The NYT has yet another column repeating its strongly held editorial view that the United States must subject less educated workers to international competition while leaving in place the restrictions that largely protect the country's most highly educated workers from international competition. The article includes the usual pleas for more adjustment assistance for those who lose their jobs, something we can all heartily endorse for doctors, lawyers, and economists, if we ever subject them to the same sort of international competition now faced by autoworkers and custodians. If the NYT ever let a real free trader write a column, they would probably also report on the enormous costs imposed on both the economies of the United States and developing countries through copyright protection and patent protection on prescription drugs. The latter raises drug prices in the United States by close to $200 billion a year (@ $670 per person) over their competitive market price. Free traders would be concerned about such costs. This sum is one or two orders of magnitude greater than the amount of money at stake in trade agreements like CAFTA.
--Dean Baker