Hi Jim

I thought of another angle that's interesting and relevant to this topic and that is the one of expanding one's market. If we protect our own markets and jobs and only buy our own products then one consequence of that will be that poor countries will remain poor. They will not share in the wealth creation possibilities of global trade.

A tough guy may say "so what?". The problem however is that the industrialized west is always looking for new markets to export their products to. This has two obvious issues; if we dont buy "theirs" then they will (a) not buy ours and (b) not have the money to buy ours. Which in turn affects our economy and affects the world because poor nations have worldwide consequences. So do we want to export our stuff but not import their stuff? ... mmmm :)

PS. These posts are not directed at you per se. Its just that you took the bait - LOL!