Global economy

Milton Friedman was an economist who promoted the idea of free trade and his arguments made sense but they do not allow for government financing certain businesses with the expressed goal of running the competition out of business. When the Chinese government subsidized the steel industry it allowed China to sell steel on the world market at a price below the cost of production and steel companies around the globe went out of business. For almost 50 years, under the heading of globalization, the American middle income worker has been fast disappearing using a free trade policy of shipping jobs overseas. There is something that can be done about this and it was demonstrated by Trump. When Ford announced the plan to close an American auto plant and move production to Mexico, Trump told them they had the right to do that but if they did he would place an 25% import tax on any cars made in that plant that were shipped to the United States. Ford change their plans and invested $700 million dollars in the American plant and saved 700 jobs. Ford then said in a face saving statement that they made the change for other reasons. Moving production facilities overseas has increased profits for shareholders but at the expense of workers. The workers no longer have the protection that unions provided back in the 50's and the result is they have no recourse but to watch their jobs go overseas. One of the main results of globalization is the widening gap between the disappearing middle income people and the upper income group.