Discusses the history of the Department of Commerce, who is in charge, what it does, and how it affects Americans today.

"With the introduction of significant tariffs on Chinese goods in 2018 and the resultant talk of a trade war between the United States and China, the questions of whether tariffs are an effective means of political influence, what effect they will have on the domestic and global economy, and how they will ultimately impact the future of trade have become sources of contention. This volume explores opposing perspectives on tariffs and trade wars, offering...

The incomes of most Americans today are static or declining. Tens of millions of workers are newly vulnerable to layoffs and outsourcing. Health care and retirement burdens are increasingly being shifted from employers to individuals. Two-income families find they are working longer hours for lower wages, with decreased social support. As wealth has become more concentrated, the economy has become more recklessly speculative, jeopardizing not only...

"The decline of the U.S. textile and apparel industries between the 1940s and 1970s helped lay the groundwork for the twenty-first century's potent economic populism in America. James C. Benton looks at how shortsighted trade and economic policy by labor, business, and government undermined an employment sector that once employed millions and supported countless communities. Starting in the 1930s, Benton examines how the New Deal combined promoting...

Nobel Prize winner Stiglitz joins with fellow economist Andrew Charlton to offer an argument about how globalization can actually help Third World countries. They address one of the key issues--how can the poorer countries of the world be helped to help themselves through freer, fairer trade? To answer this question, the authors put forward a radical and realistic new model for managing trading relationships between the richest and the poorest countries,...

In this crucial expansion and update of his landmark bestseller, renowned economist and Nobel Prize winner Joseph E. Stiglitz addresses globalization's new discontents in the United States and Europe. Immediately upon publication, [this book] became a touchstone in the globalization debate by demonstrating how the International Monetary Fund, other major institutions like the World Bank, and global trade agreements have often harmed the developing...