Round Trip: The USA in World Trade (1952)

[Music] ah [Music] ah [Music] what do you know my name wasn't on those titles I'm the guy that's supposed to get this discussion rolling a big subject too the USA and World Trade now where shall We Begin why steel and oil that's a pretty good start [Music] already riding a freight along with that stuff may not be the most comfortable way to see the country but we'll probably learn far more than by taking a Streamliner let's Us swing aboard too the 87 65 cars to pick up the Deport Final Destination [Music] presis that was certainly quite a trip must be that a lot of this stuff's going overseas now what about this foreign trade I've heard a lot of people asking does it do us any good or is it just charity to the rest of the world hey what are you doing here we're trying to find out about foreign trade where it's going to who's buying it what's the point of it all you've come to the right place Mis we take stuff from where they make it to where they needed 10 million tons from this yard alone everything from an orange to a tractor going to 25 different country why we export go in this country it wasn't for the railroads the F and Marine wouldn't have any cargos great thing that what I mean we get the general idea but uh we'd like to move around a bit and ask someone else about foreign trade maybe we could speak to some of the people abroad who built that stuff on the flat cards perhaps there's someone right here on this train who could help us he seems interested uh excuse me what's all that foreign stuff doing here those uh United Nations people moving in you don't approve of the United Nations sir H too many foreigners we got no business getting mixed up with them have we not just a moment sir I couldn't help overhearing your remarks that Foreigner thing now uh that bothers me back in 19 40 when we took eight bombs One Night in this airport of the plant you didn't think of us as those foreigners then you don't more I beg your pardon but uh not all of us understand French uh could you my English is Noto good but I'll try in the war many nights I help guide your bombers to find Bridges and Railroad tkes and now I we need the material to get them going again exactly the important thing is those bombs were pretty rough on Old Betsy here and we had to call in a welding expert to fix her up a bit trou she won't stay fixed what I hope is she'll hold together until that new one outside your dining car window gets here you couldn't ask the locomotive driver to uh or it up a bit could you sir why this is preposterous I never heard of such a thing Take It Easy Mac I built that new lady he's waiting for and if you know anything about machines you'd say it's a crime to expect a good man to turn out work on an old wreck like he's duck with that limey needs new equipment but fast thanks M I appreciate fine everybody being so chummy and whatnot but that blinking lthe on the siding out there ain't no gift we've got to pay for it and the only way we can get the money is to sell some of our stuff to you how are you Americans going to feel when our Goods turn up in your country uh-oh that don't sound so good to me maybe we should have kept that lathe right here in ciny I mean that guy needs a new machine all right but I don't want to see some American lose his job on account of what that lme is going to make on our machine yeah yeah but we have to import food so that means we have to sell Goods hey now wait a minute we have obligations I'm not going to be the Fall Guy on this deal just just a minute boys looks like we've got to find out where we are some of our friends abroad think we should send them all the Machinery they need but our people at home are afraid that the goods made on those machines are going to compete with our own products I think we've heard most of these arguments before it's high time we called in someone to give us the facts this is Dr Winfield reefer uh he's an economist with a lot of practical experience in foreign affairs uh thank you could help straighten us out on this doctor you're right all this did happen before unfortunately as a matter of fact it's all been well documented shall we take a look at the record here are the figures for 1920 in that year couldn't we have something a little more exciting uh this is a movie you know I certainly I have a film right here that ought to make things much clearer for 10 years after the first world war as today there was a great demand for our products all over the world this Scramble for World Markets resulted in some pretty shortsighted thinking for instance some people reasoned that all we had to do was to get our products on ships Bound for foreign ports and prosperity was guaranteed they forgot that a lot of this business was done on credit we wanted our pay and dollars and the only way the other fellow could get dollars was to sell us something or to send us gold from our point of view everything was Rosy but from the other fellow's point of view things looked entirely [Music] different because our tariff made it difficult to send us Goods other nations had to ship us gold gold what's the matter with gold why nothing so long as it keeps moving but in return for our Goods we were getting more gold than we could possibly use in fact we ended up with 2/3 of the world's monetary Supply some guys dug this out of a hole in the ground in Africa and now we're putting it back in a hole in Kentucky I don't get it that's just it nobody really got it only the countries that had gold could buy freely from us the others had to take their goods elsewhere foreign trade dver up and this accentuated the worldwide depression now look here don't blame our depression on lack of foreign trade it couldn't have been that important everybody knows that our foreign trade is always amounted to less than 10% of our total business if you ask my friend Paul Hoffman I bet you he'll back me up no JB I'm afraid you're wrong the crippling of foreign trade was not the only factor in the depression but it was an important one as for that 10% that's an overall figure in many Industries ours for example the figure has run much higher and that extra production for export is a very vital Factor it not only means more jobs in plants like ours but it also means lower costs or lower prices for the Home Market as well as the export Market well if he says it's good it must be okay hey wait a minute what about all this manufacturing Machinery isn't that setting our competitors up in business well uh we ship