Sir James Goldsmith - 1994

[OnlyMe]

Sure that this has been posted before, time for a revisit (just seen it referenced elsewhere).

Playing out just as badly as he portrayed it would, if not worse.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5064665078176641728&ei=OTYPS9zaDIGKqAP0mYDgDQ&q=sir+james+goldsmith+charlie+rose&hl=en&client=firefox-a#

[OnlyMe]

7 mins in and he's already stated some home truths for 2009.great find thanks for reposting

It is a good one.

What is the economy for? Very pertinent question.

In modern day parlance he'd definitely be branded a globalisation denier.

[SNACR]

Shame his son is such a soppy tw@t.

[JustYield]

Not one of Charlie Rose's finest interviews - he didn't get the most out of Jimmy I thought.

I was going to post this but wondered if anyone would be interested; seeing the vitriol against his son on the other thread I suspect his ideas are unlikely to be debated. Is his The Trap available anywhere (preferably electronic format)?

Ed Conway's iPod discussion put me on to this prescient video:

iPod - who benefits?

The other links I'd be interested in are the HBR's retractions of off-shoring being the way forward. Some comment from the Economist would also be interesting - seeing how pro-globalisation they've been.

Ford knew his worker's had to be able to afford a Ford.

[OnlyMe]

Not one of Charlie Rose's finest interviews - he didn't get the most out of Jimmy I thought.

I was going to post this but wondered if anyone would be interested; seeing the vitriol against his son on the other thread I suspect his ideas are unlikely to be debated. Is his The Trap available anywhere (preferably electronic format)?

Ed Conway's iPod discussion put me on to this prescient video:

iPod - who benefits?

The other links I'd be interested in are the HBR's retractions of off-shoring being the way forward. Some comment from the Economist would also be interesting - seeing how pro-globalisation they've been.

Ford knew his worker's had to be able to afford a Ford.

That's where I got the link.

I think the iPod argument is largely spurious. The only reason why Apple has an iPpod to brand and sell under a "US" company banner is that it is relying on skills that have built up over decades. As those skills decline (via transfer abroad and mass employment of labour in the industry abroad) the next "Apple" and their products will be coming from the countries where the mass of staff and skills are based.

[JustYield]

That's where I got the link.

I think the iPod argument is largely spurious. The only reason why Apple has an iPpod to brand and sell under a "US" company banner is that it is relying on skills that have built up over decades. As those skills decline (via transfer abroad and mass employment of labour in the industry abroad) the next "Apple" and their products will be coming from the countries where the mass of staff and skills are based.

Exactly. The long game. I think superior innovation will still come from the US, but it won't benefit the domestic economy as much as it once did. Meanwhile the manufacturers will doggedly climb the value chain until they have the whole enchilada wrapped.

Here's a critique of The Trap by one Milton Friedman:

The Trap, by Sir James Goldsmith (Carroll & Graf, 207 pp., $11.95)

Mr. Friedman is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution.

A STANDARD component of my mail consists of letters from successful businessmen, mostly retired, offering a solution for some major social problem -- inflation, budget deficit, balance-of-payments deficit, Social Security, you name it. With rare exceptions, they are convinced that their success in business qualifies them to pronounce on social issues, without the need to investigate the extensive literature on the subject to which they have just turned their attention. The letters have a common quality. They are well-written, thoughtful, ingenious proposals by highly intelligent and well-meaning people, and, almost without exception, consist of reinventing a defective wheel -- offering a proposal that has a long academic pedigree, and was early on demonstrated to have serious flaws.

The Trap is an especially long and detailed letter of this genus. James Goldsmith is a highly successful Franco-English businessman who, according to the book jacket, "withdrew from business in 1990 to devote his time to the pressing issues of our society." He has since "co-founded a new political movement." In short, Ross Perot with a French accent. And as with Perot (and Pat Buchanan) "global free trade" is his b - te noire.

...

Goldsmith's attack on global free trade, however, is as extreme, uncompromis- ing, and dogmatic as any launched by Perot or Buchanan. In Goldsmith's words: "global free trade has become a sacred principle of modern economic theory, a sort of generally accepted moral dogma." It "will shatter the way in which value-added is shared between capital and labor . . . The social divisions that this will cause will be deeper than anything envisaged by Marx." And: "We have convinced ourselves that there exists only one valid economic and social model: our own. By attempting to impose it universally, we have exported to almost every corner of the world our diseases: crime, drugs, alcoholism, fam- ily breakdown, civil disorder in urban slums, accelerated abuse of the environment, and all the other problems that we experience daily." The alleged link between free trade and the export of this long list of evils is simply asserted, not documented.

