Page 18 RAIN July 1979 For years we've been told that specializati-on and trad~~atherthan self-reliance is beneficial both in our personal lives and internationally. The effects of the economies we've built upon~ those principles suggests, however, that we've been hoodwinked by such claims and would be wise to reconsider both those basic principles and the economies we've built upon them. The theory of fair trade among equals is fine, but a far cry from the gunpoint barter and monopolistic practices that characterize the reality of trade between powerfully unequal partners. The comparisons of self-reliant and trade-based develop: ment on the international level are pa,rticularly dramatic. Tradebased economics has resulted principally in the further enrichment of a1ready wealthy and powerful countries, corporations, and individuals. Although there has been some statistical improvement in aggregate income in a number of countries, the distribution of wealth has worsened both within countries an_d between them. Wealth is relative. It has meaning only compared to prices and to the income/wealth/power of others. In 1900 people in poor countries had a per capita income of about one-half that of people in rich countries. By 1970, per capita income in poor countries was about 1/40 of that in rich ones.1 The increasing domination by multinational corporations of international trade and the internal economies of countries, and the consequent massive transfer of wealth to the rich is heavily documented in detailed studies such as Global Reach and more technical reports. Average profit rates of from 50 to 400 percent are commonplace, and compared to world market prices, national markets controlled by MNC's show overpricing from 30 to more than 700 percent. 2 The result · is that labor comes less and less close to obtainin~ a fair return for its contribution to production, while capital even further exceeds its fair return-labor receiving now about 33 percent / less than its fair return and capital receiving 62 percent more than its fair share. 3 This has not happened accidentally. Blatant gunpoint barter such as that initiated by Admiral Perry's "opening" of Japan, the forced introduction of opium into China by European trading countries, or the more recent Suez Canal war, has been ·replaced by less obvious, yet equally effective means of con= trol of the terms of trade by powerful countries. Again, the •details can be found in studies such as The Trojan Horse and The Imperial Brain Trust. They lay out dearly the U.S. business community's successful campaign through their Council on Foreign l{.elations, O_verseas Development Council a~d other channels to obtain U.S. foreign policy and postwar reconstruction conditions that have actively promoted their profitable overseas expansion and ever-increasing control of the economies of other countries. _ Th~ currently most successful gloved fist is the use of organizations such as the World Bank and the lnternati~nal Monetary Fund-in appearances international, but in reality controlled by the U.S. and dominated in staffing and policy by the U.S. husiness and finance community-to.control the terms and conditions of development loans as leverage to open national economies to outside exploitation. Case studies made in the Philippines, Indonesia, Indochina, Yugoslavia,. Brazil-, India and otper countries. have strongly documented a direct link between IMF development loan requirements to abolish impor_t controls, devalue currencies, -,_, to control wages while dismantling price controls, and to provide greater hospitality to foreign investment-all of which _ put a country at the mercy of the international trade economy controlled by the MNCs-and the subsequent collapse of sue-
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