long-run expansion of global informal sector is not exactly ‘replacement’.

2. The author fails to explain why he believes Lansburg is wrong in his assumption “that there is no difference between trade within an economy and international trade”.

International terrain exhibits much greater uneveness which facilitates standard of living arbitrage by nominally national enterprises.

3. Problems in economics often arise from rapid changes. Trade and capital flows shift much faster that people retraining and changing jobs. If we want to minimise this tempory harm of job losses and other economic problems we need to work to slow these changes.

Which is part of the uneveness the process of combining accelerates and cannot be dealt with by either national or supranational institutions. The system ’slows’ itself through crisis not policies.

Enjoyed your post. Unfortunately, it is beyond the scope of what I ordinarily write about to get into the ugliness of our corporate activities abroad (and a lot of my readers would want MSM verification, which is thin to non-existent). But keep up the good work.

1. It is hard to argue that jobs lost due to structural change aren’t eventually replace. Jobs in manufacturing have dropped significantly in the last 30 years across western countries. These have been replaced.

2. The author fails to explain why he believes Lansburg is wrong in his assumption “that there is no difference between trade within an economy and international trade”. Sure different laws, monetary policy and currency make a difference. But the author’s thinking sounds mercantilist.

3. Problems in economics often arise from rapid changes. Trade and capital flows shift much faster that people retraining and changing jobs. If we want to minimise this tempory harm of job losses and other economic problems we need to work to slow these changes.

Unfortunately there seems to be little we can do the prevent the rapid collapse of credit we are now facing. But it is our own fault.

It would appear that that the trade benefits that smarmy economists tut-tut about as self evident truths only appear in the long run. The deficit with China has absolutely gone parabolic. We’ve certainly given a whole lot of free but nary a budge toward the “trade” part.