Commentator Charles Campbell's hollow arguments against free trade policies are all too common today ("Say goodbye to U.S. manufacturing jobs," June 16).
First, he incorrectly attributes the loss of jobs at Sparrows Point to free trade. In 1974 the U.S. steel industry produced 102 million metric tons of steel and employed 521,000 people. In 2013, the industry produced 79 million metric tons of steel and employed 196,000 people.
In other words, it takes 270,000 fewer people in 2013 to produce about the same amount of steel as was produced in 1974. In reality, the job losses were from gains in productivity, not free trade policies.
But let's look at Mr. Campbell's larger contention — that free trade policies are inherently bad.
In 1850, the French economist Frederic Bastiat wrote a famous paper titled "What is Seen and What is Not Seen." In it he describes a scene in which several townspeople are gathered in the square one morning lamenting a broken window that the baker's store suffered the night before.
After much pessimism one citizen says, "at least it will be work for the glazier." Then everyone disperses, feeling better about the situation.
What the citizens could see was the work created for the glazier, but what they could not see was the loss of business for the tailor. The baker had planned to buy a new suit that morning but instead he now had to spend the money he had saved up for the suit to repair the window.
Today we see jobs lost when products are moved overseas or are provided by foreign competitors. But what we don't see is the jobs created from the increased spending power of consumers who are able to buy those products at lower prices.
I understand how the steel union workers are better off with protectionist policies, but how do the rest us benefit when tariffs on steel raise the price of a new car by, say, $5,000?
Steve Williams, Towson