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Suzanne Thiele,

While Donald Trump tends to make seemingly outlandish comments and his proposals generally lack backing, his economic agenda is worth noting, specifically regarding job creation and retention. When he looks at our country macro-economically, he does what I wish more economists and politicians would do. He abandons the price model of whatever is cheapest is automatically best and that everything will work itself out over time. Our leadership is running a country, not a business.

An analysis of the effect of policy decisions on people and the average citizen must be made, instead of just striving for financial optimization. Trump, a businessman himself, surprisingly does that. As a presidential candidate, he looks at the American worker. While he is nowhere near spot-on with his recommendations, at least he is moving the conversation away from an obsession with the status quo of market pandering, because considering the degree of rampant inequality in America, the highest in the world, our policies could definitely be reconsidered.

In response to the hit our manufacturing sector has taken and its subsequent toll on joblessness, Trump’s suggestions for how to bring jobs back, or keep them in America, is not as outrageous as it has been made out to be. One problem he notes is that manufacturers can get cheap labor in Mexico (for example) and then sell their product, say cars, in America so that the company makes all the money and our country loses jobs. Imposing taxes is Trumps solution, but there is resistance, because even if the company agrees to keep jobs within our borders, the consumer suffers since cars would be more expensive. Trump says that people may be able to have fewer cars over the course of their lifetimes, but that is better than more people losing their jobs. This hint toward a call to sacrifice for the good of the country has not been heard for some time.

First, what Trump suggested about imposing tariffs has and will be shut down by several economists. An associated press article quoted former Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Blinder, a Princeton economist, as reasserting the point that prices would increase (dramatically) and adding that other countries would block our goods if we block theirs, i.e. China. China already has protectionist policies in place, and although lately we export over $120 billion in goods to China annually, they sell us four times that amount (census.gov). When Trump made that point about taxing businesses that choose to manufacture outside the country, he was talking about Mexico, with whom we have a much more even trade balance, and he was calling out NAFTA specifically. Since Government incentives are the number one reason producers cite for returning or creating jobs in America (Reshorenow.org), Trump might be on to something by proposing to remove this free trade benefit of producing goods that will be sold state-side in Mexico.

Neo-classical economics teaches that it is always best for goods to be cheaper, despite jobs lost. The idea is that workers who lost their jobs, here in manufacturing, can retrain into new positions. The truth is that this is a process. The United States labor market is becoming increasingly more skewed toward employment options in either high-specialty higher education occupations, or the services sector. Middle class manufacturing jobs are becoming more and more a thing of the past.

The vast majority of jobs that are created or brought back to America, through FDI and re-shoring, are in high(er)-tech positions (Reshorenow.org). What can be done about that (by the government) is investment in infrastructure and education. We want to make this country attractive to a firm through incentives, but we also need to provide the educated workers who can fill the positions needed by those businesses who want to locate here. It is easiest and cheapest to prevent jobs lost to offshoring, Trump’s plan.

US higher education costs have been skyrocketing to the point where tuition expenses have been predicted as a bubble. Education costs are something to address for the economic transition of our job market to take place more fluidly. We need high-skilled workers, but college is becoming less and less worth the financial reward, perhaps even a bubble near its burst. Hillary Clinton has taken a stance that college should be free, but the feasibility of that is dismal considering the national debt and the possibility of that plan having a negative impact on quality of education. This is similar to the reportedly low quality of education from for-profit universities such as Trump’s… Realistically a cost-reduction proposal could be pursued. But in the short term, someone who lost their job in manufacturing will likely not go to a university, so a government sponsored retraining program would help those who lost their job during the shift.

Maybe Trump has not gotten this far—and perhaps he never will—but at least he is thinking about Americans, and recommending alternatives. To see a Republican offer taxing businesses as a solution that will benefit working class Americans is refreshing because it is something so outside of blind party-allegiant rhetoric and polarization. Hopefully we can proceed to focus on what is best for us as a whole and reach settlements that make improvements in the short term and for the future.
Suzanne Thiele is a Marine Corps veteran who served in Iraq in 2004. She has a bachelor’s degree in economics and Middle Eastern studies from Pace University in New York. Recently she graduated from the London School of Economics with a Master of Science in Anthropology and Development, where she received distinction in her economic development.