>I can order a trinket from china for a few dollars including shipping. That same trinket from a different province or from the US costs more than double every time. All of that was caused by Bill Clinton signing the trade deals with China which eventually gave corporations the go ahead to use slave labor in China and not have to pay a bunch of taxes to import the goods back into the USA. This destroyed manufacturing. Also the politicians colluding with the corporations and not allowing things like fracking and oil pipelines and mining, etc... destroys the economy which makes it so resources are scarce by design. My point about unions is that they were corrupted by the same people who the unions were trying to protect against. you have to pay your dues or get beat up or killed and they would go on strike over a lot of bullshit causing more problems then they are worth. It's like having a gang of thugs saying they are here to help you. They caused the businesses to look for workers elsewhere. So people ended up with no jobs and places like Detroit which was once a thriving city full of jobs and people with money turned into a shithole. I remember my dad being forced to go on strike because of the forced labor union and then not having money to pay bills. And then the company left town and nobody had a job and the entire region went to shit.