The Broader Agenda

A Facebook friend wrote, we are "...so dumbed down that Republicans don't even understand market economics… or even freedom… anymore." I'm not sure that is true.

I’m hearing a lot of this:

"America is not competitive. We don’t need tariffs; we need lower costs and more productive workers."

1. If America isn’t competitive, why do countries tariff U.S. products? Tariffs suggest American goods are higher quality, cheaper, or more available - making them more competitive than domestic alternatives. The EU slaps a 25% duty on U.S. cars, and China hits American agriculture with 15-25% tariffs, yet their economies aren’t collapsing. Targeted tariffs protect specific sectors without tanking diversified economies, unlike the broad Smoot-Hawley tariffs of 1930 that fueled the Great Depression.

2. America ranks in the top 10 globally for productivity - often higher, depending on metrics. Countries ahead, like Luxembourg or Qatar, are tiny, tax havens, or oil-rich outliers. For a large nation, the U.S. leads. Decades of productivity gains have offset higher production costs here. Lowering costs is key, but raw materials are global commodities with stable prices. That leaves labor and overhead - taxes, regulations, and social programs. We’re already the most productive big country, yet cutting overhead faces fierce resistance due to waste, fraud, and political gridlock.

3. “Cutting costs” in an age when raw materials have become a global commodity and productivity is at record levels means cutting overhead - which means we must look into cutting taxes, cutting debt and interest on that debt, and even social and welfare programs - while also eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse. We have people in the streets right now protesting the efforts of Trump, Musk and DOGE to stop waste, fraud and abuse. They literally want it to continue, not because they don’t know it is bad, but because the hate the people who are doing it. This is going to be a tough row to hoe.

I believe tariffs tie into a broader Trump agenda, echoing a meme we’ve all seen: in the 1950s and ‘60s, a single earner could support a house, car, and family, with mom at home if she chose. Now, two incomes barely scrape by. Is it because we crave more stuff? Globalization has made “stuff” cheaper than ever, so it’s both saint and sinner. Combined with tax and social policies, it’s a demon.

Is there a link between globalization, lost industrial jobs, and two-income families? No single study proves it, but threads emerge. Globalization—think NAFTA (1993) or China’s WTO entry (2001) - shifted manufacturing overseas. The Economic Policy Institute pegs 3.2 million U.S. manufacturing jobs lost to China from 2001-2013, many well-paying and unionized, the kind that once sustained single-income homes. In the mid-20th century, single-earner families were common; by the 1970s, only 40% of families with kids had two working parents, per the Bureau of Labor Statistics. By the 2000s, it hit 60-65%. Wages stagnated for non-college grads post-1970s, despite productivity rising, as global competition eroded workers’ leverage.

The connection? Lost industrial jobs - mostly men’s - may have forced families to dual incomes to stay middle-class. A 2007 National Bureau of Economic Research study hints trade-related job losses hit lower-skilled workers hardest, often leaving them with lower-wage options, pushing a second parent to work. Sociologist Melissa Kearney’s The Two-Parent Privilege (2023) links economic insecurity among non-college men to family shifts, though she focuses on marriage, not dual employment.

But it’s not just industry loss. Women’s education and workforce entry - boosted by Title IX (1972) - were rising pre-globalization. Plus, housing, healthcare, and education costs outpaced wages, pressuring families regardless of job shifts. Wait - doesn’t globalization cut costs? Yes, for goods, but I’d argue the response to job losses - ramped-up government spending paralleling industry exodus - drove up overhead, offsetting gains.

No study draws a straight line from “globalization kills industry” to “two working parents,” but it’s plausible. Job losses amplified economic pressures, making single-income life harder. America’s competitiveness isn’t the issue - our productivity shines. Tariffs abroad prove our goods threaten others’ markets. The real fight is domestic: slashing overhead while globalization’s effects linger.

And therein lies a broader agenda.

The tariff threat is already moving investment money from stocks to bonds, especially the 10 year bonds, and driving interests rates down - without action from the Fed, government interest costs are being cut.

There are lots of moving pieces that all have to come together before this agenda can be successful - it is going to be a heavy lift and one not without pain - but as I have always been told, if you always do what you did, you will always get what you got.