Lorena Gonzalez encourages San Diegans to become "economic patriots" and redirect their spending towards domestic products only. She demonizes the financial sector yet fails to see the problem:
The last year has proved to us that the revered financial sector and our undying allegiance to Wall Street have failed our country
The protectionist meddling into the financial services sector has rendered Wall Street and banking a ward of the State. Winners and losers are picked by political processes rather than economic viability. Any reasonable person knows that banks aren't doing what they should be doing; lending money. Banks won't lend money as long as the economic incentive is protectionism and subsidies.
Mrs. Gonzalez' argument for protectionist purchases is a classic tu quoque fallacy. Rather than to support a failed system, we should focus first on the principle of serving customers best. Unions, or organized labor, are exactly like the cabal on Wall Street. Rather than restrict access to capital for economic gain, organized labor restricts access to employment for political gain. Both systems are dysfunctional and symptomatic of the disease that afflicts our economy; protectionism.
Free markets are the best way to prosperity. When bad banks are bailed out, or favorable labor contracts are granted unions, those restrictions of capital and labor distort the market and lead to higher prices. You, as a consumer, might "feel better" by keeping your money in an American bank, or buying products made by Americans, but in reality, you are enabling a dysfunctional system (besides penalizing your family).
American labor and American capital needs to get competitive in this global economy. Fortunately, this country has a lot of both. Entrepreneurship has always been a byproduct of a free people and creates economic opportunities for all members of our society. Economic prosperity always starts with the question "Can I make it better, cheaper or faster?"
If you really want to be an "economic patriot" this Labor Day, find a way to compete with those foreign producers. "Build American" by starting a business to compete with them. Your solution will most likely include free workers rather than organized ones. Mrs Gonzalez won't like that because it erodes her political power but...
..it's the RIGHT thing to do.
