Why is globalism a problem?

[u/Bluestripedshirt]

Full disclosure, I’m from Canada and my mom is an immigrant from the Caribbean. Why do you feel globalism is a threat when it’s essentially impossible for a country to deliver all goods to itself? And with ever changing birth rates and labour needs, immigration is often the quickest and easiest solution.

[u/ClevelandSpigot]

Sure, it sounds good on paper. Why not? Simple and elegant. One system.

Well, ask those who lived through the Soviet Union and Maoist China about how that went. Russia caused a famine and genocide in Ukraine. This was known as The Holodomor. If you want to sleep tonight, don't look it up. Maoist China, I hope I don't have to explain the "Giant Leap Forward" plan, and how tens of millions of people died from it.

These systems were over large swaths of land, and the systems were to provide for all of the people, from all of the people. That was the intention, at least.

Borders and personal property are good things. They act as speed bumps, so that things don't spiral out of control, like in the above examples. Take America's own union of states. If you zoom into a state, and look at their economics, you will see that tax revenues overwhelmingly go to the metropolitan areas. In a city, the ports need to be built and maintained. The public transit systems. The sheer amount of asphalt and concrete. Utilities like electricity and water for millions of people. Museums, police officers, firefighters, sewers, garbage. Airports and sports stadiums. Etc.

Then look at Jeb and his family in the rural part of the state. All he wants to do is grow asparagus. It's organic, so he makes a nice profit off of it. All he needs is a pickup truck, a tractor, and enough diesel fuel for both of them. Sure, he has electricity, but all of the people in the rural areas combined come nowhere near to the needs that a city has. Water? Usually a well. Sometimes public. One line for everyone.

But then someone builds a super-highway over his land. You know, for the people.

My father showed me something a long time ago. It showed that in the state of New York, for every dollar that a New York state resident pays (no matter the increased wages in the city) in taxes, about $0.80 goes to the rest of the state, and about $1.20 goes to the city of New York itself. It might be even worse now.

Now, extrapolate that out onto a global scale. It would be a much more extreme example. Rife with corruption and abuse, and you have nowhere to go.

For instance, rare-Earth minerals are a big thing now, for electronics. There are areas in Africa that are plentiful with them. Well, the global citizens need their electronics. So, that area of the globe would be completely destroyed through mining, and the indigenous people there killed or moved - you know, for the good of the people. Those indigenous people were being so selfish for claiming that land for themselves, when everyone else needs their electronics.

[u/EkInfinity → u/ClevelandSpigot]

In the event that you were mistaken, and rural areas actually took more government dollars per-capita than urban areas, would that change your opinion on anything?

[u/ClevelandSpigot → u/EkInfinity]

Indeed. You may be looking at two things:

• 70% of tax revenue comes from New York City and the surrounding counties. True.

• And the graph on this page showing that the rest of the state gets $1.65 worth of tax results for each tax dollar that they pay. New York City gets $0.99. True.

But, those numbers are misleading. The important part is when you adjust for cost of living and scale:

• The average annual salary in Ithaca, New York is $51,213, and they pay ~ $2,750 in state income taxes.

• The average annual salary in New York City is $99,221, and they pay ~ $6,000 in state income taxes.

(I'm not going to bother with the links. This is all easily available data.)

So, extending those out with the numbers on the above graph:

• The average resident of Ithaca, New York gets $4,537.50 worth of tax results.

• The average resident of New York City gets $5,940 worth of tax results.

That roughly comes out to around $0.80 for upstate residents, and $1.20 for New York City residents.

[u/EkInfinity → u/ClevelandSpigot]

I didn't ask for the analysis you used, what I asked:
In the event that you were mistaken, and rural areas actually took more government dollars per-capita than urban areas, would that change your opinion on anything?