Harry Browne on China

Low wages abroad are no reason to restrict imports

Are low wages and poor working conditions in foreign countries a reason to restrict imports? How can Americans compete with countries whose workers make only $1 a day?

In fact, American workers compete quite well with low-wage countries because Americans are far more productive. Our two largest trade deficits are with China and Japan. Chinese wages are much lower than American wages, while Japanese wages are higher than American wages. So which way does it work? Actually, it doesn’t work either way. Extremely low wages reflect primitive production methods. American workers earn so much more than workers in, say, Malaysia because they are more skilled and have better machines and tools to work with. With these tools, each American worker produces far more each day than his Malaysian counterpart.

Source: The Great Libertarian Offer, p.140 Sep 9, 2000

No China in WTO, because no need for WTO

Q: Would Browne, if elected President, sign into law or veto a bill which allowed China to enter the WTO?

A: Browne would veto it, not because he doesn’t believe China should be in the WTO, but because he believes there is no need for a WTO. Browne believes in free and open trade with all countries, including China.

Source: Phone interview with Jim Babka, Browne’s Press Secretary Aug 9, 2000

Nuclear espionage results from over-large bureaucracy

Q: What should be done about Chinese nuclear espionage? A: The problem is a bureaucracy much too large to manage. Today we have a strong national offense (the ability to blow any country to smithereens) & a weak national defense (the inability to defend against any two-bit dictator). We should have just the opposite. When we do, we will have a much more efficient defense-with a much smaller cost & a much less complex system. Protection against espionage will be much easier to achieve. Source: (X-ref Defense) Correspondence from the candidate Jan 27, 2000

No import tariffs, regardless of human rights

Browne does not support imposing tariffs on products imported from nations that maintain trade barriers against American products, and disagrees that the US should consider the human rights record of each nation before granting most favored nation trading status. Source: Project Vote Smart, 1996, www.vote-smart.org May 1, 1996

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