I don’t mean my comment as a blanket condemnation of Asian companies, especially the Japanese firms that have located factories here. I mean to refer only to those that are based solely on the bottom line provided by cheap labor. Most of them are in fact subcontractors manufacturing things for companies that are only American or European in terms of their office staff and marketing people being in those locations. They are the kind of companies that are closing their doors in China because the relatively small amount that operating costs have gone up there recently make them unhappy.

I think the feds would have to underwrite not only the actual costs of re-training but pay for the costs of staffing the program as well. States that get slammed like Michigan, Ohio and the Carolinas don’t even have the resources to cover that. Trying to bring smaller government bodies into it would only add another layer of management and potential for confusion. It must be remembered that helping with the costs of re-training isn’t enough. Living expenses don’t just magically disappear while someone is training for a new career. I agree with you about relocation help. It’s also likely to be necessary. Of course I’d also like to see some “inshoring”. Consider those companies that are located in places with outrageously high costs like New York, Silicon Valley or Los Angeles that locate operations in India. Some kind of encouragement to relocate within the U.S. to areas with lower living expenses, real estate costs, native English speakers and a nearby time zone would be a good thing. In my job I’ve had to deal with Dell tech support as well as AT&T/Yahoo. Sometimes it’s good but most of the time their Tier One support just doesn’t cut it in both technical and English skills.

Asian manufacturers have also located plants in the US — Toyota opened a huge plant in Texas just last year. And those jobs have good benefits. The plant isn’t directly related to NAFTA but San Antonio won the plant in part because it’s now on a major transport route thanks to NAFTA. In fact, Texas has seen a lot of second-wave benefits with blue collar jobs arriving first and then the white collar jobs following.

This may surprise you, but I completely agree with you that those who’ve lost their jobs thanks to free trade should not be left to suffer. I very much support subsidized retraining programs but I do question whether this is something the federal government should handle or whether it would be better on a state-by-state or even city-by-city basis (I’m not talking funding, just administration and execution). We might also need to consider relocation help because there are some areas that just aren’t coming back on line.

What I don’t like is NAFTA being used as a boogeyman — not because it’s some perfect agreement but because one way or another, we’re going global. Trade agreements help manage that transition and while jobs are undeniably lost, the hope is that it’s better to transition slowly and constructively rather than holding on to protectionism until the whole thing collapses. “Fixing” NAFTA is not going to stop globalization or bring back the jobs. I’d prefer a more proactive than reactive response to the problems.

But it really doesn’t matter what the cause is, there are enough people with enough influence to make certain that nothing is done to help the people hurt by the combination of extremely cheap labor abroad and technology that can automate a huge variety of jobs or reduce the number of people necessary to achieve the same level of productivity. It’s not that they really think of it as hurting anyone, they are just ideologically certain that leaving things alone is the best thing to do. Let the markets work their magic. If those people are worthy they will work hard, go into debt for their re-training and if they won the crap shoot by choosing the right thing to study so that there is still a market for them they will find a job that hopefully isn’t too much of a reduction of income from where they were at. And that’s the way it should be because the government shouldn’t do anything that might interfere with the wisdom of the markets.

BTW, if NAFTA is producing jobs in southern Texas what do they pay? Are there benefits? Health insurance? All jobs are not created equal.

In 1986, the price of oil dropping from $36/bbl to $10/bbl devastated the economy of Texas. All the banks went bust and Houston alone lost 300,000 jobs in one year. A recession hit this state that makes Ohio of today look like it’s booming.

For the Wall Street Journal to point to the economy today in Texas and give all the credit to NAFTA is as disingenous as it gets.