Question
Reading this article about the sinking dollar not affecting the trade deficit, a question popped into my mind.
If the goal is, in fact, to reduce the trade deficit, wouldn't the anti-terror recommendation to screen every cargo container help accomplish that goal?
I recognize that's not the best way to do it, but wouldn't it act as a de facto tariff while, you know, making us safer?
If the goal is, in fact, to reduce the trade deficit, wouldn't the anti-terror recommendation to screen every cargo container help accomplish that goal?
I recognize that's not the best way to do it, but wouldn't it act as a de facto tariff while, you know, making us safer?
posted by mikevotes at
7:05 AM
3 Comments:
It would, but it would be such a drag on not only the U.S. economy, but the world economy, that no politician will go for it.
If it slows the inputs, it will drive up prices (inflation) it will slow payments, businesses will not be able to pay their loans... it goes on and on. The economic effects would be catastrophic, even if the mechanism for such an endeavor existed (which of course it doesn't).
Still, they should be working on a way to screen more, and do it efficiently, which of course, they are not.
By
Praguetwin, at 5:32 PM
I've always been a believer that security is a myth anyhow. Living down here in Texas where truckloads of drugs come across the border and hundreds of thousands of people, I'm always struck by the impossibility of actually stopping anything.
So, scanning containers would be hugely expensive and not particularly effective.
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 9:08 PM
I tend to agree with you. I work in an export company and when we load 25 pallets of goods, all covered in plastic wrap, It occurs to me how easy it would be to hide something inside a box, inside a master carton, deep inside the container.
There is really only so much that can be done. Still, you gotta make it a little bit harder.
Scooping water out of the sea with a strainer?
By
Praguetwin, at 3:39 AM
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