Your logical is impeccable but you will never convince someone who produces Product A in the USA (or wherever) but is faced with losing his job because an overseas manufactured equivalent to Product A is subsidised by its local government to a price that massively undercuts the US price that this is “fair” and should be allowed. Yes the US consumer will enjoy a better deal (in the short term anyway until the overseas producer can remove the subsidy having destroyed the US competition) but the displaced worker would think that that fact needs to be viewed in the aggregate with his, and his firm’s, loss to form an overall view of benefit.
Of course you would argue that the displaced worker can find alternative employment and ultimately be better off by also enjoying the cheap (by virtue of subsidy) overseas product. But good luck with persuading the owners and employees of the displaced US business that their collective losses should be sucked up because a foreign government wishing to expand its overseas trade is prepared to distort the free market to its perceived local advantage.
Well said. In this context a playing field not being level is just comparative advantage. Competition, as you say, isn't like a football match. But it is rather like selecting the best goalkeeper in the team to be in goal and the best striker to be a striker. Too often economic competition is seen as an alternative to cooperation rather than a means of cooperating more effectively.
Your logical is impeccable but you will never convince someone who produces Product A in the USA (or wherever) but is faced with losing his job because an overseas manufactured equivalent to Product A is subsidised by its local government to a price that massively undercuts the US price that this is “fair” and should be allowed. Yes the US consumer will enjoy a better deal (in the short term anyway until the overseas producer can remove the subsidy having destroyed the US competition) but the displaced worker would think that that fact needs to be viewed in the aggregate with his, and his firm’s, loss to form an overall view of benefit.
Of course you would argue that the displaced worker can find alternative employment and ultimately be better off by also enjoying the cheap (by virtue of subsidy) overseas product. But good luck with persuading the owners and employees of the displaced US business that their collective losses should be sucked up because a foreign government wishing to expand its overseas trade is prepared to distort the free market to its perceived local advantage.
Well said. In this context a playing field not being level is just comparative advantage. Competition, as you say, isn't like a football match. But it is rather like selecting the best goalkeeper in the team to be in goal and the best striker to be a striker. Too often economic competition is seen as an alternative to cooperation rather than a means of cooperating more effectively.