Free traders always talk a big game. They love to name drop Ricardo and pretend that the false syllogisms of an 18th century con artist still has relevance to economics today, but their arguments are nothing more than outdated theory that will not stand up to two centuries of evidence-based criticism anymore and they know it. Consider the following email exchange with a reader.
I was discussing free trade with a Macroeconomics Professor at George Mason University named Garett Jones. I brought up your debate with Dr. Miller and he didn’t have kind words for your work. I brought up Steve Keen and he didn’t have kind words for him either. I @ Steve Keen a request to debate this guy and I said maybe you would be willing to host it. Prof Keen said he would be willing to do that. I am sure you have Steve Keen’s email. This would be a great debate because George Mason University is one of the better libertarian economic departments in the country. We’ll see.
Sure, we can do a 500-seat Brainstorm. Let me know, I’ll host and see if the guy will show.
the professor backed out after talking you know what on twitter. He said he has too many deadlines. He spends hours on twitter so that’s a nonsense excuse. I told him it would probably only be around an hour but if he doesn’t want to back up his rhetoric then that’s fine. You and Steve would destroy this guy so it’s no wonder he didn’t want to debate. Free traders only want to show up on corporate media to shill.
This is my surprised face….
Sounds rather like the professor spent a few hours poking around here and Steve Keen’s site and belatedly realized that he was volunteering for the sort of treatment one normally only experiences in prison washrooms when the guards aren’t around.
The truth is that the free traders have NO DEFENSE WHATSOEVER against my labor mobility argument. The best they can do is offer up a lame “nations don’t matter” protest that renders their precious free trade abhorrent to 99.9 percent of the population.