a lot of Machinery to South America uh let's see what people down there think about it you know this worries me pretty soon your people are going to have so many factories of their own that they won't be buying from us anymore all these ships bringing in manufacturing equipment will be making half their trips under ballast no my friend I don't see it that way you see those fellas over there they're working for 80 cents a day but the wages in our new factories are much higher don't you think our people would want more cars radios and refrigerators just as much as your sors do all right but um in the future won't you make everything you need we can never compete with your mass production industry the more industrialized we become the more our people will want to buy and be able to buy have no fear Captain I'll be wishing you and your ship many of bom vard if these people haven't got dollars to pay us with why should we send good American stuff out of the country without getting something useful in return anything useful I've been trying to explain you can't convince that guy by talking to him why don't you find out where that shipment going hurry up we're not going to be here all night you know that was the quickest trip to Cleveland I ever made uh hope you mind the intrusion but um are you expecting a shipment from Switzerland you mean it's here where when take it easy old man we only saw it on a flat car 8 100 miles away but um what's the deal uh why did you have to get it from Switzerland don't we make every kind of machine right here in Cleveland no I'm afraid not nor even in the United States not many people realize it but quite a bit of our specialized equipment is made in Europe some of our largest like that monst flar and some of our smallers now these chains you won't find maid in America ROM the ones this size come from abroad you look surprised well I'll bet you your 10-year-old son could list a lot more stuff we need than you could at his age both raw materials and finished articles invented since you and I went to school hey where you going to settle accounts with our friend in the dining car remove that coffee it's from Brazil and the gentleman doesn't approve of foreign products and that cigar sir it was made in Havana surely you aren't going to smoke that what's this a silk necktie away with it are you aware that the works in that handsome watch on your wrist came from Switzerland and your suit sir I understand your embarrassment but off with [Music] it you certainly did a job on him but you coming to him there's something that bothers me I know other folks need our stuff and I suppose we need some of theirs what I don't understand is what I'm going to do when the fellow across the border sends his stuff here cheaper than I can grow it seems to me I ought to be protected [Music] somehow but Amigo if I cannot sell my brother in your country how can I get dollars with which to buy some Machinery how about that Pedro don't get his tractor and maybe I lose my job because this guy wants [Music] protection no I sure don't want anyone to suffer but how can I compete with someone who gets only half the wages that I get is that fair there's something fishy about this low wage argument somewhere our wages here in the north are way over what you get and where would you be if we started yelling for protective tariffs against your part of the country ah still don't make sense to me I think they've got something there people do get misled by the cheap labor argument look I'll show you why [Music] hey that's pretty good just about like us guys making automobiles you know in England the same assembly line job pays about half what we get but their cars cost twice as much dog gone I still don't know where that leaves me well let's let some sunlight in in our friends problems and while we're about it let's get some fresh air for [Music] ourselves you remember those walls those tariff walls that some people both on farms and factories would like to keep along here yet the protected Industries are not the ones that contribute most to our American standard of living many of them are sick protected at the expense of our efficient Enterprises and the consumer yes it's about time you got around to me aren't the consumer consumers the ones who have to pay for all this protection perhaps you could explain that we are paying out billions of dollars extra a year for goods which could be produced more efficiently and cheaply abroad those are the things we should make up our minds to import and concentrate our own efforts on Agricultural and Industrial Products that we can turn out more efficiently than anyone else there's a whale of a lot better pay and a better chance for your kids in an industry that stands on own feet and is not propped up by tariffs and subsidies and that goes for agriculture too you mean I should grow some other crop that's right as a should help our farmer friend adjust himself to new conditions that's one thing our government can do and purposeful thinking is just as necessary on an international scale today fortunately in the United Nations we've got a fighting chance to to bring order and common sense into our trade relations with other countries here we are right on the floor of the economic and social Council let's move in closer where we can see and hear better I think the drift is roughly this we now have a permanent Forum which can thresh out the national differences which so often in the past led to trade Wars the duty of preventing the use of destructive Trade Practices and of encouraging the expansion of World Trade on you know these delegates represent more than 50 different nations we've come a pretty long way from the time when countries altered their tariffs and trade agreements without any regard whatever for the well-being of their neighbors in fact it seems to me the peace and Welfare of our world today are going to depend very largely upon the measure of their success that must be our [Music] train hey I'm about to get the signal for a clear track and there were a couple of things I wanted to say to you before I go you know we just can't dump all of our problem onto their lap and then forget about them it seems to me that if we hope to keep the wheels turning we've got to see that everybody everywhere gets a fair chance of staying business or keep a job just like we want to and this far and trade now it's like a round trip it works best when there's a full load coming and going doesn't that make [Applause] [Music] sense [Music] oh