Capitalist xenophobes: a contradiction
From what I learned from classical (myopic, simplistic, Smithian) economics, the whole point of capitalism is that it makes the three attributes of building wealth fungible (tradeable). This doesn't mean everything is equal, but if you need something, you should be able to get it. What it doesn't consider is non-economic factors, such as human behaviour, sentimentality, weather preference, culture, language, environment, spirit, how a country treats women or minorities, etc.
Of course, anyone in their right mind knows that labour (people) with their cultural and linguistic disparities aren't an equivalent fungible commodity. And environment/resources aren't exactly equally fungible, either. What is fungible is capital (currency), after you deal with an exchange rate of course. The other two give groups of people in an environment (a resource base, which is a disgusting way to look at your environment in my opinion) competitive advantages and disadvantages.
What often baffles me about the world we live in is that fundamentalist-religious-economic-conservatives (I will broadly lump them as the Right, even though not all conservatives or Righties have all of these traits... just the ones running (or not running) for president) are such a mixed bag of hypocrisy and ideology. Xenophobia is not a captialist trait. And in many religions, it is not an admirable trait as well. So, capitalists run around the world trying to convert people to their social/spiritual/economic preference, and when people emigrate to set up shop in their country to capitalise on their competitive advantages which is exactly what is being preached to them, conservatives want to keep them out?! Which is it? Do you want the free flow of labour and capital, or do you want to impede the 'efficiencies of capitalism'?
Similarly, on the leftist angle, the Left tends to be somewhat mistrusting of all-stops-pulled-out-capitalism yet welcoming of aliens due to the cultural enrichment/diversity they bring. That is at odds with closed markets, but the social angle of things, I think, tends to trump many American Leftists' economic view of things.
In my opinion, that's the right approach. Economics should not trump society, as economics are a social science. Similarly, society is an environmental art... without an environment, you have no society... nor economy. Recognise that.
Here's the article that precipitated these thoughts: 'Fast Fashion': Italians Wary Of Chinese On Their Turf...
For more than a thousand years, the Italian town of Prato in the heart of Tuscany has been a textile center synonymous with top-quality craftsmanship.
Now, it has become home to the largest concentration of Chinese residents in Europe.
...raising fears of a growing Chinese foothold in Europe
From a capitalist's point of view, this should be a good thing. This is exactly what capitalism is set up to do: attract the best talent to where it is needed. So why is there fear?
Oh, yeah, that's right, because classical economics continues to fail to explain what actually happens in the world and it should rarely, if ever, be used to model reality and/or human behaviour. Because 'rational decision-making' is not a behaviour that humans exhibit: you're fighting biology there. What is worse? Losing $20 or not gaining $30? See: irrational. (Most people will say losing $20 is worse, but it is just a game of semantics... not gaining $30 is losing $30.)
As this article rightfully points out, economic success is done at the behest of legal limits and social norms. In order to be competitive and to win in the game that capitalism sets up, you have to break the rules. If you break the rules, you're rewarded. And people get all pissed off when people break the rules, but as any rational observer to this system can see, that's the only way to get ahead. Case in point: China, Wall Street, every Republican wanting to 'reduce red tape'. The latter folks want to just make the competitive advantage they gain by breaking the rules be the norm, so that the next boundary can be pushed, which results in more collossal failure of economic and environmental/social systems. Their end game is to be the capitalistic, lawless region like China. They righfully recognise that China is kciking our ass economically because no one follows the rules there, and that isn't a part of their culture. But they can't change our history and our rule-following nature. So we're set on a declining path, which bruises their nationalistic ego/image of Amerkuh. Observe:
Recent police raids uncovered a string of sweatshops, where illegal workers sleep, eat and work. Paid miserable wages, they sit before sewing machines for up to 18 hours in a row, producing a total of 1 million garment items a day.
The Chinese have made Prato the hub of a new globalized market.
I don't think it was accidental that those two paragraphs butt up against one another. They're intimately tied. Paying people miserable wages results in economic success. That's the social blight and problem that capitalism brings. And Italy has done a lot to create a society that is geared toward a good quality of life. And I do see that the Chinese are hijacking the Italian reputation. But I say: that's what you get with capitalism. It is kill or be killed. It is an awful model. The quesion is not how to get rid of the Chinese: the question is how to rid yourself of the system that is flawed.
So, I guess I understand the xenophobia a bit. The aliens are showing the flaws in the system you've created. They take the non-stated or non-rules and exploit the model. As anyone knows, a good model, though, stands up to these exploits. Ask any computer programmer concerned with security: they test this stuff out--they make sure it works before releasing it into the wild (the good ones do, at least). Adam Smith didn't test his model out fully. We need a new version, because the patches we make to this system aren't working.
