Re: Jagdish Bhagwati

["Devine, James" <jdevine@xxxxxxx>]

I presume that it is Bhagwati who wrote: >An
analogy, not recommended for use by politicians, is that of triage: a
lifeboat with a hundred people on board will sink and drown the hundred;
but if 10 are thrown overboard 90 will survive.<

who is it who makes the decision about which 10 are thrown overboard? 

according to most economists, the 10 who should be thrown overboard are those that fail the market test, i.e., can't compete. But that misses the external costs & benefits. Those who pollute to keep their private costs down (or bottle up external benefits) are those that can compete better (cet. par.) The greener sectors and those that provide external benefits are more likely to lose in the market test (again, cet. par.)

Of course, the real world of competition is more than a matter of low internal costs. It also involves power.  Doctors, lawyers, in-office politicians, and tenured professors can protect themselves from competition and are much more likely to be in favor of this kind of globalization triage. Those who are actually "thrown overboard" include a lot of working class folks who don't have the ability to protect themselves against competition. This becomes more and more true (in the US, at least) as unionization fades outside the government sector. 

If they're so in favor of free markets, why don't people like Bhagwati and deLong renounce their tenure? 

Jim D. 
(tenured, by the way.)