Re: [Salon] Really not clear to me that DC can run a successful industrial policy. America’s ‘Grift Coefficient’ is clearly off the charts. Everything is looting.

I agree.  We did industrial policy very successfully until we developed an ideological allergy to it.  That didn't happen spontaneously.  It had a lot of help from corporate lobbying and propaganda.

That was then.  This is now.  The same is true, I believe, with protectionist measures.  When applied to a developing technology in an infant industry they can enable the industry to grow and --if there is domestic competition -- innovate and become more competitive.  But industries dying because they are no longer competitive or very innovative because they are operating in an oligopolistic environment do not become more vigorous if protected from foreign competition.  They can be kept alive but only at considerable public expense.  Our automobile industry is a case in point.  Loss of competitiveness, followed by protectionist quotas and tariffs, followed by bailouts.  The way to preserve a healthy domestic auto industry proved to be to encourage foreign producers to produce here.  We are attempting to replicate this approach with our moribund semiconductor industry.  I am skeptical that this will work -- for reasons you and I have discussed.  But I am quite sure that shutting Chinese EVs may allow our automakers to survive but it will not revive their competitiveness and we will simply lose access to a technology that will become everywhere else ubiquitous.

Chas

On Sat, May 11, 2024 at 12:50 AM Clyde Prestowitz <presto@econstrat.org> wrote:

It is a good point to raise, but we did win WWII and the Cold War and got to the Moon, and invented the semiconductor industry and more.

 

I think it is not that we can’t do industrial policy but rather that our business and industrial leaders have gained such enormous political influence that they distort and divert the policies we attempt.

 

I have had a lot of experience in this area in Europe, Asia, and the U.S. The Asian and European corporations do not have the control of government that U.S. corporations have. The U.S. has been a champion in industrial policy when the chips have really been down and the corporations do not control the government or have much power to intervene.

 

Best, Clyde

 

From: Salon <salon-bounces@listserve.com> On Behalf Of Chas Freeman via Salon
Sent: Friday, May 10, 2024 9:05 PM
To: salon@listserve.com
Subject: [Salon] Really not clear to me that DC can run a successful industrial policy. America’s ‘Grift Coefficient’ is clearly off the charts. Everything is looting.

 

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