More Free Trade in Farming Please!
Toro @ Tue Dec 13, 2005 4:56 pm
IceOwl IceOwl:
Woo, look at that spam fly!
IceOwl's Theory of Relativity
Spam = M*C-squared.
Toro @ Tue Dec 13, 2005 5:29 pm
Scape
You seem to have a nostalgia for the past. You lament the passing of farming, yet you also decry the loss of manufacturing. Sticking to the past condemns a nation to stagnation. For example, farming has been in decline for 300 years, at least in the West. In 1900, roughly half the population and about half of the output in Canada and the US was in farming. Today, that's less than 10%. And what replaced farming? Why, it was manufacturing! As farms became more efficient, more people went to work in factories. So why would the loss of farming 100 years ago to the factories be okay while the loss of farming today be bad as we continue to move to a post-industrial economy? Which is it? You cannot have it both ways. You cannot lament the loss of farming over time AND manufacturing since it was manufacturing that replaced farming!
Second, in farming, the problem is that there isn't enough free trade! The bizarre and byzantine rules of protection and subsidies, which are designed to protect small, inefficient farmers, are causing enormous dislocations and distortions in the global market, AND in particular, to the poorest countries in the world who have a competitive advantage in agriculture. If you truly believe you want to help the poorest of the poor in the world, you would campaign to drop the subsidies and protection which so badly hurt the third world farmers.
Finally, as for your comment about free trade not working, well, there are about 150 papers in economics arguing otherwise. I have links to several and will post them if you wish.
Here's a great quote from Alex Singleton
$1:
The fact that economists overwhelmingly support free trade does not seem to stop the World Development Movement from making the truly remarkable argument that free trade is “discredited”:
Members of the public who support the Trade Justice Movement must find it difficult tounderstand how something that is so discredited can be so widely accepted in Whitehall and Westminster. Yet the truth is that free trade is only “discredited” among ideological campaigners and those who listen to them. Out in the global economy, free trade is the only trade policy that works.
$1:
On international trade they [the Conservatives] remain wedded to a failed and discredited free trade agenda for Africa. Unfortunately this too they share with the Government. Overall there is very little to set the Tories and Labour apart on these key issues.
Members of the public who support the Trade Justice Movement must find it difficult tounderstand how something that is so discredited can be so widely accepted in Whitehall and Westminster. Yet the truth is that free trade is only “discredited” among ideological campaigners and those who listen to them. Out in the global economy, free trade is the only trade policy that works.
Well said, Mr. Singleton.
Toro @ Tue Dec 13, 2005 5:32 pm
IceOwl IceOwl:
Actually, it's even simpler than that:
IF USER.TORO=POSTING
THEN USER.TORO=SPAMMING
Until you start posting some dissertation of your own with your postings, instead of just verbatim copy and paste with little comment of your own, that is.
IF USER.TORO=POSTING
THEN USER.TORO=SPAMMING
Until you start posting some dissertation of your own with your postings, instead of just verbatim copy and paste with little comment of your own, that is.
Let me get this straight. I post sources from experts, some who are world-renowned, and their studies that often take years to complete, and that's spamming?
When you go to the doctor's office, do you ignore the doctor's advice and instead ask the receptionist what she thinks?
Toro @ Tue Dec 13, 2005 6:05 pm
IceOwl IceOwl:
Yes, it is. Spin it any way you like, it's nothing more than verbatim copy and pasting of other people's ideas, which is plagiarism. With the amount you do it, it's little more than spam.
Hey, I can play that game to.
You, IceOwl, are attempting to engage in CENSORSHIP! By attempting to smear ideas that you disagree with as spam, you attempting to limit debate and knowledge being disseminated, which is censorship! And since you do it so much, one must conclude that are a censor!
I'd also suggest you go back to school and take more than just math as you seem to know little about basic research, or what plaigerism is. Plaigerism is stealing other people's ideas and passing them as your own. Posting an article and linking it credits the source is the opposite of plaigerism.
Besides, I find it amusing that you hold out to be a source on what is credible and what is not since you've contributed little in any of the threads I have been on, except for hectoring. Now, that's understandable, as you appear to have very little knowledge of the subjects at hand, which, of course, makes it more amusing.
IceOwl IceOwl:
When I go to my doctor, he tells me what he thinks, he doesn't shove his favourite magazine in my face and tell me to read it and agree with it. If you were my doctor, you would quickly find yourself with one less patient.
