Whether you believe that the obligation of businesses in the United States to pay a portion of healthcare benefits affects comparative advantage. Can they compete with countries who offer national healthcare? Are there other policies that could be enacted to improve the comparative advantage of US car manufacturers?

The status quote in the USA requires that health care costs do not go away. It is a necessary evil and part of the social services that makes American great. They must be protected. Our form of government does not promote providing free health care, so this will remain a dilemma for the big three auto makers. This is seen at the highest political levels today, even the president of the US, Barack Obama admitted in January 2010, ” that failure to change the system has brought it to a breaking point.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/09/20099922826654814.html

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2008/11/20081111182026615687.html

Notwithstanding, in terms of a fiscal policy that would be impact healthcare benefits affecting comparative advantage for the big 3.  I believe the burden on these firms is first of all the unionization that is a built into the work force. The union contracts are the biggest problems they faced. More importantly, I could not find a single American car that is sold world wide and made breaking record. Toyota for example according to http://whoartnow.hubpages.com/hub/Top-50-Best-Selling-Cars-Of-All-Time is noted as the “Over the last 45 years Japanese car maker Toyota have manufactured a record 32 Million Cars!  Cheap to buy and cheap to run worked well for Toyota over the last 45 years, and even with all the problems with the car industry at the moment, don't expect to hear of this little record breakers reign coming to an end anytime soon.” I  Could not find anything compared to this auto maker where the big three broke a similar record .

The unfortunate thing is the other auto makers are not compelled to deal with this in their overall overhead since they manufacture majority of their vehicles outside of the usa  .

I would propose more aggressive programs for younger college workers, Offer early retirement packages to older retirees to take them out of the system. Slowly transition their assembly line where the least cost of most companies occurs.  Research into options of opening factories in foreign nations to reduce costs. Keep patient design offices in the USA for strategic, Outsource developing parts and assembly them in the USA to reduce the health care cost. In early Dec 2009,  GM eye India's auto market US and Chinese car makers hope to gain access to one of the fastest-growing markets. english.aljazeera.net/business/2009/12/2009124123455292515.html

More importantly, invest heavily into R&D take advantage of opportunity make more fuel efficient cars.

This was noticed a while back. This was noticed June 10, 2009 when “General Motors took a big step toward its reinvention as the "New G.M." today when it opened what it calls the largest automotive battery laboratory in the United States, a move the struggling company believes will hasten the development of electric vehicles” phttp://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/biztech/06/10/wired.gm.battery.lab/index.html

Notwithstanding, it will take, years  before the big 3 automakers in the US can attain a comparative advantage given the current state of world economy and the fact that they are behind plus the added burden of health care cost for even retired workers.

How Open to Openess are you?

My position on trade openness is a little complicated. While there are many benefits for
poorer nations, It seems like lesser and lesser  developed countries
benefit  properly from this opportunity. Most of this is owing to less infrastructural development.
The underdeveloped countries get the shorter side of the stick while rich nations get only
richer. Take for example.. In a recent statement made by President Barack Obama about 21.30 mins
into his American Jobs Act speech http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5f-FwN2ZJs&feature=player_embedded
, he said, " this will clear the way for trade agreements for American
companies to sell their products in other countries in panama, columbia, south korea
while also helping the workers  whose jobs have been affected by global competition.
This sounds so noble and promising from a domestic policy angle. Yet, countries like
columbia and panama are under developed countries whose citizens benefit we do not
take into account in making this opportunity seem glamourous. There is no way to be sure
these agreements will also benefit that people of that country fairly.


While my position may seem a little bias and with limited facts, take for example, Liberia in West Africa
for example, very few countries in the world would be considering that nation for trade agree
ments other than Rubber, iron ore or an opportunity to use its flag as a Maritime stamp
since registration requirements are not as ridgit. Maritime revenue makes up..
http://www.liberianforum.com/Articles/Brokering-Liberia-Maritime-Domestic-Resources.html
http://www.africaneconomicoutlook.org/en/countries/west-africa/liberia/
 The bottom line is the citizens in the country
do not benefit particularily well as it would be with a developed nation since all the laws that
should be there in the first place to support fairness do not exist.. So, the response to how opened
am i to openess i am is hopefully getting clearer. Untill there are laws that should benefit the nation benefiting from exports.
and equally the imports in trade, it seems to me trade openess is yet another opportunity to only
expand corporate interest for developed nations, with no clear account for this benefits less developed nations.Most especially the citizens .There must be better laws that will globally ensure there are benefits fro both the nation as a whole and its citizens, especially in poorer countries.

How open to openness are you?

Multiple things jumps out at me when I think of Trade openesness. For the purposes of this blog I will outline a few. 

• Trade openess is a good thing. 
• Without trade openess Globalization will never take place
• Poorer countries need trade openess for their benefit.
• Wealthy countries need not exploit less poorer nations.
• There must be a lot of social responsibility best practices when countries who know better involved with those who don't.