Re:Japan auto companies triple Mexican pay rather than move ...
by valuearb on Wednesday July 01, 2020 @09:22PM
(#23708945)
The more you are forced to pay workers, the more attractive robots become.
The jaw of comparative advantage tells us that unrestrained trade benefits both parties. It means we get to deploy our workforce into higher value and higher paying jobs, while they get to increase their standard of living as well.
There is some broken thinking that high wages will increase consumer cost but replacing humans with cheaper robots won't, cherry-picking armchair cause-and-effect thinking to fit a "this is bad" narrative.
Reducing trade frictions forces economic equality, especially when that reduction is tied towards some equality metric, like wages.
Products being cheap because of economic disparity in trading partners isn't something to celebrate or bemoan the loss of. What is good for our neighbors is good for us. So many people are arguing from both sides at the same time.