Professor: "Okay class. Today is your first day. Here is your reading list. You are required to read these 20 papers and these 3 textbooks."
IceOwl: "What! I didn't expect spam when I came to University! Don't shove your favourite papers and textbooks in my face! I want your opinion! Otherise, its just spam!"
Ignorance is comforting, isn't it?
Toro @ Tue Dec 13, 2005 6:34 pm
Avro Avro:
Toro Toro:
dgthe3 dgthe3:
I agree that buying food from farmers is a good thing. The problem occurs when that food becomes too cheap. Many people in my family are farmers and they curse when they get a bumper crop. Why? because it makes their crop worth less and they will not be able to sell all of it. Cheap food hurts farmers and bennifits consumers. In this case, there is going to be the same amount of food grown initially, but many farmers will not be able to make a living off of growing it. That means there will be fewer farmers and less food. That is very bad for developing nations that rely on agriculture for the majority of their income. While it is good for the US and Canada because we get cheap rice, peanuts, and bananas out of it
This is incorrect.
One of the few true competitive advantages the poorest countries in the world enjoy is in agriculture. But they face high tariffs and must contend with subsidies which artificially depress their crops. By removing the tariffs and subsidies, the price will rise for those farmers on the global market and so will demand. And thus there will be more wealth flowing into the poorest countries in the world. Similarly, in the rich countries, food prices will fall. In aggregate, the rich and the poor win. That's the whole point of the study. However, the rich country farmers lose, which is why there is such hostility towards it from a narrow base of the population.
In other words dgthe3, Toro couldn't care less what happens to your families farm.
Again the irritating human factor gets in the way again. Who knew numbers needed to make a living and eat, hard to know when you live in a bubble.
I have to post this to answer Avro's follow-on. Avro is making several assumptions that are incorrect.
The first is that my family farmed. The funds that my family used to buy a farm where borrowed at interest rates of around 20% in the early 80s. I know how hard it is to make a living in farming, and that's not the half of it. Avro has absolutely zero knowledge to make any judgement about what I care or do not care about.
Second, what dgthe3 argued is factually incorrect. Farmers have been leaving the land for decades, yet the volume of food grown in Canada has risen. If farmers cannot make a living off the land, they should sell their land and do something else. Why perpetuate a system that keeps people teetering on the brink? Its also important to know that the policies used and needed to continue supporting the farm that Avro wishes to continue keep food prices high, which hurts the poor the most.
Avro Avro:
Toro Toro:
Avro Avro:
Again the irritating human factor gets in the way again. Who knew numbers needed to make a living and eat, hard to know when you live in a bubble.
Such silliness. They can't argue the numbers so they resort to vague, odd arguments about "the human factor" as if there is a complete disconnect between the incomes people make and how they are able to live. The numbers represent what is actually happening to human beings. They represent what people are doing to make a living and, yes, eating. What do you think they're measuring, the standards of living for trees?
No, what is silly is how easy you dismiss his families farm and your "to bad so sad attitude". I agree largely with Bort here simply because it has some degree of affection for our farmers.
You don't concern yourself with people, only money. That is the nature of what you do and why I have zero respect for it......sorry.
Finally, Avro would be embarrassed by the last statement if he wasn't flying on assumption.
Blue_Nose @ Tue Dec 13, 2005 6:54 pm
$1:
Plagiarism:
To use someone else's exact words without quotation marks and appropriate credit, or to use the unique idea of someone else without acknowledgement, is known as plagiarism. In publishing, plagiarism is illegal; in other circumstances it is, at the least, unethical.
To use someone else's exact words without quotation marks and appropriate credit, or to use the unique idea of someone else without acknowledgement, is known as plagiarism. In publishing, plagiarism is illegal; in other circumstances it is, at the least, unethical.
Source: The Handbook of Technical Writing, 5th Edition, by Charles T Brusaw.
Blue_Nose @ Tue Dec 13, 2005 6:58 pm
IceOwl IceOwl:
You see, the difference between assigned reading material and writing dissertation is that dissertation has to be in your own words as much as possible.
This isn't your or Toro's high school english class paper. It's an exchange of ideas, and Toro is being as accountable as he possibly can. If he "made up his own words" you'd just ask for proof, after which he'd direct you to the sources. You'll also notice that he's quite capable of defending the articles he posts, should you have ever bothered to question them directly.
Blue_Nose @ Tue Dec 13, 2005 7:18 pm
So what? You can't argue against the concepts if they're in his words or someone else's... why does it matter who wrote them?