That's Chilly.....

Steven E. Landsburg's Op-Ed in today's Times takes a slightly different approach than that of the Presidential candidates regarding job losses from free trade:

"All economists know that when American jobs are outsourced, Americans as a group are net winners. What we lose through lower wages is more than offset by what we gain through lower prices. In other words, the winners can more than afford to compensate the losers. Does that mean they ought to? Does it create a moral mandate for the taxpayer-subsidized retraining programs proposed by Mr. McCain and Mr. Romney?

Um, no. Even if you’ve just lost your job, there’s something fundamentally churlish about blaming the very phenomenon that’s elevated you above the subsistence level since the day you were born. If the world owes you compensation for enduring the downside of trade, what do you owe the world for enjoying the upside?"

It seems rather heartless; but he's not wrong in the fact that it's really impossible to mitigate all the negative effects of free trade. Would you vote for a candidate who had chutzpah to actually say it? Read the whole thing.....and wonder.