Goldsmith is correct that the greater availability of low-wage labor in the less-developed world tends, if trade is free, to lower the wages of low-skilled workers in the developed countries relative to the wages of high-skilled workers. Whether it also lowers the absolute real wages of the low-skilled workers depends on 1) how much total output increases thanks to the expansion of international trade and 2) how much the newly available imports of consumer goods increase the purchasing power of wages. Historically, these two forces have been strong enough so that the expansion in international trade has tended to raise the real incomes of almost all workers.

The decline in the relative wage of low-skilled workers in the United States started several decades ago, long before the major expansion in the availability of foreign labor that so much concerns Goldsmith, Buchanan, and Perot. The expansion of foreign trade has played at most a minor role in this decline. Two other primarily domestic factors are far more important: first, the technological revolution that altered the relative economic value of dif- ferent skills; and second, the failure of our public school system, which not only has a high dropout rate but also produces graduates who cannot read, write, or figure. Breaking the monopoly of the teachers' unions and developing a private-enterprise education industry would do far more to resolve our underclass problem than any collection of trade restrictions. Indeed trade restrictions would be counterproductive.

[South Lorne]

Sure that this has been posted before, time for a revisit (just seen it referenced elsewhere).

Playing out just as badly as he portrayed it would, if not worse.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5064665078176641728&ei=OTYPS9zaDIGKqAP0mYDgDQ&q=sir+james+goldsmith+charlie+rose&hl=en&client=firefox-a#

...astute perception...forecast the GATT 1994 amendment would trigger the demise of the West ...

[Guest sillybear2]

7 mins in and he's already stated some home truths for 2009.great find thanks for reposting

Anything about his son Zac becoming a Tory non-dom tax dodger?

I highly recommend you watch Adam Curtis's documentary "The Mayfair Set", Jimmy Goldsmith is featured in that too :-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mayfair_Set

Edited December 1, 2009 by sillybear2

[wonderpup]

That was the single most impressive exposition have yet seen anywhere on these issues- the fact that it was made in 94 is incredible- he even got the derivitives thing right.

He put me in mind of another thinker, this one lived about two thousand years ago,

"The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mark 2:27).

It was so strange seeing someone utter the blasphemy that people are more important than ideology. He was right, and the all the 'free trade at any cost' morons were wrong.

[Gone baby gone]

Here's a critique of The Trap by one Milton Friedman:

Goldsmith is correct that the greater availability of low-wage labor in the less-developed world tends, if trade is free, to lower the wages of low-skilled workers in the developed countries relative to the wages of high-skilled workers. Whether it also lowers the absolute real wages of the low-skilled workers depends on 1) how much total output increases thanks to the expansion of international trade and 2) how much the newly available imports of consumer goods increase the purchasing power of wages. Historically, these two forces have been strong enough so that the expansion in international trade has tended to raise the real incomes of almost all workers.

Doesn't really pan out for houses and land though does it?

[JustYield]

Doesn't really pan out for houses and land though does it?

No, and it takes no account of people using debt to disguise the falls in their real wages, for essentials like housing and tax (which increases to pay for the social safety net required when the jobs go overseas).

In short it is a con, and it is a salient lesson to recall how Jimmy was disparaged by the mainstream media at the time. Who would parallel him now?

I'm not saying I agree with all his ideas, but his exposition of the problems of globalisation is crystal clear and has apparently been borne out: a war for talent at the top; wage competition and insecurity for the rest.

[Tiger Woods?]

Exactly. The long game. I think superior innovation will still come from the US, but it won't benefit the domestic economy as much as it once did. Meanwhile the manufacturers will doggedly climb the value chain until they have the whole enchilada wrapped.

Here's a critique of The Trap by one Milton Friedman:

That Friedman is so damning is about the best positive review one could hope for.

Edited December 1, 2009 by D'oh

[council dweller]

No, and it takes no account of people using debt to disguise the falls in their real wages, for essentials like housing and tax (which increases to pay for the social safety net required when the jobs go overseas).

Yes, this is why 15 years later the majority haven't been thrown into poverty and it's something he couldn't have predicted.

Maybe the bill will arrive shortly and everything will fall apart....surprisingly.

[Olebrum]

That Friedman is so damning is about the best positive review one could hope for.

+1

[JustYield]

Yes, this is why 15 years later the majority haven't been thrown into poverty and it's something he couldn't have predicted.

Maybe the bill will arrive shortly and everything will fall apart....surprisingly.

I wish he'd lived to see some of the fall out. He went to his grave certain he was right, no doubt. At least Greenspan was given the opportunity to become totally discombobulated in public.

