Does this argument explain why I can't think of a single country that has put forth a concerted effort to discourage cross border capital flows? I don't think so. If I'm wrong please point out a case study. I think the fact that globalism ends up being a net positive for nations long-term is the reason they prefer to stick to it as a system. I'm not well-versed in economics as a whole, but it seems like PPP is one of the metrics that can somewhat approximate how well individuals in a nation are able to exercise economic power. And it looks like globalism does help increase that if the goods your country produces are uniquely positioned in some way (ie uniquely cheap, uniquely durable etc.). I remember many people predicting that the luxury-good level pricing of the iPhone meant that it would never take off in "non-developed" countries but clearly in 2021, that's far from the truth. I think what people want is access to high-quality and reliable goods/services, rather than globalism or nationalism as a system.FWIW, I like localism the most due to the psychological/cultural/scaling effects that it produces and hopefully, there's a minimally harmful way to get there without getting stuck in a nationalist rut.
rsj_hn|4 years ago
This is a complex topic in a country where many pressure groups are fighting over policies.
In terms of immediate winners and losers, on the pro-globalism side, the winners are:
* investors that benefit from the race to the bottom
* the professional and managerial classes whose salaries rise as companies become more centers of management/coordinate/design with productive labor formed elsewhere
* service workers in select urban areas dominated by business services and consulting sectors
The losers are:
* blue collar workers
* service workers in smaller urban areas and rural areas
But in terms of long term effects, the losers are the vast majority of society, because de-industrialization creates a lot of social pathologies as we became a society with a shortage of meaningful work, the decline in solidarity hurts the nation's ability to coordinate to solve problems and deliver services efficiently, and the global supply chains are fragile, with many points of failure.
But the larger point is that the proponents of globalism are those who espouse liberalism, from the university professor who believes humans are isolated machines that maximize lifetime utility to those committing street violence against "fascists" -- that is, anyone who believes in national solidarity. This array is effectively the shock troops of globalism. It is one large movement fundamentally rooted in the idea that the purpose of life is to enjoy yourself as much as possible before you shuffle off to the grave, rather than being a part of a chain of being with your ancestors and grandchildren, in which the purpose of life includes making sacrifices for your group in order to contribute to your group's overall long term success.
Thus a society gripped by liberalism is one in which everyone defects. Consumers don't buy american made goods out of a commitment to the wellbeing of their society. Companies don't hire american workers out of a commitment to their fellow countrymen's wellbeing. Taxpayers do whatever they can to offshore wealth. It's everyone for themselves, and those types of societies just don't last very long. This is why we see liberal democracies in Western Europe and North America being rapidly eclipsed and outcompeted by well organized nationalistic societies in Asia.
It is for these reasons that societies have historically put up boundaries and exacted punishment on defectors and adopted institutions to inculcate loyalty and patriotism. When those borders are knocked down and the institutions subverted, don't be surprised when you are stabbed in the back by your countryman who doesn't give a sh*t that you and he are citizens of the same country.
> And it looks like globalism does help increase that if the goods your country produces are uniquely positioned in some way
You are talking about gains from trade. The issue is not gains from trade but trade deficits -- e.g. one way trade. These large Global capital inflows are not used to finance trade, they are used to finance trade deficits.