The students returning this fall to Hollywood High School in Los
Angeles probably know more about such Tinseltown landmarks at the
Walk of Fame than about the Doha Round of trade talks that
collapsed for the umpteenth time last week. Nor are they likely to
know about the arguments being made by the AFL-CIO, Ralph Nader’s
Public Citizen, and other groups opposed to free trade, for which
the stalled negotiations were the sweetest music.
But the school’s academic woes offer insight into why many
Americans aren’t fully reaping the benefits of lowered trade
barriers and the integration of the nation’s economy with the rest
of the world. The lack of high-quality education provided in the
nation’s public education system makes it difficult for young men
and women to get the kind of high-paying white- and blue-collar
jobs that are growing thanks to globalization.
One in every three freshmen who entered Hollywood High in 2003
officially dropped out before graduation, according to a report by
the California Department of Education. Although the school records
a graduation rate of 62 percent for its Class of 2007, this doesn’t
include the 600 or so students who officially “transferred” to
other high schools, many of them heading to so-called alternative
high schools from which few of them will actually graduate.
Even those who graduate often do so without honing the math and
reading skills needed to rise to the challenges of the working
world. Just 63 percent of the Class of 2007 passed the English and
reading portion of the state’s high school exit exam as 10th
graders. Only 57 percent of them passed the math portion of the
exam.
Many of these students will struggle to enter and then graduate
from college or get into programs for high-skilled industrial
positions such as machine tool manufacturing, one of the sectors
benefiting from globalization. And ultimately, they will be left
behind by a booming world economy.
THIS REALITY WON’T BE mentioned by anti-trade activists. From where
they sit, the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement
between the United States, Canada and Mexico in 1993 is the cause
of Americans’ economic woes.
Activists believe that the passage of NAFTA, along with the
admission of China into the World Trade Organization, simply
accelerates the decline of traditional manufacturing job, fuels the
outsourcing of high-paying jobs to lower-wage Third World locales,
and fuels the nation’s tragic trade deficit. Low-cost underwear
from Mexico and the Philippines replaces higher-cost domestic
offerings. Poor and middle class Americans lose job security and
remain stuck in low-wage jobs, perhaps permanently.
Seven years of economic troubles in Rust Belt states —
including Michigan, where median family incomes have risen just 7.6
percent between 2001 and 2006 (versus the 15 percent average growth
nationwide) — along with anecdotes about jobs lost due to
outsourcing and the nation’s current economic doldrums, have helped
anti-trade activists gain traction with the many Americans.
Fifty-six percent of Americans polled by Rasmussen Reports in
June supported calls to renegotiate NAFTA. Anti-trade activists
have also gained a supporter in Barack Obama, the Democratic
nominee for president, who, as senator, has voted against such
trade pacts as the Dominican Republic-Central American Free Trade
Agreement.
Meanwhile, they look for research to boost their position. One
such report ready-made for their efforts came last week courtesy of
the Economic Policy Institute, a labor-funded economic policy think
tank. It proclaims that some 2.3 million jobs were eliminated since
2001 due to Chinese imports.
The report’s particular methodology — that every import allowed
results in a lost American job because it contributes to the
nation’s current-accounts trade deficit — involves the kind of
faulty logic that would get an economics major tossed out of
class.
Activists won’t admit to this. Nor will they admit that most of
China’s exports are in sectors already dominated by foreign imports
such as consumer electronics. Its offerings are more likely to
compete with those of Taiwan and Japan than with American
goods.
Meanwhile they also willfully ignore other trends — from the
improvement in labor-saving technologies to the development of
flexible manufacturing practices to the long-term woes of the Big
Three automakers — that have played a bigger role in the decline
in traditional manufacturing jobs than globalization.
The reality is that America has benefited greatly from expanded
trade, especially as lower trade barriers have helped increase
exports by developing countries, fostering the kind of middle-class
populations eager for American movies and other goods. Exports to
China have increased 22 percent since 2001, according to the Cato
Institute. Stateside expansion by foreign automakers such as BMW
and Honda, along with other foreign investments, has also bolstered
the economy.
And many parts of the nation have clearly gained from the
expansion of trade. Median family income in New York’s Sixth
Congressional District — home to John F. Kennedy International
Airport, its array of trade-related businesses and immigrants
dependent on such jobs — increased by 22 percent between 2001 and
2006, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
CONTRARY TO THE ARGUMENTS of anti-trade activists, expansion of
free trade and globalization offers plenty of job
opportunities.
Nor is this growth just in trade-related sectors such as
transportation or merely for white-collar workers. The median
hourly wage for welders increased by 13 percent since 2001,
according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, thanks in part to
the improved outlook for exports among American manufacturers. And
the need for new welders will grow in the next decade as baby
boomers look to retire from the trade.
But aspiring welders need strong math skills — notably in
Trigonometry and Algebra — in order to get into apprenticeship
programs and technical schools that provide the necessary training.
This need for higher-level skills is a reality throughout the
working world. Even a prospective employee in an automotive plant
now needs at least two years of college in order to get a job.
The nation’s public schools, however, aren’t helping young
Americans meet the challenge. One out of every three freshman who
made up California’s original Class of 2007 dropped out of high
school, according to the state’s education department. Some 127,300
students, therefore, are essentially condemned to low-wage
fast-food positions, working in the informal economy or dependent
on the welfare state for their survival.
This is typical throughout the nation. A quarter of America’s
high school freshmen eventually leave school without a diploma. And
the graduation rates among racial and ethnic minorities are even
worse: Just 47 percent of young black men in the nation’s Class of
2006 graduated from high school, according to the Schott Foundation
for Public Education.
Those who do graduate aren’t getting the kind of rigorous
academic training needed to succeed. A mere 31 percent of 8th
graders scored “Proficient” or higher on the math portion of the
2007 National Assessment of Educational Progress, the nation’s
most-accurate standardized test, according to the U.S. Department
of Education. Just 29 percent of 8th grade students scored
“Proficient” or higher on the reading portion of the exam.
The woeful academic results should cause anti-trade activists to
look at overhauling public schools or even proposing alternatives
such as charter schools and voucher programs. Or for that matter,
challenge teachers unions and suburban parents — the most
obstinate opponents of school reform — to admit that today’s
schools aren’t up to the task.
That, however, would mean actually admitting that free trade
isn’t the bogeyman they want it to be.
RiShawn Biddle is co-author of a report on the role of state policymaking on
teacher quality. He wrote about Michael Bloomberg’s success as New
York City mayor last May.
