[mensetmanusman]

Globalization played a role but so did bad policy.

When the Obama administration didn’t respond to China dumping below-cost solar on the US, I know many technologists who lost their job and career in the US because they couldn’t compete with companies that didn’t have to follow environmental protection rules.

Americans are addicted to artificially low prices that put the burden of costs on future generations who have to clean up a huge mess.

[robotcapital]

The article's point isn't that globalization (or policy) didn't play a role, it's that the premise of middle class downfall is false to begin with. See the section under the header "The American middle class was never hollowed out".

[FuriouslyAdrift]

The middle class of the 1980s/1990s are the poor of today... the middle class of today are different people (and probably would have been upper class professionals in the past)

[dullcrisp]

Well we’re all different people, which is why they’re looking at median incomes. Unless the problem is that these are different people?

[FuriouslyAdrift]

Those people who used to be middle class didn't just die off. There still here, a large demographic of the United States, and still very very angry. Our current political situation should make that obvious.

[mystified5016]

You act as if it's an active, deliberate choice to only buy the cheapest possible thing.

The hollowing out of the middle class means most Americans are forcibly dependent on the cheapest possible goods because they don't have disposable income.

It's a vicious cycle and the average consumer is not at fault. Most people would like to buy domestically, but domestic goods are either simply not available or not affordable.

[seec]

I strongly disagree. I have experienced many very well-off people (middle class+) who consistently choose cheap crap because they refuse to think about their choices in any other ways than maximisation of their benefits (at a surface level).

Poor people are not necessarily the ones to make those choices. In fact, sometimes you find out that they are actually poorer than they would be if they would optimise their choices for their own financial benefits. If you look at who's buying expensive local food at your farmer's market it's unlikely to be dominated by rich people. If you go to some discount supermarket, you will most likely find a lot more well-off people, proportionally. Lidl is a supermarket chain that has terrible consequences, from treating their own employees badly to putting extreme pressure on the suppliers and its whole reason for existing is cheaper prices. Their biggest customer demographic is rich boomer.

[jordanb]

Globalization was a policy!

There was always this doublespeak that came to trade deals where they say "globalization is inevitable and uncontrollable and therefore we must make these trade deals to facilitate and guide it to be good."

Of course if it's an inevitable force of nature then it does not need to be facilitated by nor can it be controlled by trade deals. There's no enabling legislation for gravity.

[owebmaster]

> When the Obama administration didn’t respond to China dumping below-cost solar on the US

What should other countries do against VC tech dumping?

[mensetmanusman]

Whatever they want, it’s their country.

[smt88]

What exact job title was lost in the US because of Chinese solar manufacturing and mining?

By your logic, Tesla (equally dependent on Chinese pollution and mining) wouldn't employ any technologists.

[daniel_reetz]

I've purchased equipment from scrapped solar factories in the Bay Area. Tons of people lost jobs and not just technologists.

[smt88]

And I've purchased solar from people who only had jobs because of cheap Chinese panels. Someone in the US still has to market, sell, install, finance, and maintain the panels. Your anecdote isn't interesting by itself, and I was asking specifically about the silly claim made about technologists.