Rejoinder

Abstract

I welcome any dialogue on the present subject because it clarifies and makes us reflect on such a significant issue of our times. Especially I would like to stress the subject of the appendix on destructive trade. We live in a world impregnated with the notion of free trade optimality, but in many contexts the notion is incorrect, and such mistakes can be serious for the advanced economies including the United States. For the theoretical mind of economists, let me stress that the theory of optimal comparative advantage includes the conditions of full employment and factor price equalization [or near-equalization], but with wage differentials of the order of one thousand percent the optimality is most unlikely. The unemployment and the financial crisis of the great recession are the most dramatic and convincing verification – as well as substantiation of my arguments concerning global ecology.

Citation

Vanek, J. (2011), "Rejoinder", DeVaro, J. (Ed.) Advances in the Economic Analysis of Participatory and Labor-Managed Firms (Advances in the Economic Analysis of Participatory & Labor-Managed Firms, Vol. 12), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, p. 307. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0885-3339(2011)0000012017