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Culture War Roundup for the week of March 18, 2024

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The reason why is irrelevant. There could be any number of reasons, from cheaper labor to less regulations to quality differences to productivity reasons. But governments are made up of people, and people who are incentivized not to let things fail are obviously going to work in service of those claims.

The Chinese factory example is apt. If you are a western nation, can you compete with that workforce, notoriously selective regulation and an ability to simply make as much as the market can absorb? Well, sure, you could. What's stopping you, aside from, well - the people in your country? (Cf. American Factory)

The other side of the Bretton Woods financial coin making money fungible across national boundaries: if you don't have some sort of protectionism in place, your economy will see significant cash outflows to foreign countries. This is hugely beneficial to countries that are primarily export based, as the US was post-WW2... and not so much in the other direction.