... from the 1940s through the 1990s, freer trade benefited from the almost unanimous elite consensus in its favor -- and the strong public instinct to defer to elites when unanimous.It's 2015, and the fact that the public feels economically screwed by both business and the government is something the readers of The Atlantic still need explained to them?
That deference has eroded. A recent Pew Research poll found that although 58 percent of Americans felt that free trade benefits the national economy, just 43 percent thought such deals benefited their own families finances. And pluralities of Americans believe that free trade slows economic growth, lowers wages, and leads to job losses.
... The trouble is that Americans no longer trust their leaders. If polls can be relied upon, trust in leaders and institutions has plunged to the lowest levels ever recorded, lower even than during the dismal days of the mid-1970s.
The belief that the economic system is rigged in favor of the wealthy and that ordinary people can no longer get ahead run is especially intense. Americans increasingly perceive the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer. Their view of business corporations has turned especially hostile, very nearly as hostile as their view of government.
Saturday, June 13, 2015
SLOW LEARNERS IN CORNER OFFICES
The trade deal has crashed and burned in the House, and what's pathetic to me is the thought that corporate chieftains are now up at their multimillion-dollar weekend houses staring with furrowed brows at their iPhone 6s, looking to David Frum in The Atlantic to explain to them why the natives are so restless on the subject of trade:
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