[Agentimmo]

Ah, Sir Jammy Fishpaste. The great tax avoider par exellence. Had his death bed flown to Mexico so he wouldn't have to pay extra taxes in either France or the UK when he popped his clogs. A great example to us all. His son seems to be following in his murky footsteps if recent reports are to be believed.....

[Gone baby gone]

That Friedman is so damning is about the best positive review one could hope for.

You got that right!

[ZeroSumGame]

Ah, Sir Jammy Fishpaste. The great tax avoider par exellence. Had his death bed flown to Mexico so he wouldn't have to pay extra taxes in either France or the UK when he popped his clogs. A great example to us all. His son seems to be following in his murky footsteps if recent reports are to be believed.....

Ah, he of numerous Private Eye column inches. A truly decent geezer..................................not. When Richard Ingrams was asked to write an obituary of the great man he declined - as he couldn't think of a single pleasant fact to remember the guy with.

[council dweller]

....I'm sure most of you were ahead of me in seeing the link between GATT, out-sourcing, globalisation, the credit bubble, house prices, tax credits (the cover for low wages) and the current QE binge.

All this makes all talk of tax increases/spending cuts laughable. Devalue to the 1 Gbp = 1 Dong level I say.

[Agentimmo]

Ah, he of numerous Private Eye column inches. A truly decent geezer..................................not. When Richard Ingrams was asked to write an obituary of the great man he declined - as he couldn't think of a single pleasant fact to remember the guy with.

Yes, if it had been up to Sir Fishpaste then Private Eye would have been closed down 35 yrs ago and the best UK investigative journo would have been lost. Allowing the criminal fraternity and politicians even more leeway. Wiki gives a sanatised resumé of his life. No doubt Ingrams didn't contribute to that either

He might have called a few economic predictions correct in the 90s, but he was part of the problem not the solution.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_James_Goldsmith

[interestrateripoff]

On a side note nearly stood for his party in 97 election, the only thing that stopped me was he'd turned the idea from holding a referendum into being anti EU plus I was doing a degree. I can remember attending the candidates meeting in York, surrounded by businessman and I was the only one there who thought the EU was a good idea provided it was supported by the people in a referendum and stopped imposing diktats. If you can't carry the people to support it, it has no right to exist.

[Wario]

Ah, he of numerous Private Eye column inches. A truly decent geezer..................................not. When Richard Ingrams was asked to write an obituary of the great man he declined - as he couldn't think of a single pleasant fact to remember the guy with.

Amen. The great man touched and enriched many lesser lives.

A friend's pater used to recount the days (and nights) in the early '60's spent shinning up drainpipes, peering through the back windows of anonymous rented flats in the company of a photographer.

At one point he may even have engaged in hot pursuit over the rooftops of Sarf London, Batman and Penguin-stylee, as he attempted to witness and gain evidence of "Sir" Jams' and his sidekick M**** S******* (who moves yet among us, I believe, and has many acquaintances who are in the habit of wearing bizarre artificial hairpieces at work, hence the bashfulness) and their gang of back-kitchen "chemists'" counterfeiting of a particular lifesaving and pioneering drug his firm had patented, to which Jimmy and M**** had mysteriously acquired the formula. Or enough of the formulation to make the fakes quite dangerous.

All in all quite tricky to manage, what, in leather-soled oxfords and a sturdy pin-striped three-piece, without disturbing a hair of his splendid moustache. I think he left the brolly in the Rover. though.

And people think accountants lead humdrum lives!

Edited December 1, 2009 by Wario

[Agentimmo]

Great anecdote

[R K]

It is a good one.

What is the economy for? Very pertinent question.

In modern day parlance he'd definitely be branded a globalisation denier.

Thanks for posting OnlyMe.

Probably the most important and relevant video posted on here.

Globalisation is killing us all as I've said many times.

First our wages, then our pensions, next up will be the public sector wages and pensions and so on in a death spiral. We already have the arguments on here every day seeking to impoverish our neighbours and families.

Nobody is representing us, our governments now work solely and completely for the globalist agenda. Not just the pygmies like Brown, Balls, Mandelschild and the 3rd form pillocks they're surrounded by, but Cameron and Osborne too.

Globalism is a head fake.

MM Climate change is a head fake.

Global banking is a head fake. Just look at how we're paying for Goodwin's f*ckups in Dubai, not to mention his £350,000 a year pension.

I'm a denier and I'm proud of it.

I want a future for my children and their children and I couldn't care less about what happens in China or Indonesia. Let them look after themselves.

We need to reclaim our country to serve our futuresm, not to serve China's future.

[JustYield]

nonchalant midweek <bump>