So anybody who doesn't think free trade is the answer must be dumb, racist or greedy. I'm glad we have sorted that out. It must be great to have all the answers.
Reading the article it's clear we didn't have human society until we had money. That all sports should be unisex. That competition always delivers the best outcome. The patent system should be scrapped. That it’s fine thing to be dependent on import as from countries that might change their minds

That doesn't convince, Poirot

>>Nice to see it's so easy to lift people out of abject poverty in developing countries simply by lowering the bar.<<

You surely cannot be suggesting that the new wealth that has been generated in China over the past twenty years is illusory, and that what we are seeing is just a manipulation of the poverty figures?

That is pretty short-sighted.

You also made no mention, I notice, of the other side of the equation, which is that the reduction in costs has in fact been passed on to us, in the form of lower prices. This has contributed in no small measure to our own - undeniable - affluence over the same period.

I would be interested to hear what alternative strategies you might have in mind, that would not harm the emerging economies, or cause our own economy to stagnate.

Any offers?

Arjay
Free trade is not the cause of poverty in Vietnam. It is the solution. Vietnam under communism eschewed the benefits of free trade and a market economy. Its population lived in abject poverty and oppression. Now that it is more open to trade living standards are rising, but from such a low base that it will take many years to become as prosperous as its neighbours which embraced the benefits of trade and markets earlier.

I’m old enough to remember when “made in Japan” and “made in Hong Kong” were by-words for cheap shoddy products made by "exploiting" cheap labour. Arguments against imports from these places were much the same as arguments against Vietnam and China today. But trade elevated these economies to first-world prosperity within a few decades, as it is currently doing for China. Look at North Korea, or Albania under Enver Hoxha, for examples of the effects of economic isolationism.

“You surely cannot be suggesting that the new wealth that has been generated in China over the past twenty years is illusory, and that what we are seeing is just a manipulation of the poverty figures?”

And of course the total destruction of the environment in China was so worth the peasants being able to labour away for a few cents per hour and destroy their health in the process?
They will be able to play with the trinkets they can buy on the way to the hospital (if there is one) to die and feel so good to be included in the “modern” world.

Their choice, sarnian.

>>And of course the total destruction of the environment in China was so worth the peasants being able to labour away for a few cents per hour and destroy their health in the process?<<

Not yours.

Jolly good show, Pericles...and we get lots of cheap stuff too !

"eutrophication" - check out China's waterways - not to mention, its air pollution.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/10/world/asia/10pollute.html

Unsustainable.