This video is too superficial and lacks historical perspective and cultural

context.

Back in the 1970s, the American business and academic press was fillled with
articles about how the American workers were overpaid, and what could be done about
it. In 1974, the Trilateral Commission (ever heard of them?) publilshed a book -
still available for free from their website - called The Crisis of Democracy,
discussing the end of the 20th century, when the economy was in the pits, and how
the ruling elite could figure out how to disengage the public from political
discussion and involvement. They were planning for the end of well-paid middle
class back then.

Also in 1974, the Lima Accords were signed, also known as the New Economic
Democracy. This was a precursor to the World Trade Organization, and it called for
US manufacturing to be moved overseas, in the name of economic democracy. I
attended a weekend workshop, and at the end, I asked a question about how we would
know that the new money flowing into these developing countries would really help
the people, and not just go into the unnumbered bank accounts of local dictators.
The presenters got very huffy and said, "How DARE you question what a sovereign
country does with its money!!".

That was pretty much what I expected, since this was the time that Phillip Agee,
Ramparts magazine, Nation magazine, and other alternative press was coming out with
the stories of the CIA and American military, working on behalf of large American
corporations, were overthrowing popularly elected governments and replacing them
with military dictatorships that would make sure none of the manufacturing
resources would be nationalized, and none of the workers would be allowed to form
independent unions to organize for decent wages or working conditions. So I was
very skeptical about the "Democracy" part of the New Economic Democracy.

I took night-school business classes in the 1980s, during the Reagan

administration. In one class, we did formal presentations about our jobs. One of
my classmates worked at the Dept of Commerce, helping American businesses move
their factories overseas. In the Q and A section of his talk, we expressed
consternation and outrage that American tax money was being used to send jobs
overseas. He reassured us that the tarriffs on the goods coming in would more than
off-set the loss of job income. It didn't make sense, but we were students, and
didn't really have the research or information to challenge that assertion.

During this time, of course (the 80s) the US Trade delegation was negotiating the
Uraguay round of the WTO talks so that just about the time these factories would
come on line and start bringing goods into the US, the WTO "free trade" agreements
would remove those tarriffs!