Holy crap, free trade is under attack. Are we going to survive? Yeah, we’ll be fine. Is free trade good, yes and no. Free trade agreements are made so we can globalize economy all over the world. So the world can become a community, that’s a good thing. So what’s the bad thing, well, while free trade has gone global, minimum wage and middle class has not. For globalization to work you first must have a globalization of fair pay and middle class wages. You can’t have one without the other. In any free trade treatise, (I looked that word up, it fits) it should be mandatory language that the country that wants these benefits must invoke a livable, sustainable and comparable living wage. Once that happens almost all other problems seize to exist.

If the government of all countries that are willing to enjoy the benefits of free trade were to impose a minimum wage that would make globalization a heck of a lot easier. Imagine that all countries had a middle class, there would be no need for tariffs at all. Manufacturing jobs would be in every country, almost. Shipping items long distance would be a thing of the past because it would be a whole lot cheaper just to build the items in that country because it would minimize shipping costs, take away from the bottom line. LG would build factories everywhere, not just where cheap labor is, because all labor is now comparative. That is the goal of globalization, isn’t it? As it stands, some of these countries that the President referred to are keeping wages artificially low so they can attract and induce manufacturers to go there. It’s a sound idea for the people that are running the country, reaping the reward of the manufacturing tax but these workers are living two families per home or live in homes that are 300 square feet, for a whole family, that’s like a college dorm.

People come to the United States with ideas of the American dream, the ability to buy a house and live in safe and secure neighborhood. America isn’t the only country that offers these things, so do others and people would love to migrate their too. Well, how about globalizing that dream to every country? How about if you couldn’t tell the difference between America and Haiti or El Salvador or any country in the world. Globalization is about making the world a better place, not about finding cheap labor. The U.S. is obviously in a position to try and rectify these situations and maybe taking a harsh stance on free trade would help it out. I don’t know, I’m not an economist but it seems to me that if everyone had a middle class, the backbone of great society, the free trade agreements wouldn’t be needed at all, isn’t that the goal, global harmony and unity not global cheap labor. I could be wrong, like I said, my economy degree comes from Crayola.

The payoffs of these actions would be incredible. Reductions in crime, illegal immigration (because everywhere is wonderful and no immigration would be illegal), deaths due to poor living conditions and hatred. Well, utopia has always been a dream of mine but it seems that the only way I’m going to see that is in the movies. I’m not saying this would lead to a perfect world, just a better one.

In a different note, sometimes, when you are correcting a problem, you are going to be hated. While I don’t agree with everything the President has done, mostly on immigration (DACA should be approved with attachments), some things that need to be corrected are going to be difficult and the person that fixes these problems will face opposition, sometimes in a great amount. Sometimes, being despised for doing the right thing is better than being liked and going with the flow when you know it isn’t right. It takes character to fix a worldwide problem but it’s better to be hated now and fix it then being liked and leaving the problem for the next guy. I don’t know if the “America First” agenda has to do with globalization, it might be a by product, but whatever works. Again, I don’t know if this is an attempt to fix globalization cheap labor but it seems that it can have an impact in promoting fair wages all over the world. Our former President’s, President Obama, biggest critique of the Free Trade Acts was the fact that countries were still not paying fair wages. I believe that President Obama’s thoughts and beliefs were that if this was enacted that countries would do the right thing and give those wages to their people and enact these laws because that would be what he would do, President Obama trusted in these leaders.

I believe in a strong America, I believe in a strong global community, I believe in a borderless global community where there’s only neighborhoods and no passports to get into those neighborhoods. I also believe in Santa Claus, so, at least in my lifetime, all of those are pretty much the same.