that Hillary Clinton lost states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan in no smart part due to their concentration on identity politics and their ignoring the economic challenges of the working class.

Former Trump advisor Steve Bannon refers to a lot of what has been taking place concerning working class jobs as “economic hate crimes.” Bannon calls Washington, D.C. a “business model,” in that those on the inside always prosper. The think tank culture is also, no doubt, a “business model,” as big donors that benefit from “free” trade write big checks to defend current policies. There aren’t a lot of big donors in those dying towns across America.

Recently, townhall’s Kurt  Schlichter was tough on the “free” traders in an article:

Conservativism forgot about the real world conservatives we expected to line up behind us. While we were talking about free trade, we were ignoring that GOP voter who fought in Fallujah, came home, got a job building air conditioners, raised a family, and then one day watched the video of the oh-so-sorry CEO. . . sadly informing his beloved employees that their jobs were getting shipped to Oaxaca. And our response to the 58-year old Republican voter who asked us how he was going to keep paying for his mortgage and his kid in college? Pretty much, “Well, that’s how free enterprise works. Read some Milton Freidman and go learn coding.”

That’s not a response, not for a political party that requires people to actually vote for it. That’s an abdication…

Last year, Victor Davis Hanson also weighed in on the topic during an interview with Laura Ingraham: (see here starting at about the 8-minute mark).

I saw a whole generation of people in agriculture completely wiped out by unfair trade with the European Union. And Every time I would write about it I was told that I didn’t understand free market economics. And the same thing with China, and the same thing with outsourcing.

I grew up in a small town where everybody had a good job at a manufacturing plant. Now it’s 16 percent unemployment and I’m supposed to say this is creative destruction.

And I read in [National Review], that I’m affiliated — that this is good. That people lose jobs. They have to move. You just abandon your family your house, everybody, your community, and you just get in the car and follow the job.

And then I think to myself, I get up every morning at the Hoover Institution — I don’t worry that somebody from the Punjab is gonna walk in my office and say I’ll write that column for 40 percent of what you’re doing.

. . .

I know people in Silicon Valley that are being outsourced right now by people coming in on Visas. The elite has never suffered the consequences of their own ideology.

It’s not just conservative commentators who are not experts in economics. Economist Stephen Moore, no Trumpian protectionist, recently wrote about how NAFTA needs to be improved, and cites unfair practices of our trading partners.

Another expert is John Westberg who we mentioned in part two. His solution is innovative and deserving of attention and study — you can read more about it here ADD LINK.

As I noted at the outset of this 4-part series, this is a huge topic worthy of an ongoing debate. The need for a healthy middle class is obvious — and impossible without enough good paying jobs. Just looking at the employment/unemployment numbers isn’t enough. We must look at the actual human impact on the ground — that is how we will measure how well trade is working for working Americans.

This isn’t a matter of feelings and emotions but of dollars and cents. American policy should be aimed at benefiting Americans, even if we wind up paying more for goods, and less on storage units.

Up next: ‘Trillions of dollars are at stake’: It is a battle over ‘the future wealth of the United States.’

Download the IFI App!

We now have an IFI mobile app that enables us to deliver great content based on the “Tracks” you choose, including timely legislative alerts, cultural commentaries, upcoming event notifications, links to our podcasts, video reports, and even daily Bible verses to encourage you. This great app is available for Android and iPhones.

Key Features:

• It’s FREE!
• Specific content for serious Christians
• Performs a spiritual assessment
• Sends you daily Scriptures to encourage and equip you
• You determine when and how much content you get