Ok, we all understand how we have lost VAST amounts of our national wealth overseas, ie; cars from Japan, fuel from Saudi Arabia, and well, every little piece of junk that we dont need from China.

it is this third example i would like to discuss, first, in the form of micro, then macro-economics.

ok, micro

I was looking at a superball, (the chinese version stamped "made in china"), and i had an idea....why do these little balls of indoor chaos have to ride on a big cotainer ship, creating a carbon footprint that would make greenpeace go postal??

Why dont I just start making these right here in America?....and i got to thinking even more Mattel, Whamo, these are/were American companies, right?

Well, it's complicated.

Lets move on...every dollar has a percentage of profit attached to it, as well, as a percentage of debt (we'll cover that next article)

If I buy a plunger from the LOCALLY OWNED/OPERATED hardware store, the profit from that dollar stays in the area...maybe the owner sends his/her kid to local private school.

IF I buy the same plunger from say a big giant store (whose name will remain anonymous), the profit from THAT dollar goes to the C.E.O., in the form of murderously ridiculous compensation, and the top stock holders..but it is no longer helping the immediate comunity around where the dollar was spent, and it is not coming back.

that should frighten you.

look at it this way.... you go to the sandbox to play with the other children, and you bring toys to share.

the little kid from the burbs takes parts from your toys.

every day.

for a year.

get it ?

ok, now macro....

There is a reason Europe, China, and the rest practice Protectionism.

Protectionism is working for them.

ever drive a mid '70's mercedes?...piece of junk, like riding in an interrogation room...rather be water boarded. almost no diference between the seats in that, than the seats in a '67 beetle

My point is this. They cost more not because they were so much better than american stuff. They cost more because Mercedes was making US pay for the cost OUR government was imposing on THEM to import THEIR goods to OUR shores.

Now, that being said, too much protectionism is as bad as too little regulation, or a "free market" economy out of control, or "trickle down" economics.

America, simply put, cannot survive as a consumer nation, without consuming our own goods as well as consuming imports, and to be honest, China no longer needs us to be their consumers...they can, thanks to the trillions of dollars we send, have their own comsumer class.

oh yeah....we owe China a TON of cash....an ungodly amount...so much so, that the Chinese are trying, and succseeding, to get the Yuan to replace the US dollar , as the world reserve currency.