What is the next economic model? Is it a mixed economy? Is that the best check against unintended exploits in your economic code?
Of course, anyone in their right mind knows that labour (people) with their cultural and linguistic disparities aren't an equivalent fungible commodity. And environment/resources aren't exactly equally fungible, either. What is fungible is capital (currency), after you deal with an exchange rate of course. The other two give groups of people in an environment (a resource base, which is a disgusting way to look at your environment in my opinion) competitive advantages and disadvantages.
What often baffles me about the world we live in is that fundamentalist-religious-economic-conservatives (I will broadly lump them as the Right, even though not all conservatives or Righties have all of these traits... just the ones running (or not running) for president) are such a mixed bag of hypocrisy and ideology. Xenophobia is not a captialist trait. And in many religions, it is not an admirable trait as well. So, capitalists run around the world trying to convert people to their social/spiritual/economic preference, and when people emigrate to set up shop in their country to capitalise on their competitive advantages which is exactly what is being preached to them, conservatives want to keep them out?! Which is it? Do you want the free flow of labour and capital, or do you want to impede the 'efficiencies of capitalism'?
Similarly, on the leftist angle, the Left tends to be somewhat mistrusting of all-stops-pulled-out-capitalism yet welcoming of aliens due to the cultural enrichment/diversity they bring. That is at odds with closed markets, but the social angle of things, I think, tends to trump many American Leftists' economic view of things.
In my opinion, that's the right approach. Economics should not trump society, as economics are a social science. Similarly, society is an environmental art... without an environment, you have no society... nor economy. Recognise that.
Here's the article that precipitated these thoughts: 'Fast Fashion': Italians Wary Of Chinese On Their Turf...
For more than a thousand years, the Italian town of Prato in the heart of Tuscany has been a textile center synonymous with top-quality craftsmanship.
Now, it has become home to the largest concentration of Chinese residents in Europe.
...raising fears of a growing Chinese foothold in Europe
From a capitalist's point of view, this should be a good thing. This is exactly what capitalism is set up to do: attract the best talent to where it is needed. So why is there fear?
Oh, yeah, that's right, because classical economics continues to fail to explain what actually happens in the world and it should rarely, if ever, be used to model reality and/or human behaviour. Because 'rational decision-making' is not a behaviour that humans exhibit: you're fighting biology there. What is worse? Losing $20 or not gaining $30? See: irrational. (Most people will say losing $20 is worse, but it is just a game of semantics... not gaining $30 is losing $30.)
As this article rightfully points out, economic success is done at the behest of legal limits and social norms. In order to be competitive and to win in the game that capitalism sets up, you have to break the rules. If you break the rules, you're rewarded. And people get all pissed off when people break the rules, but as any rational observer to this system can see, that's the only way to get ahead. Case in point: China, Wall Street, every Republican wanting to 'reduce red tape'. The latter folks want to just make the competitive advantage they gain by breaking the rules be the norm, so that the next boundary can be pushed, which results in more collossal failure of economic and environmental/social systems. Their end game is to be the capitalistic, lawless region like China. They righfully recognise that China is kciking our ass economically because no one follows the rules there, and that isn't a part of their culture. But they can't change our history and our rule-following nature. So we're set on a declining path, which bruises their nationalistic ego/image of Amerkuh. Observe:
Recent police raids uncovered a string of sweatshops, where illegal workers sleep, eat and work. Paid miserable wages, they sit before sewing machines for up to 18 hours in a row, producing a total of 1 million garment items a day.
The Chinese have made Prato the hub of a new globalized market.
I don't think it was accidental that those two paragraphs butt up against one another. They're intimately tied. Paying people miserable wages results in economic success. That's the social blight and problem that capitalism brings. And Italy has done a lot to create a society that is geared toward a good quality of life. And I do see that the Chinese are hijacking the Italian reputation. But I say: that's what you get with capitalism. It is kill or be killed. It is an awful model. The quesion is not how to get rid of the Chinese: the question is how to rid yourself of the system that is flawed.
So, I guess I understand the xenophobia a bit. The aliens are showing the flaws in the system you've created. They take the non-stated or non-rules and exploit the model. As anyone knows, a good model, though, stands up to these exploits. Ask any computer programmer concerned with security: they test this stuff out--they make sure it works before releasing it into the wild (the good ones do, at least). Adam Smith didn't test his model out fully. We need a new version, because the patches we make to this system aren't working.
What is the next economic model? Is it a mixed economy? Is that the best check against unintended exploits in your economic code?